Licked by the Flame

by Serena Gilley

  “No, this machinery has been altered in some way. Instead of supporting the Veil, it seems to create further damage to it. All we know is it’s highly dangerous and is being sent to the wilderness around the Drangajökull glacier. It’s been shipped out of Sandstrom Industries in unusual quantities for some time now.”

  The named triggered a recollection for Raea. “Did you say Sandstrom?”

  “Yeah,” Baylor replied. “It’s owned by some guy not too far from here. Not sure what his connection with the Forbidden Realm is, though.”

  Raea’s heart thudded in her chest and she shot Kyne a quick glance. He frowned at her.

  “Sandstrom? Is this name supposed to mean anything to me?”

  “It’s a fairly large corporation,” Baylor said, not noticing Raea’s panic. “It’s owned by some genius recluse who spends most of his time out on his boat.”

  Kyne seemed to be digesting this. “Boat? Wait a minute, this isn’t the same guy who—”

  Raea interrupted him and sparkled for Baylor. “Do you know this Sandstrom person? Is that how you came by your information?”

  “No, I’ve never met him,” Baylor replied. “From what I hear though, Sandstrom’s connection to the council was established by his wife, years ago. She’s deceased now—died sometime back in a freak storm, I believe—but it seems she made some kind of deal. I don’t know details, but Sandstrom Industries went from a little start-up in the guy’s garage to a multimillion-dollar corporation practically overnight. They’ve got some pretty high-end technology there. I’m not even sure Devin Sandstrom himself knows what it is they’re making and shipping all over the world.”

  “But Devin Sandstrom is the guy with the mermaid, isn’t he?” Kyne asked, glaring at Raea.

  “Mermaid?” Baylor exclaimed. “Now there are mermaids involved?”

  Obviously they were going to have to explain this to him. Well, he already knew most of their secrets and hadn’t betrayed them. One more couldn’t possibly put them at any great risk, could it?

  “Devin Sandstrom is a man we have dealt with before,” she began. “And it isn’t all mermaids who are involved, just one.”

  “I think involved is kind of an understatement,” Kyne interjected.

  Raea ignored him and continued. “She and Devin…well, they fell in love, and it was, more or less, my fault.”

  Baylor shook his head in dismay. “How is that even possible?”

  “It’s a long story,” Kyne said quickly. “The point of it is that Raea found a way to work it out and now they can be together. Sandstrom has a nice new connection to the Forbidden Realm.”

  “I’m sure he would never do anything to cause harm to us, though,” Raea added quickly. “He’s a really nice man, for a human, I mean. No offense.”

  “He might be a nice man, but his company has been supplying equipment that is being used to destroy the Veil,” Baylor said.

  Kyne cursed under his breath. “And we helped the man possess more magic.”

  “I can’t believe he would do anything that might put Aliya in danger. He loves her,” Raea insisted. “There must be other forces involved, people or creatures we don’t know about.”

  Kyne didn’t seem convinced. “You really believe his company could manufacture this sort of machinery without Devin knowing it?”

  “Well, if he knew about it, and if he had all this magic at his disposal, why did he need a Wish Fairy to help him find his true love?” Raea defended. “His company is very large, and you know he was completely distracted. Someone else must simply be using him.”

  Baylor surprised her by agreeing. “It’s possible. You both know how things work. Your Fairy Council can make humans dance to their bidding if they choose to. I have no doubt that Sandstrom Industries has been in their pocket for years. Your man might truly be innocent.”

  “So you suggest Sandstrom Industries is being secretly operated by the Fairy Council?” Kyne asked.

  “Fairies have a knack for hiding in plain sight,” Baylor said. “They’re using Sandstrom Industries to manufacture the equipment you found in the forest. Between magic and plain old deception, they’ve secretly put together a select group of humans and fairies to oversee the project. We all just manage our own little piece of the puzzle, and I don’t even know who else is involved, beyond my immediate contacts. The trouble is, I don’t think the Fairy Council is the only group doing this. I’m worried there is another faction operating around ours.”

