Bound by Faerie: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Stolen Magic Book 1)

by WB McKay

  "Are you too scared to go any faster?" he asked, his tone lightly mocking.

  I clutched my chest and took short, rapid breaths. "I think I'm having a heart attack," I said, too scared of the tight feeling in my chest to come up with a snappy reply.

  His brows lowered into a look I would have labeled concern on someone who wasn't so self-centered. "It's probably the necklace again. What were you thinking about?"

  "We're heading into the city. That's where my office is. This mess is going to cost me my job." The pain in my chest grew too tight to say more.

  "Where do you work?" he asked.

  "The Magical Objects Division of the FAB," I wheezed.

  Recognition washed over his features. "So this was a job gone wrong. You were supposed to be retrieving this necklace and turning it in."

  All I could manage was a nod.

  "Well stop thinking about that! I'm sure once this whole mess is over, you can explain it to your boss and they'll understand. This kind of thing must happen all the time in your line of work."

  The pain in my chest eased. Not because I believed Owen was right, but because he was so unbelievably wrong that my thoughts shifted from work to throttling him. "You are an idiot who obviously hasn't worked an honest day in your life. Let's get our asses back on the road to Faerie so I can be done with you."

  Owen sat there, mouth agape while I started my engine and spun off, throwing gravel. I hoped one of those chunks of stone scratched his paint. He'd probably just pay a body shop a fortune to fix it, but at least it would be an inconvenience.

  His bike roared past me, reminding me that I was supposed to follow him, not the other way around. There was no way this rich asshole of a dragon was taking us anywhere near the MOD offices. It wasn't today's problem, so I stopped thinking about it and focused on getting into Faerie. Everything would be better when we got there.

  We didn't take the abandoned house portal into Volarus like I was used to. Instead, we wound our way to the top of a hill. The view was fantastic, looking onto the lush forest below. When Owen drove straight into a tree at the end of the road, I actually gasped aloud before I realized it was glamour. I wanted to drive right in, but I had to slow down and pull up my second sight. It was just my kind of luck that I'd miss the portal and smash into a real tree if I didn't.

  The glamour tree disappeared, but I was still driving on a narrow road. Instead of winding through redwoods, we cut through a neighborhood. We were on the outskirts of Volarus, the affluent outskirts. I'd never been there before. The same could be said for most of the city, but this was definitely a rich neighborhood and somewhere I would have avoided on my own. I was uncomfortable with all the magic on display. It reeked of power and privilege. All magic came at a price and the people living here used it for fountains that looked like living swans spouting water from their mouths.

  The next house we passed resembled a medieval castle that had been pulled out of Europe and plopped down in Volarus, complete with moat and drawbridge. The shrubs on the front lawn were shaped like knights in the middle of a battle. While it was ostentatious, it was something that could have been done by mundane means, so I respected them more for it. Then, as I drew closer, I realized the shrubs were moving. I watched one hedge knight lob off another's arm.

  Part of me judged them, the other part wanted to know how it worked.

  We wound away from the residential area and into an upscale commercial district. Owen pulled into a convenience store with a curiously large parking lot and a sign that said, "Long Term". He parked his bike under one of the covered spaces. I pulled in next to him and grinned when he rubbed at a scratch on his front fender.

  I wanted to ask him what we were doing there, but I doubted he would answer me while he was in such a snit, so I waited patiently for him to get over it. Figured that my move to inconvenience him wound up costing me time.

  After several minutes of grumbling, he stood straight and walked into Last Stop. That was a curious name for a store located in the heart of an affluent shopping district. Last stop before what? Piling into your Mercedes and heading to your mansion? Inside was the usual assortment of sugary and salty snacks and a dizzying array of beverages. My stomach grumbled at the sight and I wondered what they ate in Faerie.

  Owen waved to the ogre behind the counter and exchanged pleasantries about his children as if they were old friends. Was the shop close to his home? Because I'd used the portal in Smoke and Mirrors, I still didn't know the location of Owen's place; a fact I'm sure he was happy about.

