The Rise of the Dark Lord Page 22

  No PC word for it.

  Vile.

  So, yeah.

  That was now top of the list of things I wished I could unsee.

  Ash got in front of me.

  I got in front of Ash.

  He growled and got in front of me again.

  Before I could get in front of him, Bligh asked, “Did you forget something?”

  Ash, who already had his gun out, pointed at Bligh, answered, “No.”

  “You are Fae, Sebastian, saved by an elf,” Bligh said. “And what magic do you think makes me?”

  I had a sinking feeling about this question.

  Remember, I did just mention the Scary Faerie’s orb o’ magic.

  Topping that, Scary Faerie had been with Agatha Darling, Endora and Bligh for months.

  Bligh’s voice coming from his mottled face with no lips, no eyebrows (and from what I could see also no eyelids or any hair at all) was raspy but still amused when he went on.

  “You are Fae and I am Fae. This is going to be fun.”

  He then started, looked beyond us, and Ash pulled the trigger.

  I jumped at the loud noise, but overlapping it was a sickening crack.

  With that noise, two skeletal wings broke out on Bligh’s back and he was flying away with a good deal of speed, if not much grace.

  I was a little astonished he could catch air with those wings.

  But he could.

  “Fuck,” Ash bit.

  “Fuck,” I heard, and looked behind us, to see Fane standing there, staring up at the sky.

  “Fuck!” Cystien exploded. Also there. Also staring at the sky. And last, not done shouting. “This will not be abided! That thing cannot be Fae!”

  I wasn’t looking forward to the conversation that shared I might have had a little hand in that.

  Inadvertently.

  Cystien and Fane then took flight in pursuit.

  (They didn’t catch him, FYI.)

  Sadly, Ash and I were so flipped out that Bligh was Fae, we weren’t paying attention.

  And that was when the real Agatha Darling showed up.

  And hit me with a kill spell.

  Don’t freak.

  I didn’t die and need Cystien to sing the lament to me or anything.

  (Though, I kinda wished I did because then I might turn a little Fae.)

  First, I was the Chosen One.

  And second, Agatha was debilitated from using all her magic in a variety of ways.

  So it might have been a kill spell, but it wasn’t strong enough to kill.

  Cause unbelievable pain I didn’t think I’d survive?

  Yes.

  Cause unbelievable pain that lasted four whole days before it even began to subside and it set my man, my family and other loved ones to dread and despair thinking I wouldn’t survive?

  Yes.

  Kill me?

  No.

  The gruesome and heartbreaking tally from that night was two lost goblins, one lost troll, three dead banshee, five dead wizards, and eight dead witches.

  Those wounded were three times as many.

  So I’ll repeat, my people were now focused.

  It wasn’t a good way to get them focused.

  But I was getting a lot of practice at looking at the bright side.

  Bright side to all that pain?

  When I came out of it, I was wearing a four-carat, Harry Winston, cushion-cut engagement ring on my left hand.

  “Did I miss the proposal?” I rasped to Ash.

  He lifted his hand in front of my face, on which, every day since I put it on him, he wore my ring.

  He dropped it, before declaring low and rumbly, “You’re not breathing another day without my mark on you.”

  I didn’t think that was the proposal he’d planned to make.

  But it worked for me.

  So it’s official.

  I’m engaged to Sir Sebastian Quincy Wilding.

  Yippee!

  About half a day after most (not all) of the pain subsided, I was lying on the couch with Mom’s Magical Ailment Cure-All in a bowl that sat on a plate in front of me.

  No, it wasn’t an ancient Honeycutt magickal secret.

  It was Campbell’s chicken noodle soup with a ton of saltines smothered in butter with the side of a pickle spear.

  Don’t ask.

  It works.

  For everything.

  A knock came at the door, Mack, who was looking after me (with Viv, hmm) got up and opened it.

  In came Agents Perry and Ramirez.

