Pirate's Alley

by Suzanne Johnson

  I turned to get a better overview of the scene. Jake and several of the werewolf security people were trying to stop the fire from spreading to the carpet by stomping on sparks. Apparently the Blue Congress wizards in charge of decoration hadn’t used flame-retardant fibers.

  Floating several feet above the chaos was Sabine the Faery Queen, who laughed while the dark-haired faery yelled at his blond counterpart, who apparently had lost control of his fireball. Now he stood with a stubborn expression on his face and his arms crossed over his chest, glaring at his colleague. Some enterprising wizard had at least equipped the room with emergency lighting, although the flames cast eerie shadows on the walls. The fire was spreading slowly and so far had been confined to the table, so either the table was fire-resistant or the flame was some kind of magical faery business. My bet was on the latter.

  I moved closer to the faeries. I wasn’t sure where Jean had gone, but we probably didn’t have long before the building’s smoke sensors would alert the NOFD, if they hadn’t already.

  The faeries were fighting among themselves.

  “Put the damnable fire out!” Dark-haired faery’s chiseled features flushed an unbecoming pink. He shouted with a slight accent I couldn’t place. “Make it rain, you overgrown clump of crabgrass!”

  “Make it rain yourself.” Blond faery waved his arm in the direction of the fire, and a sudden wind gusted through the room, blowing the sparks beyond the werewolf stompers and igniting the carpet beside the council table. “Sabine is enjoying the show, and she needs to see proof of my powers.”

  Oh good grief. Dueling faeries, plus a roomful of prete politicians who couldn’t figure out how to put out a fire. Could this night get any more ridiculous?

  I hobbled to my messenger bag, still on the floor beside my chair, and pulled out a container of unrefined sea salt. Ignoring the flapping and shouting around me, I laid down a containment circle to rim the burning table and the section of carpet that was on fire, shooed Elder Sato outside the circle, and touched Charlie to the salt. I watched with satisfaction as my magical barricade sprang into place.

  Just in time, too. The carpet fire quickly reached the containment circle and climbed an inch or two up the side of my invisible cylinder, but went no farther. Too bad I didn’t have the proper gear to form a bubble. I could have cut off oxygen and killed the fire.

  I also didn’t have the ingredients for a replenishing charm, or I could have multiplied the water left in the bottle on the witness table.

  With the fire momentarily contained, I looked for Zrakovi. The flames wouldn’t spread outward, but they would continue to burn until the floor beneath the circle caved in or something shorted out.

  I found him with a once again earthbound Sabine, arguing. “You must tell him to put out that fire, Your Majesty. In a moment, the human firefighters will be summoned.”

  “Florian needs to reach that decision on his own,” she said, and her husky voice brought dry grasses and cicadas to mind. She was one creeptastic queen. “This is a test of his judgment.”

  “But Your Majesty…”

  I’d heard enough. If Florian was the blond firebug, he had no judgment worth testing. While Zrakovi played diplomat and followed political protocol, the courthouse would burn down around his ears. Not to mention a hundred human firemen were going to rush in and find a serious freak show that would make one think Mardi Gras had arrived a couple of months early.

  I pushed past the dark-haired faery and pointed the elven staff at his companion. “This is my fire-maker, Florian, and unless you put some rain on that mess you made, I will give you a personal introduction to it. You won’t like it.”

  “What?” Florian unfolded his arms and looked at me uncertainly, then at Charlie. “Wizards don’t have fire-making ability.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m a half-breed.” I zapped him on the arm, and he jumped back a foot. Behind me, the dark faery started laughing. “Put it out. Now.” I sent a few tendrils of fire shooting out from the end of the staff to reinforce my point.

  He rolled his eyes. “Fine, although that fire is pathetic.” With a flourish of arms and a few guttural words, Florian did whatever faeries did, and the heavens opened from the courthouse ceiling. The last time it had rained this hard, we were having a hurricane. Outside. I doubt it had ever rained this hard inside a closed building.

