Careless Wishes

by Amy Sumida

  “How do you activate it?” Kill asked.

  “It's a series of manipulations.” She showed him.

  “That's some Indiana Jones shit,” Killian noted.

  The Lady frowned at him in confusion as she moved back into the vault and out of his way.

  “Sorry.” He waved it away as he followed her in. “Never mind.”

  “Who would know how to activate the locks?” Raza asked Ladli.

  “Only my people,” Ladli said grimly. “But, as I already said, all of my people have been accounted for and I have had the sanctuary secretly searched. The Cintamani is not here.”

  “One of them could have taken it down this tunnel, passed it to a partner, and returned to the sanctuary,” Killian suggested.

  “It is not one of my people,” Ladli said firmly. “Their lives center around this sanctuary and the sanctuary centers around the Cintamani. They would never be a party to its theft.”

  “All right.” I held up a placating hand. “Are you certain that no one else knows about the tunnel?”

  “Well, no, not anymore.” She waved her hand at the passage. “Obviously someone discovered the secret. I just can't fathom how. Unless...” She blinked.

  “Unless what?” Killian prompted.

  “No, that would have been centuries ago. No one would know to look for it.”

  “Explain it to us anyway,” Raza commanded.

  The Lady drew herself up and took a breath. “When the Fey came for the Cintamani, the followers of Buddha agreed that the stone should be protected. They helped us build the sanctuary and it was one of them who suggested that we include a way out in case we were attacked. But it can't be any of them; they were human. They're long dead.”

  “Perhaps one of them wrote it down,” I suggested.

  “No, they knew how important secrecy was,” she protested.

  “People talk.” Killian leaned against the wall near the tunnel's entrance. “It's in their nature. One of them mentions his great idea to a friend or a lover or even his child and then they mention it to someone else and so on. All it takes is one person.”

  “No, they wouldn't speak of it,” the Lady protested again.

  “Someone did.” I pointed at the empty pillow. “Someone talked and someone else wrote it down and finally, after years and years, when it all became a myth, some fairy found it and recognized it for what it really was—a treasure map.”

  Ladli deflated but it was partially in relief. “That would explain it.”

  “All right, let's get this over with,” Daxon muttered.

  “What?” I asked.

  “We're going down the tunnel, aren't we?” He shot back. “There could be evidence in there.”

  “Evidence?” Ladli asked.

  “Hair, fibers, blood, whatever.” He shrugged.

  I chuckled. “You've been watching too many cop shows, Dax.”

  “But he's right,” Killian defended him. “You never know what the thief may have left behind. Hell, even if it's a whiff of cologne, that could help. I'm flying blind here; I'm willing to try anything.”

  “Fair enough,” I conceded. “Lead on, Kill.”

  We headed for the tunnel, the Lady included.

  “A whiff of cologne?” Tiernan asked Killian. “When did you become a Bargest?”

  Killian flicked his tongue at Tiernan. “Snakes smell with their tongues, dude.”

  “That's rather disgusting.” Tiernan made a face.

  “They also have two cocks,” Kill added nonchalantly.

  Tiernan's face shifted from disgust to shock as everyone went quiet. Then they looked at me for confirmation.

  I blushed and looked away.

  “You have two dicks?” Daxon asked partly in horror and partly in envy.

  “When I want to.” Killian grinned broadly. “It took me awhile to realize it was possible, and it freaked out Seren the first time. You should have seen her face...” he trailed off when he saw my current face, then cleared his throat. “Anyway. Yeah, two.” He cracked his neck.

  “Why would that be necessary?” Raza asked with the baffled curiosity of a scholar.

  “I don't know.” Killian shrugged. “Why do you have a bone above yours?”

  “To pleasure my mate,” Raza said as if it were obvious. Which it was.

  “Oh. Yeah. Well, so do my two penises.” Killian grinned. “Just think about it a second. Imagine the possibilities.”

  Raza thought about it. From the look on his face, he was displeased with the possibilities. I'm not sure if that was because he didn't like the options or didn't like the fact that they were only options for Killian. Then again, Djinn can take any shape. Perhaps it was an option for Raza as well.

  A little thrill of excitement ran through me.

  “You said that it took you awhile to realize that you had them.” Daxon gave Killian's crotch a narrowed stare. “How do you not notice a second dick? Is it really tiny?”

  “It's usually just one. The second one only emerges when it's needed, if you catch my drift.” Killian waved his hand in front of his crotch. “And you can stop staring; there's only one dick in my pants at the moment.”

  “They're actually called 'hemipenes' collectively and 'hemipenis' individually,” the Lady said with the tone of a teacher. “It wasn't evident at first because the second penis is inverted and doesn't emerge until either the first is depleted or the male desires to utilize both at once.”