  “You mean there is more than one magical coalition hiding inside Sandstrom Industries?” Raea asked.

  “But how could something like that be hidden inside a human organization?” Kyne asked.

  “My guess is they’ve set up their own division within the corporation,” Baylor explained. “I believe the Fairy Council is managing the main one, yet someone else has infiltrated their organization and is siphoning some of the secret equipment, reengineering it and diverting it for their own use.”

  “Your mysterious person in Iceland,” Raea said.

  Baylor nodded. “Exactly.”

  Kyne shook his head, unconvinced. “So not only is the Fairy Council operating under Sandstrom’s nose, but some entity in Iceland is sneaking around under theirs? Do we really believe this is possible?”

  “That’s what you need to find out,” Baylor said.

  “All the while being hunted by the Fairy Council ourselves.” Kyne practically snarled the words.

  Not that Raea could blame him. She’d certainly learned more about the workings of their Fairy Council in the last few days than she’d ever known in her whole life. Only a week ago she would have defended them, praised them for representing the needs of her kind. She would have called Baylor’s claims about mysterious shipments and shadowy forces ludicrous. Today, though, she knew anything was possible.

  “You want us to go find this equipment hidden somewhere in a faraway place called Iceland,” Raea clarified.

  “Near a semi-dormant volcano wrapped by a glacier, that’s right. I really would go myself, if I thought I could get out from under the council’s thumb.”

  “Pity you can’t just ask my mother to look into this for you,” Kyne said. “Or is she, perhaps, not as eager to do your bidding as you’d like to pretend?”

  “She doesn’t do my bidding. Hell, she’s got her own tasks to be managing, plus…well, let’s just say the council keeps their eye on her, too. Why do you think she never told you when we got back together? No one can know. The council constantly reminds me that anytime I step out of line, they’ll find a way to make her life uncomfortable. As they will yours, I’m afraid.”

  “Is that the reason they dragged me into the Council Hall? You did something that upset them?”

  “Kyne, this is so much bigger than us. Of course I would never want to do anything to make life difficult for you.”

  “Yet here I am,” Kyne noted bitterly.

  “Yes, here we all are. I can’t protect you anymore, Kyne. Things have come too far. We don’t have a choice. We have to take a stand and see this to its conclusion…whatever that will be.”

  “Will our going to Iceland bring on this conclusion more quickly?” Raea asked.

  “I hope so,” Baylor replied, shaking his head and looking as if he wasn’t entirely certain he had any hope left.

  “Then we’ll go,” Raea announced, fluttering over to alight on Kyne’s arm. “Won’t we?”

  “Is there any way I can talk you out of it?” Kyne asked her.

  “Not very likely,” she replied with a smile. “But you’re welcome to try.”

  Baylor chuckled. “I’d love for you two kids to have time to come to an agreement, but that’s a luxury we don’t have. We need to know now what this other group is up to, before it’s too late. Let her go with you, Kyne. I have a feeling she’s good for you.”

  For the first time, Kyne replied to his father without a scowl or a sneer. “Yes. She is.”

  She had to struggle to hide
a satisfied grin. He was right, of course. She was good for him, but it ran both ways. They were good for each other.

  Now she was going to find out how good they were for each other on another continent. Together. Near a volcano. And a glacier. With magical equipment that had the power to drain their magic and send them into a sexual frenzy.

  If nothing else, this trip was going to prove to be interesting.

  * * *

  Baylor’s words had proven true. Ancient magic did run wild in Iceland. Kyne could feel it from here, and they were still quite a distance offshore.

  “So this is called Iceland?” Raea called to him as they zipped through wind gusts of salty spray and approached the dark, rocky land mass ahead.

  “It is,” he replied. “One of those peaks we see in the distance should be the mountain we are heading for.”