  Funny how being soaked made people more compliant. Alex and Jake were able to quickly get every soggy person into the transport, and only then did I realize I hadn’t seen Rand or Mace. I snagged Jake as he ushered in a team of newly arrived wizards I assumed was a Blue Congress cleanup squad. “Where’d the elves go?”

  He rubbed the water out of his eyes. The rain had slacked to a light sprinkle inside, but the room was a mess, the magically powered emergency lights were flickering and sizzling, and I could swear I already heard sirens. “They took off as soon as the vampires and Hoffman escaped, yapping about a conspiracy.” He looked around. “We’ve gotta get out of here. Wonder what the firefighters will make of this shit?”

  * * *

  Six hours later, about 9:00 a.m., I could answer that question. Jake had gone to Old Barataria with Jean so the pirate could lick his new wounds, and after a treacherous ride with Alex through streets of icy sludge, I’d ended up at his house, waiting for Zrakovi. I hadn’t wanted to wake Eugenie by schlepping in looking like a drowned wizard. Plus, although it was selfish of me, I couldn’t deal with baby drama again. Not yet. Rand would be too busy hatching conspiracy theories with the Synod to be turning his elven antennae in my or Eugenie’s direction.

  After showering, I found a pair of my jeans and a black sweater in Alex’s closet, and stole a pair of his socks. I’d left my waterlogged boots inside the back door, drying on an unfolded section of the Times-Picayune. Sadly, they were my only existing pair of footwear since my house burned. Maybe I’d hit the thrift store and find some orange shoes to match my ugly coat.

  I forced Sebastian into sharing a few minutes of quality wizard-feline time. I missed the grouchy old thing, but I couldn’t say it was mutual. He loved Alex; he tolerated me.

  After he’d finally escaped, I created an open transport on the living room floor for Zrakovi, and Alex and I snuggled on the sofa. We drank black coffee that warmed me up for the first time since the courthouse deluge, and watched the breaking news story on TV about a mysterious fire that had broken out on the top floor of the parish criminal court building. The fire of unknown origin had just as mysteriously been doused by a flood of unknown origin. Soot-faced firefighters theorized that a plumbing pipe had burst because of the freezing weather and had probably saved the historic building from burning to the ground.

  Sounded reasonable to me. At least the Blue Congress wizards appeared to have gotten the walls back in the right place before the firefighters had to explain a building renovation of unknown origin.

  Alex leaned over and treated me to a Rhett Butler kiss, slow and deep but not too sweet. He once told Scarlett something to the effect of how badly she needed kissing, and by someone who knew what he was doing. Alex knew what he was doing. By the time he finished proving it, I was breathless. I rested my head on his shoulder, basking in his warmth and filling my lungs with his scent. “What was that for?”

  “That was to show you how glad I am that we got out of that mess in one piece and that we’re here together.” He extracted his arm from around my shoulders and sat back. “Now let’s talk about your crazy stunt.”

  Damn it, Rhett did that, too. He’d kiss Scarlett silly, then lecture her. “If I’d waited until Zrakovi convinced the Queen of the Faeries to intercede, we’d all have been standing there on the morning news, surrounded by firemen.” And probably a few police officers and, possibly, mental health workers. “She was floating around like a balloon from crazy town and laughing at the whole debacle.”

  I’d been the only person in the room acting sensibly, in fact. “And besides that—”

  “Hush.”
He pressed a finger over my lips. “I wasn’t talking about that. You probably saved all of us by containing the fire and forcing Florian to act. That was smart. What wasn’t so smart was racing off with Jean Lafitte to catch Hoffman and the vampires. You could’ve been killed—or bitten.”

  Yeah, I’d show him bitten. I clamped my teeth down on his fingers before he could jerk them away.

  “Ow. Stop that. Did you break skin?” He examined them for blood. “Do you know how many germs are in the human mouth?”

  Yeah, well, he’d gotten them all over his tongue and hadn’t minded.

  I was sore and exhausted. I’d used up half a roll of paper towels getting my shoulder cleaned up and stopped bleeding. I’d need more stitches if I couldn’t get my hands on the materials for a healing potion. To do that, I’d need to go to my heatless house. And to do that, I’d need a vehicle.