  We all froze and slowly turned toward the back of our tunnel line, where Lady Ladli stood, beaming at us. We'd completely forgotten that she had come along on the tunnel jaunt. I was horrified that my husbands had been talking about penises in front of her and they were too. All except for Killian.

  “You know about them?” Killian asked eagerly.

  “Of course, we Nagas are the same,” she declared. “Females even have a hemiclitoris. It's probably your relation to Snake-Djinn. Their anatomy is very similar to that of Nagas.”

  “What?” I gaped at her. “You've two clitorises?”

  Great, now I sounded like Daxon.

  “Yes.” She grinned as brightly as Killian had.

  And why wouldn't she? She had two clits! Two! Talk about double your pleasure. Then again, with the amount of pleasure my husbands already gave me, doubling it might leave me in a coma.

  “Nagas are very sexual,” Ladli went on. “We invented Tantric sex, you know?”

  “Really?” Daxon drawled in fascination. “Then you must know all sorts of rare techniques and positions.”

  “Oh, yes.” Her grin widened.

  “We need to talk,” Daxon concluded.

  “Can we get back to my hemipenes?” Killian asked.

  “Yes, of course!” the Lady said as I groaned. “To answer King Raza's question: there are a couple of reasons for the two penises. Each one has its own testis so having two gives the male the chance to continue relations after the first is spent, thereby proving his virility. This is important since Nagini—that's what we call our females—can store semen for many years and choose which sperm we use to fertilize our eggs.”

  “I'm sorry, what?” Tiernan asked with a slow blink. “Did you just say that you can store semen and choose which to use?”

  “Yes. This is especially helpful since we Fey only become fertile every hundred years,” she went on. “Nagini can mate with several men, then decide later who they want to father their children. It's an important decision; we must choose the very best so that our race has the best chance of continuing.”

  “Talk about pressure,” Killian muttered.

  “Exactly!” Ladli agreed. “And thus, our males have two penises, which give them better odds of impressing their partner. Also, they come in handy for orgies.” Her grin turned lascivious.

  “And on that note...” I turned and fled down the tunnel.

  “Is Her Majesty not a fan of orgies?” The Lady whispered her question to my men but the tunnel acoustics and my excellent hearing ensured
that I heard her.

  I was seriously rethinking the appropriateness of her title.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Killian produced a little flashlight and directed its bright beam over every inch of the tunnel floor. He didn't actually conduct a smell test—Raza seemed to be taking care of that—but instead resorted to the more human technique of investigating—looking. While he was doing that, I searched for any lingering auras but didn't find anything.

  “We know he didn't come through the rath,” Daxon noted. “So, he had to make the trek up here on foot.”

  “It's a long journey,” Ladli said. “Unless he was already in the area, he'd first have to travel to the Wan Village; it's the last place you can reach by vehicle. He'd likely be coming from Delhi and that trip takes roughly twenty-four hours. Once he reached the Wan Village, he'd have to go the rest of the way on foot.”

  “Would he need a guide?” Killian asked over his shoulder.

  “Not necessarily.” The Lady frowned. “The trail from Wan to Roopkund is clear—anyone could follow it. That being said, most of the people we see come with a tour group.”

  “This man wouldn't come with a group.” Tiernan shook his head. “I doubt he'd want to bother with humans and he definitely wouldn't want witnesses.”

  The Lady nodded. “He'd likely hire a mule, though. It's about 13 hours on foot, with campsites along the way.”

  “13 hours for a human,” Raza amended. “A fairy could probably do it in half the time. Without a mule. If he's a shifter, he could do it in even less.”

  “If he was talented enough with his Air beag, he could fly. He'd just need to stop several times to recover but it would be much faster than walking,” I agreed. “And depending on what his mór was, he could have other advantages too.”

  “Exactly.” Raza took another deep breath and frowned. “I smell something.”

  “You do?” Killian stood up and took a deep breath, then added his tongue to it. “Huh. Yeah, that scent doesn't belong to any of us.”

  Raza closed his eyes and breathed deeply again. “I've got it now. If we get anywhere near him, I'll know it.”

  “See?” Killian smacked Tiernan on the chest. “What did I tell ya?”

  “You didn't pick up the scent, Raza did,” Tiernan said with a smug expression.

  “The point is that I could have.” Killian grimaced and went back to scanning the ground. “And I did, just not until after Raza drew my attention to it.”

  “Where's the nearest rath?” I asked Ladli. “I mean, besides yours.”

  Ladli considered this. “There's one in Delhi. Your father should be able to contact the Rath Lord, Your Majesty.”

