No Quest for the Wicked (22 page)

I leaned closer to the phone. “No, I tried, but I didn’t have much time to search.”

“Ah, pity. Are you safe now?”

“For the moment, yes,” Owen said. “I don’t know how long we can stay here, though. We tried to get as far away from people as possible, but I’m sure they’ll track us down before long.”

“Stay there as long as you can. I’m creating a new box, and once the protective spells are complete, I’ll have it delivered to you. When you have it encased, you’ll be able to bring it to your manuscript room, where you can lock it in the safe with the
Ephemera
. That room is so carefully warded that the Eye should be secure there until we can find a way to destroy it.”

“How much longer do we need to hold on?” Owen asked.

“I have at least an hour’s worth of work to do. These wards are tricky, and I need to ensure that even I can’t break them. It’s a shame I don’t have your assistance, as I recall you’re quite good with wards.”

“If I were able to help you with wards, you wouldn’t dare let me anywhere near the Eye or anything designed to protect the Eye,” Owen said. “Too many people would see that as suspicious.” He took a deep breath, then said, “Okay, then, we’ll try to hold on for an hour. Call me when you’re ready to deliver the box to us.”

When he ended the call and put the phone back in his pocket, I leaned against him again, and he settled his arm around me. “Do you think we can just hide out for an hour?” I asked.

“I doubt it. We may have about twenty minutes here, and then we’ll have to find another hiding place. If we stay on the move and stay away from people, we might be able to last until we can get that box.”

“Those are big ifs, considering that all we can do is run. We don’t have magic, and it probably wouldn’t be safe to let anyone with magic near the Eye. I’d rather fight our enemies than our friends.”

“Yeah, I’m right there with you.” He was silent for a moment, then he said, “You do know what our priority is, right? Keep that brooch safe and under your control, no matter what. Don’t worry about me. Guard the brooch.”

“I seem to recall that we’ve had a similar conversation before.”

“And I was right then, too. You saved the day by focusing on the mission.”

“Yay, me,” I said weakly. “But you know that leaving you behind almost killed me. I don’t want to ever be in a situation like that again.”

“I’m not saying that I
want
to be left behind and attacked so the mission can be completed. But I think it’s best if you have the brooch, and that means you’ve got to get the job done. And that reminds me, this is as good a place as any for that talk we’ve been needing to have.”

“What talk?” I said, trying to play innocent.

“The one you’ve been avoiding. So, come on, Katie, tell me, what’s wrong? You’ve obviously been unhappy about something.”

“It’s not you, not at all.”

“Okay, then, what is it? Because if you don’t tell me, then I’ll assume it really is me, and then you know me, I’ll mope. I might even clean my house.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Oh, no, we can’t have that!” I sighed, then said, “Okay, if you want to know, I think I kind of hate my job. It’s so trivial with all that’s happened to you and now this whole Eye business, but there you have it. I’m so bored I could scream. Not now, obviously, but this isn’t part of my regular job. It’s been sheer torture coming to work every day for the last few months, ever since we beat the last round of bad guys.”

“Why haven’t you said anything?”

“Like I said, it seems so trivial. And besides, I’m on at least my third assignment since coming to work for MSI, and I haven’t even worked there a whole year.”

“What is it that you hate, aside from the boredom?”

I had to think about that. The boredom was so mind-numbing that it was hard to get beyond it to see anything else. “Mostly, I don’t think I’m getting to use my abilities. You recruited me because I’m immune to magic, and that has nothing to do with my current job. Anyone of any level of magical or nonmagical ability could do my job. I have the skills for it because the only job I could find when I moved to New York was as an administrative assistant in a marketing department. It’s like, oh, I don’t know, say that they put you to work just setting wards. That’s something you’re good at that you’ve had a lot of practice with, but it wastes your real skill, which is translating ancient texts and ferreting out the parts of the old spells that might be useful.”

“I see your point. You are being wasted. Maybe you should talk to Sam about something in security. A magical immune might come in handy, and you definitely have experience in dealing with bad guys and solving crimes.”

“Security? Really? I’m not really the security type, am I?”

