Enchantment Emporium

by Tanya Huff

  After a moment, Michael scratched under the waistband of his elderly pajama pants and snickered. “You’re thinking about the padded handcuffs in Gran’s drawer, aren’t you?”

  She felt the corners of her mouth twitch up in spite of herself. “Shut up.”

  Dragged out of sleep by the ringing of her phone, Allie glared at the clock beside the bed. Seven forty-nine. She’d been asleep for just a little over three hours. Given the aunties, that was more sleep than she’d expected to get.

  When she managed to focus on the call display, her eyes widened.

  “How did you get this number?”

  “Don’t ask stupid questions, Ms. Gale,” Kalynchuk growled. “Is he with you?”

  Allie’s lip curled. Or would have had it not stuck to her teeth. She ran her tongue over them and said, “Don’t ask stupid questions, Mr. Kalynchuk.”

  Behind her, Graham stirred but didn’t wake. She’d removed the charm when she got into bed, but it seemed the painkillers had been enough to keep him out.

  “I want to speak with him.”

  “I want to know why you didn’t tell me about the Dragon Lords.”

  For a moment, she thought he wasn’t going to answer. When he did, he didn’t sound exactly apologetic. Or at all apologetic. “I told you as much as you needed to know.”

  “Yeah, well…” She yawned. “… they disagree.”

  “They?”

  “The Dragon Lords.”

  “Put Graham on.”

  “He’s asleep.”

  “Wake him.”

  If he’d asked instead of commanded, she might have considered it.

  “No.”

  His breathing suggested it had been a while since anyone had denied him. “I am a dangerous enemy, Ms. Gale.”

  “Interestingly enough, you’re a dangerous friend too.” Yawning, she snapped the phone closed. Since it seemed highly unlikely he could get any angrier at her, she rolled over, curled up against Graham’s side, and went back to sleep.

  Michael and Roland both had work of their own to do, so Charlie’d gone down and opened the store. Half expecting to see Joe already in place behind the counter-allowing her to haul ass back upstairs and grab some more shut-eye-she’d been a little annoyed to see the place empty.

  Seemed no one wanted to buy crap at ten AM on a Wednesday, so she’d continued her hunt for the artifact producing the autoharp music. With no distractions, it had taken her a surprisingly short time to find it in behind a white china chamber pot. Circa 1915, according to the sticker.

  Leaning against the counter, she ran her fingers over the edge of what looked to be an old presentation box for medals or jewelry. Painted gold with a red-and-black crest glued to the center of what had been the lid, the outside gave no indication of the contents. The upper edge and the long edge opposite the hinge had been beaded, allowing the box to stand on one end and be opened like a reliquary. There was no clasp to hold it closed, and when it had fallen off a pile of mildewed postcards and landed behind the chamber pot, it had opened, just a little.

  Charlie opened it the rest of the way.

  Inside, against plaid padding, were two drawings of young men holding instruments. Not exactly photorealism, one had long hair, one short and they were both wearing what were probably supposed to be kilts made from the same plaid fabric as the padding. Next to the drawings were rolled napkins from an American hotel.

  The drawings were signed.

  The napkins were sweat-stained.

  Whoever had trapped their souls either really hated or really loved Celtic music.

  Listening to “The Orange and the Green” being played on autoharp and pennywhistle, Charlie couldn’t decide which.

  “I brought…”

  She snapped the case closed and came out of the aisle to face Joe, standing just inside the store holding a mug in each hand.

  “Oh. It’s you.” He looked down into one of the mugs, then held it out. “Kenny gave me one with milk and no sugar. I guess he knew you’d be here. Where’s Allie?”

  “Sleeping. She had a late night.” Charlie and the boys had been able to nap while Allie’d been with Graham at the ER. Not exactly eight hours but better than a slap in the face with a fish. “So,” she asked after a moment spent worshiping the amazing aroma wafting up from the coffee. “Is there a reason why you didn’t mention the dragons are actually Dragon Lords?”

  Joe’s eyes widened. “She met…?”

  “We met. Might have been nice to have had a heads up.”

