Twenty-Three
- Evangeline
We arrived in Fahytre a split second later, curled up on the floor in the back room of an apothecary I knew well. I couldn’t land us directly in the FI-9 headquarters as it was spelled against it; otherwise, it’d be a lot harder to keep secure if people didn’t have to enter through the door.
A cold sweat across my body, I rolled onto my hands and knees. Redric started to say something, but I held a finger to my lips, not wanting the shop assistant to know we were here. Grabbing Redric’s hand, I cast a spell of invisibility over us.
Although I’d normally say hi to the guy, I didn’t want anyone to know I needed a potion. Friends had a tendency to quickly become enemies in my line of work.
Not being able to see Redric due to the spell, I squeezed his hand and led him out of the back room. We carefully made our way out of the shop. If we bumped into anyone or anything, we’d be instantly discovered and most likely attacked for being perceived as thieves.
Granted, I was planning on stealing, so I couldn’t even find fault with that.
Slipping down the isle of contraceptives, I pocketed a few different brands on our way out. When we made it to an abandoned alley, I removed the spell on us. Holding up the bottles I’d nicked, I uncorked them all and tossed them back one after the other.
Redric looked at me, no judgement in his eyes, and a bit of my panic dwindled. “You okay?” he asked.
I nodded even though I wasn’t quite sure of the answer.
Slapping Ashema’s ass, I said, “Let’s get her to her new home.” I walked away in the direction of FI-9. This face now ruined, never to be worn again after this, I didn’t care about being spotted. I flew straight towards the building that had ‘Fairy Intelligence’ emblazoned on its side just a few blocks down from where we’d landed, but instead of aiming for the front door, I targeted a window a few stories up. I knocked on it twice, then once, then drew a secret symbol on it that was only visible to the guard on the other side. Given ID wasn’t always carried and faces were often swapped, this was a secondary entrance for those who couldn’t yet prove they worked here.
The window was pulled up, and the guard stepped aside.
“Hi, Gary,” I said as we entered. “Four five nine six four two.”
He studied me, seeing if he could recognise me in this face, as he tried every time. And as like every time, he simply shrugged and then called the number I just gave. Instead of getting a verbal reply in his head though, he would get an image of this face.
He stared at me a second longer, then turned to his desk. He grabbed an instant camera, snapped both our photos, and printed out two IDs. Handing them over, he said, “Wear these at all times you’re in the building.”
I slipped mine over my head and did the same for Redric. Then I led him to the holding cells. Finding an empty one, I opened the door with my ID badge, then gestured him in. The door swung shut behind us as he lowered Ashema down against the wall on the far end, where two metal gloves hung.
In the olden days, we would have simply nailed her hands down so she couldn’t use them – the majority of witches needing them to practice magic safely. Now we did more humane stuff like just make them wear gloves they couldn’t move their fingers in. Magic required a conduit to be used. Take that away, and you got a useless witch.
Or rather, the two metal gloves would have been more humane if Redric hadn’t snapped her fingers. Now they wouldn’t go in nicely, but I just shoved them in how they were anyway, breaking the broken fingers even more.
Snap.
Snap. Snap.
“Maybe if you tried resetting –”
Snap!
Staring at him, I smiled sweetly. “There. Fits like a glove.”
His features flattened into disappointment. “Really? You’re a pun girl?”
“They’re the best jokes.”
“For dumb people.”
“You’re dumber than me.”
“Am I? I at least know how making babies work.”
My eyes narrowed. “I know how. I just got caught up, and you didn’t pull out, so you’re just as much to blame.”
“Unlike you, I didn’t know you weren’t runed. Literally everyone has one.”
“You don’t.”
He opened his mouth, then closed it. “Do you want me to resurrect her or not?”
I grinned, then stepped back to let him do his thing.
Sitting cross-legged in front of her, he closed his eyes. A vortex of energy swirled around him as he stepped out of his body and entered the land of purgatory.
I took this moment to study him, to wonder very, very briefly about what life might be like outside of FI-9. For over fifteen years I had been the head of this organisation. To even think about leaving it felt like I was cutting off a part of myself.
