“A faerie is a faerie, be it cold or nay. Beware. A faerie nature may twist your will, bent in shapes it doesn’t desire to fulfill.”
“Nicely rhymed.” I snapped its head off and dumped green blood in with the violet pooled at basin’s bottom. A container of my essence filled the basin enough for a single rebirth, though the green and violet swirled atop the red like oil atop water.
I slid a knife’s blade up and along one wrist and bled into the basin, mixing the blood with my other hand. Vertigo and nausea seized me. I repositioned so that the blood flowing from my wrist could not go astray and waited for death.
These amoral monsters must be stopped. For the good of my Shield...for Mare...
7: Vulgar Fairies
Judith
Judith woke, sore and satisfied. She stretched out on the bed, her movement pulling the shirt until the collar tightened enough to choke her. Her eyes flashed open. She lay fully dressed in a strange bedroom surrounded by a horde of short, unbathed midgets straight from a Medieval Times show.
Oh, God. Oh, God.
She sat up, backing against the headboard and snatching a lamp from the nearest bedside table. She brandished the light, trying to remember where she was and how she had gotten there.
The bedroom door opened to admit the hairiest, ugliest mostly-naked man Judith had ever seen. He had to be a head taller than the others. He stunk of rot and something coppery and he hadn’t brushed his pointy teeth in at least three meals.
A snide voice called from the other room. “I told you to get dressed first.”
The ugly man turned away and trudged out the door.
Judith sprang up onto her feet, leapt over the midgets and out the door. Pain shot up her leg. Strong fingers jerked her back by one leg. She hit the floor face first, looking down to find long bloody furrows along the calf in the ugly man’s hands.
The snide voice belonged to a handsome man stirring coffee on the opposite side of Quayla’s breakfast bar. “Forget it. The law keeper’s ready, just glamour yourself and go.”
“Help me, please?” Judith begged.
“Sorry, love, not much I can do for you.”
“Just let me go. I won’t say anything about...anything.”
He shook his head, adding honey to the steaming drink. “No can do. The bait never gets to go home.”
Snickers floated into the room from the clogged bedroom door.
I have to get out of here.
Judith kicked ugly in the balls. She bolted for the door, agony blinding her every time she put the slightest weight on her sliced leg. She managed the door as several strong hands jerked her back inside.
Ugly slammed the door. “Can’t we knock her out?”
“No,” the man sipped his drink and added more honey. “She needs to motivate the law keeper.”
Someone pounded on the door.
Judith fought them.
She kicked.
She screamed for help.
Despite their size, she couldn’t free herself from their incredible strength.
Mrs. Cox
Hadley crested the second-floor stairwell. Another scream and series of thumps drew her toward Quayla’s apartment. The door opened. In the blink of an eye, Quayla’s assistant from the flower shop appeared and was then jerked backward.
The door slammed shut.
My door.
Hadley knocked as hard as she could.
The door sprang back open. An ugly naked thing appeared in the doorway. He inhaled several times, face contorting. Horrid yellow eyes narrowed, pupils blazing with hatred. He spat in Hadley’s face. “Get lost, granny, you’re not invited.”
He slammed the door once more.
She glowered at the door.
No one—naked or otherwise—slams my door in my face. Oh no, they certainly do not do such a thing and get away with it.
Hadley marched back down the stairs and into her apartment. She jerked the phone off the table beside her rocking chair and dialed Quayla’s number from memory. She paced while it rang, inadvertently getting tangled in its cord.
The call went to voicemail.
“Quayla, dear, this is Hadley Cox. I think your little helper from the flower shop just got abducted into some sort of free love shenanigans going on in your apartment. You know how I feel about shenanigans, young lady. I expect you to come set this right...oh, and I do hope you’re feeling better. Miss you, dear.”
Hadley hung up.
If you want something done right.
She crossed to an old trunk, pushed the afghan off of its top, unlocked it and opened the lid to expose a massive, ancient book. The tome opened to the page she’d wanted. She ran a finger down the handwriting, glancing twice at the artwork before gently closing the book and settling it back in the trunk.
She marched to her greenhouse in the backyard. She snatched up a sickle and garden sheers, going to work on an unharvested elderberry bush. She took the fresh berries back into the building and up the stairs. She stopped once more on the second landing, frowning up at Quayla’s door.
Couldn’t hurt to try it.
She returned to her apartment and unfolded the flaps of a cardboard box at the bottom of one closet. She dug out some clothes abandoned by a long-gone renter, hanging a pair of pants and a shirt over one shoulder.
Hadley climbed upstairs once more. She laid out elderberries across the third-floor landing from Quayla’s door to the top of the stairs. She checked her gardening tools tucked behind her back and knocked.
The nasty naked man poked his head out the door. “What do you want, old bag?”
“Oh, dearie me, I just wanted to ask you if you’d clean up these elderberries. Someone might slip on them and fall down the stairs.”
He blinked at her.
Several goblins pressed past him, fighting to get to the berries.
She followed. “No need to fight. Here, let me help.”
