“You are an honest mongrel,” Zav said, “I’ll grant you that.”
“Thanks so much. You’re not using me.”
“We’ll see.” The violet glow to his eyes brightened, and he smiled again, then turned and walked into the stone wall.
Once again, his aura vanished from my senses far more abruptly than it should have. My legs almost buckled at the cessation of power. Mom came over and gripped my arm.
I wanted to wave her away, to say I was fine, but my muscles were rubbery and unreliable. I took a few deep breaths, refusing to fall or pass out in front of a lava golem and her entire clan of refugees.
“So, uh, Greemaw.” I focused on her and tried to pretend nothing had happened, while hoping that Zav had taken off and I would never see him again. “I believe we were negotiating? For your assistance?”
She gripped her broad chin with one massive hand. “Zavryd came to check on us when he learned you were heading here. I have crossed paths with his family before, in another realm, another time.”
“Are they all so delightful?”
She chuckled, the sound like rocks grating together. “He is young for a dragon, with much to prove to his family. Believe it or not, he would be considered polite and reasonable for one of their kind.”
“Reasonable! He wants to dangle me as bait until some villain succeeds in killing me.” I envisioned the black dragon version of Zav flying all over the West Coast with me tethered to one of his legs, hanging upside down thousands of feet in the air as wyverns and harpies and who knew what else flew at me with spears.
“Many dragons kill lesser beings—” Greemaw touched her own chest to include herself in the group, “—or keep them as slaves. Were I not too old for war, I would fight beside his family, to ensure they continue to hold majority power in the Dragon Ruling Council and Justice Court.”
I had a headache and couldn’t articulate how little I cared about dragon courts and councils.
“Even so,” Greemaw said, extending her hand, palm upward, “I will admit it tickles me to see someone stand up to a dragon. That audacity will get you killed, but for today, I will help you if I can. Show me the vial.”
My audacity had helped the situation? There was a first. I laid the vial on her palm, hoping she had a gentler touch than the size of her hand suggested.
“It takes heat to make the sigil visible,” I said.
Mom cleared her throat and held up her lighter in offering.
“Not necessary.” Greemaw focused on her palm, and the gray stone took on the orange color of a hot charcoal ember.
I could feel the heat from a couple of feet in front of her. Rather than trying to manipulate the vial with her large fingers, she used her power to levitate it into the air. It spun slowly, and she paused it to peer through the opening to the bottom. The elegant sigil was once again illuminated.
“I thought it might be elven, but my mother disagreed, and we didn’t find it in any of her language books.”
“That is because—” Greemaw allowed the vial to lower to her palm and extended it to me, “—that is a symbol from the special alchemical language of the dark elves.”
“Dark elves? The ones that used to live underground and war with the light elves—or regular old elves, as we talk about them now—in Norse mythology?”
“They have warred with the sunlight elves for all of eternity and across many worlds,” Greemaw said.
“Haven’t they been gone from Earth for centuries and centuries?” Mom asked.
“As far as I know, that’s the belief.” I pulled out my phone, intending to text Willard and ask if she’d heard differently, but the magic that kept this place hidden also blocked cell signals. “I’ll check with my boss later. If there are dark elves hanging out in Seattle, she would be the one to know.”
But if she did know, wouldn’t she have mentioned it in passing at some point? And would such beings, considered evil by the surface elves, have been able to fly under the radar for centuries?
Maybe it wasn’t dark elves at all but someone who’d gotten ahold of one of the race’s ancient alchemy books and learned to make a vial and a potion to get at Willard. That made more sense to me.
“Seattle,” Greemaw said the name slowly, as if it weren’t familiar. “What was that place called in past times?”
“I’m not sure what it would have been called when the last volcano erupted, if that’s what you mean.” I waved toward Paulina Peak again. “The Duwamish were the natives that occupied the land where the city now is.”
“Ah, yes. It is a newer city, by your definition of that. If dark elves live there, they would have come relatively recently. They cannot stand the sunlight, so they can only be someplace with tunnels or caves.”
“Maybe they were hanging out over in Forks with the vampires.” I meant it as a joke, but Greemaw shook her head.
“Even a rainforest would not be dark enough for them to come out in the daylight. The sun burns them quickly, but they grow ill even under cloud cover. They will come out on a cloudy night, but never when the moon is present in the sky.”
“Thank you for the information.” I doubted I was dealing with real dark elves, but at least I had a starting point now for researching potions that could have hurt Willard. I didn’t know any alchemists back in Seattle, but I was positive there had to be some in a city that big, and I would find them.
12
“When you said your work—your life—is dangerous, I didn’t fully grasp how dangerous.” Mom looked at me from the passenger seat as we drove back to Bend.
“The dragon has taken it to a new level this week, but it’s not uncommon for the magical to attack me. I’ve been killing their kind for almost twenty years, first as a soldier and now as a government contractor. They don’t seem to realize that the ones I kill are horrible criminals and it would be best not to associate with them. They don’t get it that I won’t come after them unless they do something really, really wrong. It’s frustrating.”
