Sovereign Malpractice (Office of Preternatural Affairs Book 3)

by Voss Foster

  "What, a written out spell?"

  "If I were going to guess." He pulled his phone back out and snapped an image of it. "I’ll send this to Bancroft. He can show Vellius. And I think we'd be best-served by letting the front desk know."

  I nodded and pulled out my own phone, tapping onto Swift's number. It rang three times, four before he finally picked up. Slow for him. "Dash?"

  He sounded taut, out of breath. "We've got weird shit. Some kind of written out magic in our motel. We're keeping this hush-hush, so wanted to get the go-ahead before we brought anyone in here, cleared it out."

  "Christ. Yeah, get the Las Vegas OPA out. Get the hotel clear. Don't let anyone into that room. Once backup shows up, we need you back here."

  Okay, that was definitely weird. "What's going on, Swift?"

  "Ixel went into some kind of fit or seizure or something. Casey got her stable again, but Vellius says it was strong magic, and it means we have some kind of breach in our own security. Need all hands on deck."

  Great. "All right, we'll be back when we can." I hung up and locked eyes with Gutt. "Clear the hotel, call in the field office, back to DC to deal with the clusterfuck there."

  "Oh lovely. I've so missed a clusterfuck." He immediately dialed up the field office and stalked away. I guess that left me to handle the front desk.

  I was seriously regretting being excited to get back out into the field at this point.

  Halfway up to the front desk, my phone went off. Bancroft, which stiffened my spine. He didn't tend to call me that often. "What's going on?"

  "That spellwork Gutt sent me. Are you near it?"

  "I'm in the motel with it, but out of the room"

  "You need to clear out. I won't go into detail, but it's a timed release remote transport, and it's linked into…I didn't get full details, but linked into something bad enough that Vellius transported straight out when she saw it to handle something."

  Shit. "All right, thanks." And I ran my ass to the front desk to address the fussy looking little man sitting there. I immediately pulled out my ID and slapped it on the counter. "Agent Dashiel Rourke, Office of Preternatural Affairs. We have to get everyone out of here."

  "What?" He stood on spindly legs, eyes wide as softballs. "What's happening?"

  Apparently no one fucking knew. I sure as hell wasn't deep enough into the loop. "There's a magical phenomenon we're tracking, and we need everyone out of the area as quickly as possible. My partner and I will clear rooms. If there's any way you can make a broad announcement, go ahead and do it, then you need to get out, along with any other staff who happen to be here." I locked eyes with him until I was sure he was really paying attention. "Get everyone away from the hotel. Out of the parking lot." I didn't know how big this situation was supposed to be, so I wanted them off the property entirely.

  Then I was off, going room by room. Luckily, there weren't a whole ton of people at this particular hole-in-the-wall, and those who were around were luckily pretty acquiescent to listening to the big scary FBI agent. Nobody was arguing, which I'd take happily.

  About halfway through the hallways, I ran back into Gutt. "Field office coming out?"

  "Within five minutes. Any issues?"

  "Bancroft says whatever that typographic magic is, it's some form of time-released remote transport. Vellius bolted out when she saw it. We need to clear the motel."

  "Wonderful." Gutt nodded, then he brushed past me, and we were both back into alerting the motel residents. All in all, we managed to get people out and informed enough within ten minutes, and by the time they got back, the Las Vegas OPA had already arrived on the scene.

  A pair of agents flanked the door to the motel room, a gnome with a long, blonde beard braided and rolled up into a sort of bun beneath his chin, and a Latinx woman who stood taller than me, but still not as large as Gutt.

  The gnome nodded. "OPA?" We both flashed our IDs and the gnome relaxed back against the wall. "What the hell's going on here? That's the Hand's symbol burned into the wall."

  "It's a long story. Part of a murder investigation that's proving…larger than we expected." Gutt slowly, methodically popped his knuckles. "We've been informed it's potentially very dangerous. Unsure the details, but a researcher from the Grand Archives is alarmed. So the faster you can get in and out, the better."