  Owen continued to the back of the store and opened the door to a cooler stocked with oversized bottles of malt liquor. Of course the nightclub owner had us making a pit stop so he could get his drink on. Didn't he have enough booze in his life already?

  "I don't think it's a good idea to get tanked right now."

  Owen acted like he hadn't heard me and walked into the drinks. He disappeared through the shelves. A portal. Why the hell was there a portal in the middle of a convenience store?

  I didn't take the time to pull up my second sight this time. I didn't want Owen getting too far ahead. Still, I put a hand in front of me to make sure I wasn't about to bash my face in the most embarrassing way possible. Knowing a concept worked and trusting it were two entirely different things. I had a feeling I was about to experience a lot of that trusting thing. Motherland, here I come...

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  I thought I knew what to expect when entering Faerie, but I was very, very wrong. The books I read came from a fae perspective. They led me to believe Faerie was like scenes from Lord of the Rings; I expected New Zealand with a few special effects thrown in. Faerie was like the weirdest anime you'd ever seen... on acid.

  There was no going anywhere until I collected myself. The smell alone locked up my brain. It was like walking into a perfume store after a hyper eight-year-old sprayed every bottle dry. Every breath made it worse. I sneezed at least a dozen times in a row. When my eyes cleared, I was staring down at a rock that was staring back at me. I thought someone had painted a face on it—until it winked.

  That was about all my overburdened brain could handle, and I'm not too ashamed to admit that I screamed like a small child.

  Owen did not know what to do with me. He settled for being pissed. "What the hell is wrong with you? You should know better than that!" He jerked me away from the smiling rock and put his face three inches from mine. "Damn it. You haven't been to Faerie before, have you?"

  "No," I choked out between gasps.

  He stared at me like I was stranger than the smiling rock at my feet. "Why not?"

  I took a moment to collect myself. Yeah, okay, "collecting myself" wasn't happening. I watched the rock slowly wander away. It didn't have feet that I could see. It glided. At least, it did, until a larger rock ate it. The sound tore at my ears. My mind must have been adapting, because a rock eating another rock made a strange kind of sense. "Why would I? Banshees don't have any use for Faerie. After the first few died trying to find our mother, they gave up."

  He shrugged. "It's always been a part of my life. We'd come here on vacations. It was a place I could fly without having to worry about glamour and humans. Not to mention getting a better understanding of magic. And my heritage."

  "Well, none of those reasons apply to me. I can fly wherever I want and not have a single human bat an eye."

  "Wait, you can shift?" he asked. His genuine interest wiped away the last of his anger about the scratch on his motorcycle. And my crying. And... well, okay, he was probably still mad about his hair, but he wasn't thinking about it right then. I tried not to look at it. "Into what?"

  I finally stood up straight. Sophie Morrigan wasn't going to be taken down by smelly magic. Breathing was still all kinds of uncomfortable, but at least I wasn't dizzy or sneezing. I raised a brow at him. "You really have to ask?"

  "Oooh," he said, drawing the sound out. "The Morrigan's daughter. Not a banshee. So, you're a crow then?"
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  "Caw," I said, giving him a wry grin. "We could probably get wherever it is we're going a lot faster if we flew."

  Owen shook his head. "No. Flying in Faerie brings its own set of dangers, and I'm not about to go nonverbal when you're under the influence of that necklace."

  "So you're saying that you don't want to see me naked," I said, deadpan.

  Even over the smells of Faerie I caught a whiff of hot metal and cinnamon, a dead giveaway to how flustered he was, even if he hadn't stammered his reply. "Um, er, yes?"

  "Calm down, I was just screwing with you. Between the two of us, you're the Faerie expert." I sketched a quick bow. "I bow to your wisdom."

  His cheeks reddened behind the scruff. It was a good look on him. I'd have to embarrass him more often. He turned on a heel and continued through the underbrush. My eyes drifted down to the tight jeans covering his rear. With a view like that, I'd probably follow him even if it wasn't wise. No. No coveting the dragon. Dragons are bad.

