For once in her life, Ani hadn’t second-guessed herself. She’d simply acted. She’d decided to accompany Tali to humanspace. Forever, however short that ever might be with a human lifespan. Nothing was as important as keeping her family together. The Seers’ prediction had driven that home to her.
“You’re making that up,” she accused Milshadred. “The Seers told Embor about things that affected me.” With Milshadred refusing to cooperate, Ani didn’t know what else to try. Time to focus on relocating everyone. She’d let Embor deal with Milshadred when he woke.
“Hey, I didn’t even know Jerk-off’s secret until tonight,” Milshadred said. “Drunks have big mouths. Ask him about the Seers before he sobers up. Hell, ask anyone here.”
Master Fey, silent through much of the exchange, miaowed loudly, attracting their attention. He trotted down the table and sniffed Embor’s cheek, whiskers twitching. Embor grumbled and batted at the cat.
“He told everyone a secret about me?” Ani asked dubiously.
Milshadred shrugged. “It slipped out.”
“Then why won’t you tell me?”
“Because you won’t let me go.”
Ani petted Master Fey when he head-butted her shoulder. No doubt it would be easier to ask a Drakhmore what Embor had said than confront Embor himself. “How much is everyone going to remember?”
“Fairies can’t handle the sauce.” Milshadred peered through deepening shadows. “They tend to have blackouts.”
Milshadred might be conning Ani, trying to convince her that her only chance of getting information was through Milshadred. “I can’t sit around all night debating this. I need to transport everyone to safety.”
“With Embor’s little repository gone, you’re as safe here as anywhere, which is to say, not very,” Milshadred said.
Ani pointed at her. “You did destroy it.”
“Shit, no. I don’t know anything about it.” Milshadred grinned. “Not. A. Thing.”
“Mrow,” Master Fey said at the obvious lie.
So what could Ani do? How could she protect this passel of drunken Drakhmores who weren’t supposed to be here? How could she keep Milshadred secured? How could she hide herself and Embor from anyone who might be searching for them?
How could she find out what Embor had learned from the Seers?
And most importantly, how could she make him happy?
Chapter Nineteen
“Oh my appletini.” Talista, hands on ample hips, goggled at the bodies sprawled around the bar. It wasn’t easy to surprise Ani’s humanspace-hardened sister. A giant fairy light hovered in the center of the room. “What happened here, an orgy?”
Ani clasped her hands. “A spell forced them to drink to excess.”
“A spell made ’em do it? Never heard that one.” Tali rolled up her sleeves. “Are we going to sober them up?”
“I only have two healing globes.” When she’d knocked on Tali and Jake’s door, they hadn’t seemed surprised to see her. A little surprised to see Milshadred—Ani hadn’t dared leave her behind—but Jake had disappeared with the agent, and Tali had offered her help. They hadn’t badgered for details beyond the immediate ones.
Tali pulled a silver device out of her shorts pocket. “Where is he?”
Ani, counting transportation globes, looked at her sib. “Is that a camera?”
“Hells, yes.” Tali pointed and clicked. “It’s a Kodak moment.”
“Be serious. We don’t even know what happened.” Ani reached for the camera, but Tali darted through the room, snapping portraits of unconscious fairies.
Tali shot her a superior glance. “I’ve got some ideas.”
“I’m sure you do.” Tali had ideas about everything.
“Jackpot.” Tali hovered over Embor’s golden head and photographed him from several angles. In sleep, the stress lines relaxed out of his handsome face. “I don’t suppose you’d let me take off his pants?”
Ani inserted herself between her insane sister and the Primary. A familiar anger, tinged by resentment, cramped her heart. How could Tali be the mother of three and a ring agent but behave like a bratty child? “Embor was attacked by warped magic, some horrible weapon our enemies invented, and you’re making a joke? You should be ashamed.”
Tali coughed out a laugh. “The warped weapon of our enemies, wooooo.”
