“What are you going to do?”
“Cast a spell to protect my cottage and keep others out. If somehow a magic user is able to bypass my magic, I’ll cast another to protect my potions. He won’t be able to use them.”
“All right. Where are you going after this?” Tanya asked, hurrying to stuff the bags with all Sigrid’s clothes.
“Can you keep a secret?” Sigrid asked, pausing at the doorway.
“Sure.”
“Good, because I can too. If I don’t tell you where I’m going, they can’t learn from you where I’ve gone.”
“Don’t you need help taking all this stuff with you?” Tanya motioned to the filled bags on the floor.
“Lift them.”
Tanya lifted the first bag, putting her back into it, and nearly fell over. She looked like she expected it to weigh a ton, but it was featherlight. She picked up the second bag and discovered the same thing.
“Magic. It’s as though the bags weigh practically nothing.” Sigrid gave her a hug. “I’ve got to run.”
“Are you going to the dragon fae kingdom?”
“And get their people into a predicament with the golden fae queen? No. When I was thinking of going there to avoid the prince and his cousins, that was one thing. But with Owen soliciting our queen’s help? Kingdoms go to war for less.”
“Can I come with you?”
“Then you’d be on the run like me. No, I can’t let you come with me.”
“Well, think again. You don’t believe they wouldn’t torture me to get the truth out of me, even though I won’t know where you are? And then they’ll have put me through all that painful torture for nothing.”
Sigrid sighed. “Okay, then we need to grab some more of my bags, transport to your cottage, and hurry and pack your things.”
“I hear horses.”
“The queen’s guard. Come on.”
They grabbed Sigrid’s bags, left the cottage, and transported to Tanya’s cottage, raced inside, and hurried to pack the extra bags.
“They’ll be here before long, checking to see if I came here with you since Shane knows I was with you at the castle.”
“So where are we going?” Tanya asked.
“The human world. You have a fae cousin who lives there, don’t you?”
“Lorena. Yes. She’ll be happy to put us up. She’ll expect us to work and not stay underfoot, though. She has a male friend there.”
Sigrid paused to look up at her before she finished filling a bag. “Human?”
“Yes, that’s why she’s stayed in their world.” Tanya shrugged as if she couldn’t imagine anything so crazy either.
“Okay, let’s go then.”
“What about our fae dust trail?”
Sigrid cast a spell around each of them. “It’s like an invisible bubble and will keep our dust from leaving a trail. I used one on us earlier when we went to the dog park near Houston.”
They grabbed the bags in one hand, and each other’s free hand, because Sigrid had no idea where Tanya’s cousin lived. Tanya transported them to the treed, fenced-in backyard of a two-story, red-brick home. Sigrid hoped Tanya’s cousin would be all right with them popping in.
“Let me go first and tell her we’re here and why.”
“All right.” Sigrid didn’t like this already. It was one thing to drop in on one of their kind in the human world, quite another to have to deal with a human who didn’t know what they were and had to hide it from him.
Tanya went through a gate and closed it. A curly, dark-haired guy popped his head over the backyard fence and said to Sigrid, “Hey, you planning on breaking in? Cuz if you are, I’ve got to call the police.” Then he laughed. “Dumb joke. Lorena’s boyfriend’s a cop.”
Oh…great.
“You’re one of those,” the guy said.
Sigrid narrowed her eyes at him. “One of those what?” He’d better not be a fae seer or she’d have to eliminate him. Or eliminate his memories of her and Tanya being here.
“Weird friends she has who drop in all the time, only they come and go, and I never see any of them ever again. They wore the same strange clothes like you do.” He frowned. “She’s not selling drugs over there, is she?”
“With a cop friend? Get real.”
Tanya opened the gate. “Won’t work. We have to go somewhere else.”
“You could stay over here, but my parents will be back this weekend,” the guy said.
Tanya stared at him. “Who’s he?”