  They’d used magic to plot their course as well as to accelerate their pace, but he could tell Raea was becoming exhausted from the journey. He’d insisted they spend as much time over water as they could in order to avoid detection by any humans, but as he studied the land it was obvious there weren’t many humans around. It shouldn’t be too difficult to find a safe place to land and take stock of things.

  Raea probably wasn’t going to admit to him how tired she was, so he’d have to pretend he could use a rest. She was bravely matching his wing strokes and keeping up with him as they approached the jagged landscape of the huge, alien island. It was foolish and unnecessarily dangerous for her, but he was damn glad to have her at his side.

  He pointed to one of the jutting mountains up ahead. His magical sense of navigation told him this was their destination. She probably recognized it, too, but he gestured toward it.

  “Right there. That’s where we’re going.”

  “It’s a very big mountain,” she noted.

  “It’s a volcano,” he corrected. “Dormant, supposedly.”

  “Semi-dormant,” she corrected. “And your father said scientists are in the area, and many of those machines have been sent here to tamper with magic.”

  “Well, they haven’t tampered too much. I can feel the magic from here, can’t you?”

  “Yes, actually, I can. There is strong magic here,” Raea replied as they swooped over the waves below that crashed at the rocky shore.

  They were both tossed by air currents every bit as ragged as the foaming sea waters.

  “Ancient magic,” he said. “Wild and untamed.”

  “Obviously we are in the right place.”

  “Getting tired, are you? Need a rest?” he asked as he twisted in air, watching her struggle to keep up with the frenetic pace of the wind.

  “No. I can make it to the mountain.”

  “We should rest,” he said. “Let’s just get inland, away from the damp wind, and catch our breaths.”

  He could see how relieved she was at that suggestion. She had come all this way through the wind and some pretty unpleasant weather and hadn’t complained once. He gave her a sizzling smile. The one that she sent back to him almost made up for the fact that they were flying straight on into danger.

  This land that now greeted them was rutted with deep valleys and rifts, dark volcanic rock that had been cut over millennia by runoff from the nearby glacier as it advanced and receded. The low-lying areas were dotted with sparse patches of moss and scrubby tufts of coarse grass. Their kind were not often affected by weather and external temperatures, but even he could feel the cold begin seeping into his bones. Maybe he was more sensitive to it due to his human blood. Raea gave no sign that it caused her any discomfort. Apparently she was determined to prove herself more than up to whatever challenges faced them.

  “How about there?” he asked, calling over the wind and pointing to the shadowy side of the mountain.

  It was dark and desolate, and they could see for miles around them. Nothing but vast emptiness. If they were worried about being discovered by someone, they could lay those fears to rest right now. There was simply no one to do any discovering.

  “It sure doesn’t look like a hotbed of human and magical corruption,” she commented.

  “It doesn’t look like a hotbed of anything,” he agreed.

  They had left the gusty shoreline behind them, and it was easier to talk now. The winds still blew with good force, but neither of them had to yell quite so loudly to be heard. Flight was easier in these conditions. He could spare a glance here and there to admire the way Raea’s hair tossed in the breeze and how the strange colors in the arctic skyline reflected off her wings.

  “Wait, look at that,” she suddenly called out, pointing toward a shadowy area near the base of the mountain.

  He studied the spot and a glint caught his eye. It wasn’t large, but something metallic seemed to be reflecting. With so much nothingness around them, clearly this bit of something was worth investigation.

  “Let’s move closer, but be careful,” he admonished. “We have no idea what to expect.”

  They swooped down, darting erratically just in case anyone should be trying to track them. When they were close enough, he could see that the object was indeed metallic—at least parts of it were—and clearly human in origin. It was some kind of scientific instrument, mounted on a stake that was driven into the rocky earth.

  “It doesn’t look like the machinery we found in the wood,” Kyne pointed out.

  “It’s smaller, and no one went to any trouble to hide it. Do you think maybe it’s one of the devices being used by that scientific team Baylor warned us about?” Raea proposed.