  “Thank you.” I pulled out my scry phone and called out, “King Keir of Twilight.”

  My father answered with a background of laughing children. He grinned at me, then the angle of my view changed. He had to be on his scry phone.

  “Seren!” Then Dad angled his head to call over his shoulder, “It's Mommy!”

  My babies gave a united cry of delight.

  “Give them a kiss for me,” I said with a grin. “But I can't talk to them right now, Dad. I need you to contact the Rath Lord of Delhi as soon as possible.”

  My dad went serious. “What for?”

  “We need to know if anyone came through his rath recently and if so, who they were. Specifically, I'm looking for a man, likely Sidhe, blond with fair skin, who would have come through two to three days ago, then left either today or a bit earlier. He may not have left yet, depending on how fast he's traveling.”

  “Got it.” He nodded. “Give me a few minutes and I'll scry you back.”

  “Thanks, Dad.” I ended the call and looked over at Killian.

  He'd made it several feet down the tunnel and only the Lady and Tiernan had stayed behind with me.

  “How are the children?” Tiernan asked.

  “You heard them; they sounded happy.”

  Tiernan looked away.

  “Did you want to speak to Fal?” I asked, realizing my mistake.

  He shrugged. I glanced at Ladli, who was watching us with a little frown.

  “My husbands, all but Killian, haven't been separated from our children since their birth,” I explained.

  “Oh!” Ladli declared sympathetically. “It can be hard to leave a child behind. They are so precious.”

  “My son and I are very close,” Tiernan said softly.

  I took his hand. I'd been so focused on Raza losing his daddy mind that I hadn't considered that the other men might be just as upset, only better at hiding it.

  “I'll get him on the phone for you when—”

  My scry phone chimed, cutting me off. I touched the slice of enchanted crystal and my father's face came into focus.

  “He's had two fairies come through the rath fitting your description and parameters. I've written down their names, races, and kingdom affiliations as well as the date and times they used the rath. Do you need me to read it off for you?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “Stanen Burns came through two days ago at 8:56 AM Delhi time and hasn't returned,” my father said. “He's Unseelie Sidhe, visiting friends in Delhi.”

  “Did you get an address for his friends?”

  “No. We may have gotten stricter about rath use, but not to that point.”

  “Okay, what about the other one?”

  “Mattias Sleet. Seelie Sidhe, came through a day before Stanen and returned just this morning. Said he was sightseeing.”

  “Sightseeing, eh?” I grimaced at Tiernan.

  “Is it bad, Seren?” Keir asked.

  “Not yet. But it could become so.”

  Keir nodded. “Should we shut down the raths?”

  I blinked. “Dad, we're on Earth right now.”

  “I meant for non-royal, non-Hunter travelers. You don't want to be chasing these men across two realms.”

  “Good point.” I looked at Tiernan for input.

  “I don't know,” Tiernan said. “I don't like the idea of leaving our people stranded here.”

  “It would only be temporary,” my father reasoned. “Just until you catch the thief.”

  “I'll consider it,” Tiernan said diplomatically.

  “Go ahead and shut down the Twilight raths, Dad. At the moment, we know where these two suspects are and I'd like to keep it that way.”

  “Very well.”

  “Oh, before you go, can you put Falcas on? Tiernan wants to say hi.”

  “Of course!” My dad's expression instantly brightened. “Falcas! Your father wants to speak with you.”

  As Tiernan talked to his son, I went down the tunnel to find the other men and see if they wanted to speak to their children as well. Killian had finished his search and they were just heading back to us.

  “Tiernan's on the scry phone with Falcas,” I announced. “Does anyone else want to—” the men hurried past me before I could finish. “That answers that.” I chuckled and followed them.

  Killian let Raza and Daxon take the lead, holding back to walk with me. “I checked outside the tunnel on the lake end and found a boot print. I know it's not much and we're not going to be checking Fey boots, but I snapped a picture with a dollar bill beside it for reference.”

  “It's better than nothing. We've got a scent, a boot print, and two suspects. I think we're doing pretty good.”

  “Two suspects?” He cocked his head at me. “What the hell happened while I was checking the tunnel?”

  “I had my father scry the Lord of the Delhi Rath,” I explained. “Two Sidhe matching the description Rowan gave you came through it recently—one a couple of days ago and the other the day before that. One of them returned to Seelie just this morning but the other is still in Delhi.”

  “Did you tell Dad to close the raths?”

  I grinned. “You're really good at this.”

  Kill shrugged. “I've been doing it awhile now.”

  “To answer your question:
yes, he's going to close them. Tiernan's not sure if he wants to close the Seelie raths, and I haven't spoken to Raza yet.”