“Agent, this is Seth McClure, I have a situation that requires your attention—” Then he had the gall to interrupt me.
“McClure, I am not at your beck and call,” Messner said. “I do have other responsibilities here and you’ve already given me plenty to do.”
I paused for a moment, gathering my anger and putting it away. He was too minor an issue for that much anger. Instead, I got snippy and said, “Very well, Agent Messner, I will go to more local law enforcement agencies. I wonder, though, how well equipped this county’s sheriff’s department is to handle a case involving the treason and death of a brigadier general? And all for totally unknown causes? I will have to remove all physical and other traces of my brothers and me before I leave. Peter has Marshal Harris. We’ll see what he’d like to do. Sorry for bothering you.” I disconnected the call and turned to Peter.
“I’m waiting to be put through,” Peter said as my phone rang.
I answered, holding the phone at arm’s length saying, “And I push which button?” Then disconnected him again. Peter chuckled while Jimmy just looked confused. This could get tedious, so I reached across to Gilán and grabbed three folding chairs from the earlier picnic, pulling them back. Messner called again.
“What is it, Agent? I’m trying to find a telephone number right now. The Pentagon isn’t in the Yellow Pages.”
“How did you get involved in a case of treason with a brigadier general, Mr. McClure?” Messner asked.
“No, Agent Messner, you made it perfectly clear that you did not wish to be bothered with my problems,” I said testily. “I have to admit, though, that considering the high profile that this is going to obtain that sounds like career suicide to me, but that was your decision and not mine. Good night.” And again, I disconnected the call. “Okay, I’m starting to feel a little better here.” Jimmy snickered this time. Peter was listening to his phone, distracted.
“Mr. Calhoun, this is Peter Borland of the McClures,” Peter told Calhoun an abridged version. I hit the “Ignore Call” key twice and let it ring through to voice mail on Messner once while Peter did. I finally answered the fourth call.
“What, Messner.”
“I apologize, Mr. McClure, I should not have snapped at you that way,” Messner said, trying to sound contrite. I didn’t need to see him to know that was a lie. “It’s been a very stressful day and I am in new territory.”
I paused for a moment to give him the impression I considered his apology. “Mr. Messner, I am currently forty minutes from your hotel. You’ve had ample time to have your partner track the GPS signal in both our cell phones, so you know where I am. Be here within forty minutes and we will continue this discussion of power plays and how I don’t like them. At that time, I will decide whether you will continue to be involved.” He had better be hoping I lost more of my irritation at him by then, too.
Peter disconnected from his call and sat down beside me. “Calhoun will be here as soon as he can arrange transportation of his men. He’s going to call me back. Harris is in transit on personal business for the day. Usually checks back in between eleven-thirty and twelve-thirty, so he’s still normal. Hey, everybody’s got have a little personal time, and he actually schedules it. More power to him.”
“Well, I’m betting Messner will get here in about twenty minutes with at least four men,” I said. “Which he’ll see immediately isn’t enough and try to start ordering people around. That’s when I get to play. I really don’t like these games. Why do they insist on playing them?”
“Maybe he feels he didn’t get a chance to show his,” Jimmy said. “You want me to check on those guys?”
“They look okay from here,” Peter said. “Let’s see who gets here first and let them handle the first problems. We’ve done enough for tonight.”
“But I haven’t,” Jimmy said. “I haven’t done much of anything.”
“Yeah, ya have,” I said, defensively. “Stayin’ alive is a lot harder around me than you can realize. We need to work on some non-lethal outlets.”
“Where do the Swords come from?” Jimmy asked hesitantly.
“There are five weapons and tools attached to the bend where my soul meets my physical body and mind: The Crossbow and Quiver holding the Bolts, The Day and the Night Swords, and the Foundation Stone. When I need them, I can pull them from that place. Kieran and Ethan’s are a different matter. Theirs, I think, are made on site.
