“I’ve had Bootsie since I was a girl. My dad gave him to me for my twelfth birthday—before he and mom died in a fire. Bootsie’s all I have left of my parents. When they died—”
Wracking sobs cut off the woman’s story.
My own eyes itched. The woman reeked of taint and the cat more so, but I couldn’t help wanting to cry with her. She was Fae Kissed. She’d made a deal with a Sidhe to bring back her cat—the most precious thing in the woman’s life.
There was no way for me to know the price of animating a cat for the few years it had left. Weak and distraught as she’d been, manipulating a premium from her would’ve been easy.
I scanned the cat pictures looking for any sign of other friends or family. There weren’t any. The woman’s only source of love was the tabby, a last gift from her parents at the start of puberty.
If I get my hands on this faerie, I’m going to skin him alive.
When her sobs eased to a more controllable level, I sat on the foot stool across from her, leaned forward taking her hand. “What’s your name?”
“Emma.”
“I need to find this man. Did he give you a way to contact him?”
She shook her head.
“Did he tell you the marks he made you draw were for taking the other animals?”
Her head shot up. “That had nothing to do with me.”
“Did you draw the marks in the play area?”
“Yes, but what’s that matter? He just wanted people watching the dogs play to see his art.” She held the cat tighter, but it didn’t squirm. Her eyes narrowed. “You. I thought I recognized you. You’re the one that did that.”
“You made a deal with a faerie to bring Bootsie back to life with magic. That drawing opened a door for faeries to steal animals.”
“No. I only thought he was dead. The man gave me a medicine to wake Bootsie up. You’re the one that hurt all the animals.” Emma lurched out the chair, the cat’s bulk causing her to teeter. “I’m calling the police.”
I interposed myself between Emma and the phone on her kitchen counter. “You work with animals, you know when they’re dead.”
“No,” Emma pressed her face into the cat’s fur. “Bootsie was just sick. He wasn’t dead. He wasn’t dead.”
My heart went out to Emma. She had to know her cat died. She wasn’t an evil woman who wanted to impose her will on others. She just wanted the companionship of her cat.
Unfortunately, when challenged she’d been all too willing to tell me the story. If she knew the faerie’s name, she could give it to others that might have far worse desires.
Emma had to give up the cat as a sign of contrition, then Vilicangelus could grant her absolution, with luck excise the deal and then rewrite her memory.
I watched Emma with her cat for several moments.
There was no way Emma would ever surrender the cat, even if I tried to explain her cat wasn’t her cat, but more likely a faerie spirit inhabiting the dead body. If she refused to repent of her actions, I had to kill her. A Fae Kissed could not be allowed to exist. The knowledge she had could lead to disaster.
I have to try anyway.
“Emma, did you tell anyone else about this man?”
“No.”
“Did you get his name?”
“No.”
I cursed inwardly. I could stake out the restaurant, but without the faerie’s name I would be hard pressed to hold this event against him. At best, I’d have to catch him red handed dealing with someone else.
“Emma, you’ve made a deal with a faerie that could cost your immortal soul. You have to give Bootsie up. It’s the only way I can save you.”
Her eyes flashed up to me, all color draining from her face. She whipped around, putting her back between me and that cat, soundlessly shaking her head.
“Emma, you have to.”
“No,” Emma squeaked. “It doesn’t matter what happens to me. I can’t lose him again.”
I drew my hilt, pushing essence through to grow a blade. I didn’t want to kill Emma. She’d made a choice that demanded her death, but she didn’t deserve it. She’d done what she had for love.
The tabby’s yellow eyes fixed on me over Emma’s shoulder, not the hard defiant eyes of a faerie but the pleading eyes of an animal that sensed a beating on the horizon.
I stepped closer, wringing the knife hilt I had to drive into Bootsie’s skull.
I had to kill the possessed animal.
I had to kill Emma.
I have a duty.
I raised my knife.
I stepped, closing the last of the distance between us. One downward strike would slay the faerie abomination Emma held and hugged and soaked with tears.
I couldn’t deliver the blow.
The cat wouldn’t live many years longer. When Bootsie passed on, Emma would have time to repent of her actions. With enough time, she could still be saved.
It was my duty, but I couldn’t end the sweet woman’s life.
“Listen to me, Emma. I was never here. You must never tell breathe a word about any of this to another living soul. Never.”
She nodded into the cat’s fur.
I fixed Bootsie with my gaze. I didn’t have to speak to the faerie in the fur. It knew I was supposed to kill it, and it knew what would happen if it pushed its luck.
I left Emma’s apartment, drawing my phone from a pocket. I got Ignis’s voicemail—so much the better. “Ignis, it’s Quayla. I checked on that woman from the humane society. I, uh, didn’t find...what we expected. No need for you to worry about following her.”
The elevator down reeked of taint that made me feel sick, but not as sick as I felt lying to Ignis. I’d failed at my duty.
Maybe Vitae is right about me.
Quayla
Overwhelming nausea woke me from a sound sleep. I bolted upright, preternaturally cold and skin crawling so horribly it left literal waves. I shot a glance at Dylan.
