Paint it Black: 4 (The Black Knight Chronicles) (18 page)

WE DUG UP WHAT information we could from the Dream King’s tent, and Anna whisked us all back to Milandra’s palace. She’d brought a trunk full of books with her, and when I asked about it, she just said some things shouldn’t be left lying about. I didn’t ask any more questions, because she still scared me. Not because she hated me, but because she treated me like a bug she could squash if it became worth the bother. I couldn’t wait until we got back to our world where I was at the top of the food chain again.

Greg looked a lot better when we got back. Sabrina, Stephen, and Milandra all had that hint of red in their cheeks and eyes that hinted at a tearful reconciliation, probably followed by copious amounts of booze if my past experience with fae hospitality was any guide. Yep, Sabrina was a little unsteady on her feet when she ran over to me and threw her arms around my neck. I caught her before she ended up on her butt.

“Detective, I don’t know if your lieutenant would consider you fit for duty right now, but I’m not complaining.” I enjoyed the way all her curves were pressed up against me, but I might catch some serious ribbing from Greg and Abby about it later.

“I can think of a few things I’m fit for, big boy.” Sabrina purred into my ear, then reached around and grabbed a handful of butt cheek with one hand. “Is that a Glock in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”

“Oh, I’m definitely happy to see you, Sabrina.” I leaned down and kissed her hard enough to leave
me
short of breath, then broke free to look her in the eyes. “But this is going to have to wait.”

“I’ve never met a man so insistent on keeping me at arm’s length. What’s wrong, Jimmy? Don’t you like me?” She gave me a little pout and batted her eyelashes at me. When she let a curl of brown hair fall down over her eye, I almost melted right there, but duty called.

“Boy howdy, I like you, but we’ve got another kidnapped couple. Or we will soon. And I’m afraid that when the kidnapper realizes he doesn’t have anyone to deliver the goods to, he’ll freak out and kill his latest victims to avoid getting caught with them.”

I saw understanding flicker deep in Sabrina’s wine-soaked eyes, and she heaved a deep sigh. She hopped up on tiptoes to give me another quick kiss on the lips, then turned to Tivernius. “Well, that will have to wait for another time, I suppose. Magic me sober, oh Grand Scaly One.”

The dragon chuckled and waved a hand in the air. “You’d better catch her, Jimmy. This is going to hurt.”

A greenish glow flickered over Sabrina, and she staggered against me. Her free hand flew to her head, and she buried her face in my shirt for a long ten seconds. I felt her shoulders heave once, twice, then settle down as the urge to puke all over me passed. I heaved my own sigh of relief at that, then barely stifled my laughter as Sabrina stood bolt upright and hurriedly removed her hand from my ass, tucking it into a pocket.

The newly sober and obviously brutally hungover Detective Law straightened her clothes and waved a servant over for a request. The faerie dashed off and returned a few seconds later with a pitcher of what smelled like grape juice. I put my hand on the handle before Sabrina poured her glass, and she stared up at me with pained eyes.

“Hold on for just a second. And you probably don’t want to look.” She closed her eyes and stood still as I poured her a glass, then pricked my index finger on a fang. I squeezed out a few drops of my blood, then shook the glass to stir it as well as I could. I handed the glass to Sabrina, who drained half the glass in one gulp.

“What is this? I thought you were bringing me grape juice. Are grapes different in Faerieland?” she asked the servant.

I coughed and raised my hand. “I added a little restorative agent to the juice. It’ll help the hangover heal a lot faster.”

Sabrina’s eyes narrowed. “What kind of restorative agent? The kind that comes from that flask in your jacket pocket?”

“No, honest. There’s no alcohol involved.” I checked for my flask and realized it was still there. Good thing, too. If I’d really swapped jackets with that dream-Van Helsing I’d have been upset about losing the flask. And my car keys.

“So what is it? I know there was something more than grape juice in there?” Sabrina’s eyes were starting to flash, and I knew it was about to get loud.

“Blood. I put a few drops of my blood in the juice. It’ll help you heal faster.”

She went pale and very, very still. She looked up at me, and her eyes were very wide. “What else will it do?” Her voice was low and a little shaky.