But if his sperm did take...if the potions didn’t stop it...I might not have a choice. I was stuck in this body until I either learned I wasn’t pregnant or until I gave birth. If I got just one cell of my body wrong during the transformation –something easily done when pregnant– I could die at best or permanently disfigure myself at worse. And I didn’t just mean, I’d lose a leg here or there. I could be turned into what was effectively a melted bar of wax. I would still be technically alive but in no sort of human shape. It would be hard to kill me too considering I might not have a heart or brain in the conventional sense, the magic having split it across multiple parts of the blob. That very thing had happened once and the woman who had attempted that spell and failed was still alive today, housed in a museum of magic gone wrong. She was still conscious too, and those who made phone calls in the museum often reported hearing her screams and cries for mercy.
Then there would be the pain of going through an absent motherhood again. It had killed me to not see Aurelia all the time, to miss her big moments, only seeing her when it was safe to do so. Our relationship was as good as it could be, and she knew I loved her, but I’d always wanted more.
My hand pressed against my stomach. At least with this little one, she’d be loved regardless if I was there or not.
Dropping my hand, I shook my head.
Foolish thoughts from a foolish girl.
Opening his eyes, Redric came back to the world of the living a few seconds before Ashema did.
He nodded at me, then moved back to give me point.
Cracking my neck side to side, I crouched down in front of her, putting all my silly little thoughts out of my head.
“Wakey, wakey, sunshine.” I patted her cheek, knowing it would piss her off. No one liked that.
Her eyelids opened only to narrow in a glare as they settled on my face. Then they glanced behind me, circling the room, and angry realisation twisted her mien. “You’re a cop.”
I drew back, one hand to my chest. “Ugh. Here I am being all nice not having cut off your hands, and the first thing you say to me is an insult? A cop? Really? Right, where’s my knife?” Patting myself down, I pulled one out and held it to her wrist. “Redric, you might want to step back. This is going to get messy.”
“But then she won’t be chained to the wall,” he said, and I stopped with my blade cutting just past her skin. Glancing at her, I rolled my eyes.
“I am aware of that, yes.”
“That’s too dangerous.”
“She’s defenceless without her hands.” No sooner had those words come out of my mouth than she slammed her head forward and into mine. Tears exploded behind my eyes, triggered by the smashing of my nose.
But as I stumbled back, she kicked me in the stomach, forcing me forward, and I just knew she was about to open her mouth to bite me. It was what I’d do.
Just before I got within range again though, a strong hand wrapped around the neck of my tunic and yanked me back. Redric dragged me half-way across the room before releasing me.
I wiped around the tears so I could see, blinking rapidly in an attempt to clear my vision. The coppery taste of my own blood filled my mouth, along with the saltiness of tears.
“You were saying?” he asked dryly as he ducked his head to look at me.
“Completely harm –” I said, wrinkling my nose to see if it was broken. “Ow!” Maybe. Potentially. I didn’t know. I wasn’t a healer.
His dry stare somehow turned even drier. “You’re an idiot.”
“The PC term is crazy, thank you very much.” Turning from him before he could even think of a response to that, I faced Ashema. The blood poured down my chin, staining my tunic before splattering to the hard-to-see-bloodstains black coloured floor. I took a step forward, but Redric grabbed me and hauled me back.
“You can question her from here.”
“What? That’s ridiculous. I can’t hit her from here.”
“And she can’t hit you from here.”
“She isn’t going to hit me again. That was a lucky shot.”
“You said the same thing when I killed you, and look where that got you.”
“Oh my gods, stop embarrassing me!”
“Dear fucking gods, just kill me,” Ashema cut in as she looked at us with utter disgust.
No, not disgust. Full judgment about how amateurish we were being. That was just rude. And ironic. If we were amateurish, what did that say about the person we’d caught? Hmmm? Hmmmm?
My eyes narrowed on her as I stilled in Redric’s grip. He did not release me. Clever lad. I was definitely moving forward as soon as he did.
“Can you at least release me then?” I asked him. “If I’m standing all the way back here –”
“No.”
I exhaled roughly. “You are such a control freak.”