  Now, I might just have survived a kill spell from a psycho-bitch witch, but my mind hadn’t been dulled enough by the pain I couldn’t sense right off the bat that Perry and Ramirez were not at one with each other.

  Mack immediately got on the phone, I know, to call Ash (I knew this then and I know it now, because, as you will see, Ash showed).

  Perry immediately launched in at me.

  “There’s a twenty-foot hole in the seating area at Red Rock Amphitheater!” she yelled. “And Coldplay had to cancel their concert!” she kept yelling.

  What?

  How did I not know Coldplay was coming to town?

  She regrettably continued.

  “I just knew you’d make a huge-ass mess.”

  “Lizzie—” Ramirez murmured.

  “Ex-ka-youse me,” I snapped. “I didn’t make that mess.”

  Viv was now standing and facing off against Perry. “You need to back off.”

  “Someone has to answer for the carnage at Red Rock,” Perry declared.

  “How about you finally get off your asses and do something, that something being making Agatha Darling and Jeremy Bligh answer for it, since they perpetrated it?” Viv shot back.

  “Ladies—” Mack tried.

  “Step back, you aren’t even our people,” Perry hissed.

  I sucked in breath.

  Ramirez sucked in breath.

  Viv whipped out her wand.

  Mack lifted his hand toward Viv and kept his eyes locked to Perry.

  I had a view to his back, Agent Perry’s front, so I didn’t see what he was doing.

  But I saw what he was doing by the look on her face.

  She then muttered, “My apologies.”

  “Accepted,” Mack said sharply. “Now, it can’t be lost on you that you’re talking a load of garbage.”

  Perry didn’t answer because the door opened, and Ash walked in.

  No.

  Strike that.

  The door opened, Ash stalked in, and with him he brought his fury along for the ride and at one look at him it could not be mistaken he was two seconds away from opening a massive can of whoop ass.

  Reminder: he could wipe the floor with a pack of werewolves.

  Deduction: Agent Perry didn’t stand a chance.

  “Get out,” he rumbled.

  “Mr. Wilding—” Ramirez tried.

  “Get out!” he roared.

  Oh boy.

  Time to calm my man down.

  I was making moves to set aside my bowl of soup when Ash’s head twisted my way and he said, “Don’t you move.”

  “Okeydoke,” I whispered, settling back in and giving big eyes to Viv.

  Viv missed my big eyes due to her glaring at Agent Perry.

  “We started this wrong,” Ramirez was saying.

  “We did not,” Perry then said.

  “Lizzie—” Ramirez tried.

  “We’ve got the FBI breathing down our necks. Homeland Security. Even the CIA is sticking their noses into shit,” Perry said to Ramirez.

  “Lizzie, we don’t agree on—”

  Perry cut her off. “No, we don’t.”

  Ramirez was getting mad. “I think you made a grave error.”

  “I outrank you,” Perry fired back.

  “I’m beginning not to care,” Ramirez snapped.

  “What grave error did you make?” Mack asked.

  “Nothing,” Perry said quickly.

&nb
sp; “You talk or I fucking waterboard you until you talk,” Ash growled.

  (By the by, to this day, I still don’t know if he was serious about that and I’m afraid to ask.)

  Perry whipped out her wand.

  Viv whipped out her wand (again!).

  Ramirez whipped out her wand.

  I whipped out my wand and did a quick spell that whipped their wands out of their hands and brought them to me (not Viv’s, of course).

  “What the—?” Perry stated.

  “Talk,” I demanded.

  “This is an Agency matter,” she denied. “Now give me back my wand.”

  “Fucking talk!” I shouted.

  “Some time ago, approximately nine months, we had a break in at Area 666,” Ramirez shared.

  “Anita!” Perry bit out.

  “Area 666?” I asked.

  “You’ve seen Raiders of the Lost Ark?” Ash asked me, sounding more unhappy than he’d been sounding, which made me seriously unhappy.

  Oh shit.

  “Yes,” I answered him.

