Exodus (Imp Series Book 8) (16 page)

Oh, fuck no. “I can’t. Nyalla has a strong aversion to elves. She’s ready to leave just over Bob’s presence. And there’s nowhere for them to stay. Little Red burned down my unfinished guest house and I’m at capacity. Even my stable is at capacity. If Mary and Joseph themselves came knocking on my door I wouldn’t have a bed of hay next to the manure pile to offer them.”

“Mary and Joseph can stay with the rest of the elves inside your house,” Gregory insisted. “Get those air mattress things you’ve talked about, shove your furniture to the side, and there will be enough space.”

He was completely overestimating the ability of my house to hold fifty—actually forty-four—elves, even if I stacked them like cordwood.

“What about the angels? You said they like to watch my place. If I keep the elves there, they’ll be discovered.”

“At this point it’s just a matter of time,” Gregory said. “My Grigori have said no one has been scoping out your house in months. With the war going on, it’s not a priority, and with the Nephilim in the open, there’s not much sense in diverting resources to counting how many demons enter your house. If you’re that worried, use the devices the sorcerer gave you to hide Harper and her baby from notice. They should do the same thing.”

I was out of options. Well, there was one more option, but it was a long shot. I pulled out my phone and called Wyatt.

“No, Sam. I’m not keeping your dragon for you,” he said before I had a chance to get a word out.

“No, not the dragon. Elves. A farmer just shot a bunch of them up and they have nowhere to go—”

“How about Hel?” he interrupted. “There’s an idea. They can all go straight back to Hel. Sam, you can’t possibly ask me to house elves after what they did to my sister. The answer is no.”

He hung up and I scrolled through my contacts, hoping to come up with yet another option. The elves watched me with big eyes as I dialed yet another number.

“Jaq! Long time no speak to. Hey, I’ve got some elves here who are hurt and homeless and need somewhere to stay. Can you and Kelly take them in?” I’d purposely called the Nephilim, knowing her soft heart when it came to hurt and homeless anything. Her vampire girlfriend would be less sympathetic. Actually her vampire girlfriend would probably hang up on me faster than Wyatt just had.

“Um, how many and for how long? We live in a one bedroom mobile home, Sam. It’s not like I have anywhere for them to stay. I could put one on the couch, I guess.”

Damn, Jaq had even less space than I did. “How about your Alpha? He’s got that sweet house and a bunch of land.”

“He isn’t the type to take in a group of homeless elves, or homeless anything.” Jaq sighed. “Why can’t they stay at your place? The guest house is almost done.”

I didn’t have the heart to tell her it had just burned to charcoal, so instead I let her know I’d be in touch and hung up.

“I found a place for one,” I told Gregory. “You wanted them spread out anyway to avoid detection. I’ll just call a few more friends…”

“There are fifty,” he countered. “You don’t have fifty friends.”

“Forty-four,” I corrected him. Not that I had forty-four friends. He was right. I stashed my cell phone in my pocket and turned to the elves.

“All right, guys. Seems like you’re coming with me.”

They cheered. I didn’t. Fifty, no, forty-four elves. Nyalla was going to kill me. Or kill them. I wasn’t sure which was more likely.

G
regory set about healing the rest of the elves while I gathered up the two dead from the farmer’s field, and ask for a volunteer messenger to return with me to Hel. As expected, no one eagerly raised their hand.

“Aren’t two corpses enough of a message?” the woman that Gregory had first healed asked.

“Dead elves don’t talk,” I explained. “I want the other elves to know exactly what killed them and the myriad dangers here. And I want them to know about the Elf Island project. Two corpses are alarming, but the others are liable to think that demons killed them, or that I killed them.”

There were still no volunteers.

“What’s your name?” I asked the woman. I didn’t have all day here. I’d need to just pick someone and she was the closest.

“Lysile.” The elf exchanged a quick warning glance with a younger male elf.

“Wonderful. Lysile, you’re the spokesperson. Come on, let’s get going.”

She hesitated, looking again at the younger elf, then she stepped forward. “I’ll come back,” she promised him. “I’ll find you. Don’t worry.”

“Where’s the best place to do all this,” I asked. “Normally I pop into Patchine or Dis, but I’d rather arrive where elves congregate so I can make a bit of a dramatic entrance.”

