by Bonnie Lamer
“What, no ‘nice to meet you’?” I snark as he goes by. Okay, that probably didn’t help with the gaining new friends thing. All I get in return is a growl from deep in his throat before Alonzo disappears out the door. Nope, I did not make a new friend in him today.
Next to me, Sam nudges my arm and says, “Don’t worry about it. The guy’s a moron.”
Hmm, not that I disagree, but I suspect that Sam makes as many new friends as I do considering his tendency to speak whatever is on his mind like I do. He has friend in me, though. There, I feel better. I have made a new friend today. Glancing at Jenna, I suspect I have made two. “I get that impression,” I agree with a smile.
“He’s not that bad,” Jenna insists. I have heard from Eliana that Jenna tries to like everyone, so I’m not going to put a lot of stock in her half-hearted recommendation. I simply smile and nod.
The four of them disappear upstairs to pack, leaving Kallen and me to wait in the living room. Wrapping an arm around Kallen’s waist, I ask, “Do you think Isla saw us bringing all four of them back with us in her vision?”
“Probably,” Kallen acknowledges. Pulling me into a hug, my gorgeous husband teases, “So, about this whole missing Ray thing…”
I lean up and kiss him. “You don’t even sound jealous,” I murmur against his lips. “You’ll have to try harder if you are going to get a rise out of me.”
Kallen chuckles. “I will remember that.” He kisses me again. We do have several minutes to kill while the others pack, after all. Yes, this is way better than television.
Fortunately, or unfortunately considering how much I enjoy kissing my husband, it does not take the others long to pack. In less than ten minutes, all four are back in the living room and ready to go. Still, Jenna feels the need to apologize for the length of time it took. “Sorry, we had to make a few calls to let our families know we would be gone.”
Out of curiosity, I ask, “What did you tell them?”
With a sheepish grin, she says, “Since Sam’s and my family don’t know about Eliana, we told them that we won a vacation.” Not the most believable lie, but it will have to do.
“Our parents know, so we told them the truth,” Eliana admits. She amends, “Most of it, anyway. I left out the part about the universe possibly ending. I just told them that you needed our help in your realm.”
“We can tell them about the universe after we save it,” Josh says with a wink.
I nod in understanding. “No sense in getting them all upset since we are hopefully going to prevent it.” Hopefully. I can’t lie and say definitely. I simply don’t have enough details yet.
Glancing around the room at their bags, Kallen says, “If you forgot anything, we can provide it in our realm. So, if you are ready, we really should be going.”
Eliana nods. “All set.”
Gathering everyone to one side of the room, I reach out and open a passageway to the Fae realm. “That is amazing,” Jenna whispers behind me, making me smile with pride over something that has become routine for me.
When it is ready, I gesture to Kallen to go first just in case the others are nervous. Which I am certain they are since they are entering a passageway basically to the unknown. I remember being nervous my first time, too, and I’m the one who created the thing. Eliana and Josh follow after Kallen. Jenna and Sam are obviously the most anxious, but they do not let that stop them. They hurry through before they change their minds. I follow and close the passageway behind me after a brief hesitation in case any of them change their minds. They don’t.
With a grin, I spread my hands wide and say, “Welcome to the Fairy realm.”
6 Chapter
“Wow, it looks…um…just like our realm,” Jenna says, a hint of disappointment in her voice.
I laugh and admit, “You know, I was a little disappointed the first time I came here, too. It was nothing like the Fairy realms in movies and books back home.” This earns me a scowl from my dear husband. I shrug in a ‘I can’t help it if it’s true’ kind of way.
“Is that an ocean?” Sam asks, looking out over the sand and water.
“Yes,” Kallen nods. “We are approximately where Australia would be in your realm.”
Sam nods. “I’ve always wanted to go to Australia.”
“I don’t believe we are actually in Australia,” Josh points out.
“If you are done with your geography lesson, maybe you could concentrate on, you know, saving the universe,” a voice snarks from the area of my ankle.
