Darkness Divides (Sensor #3) (20 page)

Chapter Twenty-one

Nienna was sitting on the floor meditating when I came out of my room. She showed no signs of hearing me as I closed the door behind me. It was already early afternoon, but no one had woke me up. I was thankful for that.

Between the attack last night and the long hours afterward spent explaining myself, I’d needed the rest to recuperate. I certainly felt stronger today. Even the dull ache in my chest that had lingered for hours afterward had finally gone away.

I took the comb I’d carried from my room and worked on untangling my wet hair. Then I put it into a simple braid while watching Nienna continue to meditate. She had her eyes closed and legs crossed as she breathed evenly. If I’d gotten up a little earlier, I probably would have caught Elros doing the same thing. It was a ritual both of them did every day after waking up. My senses told me he’d already left and was moving about the palace at the moment.

After going to my room to put the comb away, I returned to find Nienna had finished her devotional—or whatever she called it. The expression on her face was serious as she stood waiting for me. After my big revelation last night, her attitude had changed and I worried what that meant.

“The elders wish to speak with you. We will meet with them after Elros returns,” she announced.

“That sounds serious,” I said, taking a seat.

She nodded. “It is.”

Before I could ask anything further, she went to her room and shut the door behind her. A few minutes later Elros returned with a basket of bread and samples of cheeses and jams. He set it all on the side table—never once meeting my eyes—and went to his room. Geez, you’d think immortality was a crime.

Despite my nerves, I was still hungry. I grabbed a couple of rolls, topped one with cheese and the other with jam, and set to eating them. Both druids came out of their rooms by the time I finished. Nienna quickly ate one roll and then indicated we should go.

They led me toward the above-ground portion of the palace to the second floor in the front tower. Several fae—so old they actually showed signs of age—waited for me. They sat in carved wood chairs behind a massive mahogany table. A fireplace roared off to the right side of them. The druids stopped me just before I would have stepped onto a finely woven rug. It had a depiction of little fairies flying on it.

Among the fae who stared at me with blank expressions, I saw a female elf, a male fairy, and an unnaturally old male pixie. There was probably a story behind that guy because pixies generally didn’t live any longer than humans, but this one was about five hundred years old. Magic of some kind must have helped him. If Derrick could pull off living unusually long, why couldn’t a pixie?

“Melena Sanders, I am Ireth, leader of The Elders Council. We will dispense with any other pleasantries and move straight to the matter at hand,” the female elf announced. “I simply ask that you answer our questions with complete honesty.”

I clasped my hands behind me. “Of course.”

“We understand you are immortal now. As in, you cannot die from a natural death, correct?” she asked.

“Yes.” Though I could have done without considering the means of death part.

She glanced at her fellow elders before continuing. “You also maintain all of your abilities as a sensor?”

“I do.”

The air in the room got thicker. Usually when a sensor changed into a different race—such as werewolves or vampires—they lost their abilities.

“What are your weaknesses?”

I thought about it for a moment. “Well, I’m not that great at math. I’m usually cranky when I wake up if I don’t get coffee.” Such as now. “And, uh, I can’t seem to cook anything people will willingly eat.”

Elros made some sort of choking noise, but I didn’t dare turn my head around to look at him.

The female elf blinked at me. “While I won’t dispute these being…character flaws of a sort, that is not what I meant. Most immortals can die in some fashion. How is it that you can be killed?”

Did I have stupid written on my forehead? “Apparently, stabbing my heart won’t do the trick. I’ll have to get back to you on any other methods after I’ve had a chance to test them out.”

Which would happen…never.

The male pixie narrowed his eyes at me. “Do you think our questions are a joke?”

“Should I answer that honestly?” I asked. “Because let’s think about this for a minute. My race has been hunted to near extinction over the centuries and that hasn’t changed. I’m not saying there aren’t sensors who deserve to be killed—I’ve got several on my own hit list, including my father. But if you think I’m going to give away any weakness that could allow you to hurt me, you’re crazy. I came here in good faith to help this city and that’s all I’ve done since I’ve arrived. You can’t dispute that.”

“Perhaps,” the pixie conceded. Then he looked at Ireth.

The female elf cleared her throat. “We agree that you have proven yourself useful and we are indeed grateful for your assistance. Our concern is not limited to your few apparent weaknesses, but that you’ve also gained favor with the archangels. How do we know you won’t call upon one of them in a moment of pique and have them destroy our city?”

“For one thing,” I said, trying to imagine asking Remiel to do that, “the only archangel I’ve ever met doesn’t like me very much and I can’t stand him. For another, I have no way of calling him. He shows up at his own discretion.”

All of the elders swung their gazes around the room as if an archangel might pop out at any moment. As if they could do anything about it if one did.

“Don’t worry,” I said, trying hard not to smile. “He won’t be coming around any time soon. He knows I’ll just start arguing with him to free Lucas or, at the very least shoot him if I had my gun.”

She gave me an incredulous look. “You’re serious.”

“Absolutely.”

The male fairy leaned forward. “You’re certain he won’t be showing up any time soon?”

“Honestly, he has no reason to come here.”

The elders whispered amongst themselves, glancing at me occasionally with concerned looks.

“Very well,” the female elf said after they finished. “We would ask that you continue your questioning of the city residents.”

“I’m still waiting to find out if anything was missing from the vault so I can know where to take my investigation next.”

All the elders stiffened and the mood in the room turned dark.

Ireth looked like she had to gather her thoughts before replying. “There was a very important relic taken from the vault. Something that if put to use could bring about the permanent destruction of this city. Due to the sensitivity of this item, we cannot tell you what it is, but do recognize that we desperately need to get it back.”

I nodded. It wasn’t much to go on, but it was more than I’d had before. “You’ll need to make a list of anyone who knew about that item being in the vault or had access to enter the vault. Those would be my top suspects.”