Hadley shoved them down the stairs, glaring after them. “I don’t abide shenanigans!”
A hand spun her around. The hobgoblin bared its teeth and raised a claw to strike her. She ripped the clothes from over her shoulder and shoved them into its arms.
He blinked down at them, then her.
She frowned. “In folklore, giving a hobgoblin clothes makes it leave.”
“Crazy old bat!” He reared back to strike her.
Her sickle impaled its forehead. “I told Nana that folktale was poppycock.”
Judith screamed through her gag.
Hadley yanked the sickle from its head and waved it at the goblins surrounding the young florist. “Release that young woman. I will not put up with no-good goblins abducting people from my apartment building.”
They picked up an arm chair and ran it at her like a ram.
Hadley sidestepped in front of apartment 3D.
The goblins lost momentum turning their charge, but pushed her back against the other apartment door in the narrow stairwell. The others swarmed behind the makeshift blockade and down the stairs, suspending Judith atop their shoulders.
The glass in the ground floor entry rattled shut a moment later.
“Well, poop.”
Detective Foxner
Sabrina blinked.
Her body ached.
The scent of recent sex filled her car.
The last thing she remembered was dragging the good-for-nothing purse snatcher into the doors of her precinct. Her phone verified it was still the same day, but she’d lost several hours.
Her frown deepened.
She was fully dressed. True, her muscles glowed the way they did after a wonderful night’s sex, but that wasn’t possible. Her body hurt too, like she’d overdone things at the gym or three days of—she pushed away the thought and tried to remember how’d she had ended up in her car parked near Quayla Buckler’s apartment.
She hadn’t felt as contented and wrung out for some time.
Not since before I told Mary...
A bu
rst of activity saved her from dark memories. A horde of small, dirty-looking men in some sort of theater costume exploded down the front steps of the apartment building. The junior florist from Ponds De Leon Flowers thrashed atop their shoulders. She worked her gag free and screamed.
They hurried across the street and shoved the woman into a windowless panel van.
Sabrina turned on her light, blipped her siren and stepped out of her car. “Stop where you are.”
One of the little men turned toward her. He flipped her the bird. Her vision swam, resolving into a wall of white.
Doors slammed.
Sabrina stumbled forward. White eased away enough for her to see them pull away down the street.
She hurried back into her car, wiping her eyes but unable to hurry away the fog across her vision. She followed anyway, siren blaring to help keep cars from her path.
The van turned left. The rapid direction change cost the van’s back tires traction. They slid into a parked car with a crunch.
Kidnapping, hit and run, speeding.
She took the turn too fast too, but managed to avoid hitting the blurry parked cars and swerve around a car blaring its horn at the van. Their two vehicles wove left and right. It took all of Sabrina’s training and no small amount of luck to keep up with the escaping vehicle.
I’ve never seen a van move like this.
“Dispatch, this is Detective Foxner,” She rattled off her badge number, “I’m in pursuit of a suspected kidnapping and requesting backup.”
“This is dispatch, we have your locator, Detective. Sending available units to assist in pursuit. Please provide regular pursuit updates.”
The van raced deeper into Atlanta, leaving behind the older Marietta neighborhoods of Buckler’s apartment building.
Come on, come on.
She tapped her left foot on the floorboards.
They turned onto North Cobb Parkway, weaving through traffic. They turned hard left, nearly ending up on two wheels as they cut off a pair of young bicyclists in their hurry to round the corner in front of the Big Chicken.
She looked over the frightened kids as she followed, ensuring them nothing more than shaken. The van headed for a far overpass.
Bet they don’t know this one has no highway access.
She floored the accelerator, trying to catch up on the long straightaway. Her car proved its muscle, nearly catching the van. They turned hard right, vaulting into the Whole Foods parking lot. They cut off an old gremlin covered on all sides by pagan coexist stickers—its driver flipping them off.
The van swerved hard twice, rocketing into the truck loading area behind the shopping strip.
Gotcha.
Sabrina radioed in their location and pushed her skills for all they were worth. One loading semi and she’d be able to box them in even without backup.
She slid around the corner with a squeal of tires.
She cheered her good fortune.
The van barreled toward the semi-truck trying to line its trailer up with a loading zone.
Sabrina accelerated.
So did the van.
She spied a small gap between the truck’s cab and a retention wall. The van didn’t veer toward it, but rather charged straight at the trailer.
Sabrina’s heart leapt into her throat.
They’re going to kill themselves and Buckler’s helper.
The van shrank, squished downward on widening tires by some unseen hand.
Sabrina blinked again and again, unable to believe what her eyes told her as the van drove under the trailer. Shock grabbed her and held on, nearly causing her to collide with the tractor trailer. A hard right then left cost her traction, but she squeezed between the semi and the wall only losing her passenger side mirror.
The van came back into view, returned to its former dimensions.
She floored the accelerator once more.
The van’s back doors flew open. Two of the kidnappers played one-handed patty cake in the opening. Their game ceased, ending in twin rude gestures.