  “Well, that warehouse exists. In the New Mexico desert. But there’s a good deal more dangerous things in there than the Ark of the Covenant.”

  “Though the Ark of the Covenant is also there,” Ramirez muttered.

  Holy Holy Relics, Batman!

  “Anita!” Perry snapped.

  “What?” I shouted.

  “What was taken?” Ash demanded.

  “This really is an Agency—” Perry tried.

  “What…was…” Ash leaned scarily toward Perry, “taken?”

  “Elspet’s Athame. Three vials of blood of the Gorgon. A Pegasus feather. The remains of Cleopatra’s familiar. And the Book of Shadows of Sorcha Mac Gearailt,” Ramirez shared.

  I’d heard of none of that.

  “You are bloody joking,” Ash whispered sinisterly.

  Ash had heard of all of it and wasn’t a big fan it was no longer under the lock and key of the United States Government.

  Eep!

  “We’ve been working around the clock to recover these items,” Perry put in.

  “Was it Darling and Bligh?” Ash asked.

  “It was a well-executed break in. We have no—”

  “Do you suspect it was Darling and Bligh?” Ash gritted.

  “Yes, those are our prime suspects,” Perry blew out on an irritated sigh.

  “And you didn’t share this earlier,” Ash went on.

  “It’s an Agency matter,” Perry retorted.

  “It’s a goddamn bloody disaster,” Ash returned. “And the prophesied Chosen One should have known about it nine months ago.”

  “Told you,” Ramirez mumbled.

  Perry gave her a killing look.

  “Uh, at this juncture, can someone tell me how freaked I need to be that all that is in the hands of Darling and Bligh?” I requested.

  Perry pointed at me. “See? She doesn’t even know what it is.”

  “Do not point your finger at my fiancée,” Ash growled.

  Perry dropped her finger.

  “Hey. You’re engaged. Congrats,” Ramirez said to me.

  See?

  Knew I liked her.

  I shot her a smile.

  “And you can’t stand there and tell me you knew what it was until it went missing,” he continued ranting at Perry.

  Perry shifted on her feet.

  She didn’t know either.

  Huh.

  “It’s so secret, most of Le Société doesn’t even know what it is,” Ash went on.

  “Well, it’s missing, and we can assure you, we’re doing everything in our power to recover it,” Ramirez tried to calm the situation.

  “You will note my absence of relief considering they at least used the Gorgon blood to murder nineteen people five days ago,” Ash replied.

  “I’m reporting you the moment we get back to the offices,” Perry threatened Ramirez.

  “Lizzie, seriously?” Ramirez asked. “Okay, it’s embarrassing to the Agency those things were taken under our watch after we made such a big stink that we had the best security to hold them. And I know you live and breathe the Agency. But nineteen beings are dead, eight of them witches.”

  “You shared FWA intelligence with those who don’t have the clearance.”

  Ramirez had clearly had enough.

  “Right then. I’m resigning the moment we get back to the offices,” she declared.

  “You are aware that if this gets out—” Perry started.

  “It’s out and should have been out nine months ago,” Ash cut in. “Now you face the consequences for doing something so spectacularly stupid.”

  Perry glared at him like she was losing respect for him.

  Ash couldn’t care less, and I knew this before he said his next words.

  “Get out,” Ash finished.

  “Mr. Wilding, there’s still the matter—” Perry kept at it.

  Yeesh.

  What was up with this woman?

  “I can pull rank too,” Ash said quietly. “And in doing it, I can assure you that there are a variety of factions as per protocol who should have had this information and they did not and someone is going to answer for that.”

  Oo.

  What did that mean?

  It meant something, because Perry got pale and then she marched her butt out the door, not even asking for her wand before she took off.

  “You have my apologies,” Ramirez said.

  “You do know at this juncture they’re not worth shit,” Ash retorted.

