“I love sparring with swords,” I replied.
From my side, the Queen said, “Then let’s see what you can do with the Queen’s Blade, in a friendly sparring match. First blood to determine the winner.”
The Queen’s Blade called out the last sword and gathered the gold up in one pile calling for bets on our match. The fae loved betting on just about anything. I did doubt anyone was going to take his bet however, even I knew what the position of the Queen’s Blade meant. There was probably not a fae here that could beat him.
“I’ll take that bet,” the Queen said, and one of her attendants went to fetch some gold. Okay, I was thinking, the queen had just placed a bet on me, against her own Queen’s Blade. Maybe she knew more than she let on earlier. The royals around us looked at me strangely. They were also wondering what was going on. The Queen’s Blade just smiled.
“I am not really dressed for this,” I said. I looked at Diocletus. “Perhaps if you could lend me your belt?”
“Of course, “ he said taking it off and handing it to me. I was concerned the dress would billow out on me, getting in my way. The fact that I was wearing nothing underneath the gown might come in handy as a distraction, however. I was not beyond using all available resources, after all.
“I will need something to tie back my hair,” I said. The Queen handed me a ribbon from her cloak.
Jeepers,
I thought. I was in real trouble. I used it to tie my hair back in a pony tail, it might be a problem in a real fight, that’s why I normally wore my hair short but since this was more of a sparring match, I thought it would be better to have the hair not getting in front of my eyes. Diocletus handed me his sword rather than the fake one from the younger fae I thought I would be using.
“I am betting on Jade as well,” he said and emptied a large bag of gold on the table in front of him. “Any takers?” He had no trouble finding enough that were willing to bet against me to match his pile.
“Are we ready now?” the Queen asked.
“Yes,” I replied.
“You may begin,” she said, looking at the Queen’s Blade.
The Queen’s Blade attacked immediately, at full speed and full force.
Nothing half-way about this guy,
I thought as I parried, barely meeting his initial attack.
As we fenced, I could tell he was one of the few talented swordsmen who could give me a real run for my money. He was a natural and had probably been practicing for decades if not centuries. I had just a little more in terms of speed and strength, in those two areas he was way past what I considered to be a normal fae’s talents. I was almost at my max, still a bit faster but not pushing it further. I had to stay faster, I realized as we went back and forth across the room because he was simply better than me, something that really shocked me to the core. I had not expected this.
Fifteen minutes in, neither of us had been able to penetrate the other’s defenses. Even with my strength, that is a long time to be continuously swinging a sword around. We were both starting to work up a real sweat.
I had an idea, wanting to take advantage of my shifter side, and leaped up on a long table we had come close to. He, of course followed. This table was covered with platters and trays of various food. My shifter side could smell the placement of these things easily and I allowed my nose to place my feet as I pushed the battle towards him. He retreated down the length of the table, stepping in one plate of food after another, starting to curse and swear the whole time.
This is fun,
I thought to myself as he stumbled a bit to get his balance. I almost had him then coming within a very small fraction of an inch of nicking his arm and ending our match.
He did the smart thing and jumped down from the table and I of course, followed. He almost had me a few minutes later, if I had not maxed out my top speed a few minutes earlier, he would have had me with a slice across my cheek. We were both starting to tire. I was thinking espresso and steaks. I was going to need a lot of food after this effort.
“I think we have seen enough,” the Queen said and we stopped, both breathing heavily. My gown was absolutely plastered to my body at this point. I think it was probably pretty obvious I had nothing on underneath. The Queen’s Blade looked at me in admiration.
To the Queen I said, “I think he may be better than me,” and she could hear the truth in that.
“It doesn’t mean I would have won the match,” he said and we could hear the truth in that as well. “Nice touch with the table, you almost had me there.”
“I will answer your petition now,” the Queen said. “I had somebody do a quick check on things. It is worse than I knew over there and my interests in the human world are already taking a beating. Noon two days hence I will visit your realm and meet with your Captain and the Mayor of your city. They will need to provide me with access to the evidence and I will assist in whatever way I can.”
The Queen’s Blade looked at his Queen. “If I may ask, how did you know she would be such a worthy opponent?”
“I heard she killed three zombies, without a flame thrower, and had taken out three vamps the day before. I don’t know how she did it but I guessed she was not without some great degree of talent.” To me she said, “Stay as long as you wish, you are welcome back here at any time.”
She held out her hand, ring side up, the ring with the royal crest on it. I bowed and kissed the ring.
* * * *
I was now a member of the Summer Queen’s personal court, I knew her offer and my acceptance had many consequences. I hoped I had made the right decision. The fact that her ring was made of one of the most beautiful pieces of jade I had ever seen probably helped in that acceptance.
I also knew I needed to go, but I had something I needed to do before I left. I looked to Diocletus, such a nice man, I felt. “Would you do me the pleasure of the next dance?” I asked him. “I may not smell very good, but to dance with you before I leave would give me great joy.” He smiled. I think I had just made his day. The fae love to dance and he liked me. I felt like I had made another friend.
I went back the same way I had gone in, emerging in Kaosium’s office. I had returned the belt I had borrowed from Diocletus. The Summer Queen had insisted I keep the ribbon she gave me for my pony tail. They had all treated me like family, asking when I would come back for an extended stay.
My eyes kept the jade color and my hair, instead of growing shorter, actually even grew longer on my return, now about eighteen inches longer than when I had gone in. The shape of my eyes still seemed slightly narrower and my ears seemed a bit more pointy than when I had entered Faerie. I wondered if the Summer Queen had put some sort of spell on that ribbon.