“If you’re asking about the Swords’ history, I’m afraid I don’t know much about them,” I told him. “Shrank may know more.”
Eleven and a half minutes. For eleven and a half minutes, it was extremely pleasant around us merely because it was quiet. The air was drier than usual and the evening heat blended into a cool breeze through the hills that felt good, likely due to the ton of ice melting up there. At least for those eleven and a half minutes, anyway.
Calhoun returned his call and told Peter he’d be here in an hour with three men. The rest would take longer, but that wouldn’t be our problem. This was a welcome intrusion to some degree. It gave us some idea of how long we’d be tied down here because regardless of how strongly I believe in the compulsion spell, there were still some unresolved issues that would require outside interference, like transportation. Something had moved these men here and something expected to move them back to wherever they belonged when it was over and there wasn’t anything to move anyone on the property now. This whole situation was going to have serious repercussions to be felt for some time. I almost wished I could stay and watch it all happen. Almost.
We heard a car slowly pulling up the road as Peter hung up. I looked to see a soldier, the sniper along the road earlier, lazing on the hood of the car as it slowly pulled toward us through the field, foregoing the road. The soldier slid off quickly when the car hit an unseen rut in the grass. He kept walking toward us like he practiced the move. That’s a lot harder to do than it looks.
“These guys say they’re with you?” he asked, his voice both deeper and squeakier than expected out of his short, lean frame. It made me grin at him briefly.
“Yes, sir, unfortunately,” I answered.
“Understand that, chief,” he said, nodding. He slung his rifle up to his shoulder and headed for the command tent. “The blond guy’s got a serious chip on his shoulder.”
I turned back to the car as the FBI agents slammed their doors shut. Watching them as they first assessed the situation from afar, I pretty much pegged it. When they started moving to us, Messner had already decided that I’d let the situation get out of hand. When they got within ten feet of us, I enclosed the seven of us in a wall of highly active energy thirty feet in a circle. It used an incredible amount of power and would have vaporized a rhinoceros trying to run through it at full tilt.
As I stood up, I armored up, calling for all five weapons for the show, then I turned to Messner. “Agent Messner,” I drawled in my finest Georgian accent, “I’m not terribly sure why you people have such a love of power games, but you and your team had your chance to play that earlier today. I don’t have to play. Period. I don’t want to play. My brothers don’t play, either, for the same reason.” My anger rose during the tirade and my volume rose with it.
I unhooked the Day from my waist and held it out to him. “Take this, hold this Sword by its hilt and hold a true Sword of Power in your hand, Agent Messner, then look at me.”
He gulped visibly but reached out meekly. I held the Day’s animosity in check as his hand wrapped around the hilt, but he felt its warning all the same.
“Can you feel the Day Sword’s power, Messner?” I asked, taking hold of the scabbard and jerking it off. The Day once again proved its name and lit my enclosed world like the sun. “My brother, Ehran, took these from an elven assassin team the day after we met. He was unarmed at the time. Ethan took the elven bindings off and at Ehran’s behest gave them to me because I didn’t know enough about magic to protect myself.” I pointed at the shield wall around us. “T
hat changed.” I called the Sword back and it shot from Messner’s hand to mine, surprising him.
“Peter, would you mind loaning Agent Messner your eyes for a moment?” I asked.
Peter snickered, then looked at me. “Oh. You weren’t kidding?” Then he snickered again. Walking over to Messner, he whispered, “His father’s the only one who didn’t freak out over this.” He threw his arm over Messner’s shoulder. “When you’re ready, Lord.” Peter was enjoying this too much.
“You see us as nothing, Agent, even though you know it cannot be right,” I told him, calmed considerably now. Knowing what the Day made him feel like consoled me well enough. “This is how we see each other.” Peter made the minor connection to Messner, tweaking into his mind and linking his visual cortex with Messner’s. He held it for less than two seconds. Then he was holding Messner upright for a minute before his partner realized he passed out and took him from Peter to resuscitate him. Peter and I were worthless with that task, seeing as we were laughing so hard about it.