Jenna lets out a little shriek and takes several steps back. “Is that a Tasmanian devil? Aren’t they dangerous?” Wow, she certainly knows the animal kingdom.
I snort down at the little beast. “The only thing this one is a danger to is a slab of bacon.”
Giving Jenna a better reply to her question, Kallen says, “In general, yes. This one happens to be Xandra’s Familiar and is not a threat to you.”
“You have a Familiar?” Jenna says in awe, forgetting her fear. “Can it perform magic like you can?”
I shake my head. “Mostly, he’s just annoying.” Feeling guilty that I am being mean, I add, “But, he has saved my life on several occasions. He can also channel my magic, which is really dangerous for anyone else to do.”
“Nice of you to remember that,” Taz snarls. “Don’t count on it happening again.”
“Oh, you love me and you know it,” I tease him.
If Tasmanian devils could make rude gestures, Taz would be making one about now. He is forced to settle for walking away with his tail pointed straight up in the air. I do not want to know what he is muttering under his breath at the moment.
“Are you having a conversation with it?” Josh asks.
“Those snarls and growls you hear from the beast apparently sound like words to Xandra,” Kallen explains.
Josh grimaces. “That must get annoying if only she can understand him.”
“It does,” Kallen acknowledges.
“The wanker is just jealous because you like me better,” Taz snarks from the terrace steps. I roll my eyes but don’t say anything. I don’t want to have to explain what he just said.
“I did not realize you were bringing back a group,” Kegan calls from the doorway to the mansion. He has Keelan cradled in his arms again, dressed appropriately for the night chill in a tiny hat and warm pajamas. It is still the middle of the night in the Fairy realm.
“We decided to make it a party,” I tell him, ushering everyone toward the house. “Where is Isla?” I ask.
“Waiting impatiently in the kitchen with Tabitha and Garren.” With a grin, Kegan adds, “Tabitha is making an early breakfast.” Confirming that Isla did know we were going to bring back a group of people. She must have passed that information along to Tabitha.
“I hope you’re hungry,” I tell everyone.
“Sam is always hungry,” Jenna says with a fond smile in his direction.
“I hope she’s not going to any trouble just for us,” Eliana says, a trace of guilt in her voice.
I shake my head. “Most likely, she is annoyed at being woken up in the middle of the night yet again, and she is taking it out on her pots and pans.”
“If that’s all it takes to get 4 a.m. bacon, I’m waking her up every night,” Taz declares.
I scowl down at him. “Let me know how that works out for you.” Tabitha likes her sleep. My irritating little Familiar would soon find himself without any bacon at all. Which just might kill him. I hear it is possible to die of a broken heart.
We make our way through the house to the kitchen with Kallen and me in the lead and the rest following behind. Kegan takes up the rear with Keelan, making cooing noises and funny faces. Apparently, he has given up hope of getting the child back to sleep anytime soon. Keelan is going to be one cranky baby tomorrow, I bet.
We should probably give our guests a tour of the mansion since they will be staying for however long, but for now, they will need to content themselves wi
th curious glances into rooms as we pass them. We need to get started on a plan. When we finally reach the kitchen, we find Tabitha cooking waffles and bacon. Taz hurries to her side just in case she ‘accidently’ drops something. I note Felix is already there. Taz is definitely a bad influence on my other Familiar who has gained several pounds since moving in with us. He actually needed them, though, unlike Taz.
Isla and Garren are at the huge island counter drinking coffee. Garren looks ready to fall back to sleep despite the caffeine he is guzzling. His eyes are barely open. I wonder if he looks back fondly at the time he spent in his cave in the Dragon realm where he could get as much sleep as he wanted. All he had to do was put up with Dragon fire and Goblin stench. He certainly doesn’t get all the sleep he wants here. On the other hand, we are fire and stench free. I glance at Keelan. Mostly stench free. The boy has his moments.
