Loose Changeling: A Changeling Wars Novel

by A. G. Stewart

  Kailen sighed. “I’ve been thinking about it and don’t have any good answers for you.”

  “Then what are the bad ones?”

  “Well”—he traced the seam in the center of the table with his fingertip—“you could keep running. Pick up every few days, don’t stop moving.”

  I blinked. “Wow, when you said bad, you meant it.”

  He lifted his finger. “Or, you can face your attackers.”

  “Or…?”

  “That’s it,” he said. “Those are your options.”

  I’d intended to finish my dinner, but I no longer had an appetite. I pushed my plate toward the center of the table, my mouth dry. “When you say face my attackers, do you mean all the Fae trying to kill me? The Guardians? This Grian you mentioned?”

  Kailen scraped the last of the noodles from his plate. “You know how I said the greater Fae, the Sidhe, are the heavy hitters? Grian is a Fae Queen, and one of the heaviest hitters. There are twelve Fae families, each presiding over a realm in the Fae world. They constantly jostle for power. Power is often determined by the lesser Fae the families have in their thrall.”

  “And the lesser Fae don’t mind that?”

  “There are some powerful lesser Fae, some free agents. But being beholden to the Fae families provides benefits as well. Each family extends protection over the lesser Fae in their care, and some of us have the Talent to enhance their natural powers. The lesser Fae can change loyalties, but only when they think it benefits them. Powerful Fae families have been known to hunt down the lesser Fae that have betrayed them.”

  Interesting, but not directly relevant to my worries. “Then I have to fight Grian. She’s the one trying to get me killed, and the hobgoblins and grushound just have to do what she says.”

  “No. She’ll deny she’s provoking any attacks on you, and we have no proof. Go after the Guardians. There’s an old law among the Sidhe. If one family suffers from the aggressions of another, they can challenge them to combat, in the Arena. Each side chooses a champion, and they fight to the death. The matter is settled, and the aggression stops, no matter who wins. Now, the Guardians aren’t exactly a family, and you’d have to issue the challenge on behalf of Faolan and Maera, but it might work.”

  Owen looked from Kailen, to me, and back again. “How would that work? That doesn’t sound like it would follow any of your rules.”

  “Grian is one of those Sidhe with her hands in everything. If you challenge the Guardians, she may see this as an opportunity to get rid of you. She’ll find a way to make it happen.”

  “What about the other families that want me dead?”

  “The Arbiter—the eldest living Fae—presides over any challenges. He is the only one who can make and unmake our laws. You’ll have the chance to talk to him, between rounds. If you petition him for legal status, he may grant it.”

  I placed my hands on either side of my face, leaned my elbows on the table, and stared at the beige wall opposite me. That was a lot of ifs. “I’m going to die, aren’t I?”

  “Don’t give up yet,” Kailen said. “Remember, Changelings are powerful.”

  I lifted my head and looked at my hands. “Maybe after thousands of years. Right now I can’t even control my magic without him in the room.” I gestured toward Owen. He stopped mid-bite, a few noodles hanging from his mouth. “How am I supposed to fight a Guardian? I’d have to drag Owen with me every step of the way.”

  A knock sounded at the door, making all of us jump. “I’ll get it,” I said. “All of you stay here. I’m the only one who's supposed to be in the house anyways.”

  Kailen’s hand went beneath the table, to where he kept his sword. “Stay here,” I reiterated, as I rose to my feet and left the dining room. I flipped on a light as I moved into the living room. I checked the peephole and froze. A man and a woman stood on my stoop, navy blue uniforms and silver badges easily visible. Cops.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  As I watched, one of the cops, the man, leaned forward expectantly. They'd seen me turn on the light and must have heard my footsteps. There was nothing for it.

  I opened the door.

  “Hi,” the male cop said. He had an affable look to him—rounded belly, laugh lines, and a mustache that completely obscured his upper lip. “Are you Nicole Philbin?”

