The Emerald Dragon (The Lost Ancients Book 3) (6 page)

Chapter Eight

Sadly, I had just taken a sip of ale when he spoke. Sadder for Harlan, since I couldn’t control it when he made me choke and he got hit with a bit. Served him right for not telling me Alric’s plans right off the bat.

“He’s doing what?” Covey and I managed to say it at the same moment. At least Alric’s newest exercise in stupidity had drawn her out of her worry about her missing time, and potential killers stalking her.

“Why is he doing that?” I knew we should be out trying to stop him, but I also knew that with that slippery bastard, he was probably already gone now. I looked closely at Harlan. He was a bit of a blowhard, and definitely a gossip. He was not, however, a scatterbrain.

Alric had been teaching me more than how to use magic. He was also training me to read signs to see if others had been using magic or had been hit with some.

“Hold still.” I peered into Harlan’s eyes. Yup, a faint shadow flashed across his eyes. It could be something else, but most likely he was recently spelled. “That bastard.”

Harlan pulled his head back and looked between Covey and me. “What? What did he do?”

“Alric spelled you. That’s why you didn’t remember until now that he was breaking in.”

Harlan downed his ale then rolled to his feet. “We need to stop him.”

I flagged down Lehua, the half-giant barmaid. “Can we get some food to go? Doesn’t matter what.” When she’d nodded and jogged into the kitchen, I looked to the others. “Going there won’t help. He would have timed it so the spell broke as he finished. We need to catch him at home.”

“His apartment? He’s rarely ever there,” Harlan said.

“I know.” I smiled. “Not there. He had a spot in the ruins before, but I think he’s found another one recently.” Again, another thing I’d hoped I’d been wrong about. “I think we may even get there before him.”

Lehua came back with a few bags of food that I shoved into Harlan’s arms. “Thanks. Tell Foxy to put it all on Alric’s tab.” In the last few hours, Alric had unraveled all of the changes I thought he’d made. Obviously, he never ever made them, but was making it seem that way to get whatever he was after. As usual. If I wasn’t so worried about whatever he might have taken from my patron, I would have found a nice corner of the pub and sat there wallowing in ale for a few hours. I really had horrible taste in men.

Covey grabbed my arm as I turned to go. “If you can tell Harlan was spelled, look in my eyes.”

I didn’t know which answer would be worse, that someone took her memories with magic or without.

“I may not be able to tell, and even if I see something it may not mean anything.” I ignored the fact I was leading us on a hunting trip based on what I saw in Harlan’s eyes.

Covey shook her head. “I don’t care. Check.”

I knew we couldn’t leave until I did it, and while I was sure where Alric was hiding, I wanted to make sure we got there before him. Besides, the pub patrons were looking at us oddly.

Covey had to bend down, since we were both standing and she’s a good foot taller than I am. It was weird looking in Harlan’s eyes; it was positively bizarre looking in Covey’s. Her eyes were those of a true predator, and somewhere thousands of lifetimes back in my family tree, an ancestor of mine shook in fear.

I took a deep breath, pulled in whatever skills I had, ignored the screaming voices, and looked.

A spell slammed into me and tore the air from my lungs. I dragged in another breath, trying to sort out what I was seeing, or at least pull away from Covey’s eyes, but neither attempt worked. Finally, I collapsed to the floor.

Covey and Harlan were around me in moments, with the rest of the pub hovering around on the edges. Not wanting to be involved, but desperate to know what weirdness I’d fallen into this time.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Covey’s question sounded like she’d asked it before and didn’t like the answer.

I forced a nod, as I didn’t recall giving her an answer before.

She and Harlan pulled me off the floor and sat me back on a chair. Then Covey turned to the gaping masses.

“Don’t you all have something far more important you should be doing?” Her hands were on her hips and the do-not-mess-with-me tone flew strong.

Even the drunkest person around us fled within a minute under that glare.

I felt bad for Covey’s students.

“I was spelled, wasn’t I?” That was Covey’s concern. I’d been knocked on my ass, had no idea what I’d really just seen, and she was worried that she had been spelled.

“Yeah.” I took a sip of the ale in front of me. “I have no idea what happened, but I’d say someone messed with your head.” And mine, but I didn’t say that out loud.