  The gnome nodded again, then headed into the motel room. His partner sighed. "This is about the headless troll, I assume. Nasty thing."

  Gutt nodded. "The closer we can play that to the vest when it comes to the local PD, the better."

  "Mum's the word," she said, cracking her neck side to side.

  Gutt turned and walked down to the end of the hall, putting a decent distance between himself and the motel room before he circled his hand through the air, opening our path back to DC, where a whole new series of headaches awaited us. I glanced up at Gutt as I approached. "Feel well-rested and ready?"

  "No." But Gutt smiled his way into bearing his tusks. "But as I said: I'm heartier than I look."

  And together, we stepped through, arriving to clattering and pounding footsteps.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I immediately tried to take stock of what the hell was happening. The first thing that told me things had escalated was the presence of Oona and Rothiel, out of the R and D office and currently strapping on enchanted bulletproof vests.

  Next was Vellius, apparently back from the Hidden Kingdoms, moving her hands in arcs above her head while her striped serpents hissed and darted back and forth. She was raising some sort of powerful magic, powerful enough that it raised the hair on the back of my neck.

  Most shocking, though, was Lenva on the opposite side of the room, making similar movements to Vellius. If we were letting our Class A roam around and help us, that meant we were in the shit. Deep.

  "Dash. Gutt." Swift marched up and shoved vests into our hands. "The office is under siege from somewhere. We don't know where the hell, though. How's Nevada?"

  "The field office is examining the magic left behind at the motel." Gutt began to slip into the bulletproof vest, pushing the limits of the seams. "I told them to finish up as quickly as possible."

  "Good. And the golem?"

  I shrugged. "No idea what it means, but there was a golem involved at the murder scene. According to Bancroft, a powerful one. Don't have any more than that, though." I finished outfitting myself and jerked my head over toward Lenva. "She's out, it's bad?"

  "If we could make use of Ixel, we'd be bringing her in, too."

  Right. Ixel. "She's fine, now?"

  "Not fine enough, but she's not spasming out, which is good. Potentially closing up one of the holes in our security." Swift's fingers tightened into a fist that paled his knuckles, showing the bones starkly beneath his skin. "We still don't know what's happening. Vellius, well it's her expertise. And Lenva knows about creating a solid holding system for all the obvious reasons."

  Yeah. All the obvious reasons.

  At this point, Vellius marched her way over to us and slapped her hands on her hips. Her eyes narrowed and the serpents continued to whip annoyedly back and forth. "What exactly did you get me involved with, here?"

  "A Class A being broken out and let loose amid stirrings that the Seven-Fingered Hand might be returning to fuck everything up." I figured I should just lay it out for her. "Did you expect it to be a walk in the park."

  She smiled. Just a little bit. "Did you get the motel safe?"

  I nodded. "It's time release. How long do the agents have to get out, so we can let them know?"

  Her eyes widened a moment before she responded. "Seven minutes, now, if they don't disarm it."

  Gutt was on it before I could even fish my phone out, walking away as he dialed them up. I sighed. "What does it do? Figure it must be bad if you ported straight out."

  And Vellius broke eye contact. "It'll remote transport a large area surrounding the spell into a most likely dangerous location."

  Oh hell
no. I wasn't going to let her get off on that obvious mistruth. "Where's this dangerous location."

  "That's what I'd like to know," said Swift. "Since you came back, you've been busy helping with the defenses. What are we dealing with here? What are my agents risking if they don't get away in time?"

  Her eyes darted side to side, checking for I guess…I didn't know, but she seemed satisfied with her assessment. "It will open a portal into the former Kingdom of Solvar. Anyone there will die."

  Solvar. It was the kingdom Ixel was supposed to deliver Lenva to. And according to King, that was impossible. Dangerous, too.

  "Solvar?" Rothiel, the teal-mohawked ghoul woman, crept up, her sunken eyes wide as she approached. "It's closed off. No one can get in."

  "Anyone can get into Solvar. Or Darthenal for that matter." Vellius's voice was rough and barbed, but she wasn't avoiding eye contact anymore. She fixed straight on Rothiel as she spoke. "Do you honestly think that no one has any access just because the public doesn't? You just have to know what you're doing. I've been to each of them as part of my research."