  “I am,” I said. I had my hand on the doorknob, my body halfway behind the door.

  “Do you mind if we come inside and have you answer a couple questions?” The woman spoke up this time. She had a jaw that could cut metal, dark brown hair slicked into a ponytail, and blue eyes with all the warmth of a glacier.

  Kailen, Owen, and a mouse all still sat at the dinner table. I wasn’t keen on explaining that tableau. I stepped outside. “Can we just talk out here?”

  The woman narrowed her eyes.

  “I'm Officer Brown,” the man said, “and this is my partner, Officer Gomez.”

  “Nice to meet you,” fell automatically from my mouth, though it really was anything but.

  “Are you familiar with Jane Barston?” Officer Gomez asked.

  “Jane?” Great. Kailen had said he was a lawyer. Did he really just deal with divorces? Hopefully he had some experience with criminal law. I had the feeling I would need it.

  “Yes,” Officer Brown said. “Jane Barston.”

  “I might be.”

  “Really?” Gomez said. She crossed her arms. “So you're telling me you're not sure if you've ever had any contact with her?”

  I cringed. “Maybe?”

  “You'd better come with us,” Gomez said. “Down to the station.”

  Hopefully Kailen didn't think now was the time to run his hero routine. Yes, I had Fae trying to kill me, but I still had a life in the mortal world and hoped to keep it. Assaulting cops would be the best and easiest way to lose my job and any chance of ever getting that promotion. Besides, I hadn’t actually done anything to Jane except turn her into a mouse. There weren’t any laws against that. And the police station was probably the least likely place the Fae would look for me. I hoped.

  “Now?”

  “You're not under arrest,” Brown said. “We just want to ask you some questions. Can you do that right now?”

  “Sure,” I said. I raised my voice so that Kailen might hear me. “I’ll just come with you to the police station to answer some questions.” I closed the door behind me and followed them to the patrol car on my driveway.

  I'd never ridden in the back of a police car before. I wondered what my neighbors thought of me—did they assume I'd done something wrong? I'd never really taken the time to get to know them, so I'd probably never know.

  The two cops got in, one after another, Gomez behind the wheel. “Can I ask what this is all about?” I tried to make my voice sound innocent, but it came out querulous more than anything.

  “Missing person case,” Brown said. “That's all I can tell you right now.”

  We rode in silence the rest of the way. If I was lucky, they'd drop me back home when they'd finished questioning me. If not, well, at least I'd get a phone call. I wished more than anything that I'd tried again to turn Jane back into a person. The police could have shown up at my door, asked about Jane, and bam! She'd be there, smiling, eating chicken Alfredo, clearly unharmed. Well, if wishes were horses. I hated that phrase. It was something my dad always used to say to me. And isn't that the nature of a bad situation? Even your mind starts attacking you.

  When we stopped, Officer Brown opened the door for me and led me, quite politely, into the station and to a small room. Brown's face said we were about to embark on a nice little chat. Gomez's face said she was about to grab my head, throw it on the table, and grind her palm into my cheek until I told her what she wanted to hear. Good cop, bad cop. I guess some stereotypes had basis in truth.

  For an interrogation room, it was pretty nice. Cushioned chairs, and a wooden table. A few photographs of a river on the wall, framed in black plastic. I would have bet my life, though,
that they had a way to record our conversation.

  “So,” Officer Brown said, “here's the deal. Jane Barston went missing several days back. Not the type known for disappearing. So we did a preliminary investigation.”

  Gomez leaned forward. “And what do we find?” She punctuated each word by chopping her hand onto the table top. “A nasty voicemail message on her phone at work. From you. From her cell phone number.”

  I had to admit that it didn't look good. “Okay,” I said slowly.

  “Okay? That's all you have to say?” Gomez said.

  I stared at her, determined not to be intimidated. “You brought me here to ask me questions. That wasn't a question.”

  “Here’s a question,” Officer Brown said. “Why do you have Jane's cell phone?”