“The nosey, next-door neighbor.” Sigrid said to him, “We’ll pass.” Then she said to Tanya, “We’ll have to stay at a hotel. But if we’re going to do that, I want to make it someplace fun.”
“A beach?”
“Yes.”
“There aren’t any beaches around here,” the guy next door said.
Sigrid went over to the fence and waved her hand at him, and he fell off whatever he was standing on to peek over the fence.
“What did you do to him?” Tanya asked, worried.
“Made him go to sleep. When he wakes, he’ll wonder why he’s sleeping on the grass. He won’t remember what’s happened in the past hour.”
“But you were only talking to him for a few minutes.”
Sigrid smiled. Then she took her hand and they grabbed their bags. “To the dark fae territory.”
“Wait.” Tanya climbed onto the cross timber on the fence and peered over, then concentrated on the guy.
“What are you doing?”
“Giving him a nice dream, surfing in the waves. Hopefully, he’s not afraid of water. Or dreams up a shark.” Tanya stepped down from the fence rail. “We’re not really going to the Denkar’s claimed territory, are we?”
“The dragon fae are united through marriage, and now the golden fae are united with the dragon fae. So somehow that should mean we’re allowed to go to South Padre Island, I think.”
“Yeah, but you’re a falcon fae, not a golden. And I’m a dream-weaver, not part of any fae kingdom that has an alliance with them.”
“So, live dangerously. What can they do to us? Lock us in a dungeon?”
“Or eliminate us.”
4
Owen couldn’t believe Sigrid had learned he was negotiating a price for her services and had escaped the castle before the golden fae queen’s guard could hand her over to them. She lived here under the queen’s protection, so she should have been grateful…and obedient.
In addition to the iron mesh net, he had bracers that would negate her magic while she wore them. He just had to capture her, keep her from transporting, and ensure she couldn’t use her magic on him or anyone else involved in taking her home with them. Once she was home, he’d convince her she was doing the right thing. Particularly, if she worried about him reporting back to her queen that she wouldn’t cooperate.
Her disappearing act was another setback.
“What do we do now?” Connelly asked, as they tried to get into her place, but couldn’t.
She’d set a security spell around her place, visible in a faint shimmer of color, which was a warning that she’d protected it with a barrier. From the faintly blue color, he knew anyone who touched it would get a nice shock. That meant they couldn’t retrieve their nets then.
“Can you disable her security shell?” Owen asked Tarrant.
“I can try.” Tarrant waved his hands and tried casting a spell that would dissolve hers, but it only shocked him, throwing him back several feet, and he landed on his back.
Owen looked at Connelly.
Connelly held up his hands saying no way. “You’re the best at disabling a spell like that. But Tarrant’s next. If he can’t, I can’t.”
Owen frowned at him. “We need the nets. What if Tarrant weakened the field around the cottage? You could get in when he couldn’t.”
“All right. All right.” Connelly tried a spell, but Sigrid’s spell had the same effect on him, and he was thrown backward, running into Tarrant as he got to
his feet, their hair standing on end.
“We follow her trail,” Owen said.
“She didn’t leave one,” Tarrant said.
“Not that we can see, but maybe a dark fae tracker could locate her.”
They went to the other girl’s home after that, no security spell on it—and learned that Tanya had packed and left too.
“Tanya has a cousin in Baltimore who lives there permanently,” Shane, the head of the queen’s guard, told them. “I’d bet anything they went there.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“Yeah, I went there once. She allows fae guests to visit, though she has a permanent human friend live-in now.”
Owen frowned. Sometimes fae would fall in love with a human and make them one of their own. If they decided they didn’t want the human any longer, they could return them to the human world, and make them human again. But to live in their world with a human permanently? He couldn’t imagine anything more boring. Though they didn’t bother with all the newfangled devices that they used in the human world—phones, computers, televisions, cars—so he could see how a fae might like the novelty and stay a while. “Can you take us there?”
“Yes, the queen has agreed to this, and Sigrid is bound to honor the agreement,” Shane said.