  Rothiel was silent a few seconds, and when she responded, her voice took on a certain hoarse quality that, coupled with her appearance, sent a little ice water trickling down my spine, even though I'd know her a year. "But they've been locked away for centuries. No one knows what would happen if they became somehow reintegrated."

  "We do know what would happen. Largely nothing, if it was merely remote transport." Vellius seemed to be getting back into her area of comfort, at least enough that she relaxed a touch, although her snakes were still in a frenzy, a mane of fangs and hissing. "However, this particular piece of magic isn't merely remote transport. It's not powerful enough to create a permanent crossing point between the Mundane and Solvar, but it could last weeks. Without proper containment, which we have no experience with, it would remain open, and anyone could merely stumble into the void of destruction that is Solvar."

  "I'm not versed in any of this, but void of destruction sounds pretty bad." It was one annoying habit that still happened around the OPA, and apparently around Vellius, too. "By the way, does anyone plan to explain to the dumb humans in the room?"

  "As a fellow dumb human, I concur," said Swift. "What's bad enough that you had rush back to the Kingdoms?"

  Vellius sighed, as though we were asking a great service of her, and I was considering taking a page out of King's book and just letting her have it, but before she could say anything, or I could respond, a gentle voice floated over from the corner of the offices. "Solvar and Darthenal were two Kingdoms destroyed by a Class-A hag roughly five-hundred years ago."

  My stomach clenched around a sudden ball of ice. Lenva had stopped raising up the protections around us and hesitantly stepped forward, answering the question. She couldn't be implying what it sounded like she was implying, but what the fuck were the odds there was another Class-A hag around the same time who could also cause mass destruction?

  She stopped a few feet away from where we'd gathered. "I'd been attacked and I was afraid, and it just happened. After Darthenal…I didn't know the extent of what I'd caused. Word reached the rest of the Kingdoms before it reached me, and they cornered me in Solvar, threatened me. I didn't want it to happen, but I wasn't in control. It was…it was so fast." Her eyes widened, and her face blanched, and I smelled a brief whiff of ozone that could have been the massive amount of magic currently encasing our offices, but I had a sneaking suspicion that it came from her. Lenva getting emotional.

  And now that I had some inkling what she was capable of, that took on a whole new threat. And another layer of threat on top of that. She'd destroyed two Kingdoms? On her own? She couldn't be allowed to lose control.

  After a few moments, the smell faded and she sighed. "Now you know. Whoever is involved in this remote transport situation…it doesn't seem like a coincidence that Solvar is the Kingdom being accessed."

  On that, we could agree. "The spell came with the Hand's symbol."

  "They think they've neutralized the enchantment at the motel." Gutt slipped his phone back into his pocket as he walked back up. The scowl gracing his lips told me he'd likely overheard some of our conversation over here. "They’ve headed out anyway, after I informed them they'd be potentially dealing with Solvar breaching into the Mundane." And he snorted. "I don’t appreciate being kept in the dark about all of this information."

  "Do you expect me to believe you didn't know what was going on with Lenva?" Swift raised one eyebrow at Vellius. "Class-As are your thing, Vellius."

  She sighed. "What good does it do to incite a panic? There's a reason the information about some of our older Class-As are expunged. We don't need anyone getting certain pieces of information. And as long as Lenva is not posing a threat, as she doesn't appear to be at the moment, I trust the Office of Preternatural Affairs to keep her safe from whoever figured out how to get her out of holding." She huffed and locked eyes with Swift, her yellow eyes sharp and blazing. Then she blinked, and her face softened. "Perhaps I should have been forthcoming, but Lenva's nature was hidden from the rest of the world for her own safety as much as anyone else's. The issue at hand with her particular magic is that it's tied to her emotions. Under threat, she has created destruction. And the last time people found out about her past…"

  "Solvar happened." Lenva sighed. "I've done what I can to protect us here. I can go back down into the cell if you're not comfortable."