An enormous brick wall rose out of the ground, spanning the entire loading area.
She slammed on her brakes, and turned away to minimize impact inertia. She braced herself for a crash and subsequent side and front air bag impacts.
Her car stopped.
She opened her eyes.
Graffiti painted the brick wall in garish colors. “Screw off, pig. Huff and Puff somewhere else!”
“Dispatch, I lost them due...to a sudden obstruction. Have any of the other units got them?”
“One moment, Detective.”
Sabrina took long deep breaths.
I can’t have seen what I think I saw. It’s not possible.
“Negative, Detective, none of the units moving to assist have eyes on your suspects.”
Sabrina cursed. “Thank you, dispatch.”
I sure as hell hope the cameras got all that.
8: Stolen Treasures
Quayla
I turned the old vellum page with care. Despite the library’s lack of novels, it remained a peaceful place to rest between essence transfers when I grew stir crazy or sleep refused to come.
Even days later, the events of our last meeting left me unsettled.
I’ve never seen Ignis like that.
Vitae entered.
He visited the library often, preferring to read in his study and thus offered only a temporary nuisance. His shadow fell over me. I ignored him, hoping the dark cloud would blow away.
It didn’t.
I raised my eyes from the pages of: Primal Battle, A Primer on Essence Warfare.
“You have a guest,” Vitae said
“Quayla?” Dylan stood at the library’s entrance.
I dropped the book and leapt out of my chair. I hit him like a runaway trolley, evoking a grunt.
“Good thing I decided to forgi—”
I pressed my lips into his, already tasting the salt of tears escaping my eyes. I poured myself into the kiss, trying to fill him with every bit of my love. Dylan answered back. His warmth filled me in return, swelling my heart until the overflow added to our passion.
Vitae stepped around us. The library door closed with a click.
“Shield Quayla...,” Anima said.
Oh, God, don’t let there be a breech.
“Your paramour’s vitals indicate a need for oxygen,” Anima said.
I eased away, cheeks burning with embarrassment. “I’m sorry.”
Dylan’s lips quirked. “Pretty much how every man wants to die.”
I flashed a mischievous look. “Every man wants to suffocate with my tongue down their throat?”
“You know, there’s really no good answer here.”
Warmth shot through me. I’d missed him and his sense of humor more than I’d even realized.
“Is it my imagination or are you even smaller than before?”
“I died,” I said.
“Way Vitae told it, you saved him and the whole Shield.” Dylan ran fingers through my chin-length hair. “There’s a shimmer of blue in your hair now.”
“At least it isn’t frizzy.”
His eyes caressed me top to bottom.
“You’re not going to freak out, are you? It was a bad situation, I only did what I had to do.”
His brows rose. “Do I get to go exploring again?”
I rolled my eyes and batted at him. “I can’t believe you’re here or that Vitae let you in.”
Dylan raised a card. “I have my own access.”
I gaped, words log-jammed in my head.
“So, I’m supposed to evaluate your computer system for upgrades.”
“Dylan meet Ani, Ani—don’t steal my boyfriend.”
“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Dylan,” Anima said. “Despite any desire I might have to experience your racing heartrate and the endorphins shooting through your body, Quayla, Dylan and I are not compatible.”
“You’ve got an AI capable of
humor and you expect me to upgrade your system?” Dylan asked.
“Shield Caelum has made minor upgrades, but the sanctuary’s systems are in need of upgrades,” Anima said. “Our Praefectus has several enhancement items in mind.”
Dylan laughed, head shaking as he pulled out a new cell phone. “Here, you better take this before this charming young lady steals all of my attention. It’s from Vitae.”
“Did Vitae apologize to you?” I asked.
“He did, and he paid me to get you a phone that you’d like.”
Maybe Vitae isn’t so bad after all. Maybe he was just a victim after all.
“I ported over your number,” Dylan said. “I hope you don’t mind.”
I kissed him again, joy flowing through me like an endless spring.
“Feel like a little exploration?” I asked.
His heated expression made my insides melt.
“Before that, Ani, where is Vitae? I owe him an apology.”
“Vitae left a few minutes ago. You and Dylan are the only ones in headquarters,” Anima said.
That was awfully accommodating of him, which doesn’t feel right.
“Was there a breech you didn’t tell me about?”
“No, Shield Quayla.”
Why would the Shieldheart leave his nest of comforts without a breech to compel him?
I frowned. “It seems odd that he’d leave without a breech. Is it normal for a Vitae to leave the sanctum like that?”
“No. It’s generally accepted for a shield to remain in residence, in most cases the Shieldheart.”
“But I’m here, so he’s got to go cover for me.”
“Vitae has had to function as replacement in your convalescence. It is his honor to do so.”
I’m sure he thinks so.
I stopped myself.
I have to give him more credit. He was tainted, essentially sickened out of his right mind.
“Are there any active breeches?”
“Not at this time,” Anima said.
I grabbed Dylan’s hand. “Come on, you can work with Ani once we’re done.”
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