Chapter Twenty-Eight Taissa #3
The first thing that Taissa notices about Shrieking Pumpkin is that it is, indeed, shaped a bit like a pumpkin in the interior.
The dark walls are curved around a pulsating, light-strobed dance floor, and lined with loveseats filled to the brim with partiers.
It smells like sweat and, strangely, something akin to cinnamon apples.
Shrieking Pumpkin is packed from wall to wall with Unseelie, dancing and laughing, shouting over the music.
They look free, happy, unrestrained by the prejudices of the UKHC.
A banshee shrieks gleefully along to the music, embraced by a clurichaun.
A group of female trolls dances in a circle around one of their own wearing a Birthday Girl tiara, cheering her on as she moves her body to the pounding beat of the 50 Centaurs’ song.
Suddenly, Taissa feels uncomfortable; an intruder, an invader.
Maybe it was wrong to come here. Witches and warlocks are neither here nor there (not fae with extended life spans but not lackers, either), although they’re predominantly classified as Seelie.
This isn’t their haven, their safe place. Guilt feels sticky in Taissa’s stomach.
But they’re here now, and the Wingeds are counting on them. Sansa is counting on her. Cronus, too. Her grumpy, crochety stymph…It would kill her to see him reduced to a sleeping statue like Sansa, his sharp, acerbic tongue silent, no pointed barbs rolling off it.
“When you find Orla,” Jacks shouts, already being swept away by the tide of dancers, “do be sure to leave her in a good mood for me!”
“Bloody unlikely,” mutters Kion. Taissa is inclined to agree.
Steeling herself for Cronus’s sake, Taissa takes a deep breath, glancing around for someone who could be Banes. Since púcas are shapeshifters, the only telltale sign of one of the creatures will be their perennially golden eyes. The music thrums through the air, hot and heavy.
“Come on,” she hollers to Kion, tilting her head toward the bar at the back of the club, where a goblin bartender works hurriedly away.
It’s as good a place to start as any. Before she can lose him to the crushing crowd, Taissa takes Kion’s hand in hers, tugging him toward the sparkling black-glass counter.
Their hands fit perfectly together, like a key sliding into a lock and calling it home.
Behind them, Isla, Bronte, and the Bickering Duo (as Taissa has begun to call Knox and óríon) gain entry. Over her shoulder, Taissa watches as her teammates quickly disperse, also intent on tracking down Banes.
“What can I get you?” the goblin shouts over the din as they reach the bar, beady black eyes narrowed in impatience. As Kion rattles off a random drink, Taissa takes a quick peek at the other patrons around the counter, scouring for a glimpse of gold…
The hairs on the back of Taissa’s neck stand on end. Fueled by some deep, primal instinct unblemished by time, she turns and freezes as she locks eyes with a golden, golden gaze.
The woman stands in the middle of the dance floor, unmoving, those uncanny—Unseelie—eyes glinting underneath the miasma of strobe lights.
Almost in slow motion, the crowd dances around her, stirring the strands of her long, white hair that contrast sharply with her brown skin.
A thin set of lips tilt upward in a cruel smile, as Orla Banes lifts a gloved hand to beckon her closer.
“Locke,” hisses Taissa, finally snapping to just as Banes walks coolly across the dance floor toward a nondescript door guarded by two unsmiling guards, also golden-eyed.
“What?” he demands, and then chokes on his drink as Banes beckons them again. “Shit. We were supposed to find her—”
“Did Jacks snitch?”
“How the hells am I meant to know?” he asks sourly, which she takes to mean, probab-fucking-ly.
Taissa inhales thinly through her nose. “Well, there’s only one thing to do…”
“Go after her.” Kion hastily sets down his drink, some of the lavender liquid sloshing over the top.
“No, you numpty, we need to plan…” It’s too late.
Kion is already striding toward Banes, and probable death—which is how Taissa finds herself hurrying after him, a hand falling to the hem of her tight red dress, under which her holstered qyl rests like a garter.
She’s right on Kion’s ankles as Banes slips through the door.
Although the guards’ eyes narrow as Kion and she follow moments later, the door remains open until both have slipped through.
