Imperative: A Quinn Larson Quest (22 page)

I hoped the book wasn’t sitting out on the counter. I prayed that Lionel had slipped it into his pocket. Fionuir hadn’t noticed I was blind so maybe if it wasn’t sitting under her nose, we could pretend it wasn’t here.

His hand left my shoulder and I assumed he was leading her to the door. I felt my way to a kitchen stool and was about to sit, when Fionuir’s voice shout in triumph.

“Hah, you should have hidden it better. It’s hanging out of your pocket you foolish wizard.”

“I’m sorry,” Lionel said.

Fionuir gasped. “You can’t see. Hah, a fitting punishment for something, Wizard.” I felt her presence loom. “I have what I need. I don’t wish to stay here longer than I have to, it smells of witch.”

She stomped down the hall and slammed the door.

We were in Bank’s sitting at a window table. I could feel the chill coming in from the glass. Clarence and Edrinda were there along with Burr, there was no news about baby fairies but we were probably a day early for that. I had the amulet deep in my pocket and I had my hand wrapped around it. This wasn’t leaving my control until we could find a safe hiding place.

The waiter put a platter on the table; it smelled of toast and honey, refreshed our coffees and then left.

Clarence restarted the conversation. “We should give it back to the druids.”

“They lost it in the first place. If we give it back how do we know they won’t lose it again? It’s a powerful battery,” Lionel said before the sound of crunching came from his direction.

“It is a powerful temptation, too. Are you thinking you would keep this power for yourself?” Edrinda’s voice was cold.

“No,” Lionel sounded appalled. “Imagine how much trouble I could get into if I tried to use it.”

I laughed. “You have the right attitude boy. He also has a point. The druids lost it in the first place. And they haven’t been looking for it. I thought it was a spiritual object for them.”

“What else could we do?” Clarence asked.

“A spell is going to take some work. Lionel can’t cast one strong enough to hide it from close scrutiny. I can’t guarantee anything I cast will work the way I expected. I need to learn how to cast blind before I attempt anything”

“The fairies could hide it,” Burr’s voice piped.

“Thank you, but the fairies have been through enough.” I didn’t want the amulet to go missing around the confusion of the fairy kingdom. “Can someone check with the druids to see if they even know the amulet is missing?”

“I’ll go,” Edrinda said. “You could be right about them not knowing, they have a lot of powerful stuff there. I will also suggest they may want to consider releasing the spirits soon so that the amulet is not a danger any longer.” Her chair scraped against the floor. “Shit.”

When I said we need to investigate, I hadn’t thought through the fact that I was still blind. I took Lionel’s arm and he led me across the road giving me a running commentary.

Lionel led me but I could tell where we were based on the sounds and smells; the bakery, the florist, the butcher. Next would come a park, and then we’d pass the school. The park was now a bundle of scents, pine, garbage, someone was smoking a cigar. We would be at my place in five minutes. I could start training Lionel to remove the spell on Princess, and we could figure out what to do with the amulet.

“It’s okay. You don’t have to act in any way that’s not natural for you. You are a wizard, how you act is how a wizard acts.” I suddenly realized how young he really was. “So why did you swear?”

He sat me on the bench and walked away. I tried to be patient, but it was not my best skill. I concentrated on listening. I could hear birds in the trees, so we must only be about a third of the way through the park. I couldn’t hear children but by the sounds of the voices I could hear, there were humans nearby. They could be on the street, though.

I heard Clarence say something to Edrinda, probably just noticing we weren’t behind them. Then I heard what sounded like an elk running toward me.

“We need to get home.” I didn’t want us anywhere near a dead body. I told Lionel to clean his shoes on the grass before we started.

We got home without further incident. I kept asking if anyone saw police hanging round. It’s hard to keep a compulsive need to check on one’s surroundings a secret when you can’t see.

Olan landed on my shoulder. “Not necessarily. The police are just as confused as everyone. There is no pattern they can find. Three humans died overnight, and now a couple of people this morning.”

“So they found the body in the park?” Edrinda joined in.

Olan hopped on my shoulder, it was disconcerting to have something walking on you when you can’t see. “No,” he said. “But, that makes six.”

“Why don’t the police have a theory?” I tried to keep my mind away from focusing on the image of Real Folk bodies strewn everywhere in an orgy of retaliation.

“There are too many differences. You know the humans love their patterns. Two people were poisoned. One strangled. One had their throat cut. One was stabbed, what about the person in the park?”

“Stabbed,” Lionel said.

I could see a pattern forming. “How long do you think we’ll have before they see the pattern, or something else that will lead them to Real Folk?”

I heard the kettle boil and then Edrinda asked, “Why do you think it’s someone from the Real Folk?”

That was a good question. Why did it feel like there was no argument to that? “I guess it feels like too much of a coincidence. We stop Fionuir and humans start dying in quantity.”

“It could be a coincidence.” Lionel didn’t sound like he believed his own theory.

“I would guess we are two weeks away from someone figuring out it’s not a human. They won’t be coming to that thought easily. If we find them and stop them…” Olan stopped speaking.

I hoped this was good news. Maybe the last bit of good news I was going to get for a while. “Lionel, go check him out, if he seems harmless, pass him though wards.” I gave Lionel the words to open the protection.

We couldn’t keep talking about the murders with this fairy near so I listened to the conversation at the door. “What do you want with Quinn?”

“I want my wife back.” I could imagine his chest puffing out.

“Why do you want her back? You could have protected her before, why should we give her to you now?” Lionel was doing a good job of screening this guy.

I hated to think that I was going to be the one to break it to him, but if I had known the starvation was her idea, I would have called her bluff and fed her. “She is in my workroom. I have her under a suspension spell; do you know what that means?”

“Yes, like death but not permanent.” The fairy’s voice trembled.

“She will need to be fed as soon as the spell is removed and she will be weak until she has eaten three or four times.” I rose. “Someone help me get downstairs and we’ll deal with this right now.”

I muttered some restriction spells to keep Diablo from seeing the important parts of my workroom and we went down. I had Lionel take me to Princess’ couch and put me at her head. Reaching out I drew the blanket off her and touched her skin. It was too cold for me to feel comfortable about her state of health.

“She is so thin,” Diablo whispered. “How did she get so thin?”

“She didn’t eat. It doesn’t take long for you fairies to fade.” I reached out carefully and found Princess’ forehead. “Lionel, open the honey and put some on her lips. Then give the jar to Diablo.”

I felt him move beside me. “Done.”

I pushed away the worries about dead humans and the possible repercussions and concentrated on the elements of the release spell. I ran my finger from her hairline down to the tip of her chin. When I finished I thought the words to undo the spell.

She breathed in and coughed. I felt the brittleness of her bones under my fingers. “You can eat now.”

Princess looked at me and licked her lips. Then Diablo nudged my arm aside “Babies are quickening. We will have a baby as soon as you are strong enough.”

“Lionel, put her in my room, in the bed. They can stay there.”