I left the gown on Kaosium’s desk with a note that I would be back to purchase it in a few days but to please get it cleaned. I had no idea how to clean a fae made gown. I went out the back way and hailed a cab, I didn’t know if I was being watched. I had the cab stop at two Starbucks and a minute saver on the way home. They had some cheap red wine, I bought three bottles and every dark chocolate bar they had. A dozen shots of espresso and several chocolate bars later, I had the cab let me out a few blocks away from the safe house and walked the rest of the way, carrying my bag of goodies.
I was afraid they would not recognize me and let me through but my appearance must have been close enough. I spotted at least three undercover agents on my way in. I could sense Rolfe looking through the peephole as I approached the door, he had probably smelled me a mile away, I was in serious need of a shower.
“Smith,” he said. “Nice touch with the wig disguise but next time go blonde or redhead, this one is the same color as you hair.”
“Not a wig,” I said, “and please call me Jade.” There was a small dinette in an area off the kitchen, I could see they had been playing cards. I went over and took the seat with no cards in front of it. Chris and Sarah gave me a curious look but didn’t say anything.
Rolfe came over and joined us. “None of us could sleep,” he said. “The Captain called and said they did find a bomb in our car and they are checking the car garage video but have not found anything yet.”
“Let the Captain know that the Summer Queen will be coming in at noon, day after tomorrow and wants to meet with him and the Mayor. She will want the case file to look over and has promised her full cooperation. I am not sure she speaks English, all we spoke in Faerie was the normal fae dialect, so I will be there to interpret. By the way, I am now a member of the Summer Queen’s personal circle and a ranking member of the inner court.”
“Your hair,” Sarah said. “Tell us about your hair.”
I opened the first wine bottle, it was so cheap it had a twist-off cap. It sure tasted good going down, however. “I think Faerie or the Summer Queen, or probably both, like my hair long.”
“Is Jade your real first name?” Rolfe asked.
“Yes it is,” I replied. “This is going to have to be a story for tomorrow guys, I am beat. I need a shower and some rest.”
“Let me show you around the place,” Sarah said.
Chapter Eleven
Something wasn’t right with my dreams so I had to wake up. The house was strangely quiet but something was going on outside. I walked from the bedroom to the kitchen, both Chris and Rolfe were slumped on the floor, not dead, sleeping.
A sleepy-time spell,
I thought as I started towards the front door.
The main door was partially open and as I opened it further I could see through the screen door that Sarah was on the front porch, facing down three witches on the small front lawn.
Here are the other three,
I thought,
what Rolfe had predicted yesterday.
Three is a good number for witches, it expands their power making it greater than the sum of their parts.
Sarah was a powerful witch and she was doing an amazing job holding three witches at bay. I stepped out to join her. I was wearing an over-sized Beatles T-shirt–a safe house has a lot of clothes on hand, knowing that people on the run without time to prepare would likely be using it.
As soon as I stepped out, a couple of witches threw a spell or three my way. I simply absorbed the magic of the casting, and ate the spell itself, a trick I learned while in my beast form. “Oh, yuk,” I said, “nasty stuff,” chomping down metaphysically on another spell. This was definitely not on my approved diet list, I would likely be sick later.
As I arrived at Sarah’s side, I smiled at the witches, showing my fangs. It had worked with Sarah at the restaurant so I thought I would give it a go. One of the witches stumbled and Sarah hit her with a ball of power, sending her flying towards the road, only stopping when she hit a car parked across the street.
Nice,
I thought. The odds were now even, and the car alarm was going off. Sarah was on her reserves, however, and we had to end this thing quickly.
One of the remaining two witches threw a particularly evil spell my way. “Now, that’s just God-awful,” I said as I tried to chew on that one. I spat it back out at the witch who cast it. Poor witch, it was her spell and therefore she had no way to stop it from returning to its source.
“All you need is love, bitch,” I intoned. I wasn’t good at spells with words so I just used the writing on my T-shirt. She burst into a ball of flames, must have been a spontaneous combustion spell.
Sarah hit the last one with a very strong knockout spell, using the last dregs of her magic. The witch fell face forward on the concrete walkway leading from the street to the door making somewhat of a splat sound when she hit. “Now, that is going to hurt,” I said, turning to Sarah.
Fist bump and high five, we made a great witch team. The sound of sirens was approaching and I was hoping Rolfe would wake up in time to do the typing on this report. Either I was followed, and I had not sensed that, or we had a leak somewhere, a mole within the FBI or the cops. Not good at all.
* * * *
A few hours later we were still at the safe house; this scene was a real mess. Two undercover agents were dead, we had one witch that was a smoldering pile and two that were injured. And we had to wait awhile for Sarah to get her mojo back before we could wake up our two sleepy heads. Glad somebody got some sleep last night. It was almost dawn and after giving our statements, Sarah had helped me find some clothes to wear. I settled on my black jeans and boots, with daggers, black pullover turtleneck and dark sunglasses–a very short-sleeved badass agent look. Sarah had also showed me how to braid my now very long hair, still with the Queen’s ribbon.
She didn’t seem real satisfied with the result however, saying instead that I now looked like a young Lara Croft. Beats me, I was now full of excess energy and felt good about myself. I wasn’t even hungry although I didn’t refuse the coffee Sarah made. Not being hungry in the morning was new for me.
The Captain didn’t want to risk us coming into the station, we were going straight into pack territory and we would be staying at the cabin James had selected for Emily’s first shift. Rolfe had finally awakened and alerted James that we would be coming earlier than expected. James assured us that the territory would be patrolled and well guarded. Lily and Emily would be meeting us later in the evening, no need to have them there as potential collateral damage until her change was near.