“Consider it done. You can expect the first few of them to arrive at your interview room within the hour.”

Nienna and Elros guided me out of the room. The male druid clucked his tongue at me as we walked down the stairs. “Most people wouldn’t have had the guts to talk to the elders like that.”

I snorted. “They’re the ones who asked me to be honest.”

“If it’s any consolation, I think they actually liked you,” Nienna said.

“Why would you think that?” I asked.

“Well for one, they didn’t try testing out which methods might kill you. For two, they let you continue the investigation. There were no lightning strikes either, which is always a good sign.”

We reached the last step and headed in the direction of the kitchen. I hoped that meant we were getting coffee before kicking things off.

“Lightning strikes?” I gave Nienna a quizzical look.

“Ireth is one of the few in the city who can control weather. She prefers to punish those who annoy her by zapping them with lightning strikes.”

“She’d have to use magic and that wouldn’t work on me,” I pointed out.

Nienna opened the kitchen door for us before answering. “True, but she has other methods of punishment that don’t require magic.”

“Like what?”

“Removing that person’s favorite food or drink from the kitchen menu would be one example,” she said, moving toward the refreshment area.

The kitchen was the largest one I’d ever seen and had a sort of country feel to it. There were high wooden tables for food preparation and long bench tables for casual dining, which the druids and I often used. It didn’t have electricity, but something powered the modern machinery in it, including coolers for food storage. I could sense the magical vibrations in the air and they were unlike anything I’d felt before.

Not many people were in here at this time of day. Other than a handful of kitchen workers—two of which were human—there wasn’t anyone around. None of them paid any attention to us.

“Yep, she likes you.” Nienna pointed at the coffee maker. “It’s still here. She could have contacted the staff and had it removed before we even arrived otherwise.”

“She wouldn’t.” I gasped.

Elros shrugged. “You’re the one who named your weaknesses.”

Chapter Twenty-two

I slammed the one-hundred-year-old elf against the wall. “Where were you when the explosion went off? It’s a simple question.”

“My, my, the immortal sensor has more strength than I expected.” He chuckled in spite of my grip around his throat.

Word had spread fast about me since the stabbing incident. We weren’t sure who leaked the details, but it was too late to do anything about it now. Several days had passed and we still had no clues about who’d taken the relic or precipitated the attack on me.

I squeezed harder. “Where?”

Ever since I’d started interviewing the fae who had access to the vault, I’d had more trouble than ever getting the subjects to talk. None of them wanted to cooperate. Not necessarily because they were guilty, but because they enjoyed testing me. Those on our newest list were the more powerful fae and they seemed to appreciate a good test of wills.

When the elf started choking, I eased off. He gulped in air before speaking.

“If you must know, I was having a ménage with my human slaves. Mortals are such weak, pathetic things…” he stopped to grin, “it takes several of them to please me, but I keep them screaming the whole night through.”

The elf was speaking the truth, except he didn’t mention why they were screaming—perhaps in horror? Who knew what he’d done to them? I reached down and grabbed his balls through his pants. “I don’t know. I doubt you could have pleased me when I was a mortal.”

He smirked. “You must be getting desperate with your nephilim and his twin brother missing, but I might be willing to help with your little problem if you beg me properly.”

The idiot just had to bring Lucas into this. As if I needed a painful reminder of him right now.

I squeezed the elf’s balls. “Not on your best day.”

“Suit yourself,” he gritted out.

I let him go and backed up a step. “Did you take anything from the vault on the day of the explosion or not?”

“Get on your knees and ask me nicely.” He shrugged. “Perhaps I’ll tell you.”

That was it. I’d had enough of his crap. I gave Nienna a look that said to follow my lead.

“You’ve got two things going against you today.” I paced in front of the elf. “One is that I didn’t get my morning coffee. That alone should strike fear in your heart, but the second is even worse. My period just started. It doesn’t come often, but when it does I become a raging bitch.”

I stopped in front of the elf and got up in his face. “Now answer my fucking questions before I’m forced to resort to extreme measures.”

“You don’t scare me,” he said, looking down his nose.

“Very well.” I glanced at Nienna. “Grab him and force his mouth open.”

She moved toward him with no hesitation. We’d begun to work well together as a team.

The elf glanced between us, looking worried. “Why would you need her to do that?”

I started to unzip my cargo pants. “Well, since you refuse to talk then perhaps you need a little incentive. I’m just going to take my bloody tampon out and shove it down your throat. It’ll serve two purposes. For one, it will be really gross. Two, it will prevent you from practicing magic for the next week since sensor menstrual blood is the most potent of all.”

That last part might have been stretching the truth, but he didn’t know that and it never hurt to spread nasty rumors that might work in my favor.

“No.” He put his hands up and backed away. “You can’t be serious!”

“Oh, I am,” I said, shoving my pants down to my knees and reaching for my underwear next.

Nienna had him backed into the corner by this point, but he could see where my hand was heading.

“Okay, okay, I’ll talk.” Panic was written all over his face. “Please, just don’t do it.”

Relief swamped me. It might have been a funny story to tell later, but I hadn’t really wanted to carry out that threat. I pulled my pants back up and zipped them closed.

“Good. Now answer this. Did you take anything out of the vault on the day of the explosion?”

“No.” He shook his head vehemently. “And I don’t know anyone else who might have either.”

“Do you know of anyone who would have a reason to take something from the vault?”

He straightened his shirt. “A lot of people would love to control some of the items inside it, but I know of none who would attempt to steal anything.”

“And neither you nor anyone you know of was involved in the attack on the city?”

“Absolutely not.” He spoke the truth.

“He can go.” I told Nienna. “Other than being an asshole, he’s not guilty of anything.”