  “We’re not having this discussion.” Scarlett might have let Rhett get away with it, but I wasn’t taking lectures from Alex just because I’d done something he hadn’t approved of. On the whole, during an extremely bizarre evening, I thought I’d handled myself well. “I did what I thought was right. I did what my job calls me to do. And because there was no one else there and I had a split second to act, I went alone.”

  Alex was quiet a whisper too long. “You weren’t alone. You were with Lafitte.”

  The silence stretched between us and tightened around my throat. Damn it. “Is that what this is about? Jean? I thought we’d moved past that.”

  He sighed and got up to look out the front window. “I thought we had, too. And yet, there you went with him on another half-assed adventure, acting without thinking. Jumping from one chaotic scene to another. I repeat, you could’ve gotten killed or bitten. He can’t die. You can.”

  I tugged aside the crew neck of my sweater, and could tell by his widened eyes when he spotted the two puncture wounds. “Melnick,” I said. “He spat my blood out and said it tasted vile.”

  Alex opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again. “Where was your partner?” He said it much as one might say pus-filled boil.

  “Trying to kill Etienne Boulard,” I said, not willing to sugarcoat it. “Unfortunately, he didn’t succeed. I burned Etienne’s ass with the staff, though.” And Melnick and, now that I thought about it, Hoffman. Charlie had been a busy staff. “And before you ask, yes, they all got away, even Hoffman.”

  I wanted to share the hilarity of watching the pompous First Elder’s expression of horror when he realized his magic wasn’t going to work against me, but knew Alex wouldn’t think it was funny. I wanted to tell him how badly I needed to save Jean after what had happened last month, but realized he wouldn’t understand. Not only wouldn’t understand, but would be angered by it. In Alex’s black-and-white world, Hoffman was now a criminal who needed to be apprehended. Jean Lafitte was a menace he’d prefer to never lay eyes on again. I was the woman who didn’t have the sense to stay out of trouble.

  That realization hurt most of all.

  Tears built behind my eyes, and I fiddled with a loose thread on the arm of the sofa. Damn it, I wasn’t going to cry like a girl just because I was tired and he’d hurt my little feelings. Until he said, so softly I thought I might be imagining it, “I’m sorry.”

  I looked up at him, one telltale tear escaping. He returned to the sofa and pulled me into a hug. It sent a blast of pain through my shoulder, but I didn’t care. Damn it, I wanted to make things work with Alex, but why did it have to be so hard?

  “Let’s forget it.” He stroked my back, making me want to purr like Sebastian with every stroke of his fingers. “I keep underestimating how well you can handle yourself. And Lafitte pushes my buttons.”

  “He shouldn’t.” Or should he? I pushed the annoying mental question aside.

  A sizzle of power flicked across my shoulder blades, making me shudder.

  Alex pulled back. “What is it?”

  “Daddy’s coming home.” I pointed at the transport, where Willem Zrakovi materialized a few seconds later, carrying the smoke-infused tatters of his black robe.

  He broke the plane of the transport and stepped out, walking straight to the recliner in the corner and collapsing with a noise that sounded like half sigh, half wounded water buffalo. “I need to talk to you two briefly before heading to Edinburgh. We’re having an emergency meeting of the full Congress of Elders in”—he looked at his wristwatch—“two hours. We have to form a strategy and establish stability before reconvening the Interspecies Council day after tomorrow to finish this sordid business.”

  “What about the First Elder’s seat?” I briefly gave Zrakovi an account of following Hoffman and the others into Vampyre.

  “The Congress’s first order of business will be to formally remove Geoffrey and name an interim replacement as First Elder. If that person is not from the UK or Europe, we’ll need a new Elder for that position since Geoffrey served as both.”

  Alex stood up and paced, which he tended to do when he was thinking hard about how to phrase something. “You’re the senior Elder, sir. It would make sense for you to step in as First Elder.”

  That could be a good thing, and Zrakovi had a hard time feigning disinterest. The idea had occurred to him already; I could feel the surge in his emotions. My empathic grounding had worn off sometime during the courthouse monsoon.