Both Garren and Isla rise when we enter the room. “Grandmother, I would like to introduce you to our friends from the Cowan realm,” Kallen says, introducing the highest ranking person in the room first. I leave him in charge of that kind of etiquette because I would never remember all the rules. Kallen points to each person as he says, “This is Eliana, Josh, Jenna and Sam. Everyone, this is Isla, my grandmother and High Chancellor of the Fairy realm.” Pointing to the other Fairies in the room, he introduces them next. “This is Tabitha; my cousin Kegan and his son, Keelan; and Garren, Isla’s husband.” Garren seems slightly offended to be introduced last. Maybe Kallen isn’t as good at this as I thought. Or, he did it on purpose. He does like to needle Garren on occasion. Lots of occasions.
After a round of ‘nice to meet you’s’, Isla indicates the stools around the counter. “Please, have a seat. There is much to discuss.”
“I assume Dagda is on his way?” I say as I climb onto a stool.
Isla nods. “Yes.”
Eliana’s eyes widen a little. “Isn’t he the King of the realm?”
“He is,” I confirm. “And my biological father,” I fill in for Jenna and Sam. Thinking of parents, I ask, “Are Mom, Dad, and Zac still sleeping?”
“Yes, I thought it unnecessary to wake the whole house,” Isla says. “Best we have a plan in place before filling them in.” Good point. I wish I hadn’t been woken to end of the universe news with no plan in place.
“We would have a plan if a certain Archangel we know wasn’t so damned tight-lipped,” Garren grumbles under his breath.
I can’t help but defend my friend. “You know Raziel can’t say anything. He’d lose his wings. Not to mention violate our free will.” Sometimes, I admit silently to myself, free will may be overrated. At least, when it comes to saving the universe.
“Thank you, you are a dear friend,” Raziel says from the doorway, almost startling me off my stool. Adriel is with him. From her scowl, she is not any happier than Tabitha or Garren to be woken up in the middle of the night, and she can get downright crabby about things. Most Angels of Death can.
“If it makes you feel any better, I cannot pry any information out of him, either,” Adriel grumps, reaching for a mug from the cupboard. She pours herself a cup of coffee.
Watching her reminds me of my manners. “Would anyone else like coffee?” I ask, rising from my stool to get more cups. “By the way, this is Raziel and Adriel. They’re Fallen Angels.” I don’t usually introduce people by what type of supernatural being they are, but Garren already mentioned that Raziel is an Archangel.
Raziel smiles and holds out his hand to Eliana. “Eliana, it is very nice to meet the Cowan who carries within her the essence of two gods.” He also shakes hands with Josh, Sam and Jenna, referring to all of them by name without being introduced.
“Show off,” Kallen mutters under his breath.
“Leave him be. It is the only fun he has with his knowledge,” Adriel says, taking a seat at the counter. She may be grumpy about Raziel not sharing information with her, but she loves him too much to let anyone else disparage him.
Biting her bottom lip, Jenna glances back and forth between the Fallen Angels. Finally, she blurts out, “Is it rude to ask what kind of Angels you are?”
“Yes,” Adriel drawls, not at her friendliest in the middle of the night. Who am I kidding? I love her, but she could never really be described as friendly any time of day. “But, we will tell you, regardless.”
“Be nice,” I admonish to my friend.
I get a look that tells me exactly what I can do with my admonishment before Adriel continues. “Raziel is an Archangel, and he is the only one among us who is omniscient. I am an Angel of Death.”
The tension in the room among our guests just ratcheted up about a hundred notches. “Angels of Death do not kill people,” I hurry to explain. “She simply strips the souls of those who die of all the bad stuff on them, and then she decides if there is enough left of their souls to move on or not.” Okay, that comforted no one in the room. It did earn me another dirty look from Adriel for making her sound rather heartless. To be fair, she does have to leave emotion out of the equation when she is making those decisions.
“You have nothing to fear from Adriel,” Raziel assures everyone with a beautiful, Angelic smile.