“Could you tell anything else?” Covey shoved another ale at me and nodded. “You looked like you needed another. Now, what else did you see? You didn’t collapse about Harlan.” The look on her face said she was wishing she drank about now.

“It’s my wonkie magic.” I tried to shrug it off and took another long drink of the free ale. “Sometimes it goes badly.”

“You are a terrible liar, Taryn. But I won’t pry now, you still don’t look good,” Covey said.

I finished my ale, then stood up. Proud when I only wobbled slightly. Whoever had spelled Covey was of a far different type of magic user than Alric. “Now, can we go find out what that pointy-eared bastard is doing this time?”

Harlan looked like he wanted to ask more questions, but Covey got to her feet and pulled him up with her.

And fell back to their seats when the pub rattled its walls.

I might have thought the bouncing around was another added bonus from peering into Covey’s eyes, except that everyone who had been upright in the pub had taken a tumble.

“Another earthquake!” one of the patrons shouted from under his table. He had been under it since we came in, so most likely he was just upset the shaking ground woke him up.

Considering that the first two earthquakes we had today were actually delayed explosions from spells, I hoped he was right and this was natural. If I kept telling myself that, eventually I might believe it.

When more faeries started living in town, Foxy had made a tiny entrance above the top of the doorframe for them. When it had only been my three, they had to wait for someone to open the doors to let them in or out, but now faeries could come and go at will.

Three blurs of color shot in through the hole over the door and headed right for me.

“Not our fault!” Garbage yelled defiantly to anyone who would listen.

A horrific rattling at the door made many folks dive for cover again. Harlan went over and opened the door to let Bunky in.

The crazily flying chimera listed to one side and seemed a bit stunned. If constructs could be stunned. Crusty Bucket flew over to him and patted him comfortingly.

I shook my head and focused on Garbage. “What wasn’t your fault?”

“Boom.” Leaf buzzed forward with a serious look. “We no boom.”

Garbage pushed ahead of her. “Things out there go boom. We not out there. Not our fault.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose and shut my eyes. “Do you know where the boom is?” I ignored the worried looks from both Harlan and Covey.

All three faeries shared a look and Bunky buzzed around behind them. While they were conferring, I motioned for him to come closer. I wanted to get a look at the side he favored.

I found out the first time I saw him, that I couldn’t touch Bunky without a flood of strange images filling my head. It didn’t seem to happen to others, and Alric said it was related to my odd magic. Since I didn’t have my gloves with me, I motioned for Bunky to turn a bit.

A long shallow gash marred his left side. I had no idea what would do that to magical obsidian, but it probably wasn’t good. And it confirmed that the faeries and Bunky had been in the center of something.

The three faeries were still arguing, but then Garbage pushed the other two aside and flew back to me. “We no faulted. But we go there.” She was clearly not happy, but then none of them looked happy.

“Aren’t we going after Alric?” Harlan regained his annoyance at being spelled. His tail lashed back and forth a few times. Not a good idea in a crowded pub.

“I have a feeling whatever caused that shake might be a bit more important.” I was hesitant to say ‘explosion’ in the pub. The rattling had shaken folks up, but for the most part they went back to their drinking. The quakes of earlier in the day had shown them the buildings probably wouldn’t collapse.

“Same.” Crusty looked up from where she was petting Bunky.

Garbage waved at her to stay quiet, but Crusty completely missed it.

“Him and boom. Same.” She patted Bunky and I swore I saw the injury heal a tiny bit.

I shook my head as her words hit. “Wait, Alric exploded?” I doubted their ‘boom’ was that literal, but I needed to be as clear as possible.

“Silly.” Leaf shook her head. She also ignored Garbage’s waving off. “He there.
It
boom.”

I finally gave up and turned to Garbage. “Look, I know you didn’t do it, whatever it was. But I need to know where it was.” I held up one hand as Crusty started excitedly bouncing around. “Not just ‘out’. I need to know where. You need to take us there.”

Garbage didn’t answer me at first but turned to the other two and chittered something that sounded very angry in native faery. Finally, after a few more strong words, she turned back to me.

“Fine. We take.” She started toward the door but then spun around quickly. “Just remember not our fault.” The way her lower lip stuck out I knew something of what we were about to see was definitely their fault.

The rest of the patrons were carefully not looking our way, and I’d already added all of our drinks and food onto Alric’s bill. We followed the faeries out the door.