“Nothing. I put like three drops in there. Not enough to do anything but provide a healing boost. For it to have any effect on you other than healing you’d have to be almost dead yourself, and drink me almost dry. The drops will just help you heal and give you a little extra pep in your step. That’s all, I promise.”

“Are you sure? I’m not suddenly going to have to have all my steak
tartare
, am I?”

I pulled back, offended that she thought I’d turn her against her will, and barely caught sight of Greg out of the corner of my eye.

“I’d never do that. Not again. Not now that I know what it means,” I said, trying hard to keep my voice under control. The idea that she thought I wanted to turn her hit me in the gut, and left me wondering how good an idea this whole “try to date a human” thing really was.

“No, don’t worry, Sabrina. He only condemns people to eternal darkness and a limited diet when he’s ignorant and really hungry.” Greg picked the wrong moment to add in his two cents.

“You wanna go, partner? I’ve just spent the last half a day battling a guy who turned my head inside out and showed me my psyche, while you’ve been lounging around here snacking on faerie neck and laughing it up in the lap of luxury. I’m not exactly in the mood to have my motives questioned, especially from the guy who used to list his biggest goal in life as ‘develop super-powers.’ Well, I gave you everything you ever dreamed of, pal. So back off.”

Greg and I had moved to where we were facing off just a few feet from each other. There was a wide circle around us, like a playground when a fight was about to break out. I took one step in, and then Abby was between us.

“God, I hate it when Dad and Dad fight!” she said, putting a hand on each of our chests. “This isn’t the time. We’ve got to get these humans home and find the kidnapper before he grabs another pair, remember?”

I nodded and stepped back, turning to Sabrina. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

She didn’t look in my eyes, just said, “I’m sorry, too. It’s been a tough week.”

“Tell me about it. I had a goblin eating my arms, remember?”

“You’ve got a point there. And my head really does feel a lot better. Thanks.”

“Anytime, babe. Anytime.”

I turned to Greg. “Can this be over?” I asked.

“No, but it can be over enough for now.”

“I’ll take it. Here’s what we’ve got so far. We beat the bad guy here, but I’m afraid there’s at least one more guy back in our world that needs an extra-large can of whoop-ass opened on his head,” I said, cracking my knuckles.

“I can do that. I’ve really wanted to hit something ever since we got out of the chef’s tent.”

“I’m pretty sure we can arrange that. So what are we looking at?” I asked, trying to get a good look at the paper he held.

Abby stepped forward and grabbed the page. “Well, I’m no Picasso, but I came up with a rough sketch of our bad guy based on Mr. Carmichael’s description.” She turned the picture around, and I immediately disagreed with her. It might have been a Picasso. From the cubist period. Or a Dali. Or a Pollock. What it was not, was a useful sketch that we could compare to the features of any living human being, unless their face was first run through a meat grinder and then spit out the ass end of a wood chipper. I tried to hide my reaction, but I was all out of subtle for the day, apparently, because Abby’s face fell to somewhere around her kneecaps.

“Why not simply pluck the image from his mind and transfer it to the page?” Milandra asked from behind me. I jumped a little and whirled around.

“How did you get there?” I asked. “Nobody should be able to sneak up on me!”

“I’m the Queen of Faerie, James. This is
my
realm, and I get to do whatever I please. Including mask my approach from the legendary senses of the Sanguine.”

“One of these days I’m going to get you to explain that whole Sanguine thing. Seems to be a little bit more than a title around here,” I grumbled at her.

“One day I shall. Now back to the matter at hand. You have a powerful witch with you, why not simply transfer the image from Mr. Carmichael’s mind onto the page. And welcome to Faerie, Mr. Carmichael. I apologize for the wrong done to you by the denizen of the Market, and promise you and your wife the protection of my consort Tivernius and all the legions of the Fae while you are here.” She gave him a courtly curtsey, and David stood up to offer the best bow he could manage, which was good for a guy raised in contemporary America.

Anna stepped forward and curtseyed to Milandra. “Thank you for the kind assessment of my meager abilities, Your Majesty, but I have no idea how to do this thing of which you speak. I fear Mrs. Carmichael is far too fragile to attempt any tampering with her mind at this time, and I would hesitate to put Mr. Carmichael’s mind in jeopardy by attempting an unfamiliar spell.”