As evinced by my white knuckles around the steering wheel. And the tightness in my chest again. I felt the need to grab the inhaler, but I didn’t want to do it in front of Mom. In front of anyone. The only saving grace was that, so far, I’d been more prone to the lung constriction when I was in a quiet albeit stressful situation than when I was in battle. Maybe adrenaline helped keep the airways open. But could I count on that to last? I didn’t know.
Rocket whapped his tail against the upholstery, wagging in sympathy. Or maybe he was showing relief that I’d dismissed Sindari.
I’d sent him back to his realm, wanting him to be fresh if that dragon showed up again and I needed him. I was still almost shaking with anger at Zav’s audacity to want to use me as bait. If he showed up again to arrest someone I was in the middle of battling, I didn’t know what I would do, but I would complain vehemently.
Maybe it was possible to lodge a protest with his vaunted Dragon Justice Court. I would just have to figure out how to mail letters through a temporary magical portal to another world. No biggie.
“If you did something to help them,” Mom said, “the good ones, maybe your reputation would improve.”
I almost said there weren’t any good ones, but that wasn’t fair. Greemaw had helped me, and it wasn’t like the kids with the balls and pool toys had been oozing evil. Just because their families had fled their original worlds didn’t mean they were all criminals. Even if that was what I’d been taught during my military training, I’d seen plenty of examples otherwise over the years, so I knew better.
“Help them, how? It’s not like I’m rich enough to start a foundation.”
“Maybe you could hunt the people that hunt them for sport.”
I shot her a semi-confused look. “Is that a thing?”
“Greemaw said it was. That’s why she’s invited so many to her secure valley. Some of the beings we saw were there to visit and trade, but a lot of them are too weak to fight groups of people with guns, so
they’re hiding under her protection. They worry that if they defend themselves and kill a human, someone like you will come after them.”
“I wouldn’t. I research my contracts before I accept them.” I did now. Now that I was an independent. Once, I hadn’t had the choice, and there had been a few assignments that had been less than clearcut.
“I doubt they know that.”
“I’ll keep your suggestion in mind, but helping Colonel Willard is my priority right now.”
“I understand.” Mom removed her boots, plunking them down, along with her socks, and put her feet against the dashboard.
“Are you really seventy-one?”
“Do you ask because I’m far too healthy and spry to be so old or because you think retired people can’t be quirky?”
“Yes.”
She snorted. “I’m surprised you got the year right. You haven’t been around for a birthday in a long time. Or invited me to visit for any of yours.”
“I know.” I didn’t want to argue again, so I left it at that.
“Though now I understand a little better why,” she admitted softly without looking at me. “That werewolf almost got me. My bullets didn’t do anything against it.”
Not sure what to say, I took the exit and headed toward her neighborhood.
“Should I get some silver bullets?” Mom asked. “I saw someone selling them in town and thought it was silly, but now I wonder. That’s the correct course against werewolves, isn’t it?”
“Silver is toxic to them, yes. You’d still have to plow one into their heart or brain to achieve a quick death. They’re hard to kill.”
“So I saw.”
There were two black cars with government plates waiting in the gravel driveway as we approached. It had only been a matter of time.
I was tempted to keep driving, zip around the block, drop Mom off somewhere safe, and head back to Seattle, but two agents in gray suits were standing outside and waiting. They looked right at us. Not that I couldn’t still run—I imagined the local news reporting on a high-speed chase through their quiet tourist town—but if I wanted my words to Zav to be true, that I wasn’t a criminal, I couldn’t flee.
Reluctantly, I pulled in behind their cars. Dimitri’s van was in its usual spot, in the gravel beside the driveway, but I didn’t see him around.
The agents’ eyebrows arched when Mom exited the car and let Rocket out. There was a mixture of golden and silver fur all over the back seat. I hoped Lieutenant Sudo had to clean it.
“Hello, gents,” I said once I got out. “If you’re here for the car, I’m going to assume you brought another one that I can use. Did Lieutenant Sudo tell you about how my Jeep was wrecked in the line of duty?”
The two men, both clean-shaven except for bland mustaches, exchanged long looks with each other.
“Ms. Thorvald,” one agent said, stepping forward. “We’re taking you into custody under suspicion of colluding with Colonel Willard to embezzle tens of thousands of dollars from the U.S. Army Occult Research Department in Seattle. There’s an additional charge for stealing a government car.”
“It’s not stolen. It’s right there. You can have it.” I buckled on my weapons, hiding the movement behind the open car door, while debating my options. I needed to get back to Seattle and find an alchemist to heal Willard. And it looked like I needed to clear her name—and mine, too, damn it. I couldn’t get stuck in jail.
But if I beat the crap out of these guys and ran off, I might be labeled a criminal forever, never getting a chance to clear anybody’s names. Worse, I’d end up with every cop in Seattle chasing me while I tried to figure out how to save Willard. I needed the government to work with me, or at least not oppose me.
“Will you come along without resisting arrest?” One agent eyed me warily.