Only then does it slam closed, leaving Taissa to take in the room she’s found herself (trapped? lured?) into.
“I am going to kill you,” she mutters to Kion, taking a look around the office where they might be murdered.
It’s real posh, is what it is. Ridiculously so.
Dark velvet walls, for Morgana’s sake, burdened with expensive-looking art (which, on closer inspection, all depicts people dying in horrible, horrible ways).
A chaise so long that it’s practically a bed.
And a literal diamond chandelier hanging from the high ceiling, sending shards of light refracting across Banes’s face as she sits behind a polished blood-red desk, looking like the cat that caught the canary.
(This does not bode well.)
(Taissa is also fairly creeped out by how Banes has chosen to dress like the ghost of a Victorian ne’er-do-well. Dark gloves, a sharp green waistcoat, and a fairly intimidating cloak are setting the mood for this conversation.)
“I admit,” says Banes, leaning forward on her elbows, “the glamours are a nice touch.”
Her accent is Scottish, like Taissa’s own. It’s enough to give her some hope.
“I’ll ask you to remove them before I remove your heads from your bodies.”
(Right. Maybe it was too soon to be hopeful.)
Exchanging a look with Locke, Taissa draws up the skirt of her dress and drags out her qyl.
She etches a Nullifying glyph onto her waist, feeling his intense gaze lock on her bared, new panties.
Banes looks amused, but Taissa’s past the point of caring.
She lets the skirt drop down just as her glamour—and Kion’s—falls.
“That’s better,” says Banes. Her voice is gravelly. “I know why you’re here.”
“Jacks,” Taissa groans. It’s not far-fetched to assume that the dullahan found Orla first, not long after leaving them, and in an attempt to win her over, alerted her to the Seelie in their midst. It’s her first and last time trusting the sharp-smiled dullahan–trickster demigod.
The self-serving, deceitful, lying, little…
“I have to say, I’m excited to meet you.” Banes’s mouth curves into something resembling a smile. “I’m very interested in the two of you. And I hear you have some questions for me. So ask. Or are you frightened, now that you’re here?”
(Yes.)
“We know you’re behind the Sleeping Death,” Taissa forces herself to snarl. “We’ve come here to demand that you reverse it. Now.”
Banes doesn’t so much as blink. “Good grief. You’re just as bad as those ninnies over at the DMC. I wonder, will you also be sent off with your tail tucked behind your legs when I utter a few sharp words?”
Well, that confirms it: The DMC is utterly out of their league. Taissa hopes Elder has made the call to the CCB.
“No,” she snaps back. “I don’t think we’ll run.” Pressing the tip of her qyl into her wrist, she meets Banes’s eyes menacingly. “Do you know what a Voltaic glyph can do, Orla? Maybe you’d like to find out?”
“Oo.” Banes does that odd smile again, revealing pointed canines. “Maybe I would.”
“Reverse it, Banes,” growls Kion, slamming a hand down on her desk.
“Ehhh.” She looks bored. “Come up with some more creative threats first.”
Taissa exchanges a helpless look with Kion.
Wow. This is going really badly.
They’re athletes, for Morgana’s sake—and Taissa has just realized that for all of their physical acuity, and their magic, they have no idea how to interrogate the head of a notorious crime syndicate in her own office with two giant Withers waiting by the door for her and no doubt listening to their every word.
They really did need óríon, but she knows that there’s no way the towering Icelander will be allowed into this office.
Wondering if she should, possibly, punch Orla in the face, Taissa lifts a suggestive brow to Kion and subtly taps her right fist. His jaw clenches and he shakes his head infinitesimally.
Sighing, she vaguely gestures to her neck, wondering if Kion is thinking of something more along the lines of strangling.
His head-shaking is more alarmed this time.
Glaring, Taissa scowls. He doesn’t seem to have any ideas, which she communicates through a look of irritated desperation.
“You are not subtle,” says Banes, who has watched this entire interaction with a cold smirk.
Kion winces, then in an admirable attempt at recovery, turns back to the darkly amused gang leader. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he growls, “but I will.”
Taissa tries very hard not to face-palm. He sounds like a cheesy star from a bad action film.