“I’ll take the camera away.” Ani was taller, with a longer reach, and exercised more. “You told me yourself human alcohol isn’t a fairy’s friend. They could have been—”
“Fine, fine. I’m done.” Tali’s cheeks reddened. She held up the camera and, with exaggerated gestures, retracted the lens. “But I’m not ashamed.”
Ani closed her eyes. “How much do you know about what happened at Court?”
“I heard Embor went bananas and molested you.” Tali slid the camera into her pocket. “Then he set the palace on fire, killed a cat and kidnapped you to further his evil plans. It was great—like one of Pap’s crazy stories.”
Tali’s human grandfather-in-law collected gnomes that had turned to stone in humanspace. He claimed he’d known about the Realm for years. Ani had never met him, though she’d spoken to him on the phone and seen his handiwork.
Even so, her experiences the past couple of days were nothing like one of Pap’s tall tales. Especially not the kissing parts. “How long have you known I might be in trouble, Tali? Have you helped search at all?”
“You don’t have to take that tone. You’re my sib. Skythia let us know immediately.” Tali pulled out her own baggie of transportation spells. “Said she’d keep us posted.”
Not once had Ani sensed Tali looking for her. She’d never have been blasé about Tali’s possible rape and kidnapping. Keeping the secret when Tali had gone AWOL in humanspace had given Ani an ulcer, and healers rarely got sick. “My situation didn’t concern you?”
Tali’s gaze shifted to a spot near her feet. “Why should it? It’s total bunk, right?”
Ani’s lips tightened.
“Right?” Tali repeated sharply. “Or am I about to kick our fearless leader in the head?”
Tali had never cared for Elder Embor, but to suspect him for one moment as capable of rape and kidnapping was outside of enough. The man was the leader of their Realm. He was honorable and just. He was also infuriating, uptight and sexy.
But he was no rapist. Ani could personally verify he was more of a tease.
“Do I look as if I’ve been ravished?” she asked Tali.
“Kinda.” Tali returned her gaze to the floor. “I won’t really kick him. You can tell me if he—”
“I haven’t been ravished.” Much to her dismay. “The cat is also alive and well.”
That dragged her sister’s attention from the ground. “There’s really a cat? I figured that was part of the bunk.”
“He led us to Key West. There was another Fey cat here, but she disappeared.”
Tali scratched her head. “That is so weird.”
“He wants revenge on the Torvals. He said they hurt him.” Ani spied Master Fey sleeping on the back of an unconscious Drakhmore. “He’s over there.”
Tali spotted the cat. “He looks familiar. Hey, cat, do I know you?”
Master Fey ignored them. Tali squeezed Ani’s arm. “If there are cats involved, I’m done messing around. I don’t know why I do it. I swear, you bring out the worst in me.”
“I’ve noticed,” Ani said gently. It seemed true of most siblings. Certainly in Tali’s presence, Ani felt her timidity and lack of contentment most keenly.
“Hugs later.” Tali narrowed her eyes. “Tell me everything.”
“I’ll have to abbreviate for now.” Ani sighed. “Embor knew something bad had happened to me. Warran Torval—”
Tali interrupted with a gagging noise.
She ignored it. Tali couldn’t grow up completely in ten seconds. “You were right about Warran. He’s a nasty piece of work. He and Ophelia intended to force a bond on me. I have no ide
a why they thought it was possible, but they mindwiped me to hide their failure. Then they used more spirit magic to turn the tide against Embor.”
“Do you want me to kill them?” Tali asked, her blue eyes serious. “I’m authorized to use deadly force.”
“No, you’re not.” Fairies did not murder.
“Under certain circumstances.” She shoved her red curls off her forehead. “I can’t tell you everything. You’re not cleared.”
“I daresay the current situation changes that.” If she couldn’t get answers from Tali, she may never get them.
“Some things aren’t mine to tell.”
“You sound like Milshadred.”
“Oh, please. I’m nothing like that mean old goat.”
“She claims to know secrets about the AOC board and the Torval Elders.” Ani paused, trying to decide if she should introduce something personal when they had important tasks to handle. “She said Embor learned something from the Seers about me.”
