Free Agent

by J. C. Nelson

  It shot upward like a rocket. Gravity tried to pull my stomach out through my feet as I rose. The elevator doors slid open to reveal a suite entirely of windows, wide open. All around me was the city by day.

  “Finally,” said a woman. I recognized her immediately as Queen Mihail. No flowing gowns or high crowns. She wore a clean-cut business suit and handed her tablet to an assistant as she strode across the marble to meet me. She wore flats, not heels. “I was wondering when the pawn would arrive.”

  I’d have been upset, but I’d gotten used to how royalty spoke and acted. The princes and princesses were a bunch of worthless brats, but I kept my tongue in check around their parents. As we moved across the building, a man followed. I had thought him an assistant, but he was too wide, too heavy. Bodyguard or personal assassin.

  “Pawn, that’s Shigeru. You needn’t fear him.”

  Shigeru bowed to me, and I returned it, hoping I remembered the correct angle and length for an honorary bow.

  “Don’t be afraid, girl, he’s not magical, he’s Asian.” I had two Korean girls in my class at community college, and I knew Asian magic—it was hard work and high expectations. The tattoo on his arm matched that of the ninja assassins Grimm occasionally hired for government work. That meant Shigeru wasn’t dangerous. He was deadly.

  “You are late,” said Queen Mihail, taking a seat on a couch edge by a window. “Sit.”

  Now, I wasn’t afraid of heights. It doesn’t pay to be—too many ledges, ladders, and crevices—but sitting on the edge of the couch I could look down the building. The farther down I looked, the more dizzy I got. “I’m sorry I’m late. I couldn’t figure out how to call the elevator.” I actually thought I was fifteen minutes early. Grimm has this theory that me showing up early was actually a harbinger of the apocalypse. If he was right, every time I showed up late, I actually saved the world. You’d think he would thank me for it.

  “My elevator isn’t called. It’s sent. I told it to pick up the head of the investigation and only the head of the investigation. I called Fairy Godfather five minutes ago, and you just showed up.”

  Something was wrong. I’d accidentally stepped into a mystery, and all I had to go on were Saturday morning cartoons with a talking dog and monsters in masks. Something had gone wrong in the time it had taken me to bus through Kingdom and get here, and I was going to be damned if I let her throw me off. I’d look like an idiot. I’d make Grimm look like an idiot.

  “Show me where it happened,” I said, taking a stab at it. She rose and I followed her up a sweeping staircase to another floor. She placed her hand on the door. It glowed for a moment, and opened. Huge, messy but recognizable: I stood in the middle of a bachelor pad. Mihail’s apartment.

  My bracelet tingled against my arm. That meant they had enough Glitter to put cancellation wards over the whole top floors. Grimm wasn’t going to be watching over my shoulder. “I need to look around,” I said. Then, drawing on many Saturday mornings’ worth of TV, I added, “We need to search for clues.” Only problem was, I was an agent, not a private investigator. In Kingdom, if you tried pulling the mask of a monster, it would probably pull the skin off your head.

  “Shigeru will watch you. Don’t try to take anything.” She left us alone.

  “You are not an investigator.” He came over and stood behind me.

  “No. I’m the messenger girl, errand girl, that sort of thing. I was supposed to be filling in a questionnaire about the prince’s magical tolerances. We had a basic love potion fail on him.”

  “You assume the prince is capable of love. May I have your gun for safekeeping?” I hadn’t put a hand on my purse or looked at it once, but he knew. “It would make me less, how to say? Tense.”

  It wasn’t like shooting him was an option anyway, so I took it out, pulled the clip, and handed it to him.

  “Thank you.” He tucked it into a deep pocket in his loose black pants. “I assist the royal family in all positions, so I will answer your questions.”

  “Is there someplace we can sit? Trust me, I’m not going to take anything he’s touched.”

  I think a smile almost made it out, but he stifled it. “You have met the prince.”

  “Yeah. We’ve talked more than I’d like.” I was actually glad I had met Liam instead. Three dates with Mihail would have triggered my gag reflex. His apartment was actually decorated with paintings: paintings of himself.