“A wise response, Madame Witch. I believe Tivernius may be of assistance. Dear?” she called, and Tivernius came over. He was less terrifying in human form than when he was a twenty-foot-tall dragon, but he was still better than six and a half feet of pure muscle and chiseled jaw. I reflexively tightened my grip on Sabrina’s hand when the paragon of manliness strode over to us. I noticed that Tivernius never walked, he always
strode
. I wondered a little if I could stride, then remembered that I tended to trip over things when I took long steps. I sighed a little and focused on what the magic-users discussed.

“I believe I can help. Mr. Carmichael, did you get a good look at the man who abducted you?”

“Yes, I’ll never forget his face.”

“If you concentrate on that image to the exclusion of anything else, I should be able to peer into your mind and transfer that image from your mind to paper by magical means.” Tivernius snapped his fingers and a servant ran over to him. “Paper, please.”

The servant returned moments later with a sheaf of thick paper, and Tivernius led David over to a small round table with two chairs. He sat opposite David, and instructed him to lean forward with his elbows on the table and head in his hands. “There should be no discomfort associated with this spell, but I cannot promise it. I do not completely understand the magic of this so-called Dream King, so there may be damage to your brain of which we are not currently aware. I can only assure you that I will attempt to cause you no undue pain, and that this is the most accurate method for creating the sketch that could bring your abductor to justice.”

David nodded, then assumed the position. Tivernius mirrored his posture, and leaned forward until their heads were almost touching. The dragon-man shifted until his head was supported by one hand, with the other hand touching the stack of papers. He closed his eyes, and the pair were enveloped in a warm yellow glow that flowed from Tivernius across the air to David, and down over the man’s head and shoulders.

Sabrina leaned over and asked me, “Do you know what he’s doing?”

“I have no idea. I can’t even program my DVR, much less do magic on this scale.”

She grinned at me. “Yeah, good point. You’re more the hit-things-until-they-work guy. Anna?”

The witch turned from where she had been closely studying the process. “It seems that there are two spells layered on top of each other, maybe even more. The first spell allows Tivernius to see an image that David has fixed firmly in his mind’s eye, a type of magical clairvoyance, if you will. Then there seems to be another spell on top of that one which gives Tivernius significantly increased artistic ability, to let him draw anything that he holds firmly in
his
mind.”

“So it’s using magic to create psychic abilities?” Greg asked. “Because I’ve heard of people doing that before. Drawing things they’ve never seen.”

“Automatic writing, I chimed in. Everyone turned to look at me like I had three heads. “What? I read.”

Anna continued. “He’s right, for a change. It’s also called psychography, and it’s the principle on which a Ouija board works. Something outside the person holding the pen, or planchette, takes control of their body and writes, draws or moves a pointer through them. That’s what Tivernius is doing—he’s using magic to move the pencil and create a drawing based on what he sees in David’s mind.”

After a few minutes, Tivernius’ hand started to move across the page. I tried to peek at what he was drawing, but his hand was moving too fast for me to get a good glimpse. It took him another five minutes or so, then he leaned back in his chair and the glow faded from around the two men. I walked over and picked up the paper.

I showed it to David, and asked “Is this the man that kidnapped you?”

He gasped and nodded. “That’s him. That’s him exactly.”

I walked over to where Elizabeth was sitting and showed her the picture. “Is this the guy? Take your time, we want you to be sure.”

She didn’t take any time. “That’s him. That’s the bastard. He pulled out of a parking space right in front of us, and when we stopped, he jumped out of his car with a gun in his hand. He pointed the gun right at David’s face and made us get in his van. When I tried to go back to Andrew, he grabbed me by the hair and threw me in the back of the van. David tried to fight him, but he sprayed something in his face.”

“Probably mace or pepper spray,” Sabrina said, her tone now back to business. “Traces of capsicum spray were found at the scene. We figured that was what he used to subdue his victims. Can you describe the van for me?” This was the first we’d heard from Elizabeth since we got her free of the Dream King, and she was proving a lot more helpful than I’d hoped.