I released the shield wall as unnecessary. I’d scared the other FBI agents enough already and as Messner woke, I was certain we had Messner tamed now. Jimmy got the chairs for us, so we lounged around while they roused him.
“You look at that all day?” Messner asked Peter weakly after a few minutes.
“We’re all like that, dude,” I said. “Ehran, Ethan, Peter, and me. Ehran likes to say that’s why you can’t see our auras, so we don’t scare everybody. But we didn’t show you to scare you, Mr. Messner. We showed you to try to get you to understand that we’re not playing games with you. Ever. And because we have gone to such lengths with you, you are now our contact with the FBI. Our only contact, whether you like it or not.”
“Yes, sir,” Messner said. He didn’t like it, but he accepted it and that scared the hell out of him.
“Good,” I said, standing. “Now, let’s go talk to the major and I’ll explain what’s happened and will happen and what I expect to happen. Now you will have to come to an understanding with the Marshals because they agreed to listen from the beginning. Mr. Calhoun will be Mr. Harris’ agent on site in that regard and will be arriving shortly.”
The FBI and the Marshals played nice together, at least while I was there to supervise. If that changed, I’m sure I’d hear about it tomorrow.
Chapter 15
If you can find a world built to your subconscious specifications with a fantastically large palace filling the top of a majestic mountain range, claim it. Then have said palace wake you each and every morning by singing your name to you as the sun streams into your bedroom window. There is no more exciting and energizing way to start your day. You literally feel like the world is revolving because of you. I strongly recommend the experience.
I’d once again awakened at dawn in my room at the Palace. It wasn’t a surprise this time because I’d gone to sleep there last night, shortly after midnight Central time. Near as we’ve been able to tell, time synchronized at the Palace was somewhere between New York and Dublin, so roughly a four-hour difference between Alabama and the Palace. I felt amazing for three-and-a-half hours of sleep coming off such an awful day.
Good morning, Jimmy, I sent to the only other waking member of the Palace at the moment.
Good morning, Seth, I wondered if I was the only one awake yet, Jimmy sent back over the link.
Would you care to go walking around for a while? There are a few people I should check on while we’re here.
Yes, I would, Lord.
I shifted to the lakeside and sent the sense of that place to Jimmy. He is able to move with the diamond key, but if what I thought was happening, that would soon be extraneous for him, too. Feeling his shift from his room to standing beside me, I was right—he could shift through Gilán on his own. He probably didn’t know it yet because he had the diamond so tightly against his wrist, held in place by a wide leather band.
When I glanced up at his arrival, I did a spastic double take. The shirt he wore looked awesome. Solid black shoes, slacks, and a long-sleeved shirt. The front right panel began a different motif. In brilliant detail, the First of Gilán was woven through the fabric in the bright colors of the daybreak, with the blue of my power and Gilán being the most prevalent. And he didn’t look emaciated anymore. He still needed a few good meals and a few more days of actual rest, but he was looking pretty damn good.
“Good morning, Lord Daybreak!” Shrank called happily, shooting out of the trees with the Dea brothers in hot pursuit. He almost skidded in the air as he turned around Jimmy, looping back, slowing and reading the script carefully. Relief was his primary reaction, which rather surprised me, even more when the Dea brothers mirrored that reaction. Then all three of them were happy for him and glad it wasn’t them.
“Should I be insulted by that?” I asked in general, grinning. “Everybody’s happy you’re the First, Jimmy, but they’re also happy because they’re not!”
“No, Lord Daybreak, we most certainly meant no insult,” Shrank trilled merrily. “We are relieved because we would have much greater difficulty in fulfilling the role of First. He appears to be a much better selection and he is handling the bonding quite well.”
There were a few more sprites moving about the lakeside and the woods beyond. Parents looking after children, collecting wood and plants of various sort. In general everyone was playing. Fun to watch, but these people needed to be getting along with their lives and I couldn’t help thinking they were just marking time right now. Made me a little happier to move the date up.