  “Look, when I get back, Grimm’s gonna want to know what happened, and I don’t want to look bad. I’m a messenger, but even a messenger wants to do good by their boss. What’d she call Fairy Godfather about?”

  Shigeru leaned back and blinked, his eyes getting wider. “The prince, Mihail. He is missing. Kidnapped.”

  That did it. I took pride in knowing when to call for help, and when to handle things myself. “You get bracelet reception anywhere in here?”

  “That corner. Wards are weakest there. You’re above most of the normal interference, anyway.”

  I wandered to the corner, stepping over discarded laundry and avoiding anything that had so much as touched the prince. The moment I hit the corner my bracelet shook like it was going to tear my arm off. The wall was all glass and the view made me want to hurl, so I took out the compact and focused on the tiny mirror.

  “Grimm?” When I saw him I knew things were bad.

  “Marissa, where are you?”

  “Mihail’s apartment. Don’t worry. I showed up and the queen figured I was here to look into it. I need an investigator and the cops. This isn’t my area of expertise, Grimm.”

  “There’s a secondary team on their way already and I’ve contacted the police, as they should have to begin with. Simply tell the queen you don’t believe her son’s case is getting enough attention, and you’ve dispatched a squad to handle it.”

  “I dispatched them?”

  “Let her believe what she wants to.”

  I heard Evangeline’s voice, distant and broken. “Let. Me. Talk to her.”

  “Not now,” said Grimm, but I could feel her reaching through him.

  I had this horrible feeling in my stomach and needed to lean against the window. “What’s wrong?”

  “We’ll discuss it when you return,” said Grimm.

  I felt Evangeline reaching out again. “Tell her.”

  Grimm dropped his eyes. “There’s been an accident at Liam’s house.”

  “Show her,” said Evangeline.

  Grimm didn’t usually connect us like that, and while his magic reached into our ears he almost never did anything with our other senses. “You need to trust your own eyes,” he always said, but I felt my vision slipping away. I stood, too tall, and at the wrong angles. I was looking through Evangeline’s eyes. It had been a house, or a barn, or a house with a workshop, I don’t know. Everything left was charred chunks of wood and twisted bits of wrought iron.

  Evangeline strode across the charred ground, each step so foreign I was sure she’d fall over. She reached down and shook the ashes from something. A silver snake—the curse shell. Its eyes were lifeless; it rattled and clinked as she picked it up. Grimm cut the link to Evangeline and I sagged against the window.

  “He’s not dead, I already checked,” said Grimm. “I can’t seem to find him.”

  “I gotta go.” I snapped the compact closed. My gaze wandered out over the city and the world spun, slick with tears and fear and pain. Hands seized me and led me from the window, and I was unwilling to resist.

  “Sit,” said Shigeru, and I collapsed onto a couch by a king-sized bed. “Bad news.” He sat on the edge of the bed.

  I nodded. I struggled to find my voice, to focus on my job. “Team of investigators coming. Cops too. Some of them are friends, sort of.”

  “I will restrain myself. I do not believe you will take anything. When you are ready, the doors beside the elevator lead down.” He put his hand on my shoulder as he spoke. “Bad news and good news are brothers. Where one is, the other is never far b
ehind.”

  My eyes ached, my head pounded, and I blew my nose on a tissue and tossed it in the trash by the bed. That’s when the dressing mirror caught my eye.

  It was long and narrow and ugly, obviously a family relic from a time when fine copper mirrors couldn’t be had. The thing was a silver mirror, the old kind, with a silver platter painted and polished until it held a dim reflection. The polish had long since worn off it and the silvering looked like sludge that had run down the mirror, leaving lumps. What bugged me was the feeling I got when I looked at it. It’s the same feeling I got when Grimm watched during an assignment. For a moment, the desire to touch it seized me. The thought of Mihail’s hand doing the same washed over me like cold water, and the moment was gone.

  I met the queen on the way down, Shigeru close behind.

  I looked her straight in the face, always the best way to lie. “I’ve decided this case deserves more attention. I’ve ordered a team of investigators, and contacted my most trusted detectives. I made it clear there was no higher priority.”