Tali sucked her teeth. “Yeah, that your hottie brother-in-law was going to raise the roof.”
“She said it was about me specifically.”
“How could there be anything about you and Embor?” Tali laughed abruptly and loudly. “Wow, really? You fell for that? Classic confidence game. People are more gullible if you pretend they’re special.”
“The cat agreed with her.” Ani had wondered how much truth there was to Milshadred’s words and now doubted her…doubts. Double doubting. Typical.
“She played you like a tin bucket. Gosh, we need to get cracking.” Tali marched away from Ani and grabbed a Drakhmore by the arm. “The D-mores can sleep it off in the shed. I don’t want them puking on my new carpets.”
“The who?”
“The Douchemores. That’s what I like to call… Balls.” Tali shot her a tight grin. “I mean, they seem like douches. More douchey than you, that’s for sure. You’re a great sister. So kind and understanding.”
“Douchemores.” Ani didn’t know what it meant, but it was plainly an insult. “That’s awfully close to their clan name. I never told you who they were.” It had been Ani’s understanding Jake wasn’t being introduced to the Drakhmores. He was the reason their clan had been banished from Court, and it was thought best to let that sleeping sphinx lie.
“Uh…yes, you did. You called them Drakhmores several times. You just forgot.”
She hadn’t. “Has Jake met them?”
“Well, he and I aren’t together constantly.” Tali rocked on her heels. “I guess he could have met them. He and Embor are always running off to—”
“Jake and Embor?” Ani asked sharply.
“Balls,” Tali said.
A small hand shook him. “Psssst.”
Embor tried to open his eyes. A spike of pain that felt hauntingly familiar shot from one temple to the other. “Where am I?”
Two hands, one on each shoulder. “Wake up, dude.”
Through blurred vision he glimpsed red hair, pale skin. He reached for her. “Anisette.”
“Hells, no.” Talista jerked away like she’d been zapped by electricity. Embor was in the guest bedroom of the Serendipity’s house in Vegas with no memory of how he’d gotten there. His hostess gestured at the door. “I’ve only got a second. Listen up.”
Embor heard footsteps in the corridor.
“Cow pox. She knows, okay? She tricked it out of me.”
The discomfort between his ears slowed his comprehension. “Knows what?”
Anisette’s mild voice from the doorway. “I know you’ve been plotting with my sister and Jake.”
Embor flopped an arm over his eyes, surprised to find his skin bare. He drew the sheet to his neck. “It was necessary. Where’s my shirt?”
“In the laundry.” Anisette studied him as if she could see through the thin sheet. She knew about the scars, but Talista didn’t, and he wasn’t in the mood for a rude interrogation.
“How long have I been here?” Over a week, he guessed, for him to feel this degree of separation sickness. The headache was much worse than the one Anisette had labeled withdrawals. Why couldn’t he remember anything past Skythia’s house in Key West, and why was he still suffering from separation sickness instead of being healed?
Anisette checked the watch on her wrist. She was dressed in a blue shirt and flowered trousers. “We’ve been in Vegas about twelve hours.”
“That’s all?” The frown wrinkles on Embor’s forehead shoved the hurt deeper into his brain. He focused on his bottom half, relieved to find his drawers in attendance. “Tell me what happened.”
Anisette, her face expressionless, nodded. “Tali, if you could give us a moment?”
“Why do you need your own moment?” Talista plopped into an armchair and glared at him, for what he had no idea. “We both have questions for him.”
What was wrong with him? He replayed the events of the past day. The cat had guided them to Key West. He’d intended to contact the Drakhmores. No, he had contacted them. Vague conversations flashed through his brain.
“I may not be able to answer all your questions,” he admitted as the obvious truth hit him. “I seem to have been mindwiped.”
Ani ducked her head. Tali snickered and clapped a hand over her mouth.
More feet in the hallway, these small yet thunderous. “Hooray, it’s the mean man.”
The bed trembled as a body leapt onto it. Embor glanced over to see the red hair and grinning face of Violet Serendipity, cleaner than the last time he’d seen her. Before she could jackhammer into him, Talista caught her around the waist.