“Shrank, weren’t you about to go down for your morning nap?” I asked him. “We don’t need to keep you up if you don’t need something.”
“Actually, Lord Daybreak, I have news and a request,” Shrank said. “I have found a smith. Unfortunately, none of us foresaw that you would require the services of a sprite smith and he has been exercising his power in inappropriate ways that have damaged him significantly.”
“What was he doing?” I asked, wondering how a smith used power inappropriately.
“He metalcrafted without a forge,” Shrank said. “It creates a magnificent stress on the smith. He created a gift from his clan to you to be presented on the night of the Great Claiming. All of the clans are planning something. Especially the new ones. It will be a fascinating night. Which actually brings me to the request.”
“There are fourteen kilns in the Palace that aren’t being used,” I said, “and at least three different forges capable of working several extremely strong steels. Why not use one of those?”
“We would not think to ask such a thing, Lord,” Deason squeaked. “No one would think to look to the Palace for supplies or housing.” Deacon nodded briskly beside him.
I actually understood that, but Jimmy didn’t. He needed more time among the Fae to understand their mindset.
“All right, take me to him then,” I said, getting it in my head that I was going to be disturbed by what I saw next. The Fae and metal poisoning wasn’t a pretty picture.
“That brings me to their request, Lord Daybreak,” Shrank said seriously. “The smith has finished his task but for one item. The clans have scoured the countryside and into the mountains looking for a suitable pairing to no avail. I believe we may find something in the Palace…”
“Okay, Jimmy can take you up there to look while I’m checking on the smith. Will that work for you?” I asked distractedly. Shrank nodded happily and shot off into the woods, leading us to one of three brownie villages. This was the diurnal village, the most confused of the three—four out of ten clans here were on different cycles than the others. It seemed like someone was always busy here when half the town was sleeping. There was a roar of greeting out of the village, which unfortunately kept the other sixty-percent of the village up longer. They weren’t expecting us till tomorrow when we would spend the day here, but that did not stop them from throwing a parade right then and there. Jimmy got his own, which confused him to no end.
“Are they always like this?” Jimmy asked, wading through the excited throng of “You have to be this tall to ride” rejects.
“They are with me,” I answered, spotting the one house full of dark energy on the hillside. It was closer to the nocturnal village, which sort of made sense for someone whose magic worked on the metals of the ground. Shrank headed in that direction as well. “I’m hoping they’ll calm down with time, but it’s not hurting them and it shows me that they’re happy and healthy, so I won’t complain.”
“Were they unhappy before?” Jimmy asked, which brought out the strangest reaction from the Fae that I’ve seen. They stopped. Some two hundred and eighty brownies and sprites all around us stopped stock-still and slowly turned to face Jimmy, to answer his seemingly innocuous question.
“Yes.”
For miles all around us, we heard an echo, serious and somber, as the rest of the Fae took up the call and answered the First’s question. “Yes.”
Then Gilán erupted again in happy chitters and squeals as the question was forgotten and nature re-asserted itself. “Wow,” Jimmy said, looking at me. “You don’t do anything small, do you?”
“It was either him or me and I liked me better,” I said defensively, turning back to the unhealthy house at the base of the hill. The brownies got a little nervous about the comment, but Jimmy chuckled, taking it as intended, and they relaxed. That meant they had a sounding board in Jimmy, which would help me immensely.
Calling the smith’s current home a house is being generous. Even considering this as temporary housing, it looked like a hovel to me, but to them it was merely a long vacation in paradise. This was a lean-to in front of a few deep holes in the ground to my eyes. Outside the front of the lean-to stood the head of the clan and two female brownies with wash basins formed from bark and clay. They were his caretakers for this time of the day. It struck me as odd that the clan head cared for his cousin so closely, but he had a strong emotional attachment to him. They’d grown up together, both developing unusual talents before the crossing.
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