  A speaker chimed, and the doorman spoke. “My lady, a group begs admittance.”

  “I will send the elevator. Allow them in,” the queen said. “Pawn, come with me.”

  Shigeru followed along behind us, padding softly on the carpet, so close he almost brushed me. She led me to a granite serving room separated by low marble walls.

  “You’ll take care of the investigation, won’t you?”

  Grimm had told me to let her believe what she wanted to, but the look in her eyes made me worried. “Yes, Your Highness. I’ll be overseeing it personally.”

  She popped the cork from a wine bottle and poured rich red merlot into a glass. “It always falls to us when trouble comes. A man may make money, and earn Glitter, and make a thousand decisions. When trouble comes, it is a woman who deals with it.”

  “I do what I’m told.” It was a somewhat truth.

  “Then listen to what I’m telling you. My son has done something, or offended someone. I do not know what or who, but I will be the one to deal with him. When you find him, you will contact me. My gratitude will be impressive. I can give you rewards your Godfather cannot.”

  I shouldered my purse, eager to get back to the Agency. “I’ll find him.”

  She raised a glass of wine to me. “I hope so. My generosity is legendary, and it will fall on everyone who aids you.” She took a sip and considered me, as though she could scry the future in the wine. “Fail, and my wrath will be legendary as well.”

  Fifteen

  ROSA MET ME at the door with a shotgun. Strictly speaking, not aimed at me, but you don’t really have to aim a sawed-off shotgun. She swung it toward me. “You, get in there.” She turned her attention to the crowd. “The rest of you will take a number and have a seat.” Her paperwork skills might have been lousy, but her personal touch was something I aspired to.

  I ran down the hall and slammed the door to Grimm’s office. “Where is Liam?”

  Grimm flickered into the desk mirror. “We’re in the conference room, if you don’t mind.”

  “I do. Where is he?” I sat down in one of the chairs and waited.

  “Marissa, please?”

  Evangeline came through the door and joined me, putting her feet up on Grimm’s desk.

  “Ladies, I don’t like you two meeting in here. Too many toys, and some of you have shown a tendency to act first and think second.”

  Clara opened the door. I looked at her white hair and wondered what she’d seen over the years, and where those scars had come from. I thought they were only on her face, but now I saw they ran down her arms as well, and most likely covered every inch of her body. She looked at me and Evangeline. “Nice to see things haven’t changed around here.” Clara limped over and took Grimm’s mirror out of the chair.

  “Clara, you are sixty-two. Act your age,” said Grimm. “Put that back.”

  Clara sat it up against the wall and took his chair. “I heard you met Queen Mihail. I knew her when she was just Irina.”

  I had the beginnings of a migraine. “She threatened me. Said she’d reward me if I succeeded and punish me if I failed. Said Grimm couldn’t protect me or reward me the way she could.”

  “That woman,” said Grimm, “is invoking powers beyond her control.”

  Clara turned back to look at Grimm. “Wouldn’t be the first time. She wants her boy back, right?”

  I nodded.

  She opened a drawer in Grimm’s desk and began to pick through it. “Then we better get him. When Irina gets angry, she doesn’t get violent. She hires someone else to get violent for her.”

  “She thinks I’m in charge of the investigation.” I had everyone’s attention now. “It was a misunderstanding. Grimm, you’d better have an idea of how we’re going to find that prince, or I am going to suffer the consequences. I told her we’d find him.”

  “If Irina threatened you, she’ll punish us all,” said Clara, her eyes narrowing. “Do you have any idea what that woman is capable of?”

  I stifled a keen desire to see if I could strangle her faster than Evangeline could intervene. “No. I was born less than a century ago, so I don’t quite have your range of expertise.”

  “Then how are you going to find the prince?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll think of something.”

  The look she gave me would make a kobold soil his pants. “Remind me exactly what it is you do around here? Oh, yes. You’re pretty. You know, you’re plain for a pretty girl. Does Grimm have to spice you up for dates?”

  “That is enough!” said Grimm, shaking the desk with his anger.