  “It could be. I wonder what it does.”

  “This doesn’t appear to do anything. It just pokes into the ground.”

  They moved in closer, approaching the object and circling it.

  “Why would they monitor the ground?” Raea asked.

  “This is on the edge of a volcano. Maybe they want to find out if it’s going to become fully dormant, or if it’s waking up.”

  She nodded. “Makes sense. Without magic, they’d have no way of knowing that sort of thing.”

  “I think it’s safe. I don’t feel any of the effects we’ve experienced before near the hybrid machines.”

  He touched down carefully on the rough, rocky ground. She landed softly beside him and brushed him ever so slightly with her wings. When he looked at her she was smiling.

  “You don’t feel anything like that?” she asked.

  “When you’re around, I always feel some of that,” he replied with his own sly grin. “What I don’t feel is the presence of the kind of equipment we came here to locate.”

  He studied this device. To a human, it would have stood up as high as a knee. To fairies, though, it towered over them, twice their height. About the size of an average fairy dwelling, it was rectangular in shape and rather ungainly in appearance as it hovered there on its thin stake. Raea fluttered upward, studying the pinpoint lights blinking on the front of it. Kyne walked around the base, investigating it from below.

  A strange little box had been affixed onto the side of it, he noted. Somehow that didn’t seem to belong, with odd wires protruding from a roughly cut hole in the side of the device. The humans who had constructed this clearly did not care for aesthetics.

  He wondered how deeply this stake was imbedded into the ground. Most likely a hole had been initially bored into the rocky earth so the stake could be wedged in tightly. Curious, he kicked the stake. To his surprise, the odd box with the wires suddenly began humming.

  “What did you do?” Raea called. “The lights on this thing just started blinking like crazy.”

  “I don’t know. I kicked it, and now it started making noise.”

  He put his hand out to touch the stake. He shouldn’t have. A jolt of magic suddenly coursed through him. He jumped, then swore.

  “What is it?” Raea asked, dipping low to check on him.

  “I don’t think it’s good,” he said, reaching to touch it again.

  Sure enough, the
re was magic around this device. It must not have been functioning when they first arrived, but somehow he’d triggered it. By the Skies, he could feel the effects already. Raea moved closer to him.

  “So Baylor was right,” she noted. “The humans are using magic here.”

  The worry and effort of their travel must have been taking a toll on her. He could see fear wash over her expression and she leaned on him for support. Her body trembled, so he put his arms around her. She felt immeasurably good up against him, so he pulled her close.

  “Don’t worry,” he assured her, pressing a tender kiss on her head. “We’ll figure out what to do about this.”

  “But what if…” She gazed up with huge eyes. The heat he saw burning there wiped every bit of chill from his body and kindled his desire.

  “The machine is affecting me already,” he said.

  “Didn’t Baylor mention once that the effects are more powerful when the machinery first starts up?”

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  She was holding him now just as tightly as he was holding her. “And we are standing very, very close to that little box.”

  “We’re closer to each other.”

  “I think we could get closer, even.”

  “I know that we can,” he said, just before he kissed her.

  * * *

  Raea would never grow tired of his kisses. Her lips gave in to his easily, eagerly begging for more. Her skin celebrated his touch, energy flowing into her body despite the exhaustion she’d felt just moments ago. Desire burst into life inside her and she held on to him tightly.

  “I almost wish we’d stayed back in the cabin,” he said as he trailed kisses along her neck and over her shoulders. “This hardly seems the perfect place to give in to passion.”

  “It feels perfect to me,” she said and encouraged him by running her hands over his chest and down between them to the heat of his thighs.

  She was careful to simply tease him with touch, not let instinct take over fully and explore the hardening shaft she could feel pressing against her already. Kyne’s lovemaking was so generous, so wonderful, she would hate to hurry things along. Although, there was a lot to be said for hurrying, too.