Owen wondered if the woman would be so willful that she’d defy the queen. “Has she ever disobeyed Queen Avalon?”
“Never. So, I’m really surprised to see Sigrid run. Maybe it was something you said or did,” Shane said, looking annoyed. “Oh, and she has a golden fae friend who turned into a dragon shifter,” Shane warned before they left for the human world. “She used to have a cottage near here, but she’s now living with her dragon mate, Alton, in the dragon fae kingdom.”
“Maybe they’re in Morcalon then.” Owen didn’t like the sounds of it. He suspected the dragon fae would take Sigrid’s side in this, unless he could convince Sigrid that going with him was for her own good, not his. “Let’s go there first.”
“Do you want me to show our fae aura?” Tarrant asked Owen.
“Yeah, since that’s what Sigrid is.”
“All right. Do you know how to get to their kingdom?” Tarrant asked Shane.
“Yes. Alton’s castle is here.” Shane drew a map in the dirt. “They might see you in a hostile way. Me also, since I’m in charge of the queen’s guard, but if you go without me, they may not believe the queen is backing you in this, and how serious it is.”
“I agree.” To an extent. Owen also figured that it would irritate the dragon fae if the golden fae royal guard were there, insisting they turn Sigrid over to them. But like Shane said, without the royal guard with them, the dragon fae could believe Owen and his cousins were just making this up. “We’ll meet you there.” He suspected this Alton, dragon fae shifter, might even deny Sigrid was there, if she was.
“What do you think?” Tarrant cast a spell to allow their fae aura to show.
“That we’re going to strike out, whether she’s there or not.” Owen would bet his life on it.
A few minutes later, they were standing at the closed gates, the castle spires looming above. Dragon statues were perched on the wall walk towers, looking real enough that they could fly off at any moment and swoop down to incinerate them.
He swore he saw a couple of them move slightly.
“Do they look like they’re moving, cousin?” Connelly asked, studying the dragon statues on either tower.
“They appear to be, but it could just be our imagination.”
Tarrant studied the dragon statues. “I don’t see them moving at all.”
Shane called out to the guard. “We are here on the queen’s business.”
A guard laughed and opened the gate. “The dragon fae’s business? Or your queen’s?” He eyed Owen and his cousins. “Falcon fae?”
Owen didn’t respond. The guard shouldn’t have said that much to them and just escorted them to the castle. A couple of more guards eyed them from atop the wall walk, and he wondered if they were strictly dragon fae or dragon fae shifters.
An older, gray-haired man met them in the inner bailey before they reached the castle doors. “You have business with Alton?” he asked Shane.
“Yes,” Owen said, knowing this man would most likely know if Sigrid was here, and they wouldn’t have to trouble the dragon shifters. “But if you know the answer, we won’t have to bother him, or the lady of the manor.”
His gray eyes widening, the man raised a gray brow.
“I need to find a falcon fae by the name of Sigrid. It’s a matter of life and death,” Owen said.
The man glanced in Shane’s direction. “And you need the golden fae queen’s guard to aid you in this quest?”
“Sigrid doesn’t know that the queen wishes it,” Shane said. “We only came to ensure that she knows her queen has agreed to this and what’s at stake.”
“What is it?” a woman asked, coming to the door, wearing a lavender gown, gold chains, earrings and bracelets like a golden fae would wear, but no gold paint on her face and hands like many of them adorned themselves. She had both a golden fae and dragon fae aura. Her dark brown hair was pulled up on top of her head and a circlet of gold crowned it. Dragon shifters normally hid their gold, so being half golden fae was probably the reason for her showing off some of her gold.
“These men want to find Sigrid and take her with them. They say the word has come from Queen Avalon, the golden fae queen herself, and that it’s a matter of life and death.”
“Really, Shane? Well, come in, come in,” Kayla said, welcoming them into the castle. She held her hand to stop Shane and the rest of the golden fae guards from entering. “You can wait outside. Thank you.” Then she said to Owen and his cousins, “Would you like some lavender tea? I grow it in my gardens.”