His lips touched my ear as he leaned against me from behind. Chills fluttered across my skin as he spoke the softest of words, “I’m a protective father. Once we both know you’re not pregnant, you can do whatever you wish. Until then…” His hand tightened on the nape of my neck. “You will stay outside of hitting range.”
“You are the worst.”
He straightened, and I could just picture his ‘I don’t give a shit what you think’ look on his face.
My thighs clenched. My mouth watered. I shook my arousal free of my head and focused on Ashema. “I’m a spy, not a cop,” I said. “And you’re about to be mutilated and stripped of all your magic if you don’t tell me what I want to know. So,” I said as I tried to take a step forward, but Redric still had a blasted hold on me. He was seriously killing my badass vibes here.
Rolling my eyes, I started again. “So…tell me what deal you’re making with King Ethiria.”
Her mouth twisted in disgust, and she spat a wad on the floor between us. “As if I would ever do a deal with a fucking Alzan.”
I stilled, staring at her, wondering if she was acting. The Alzans were hated by most of us given they ate our children. To be fair, they sometimes ate their own children too. But with the whole shedding their skin every year thing, it was nigh on impossible for their PR to hide all their crimes and red flags under sexiness. I mean, they didn’t even have a dick – though that was not to say they had never fucked a fairy before. Once you go tail…
I sighed, then spun the knife still in my hand. “Guess we’re doing this the hard way.”
“Torturing me won’t change the truth,” she said, lifting her chin.
“Oh, I’m not going to torture you. There’s no point. You won’t talk. I’ll just waste more of my time. Your deal with King Ethiria can’t go through if you’re here – for a bit at least, and if it is another gang he’s meeting, well, they can’t make a deal without bringing me to him. So –”
“You’re Evangeline,” she hissed as her eyes hardened into Alzan-like slits.
“Ring ring ring. Give the woman a bell.”
“Prize,” Redric cut in.
My eyes flattening, I glanced at him over my shoulder. “You are seriously killing my vibe here.”
“The vibe of looking stupid?” he asked deadpan. “Why would it be ‘ring ring ring, give the woman a bell’? She already has a bell if she’s ringing it.”
“Why would they ring a bell to give you a prize?”
“They’re not ringing a bell. A bell is ringing.”
“That is literally the same thing.”
“No. One is a man ringing it to call his kids home for dinner or something and the other is a bell that happens to ring when you win the game.”
“What game?”
“You know, a carnival game.”
When I continued to stare at him, his eyes softened into something that looked suspiciously like pity. Turning before he could ask me if I’d ever been to a carnival or knew enough about said carnivals to know what kind of games they had –because he definitely would’ve asked just to humiliate me in front of Ashema– I pierced the woman with my gaze.
Then I smiled.
“You know, I am a really big fan of your work. If you ask me, the Raveni are so much better than ZAZ or Lav Nera, way more sophisticated. Lav is too ‘let’s get high and crazy’, giving crazy a bad name, and ZAZ is all ‘loyal this and loyal that and don’t beat men’.” I lifted both my hands up to my chest and shook them. “But the Raveni… You all know how to get things done, running a very slick business model. I admire that. I respect that. It’s why I’ve left you –”
I stopped suddenly, then gagged. “Oh my gods,” I said, horrified. “Am I monologuing?”
She stared at me, her face blank but her eyes clearly dumbfounded. Some of my peers preferred to unnerve our suspects with silence and broodiness and the bad spy routine. But I much preferred just letting my thoughts run as they wished. That always got people to put their guards down as they struggled to understand what the hel I was talking about. Couldn’t think up a defense if you had no idea what angle I was going to come at you at.
“Shit. I just realised,” I said, slapping my prosthesis. “How much do you think a leg weighs? In proportion to the body, I mean. Ratio wise. Ten, twenty percent?”
“I’d say, very approximately...16.734 for men and 18.41 for women.”
I glanced at him, wondering how the hel he’d answered so quickly. My respect for him went up a notch. “You go around weighing body parts?” I asked in awe.
“Of course not,” he said as if I’d just insulted him. “But you need to know these things for necromancy. If you have a guy with a chunk missing out of his leg, can you bring him back safely? Or is his body no longer capable of housing his soul? Get that calculation wrong and part of him can go into you.” And when two souls merged, it was an explosion of agony and only one would come out alive.
