by Susan Conley
As she spoke, Weres started coming into the room, some hurrying, others in caution, from both units.
“You may perceive yourself to be the senior Were here, but you are not the highest ranking.” Mona silently gave thanks to Smythe for making her memorize the endless lists of hierarchy. “I outrank you, as do, I am sure, several members of Cart’s crew. However, even they do not have the authority you have sought to assume by putting the entire group under one umbrella. Right now, until the Buffalo pack has trained its own protectors and named a chief, you all are under the direction of the Warder and the Pack Leader.”
Anger simmered out of him, then a sly look came over his face. “Yes, and she—”
Mona could not let him complete the sentence and possibly perjure himself. “She what? Be careful what you say. Remember I was there when she banned you from the pack house. Shall I call an imp to refresh your memory?”
He paled; everyone knew that what one imp knew, they all knew. Plus, Cart had said he didn’t want any of the protector group using them.
“Fine, then.” Mona turned to scan the crowd. “Menlo, Tiffany, if I could meet with you and the rest of the investigators, please?”
“Bitch.” Herrick muttered. The acoustics of the room carried his pronouncement to everyone.
As Mona turned back there was a loud pop and lights began to blaze from every wall. But they weren’t lights—more imps than she’d ever seen lined the rotunda.
Randall stood on the desk in a furious rage. The thirties gangster outfit completed the impression of lethalness. Mona heard several gasps.
“You are so far out of line, Herrick, you’ve just earned yourself a one way ticket to visit me. And if you think I’m mad, just wait until you meet the goddess. You don’t mess with her designees.”
He turned to the imps, who had coalesced behind him like a large sparkling cloak. “Take him.”
They swirled around Herrick, completely blocking him from sight. Then they were gone, Herrick along with them.
Randall turned and looked over the crowd, his body relaxing and face easing into a smile when he saw Mona. “Hi, Warder.”
“Hello, Puck.” It was times like this, when he went from an overwhelming rage to charmingly calm that she remembered he was even less human than she was.
He flashed a large grin before somberly addressing the crowd. “Protectors, investigators.” He stabbed his finger at the groups within the crowd. “Do your job. Now. The goddess is watching.”
He flipped off the desk, causing people to scramble out of the way. In the middle of his back flip he disappeared.
On the one hand, Mona was a little annoyed at his jumping in and not letting her handle things. On the other, she wondered just what all was going on to make him interfere. Most Weres were lucky if they saw him once in a lifetime.
The problems in Buffalo clearly had wider consequences than they’d realized.
A few people stood still, looking shocked. Most, however, were already merging into groups and discussing things. Mona found Cart’s crew heading toward her.
As a group, they bowed to her.
Crap, that designee of the goddess line was going to be tough to live down.
“Warder,” Menlo said, confirming that he was in charge. Or maybe Tiff was and she’d asked him to speak. Mona cut a glance over to her. She nodded, her smile faint on her face.
Wait.
“I’m not a Warder yet.”
“Pretty sure you are if Randall just named you one,” he said, a grin on his face. The rest of the group grinned too. “Handy, that. I wonder if I could get his help.”
Right, Menlo specialized in dealing with elves who were coming into power.
“Let’s head to the conference room,” Hyram said, looking around. “We can go over what we know there and add to the schematic Cart made up. Good job with the fireball. The little bit of intelligence we have says you put him out of commission. At least for now.”
They started to turn.
“No.” Despite all that had gone on, Mona still clung to her objective. The group turned around. “I need to get to the complex. That’s why I was looking for you all. I need a buddy.”
Tiff and another woman stepped forward.
“I thought you were in charge,” she said to Tiff, who’d just directed the other woman to get their coats.
“Yes and no. Menlo and I share the job. Besides, Cart said guarding you was top priority, since things seem to happen when you’re around.”
Mona would deal with this guarding thing later since he was right about things happening. She hadn’t fully articulated the coincidence in her head yet, but she did now. Crap.
Mona rubbed her face. No wonder Cart thought she was an accident waiting to happen. If he couldn’t get over his worry. . . she wasn’t going to think about that now. Restless energy and a sense of urgency had Mona pacing. “I need to get out to Smythe’s complex.”
“Anyone out there to keep an eye on the ward?”
“Not that I know of. But then, we hadn’t started that part of my training yet.”
The woman was already coming back with their winter gear.
“Let’s go,” Tiff said.
“Wait, all of us? We don’t need three people.”
“All of us. Emetaly,” she waved a hand at her companion, whose long, black hair and hooked nose were reminiscent of a Mexican native tribe, “is a first generation Were and can jump us out if need be. And I’m not not going.”
“You can’t jump in or out of Smythe’s complex!” Mona said, exasperated that she needed to explain.
“Right, but if we need to jump at some point outside of it, she can do it. I can’t.”
“Fine.” Okay, Mona saw the logic, given how often Cart had jumped her out of tight places the last couple of days.