  “I thought she knew.” He jerked back a step, two spots of color burning high on each cheek. “She said she knew. I swear, she told me she knew! Fuck me, I wouldn’t have not told her if I hadn’t thought she knew. Even before. I wouldn’t have.You have to believe me.You have to…”

  “Joe!” As his mouth snapped shut, Charlie sighed. “At the risk of sounding last millennium, don’t have a cow. I believe you.”

  He looked startled and she realized he hadn’t expected that. “Why?”

  “Why not?” To begin with, he was telling the truth. He had thought Allie’d known. Or he’d convinced himself she’d known, which was close enough for Charlie. She had no trouble at all seeing Allie making assumptions and Joe choosing to go along with them rather than raise the suckage in his life even a little bit more.

  A flash of ebony and gold out on the street caught her attention and, frowning, she waved Joe away from the door.

  Okay.

  Not so much a flash of ebony and gold as a whole freaking sidewalk full of it, framed by Auntie Catherine’s clear-sight charm. In the sunlight, the highlights gleaming off the scales were very nearly aubergine.

  Flipping open her phone, she called Roland.

  “Hey, get Allie up. We’ve got company.”

  The sound of Joe’s mug shattering against the floor almost drowned out Roland’s response.

  EIGHT

  “He’s what?”

  “In the store,” Roland repeated, flipping the covers back, pivoting Allie around until her legs were out of the bed, then pulling her up into a sitting position. “Right at this very moment, there’s a Dragon Lord in the store. Get dressed and get downstairs.”

  “What about…?” She twisted around until she could see Graham. With the heavy drapes still shut and the only light spilling in the open door, she couldn’t tell if he looked any better.

  Roland tossed a pair of clean underwear at her head. “I’ll keep an eye on him.”

  “You’re not coming down?”

  He stared at her for a long moment. Opened his mouth. Closed it again. “No,” he said at last as she shimmied into her jeans, “I’d just be a distraction.”

  Even barely awake, Allie knew distraction was not his first choice. She’d have called him on it, but right at the moment, Roland being a bit weird was far enough down her list of things to worry about that she could, essentially, not worry about it. She grabbed the bra she’d taken off a depressingly short time before, dug out a T-shirt, and threw on a hoodie, turning back toward the bed as she zipped it. Graham had his face turned away from her, but she could see the shallow rise and fall of his chest. “I’m worried about him, Rol. The painkillers should have worn off by now.”

  “It’s barely been eight hours,” Roland reminded her, handing over her shoes as she left the bedroom and pulled the door almost all the way closed behind her. “And you may have messed with timing when you charmed him. But it’s possible he’s just catching up on his sleep. Tabloid reporter by day, ninja by night-working two jobs’ll really take it out of you.”

  “If he wakes up…” The sudden fear of returning to the apartment and finding him gone had her heart pounding in her throat. “Don’t let him leave.”

  “Fine. Now move.You don’t want to leave Charlie alone with a Dragon Lord any longer than necessary.”

  The mirror showed her reflection in a full suit of armor.

  Allie patted the frame as she passed. “Thanks. I’ll be
fine.”

  As it happened, Charlie wasn’t alone with the Dragon Lord. She was standing behind the counter, one hand clutching what looked like a gold-colored book, watching something at the opposite end of the store-Three guesses to what, the first two don’t count, Allie told herself silently-and Joe was by the door either wiping up a spill or rubbing it into the floor. The dark patch of wood offered no clues, but the mop seemed to be anchoring him in place. Keeping him from running. She could feel the terror come off him in waves.

  It had to be instinct. Joe was full-blood Fey, sure, but he was a changeling; he’d been in the MidRealm since he was a baby, so he didn’t actually know anything more about the Dragon Lords than they did. Allie suspected that a smart person would use his fear as a cue to how they should be feeling, but it only made her sad.

  “Joe?”

  He jerked around to face her and gasped, “I thought you knew.”

  She had no idea what he was talking about and no time to figure it out. “Michael could probably use a hand in the loft. He’s got tradesmen coming in to lay the floor today.”

  “There’s, I mean… Coffee!”