  I'd always heard that you shouldn't talk to the police without a lawyer, but I hadn't technically broken the law, and I couldn't get into trouble for just telling the truth, could I? “She's my husband's mistress,” I blurted out.

  “So you killed her,” Gomez said, leaning back, nodding.

  “What? No.”

  “You had someone else kill her,” she said.

  I looked to Officer Brown, trying to appeal to some good cop. Or, in this case, not-crazy-cop. He sighed. “Tell us why you have her cell phone.”

  “I caught her in bed with my husband. I started yelling at him. When I stopped, she was gone.”

  “Gone?” Gomez said.

  “She’d disappeared. She left her purse and her cell phone.”

  “No one just forgets her purse and cell phone,” she said.

  I shrugged. “Jane did.”

  “Here’s the way I see it,” Gomez said. “You catch her in bed with your husband. And then, in a jealous fit of rage, you kill her, hide the body.”

  “Then why would I leave a message on her office phone?”

  She shook her head. “I know you did it,” Gomez said. “You could be connected to the other three murders. We know you worked with Anne.”

  For all I knew, the Guardians might be hunting me right now. I wondered if they’d check the police station. So much for one quiet evening. “I didn’t kill those people, or Jane. Can I go home now?”

  Officer Brown stared at me, his mustache quivering as he pursed his lips. “Do you know the whereabouts of your husband? We’ll need to question him, too.”

  “I don’t,” I said. It was the least I could do for Owen, after getting him into this mess.

  “When you caught her in bed with your husband—was that the last time you saw Jane?” Gomez asked.

  Well, now there was the sticking point. “What do you mean exactly by see her?” I didn’t want to get caught in a lie. Funny the way morality works. Turn a woman into a mouse, and it takes a day or so to process some guilt. Sit across the table from two cops, and every word you say just seems to drip with malfeasance.

  “We’ve got enough circumstantial evidence to keep you here for a while, so why don’t you just tell us the truth?” Gomez said.

  “Please,” Brown said. “It would help us find this poor woman more quickly.”

  I tried to think of the best way to put things. “Let me just say that I think she'll be turning up in a day or two. I don't think her friends and family should worry.”

  Gomez slammed her hand down on the table. “Don't play games with us!”

  “No games?” I said, my hands clenching into fists. I’d had enough. “Fine. How about this? I found out I'm not human three days ago, and when I caught my husband and Jane in bed together, I turned her into a mouse.”

  Both Gomez and Brown blinked. Somewhere in the station, I heard a door open and shut.

  “So you think this is a joke?” Gomez said. Though the words were tough, she sounded more confused than angry.

  “You said you wanted the truth; there it is,” I said wearily.

  Brown raised his eyebrows and exchanged glances with Gomez. “Obstruction of justice?”

  She nodded.

  “Can you please stand and put your hands behind your back, Ms. Philbin?” Officer Brown said.

  The next thing I knew, I was in handcuffs, being read my Miranda rights, and then transported to the Multnomah County Jail to get booked and have my picture taken. The flash of the bulb barely even registered. This could not be my life. When I got out, I was going to kill Owen.

  By the time Office Gomez handed me the phone for my one phone call, the series of events had started to sink in. But instead of calling Kailen, or even Owen, I dialed Lainey's number. I needed something familiar. Family.

  “Nicole,” I said, when the collect call company prompted me for a name. I waited, crossing my fingers that she'd be awake and would pick up the phone.

  A click sounded.

  “Hey, sweetie, are you serious? This isn't some kind of prank, is it?”

  “I...” My voice didn't seem to work properly. The warmth of Lainey's tone made me choke up. The Aranhods may have been my biological parents, but Lainey was my sister. “I need you to bail me out.”

  She cleared her throat. “Well, this is a little unexpected. Okay, well, I'll be there in a bit. Mark can watch the kids.”

  “Thanks, Lainey.”

  “Hey, tell me about it later. That's how you can thank me.” She hung up.