Lysile took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders, standing next to the two dead elves. “Thrai. It’s in the northern kingdom of Asha. That’s where the High Lords have their Council.”

I grabbed her sleeve, more to ensure she didn’t dash away once we were in Hel than a need to touch her during transport. The world blurred around us, and when everything righted we were in a city of crystal towers and marble walkways. The southern kingdoms were all about trees and greenery, but up north the elves affinity for nature leaned more toward the stone and spires of the jagged mountains. Tall silver-barked trees lined the avenue and onyx vines decorated the buildings.

Someone screamed. Then dozens of people screamed. I tightened my grip on Lysile and waited. It didn’t take long for the guards to arrive.

“Just returning a few of your citizens who wandered across the gates into the human world.” I gave Lysile a little push forward. “Sorry, the humans have the other four bodies, but I managed to retrieve these two.”

There were gasps from the crowd and panicked murmurs.

“It’s true,” Lysile announced, her voice carrying over the others. “We crossed into the human world and immediately two of our group were killed by giant, metal death-boxes. Two others met the same fate later, then these two were shot and killed by a farmer with magical weapons. There are dangers that no one warned us about. There was no welcoming party, no one to meet us as promised. We were left to wander around a hostile world alone. If the angel hadn’t arrived to heal us, more would probably be dead.”

Now the crowd really was panicking. Several braved close-up looks at the corpses, covering their mouths in horror. I heard more than one elf announce that they weren’t going to leave Hel if this is what they’d face.

“She lies,” one of the guards shouted. “The High Lords would never promise us Nirvana and send us to such a place. The demon has threatened her, forced her to tell these lies.”

The general population seemed to believe Lysile. They pressed forward, angrily facing off against the guards. We were knocked to the side, suddenly squashed between the two groups. I grabbed Lysile’s shirt again, wondering if the corpses were now being trampled.

A rock smacked me upside the head, bouncing off to hit one of the guards. They drew swords and before I could take another breath a blade sliced along my shoulder.

“Get down.” I pulled Lysile to the ground and immediately felt kicks and the pressure of bodies on top of me. We were going to be trampled, or skewered by the guards, or stoned to death. I gripped Lysile tight and did the only thing I could. I teleported us the fuck out of there and to my house in Patchine. We arrived sprawled across the cold, stone floor, two of my Lows staring at us in amazement.

“Mistress? What are you doing to that elf-lady?”

I stood and hauled Lysile up with me. “You okay?”

She nodded. “Bruised, but I’m fine. Was that the effect you expected my message to have?”

It wasn’t. I thought the elves would be shocked and alarmed, that they’d hug Lysile tight and take her off to give her a nice cup of tea and discuss how they were all going to stay in Hel. I didn’t expect a riot to break out, or the guards to begin stabbing the city residents right and left.

“I can’t stay in Hel,” Lysile pleaded. “I’ll be seen as a liar, as a traitor. They’ll kill me just to make sure I don’t spread tales of what happened to us. I’ll have to live as an exile in Hel, an elf with a price on her head. Please, please take me back to be with my group.”

I didn’t see where I had another choice. What was one more elf among the others? That made a total of fifty including the elves in Iceland. Add to that the Klee elves plus the ones who’d snuck back into France and we’d have a hard time keeping their presence a secret from the angels. But one wouldn’t tip the scales either way.

Shit. As much as I hated the idea of Elf Island, or any elves remaining among the humans, it seemed inevitable. First the deal with the Klee, then Iceland, and now this group. Even if I somehow forced them to stay, what kind of life would they have here? Without the high elves, they’d be living in a desert, struggling just as much as the humans in Libertytown to produce food in such inhospitable conditions. And it seemed the high elves and the guards were treating them just as poorly as they’d treated their human slaves. The only way these elves could remain in Hel was if I convinced the high elves, the Lords and Ladies to stay and continue the environmental modifications. And they wouldn’t stay, not when they had the angels’ enthusiastic welcome to look forward to.

No, the elves were coming. The whole damned lot of them were coming. And there wasn’t much I could do about it except make sure they all wound up on elf island, and that the humans were strong enough to not fall prey to their allure. I thought about Iceland and winced. Hopefully the other humans would be more like the French and that farmer with his combine.

I turned toward Lysile, noting a bruise forming along her cheekbone. She watched me carefully, knowing that her future depended on my decision.