Inclining my head, I turned back to Ashema. “Anyway, my apologies for the start of a monologue. But now I’m going to kill you because you’re not good to me alive, and you should see the maths for how much it costs us to keep someone in their own cell every year.”
Redric’s hand tightened on my nape, telling me in no uncertain terms that I’d have to kill her from afar.
“I have the right to a trial.”
“And I have the right to decide you’re a big enough risk not to get one. Granted, that’s going to cause a lot of paperwork on my end, but I’ll just get some pleb to do it. Job’s a good’un.”
Her lips tightened as she stared at me and I stared back, completely indifferent to whether she lived and squealed on her plans with the Alzans or if she died, giving me a few more days or weeks perhaps, maybe even longer, to figure out what was really going on as her death caused everything to change hands and pass down to her Underboss. Mafia or no, no one could sidestep the admin jobs.
Raising my arm, I aimed the knife at her heart. She’d try to twist away, but she wouldn’t be able to move far due to her restraints and it’d hit her chest in a nonlethal blow. But that would actually be ideal. She’d know I was serious about killing her, and it would give her the option of squealing in her final moments as she begged for a healer.
Lifting her chin, she glared at me.
I threw the knife without hesitation, letting it sail smoothly out of my grip. She twisted predicatively, letting it hit her in the chest. Catching in her ribs, it didn’t go deep, but it was still enough to stick.
Pulling out another knife, I raised my arm, but Redric grabbed my wrist before I could throw it.
“What are you doing?” he hissed. “You said you only wanted to talk to her.”
“I can keep talking to her while I kill her if that’s more acceptable to you.”
I smiled at him.
He did not react.
“What? She doesn’t know anything about the Alzans, meaning Cunt Face set her up, meaning she’s not the one I need to make a deal with. The Raveni will replace her in a second, so her death won’t even affect the economy.”
“You can’t just kill her.”
“You’ll find that I very easily can.”
His jaw tightened. “If we’re going to be...you know... together, you’re going to have to have a better sense of what’s right and wrong.”
I rolled my eyes. “One, this is most definitely ‘right’. She’s a baddie, remember? Kills babies in front of their mothers and all that? Is potentially trying to assassinate King Morningstar via sneaking the Alzans into Kholar. Two, I really feel the urge to kill something, and according to my therapist, my real therapist, not whatever the Dame is claiming to be, I shouldn’t hold things in because that leads to a bottle effect that will eventually erupt. Three, we are not...whisper, whisper...wussies.”
Whereas Ashema’s mouth opened and closed, Redric didn’t even hesitate in his reply. “One. Executing without a trial is never ‘right’. It’s lazy.”
Can’t really argue with that.
“Two, that is most definitely not what your therapist meant.”
Bullshit it ain’t.
“Three, it doesn’t make you a wuss to know right and wrong. It takes more strength not to go around throttling everyone.”
My mouth fell open. “Says the king of throttlers!”
“What is this interrogation!” Ashema yelled, clearly done with all our shenanigans. “For fuck’s sake. If you promise to shut up and kill me quickly, I will tell you whatever you want to know. Gods damn, Niflhel cannot be as bad as this.”
“Whoa!”
“Hey!”
“What the fuck, lady?”
“One more word that isn’t a question, and I will bite out my own damn tongue,” she warned.
We could easily get a healer to reattach it, but it would be an annoying waste of time. Pinning my knife to my palm with my thumb, I held both hands up. It wasn’t very secure, so the knife immediately slipped out, and I went to grab it out of the air, but Redric yanked me far back.
I almost started to yell at him before I remembered I couldn’t say anything without having to deal with a severed tongue. Huffing as my eyes landed on my baby, my blade, clattering on the hard floor, I frowned. Then shifted my attention to Ashema. Cutting pieces off of mafia bosses was nowhere near as effective as making them seem insignificant. Every time, they snapped under the bulk of their pride and ego, demanding me to stop being a ‘fool’ and ‘get on with it’.
“Are you in the middle of making a deal with King Ethiria, giving him access to Kholar in order to kill the king?”
“Yes,” she bit out.