He shouldn’t have been able to see the magically camouflaged Chopper and Fezzik, but he looked like he suspected they were there. Too bad. I would rather have been eyed dismissively. If they knew all about me, it would be difficult to slip away from them. Maybe I would get an opportunity on the way back. So long as they didn’t take my charms and I could still access Sindari…
Did they know about them? I had no idea how much Willard had recorded in my file.
“Yes,” I replied. “I’m tired of driving. Do I get to ride in the back? We are going to Seattle, right?” If they meant to take me somewhere else, my willingness to cooperate would go downhill.
“Fort Lewis, for now. You’re not in the military anymore, so you won’t receive a military judgment, but it was deemed a safe place to hold you.”
Safe. Meaning the army knew what they were dealing with and could handle me more effectively than a traditional civilian jail?
Well, at least Fort Lewis was in the right direction. The drive up there would give me five hours to contemplate my next steps.
“Remove your weapons.” The man shifted his jacket aside to rest a hand on a handgun in his holster. “We know you have them.”
I was tempted to rest my hand on the much bigger firearm in my thigh holster, but it was time to play nice and cooperate. Sighing, I removed Chopper and Fezzik and laid them on the gravel. The men stirred as I stepped back, and to them, the weapons appeared out of thin air.
One agent picked them up, and the other opened the door to the back seat of his car, gesturing for me to get in. There were two more men in the car in front of that one.
“Val,” Mom said uncertainly. “Will you be all right?”
“I hope so. Will you keep taking care of the cat for now?”
“Of course.”
“Thanks.”
She headed for the front door, tugging Rocket along with her. The agents didn’t try to stop her.
As I turned to get in the car, the man holding my weapons lifted his hand. “Give me your necklace too.”
My gut dropped into my boots as he pointed straight at the Sindari charm.
“Pardon?” I plastered the most innocent expression on my face that I could manage. It probably came out as the most panicked expression.
“Remove it.”
“Why? It’s just jewelry.”
“We know it’s not.”
I rethought my decision to cooperate. But there were four of them, and my mom hadn’t made it inside yet. My mom and her dog. I couldn’t risk a shootout here.
“Your necklace.” He gestured firmly with his hand.
I reached for the tie in the back, as if meaning to comply, but my mind was scrambling. I spotted a wide-eyed Dimitri staring out from behind one of the curtained windows in the back of his van. So that’s where he was. Had he been hiding in there because he thought the agents were here for him?
He saw me looking at him and pointed at something in the yard. One of the tacky metal statues. The bear facing the driveway and holding a giant fish. What did he want me to do with it?
“Take your time, Thorvald,” the agent growled.
“I never take it off. It’s a tough knot.”
He pulled out a multi-tool, flicked open the pliers like a switchblade, then thumbed open an actual knife.
I should have let the dragon take me to dangle as bait. He wouldn’t have made me take off my weapons and charms.
“I’m also not sure I can trust you not to hawk it on eBay,” I added, stepping away from the knife, especially since he looked like he wanted to cut the leather thong for me, while it was around my throat. No way.
“I’m sure your faux ivory trinkets would bring a fortune.”
Dimitri was still watching me, his eyebrows raised. A question on his blunt face. What?
I nodded once, though I had no idea what he was asking. Hoping for the best, I tapped my cloaking charm to activate the stealth ability.
The agent’s eyes bulged as I seemed to disappear. I ducked, anticipating a snatch, and yanked Chopper and Fezzik out of his hands before he reacted. Soundlessly, I dropped and rolled away, evading a lunge and an attempt to grab me.
If Dimitri really could help, I didn’t know, but I couldn’t go back with these guys, not if they were taking all my stuff and my ability to fight, my ability to escape. Once I found a way to save Willard’s life, then they could arrest me.
A buzz of magical energy ran up my spine as soft twangs reached my ears. Something whizzed over my head. Several somethings. Sharp hisses came from the cars in the driveway.
Careful not to make noise and give away my position, I low-crawled across the grass and scattered pine needles. The men cursed and ran to their cars.
“What was that?” someone barked. “Is someone shooting?”
More twangs sounded. This time, I glanced back quickly enough to see tiny metal darts shoot out of the bear’s fish as the statue rotated back and forth, like a gardener spraying down a bed. Several darts pierced the glass windows of the cars with the power and authority of bullets. Others slammed into the tires. The hissing of air grew louder as it escaped through dozens of holes.
The roar of an engine sounded over the rush of the nearby river. The orange camper van, somehow spared the fate of the cars, spat gravel as it raced around them and turned toward the street. It paused, and Dimitri stuck his head out the window, peering into the yard.
Looking for me. I leaped up and checked to make sure Mom and Rocket had made it inside. They had, and she was peering out through the open front window.
“Stay safe!” I called in Elvish, one of only three phrases I remembered that she’d taught me.
I wanted to add for her to run out the back door and stay at a friend’s house, at least until I was out of the state, but I couldn’t say all that in Elvish. I had to trust that she would be able to take care of herself.
She disappeared from the window as I raced toward Dimitri. One of the agents dropped to his knees behind his vehicle—three out of four tires were deflated, still hissing weakly—and aimed his gun at the back of the van. His buddy grabbed his arm and said, “No shooting civilians.”
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