  Given the accompanying movement of the mop, she assumed that was what he’d spilled. “I think you’ve got it.”

  “I could…”

  “You could help Michael? Yeah, that’d be great.” She stepped forward, giving him a clear route to the back hall.

  Knuckles white where he gripped the mop handle, he shot a panicked look at Charlie.

  “We’ll be fine,” she said and hopefully only Allie heard she was speaking through clenched teeth.

  “Customers…”

  “Dude, there’s two of us and a Lord of the UnderRealm.” Without shifting her gaze, she jerked her head toward Allie. “I think we can figure out how to sell a yoyo. Go on.”

  He managed an eye roll and walked with exaggerated bravado to Allie’s side.

  She touched his shoulder as he passed. “Keep Michael from coming in here. He’s…”

  “A distraction?”

  “Yeah, that, too.” Second time in as many conversations she’d essentially been warned about getting distracted. Given the whole facing-a-Dragon-Lord thing, she actually planned on paying attention.

  Joe squared his shoulders. “I can do that.”

  “Good.”

  She waited until she heard the back door close before she moved to stand across the counter from Charlie. From there, she could see the Dragon Lord in front of the bookshelves that covered the far wall. The shoulders of his black trench coat were spotted with rain, and Allie wasn’t at all surprised when the coat made a sound like the rustle of wings as he turned to face her.

  Then she stopped thinking about wings and tails and talons and conservation of mass and high school physics.

  “Whoa.”

  “Yeah,” Charlie agreed. “Kind of too distracted to appreciate it last night, but he’s a hottie. Be careful. I’m staying back here so I don’t embarrass myself by humping his leg.”

  Skin the color of burnished mahogany, the Dragon Lord had black hair cut short, a black goatee, and cheekbones that weren’t so much chiseled as sculpted. He wore a pale gray suit under the trench coat with a darker open-necked shirt that framed the strong column of his throat. He was very tall, with broad shoulders and narrow hips and hands so large and powerful looking Allie had trouble focusing on what they were holding.

  “This,” he said, raising a tattered, leather-bound book, “should not be available to anyone able to see through the charm.”

  She could feel the sizzle of attraction across her skin, but she didn’t seem about to succumb. Which, all things considered, was good, but the power coming off a Dragon Lord should have had her too attracted to concentrate on anything but him.

  Where attracted pretty much meant: Oh, baby, here and now!

  It hadn’t been a problem on the street last night either.

  Maybe, she thought, realizing he was waiting for her to respond, it has something to do with the whole patronizing Prince of the UnderRealm tone. He sounded a bit like Auntie Jane, and that was just creepy enough to put her right off.

  “That’s a complex charm,” she pointed out. “There’s not going to be a lot of people who can see through it.”

  “One is too many. There’s enough knowledge contained in these pages to do serious harm. When we have finished our conversation, I’ll take it somewhere less…” A glance around the store. “… flammable and burn it.”

  “The price is inside the front cover.”

  Charlie made a sound halfway between a gasp and snicker, but Allie refused to look away, holding the Dragon Lord’s gaze determinedly if not entirely fearlessly. The whole do me thing aside, he could still rend, devour, and-oh, yeah-fry her where she stood. He raised a dark brow, and the temperature rose. Allie felt a drop of sweat run along her spine.

  “Really?” He offered her a chance to back down. To apologize. To throw herself on his mercy.

  Allie bit her lip hard enough to draw blood and squared her shoulders. “Really. We can handle whatever currency you’re carrying.”

  To her surprise, he laughed, and it got significantly easier to breathe. “You’ve got fire, Gale girl. Very well.” A quick glance at the flyleaf and he pulled his wallet from his pocket as he walked toward the counter.

  Wallet?

  “Don’t worry, it’s not illusionary.” He pulled out a pair of fifties. “I have no interest in spending all my time on a rocky cliff eviscerating…”

  “Virgins?” Charlie offered.