He grunted and tossed a little. He slept deeply enough that my sudden motion didn’t wake him. The nausea vanished.
Taint, but come and gone that fast?
I threw off the top sheet and bolted to my nest. “Ani, I think we have a Veil breach.”
“Confirmed,” Anima said. “I detected a breach several seconds ago at the DeKalb Fur Family Hospital, but it’s gone now.”
“It’s not gone, they destroyed my seed. I’m going to check it out.”
“Should I notify the others?”
I glanced at the side table. The clock read a few minutes past three in the morning. “No, I can handle this.”
“You said something similar a few days ago,” Anima said.
“I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.” I fastened my jeans and scooped my backup Karambit hilts from the lingerie drawer. “This time I do.”
I descended the stairs as fast as I could while taking care to land as lightly as possible, so as not to wake Mrs. Cox. I raced down the block, leapt onto my motorcycle and put on my helmet.
I hadn’t managed to invoke my baby’s purr before Vitae’s voice exploded out of a disgruntled looking bronze angel. “Aquaylae, you will wait where you are until backup arrives at your location.”
“Vitae, there’s an incursion in progress. We have no idea what’s happening, or who they’re harming. There’s no time to waste waiting while you divert someone here.”
“Terrance wouldn’t be required to deviate his route much to pick you up,” Anima said.
“He’s out in Dallas, almost half an hour away.” I put my motorcycle into gear.
The engine died.
I shot the angel a dirty look.
The statuette glowered over folded arms, one raised foot frozen in mid tap.
“Mortals could be in danger,” I said. “At least have someone meet me en route.”
“No,” Vitae snapped. “Your judgement can’t be trusted in this.”
“I’m a full shield, Vitae, not some green fledgling!”
> “And if you were based here where you should be, you’d be central to all disturbances,” Vitae shot back.
“Fine.” I ripped off my helmet. “If I can’t drive, I’ll fly.”
“Absolutely not,” Vitae said.
“Shield Aquaylae, your form is particularly visible at night,” Anima said.
Terrance’s deep baritone escaped the statue. “Little sister.”
I froze, essence already compressed halfway to winged escape.
“I will be at your home in ten minutes,” Terrance said.
How?
“Please wait for me. I would rather no harm became you.”
“I can look after myself.”
“You proved that this week,” Vitae snapped.
“Bide a few minutes. We can look after each other,” Terrance said. “Unless you’d rather team up with our Vitae.”
I shot the bronze archangel a nasty look. “Not a chance.”
I leapt off of my baby. I folded my arms, not to warm myself in the muggy morning but to keep from flying apart—or just flying. I paced up and down the sidewalk.
I can’t believe this. I’m a full shield. I called in the breach. I shouldn’t be sitting here waiting for a babysitter. People could be dying right now!
A decades-old evergreen pickup, raised several feet off the ground, pulled to a stop behind Dylan’s car. I glowered at the truck.
Terrance reached across the seat and rolled down the window. “Are we not in a hurry, little sister?”
Damn it, he’s right.
Terrance pushed the door open as far as his fingers stretched. I jerked it the rest of the way and climbed Mount Pickup onto the old, duct-taped leather seats. Terrance’s truck roared forward as I cast around for a seatbelt.
When digging into the seat didn’t excavate one, I leveled an arched brow at him. “Where are your seatbelts?”
“They were not required when this truck was built.”
“Were wafers walking upright?”
Terrance’s laugh carried the warmth of rich farming soil.
“Aren’t you our earth phoenix? Shouldn’t you care about the environment?”
He pulled the truck onto Cobb Parkway. “I have cared for this Earth centuries beyond your time upon it, little sister.”
“If driving this fossil fuel-guzzling monstrosity is how you’ve cared—”
Warning undercut his tone. “Take care, Aquaylae.”
My tirade froze in my mouth. Terrance seldom if ever called me by my full name.
He pointed to a small dent just above the windshield over my seat. “That is where my so-named monstrosity cracked open the skull of a wyvern. My vehicle is built of steel and like myself is scarred from many victories over the Tainted Ones.”
A wyvern?
“Were you alone?”
“Other than the beast.”
I couldn’t hide my amazement. “You slew a wyvern by yourself?”
Terrance chuckled as they drove up an onramp to I-95. “When you’ve served as long as I, you learn much about the limits of a given shield.”
All by himself. I couldn’t even handle a few grendling tribes.
“Still, it was reckless of me, little sister. A Shield contains five of us for a reason. Each shield brings complimentary elements. Our strengths protect weaknesses in the others.” Terrance studied me several moments. “You needn’t fight alone to prove your worth.”
“Vitae treats me like an unskilled, untrained fledgling.”
“Vitae has seen many years, many water phoenixes. He is correct in asserting that you have not shown what you are truly capable of becoming. More training, more working with the rest of us and more confidence in your true value will help—as would less time spent recreating with mortals.”
I folded my arms and stared at a crack in the dashboard.
By time we arrived, an orange and yellow conflagration covered an entire city block. Firefighters worked in teams to halt spreading flames.