“Thank you. We’d love to have some.” Owen had to learn what she knew, in the event that she might know where Sigrid was, but he suspected she wouldn’t tell them if she did.
“Well, who have we here?” a man asked, intercepting them as he joined them from a corridor. He looked over Owen and his cousins as if they were foe, not friend, his dark brown eyes narrowed. He was dressed in blue jeans, sneakers, and a T-shirt that said: “May the Force be with Me.” Fluorescent light sabers were crossed against the black fabric. The dragon fae must have just been in the human world.
“They’ve come looking for Sigrid, Alton,” Kayla said.
Alton studied them further. “Ah, and you’ve told them she’s not here, and we haven’t seen her since our wedding?”
“Not yet, but you’ve already told them now. They’re here to have some of my lavender tea made specially from my lavender gardens. Aren’t you?” she asked Owen.
“Of course. We’re looking for—”
She waved her hand in dismissal. “First, we have our tea.”
Owen’s cousins looked at him, and he knew what they were thinking. The same as he was thinking. Was Kayla trying to use delaying tactics on them?
“Thank you,” Owen said, trying to sound gracious, as much as he didn’t feel it. He wanted to go after Sigrid. Still, what if Kayla did tell him what they needed to know?
They took seats around a long oak table and servants hurried to serve tea and cakes.
Owen waited until everyone had their lavender cakes and cups of tea. “We’re looking for Sigrid and need her to return home with us.”
Kayla sipped from her tea and didn’t say a word.
Owen fought grinding his teeth. He didn’t want to say anything that would make her clam up, not that she was readily offering any information. But, he suspected if he worded this right, he might convince her to tell him where Sigrid might be, if she didn’t know for sure.
Owen ate one of the lavender cakes. “She needs to be with her own kind—with the falcon fae. That’s what she is.”
“That must mean that you love her and want to marry her,” Kayla said.
Connelly smiled a little. Tarrant
choked on his tea and frowned further.
Owen knew Kayla didn’t believe anything of the sort. “We need her help.”
“Ah,” Kayla said. “You need her magic.” She finished her tea. “You’ve already asked if she’d help you?”
“We have Queen Avalon’s agreement that she will aid us.”
“You didn’t answer Kayla’s question,” Alton said, his brow furrowed.
“I’ve asked her. She said she didn’t want to help,” Owen said, honestly. “But her queen—”
“You asked Sigrid, she said no, and then you went behind her back to see if Queen Avalon would command Sigrid to go with you? How much gold did you have to pay the queen for Sigrid’s services? And what will Sigrid get out of the bargain?” Kayla asked.
“She will be with her own kind again.”
“You must have told her this already, and she still didn’t wish to return. Could she find a mate among her kind?” Kayla asked.
“She could. What would she find among the golden fae? She’s not even really welcome there from what Shane says.”
“The golden fae took her grandmother and mother and her father in. Why did they have to flee from your kingdom? She was under the impression all her kind had killed each other off.”
“It’s not true.”
“Then tell me what is true.”
Owen was afraid he couldn’t lie and get away with it with the dragon fae shifters. They were as wary as his kind, watchful, alert. “Her grandfather tried to take over power from mine.”
Kayla’s green eyes widened.
“Either my grandfather died, or hers did. My grandfather was king, from a long line of kings.”
“And you are?”
“I’m Owen, the crown prince of the falcon fae. These are my cousins, Princes Connelly and Tarrant.”
Alton took another slice of lavender cake. “So, Prince, what exactly is Sigrid to do for you?”
“Whatever she can—as far as her magic goes—to assist us in repelling and defeating our enemies.”
“I again ask what she gets out of the bargain,” Kayla said. “If she doesn’t want to return home, despite now realizing the falcon fae kingdom still exists, then it sounds to me that she isn’t interested in being with her own kind. It means she’s only being used by the two parties. Unless she gets something in return that makes it worth her while, I don’t see that we can help you.”