“Unless you get close to her before she brushes her teeth. Who knew Angels could melt eye membranes with their morning breath,” Taz snarks. A tiny snort of laughter escapes me and I have to cover it with a cough. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Raziel trying not to laugh, as well. He may not understand Taz, exactly, but he does know everything. I give the Archangel a pointed look and he returns it with a half-shrug as if to say, ‘It’s true.’ I will not be divulging the details of this conversation to Adriel, even if she is looking at us suspiciously at the moment.
The kitchen door bangs open, signaling that Dagda has finally arrived. “Just once, once is all I ask, could you please have an emergency that does not involve dragging me out of bed in the middle of the night?” He stops short, and quits complaining, when he sees that we have company. Instead of introducing himself, he demands, “Why are there three Cowans and…” he stares at Eliana as if trying to figure out her magic, “and whoever she is in this kitchen?”
“Nice to see you, too,” I snark. “Thank you for going out of your way to make our guests feel welcome.”
Realizing how rude he is being, Dagda clears his throat and assumes a more regal posture and tone. “My apologies.” That would be convincing if he actually meant it. I never have to wonder where my occasional bouts of rudeness stem from. It’s an inherited gene. “I believe introductions are in order,” Dagda not-so-subtly hints.
Seeing that I am growing annoyed with my father, Isla does the honor before I can choke him to death with his own rudeness. When she is done, she fills Dagda in on the little problem of the Phoenix. When she is finished with that, my father is several shades paler than he was when he entered. At least he’s no longer being rude. Shock has swallowed his rudeness whole.
His lack of sleep now forgotten, Dagda takes a seat at the counter and sighs. “How, exactly, do you propose we find a being who could be disguised as anyone in any realm?”
Way to be encouraging. “That’s why Eliana is here,” I explain tightly, not any less annoyed with him for his pessimism than I was with his rudeness. “We are hoping that the essence of Ra within her will be able to help us.”
Dagda gives my friend a much more appreciative appraisal than he did when he first came in. “Do you truly carry the essence of a minor god within you?”
Eliana chafes a bit at him referring to Ra as a minor god, but she does not contradict him. “Yes,” she replies. “Two, actually.”
Dagda nods. “Then we may actually have a chance.” Glad he has finally boarded the optimism train. You should never start out on a save the universe journey with a poor attitude. Yet, I still find I am a bit insulted he didn’t think we had a chance with just me on our side.
“Could you explain a bit more about the Phoenix?” Josh asks the room in general. �
�Honestly, those of us who are not magical are trying to reconcile the magic and the science without much luck.” I smile at his honesty, and the fact that he is not intimidated by the King of the Fairies.
Dagda nods and proceeds to give us a better understanding of what the Phoenix does than either Kallen or Isla did. “Of course. To put it simply, the Phoenix is the glue that holds the realms together. That is why she must constantly travel between them. She serves as a sort of conduit, a magnetic force in the ripples of the realms. Through her, the pieces of the universe are held eternally together. Within her, she carries Cosmic Fire, which is needed to anchor each realm in place while orbiting the sun. Cosmic Fire cannot be controlled, though. Just as the cores of the suns and the stars in the universe will grow hotter over time until they eventually go supernova, so does the Cosmic Fire within the Phoenix. It is only by dousing the flames every five hundred of the Phoenix’s years until they are just smoldering ash, can the Phoenix keep from going supernova herself. If that happened, because she is the glue holding everything together, it would start a chain reaction with every star and sun in the universe. The Phoenix prevents this through her deaths. But, since she is immortal and can never truly die, her essence, if you will,” he says with a nod toward Eliana, “never truly dies. She reforms from the smoldering ash, and the Cosmic Fire within her begins to grow again. This is why her death and rebirth is vital to the universe.”
“That makes sense,” I nod, finally getting it. I scowl at Kallen and Isla for not giving me such an in depth explanation earlier. Unfortunately, neither of them knows why I am scowling at them. Apparently, they thought they explained it just as well.
“So, when she reforms from the smoldering ash, the Phoenix does not reform from all of it? She leaves some of her ashes behind?” Eliana asks. “Xandra mentioned that Ra stored them for her.”
