“Wakey, wakey, Ahndray,” I said as I sat on the sofa.
The table, bespelled as a joke by my father, seemed to grow a bit as it shifted from a sedentary table to an animated object. Its legs bent and moved as though they weren’t wood, and it trotted over to where I sat. Dad did say the table had never been an actual person, unlike the animated objects in the beloved “Beauty and the Beast” fairy tale.
To go along with the joke, I had named it Ahndray, and I used it whenever I was in the room. When I was finished, I simply knocked twice on it and told it to go back to sleep. The best part was that the table never spilled anything, even when moving around the room or house.
“Your Magick or your parents’?” Sterling asked. “That is a clean and simple spell. Not having to move a table is not unacceptable laziness, either,” he assured me with a wink, while he placed the platter and his cup on the table. He walked back toward the kitchen.
“Leaving me so soon?” I half teased.
“I need to get plates and silverware,” his voice carried back to me, “unless you plan for us to eat breakfast off of one another’s bodies.”
“Tempting, but there are better choices for that,” I called back to him. “And it was a gift from my father.”
Instead of responding, Sterling returned a minute later with china plates and silverware for two, along with two red silk napkins. He handed me a plate, silverware, and a napkin before sitting next to me.
As we began eating, I leaned over and grabbed the papers I’d left on the end table. After spreading them out on the coffee table in front of us, I turned my attention to my food.
“One of these clients hired mercs from Universal Manpower. I have the license plate number for the vehicle used in the abduction, but it’s owned by U.M., so the only lead from there would be finding out who signed it out that day,” I said.
“We could figure who took Althea and see about getting her location from them,” observed Sterling, “but we have no idea of who was paying them. We should try to discern who the client is and go at the problem that way.”
“Mercs don’t have to be human. Wasting time and spells trying to get answers from them isn’t my first option,” I added between bites of toast and scrambled eggs. “This is heavenly. Usually I skip breakfast, but for you, I’ll make an exception every time.”
“The egg recipe is a little culinary surprise I whipped up about fifty years ago while in Germany.” He looked at the papers while talking to me. “I don’t recognize two clients on this page.” Leaning over, he brought the fourth page closer to us. “I am fairly well versed in the area businesses; however, CopperWyvern.org and Empowerment la Femme are unknown to me.”
“Okay, we’ll check those out,” I said, making a mental note. I pointed to two other names on different pages. “What about those two?”
“Fellhaven Tavern is off Main Street in Waynesboro. It’s owned by an ifrit and an elf,” Sterling said pleasantly. “Lovely pair. Love their appetizers and house punch. ShenValley Shipping was recently sold. The new owners are supposedly out of Texas and have yet to take possession of the property.” He chuckled. “Owners from a distant state. I suppose that’s as good a cover as is needed for demons doing their master’s bidding. Ah, the endless depths of naivety Humanity possesses.”
“A vengeance demon and an elf became partners? How does that work?” I couldn’t help asking.
“Better than most would believe,” answered Sterling. He plucked the last page of the client list off the table and pointed out two more company names.
“Dullrock Studios and…this one, Elfwagon Inc. I don’t recognize either of those. They may be too small or, perhaps, online companies.”
“We should check them out anyway,” I said. “Thoroughness is what makes for a solved investigation.”
“Learn that notion from your father?” Sterling asked, a bemused expression on his face.
“Yes.”
“He stole it from a young author named Doyle,” Sterling explained, “although Doyle thought that phrase wasn’t catchy enough for his short stories and novels. Perhaps he was right; he did eventually receive a knighthood for his tales.”
“Be that as it may, can we stay focused on this, breakfast, or both?” I asked, not giving his claims much thought for the moment.
“As you like,” Sterling replied, taking my smartphone out of the robe’s single pocket. “Shall we Google the four names and see what the wonderful world of the internet can do for us?”
“We can put Empowerment la Femme at the bottom of the list. It’s a club Nick uses to lure in girls for his harem.” I paused a moment as his actions finally registered. “Wait a minute, did you steal my phone from the bedroom?” I asked.
“Oh no, I used Magick.”
* * *
After breakfast, Sterling joined me for a shower that took far longer than normal. Not that I was complaining. With any luck, my heart wouldn’t become entangled in our sultry affair. I had no clue what Sterling’s thoughts were on the subject of long-lasting, intimate relationships. I’d heard that he hadn’t ‘settled down’ in the past three millennia, and so far, the rumors hadn’t lied. Until he decided to end the fling, though, I was going to enjoy it with every passionate fiber in my body.
Before investigating the companies, we agreed to check out Althea’s house. Maybe, with some luck, there would be a few clues among her personal effects. I was secretly hoping she kept a diary, but I doubted we’d get that lucky.
Instead of using a vehicle, we teleported to Althea’s home in Waynesboro after cloaking ourselves so we would be invisible to mundane observers. There was no need to advertise to the local police or nosey neighbors that we appeared out of nowhere and waltzed into her house.