  Ramirez, looking crushed (and I felt bad for her because I suspected she’d been trying to do her best in the face of stubborn bureaucracy, and even when she was right, it was her who was going to be unemployed), also exited the cottage.

  Though I gave her back her wand before she did.

  I’d courier Perry’s to the FWA offices.

  Maybe.

  “That was a little harsh, honey,” I murmured when the door closed on Ramirez.

  “Were you writhing in pain not forty-eight hours ago?” Ash asked irately.

  I decided not to say anymore.

  Ash pulled out his phone.

  I looked to my sister. “Do you know what all that stuff is?”

  Viv didn’t answer.

  Ash lost interest in his phone and shared.

  “Elspet’s Athame. The knife used to mix the potion that Morgan Le Fay concocted and consumed to glamour herself in order to seduce her half-brother and produce Mordred, who in turn killed his father/uncle King Arthur and assumed his rule. Elspet was a powerful dark witch who was trained in The Craft by Merlin himself, and this power was instilled in Mordred through his mother taking that potion.”

  Great.

  Ash kept going.

  “Gorgons are she-beasts with snakes for hair and the ability to turn men to stone with one look at them. They’re immortal, have since gone to another plane, and their blood is powerful, undetectable and highly combustible.”

  Brilliant.

  Ash wasn’t done.

  “A single Pegasus feather, if a witch can craft a spell to harness it, which fortunately, none have since time began, holds more power than every witch currently existing. The only thing more powerful than a Pegasus feather is the horn of a unicorn.”

  Fantastic.

  And more from Ash.

  “Cleopatra’s familiar is the first witch familiar and it is lore that every cat familiar since is of her blood.”

  Hmm.

  So Daphne was kind of royalty.

  No wonder she demanded so much respect.

  “Last, Sorcha Mac Gearailt was the witch who created the first Dark Lord at around 13 BC and his existence brought down the supremacy of the Celts who had until that time dominated Europe for over seven hundred years.”

  Fabulous.

  “In other words, we’re fucked,” I deduced.

  “Yes, sweetheart. In other words, if we don’t get those things back, we’re fucked,” Ash
agreed.

  Shit.

  We didn’t have any further trouble from the FWA, mostly because Ash didn’t keep it a secret that powerful relics had been stolen.

  In fact, I lost him for two whole days as he got on his phone or laptop for conference calls and spoke (angrily) in so many languages, it was insane.

  Now the FWA were busy doing damage control when the FBI, CIA, Homeland Security, BWC, MI5, MI6, KGB, Mossad (etc.) landed a truckload of shit on them.

  So that was good.

  I guess.

  More good (and not the dubious kind) was that Cystien called back Sar and Trae so they could be on hand should they be needed (and it was pretty clear they’d be needed).

  Cystien then took off, probably to the Realm, but he didn’t share his destination with me.

  I suspected he did share this with Ash, but I didn’t ask.

  If my man wanted me to know, he’d tell me.

  And anyway, Cystien taking off meant I didn’t have to share I semi-kinda gave Bligh Fae magic by deflecting Scary Faerie’s spell.

  This wasn’t just good because Sar and Trae were there, humongous, muscled, immortal and magical.

  It was good because Cystien took off, and when he did, BecBec returned.

  What was better was that, when BecBec returned, Sar and Trae started acting funny.

  Obviously, this was goss I needed, so after joyously welcoming her home, I took her aside and asked what gives.

  “They found me some time ago,” she shared.

  “Really?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she confirmed. “And I have lain with them both, individually.”

  “Really?” I repeated.

  “And together.”

  “Really?” I breathed.

  Whoa!

  “Indeed,” she said. “They enjoyed the experience. Greatly.”

  “You go, girl.”

  “They want more.”

  “You go, girl.”

  “I have been denying them. It is not making them happy.”

  She grinned.

  I high-fived her.

  “Did they, uh…cross swords?” I asked.

  She looked perplexed. “I don’t know this vernacular.”

  “You know…” I waggled my brows. “Swords.”