Elven Lies (Court of Rebellion #3)

18. Chapter 18

18

D ammit, Rowan. We haven’t even gotten started, and you’ve already screwed us!

Before Rebecca or Rowan could form a response to Mr. Kaplan’s shout, the darkened tunnel they’d entered rocked violently beneath a massive tremble.

The bricks beneath their feet buckled and rolled, sending them both stumbling off-balance only to crash back and forth against the cold walls to either side.

One by one, the magical light orbs—all of them now a matching shade of reddish-orange—detached from the wall to zip haphazardly up and down the tunnel. They crashed into each other between the walls and against anything else they encountered along their erratic flight paths. Every time an orange orb hit something solid, a flare of crackling blue light zapped out of the floating lights to consume whatever it had just hit.

Rebecca ducked beneath two of them swinging toward her in quick succession, then straightened and glared at Rowan. “People don’t just hand out warnings for fun! Ninety-nine percent of the time, they actually mean something.”

“Ninety-nine percent of the time,” he shouted back, “people don’t get attacked by their own alarm systems inside their own domicile!”

Rowan jerked his head to the side to avoid another diving orange orb, then leaped away from the wall when the orb crashed into the bricks and lit up the whole thing with an electrifying jolt of blazing blue energy.

“Don’t even try to make this his fault!” she shouted. “He told you not to touch anything!”

“If he didn’t want me to touch anything, he should have just kept quiet about it!”

“Oh, now you’ve done it,” Kaplan groaned up ahead. “This way! Hurry! We don’t have much time!”

With another scathing glare at Rowan, Rebecca huffed out an exasperated sigh and raced after their host.

Rowan’s maddened laughter echoed behind her. “Say what you like. This is certainly more exciting.”

“I already have more excitement than I can handle without you stepping in to help, thank you very much.”

Up ahead, Kaplan’s dark silhouette flickered in and out of view as the orange orbs zipped back and forth and the siren wailed at head-splitting volume. The old elf ducked beneath an orb careening toward his head, then leaped forward just before another violent tremble rippled across the floor and sent all three of them lurching forward.

Now that the orbs had made it in front of Mr. Kaplan, they illuminated one of the stranger spaces Rebecca had seen in Chicago. If they’d been in Xahar’áhsh instead of a modern human city, she would have called it a hovel.

The circular room with a domed concrete ceiling strobed with growing and fading flashes of the orbs’ red-orange light, illuminating only bits and pieces at a time.

Most noticeable were the intermittent flashes of Mr. Kaplan’s form in the darkness as he flung himself back and forth across the room, pulling at enormous mechanical levers in the walls and stumbling all over himself while simultaneously trying to avoid the flying orbs clearly set to attack mode.

Why the old elf had installed four different levers and control panels in four different difficult-to-reach places around the room to deactivate his security alarm, Rebecca couldn’t guess. But when the most violent tremor of them all ripped across the floor and made the stone at her feet roil like a pot of thick soup on the verge of boiling, she couldn’t help but feel the remaining time to deactivate the alarm had almost run out.

Another heavy lever cranked down in Kaplan’s hands with an echoing boom before the siren rose again in a new cycle.

“Oh, come off it,” Kaplan seethed. “These damn contraptions… What are you for if you don’t work?”

The orange orbs zipped faster and faster around the room, creating a sickening swirling-strobe effect, until the elderly elf snatched a large rock off a nearby table and used it to mercilessly beat the final control panel in front of him.

Hollow clangs reverberated around them. The siren wobbled, let out a choking stutter oddly reminiscent of a cough, then cut out entirely.

The ground stopped trembling. All detached orange orbs froze midair before each letting out a gentle hum and phasing back into their soft white light. Then they rose toward the ceiling together to illuminate the room as one.

From somewhere far below them, a deep metallic grind filled the instant silence before petering out in a stuttering series of metallic clanks until, finally, the place fell silent.

Kaplan tensely scanned the domed room, then sagged against the wall with a sigh of relief. After a few moments to collect himself, he seemed to remember he had visitors and straightened again, brushing down the front of his suit jacket.

Straightening his lopsided top hat with one hand, he wagged an accusing finger at Rowan, still panting to catch his breath. “I have half a mind to bind him for the duration of your visit.”

Rebecca also glared at the Blackmoon Elf. “Just say the word, and I’ll help you.”