  “Well, we shall see.” He leaned forward, a short, balding, soot-covered man in a ripped black business suit, in whose hands rested the fates of wizardkind and, to a great extent, the other pretes and the human world beyond. “I have assignments for both of you in the meantime. Alex, form a team to monitor the two main transports into New Orleans from the Beyond—the one at St. Louis Cathedral and the one at City Park. I also want someone watching L’Amour Sauvage around the clock. If Garrett Melnick or Etienne Boulard show up, they’re to be detained.”

  Alex propped an elbow on the fireplace mantel. “And if they resist?”

  “Don’t kill them. We need more proof than the word of Jonas Adamson—the late Jonas Adamson—that Garrett Melnick was involved and playing the elves and wizards against each other. It would be easy for him to pin everything on Etienne. Our best hope is getting Etienne to turn on his Vice-Regent, but that won’t be easy.”

  “Jonas spoke the truth. I could tell, and Rand could tell,” I said, trying to settle my shoulder into a comfortable position. It throbbed like it had its own heartbeat.

  “I have no doubt of it,” Zrakovi said. “Which brings us to you, DJ. I have something for you.”

  He reached in a pocket and pulled out his wallet, then extracted two plastic cards and held them out to me.

  I took them and frowned. The first one was a corporate American Express gold card, with Drusilla J. Jaco, Crescent City Risk Management as the cardholder. The second card was sable and gold with a magnetic strip on one side and a fleur-de-lis on the other, with no writing.

  I held it up. “This looks like a hotel key card.”

  Zrakovi nodded. “I’ve taken out a room for you at the Hotel Monteleone, directly across the hall from Jean Lafitte—that took some serious negotiating with hotel management, I assure you.”

  He paused, waiting for me to respond. Given the conversation Alex and I just had, my wisest response would probably be forget it. But I was a woman with two plots of land, a third of a house, no vehicle, and no heat. “When should I be there and what, exactly, do you want me to do?”

  “Keep close tabs on Captain Lafitte. In fact, you should go to Old Barataria now and find out when he plans to return to the city. I don’t want him to go anywhere without you either accompanying him or following him.”

  Alex’s face was as revealing as a clay mask, but his anger levels had ratcheted way up.

  “Uh, that could be difficult,” I said, dragging my gaze away from Alex. “And is it really necessary?”

  It seemed awful to even think it, but would the world be such a bad place if Etienne Boulard no l
onger occupied a spot in it? Once Jean took care of his former friend, he’d probably be willing to play political footsie again with the elves since Lily and her head had parted ways.

  “It is absolutely necessary.” Zrakovi stood up, looking at his watch again. “We can’t afford for him to go off on some vengeance-seeking mission and stir things up with the vampires and elves. And we need Etienne Boulard alive.”

  He paced the length of the room once before stopping in front of me. “Relations between all the species are more sensitive than ever after what just happened, especially given Geoffrey’s involvement. The wizards’ position is very precarious.” He frowned at me. “I wish you’d told me your suspicions about the First Elder before bringing them out in such a public way.”

  I nodded, swallowing down the scathing comments I wanted to make. Namely, that had I told him, he wouldn’t have believed me. Not without proof. “I apologize for that. He took me by surprise, trying to pin everything on me.”

  Zrakovi nodded. “Perfectly understandable. Anyway, Captain Lafitte will want revenge, and probably deserves it. But he can’t worsen our standing with the other species. I have given my guarantee that he will be held in check.” He paused and speared me with fierce brown eyes. “So hold him in check.”

  “Check. I guess.” I looked at Alex, but he was staring at the floor like Sebastian trained on a bug.

  Zrakovi held out the stinky robe. “Can you throw this damned thing away? One of Geoffrey’s stupid ideas. It’s high time some things changed back at headquarters.”

  I took the robe. It sounded like Zrakovi already had First Elder kinds of plans.

  He walked toward the transport, but Alex stepped in front of him. “Sir, could you stay a few more minutes? There’s a situation you need to be aware of.” He glanced at me. “It’s of a delicate nature.”

  Alex was nervous. Alex never got nervous. Damn it. He was going to tell Zrakovi about Eugenie.