“If I offered you a deal instead, would you take it?” The room was warded in silence, meaning no one outside could hear us. It was also protected against scrying for the sole purpose of doing deals like this one. And although, our undercover stories were about her dealing in Vyla, I couldn’t exactly offer her that and she knew it. Plus, I highly doubted Redric would be anywhere near on board with that in real life. “We can stage an escape,” I added.
She didn’t say anything for a long time, but I was content to wait, the real interrogation having finally started. Whichever one of us spoke first would lose, the other person having the advantage in these negotiations.
Eventually, she exhaled long through her nose. “What are you offering?”
“Because I’m not a cop, I will give you the location of ten people in FI-9’s protective custody as long as their deaths don’t cause national unrest.” I traded more than that to Smoke. Plus, my job was to keep the kingdom itself safe; if the cops sucked at theirs, that wasn’t my problem. “When doing whatever it is you’re going to do to those people, you cannot permanently harm or kill any of my agents watching them.”
“And in return?”
“I want all the names and faces of ZAZ’s and Lav Nera’s top officials.” Asking for hers would clearly be an end to the negotiations. This way, she would feel safe and would be given an advantage on her opposition. Win-win for the both of us. “And of course, I want all information you have on King Ethiria – actually, make that everything you have on Alcara and Okahea, as well as an end to your dealings with both kingdoms.”
“Is that all?” she asked.
“Oh, and I want to know who Cunt Face was – the woman who tried to ambush me at the diner.” She had absolutely ambushed me, but I wasn’t going to admit to that.
Ashema’s jaw tightened with just the smallest of tics, but it was enough to let me know I wasn’t going to be getting that name out of her. Which meant Cunt Face was family, maybe a daughter or sister.
“I’ll take fifteen names –” The way she said it, I knew she already had a list. “And five every year.”
I smiled. “Thirteen, but I’ll give you the five as long as you supply with any new players on the market.” The way I saw it, if I could round up her competition that would make the streets bleed less. Crime was always going to exist either out of necessity or boredom. All I could do was hope to control it just a little.
The silence stretched as she debated the terms, then she sharply nodded.
“Cool beans,” I said, sheathing my knife. The one in my hand, not the one still inside her chest. That baby was unfortunately going to go with her when she ‘escaped’. That was the sad news. The happy news was I would get to buy a whole new knife set to replace it. Yippee.
“I’m going to need you to release me now, Redric.”
He hesitated for a second, then dropped his hand, and I sat down on the floor cross-legged. Breathing in, I opened myself up to my magic to create a portal to my stash house, where I kept all my items that were too important to ever leave behind but way too dangerous to carry on me.
I stuck my arm through the pitch-black hole, keeping it straight until it came out the other side in my house. Wrapping my fingers around the pager I’d aimed for, I ran my thumb across its runes.
The hairs on my arms rose as the sound of scuttling and clicking mandibles came through the darkness of the portal, pulled by the light of our world.
Finding the rune I wanted, I tapped it twice, activating it. Then yanked my arm free, back to this side before any of the monsters could grab it and bite it off.
Shaking my arm out, feeling the phantom slobber and teeth across its skin, I stood. “Right. If you want to contact me, drop a message in the back of the toilet at Elanora’s Lady Club. Ground floor loo, middle stall. There will be a distraction in about –”
The building shook hard, and I stumbled into Redric. He grabbed me as he shuffled his feet, keeping us upright as a second explosion went. Delilah, down in the secret research lab in the basement of FI-9, was always playing with things she shouldn’t be playing with – such as mixing magic in terrible ways and summoning powerful demons who were not very happy about being summoned.
I wondered if she’d got my signal and let something loose or if that had just been a lucky coincidence on her part.
Either way, it would do the job of getting us out of here to go check it out, leaving Ashema here to escape. Just as I made it to the door, though, I realised she might think someone was coming to get here and would simply wait for rescue. Pausing, I turned around. “Have fun cutting off your hand,” I said, then nodded at the knife sticking out of her chest. The one I threw just close enough for her to reach it with her mouth.
Waving at her with my fingers, I exited the room as she cursed, Redric running behind me as I pulled him towards the basement.