  I was done being cordial. “What is your problem with me?” She could talk about my looks all day. I had a mirror with me at all times, and no delusions. My mirror might talk, but it didn’t lie.

  She leaned forward on the desk. “You have no business being involved. You show up and don’t have the sense to wait when Irina is obviously throwing off thunderclouds. You got mugged, for Kingdom’s sake, and used to launch a curse, and you couldn’t even aim it at the right person. You’re carrying fae blessings around with you like they’re a puppy.”

  She stood, and for a moment, I saw an image of what she must once have been like, and a sad prophecy of what I might become. She pointed her finger at me. “I have a family. They live in this city. That curse is old, and powerful enough to level twenty city blocks. You jet around with your curls and your smile and treat it like some sort of adventure. Now you bring down Irina’s wrath on us?”

  I looked at Evangeline, but she kept her eyes down. I glanced at the mirror. “Grimm, what do you want me to do?”

  Clara spoke before he could. “Settle down and act like an adult. Let your friend and Jess worry about your crush, and let me try and put a lid back on Hurricane Irina before innocent people get hurt. Grimm, do you want her tripping around with a set of blessings while we try to fix this?”

  “That what you think?” I asked Evangeline.

  She at least had the decency to meet my eyes this time. “I think you need to be more careful, M. I promise you I’ll find him and make sure he’s safe.”

  Clara spun Grimm’s chair to face the mirror. “Make a decision, Grimm. I won’t work with her. She’s too much of a liability.”

  “Clara, I need you to handle the Court of Queens,” said Grimm. “You wouldn’t be working with Marissa anyway.”

  I snapped my fingers for Grimm’s attention. He hated that, but I did it because it worked. “It isn’t my fault with Queen Mihail. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  Clara took a pack of cards out of Grimm’s desk and began to shuffle them. “Wrong place? Or right place? You’ve got things attached to you that wouldn’t hesitate to make a change in your favor.” She began to deal cards to me. “Anything else like this happen? Strange coincidences? Improbable accidents? People mistaking you for other people, bad things happening to people you don’t like?”

  My jaw fe
lt numb for a moment as I thought back. Ari getting sick. Me getting mugged. The elevator.

  Clara tossed me a card. Ace of spades. “Grimm, slaughter a few bunnies and ask if magic was involved in any of those ‘accidents’ you’ve been telling me about. Or don’t. You know the answer as well as I do.”

  Grimm disappeared and I waited as the minutes ticked by. I took the deck from the table and began to deal cards to myself. Aces, kings, and then queens. Always. I went through the cards and picked out the two of diamonds, then turned it back over. I focused on it while I reached across the table. At the last moment, something pushed my hand. What I came up with was a ten. The best card left in the deck.

  “See?” Clara crossed her arms and looked at me like I was a schoolgirl.

  Grimm reappeared in the mirror, and he looked worried. Almost afraid, though he’s never afraid.

  Clara looked up at him and grinned. “Could’ve saved you a few rabbits. What did you always say? ‘Clara is right.’ So nice to hear that again.”

  “Marissa is not responsible for the potion’s failure,” said Grimm.

  I waited for him to speak. And waited. And I knew a defense wasn’t coming. “I didn’t do anything,” I said.

  Grimm ran his hands through his hair. “My dear, I’ve used enough rabbits to keep Alice in Wonderland for the rest of her life. You have powerful forces acting on your behalf.”

  “Grimm, you know how blessings work,” Clara said. “You want her involved when something like this is going down? This is a conjunction. You’re several thousand years old. Act your age for once. Or if that’s too much to ask, act mine.”

  I looked at Evangeline, and saw the word didn’t mean anything to her either. I waited until Grimm glanced at me, and I asked, “Conjunction?”

  “Something nasty,” said Clara. “Every so often magic goes head-to-head with magic, and the rest of us try to survive. Imagine the world is a silver platter balanced on a ball. Now imagine they’re playing soccer with that ball, and we try to keep the platter from tipping over and killing everyone. Now imagine you are tap dancing around on the platter with a couple of live bowling balls at the same time. Grimm, ditch her.”