Bunky stayed by me as we left. He listed less, but whatever had happened had left him rattled. The faeries were his friends, but I was his protector. In his mind anyway.

Covey and Harlan were silent at first, but then started talking once we were clear of the pubs.

“Is this where we were going anyway?” Harlan said as we turned toward the outer edge of the ruins. “I need to give Alric a piece of my mind.”

I refrained from pointing out Alric took a piece already—or rather blocked the memory of part of it.

The girls were still buzzing ahead, clearly annoyed by how slow we were going.

“Unfortunately, yes.” Alric seemed to favor this one side of the ruins. Not popular with patrons or diggers, it was rocky and jutted out over a cliff that led down to the Forgotten Plains. Most of the ruins were safely far from this edge.

It was late on a weekend so not too many people were around. The ones that were peered down over the cliff. A cliff edge that was quite a bit closer to us than it had been previously.

“Oh crap.” I started running toward the huge section where the former cliff had decided to join the plains below. The plains way below. If Alric had been in there—it looked like the approximate location of his most recent hovel—he was too far down for us to recover his body.

“Alric!” My heart started pounding. Yes, I’d been pissed off that all the changes I thought he’d made, he hadn’t. But the idea that he was gone for good terrified me. My heart wasn’t ready to lose him.

“What?” He stood in between a few of the lookie-loos and I hadn’t even seen him. The fact he had his black cloak on and the hood pulled up hadn’t helped.

“I thought you were in there.” I ran to get to him before Harlan and Covey could have their words.

As I got closer, I noticed his hands were bloody and he had scrapes on his face and up his left arm where his sleeve was pushed up. He was also dusty and was hanging on to a large pack on his back so tightly his knuckles were white.

“I was.” His face was grim and furious. He shook his head tightly as Harlan and Covey got closer. “Not here.”

“Look, whatever you did to me, was completely uncalled for—” Harlan stepped around a rock to get a better angle for his tirade. He also got a much better look at Alric’s condition.

“Not. Here.” Alric watched the people around us for a few moments, and then shook his head. “We need a private place to go.”

I had been watching the faeries loop around in the air over the plains. I had to believe their claimed innocence on this—even they couldn’t do this much destruction.

Covey had been silent, but her eyes narrowed at the sight of Alric’s pack. “My place will be fine.” She held up one hand as Harlan started to speak. “No. My place. Now.” Without waiting, she turned and stalked away from the collapsed cliff.

Alric started to follow her, and then froze when he saw a rock her foot had flipped over. He grabbed it fast, almost too fast for me to see. However, not fast enough.

Etched in the stone was a tiny green dragon.

Chapter Nine

Covey was a fast walker. Alric gave her a run for her money, with Harlan and me almost running to catch up.

Alric had dropped the stone in his pocket, but quickly pulled his hand free. He did, however, keep his hand right next to the pocket.

I sped up so that I could keep my voice low. “So were they after you? Or just an unfortunate coincidence?”

He shot me a glare that repeated his earlier words about not here, but must have realized no one was near us, nor was anyone paying attention to us. “I would say coincidence. But I know you’d never believe me.”

I looked around for the girls, but we were rapidly moving away from the forest and they were air dancing over the plains below. Nothing like now to test my new skill. Rather, the faeries’ new skill. I thought about them joining us.

Nothing. They were still whooping and flying around, playing on air drafts coming up the new sharper cliff face.

I envisioned a big bottle of ale and all three of them with it.

Yup, that did it. The whooping came our way and Alric had to dodge as Bunky, following the faeries, made a detour for his head.

I waved the others on ahead; I knew where they were going. Covey didn’t slow down. Harlan looked at me, shrugged, and kept following her. Alric stopped.

“Girls, I need you to look over the boom area.”

Garbage immediately stuck her lip back out. “Not our fault!”

“I know, I know. But we need you to look around for any more markings like this.” I turned to Alric and pointed to his pocket. He looked around quickly, and then pulled out the rock.

Garbage flew over first, and shook her head as if she’d smelled something nasty. “No good, we no want.”

Crusty came by and tilted her head. “We saw.”

This launched Garbage into another round of pissed-off faery arguing.

“Look, girls? I don’t want you to touch them, but I need you to fly around and see if you find any more marks like this. And make a note of where they are.” I’d noticed they could recall things they saw; you just had to make sure they knew they were supposed to recall them.