“Come on,” I told her. “I’ll take you back. Just don’t tell any of the other elves about me getting trampled and stabbed. Okay?”

Her eyes shone with tears, a trembling smile lifting the corner of her mouth. “Anything, Iblis. Anything as long as I can return to my friends and family.”

I
t was after dinner time before I’d managed to make my way back to Hel and my home in Patchine. Well, Ahriman’s former home which I was only now beginning to think of as mine. I stood outside the flaming gates, taking in the stone façade, the crushed skull walkway, the intricate arrangement of bone that made up the porch pillars. It was a sad state of affairs when this monstrous house with its residual air of torture and death would seem restful in comparison with my beloved earthly home—the home filled with all sorts of beings. The home whose pasture now included forty-four elves in cheap tents. I’d bought out three sporting goods stores in my search for inexpensive tents, sleeping bags and basic camping supplies. And then after showing them how to assemble a dome tent, I’d needed to run out and buy an entire truckload of food. I could only hope they hadn’t gone through it before I got home. The neighbors might not think kindly of elves foraging in their gardens and garbage cans, or hunting in their backyards.

Nyalla had thrown up her hands at the whole thing, packed up Boomer and drove to Michelle’s. I knew deep down inside she wasn’t really mad at me. It was just the proximity of so many elves had her feeling stabby. She’d gotten somewhat used to Bob popping in the patio door to use my laptop, but dozens of them in the back field was too much for her to take. And it made me feel horrible. How could I subject her to this after all she’d gone through? It was wrong of me to put these elven lives before her, but I was out of options. Hopefully, this situation would only be for a few days.

So while Gregory was readying an island orientation, and Nils was making sure my elven guests didn’t burn my field, and Bob was keeping watch for any additional waves of migration, I was here in Hel, trying to raise an army. Gregory had commented that I didn’t have fifty friends. He was right. And how I was going to pull together the two dozen Lows in my household and magically transform them into an army was beyond me. And Lows? I seriously needed higher level demons than that. My Lows would be slaughtered in Aaru, and as much as I’d put them through over the last few years, I didn’t want any more of them dead.

The fire gates parted before me. My feet crunched on the pathway, my hand brushing the smooth, worn bone of the pillars as I approached my door. I could hear laughter inside, smell cooking food. I rarely got homesick for Hel, but this was one of those moments when I felt a pang of longing for my own kind. Heck, I didn’t even have any of my demon household staying at my earthly home right now. How sad was that? A demon, the Iblis, surrounded by angels, elves and humans.

Yeah, there was Boomer and Diablo, but I missed full blooded demons. And I especially missed my Lows, silly scamps that they were.

And those silly scamps all shrieked when I flung open the door and they saw me. I was barely a foot across the threshold before slimy and scaled arms were pounding me on my back, others pelting me with scraps of food or broken bits of furniture. Six hairy arms hoisted me in the air and before I could take a breath I’d been deposited on an enormous chair hewn from the body of an Ent. I squirmed on the leather cushion that I was pretty sure had once been the skin of an elf. Ironic, my sitting on elf-skin when I was playing Suzie homemaker to a bunch of them on the other side of the gates.

“Did you bring the elf woman back?” one asked.

“Can we play with her?” another chimed in.

I held up my hands for silence. “No, I did not bring the elf woman back. But, there’s good news. I’ve got a project,” I told them. Cheers ensued. “I need to raise an army to fight the angels in Aaru.”

Silence.

“Umm, Mistress?” Snip spoke up. “Isn’t that the place where nobody ain’t got no bodies? I don’t think I wanna go there.”

“And I don’t wanna meet any angels, yourself excepted, Mistress,” Pustule added. “They’ll kill me. I’d rather fight a dozen durfts bare-handed and covered in honey than face an angel.”

There was a chorus of agreement from the others. I held up my hand for silence. I got it. None of them was particularly interested in Aaru or angels. I didn’t want to sacrifice them anyway. Throwing a bunch of Lows into a battle in Aaru wouldn’t do much but cause a minor distraction, and their lives were too steep a price for that. I needed demons who were cocky, who wanted to have the street cred of killing an angel on their resume. I wanted demons who would line up for the chance to say they marched into Aaru and kicked angelic ass. I needed arrogant bullies.