Until recently, Mona had never understood why the complex was so far away from the Were enclave. Now she knew the forty-minute drive was to keep the ward removed from Folk and still keep the Warder close enough he could do the rest of his job.
And the skyway was still closed, so they had to go a circuitous route.
Then things kept delaying them.
Broken lights.
Long freight trains.
Disabled cars.
A massive pothole.
No one said anything—it was clear someone or thing was determined they’d not get there.
This, of course, made them all the more determined to do so.
The worst delay was when they got stuck on a road behind an accident where they had to airlift someone out. Two hours. Mona actually took a nap, once it was clear they weren’t going to be moving any time soon.
Dawn was streaking the sky by the time they got to the turnoff for the Warder’s driveway.
Mona pulled over at the second to last turn in the drive.
“We should leave the car here and walk the rest of the way,” she said, fighting to keep her worry from her voice. They’d all taken turns driving and cat napping when they could, but none of them were anything near rested and up to speed. And the way things were going, they’d need to be.
“We got any rations, Emetaly?” Tiffany asked, tucking her short, wine colored hair under a knit cap.
“Yeah,” Emetaly reached into a satchel that was on the back seat. Mona had used it as a pillow one of the times she’d tried to rest. “Let’s see what tasty treats we have in store today. Eggs Benedict? Hash browns? Belgian waffles? Ah, yes, I see they’ve opted for the almond butter and coffee bean option, my favorite.”
They ate their protein bars and washed down the thick taste with sips from the one bottle of water that’d been packed. Mona almost missed the rations from the emergency kit.
“Okay,” Mona said once everyone was done. “Let’s check this place out.”
Mona’s tire tracks from earlier in the week were still discernable and they followed the path as the drive made its way through the stand of trees shielding the complex from the road
.
Tiffany stopped where the path ended in a large area of trampled snow. “Which way?”
“To the right, but let me lead. There was a trap here earlier in the week, and I need to make sure it’s gone.”
They halted at the edge of the clearing around the walls, the full set of buildings in view. The high, crenellated stone wall and the turrets on the corner of the inner buildings looked medieval in the frosty morning air.
Of course, they looked medieval in any air, but something about the crisp blue sky made the slate spires atop the building look far more sharply out of time than they had before. Tiffany and Emetaly stopped and stared.
“That is awesome. A castle in the middle of a forest in upstate New York. Definitely the most . . . um . . . warrior-like Warder compound I’ve seen,” Tiffany said. She scanned the area in the front of the gate. “That’s where the working earlier in the week was, right? I can see the residual from the disturbance in the ground. Not seeing anything now, though, are you?”
Emetaly and Mona shook their heads.
“Any way in besides the gate?” Tiffany asked, gesturing to the large wooden doors mounted deep in the keep’s outer wall.
“No.” There had to be a back way, but Mona didn’t know where it was.
Tiffany shrugged. “Then let’s go.”
This time Tiff led and the other two followed.
She skirted well wide of the churned earth left from the spell Smythe had said was a test. Once at the gates Mona noticed the runes on the warding spell were rearranged.
“He’s changed the spell. You won’t be able to come in with me.”
“What? You’re kidding right?” Tiffany reached to run her hand over the door, as if that would give her information.
Mona’s yell of “Stop!” coincided with the arc of energy coming off the planks of the door.
Tiffany flew back a couple of feet and crumpled to the ground. Her breathing was shallow and her pulse, when Mona thought to feel for it in her neck, rapid.
Emetaly lifted Tiff’s hand and carefully pulled the remnants of her glove off. An angry red welt ran across Tiff’s palm, but the glove had protected her skin from the worst of the heat, if not the energy of the power.
“Go, jump her back,” Mona said. “I need to stay here and see if the Warder’s left me a message.”
Emetaly bit her lip, clearly torn on what to do.
“Look, it’s pretty clear no one besides me is going to get in. If I think anyone is trying, I’ll call, imp restriction be damned.”
“Okay.”
Truth was, Mona wasn’t sure she would be able to get in, but she was going to try.
Mona watched the spell as she approached and reached out for the handle. There, to the right, was the part she needed to change. She tweaked the rune, opened the door, and tweaked it back. “I’m in,” she called out. “Go! Get her some help.”
Mona felt the surge and knew they were gone.
Chapter Thirteen
The circular drive was barren. No snow on any surface. Mona had forgotten how odd the effect of the three large castle-like buildings with the pristine cobblestone drive looked after walking through the snowy forest.
She crossed the wintry lit courtyard to the Warder’s house. Mona realized very quickly gaining entry was a lost cause. The spell had been twisted and turned in a very convoluted string—it’d take her all day to loosen it enough just so she could figure out what she could change to get in. The good news was she was pretty sure nothing was going to get out.
Okay, off to the middle building then, which housed a large library and warehouse. Saying the classrooms on the third floor were too old and dusty to use, the vast book-filled second floor was where most of her training had taken place. Aside from his journal, Smythe kept logs of most events in the Folk community, from births to marriages to the date and location he’d fixed a set spell. They were more like lists than narratives and very, very dry reading. Mona hoped to find something in the library to explain Smythe’s cryptic numbers as well as “make note” of them in the current diary.