  “Cattle,” he said. “They’re easier to find.” The book disappeared inside the folds of the trench coat. “And cash is easier to obtain than a credit rating. Now then…”

  Allie didn’t remember him taking her hand. Actually, she didn’t remember moving close enough to him that he could take her hand, but apparently she had. In direct contrast to the expensive suit, his fingers had a working man’s calluses. What did Dragon Lords work at? she wondered.

  He stroked his thumb over her palm, the rough pad leaving a path of warmth behind it. “You may call me Adam. It isn’t my actual name, of course, but it has relevant symbolic value. And you are?”

  “Alysha.”

  “I’m very pleased to meet you, Alysha Gale.”

  His lips burned against the back of her hand. The almost pain made her knees weak. She locked them and tried to banish the ringing in her ears.

  Not her ears.

  “My phone is ringing.”

  Adam blinked, the motion the least human seeming thing he’d done. “I beg your pardon?”

  “My phone.” Allie tugged her fingers free. “I have to get it.” She shoved her hand into the pocket of her hoodie, closed it around the phone, and left it there for a moment while her fingers stopped trembling. When it rang again, and Adam’s brows rose, she pulled it out, and flipped it open.

  “Hello?”

  “Why are we hearing about this man you’ve met from your cousin?”

  This time, it was her ears ringing. Ear. She moved the phone out about six centimeters from her head. “I’m kind of busy right now, Auntie Ruby.”

  “Too busy to talk to a dying old woman?”

  She sighed and gave some serious thought to beating her head against the counter as Charlie made a noise that was mostly a snicker and even Adam looked amused. “You’re not dying, Auntie Ruby.”

  “Don’t sass me, girl! What’s wrong with this man that you’re hiding him?”

  “I’m not hiding him.”

  “Then bring him for dinner. And stop by your Uncle Gerald’s on the way home and get milk.”

  Uncle Gerald had been dead for ten years. Most of the time Auntie Ruby remembered. Sometimes, she didn’t bother. Allie gentled her voice as she said good-bye and hung up.

  “Family,” she explained, shoving the phone back into her pocket.

  Adam snorted, puffing two white streams of smoke. “Tell me about it.” “Ryan?” she asked,
given the interactions she’d seen.

  “My youngest brother.”

  Which implied: “You have more than one?”

  “I have eleven. And a sister.”

  Twelve Dragon Lords. And a… female Dragon Lord. A baker’s dozen of Dragon Lords. She could practically hear Charlie thinking it. “They’re all… here?”

  “No, not all. Just my brothers.”

  Twelve Dragon Lords. Allie couldn’t see how the word just applied any more than the word merely that Roland had objected to. “Why?”

  Adam shrugged, the movement as elegant as every other movement he’d made. “I think you know why. The man who wears your mark also wears the mark of sorcery.You have spoken to his master.”

  Not a question, but she answered it anyway. “Yes.”

  “He has probably told you we are hunting him. But that is no concern of yours. A family matter. I’m sure you understand.”

  If there was one thing a Gale understood, it was how family matters were no concern of anyone outside the family. Allie didn’t much like being on the other side of the fence.

  Twitching a cuff into place, Adam met her gaze. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to tell me where he is?”

  “No.”

  “I could force you.”

  “And bring my family into this? If you were going to do that, you’d have done it last night.”

  “True. You are correct in assuming we do not want your… aunties involved.” His expression was almost fond and Allie had no intention of asking why.

  “The sorcerer says you’re hunting him to stop him from preventing one of his enemies from coming through. So this enemy must be some kind of ‘big bad’…”

  He narrowed his eyes at the air quotes.

  “… to be giving you orders.”

  “Some kind of big bad?” His chuckle lifted the hair on the back of her neck. “Oh, Gale girl, hope the big bad never decides to visit. It would take more than sorcery to prevent disaster. What is on its way is, in comparison, a little bad.” A pause to remove nonexistent lint from his lapel, and when he looked up again, his eyes were hooded, alien, and his voice had picked up the hint of a hiss. “The sorcerer’s painful death is the one thing all my brothers and I agree on. However, although each of us would happily roast his organs within his living body, if he swears to stay hidden in his coward’s lair, we are willing to ignore his very existence until after the ‘little bad’ is dealt with.”