The fae woman not only had Magickal wards up, but she had also invested in a mundane home security system. Neither, however, was working fully when we arrived. In fact, the only reason I knew she’d used wards was because I could feel their energy fizzling in the air. Someone had forcefully broken through them and had hacked the security system. Tipping my head to the side, I wondered if whoever had done it was still there, or if it had happened sometime earlier. With luck, they’d still be there, and I could have some fun.
It was hard to acquire decent ingredients in this era without angering all sorts of people. It was no wonder my area of expertise was a dying profession, unlike centuries earlier where maiming, torturing, and killing people wasn’t such a touchy thing.
Sterling gestured toward the door and then to the left. He apparently had a destination in mind, or perhaps he could detect something or someone of interest.
Being invisible to all but each other meant that the front door appeared to swing open and closed of its own volition to any nosey neighbors, but that wasn’t our concern. The vintage furniture, floors, and decor of the wide living room we stepped into was a sight to behold. It was a throwback to wealth from the early 20th century. The youngest piece of decor dated back to the 1930’s.The front window was leaded glass, slightly stained for a prismatic effect when sunlight shone directly against it.
Unfortunately, the window and a 1930’s silver service tray were the only things left untouched. Past the mess on the floor and the overturned furniture, we could see a thoroughly modern kitchen that had also been ransacked. The large, stainless steel fridge had been left open, with food and liquids dribbling out onto the once immaculate wooden floor. To our left was a hallway. Some mild scuffling could be heard from an unseen room.
Sterling was already heading down the hallway with long, silent strides. He looked to the left, then straight ahead as I came up beside him. He seemed to be lost in thought for a moment, but then he pointed in both directions. I nodded straight ahead. He tilted his head to the left, and we knew which way each of us was going.
I started down the short hall to the room at the end, and I passed a cozy bathroom that hadn’t been ravaged as badly as the living room or what we could see of the kitchen.
There was a discharge of energy from somewhere behind me, and I turned to look back down the hall. A moment later, Sterling came into view at the other end, dragging a light-haired person in black pants and sweatshirt by the neck. When the expression on Sterling’s face hardened, and his free hand started to come up, I knew another goon must have come up behind me.
Instinctively, I spun around, bending my knees to make myself a smaller target. My right hand snaked out ahead of me and slammed into a chest. Before I identified the being before me, I sent energy through a small bag of items that was now mashed between my hand and the stranger’s beating heart. The spell dropped the core temperature of the being’s body by ten degrees within a second. A male voice grunted, and the body began to sag. I stepped back into a defensive stance, dropping the now useless bag of spell ingredients to the floor.
The man was back up on his feet, and his body grew while fur burst out from his skin. His face elongated and took on a bear-like appearance. I was facing a werebear, and he was getting ready to charge. Sterling was poised to counter, but I grabbed the tea platter and moved toward our adversary before either of them could move. The werebear lumbered toward me, roaring, and was promptly ensnared by coils of energy that spooled from Sterling’s fingers. The bear-like creature roared again, this time in frustration, and struggled against the golden coils surrounding him from his neck to his hind paws. I darted around him and grabbed the one useful, intact item in the room.
That’s when the person lying on the floor came to life. A scissor kick took Sterling down and broke his spell. Before he hit the floor, the werebear’s partner, a fae female with dark, flawless skin and white hair, was on him. She struck him repeatedly in the face as the lumbering hulk of black fur turned to face me. I charged, running right at the werebear.
As the large, furry face turned toward me, I opened my left hand and blew the crushed remains of my spell components into its face. At the same time, I swung the platter in my right hand at the head of the dark fae, reciting an incantation.
Small wooden and leaf fragments that are ignited can cause old, dry wood, paper, or even fur to burn. However, the fragments’ composition, size, and other features determine how long they will burn. What I had blown into the werebear’s eyes and up its big nose wouldn’t burn for more than a second or two, but that was long enough. The small pieces ignited and temporarily incapacitated the creature.
The fae woman fell sideways when I struck her head, but she recovered almost immediately. She said, “Ow!” in an indignant voice that was almost a child’s, and she wasted no time bolting out the front door. There was no time to chase her. I swung the tea service platter, made of pure, polished silver, into the werebear’s face.
Despite the satisfying clang, the platter wasn’t going to be enough to lay it out. Swinging from my hips, I hit him again, silently apologizing to the antique’s unknown maker for the damage I was causing.
The platter held up through four more savage blows, finally bending into a triangle when the fifth blow landed on the werebear’s head. I drove the pointed end of the silver triangle into the werebear’s left eye socket and brain. He stopped roaring, yelped oddly, then collapsed. I stood over the dying body.
“Was that necessary?” Sterling asked. Looking over, I saw him groggily getting up from the floor. Considering the swelling around his jaw and temple, I was impressed he was conscious and moving.
The lycanthrope transformed back into human form. I looked carefully at it, then stomped down on the wide end of the platter, driving the point another two inches into the man’s skull. As the body died, I glanced back up at Sterling.
“If we are going to get answers from him, yeah, it was,” I answered.
Not wasting a second, I knelt over the corpse and reanimated it. The action was second nature to me, and although I had to imbue the body with my energy to bring it back to life, the dark power fed me. When I stood, again, and stepped away from the man in shredded clothing, there was no physical indication I’d been in a fight.