Rowan seemed oblivious to the chaos he’d unleashed, focusing instead on taking in every bit of the room before he chuckled, but he offered neither defense nor apology for his actions.

Big surprise.

“If you’ll still accept my hospitality, my dear,” Kaplan said before clearing his throat. “Welcome. Please, make yourself comfortable, and we can discuss your little mystery.”

“Thank you.” Rebecca centered her warning stare on Rowan for a moment longer, then finally peeled away her gaze to take in their new surroundings.

Beyond the glimpses she’d caught of the domed ceiling and the metal panels of gears and levers at various intervals around the circular room, the orbs of soft white light bobbing just beneath the ceiling now illuminated everything else.

Tall, sturdy metal shelves covered every bit of available wall space, housing an odd variety of magical artifacts and spell reagents interspersed with the odd human knick-knack.

One collection boasted a series of highly volatile potions swirling in enchanted glass vials up on the top shelf, a partially reconstructed Xaharí skirra skeleton on the second, and a wide variety of single, unpaired shoes on the third—from boots to sandals to dress loafers to athletic sneakers for men and women, all in different sizes and various stages of wear.

A brightly painted globe spun on its own on a pedestal across the room, beside which hung a six-foot pegboard with a hook through every hole and a different key hanging on every hook.

Tilting stacks of books dotted the floor, both on and off the woven area rug. In the very center of the room, two mismatched armchairs perched on either side of a twin-sized bed, complete with antique wooden frame, though the sheets were rumpled and the pillows lumpy from use, almost as if Mr. Kaplan had just woken for the day.

The place had an oddly cozy air despite the cobwebs draped across every shelf and the thick layer of dust streaking the cement floor, but only in random patches, while other areas looked recently cleaned.

After her quick perusal, Rebecca made her way toward the closest armchair, which seemed the most appropriate place to sit and after having to maneuver through a maze of stacked books just to reach it.

When she finally made it and lowered herself onto the slanted cushion, Mr. Kaplan was already seated in the opposite chair, settling comfortably against the well-worn fabric with a sigh.

He propped both feet on a mismatched footstool in front of him, and somehow, it didn’t seem at all odd that the elf still wore his stiff top hat, crisply pressed suit, and leather loafers polished to a high sheen while resting in his own home. Or workshop. Perhaps it was both.

“Lovely,” Rowan said cheerily as he made his way toward the center of the room. “I’ll just take the mattress then.”

“You most certainly will not!” Kaplan screeched.

“But you said to make ourselves comfortable.”

“Not you .” Kaplan wagged a finger at him again. “You stay right where you are. Just like that, yes.”

Rowan frowned despite the playful smirk remaining on his lips. “For how long?”

“Until the grownups are finished talking,” Rebecca said.

A startled chuckle burst from Kaplan’s mouth as he regarded her. “The grownups. Ha. Yes, indeed. Quite right.”

Rowan rolled his eyes and exaggerated a sigh, though his smirk remained while he stood at the foot of the bed and folded his arms.

He could handle standing. If this elderly elf was as good as Rowan made him out to be, they wouldn’t be here very long, anyway.

“Now, then,” Kaplan began. “May I offer you some refreshment, my dear? Tea, perhaps?”

“No, thank you.” From the looks of the place, there didn’t seem to be a way to make tea. “All I need is your help finding out what this key opens.”

She pulled the key from her jacket pocket and held it toward him before realizing how awkward it would be to try handing him the key with an entire bed between them.

“Yes, yes, very good.” Kaplan waved away the key. “All in good time, my dear. All in good time. Now, first, before we get into the nitty-gritty of it all, do catch me up on things. And leave nothing out. I want to hear it all.”

Rebecca had encountered more than her fair share of eccentric magicals in the past, but now she wondered if Mr. Kaplan wasn’t entirely of sound mind. How much help could a crazy old elf be?

She glanced at Rowan with a raised eyebrow, to which he responded with a light chuckle through his nose and a mockingly polite dip of his head as he gestured toward their host.

If this odd meeting didn’t yield beneficial results, the Blackmoon Elf would have a lot more to answer for than a poor attitude and even worse personal life choices.

“Where would you like me to begin?” she finally asked.

“Why, at the beginning, of course.” Kaplan graced her with a kind, warm smile and folded his hands in his lap. “Starting with what you had for breakfast this morning.”

“For breakfast? I’m sorry… What does that have to do with this key?”