She headed up the side staircase to the vast and chilly room. The stone walls and high arched windows reminded her of an ivy-clad prep school she had attended for a year. That was before her mother left and Nic switched her to public school.
Fortunately there was a much smaller reading room off to the side, in an alcove made by the exterior tower. The circular space held the desk Smythe used and the table Mona studied at as well as comfy seating. And a potbelly stove, old but still working.
Mona closed the door. After making sure the flue was open—she wasn’t going to make that mistake again—she started a fire from the wood already laid in. A set spell made the cast iron fixture more efficient.
As the room started to warm and the scent of wood smoke filled the air, Mona took off her coat and sat at the desk. She’d check the Warder’s journal and add a note on what he’d said in his message.
But the top left drawer, where Smythe always placed his book, was empty. So was the one below it. And the three on the right hand side.
Nor was the small leather clad volume on the shelves to the right of the desk where the pervious journals were kept.
Or the floor, or under any of the cushions of the couch or on any of the side tables in the room. Not there.
Would it make more sense to look through the older journals or to look in the larger room for the current one?
Library.
Mona shrugged back into her jacket, did what she could to bank the fire, and headed back into the vast book-filled space. Smythe had a journal for every month he’d been Warder. Add to that the fact that he’d been doing it for over a hundred years . . . that was a lot of journals she was going to have to do through.
She pulled out the oldest, brittle with age and flaking.
She read the first journal entry date.
March 21, 1812.
Abner was even older than they realized if his first journal was two hundred years old.
Nothing seemed relevant on the pages she checked. Births, deaths, trades with the natives. Mona carefully slid the journal back and pulled out the next.
Nothing, nothing, nothing.
Three hours later, she was starving and still hadn’t found the book or stumbled onto anything that might help decipher the numbers.
Giving into her hunger pangs, she headed down to the kitchen hoping to scrounge something to eat. There was a large bag of string cheese sticks in the fridge sitting all by its lonesome on a lower shelf. The freezer had been cleared out as well, although three pints of frost covered soup remained stacked in a corner. In the cabinets, a case of fusilli sat next to an institutional-sized box of toaster pastries. Smythe always had them around, although, come to think of it, she’d never seen him eat one.
Standing in the empty kitchen, Mona was struck by how off things really were. Usually brownies kept the house stocked with at least enough for Abner to eat, plus food for anyone who worked here.
But there was nothing. Even most of the serving ware was gone—a handful of mugs, a saucepan, and a bowl were all that remained. She had no sense that the brownies were about at all.
Mona felt like she was trespassing in an abandoned home. But the answer to the clue Smythe had sent was in all likelihood here, she was sure of it. Knowing she was on the right track didn’t assuage her guilt she hadn’t told anyone of his message. Only one way to deal with that.
“I’d like an imp please.”
Nothing happened. She counted to twenty and tried again. Nothing.
Mona pulled out her phone. No reception. How was she supposed to check on Raine? Find out if more spelled Weres showed up? She was torn, sure she needed to be here, and unwilling to be disconnected from everything that was happening. Focusing on the big picture helped, along with the worry that if she left, she might not make it back. If the goal was to get the person spelling the shifters, her best option was to stay and use the journals to attem
pt to figure out what the numbers from Smythe meant. The protectors knew where she was. If they needed her, they would figure out a way to come get her. Determined to find something, she grabbed several cheese sticks and a toaster pastry, and headed back upstairs to the bookshelves.
Mona passed several days in a stupor of reading, eating when hunger hit and sleeping only when she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer. Worry over Smythe and Raine, as well as the shifters the madman seemed to control, became a constant companion, one that urged her to keep looking, keep going. Her tiredness served as an excellent buffer for thoughts on Cart and his declaration that he couldn’t be with her. Not to mention the sadness that he hadn’t even shown up to check on her. She simply tried not to think and worked her way through over two thousand books.
The sun was streaming through the windows when she woke up from a cat nap nearly a week after she got there. Mona sat up and rubbed her face. She slid her phone out from under yet another journal to check the time.
She’d not found anything, despite stacks of notes on the pages she’d checked and today was the day the Maven had set for the Lackawanna pack meeting. Mona didn’t understand how her feeling that she’d find something here could be so wrong. She’d wasted days when she could have been with the protectors, helping them. With nothing to show for her work she started bundling herself back up and grabbed her keys.
Which were next to a journal.
A journal that had not been there when she went to sleep.
Looking around, she saw the faint trace of imp magic—which was unnerving, given none had been around the entire time she’d been there.
Gingerly, she picked the book up, holding it by the binding. There was a spell running along the side of the cover; the markings looked like Randall’s work. Understandable, then, why the magic hadn’t awakened her—she trusted the Puck implicitly, pain in the ass that he could be.
Although, maybe she shouldn’t. Not that he’d mean her harm, but protecting all the non-human Folk would always come before any friendship they had.
Only one way to find out.