  I knew, intellectually, that she must be dangerous. I'd seen her tear apart Vois, and even with that helpful visual, I couldn't imagine the sheer scale we were now discussing. I'd traversed some of the Kingdoms before. Nedelwald, not deeply. Tarwald, a little more heavily. But most of all, Al-Sekar. The nigh-endless white sand desert with indeterminate edges, if it had edges at all. Bigger than New York City or Boston or Washington, D.C. or Seattle or even Tokyo. I tried to start there. I at least had some point of reference. We'd nearly lost Manhattan to the releasing of Jörmungandr a year ago.

  It didn't approach the level we were discussing. The Mundane itself, the world and universe that I knew and lived in, was the equivalent of a Kingdom. A dimension. And there was no imagining the unfathomable scale of everything turned into dust. And that most likely helped, honestly. I still knew it was serious, but at least I wasn't crippled out of doing my job. I couldn't imagine the scale, which made it easier to sidestep the existential horror. Because my job was still to protect Lenva, which would in turn protect…well apparently it would protect fucking everything. Keep her calm, keep her away from the bastards who wanted her, and hope like hell those bastards didn't happen to actually be a long-defunct terrorist organization with a penchant for releasing the most dangerous preets in existence.

  That one would be extra nice, in fact.

  "We've got action in Nevada." Kimmy rushed out of the computer vault, cradling an open laptop in one arm. She plopped it down on the desk closest to Swift, and I could see what looked suspiciously like the very motel we'd just left, shot from across the street on…probably a cell phone. When Kimmy hit play, it became more than a suspicion. That was definitely the place, and a cluster of FBI agents were visible off to the side, but still well away.

  I waited…and waited…and waited. The room grew silent and the air heavy, partially from the magic now lining the walls, and partially from the tension.

  There. The front door came open. It wasn't wanton destruction or tearing. Simply the door opening, and an elf stepping out.

  "Is that…?" Gutt leaned forward toward the grainy image, squinting his eyes tight and shading his eyes as though it would actually help him make any more detail out of the shit we were looking at. "Is that Vois?"

  "We saw Vois die." I found my stupid ass leaning down right in with Gutt, trying to get some details. And hell, I could tell we were looking at an elf, but no more than that. What I could see was the door opening again, releasing a reddish orc. Then a bluish one. And then a dark gray one. All hulking, mass
ive, standing in line behind the elf.

  The agents pointed rifles toward the group. A few sparkles of magic flared to life. The camera, whoever was holding it, finally swung around to get the agents in better view.

  "Is this live?" asked Swift.

  "It's got a several second delay," said Kimmy. "Otherwise, yeah."

  Spells flew, bullets popped, and the camera person flinched back, getting away even as they tried to keep their camera pointed behind them. Didn't work at all, though. We could see exactly nothing of any detail for a solid thirty seconds until they finally seemed to have gotten far enough away for comfort. Then they repositioned enough we could see the conflict again. The agents had moved into the parking lot.

  Surrounding emptiness. I could only assume that the elf and the orcs had remote transported out.

  Out of nowhere, Gutt and Vellius both gripped onto me, as though I was enough of a pillar of strength to support her and a four-hundred pound troll.

  Lenva moved in, her eyes going from their usual pale blue to nearly pitch black as she approached. "We're not alone. I can only hold them back for so long."

  Two plus two was four, and I had a feeling our visitors had just recently been out at one particular Nevada motel.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The burn of ozone almost immediately hit my nose as Lenva splayed out her fingers. "This isn't good."

  "Figured that much out." Swift ducked underneath Gutt's other arm and took some of his weight off of me. "Is it the same people we just saw vanish in the video?"

  "I don't know. Just know there are several of them. So it could be. They're trying to get in." She quivered, her eyes going full pitch black for a moment. Then she pulled herself back under control and planted her feet wide, staring straight up at something I sure as hell couldn't see. "We need something more than this. They're exploiting the weaknesses in my protective magic."

  She had weaknesses? I found that hard to believe, but watching her struggle against whatever onslaught was headed our way…something was up.