“We must establish a baseline, my dear. Only then can we move forward in the necessary direction and nowhere else. So go on. What did you eat?”

So much had happened since yesterday morning, it felt like years. This morning might as well have been months ago. With everything else tumbling around in her brain, how was she supposed to remember that ?

Rebecca wrinkled her nose. “I don’t know. I generally don’t eat breakfast. I don’t think I had anything.”

“I see.” Kaplan nodded sagely. “Pity. They do say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, you know.”

“They do say that,” Rowan echoed, choking back a snort when Rebecca shot him another scathing look.

“Well, in the absence of that information, then, I suppose we’ll make do with something else.” Kaplan settled farther back into his armchair. “Do you own a vehicle?”

“Personally?” Rebecca asked. “No.”

“Then a vehicle you operate. Or one in which you frequently ride. It’s all the same, really.”

“Oh, in that case, then, yeah. Several.”

“Make and model of the vehicle most often used?”

What was this?

“Mr. Kaplan,” she said, “I’m not trying to be rude, but I really don’t see how—”

“Of course you don’t. But you came here for my professional insight and opinion, my dear. Not to worry. This is all a very standard part of the process, you see.”

“Right.” She shifted in the armchair, unable to find a comfortable position with the cushion so steeply slanted.

Rowan wasn’t any help. It seemed all he could do to stand there at the foot of the bed and not burst into gales of laughter at her expense.

“What was the question again?” she asked.

“Make and model of the vehicle most frequently used for your own everyday purposes. Business or pleasure, my dear. The why of it hardly matters.”

“We have a 1972 Volkswagen Bus.”

“Ah. I see. Yes, very good. And do you have central heating and air in your current domicile?”

“I think so… But—”

“And who installed it?”

“I have absolutely no idea.”

“Not to worry. Some questions simply do not have answers. Moving on. From which side of town did you travel today?”

Finally, a question that might have been remotely relevant.

“From Roseland,” Rebecca replied with a nod.

“Excellent.”

Unfortunately, that was the only marginally normal question.

“Who were you hoping to find?” Kaplan asked.

“Well, you . I think that’s fairly obvious.”

“No, no, my dear. With the key .”

“Actually, when I figure out whatever this opens, I really hope I don’t find anyone at all.”

“How long is the longest you’ve ever grown your hair?”

“Um…this long, probably.”

“Apples or oranges?”

“What? That’s… Oranges?”

“Have you or anyone with whom you have ever been remotely affiliated, to the best of your knowledge, been involved in illegal blahkti worm racing in the last fifty years?”

Rebecca tilted her head. “I don’t even know what that is.”

“Do you prefer the left foot or the right?”

“Both? Neither?”

“I see… And finally, if you were stranded on a deserted island, completely cut off from the rest of the world, this world, of course—”

Rebecca scoffed. “Of course.”

“What is one physical commodity without which you couldn’t survive? One thing to bring with you, if you could, to join you in exile and solitude?”

Well that sounded dark.

“Coffee. And sugar.”

“Ah-ah-ah.” Kaplan lifted a finger to stop her. “Only one.”

This was absolutely ridiculous.

“Fine.” She tossed a hand in the air before letting it drop into her lap. “Coffee that’s been heavily sugared before I get it. Does that work?”

The elf’s eyes narrowed while he stared blankly across the room, as if this were a matter of the utmost importance. Then he closed his eyes with a hum of satisfaction and nodded. “That will do.”

“Great. Anything else?”

“One moment, please.” Kaplan still hadn’t opened his eyes, though now he’d straightened in his armchair and cocked his head like a cat that had just picked up some strange new sound and was about to go investigate its source.

For several long, highly awkward moments, he remained that way in his chair. His study turned private living quarters grew intensely silent while Rebecca waited.

So silent, in fact, she thought she could hear some kind of mechanism or energy source deep underground beneath them, chugging away in rhythmic timing as it pumped who knew what into any number of buildings around them, including this one.

Directly opposite her along the far wall, an oil lamp hanging from an unsteady hook in the wall flickered to life, then exhibited a disconcerting display of flickering flames growing and shrinking inside before the fire crackled with a blue tint, then orange, then purple, teal, fuchsia, and bright white until it repeated another cycle.

She hadn’t seen anyone light it, and it hadn’t been flickering away like that when they’d arrived.

If she had to sit here like this for much longer—or if Kaplan had some other ridiculously irrelevant test to put her through before offering anything resembling an answer about this mystery key—she was out of here.