  We walked quietly through the woods while I ogled all the Faerie weirdness. I called it a forest, but it didn't conform to any Earth standard. Trees rooted in rock as often as they did in dirt, paying no heed to the lack of nourishment available in a stone. An army of plants crossed our path, marching on legs made of roots. They settled in around a small pond and a rotting tree covered in pink flowers. As I watched, a frog jumped out of the pond and took flight on gossamer wings.

  I wandered a few steps away from Owen. He didn't seem to notice I'd fallen behind, and I took the opportunity to get a better look at the trees. They were all still now. The only thing moving were the pink flowers around the rotted tree. They danced on a breeze I didn't feel. I saw this a lot at home in the redwoods—new growth sprouting around something dead. Still, the flowers were like nothing I'd seen. They were too high up to get a good look at, and I reached out a hand to grab a branch and hoist myself up the dead tree for a better look.

  A gasp came from behind me. "Stop! Oh my fae. No, no, no. Sophie, back away slowly." He took a tentative step toward me, his eyes locked on the dead tree while he gestured frantically for me to come toward him. "So sorry, ma'am! So sorry! She's new, she didn't know." Eyes wide, he turned back to me. "Back away, now."

  I had no idea if he was serious or if he was messing with me for embarrassing him earlier.

  "So sorry, ma'am," he said, still apparently addressing the rotted tree. Now that I looked closer, one part of it did resemble a face. "I can't stress enough how sorry we are to have invaded your space."

  I backed away, and Owen exhaled loudly. He grabbed my arm as soon as I was within reach.

  "Have a good day, ma'am." He pulled me along with him as he started back down what I could now see was a trail. I turned my head back to take another look—what was so special about that decaying tree? Was I missing the joke?

  Owen grabbed my chin, facing me forward. He gave a slight shake of his head. "No."

  "Are you serious?" He looked serious, but maybe he was fully committed to the joke

  "Shhh. Not now. Keep walking."

  We were several minutes down the trail before Owen let go of me, promptly shaking out his arms and rolling his neck. "No wonder you wound up with that necklace around your neck. What are you thinking? Just wandering around and touching things in Faerie."

  "I didn't actually touch anything," I argued. The words felt childish as soon as I said them, but he was berating me like a child, so it was fitting.

  "I know that. You know how?" he asked, then continued before I could respond. "Because you're still alive, that's how."

  "You don't have to be so dramatic," I groused. "I screwed up. If you tell me what I did, it won't happen again."

  "Do you seriously not know what that was?" His anger waned. "No one ever taught you. Well, rule number one of Faerie: no touching unless absolutely necessary."

  Slowly, so he saw it coming, I reached out and poked the tip of his nose.

  "We are going to die, you understand that, right?"

  I shrugged, and he muttered some stuff under his breath I pretended not to hear. The truth was, I did understand. Faerie was dangerous. I was in a new world. There was no telling what might happen. Any moment I expected to turn a corner and end up in the Fire Swamp from The Princess Bride. Owen would have made a decent Dread Pirate Roberts. I didn't dare tell him so because I wasn't about to be called Princess Buttercup.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The small trail reached a junction and widened into a major thoroughfare. From what I'd read, most of Faerie was undeveloped. Villages that gathered more than a few hundred residents were rare. Then again, my books had proven woefully inaccurate when it came to describing Faerie to someone who hadn't been there before. "Are we on the way to a village?" I asked Owen.

  "Something like that," he said, a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

  He was being deliberately vague again. I wondered how much of that was his personality, and how much of it was necessity because of my condition. "Fine, don't tell me then," I said, more grit in my voice than I intended. "My gut is telling me we want to make a right at the next fork."

  "Your gut is being influenced. We are going left at the next fork."

  I growled. "You're just being contrary for laughs."

  "Not at all," he said, unbothered by my temper. "We're almost to our destination."

  "You said that two hours ago," I argued.

  "And now we're even closer than that," he said, not even bothering to hide the mocking tone in his voice.