  Once they'd finished booking me, I had to wait in a room with about twenty other men and women, all sitting in chairs, staring at a television. None of them looked the type you'd want to meet in a dark alley, or ever, really. They sat me on the edge, near a man with hair like a pile of straw and breath like the bottom of a wine barrel. He leered at me but then turned his attention back to the television.

  I spent three hours watching cartoons before Lainey showed up. But she hadn’t come alone. She’d brought Mom and Dad.

  What can I say about my parents? My dad had stayed at home with Lainey and me when we were growing up. He hadn’t raised us, not exactly. Rather, he’d indulged our curious whims and had involved us in games of laser tag and nerf wars. I would have said I took after my mother—with her business suit, her no-nonsense attitude, and her green eyes—but that was before I’d found out she hadn’t birthed me. And I’d never had her affinity for crystals, Renaissance fairs, and candles.

  “Nicole,” My dad stepped forward first, engulfing me in a hug. The few soft hairs left on his balding pate rubbed against my cheek. I vacillated between mortification and relief. “Whatever you’ve done, we’ll get through this.”

  I stepped back as soon as I could manage without offending him. “Lainey! You said you were coming, not Mom and Dad, too.”

  She gave me a little smirk and shrugged. “It’s funny; I always thought things would be the other way around, with you, Mom, and Dad bailing me out. Look, you didn’t tell me not to tell them, and Mark and I have been on a tight budget since Justine was born. Mom offered to kick forward the cash.”

  I looked to my mother. She'd retired a year back but still dressed in a business-casual way. She wore black slacks, a button-up white sweater with an argyle pattern, and had her silver hair pulled into a bun. She hesitated and then stepped closer. “Lainey told us that you'd found out we adopted you. This didn't have anything to do with it, did it?”

  “It might have,” I said.

  She clutched at her chest. I was certain that beneath the sweater lay a crystal on a chain, or some symbolic pendant. “You really ought to keep your temper, Nicole.”

  “And you should have told me a lot sooner!”

  My father, ever the peacekeeper, stepped between us, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Can we discuss this in the car, or maybe back at the house?” He looked to me, blue eyes earnest. “Why don't you come back to the house, have a cup of tea, and we'll explain.”

  “Fine.” I crossed my arms. “But I can’t stay long.” Angry as I was, I didn’t want to bring the Fae about their ears.

  “Lainey?” Dad said.

  “Oh, I'll come, too,” she said. “Wouldn't miss it.�
�

  I glared at her, but she ignored my warning look and linked her arm with mine. “It's not that bad, is it?” she leaned in and said to me. “Whoever your biological parents are, they can't be as kooky as Mom and Dad.”

  Oh, she had no idea.

  She squeezed my arm. “Hey, no matter what, you and I are sisters. Forever. I never treated you any different after I found out, did I?”

  Lainey had a way of getting under my skin, staying there, and then somehow becoming less irritating. “No, you were as much a pain in the ass as always.”

  She laughed as we followed Mom and Dad out into the parking lot. “Yes, well I've gotten better, haven't I? More respectable.”

  “Marginally.”

  Lainey and I crowded into the backseat of my mom’s blue Prius. My dad took the wheel. It felt almost like old times, except Lainey and I were both grown, and we were pulling out of the parking lot of a jail. I checked the clock. Two in the morning.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, once we’d hit the first stoplight.

  “A lot of reasons,” my mom said. She turned in her seat to look at me. “You’ve manifested, haven’t you? You look different than you used to.”

  “You knew about that, too?” I clutched at the edge of the seat. I couldn’t believe this.

  “Your mother and I were going to tell you,” my father said. “We just never found the right time.”

  “The adoption wasn’t exactly, well, legal,” my mother said. “So, we figured it would be best to wait until you were older to tell you.”

  “I’m thirty-two,” I said. “How old did I need to be? Sixty?"

  Mom and Dad exchanged brief glances. “Let’s wait until we get home,” my mom said. “There are some things we should show you.”