“Let’s see, in the time you’ve been with the company, you’ve caught intruders, revealed a spy, and helped bring down the bad guys while evading the opposition. Sounds like security work to me.”

“That could actually be kind of cool,” I said thoughtfully. “But you don’t think I’ll seem ungrateful to reject a job Merlin created for me?”

“The needs of the company keep changing.” I felt his shoulder shrug where my head rested on it. We were both quiet for a moment, listening to make sure our enemies hadn’t found us. Then he said, “I have to say I’m relieved. I thought you were unhappy that we weren’t spending enough time together. I know I can get obsessive when I’m working on a project.”

I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him. “Yes, I know you can get obsessive, which is why I try to find ways of working around it, like sneaking in early in the morning to bring you breakfast. If you weren’t obsessive, you wouldn’t be you, and I happen to like you a lot.”

“We
will
take that vacation, I swear,” he said.

“Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.” But I was smiling when he kissed me. A tunnel under a Central Park bridge late in the evening wasn’t a bad place for a makeout session—that is, if there weren’t multiple factions out to get us. As if to remind us that we probably ought to be a little more focused on our surroundings, Owen’s phone rang before things could get too heated.

It was Rod. “Are you two okay?” he asked.

“For now,” Owen replied. “What happened back there?”

“I wish I could have found a way to record it because Katie would’ve enjoyed seeing it.”

I stood on my tiptoes to speak into Owen’s phone. “Oh, do tell!”

“Mimi made a huge fuss about her missing brooch, so they eventually brought in one of the NYPD officers working event security to take her statement. They couldn’t take her too seriously when she was griping about missing a brooch that she was still wearing. She insisted that it was a different brooch, and the way she could tell the difference was that the real one made her feel better. Once the officer heard about her earlier meltdown, there was talk about calling Bellevue, but one of the museum trustees was there and talked them into just letting her lie down for a while. They may have given her a little something to help her relax.”

“So we won’t have to worry about Mimi coming after us for a while,” I concluded with some relief. “What about the others?”

“Thor and Granny are with me. Sylvester finally woke up, and he and his group, including Earl, just left. I’m not sure how much time you have before they reach you. Sam’s tailing them and we’re trying to stay in range so we can help if you need us.”

“Thanks for the warning. We should be on the move.”

“I hope you’ve got a plan because you’re eventually going to have a lot of people after you.”

“The boss is working on a new protective case, and when he gets it to us, we should be okay. We just have to hold out until then.”

“Maybe instead of following the elves, we should meet up with you.”

“No, sorry, I’d rather not tell you where we are. It’s not that I don’t trust you.”

“It’s that you don’t trust us around the Eye. Don’t worry, I get it, but I’m not sure Katie’s grandmother does. She’s not happy.”

“I’ll deal with her later,” I said.

“Are you sure you don’t need help? I don’t like the idea of you two out there alone, defenseless, with who knows what coming after you.”

“Who’s defenseless?” Owen said indignantly.

“Magic can’t hurt you, but I can think of a lot of other things that could.”

“Still, the fewer people who might be affected around me, the fewer I’ll have to deal with. Or do you want me to have to hit you?”

“Okay, then,” Rod said, “I’m here if you need me. We’ll try to keep everyone else off your backs—from as far away as possible.”

Owen ended the call and said, “We should probably move on.”

“Yeah. It would be too easy to trap us in here—just close in on either side.”

However, neither of us moved. It was comfortable standing huddled together, and I felt safe in the enclosed environment, even if it did make a perfect trap. Outside, the world was a scary place, full of people who were out to get us—and this time, that wasn’t paranoia talking.

“So, maybe we should check to see which side is safest for leaving,” Owen said after a while.

“If you insist,” I said, forcing myself to pull away from him, and then instantly missing his warmth.

“You check that end, I’ll check this end.” He grinned. “Maybe you could consider all this part of your security job audition for Sam.”