  I was about to go on a tirade about keeping me better informed when we rounded a bend and came upon a large cart moving at a glacial pace down the path. It wasn't long before we were walking alongside it and gawking. Okay, I was gawking. The cart was loaded down with roughly hewn statues of bears, like the chainsaw carvings popular along rural roads in Humboldt county, except these were carved out of impossible materials. The one at the rear of the cart was made of molten lava. Magic kept it from burning right through the bottom of its cage. So many questions swarmed my mind. What kind of magic was this? How did someone go about carving molten lava? Why did he do it? My face was inches from the cage, inspecting the details as best I could, when a paw swiped at me through the bars. Its low yowl reminded me of a black bear. It lashed out again, almost getting me that time, and I finally jumped back. The cart was overloaded with cages, all of them housing a different bear. Two were formed of sloshing water, one a glowing blue light, and another of pale green mist. Carving marks from a rough blade marked their bodies, even though it was clearly impossible for a knife to have left permanent impressions in water or mist or light or lava... The effect was mesmerizing.

  Owen swiftly outpaced the cart. It was pulled by a very old unicorn who looked more like a donkey with a shining white horn attached to its head. At the unicorn's side was a companion, leaving a trail of slime behind them. They looked like a slug that had been enlarged to the size of a person, with arms and vaguely humanoid facial features. I slowed down and smiled in greeting at the donkeycorn. Unidonkey? Whatever.

  "Those bears are amazing," I said, not bothering to keep the awe from my voice. I almost held out my hand to shake until I remembered the slime. "I'm Sophie." I settled for a small wave.

  The slug-man's grin transformed his strange face. "Your compliments are very much appreciated. I'm Barnabas and this is my partner, Atticus," he said indicating the donkeycorn.

  The donkeycorn spoke directly into my mind, his voice sweet and soothing. "It took us a long time and a lot of spells to figure out how to carve them. Nobody in Faerie wanted the ones we made of wood. They were good practice though, and we let them wander around the property. They keep out the pests. Those humans have good ideas every now and then."

  "So they are based on the chainsaw carvings that people do on Earth."

  "They are indeed," said Barnabas, scratching his chin. "Though I can't imagine what enjoyment they get out of them when they can't move."

 
"I think it's about admiring the craftsmanship that goes into them and the bear's beautiful form." Owen cleared his throat behind me, indicating it was time to get moving again. "I have to go now. It was nice meeting both of you." I waved and resumed our previous pace down the path.

  "We'll never get anywhere if you stop every time you see something interesting," said Owen, though he sounded more amused than annoyed.

  "Not much point in taking a trip if you can't enjoy the sights." I may or may not have stared too long at his chiseled jaw when I said it.

  "True enough," he said, hitting me with his bright smile.

  I turned my eyes carefully back to the road in front of us. I was not going to flirt with a dragon. Even a sexy one who was trying to help me save my life. "I think I see a little village way up ahead. Is that where we're going?"

  "Yes?" said Owen, his eyes flicking down to my feet.

  I rolled my eyes at him. "That's most of a day away. I'm fine. There will be plenty of opportunities between now and then for me to slip away." I grinned at him.

  He shook his head and let out something between a chuckle and a sigh. "It's hard sometimes to tell whether you're messing with me, or whether it's the enchantment."

  "It's always safe to assume I'm messing with you," I replied, my grin widening. "How about you give me more ammunition and tell me things about Faerie?"

  "Are you serious?" he asked, obviously waiting for the punch line.

  I carefully composed my face into a calm mask. "I'm always serious," I said in my best deadpan.

  I had intended for him to laugh, but he launched into stories of his time as a kid in Faerie. He liked to talk. All the reading he did seemed to have turned him into a natural storyteller. He had a great voice for it. I relaxed for the first time in the last couple of days. The sun sunk lower in the sky, turning it a beautiful orange. The overload of my senses had become bearable, and with Owen's repeated endorsements of Faerie's better qualities, I found myself growing fond of the place. When he'd been going on for almost an hour about the adventures he'd had in the woods around us, I noticed a pattern. He told stories about the world and its fae, not his family. When he slipped and mentioned his mother or father, less frequently a sister, his story took an abrupt turn, speeding away from his family until they were so small in his rearview they might as well have not been there at all. Maybe I wouldn't have noticed it if I hadn't done so much skirting around topics of parentage myself. Everyone knew The Morrigan was my mother, and everyone wanted to ask about it. I never let them.