Even hearing the elf was unable to help them would have been better than sitting here with nothing to show for it.

Then Kaplan sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth, and his eyes flew open, startling Rebecca in her armchair.

Her first thought was that something else had gone terribly wrong.

But then the older gentleman puffed out another sigh, blinked rapidly as if he’d just been roused from an afternoon catnap, and smacked his lips before settling his gaze on her. “Well?”

She looked questioningly at Rowan, but he was no help and only offered a clueless shrug. “Well what?”

“Let’s see it, then.”

Rebecca paused, scanned the circular room, and shook her head. “I don’t—”

“The key , my dear. That is why you’re here, is it not? Really, I wouldn’t put it past him to forget that singularly important detail.” Kaplan jerked his chin in Rowan’s direction, refusing to look at him. “But you seem a good bit more lucid, Miss… Oh my. I do apologize. By what name may I call you, Miss…”

“Knox,” Rebecca said stiffly, battling her impatience and the mind-baffling confusion of this elf being their only viable lead for potentially solidifying Shade’s future. If they ever got around to it.

“Miss Knox. A pleasure. And, I dare say, you also possess far more common sense at a glance. So do come along and show me what we’re working with. I’m quite happy to assist you if I can. Nothing guaranteed, of course.”

“Of course,” Now that they’d finally gotten to the key, she forced back a laugh when she stood from her armchair, stepped toward the twin-sized bed, and leaned forward over it to extend her arm all the way across toward Mr. Kaplan sitting on the other side. “Thank you. I appreciate any insight.”

Kaplan took the key, held it up in front of him, and craned his neck to peer at it as if it were a translucent gemstone he could more thoroughly inspect under better lighting. “Now. Yes. To whom does this belong?”

“Me.” Rebecca decided to stay on her feet in case he asked her to run a lap around the room or perform jumping jacks for the next thirty seconds. At this point, even that wouldn’t have surprised her.

The old elf lowered the key toward his lap, then blinked at her. “You don’t need a key-maker, my dear. You need a memory jump.”

“I’m sorry?”

“I’d say you have bigger problems than this if it’s your key but you still require my services to tell you what it opens.”

“Oh. Well, it is mine, but I inherited it, actually.”

“Really?” His eyes widened. “Do go on.”

There wasn’t much more to that story with any relevance to their conversation, but if he needed more, fine.

“The key belonged to my predecessor,” she cautiously explained. “It was included in his belongings left to me after he…passed, though unfortunately, he neglected to leave any instructions.”

“I see. That is an interesting conundrum.” Kaplan turned the key over several times, then pinched it between his thumb and every other finger of his right hand first before doing the same with his left. After that, he lifted the key to his face for three quick, tentative sniffs before prodding it with the tip of his tongue and smacking his lips afterward with another thoughtful hum.

Finally, he clenched the key tightly in one fist, muttered incantations she couldn’t hear, and opened his hand.

The key blazed with brilliant sky-blue light and shot from the elf’s hand to careen around the room like one of the light orbs during the alarm.

It darted faster than Rebecca could follow, pinging off the concrete walls, occasionally throwing up sparks and chips of cement, clanking against metal bookshelves, and came dangerously close to crashing right through the glass of the oil lamp hanging along the far wall.

She narrowly avoided catching the flying blue key with the center of her forehead by ducking last-minute. When she spun around to follow its violent trajectory, she was just in time to see Kaplan snatch the key from the air in one single, lightning-quick swipe.

Rowan’s amused chuckle followed, but she ignored him.

When Kaplan opened his hand, the key had lost its blazing blue glow and now lay still and dormant on his palm once more. Just an ordinary key.

He gazed at it blankly for a long moment, looking unimpressed by the results. “Hmm… That’s interesting.”

“What is?” Rebecca asked.

“The matching door coincides with those in the downtown Nexus building, if I’m not mistaken. Do forgive me for saying it, Miss Knox, but if your predecessor didn’t leave any instructions with this particular key, I would hazard to guess he was a bit of a reckless bloke.”

She snorted. “You have no idea.”

When the alleged key-maker offered nothing else, she couldn’t help but ask, “Can you give us any more information than that?”

“Well, it’s really very simple. This key opens a personal storage vault in one of the most secure high-end magical storage facilities this side of the Mississippi. Honestly, my dear, you couldn’t figure that out on your own?”