I pounded my fist against the dashboard. “We’re too late.”
Terrance rolled down his window and lifted his nose. “Faerie fire. These mortals are ill equipped to fight this battle. You must help them.”
“Me? Not us?”
“The mortals wield water as their weapon, not earth. Have you never faced faerie fire?”
I shook my head. “Just the normal kind.”
“Do you smell the taint in the wind? The shadow of their magic?”
I struggled to rotate the crank on my door that lowered the window. Frustration at the foreign motion mounted, until I gave it up and threw open the door. I lifted my nose.
Thick taint left me choking.
“Yes, a very powerful Sidhe,” Terrance said.
“I don’t understand. First, they’re abducting animals, now they’re burning down shelters?”
“Understanding will come.” Terrance gestured. “Help the mortals first.”
The fire engulfed the shelter’s block. Small fires had already spread to the closest building across the southern cross street. The fire department had the block surrounded, but even as I watched, two engine companies were forced to surrender their cornering positions and pull back another half block from the heat. Another two companies, supported by ladder trucks, held their position, spraying a four-story office build high and low.
With that much water in the air, I could transmog and smother the fire.
I grabbed the oh-shit handle, preparing my precarious descent.
Terrance seized my shoulder. “You needn’t draw attention to yourself.”
“You said I need to help them!”
“You do.”
“From here?”
“Yes.”
I barely restrained a scream. Outside my natural form, my aqua kinesis abilities remained extremely limited. “The only way I can put out that fire is—”
“Something spectacular, like swallowing the flames?” Terrance gestured. “Taking such action would reveal our kind to the world.”
Well back from the firefighters, news vans parked interspaced by utility trucks.
I scowled. “We don’t have time for this all this cloak and dagger. We need to do something now.”
“The mortals have the blaze in check for the moment.”
“That doesn’t make this the time for a lesson.”
Terrance pursed his lips. “Better the fire causes a little more property damage and you learn this lesson than the alternative.”
“Better than killing the fire now and requesting a few rewrites?”
Disappointment crept into Terrance’s gaze. “Yes, Aquaylae, either you or I could defeat these flames in a spectacular display.”
Oh, blighted hells, he called me by my full name again.
My gut filled with hollow cold. I dropped my eyes.
Terrance drew my chin back up. “The power of our Divine Ones is not infinite. Every time we rely on them rather than doing our duty to protect the secrets of our existence, we risk Faery recruiting the one Fae Kissed that pushes their influence to critical mass.
“Be sure you are hearing me, Aquaylae.” Terrance’s expression sobered. “That is why we moved closer to the mortals. That is why we continue to insist living outside the sanctum is better. This world of billions and their access to instant communications makes the possibility of hitting critical mass that much more dangerous.”
Terrance gestured, and I followed his gaze out the window to the mortal fireman throwing their lives into the path of a magical force they had no hope of stopping.
“Are there any among them that wouldn’t make a deal with the faeries for the ability to stop this enchanted inferno from consuming the city?” Terrance asked. “If humanity learned of the power the Sidhe offered, that power wouldn’t just corrupt the criminals. Our foes would usurp the souls of all of our charges. The Sidhe would pervert Creation to their purposes. They’d realize their revenge and whatever other motivations drive their need to usurp Creation.”
I stared, seeing—no feeling—the weight of his words.
12: Fighting Faerie Fire
Quayla
I returned my attention to the fire, searching the flames for ideas on how to satisfy Terrance’s requirements. Taint undercut the thick smoke and acrid stink of burned plastics.
A loud crack snatched my attention to one side. Power lines fell from their former heights onto wet pavement. Thick, uninsulated electrical wires snapped and writhed, their melted ends resembling slender vipers’ heads.
A moment later, the entire block went dark, killing the writhing of the downed power line and leaving only the fire and emergency vehicle lights to illuminate the scene.
My head shook back and forth. The mortals had no chance at all to prevail against the magical conflagration without our help. Terrance was right about revealing ourselves, but showing myself seemed the only way to extinguish the fire. This situation offered no alternatives, Vilicangelus or Summus would just have to track down and rewrite all the witnesses. “I don’t have a choice.”
“You do. Why can the mortals not slay these flames?”
“They’re bolstered by magic.”
“Correct.”
“How am I supposed to steal magic from fire?” I asked.
Terrence turned fully toward me, brows knit until they joined together. The force of his personality hit me like an avalanche. “You are not a witch, Aquaylae, but neither are you stupid.”
That’s thrice. Did I piss him off somehow? Insulting his truck?
I liked Terrance better than any other shields, but he wasn’t the only one getting pissed off. My reply sounded petulant even to me. “Then what am I exactly?”
“Young and lazy.”
“I’m not lazy!”
“Your thinking is. You look upon this problem and search for the way Aquaylae might defeat the whole and save the day. You must think beyond ego. Find a solution that relies on cooperation.”
“I don’t care about being the hero!”
“All young do. They think how they are different from their elders but feel overshadowed and thus wish to stand out even more.” He swept a hand toward the blaze. “This is not a problem for only Aquaylae.”
Ashes of Raging Water Page 11