I reluctantly headed to the opposite end of the tunnel from Owen. I didn’t like splitting up like that, even if I thought it was probably a good idea. I flattened myself against the tunnel’s wall and peered out from behind the bridge’s decorative edging. All I saw was a dim darkness. It wasn’t pitch black, thanks to the lights from the city around us and the lampposts that lined the footpath, more of a dark twilight. I thought I heard faint footsteps on the road above, and I held my breath to listen, but they grew fainter until I could no longer hear them. I didn’t hear anything else, other than distant city sounds, and I didn’t detect any motion, either on the ground or in the air.

I turned back to look at Owen’s end of the tunnel. He was doing the same thing I’d done, hovering at the edge of the tunnel to watch and listen. I could only see him in silhouette, but I thought he turned back to look at me. I gave him a thumbs-up sign, holding my arm away from my body so he might be able to see it. I waited for a similar signal from him. Instead, he jumped, and then I heard his footfalls echoing through the tunnel as he ran toward me.

Apparently, the coast wasn’t clear on that side.

Obeying his directive to focus first on protecting the brooch, I ran out of the tunnel. He was faster than I was, so I figured he’d catch up soon enough, and I didn’t want to risk being trapped.

After all our earlier running around, I didn’t know where I was in the park or where I should go, so I stuck to the path for the time being. Owen caught up with me pretty quickly, and I reached out to catch his hand. “The elves,” he panted. “They must have sensed the Knot and found us.”

I risked a glance over my shoulder, but didn’t see anything coming up behind us. I also didn’t hear footsteps. That made it hard for me to force myself to run all-out, since I was still winded from the last footrace. The next time I looked behind us, I recognized Lyle’s upturned collar as he raced toward us. He ran like a gazelle, and I wasn’t sure his feet even touched the earth. No wonder I hadn’t heard footsteps.

That gave me plenty of incentive to put on a burst of speed, although I suspected it would be fruitless. Owen had been holding back to keep pace with me, so he matched my speed. We were so busy running from Lyle that we nearly ran head-on into Sylvester, who seemed to come out of nowhere to block the path. We probably left skid marks as we stopped abruptly and turned to the side. The sides were also blocked, with Earl standing on one side of the path and another elf blocking the other way. Lyle then came up behind us, blocking our retreat in that direction. We were surrounded.

“You have my brooch,” Sylvester said. “Hand it over!”

Owen regarded Sylvester calmly, acting as though he’d just run into him while out in the park and completely ignoring the fact that we were surrounded by elves. “But, see, your brooch got all mixed up with our stone,” he responded. “So we’re just going to get our stone out of the brooch, and then you can have your brooch. That is, if it survives.”

“Don’t get insolent with me, boy,” Sylvester snarled. “I haven’t forgiven you for knocking me out earlier.”

“I wasn’t trying to knock you out. You got in my way, and even if I hadn’t knocked you out, you wouldn’t have been able to take the brooch. Don’t you know how the Knot works?”

“Hand over the brooch!” Sylvester sputtered. He was deeply under the influence of the Eye, and I doubted he’d listen to reason. Even in the darkness, I could see his eyes glittering with need.

I instinctively flinched, but Owen stood firm. “If you want it, come and take it,” he said. “I don’t recall that you were very successful in your previous attempts.”

I wasn’t sure what Owen thought would happen when Sylvester called his bluff. The Knot wouldn’t protect me the way it had protected Mimi. I turned to Earl, who stood his ground while fidgeting uncomfortably. I gave him my best pleading look, but I didn’t expect much, even if he really was on our side. If he helped us, he’d blow his cover.

So far, Owen’s bluff was working. Sylvester held back, watching us, unable to tell which of us had the brooch. His eyes shifted back and forth between us as he tried to decide who would be the most likely keeper of the brooch. Owen oh-so-casually put his hand in his pocket, as if to protect something valuable, and then Sylvester made his move.

Chapter Fourteen

Sylvester rushed at Owen, who stepped forward to meet his attack, catching him off-guard and grabbing his arm to use Sylvester’s own momentum against him. The Elf Lord went flying, landing face-first on the path. The other elves hesitated, torn between keeping their positions and moving to help their leader. We darted through the opening Sylvester left.

Sylvester shouted, “Get them! Get the brooch!” and soon the other elves were after us. I didn’t see how we’d avoid capture for very long. They could outrun us, they had magic, and they had us outnumbered.