The undead man sat up and found me with his intact eye. The platter still protruded from the left.
“Why?” he croaked.
“I require answers. You will give them to me and do my bidding before I release you.” My voice was calm and unyielding. The staring cadaver paused a moment before nodding.
“Why did you and your partner come to this house?” I began.
“We were looking for an amulet. Ilygad Amon,” he replied immediately.
“What were your plans once you found it?” Sterling asked.
“To take it to our Master. An ancient dark elf. The dahnri.”
Sterling ground his teeth for a moment. “I should have known he was starting trouble, again.”
He noticed my expression of intrigue, excitement and fear.
“Xantos?” I whispered.
“We will deal with the dahnri another time,” Sterling said dismissively.
“Where is the dahnri based?” I blurted out.
“He comes to us. We are not yet worthy to enter his chambers,” the werebear corpse said, unhappily.
“How were you to notify him?” I pushed.
“We have burner phones programmed with a single number.” He pulled an old flip phone from a battered back pocket. Sterling took it and tucked into his suit coat.
“The woman you were with? She has a similar phone?” asked Sterling.
The man nodded once.
“Very well,” I said. Looking at Sterling, I silently waited to see if there was anything else he wanted from this servant. Sterling nodded at me.
“Pull that object from your head and place it on what remains of the couch,” I instructed.
Since the undead have no sensation of pain or wellbeing, the big fella pulled out the platter with a mighty tug. It sounded crunchy and wet, but no one here was grossed out or bothered. He gently put the bent silver tray on one shredded cushion, then looked to me for further instruction.
“Find your partner. Kill her, then eat her. When you are done, you may rest in peace.”
The man smiled and ran out the door.
“It seems that you do earn your reputation, after all,” Sterling said, and I heard approval in his voice.
I grinned at him and turned toward the mess the would-be burglars made.
“Xantos,” I stated, trying to wrap my brain around it. “This case has just become far more intriguing.”
Sterling, I now suspected, was an Ancient One. The Ancients were beings who had been around since Magick was created. They were older than gods and could have claimed the title, themselves. From what I’d seen of Sterling, and from what my father had said, he definitely fit the category.
Xantos, however, was a predator of another caliber. I wasn’t entirely certain where he lived, but I knew it wasn’t on this plane or in this realm of existence. He was a powerful necromancer known to be cruel beyond words to those who opposed him.
I knew he easily walked the planes of Hell. Demons were bigger gossips than mortals, and I had ways of convincing them to tell me what I wanted to know without sacrificing my soul, life, or anything else I didn’t want to give them. Though I’d never met the dark elf, I’d witnessed the bodies he left behind as warnings or reminders of what he was capable of.
Believe me when I say seeing someone skinned with the expert precision of a surgeon is something you couldn’t forget. It may have left me envious of his experience and skills, but it also left me rather fearful, since he had done it while the person was living.
Even I had my limits.
Sterling shrugged slightly, so I had no inkling about what he thought of Xantos. I was sure I’d find out soon enough.
* * *
We split up again to search the rooms. The amulet wasn’t going to be in the fae’s residence, but there was plenty of solving left to do on this case, and the hunt for clues went on.
It turned out the two remaining rooms on the floor were bedrooms, an
d the werebear had been in the master bedroom. I looked at the king-sized bed with luxurious sheets and goose down pillows and felt bad for Althea. Two large plants sat on the floor. Gorgeous landscape portraits hung on every wall except the one with the six-foot window that looked out onto the vast floral garden in the backyard. An antique wash stand with bowl and pitcher sat against one wall. Everything but the window had been broken or shredded.
Too bad she hadn’t thought to put some wolfsbane in a pot in this room. But, who expects to be kidnapped in a cemetery, let alone have their domicile tossed by a lycanthrope? It was a hellish mess.
The cracked and emptied dresser had been home to the plants. Among the scattered clothes and leaves, it found a small picture in a shattered frame. The picture showed Althea at a party somewhere, laughing and being kissed on the neck by another woman. The intimate and comfortable way their bodies were pressed together suggested they were more than friends.
The other woman was one of the groupies I’d seen with Nick at the Tower. Removing the broken glass, I pulled the picture out and pocketed it. After a quick check under the bed, I stepped back into the hallway.
Nothing about the bathroom struck me as remarkable when I glanced into it. There was a small sink, a modern toilet, and an antique porcelain claw tub. A pair of toothbrushes and a tube of mint paste lay next to the sink. Light green soaps that smelled like fresh tea and flowers sat next to the sink and tub. The only things out of place in here were toilet paper and towels, which were scattered across the floor.
“The other room is a guest room,” Sterling said, startling me. He stood behind me, peering into the bathroom. “Full-sized bed, empty dresser, washtub stand with accoutrements. A lamp and small candelabra. Everything was moved around but not destroyed. Nothing of interest.”
“Let’s check out the rest of the house,” I suggested, hoping to keep him from seeing that he’d startled me.
The destruction was nauseating, at least to me. I was a lover of all things antique, and the wanton destruction made me wish I could have tortured both burglars before their deaths.
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