Garbage looked ready to continue her argument, but then Bunky flew next to her and nudged her. The change in my little perpetually cranky faery was amazing. She smiled and petted him. Then scowled and started to pull away. Her face softened as I’d never seen before as he flew closer to her.

“Fine.” She petted Bunky a few more times. “We go see. Want us look for sneaky little men too?”

Alric had been mostly watching the crowd behind us but started at her comment. “Sneaky little men?”

I was curious too, but he didn’t look curious, he looked freaked out.

Garbage focused on Bunky, but pulled herself away. “Yes. Little. Sneaky. Smell bad.” Then she went back to petting Bunky.

I waited to see if Alric would ask more questions, but he had retreated into his own sneaky head. He looked like he’d found something deadly in his shoe and wasn’t sure it hadn’t already bit him.

“I think you should look for the men too, but,” I held up a hand as all four started to buzz around, “do not leave the area. Just look around here where the collapse happened.”

“Where cave, yes.” Garbage had one of her own trying-to-be-sneaky looks.

It took me a minute to get what she was talking about. “Where it was up here, not on the plains.”

All three faeries looked disappointed but nodded. Bunky buzzed around waiting for instructions. Which might be a good idea.

“Bunky? Keep the girls from going down to the plains, okay?”

His buzz increased a bit and moved into his purr sound. He bobbed up and down. When you didn’t have much of a neck, nodding was a full body endeavor.

Not sure why I never thought of this sooner. Bunky loved the girls, they loved him, and he was good at following orders.

The girls must have realized what had happened as all three tiny faces went from disappointed to downright petulant. Without another word, all four of my flyers took off.

Alric had started slowly walking away while I dealt with my delinquent faeries. He was so lost in some dark thought, I doubted he knew I wasn’t next to him.

I ran to catch up. “Let me guess, the folks you think rescued our friend are supposed to be little, stinky, and sneaky?”

Alric still looked like he was frightened and angry. Even on his disgustingly handsome face that look wasn’t a good option. “I don’t know. We had different myths about them. The more recent made them like giants, huge creatures who could devour entire towns. I liked that myth. It meant they couldn’t have gotten him out because they never would have fit in that tunnel.” He went back into his head again.

“I take it there were other myths?” He was starting to freak me out. This distracted and worried Alric wasn’t one I’d had the pleasure of meeting yet. And I can’t say I was enjoying the experience.

He shook his head. “Yes. Tiny, evil beings, no more than chest high to you or me with mouths full of teeth and three-inch-long claws for hands. And they follow dark magic.”

I thought about how high that green dragon emblem had been in the mine. A person about that height would have to reach up a bit, but no more than someone my height would when hanging a picture. A shiver went down my back. Next time that look on his face showed up, I wasn’t asking about anything. These little monsters might have only been after elves in the past, however, most of the other races were still living in caves to the far south back then. Who knew what else they’d like now that there were more races to hunt from?

Harlan came huffing down the path toward us. “What are you two doing? Covey’s about to come drag you both in by your hair.” He didn’t even pause to wait for us to respond, just turned back and trudged toward Covey’s side of town.

“Not to change the subject,” which of course was what I was doing, “but I think Harlan and Covey are going to rip you a new one.”

That shook him out of whatever was crawling around in his head. “What? I didn’t do anything.”

I managed to fold my arms, tilt him an eyebrow raise, and keep walking. Not as easy as it sounds. “They know.”

“Know what?” Whatever was going on in his head about those rakasa still had him off his game. He wasn’t even trying.

“That you spelled Harlan, stole one of Covey’s scrolls, and broke into Qianru’s house and most likely stole something from there too.”

Silence stalked us for a good five minutes before he finally responded. “Oh.”

Wow, even when his magic had been stolen from him I hadn’t seen him this out of sorts.

We’d slowed down enough that Harlan was nowhere in sight as we walked down the twilight darkened street to Covey’s house. Unlike me, Covey lived in a decent part of town. Not fancy and overblown like the folks on The Hill, but a nice, quiet, respectable neighborhood. Her house being thrashed a few times in the last few months was about the only criminal element probably ever seen here.

So I could not be blamed for screaming out in shock when two masked thugs, holding mini-crossbows jumped in front of us.