“Vi, people are not jungle gyms.”
“He likes me,” Violet insisted.
“I doubt that.” Talista spun the child upside down.
Violet shrieked with laughter, her hair dangling like a mop. “Fly me to spoon.”
Embor winced and considered his situation. Anisette was justly perturbed about his involving her family in illicit activities but seemed unconcerned about his health. Either she was glad for his pain or he wasn’t in as much jeopardy as the headache suggested.
His vision seemed normal. He had no tremors. His skin wasn’t sensitive, and his bones didn’t ache. His stomach did, though. A sour odor hovered around the bed.
Conclusion—the pain in his head wasn’t separation sickness.
Nor did it seem to be entirely due to withdrawals. His memories of the past twelve hours were missing, and withdrawals didn’t include memory loss, confusion or anxiety.
Mindwipe did. He’d need to be alert for any urges toward atypical behavior.
“If I could have a shirt with long sleeves,” he began.
“Shirty, shirt, shirt,” Violet sang. “Birdy, bird, bird. Fly, fly, fly.”
Violet’s ruckus attracted the other children, who raced into the room and clung to Anisette’s legs. “Ani!”
Their gusto threatened to tug off her trousers. Embor glimpsed purple panties before she gripped her waistband and smiled. “You saw me five minutes ago.”
Talista righted Violet. The tot began singing a loud ditty about ghosts. Combined with the piping voices of the other two, Embor thought his eyeballs might pop out of his head.
“Where’s Jake?” he asked hopefully. Surely the other man would sympathize with Embor’s predicament and save him.
“Activating trackers on all the rings,” Talista said. “It’s the second phase of the plan, remember? Oh wait. You don’t remember, since you and the D-mores tried to land the Torvals without us.”
“We did no such thing.” He might have a blurred memory, but if he’d acted on his strategy to capture Milshadred, he would have succeeded. Anisette would hardly be displeased with him if he’d concluded his mission, freeing him up to deal with the other Torvals.
Yet she hadn’t congratulated him, hadn’t even smiled at him. She was definitely displeased. Talista was something else entirely.
“Oh, but you did.” Talista rubbed her hands together. “This is too g
ood. He’s got total blackout, Ani. Not even Corvan is this bad off. Bet he was out of his gourd last night. It explains why the Drakhmores keep saying you two are…” She whispered something to Anisette, whose eyes narrowed.
Embor pinched the bridge of his nose, hoping the pain he inflicted on himself would offset the pain in his head. “The Drakhmores are here?”
“They’re all here, Chief Hangover.” Talista crossed her arms. “You owe me. You owe Jake. And you really owe Ani. I can’t believe you dragged her into this. She’s not cut out for this stuff.”
“It was necessary,” Embor grated.
“Pfaugh.” Talista rolled her eyes. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d question your intentions toward my sister.”
How much did Jake and Talista know about the situation in the Realm? “I was protecting her from a threat at Court.”
“Tali, hush.” Anisette, her cheeks pink, disengaged herself from the Serendipity tykes. “Children, do you know what? Your mommy wants to give you a bubble bath.”
Petunia and Charles applauded. “Bath, bath, bath!” The excited chant faded as the children rattled down the hallway.
“Baaaaaaaaaath!” Violet writhed in Talista’s grip until she put the child down. “Now, Mommy.”
“You’re a traitor,” Talista told Ani. “Giving them a bath kinks my spine.”
“I’ll heal you.” Anisette smiled. “You can’t disappoint them.”
Talista pointed at Embor with a slightly crooked finger. “I’m going to leave you two alone for twenty minutes, sir. No monkey business.”
Embor raised an eyebrow. “I’m not a monkey.”
He hadn’t shared the Seers’ prophecy with Jake and Talista, considering Talista’s reaction whenever Anisette’s name came up. Why did Talista object to the Primary asking after her twin? He’d expressed polite interest the way anyone might about the siblings of their associates.
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