Pirate's Alley (26 page)

One dress after another, I pulled out and rejected. One looked like Jerry Garcia’s grandmother should be wearing it to a costume party. Another was so sheer and low cut, I wouldn’t be caught hibernating in it—although it might create a diversion at the council meeting. Another would out-bling Her Royal Highness Sabine, which she’d probably resent. The only dog I had available to sic on her, Alex, would likely not be speaking to me after this morning.

I finally settled on an ankle-length dress with a burgundy and gold print skirt below an empire waist of gold brocade. The bodice of black velvet was trimmed at the neck and cuffs with burgundy lace. Vervain had been an inch or two shorter than me, so with my sturdy black slouch boots with the silver buckles and a flash of bare leg showing between the boots and the dress, I looked like I should be taking the stage at an Alien Sex Fiend concert. I needed more black eyeliner to complete my undead goth look. At least I’d managed to shave my legs in recent memory.

Oh well, it was far short of my new standard for humiliation—hibernating on Royal Street in broad daylight—so I’d make the best of it.

I locked the door behind me when I went back into the hallway. I stuck my head in the sitting room, but didn’t see Rand, so I knocked at the door to his bedroom. A muffled “c’mon in” sounded from inside.

This room, I’d never visited, and I had to admit I was curious. Rand was in the bathroom, so I took an opportunity to snoop.

The bedroom of the T
â
n clan chief was surprisingly normal, without a stitch of tie-dye in sight. A four-poster king-size bed with heavy posts of what looked like birch matched a heavy chest of drawers. There were lots and lots of textiles—hanging on the walls, layered on the floors, and covering the furniture, all in pale, pale tones of blue and white with an occasional dash of copper or gold. Russian snow prince colors, same as those Rand wore.

The only things of real interest hung from the ceiling near the head of the bed and adjacent wall.

Over the bed dangled something that looked like an ornate dream catcher, only instead of leather or rope, it was woven of copper wire, and the feathers hanging from it were encrusted with blue gemstones. In the center of the dream catcher circle, an orange stone was suspended. It appeared to have a live flame flickering inside it.

On the wall beside the bed hung a large shield of tooled leather. It looked ancient. The background was the same rich blue as the dream catcher gemstones, but layered on top of it, in worn leather, was a dragon the size of a breadbox, his wings outstretched, an orange leather flame erupting from his open mouth. Tiny white claws of carved bone, or so it appeared, stretched from his fore and hind feet.

“That’s my clan’s ceremonial shield.” Rand’s voice came from behind me, and I jumped, startled. When I turned, he took in my outfit and laughed. “I can’t wait to see the reaction you’ll get from your shifter, but I like it. Funky suits you.”

I suspected funky didn’t suit me at all, but I was stuck with it for now. “What’s the significance of the dragon?” I asked, turning back to the shield.

“It’s our symbol, I guess you’d call it. There aren’t as many dragons in Elfheim as there used to be, but those that still live in the hills answer to the T
â
n.”

I turned to stare at him. “You mean there are dragons? Real dragons?” Why didn’t I know there were dragons?

“Of course.” He said it as if I were an idiot for asking.

I pointed to the suspended copper structure. “What about the dream catcher? The fire in the stone looks alive.”

“It is.” He touched a finger to one of the jeweled feathers, and the fire inside the center stone leapt outside the confines of its metal setting. “It strengthens my dreamwalking skills as I sleep. It was my mother’s. The dream catcher and the shield are the only things of my parents I brought here.”

There was so much about the elves I didn’t know or understand. Before he’d become besotted by Terri the vampire and let himself be manipulated into getting fangs, courtesy of his own father, Adrian Hoffman had been giving me lessons in elven history. I wished I’d taken them more seriously.

Speaking of which. “Have you heard anything about Adrian?” As annoying as I found the man, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. He’d betrayed me, but he’d been played big-time by his father and Garrett Melnick. And now he was forced to hide out with them or be arrested by the Elders for whom he once worked.

“No, and I can’t believe you’d care.” Rand gave a dismissive wave. “Good riddance. Hope he enjoys life as a vampire.”

Now there was the Rand I knew and despised.

“Do you have a transport that goes somewhere besides Elfheim, or do I need to make one?”

He leaned against the bedroom door. “Could you redo the transport in the greenhouse so it can go anywhere? It still goes only to Elfheim.”

“I think so. Is that the one you call Rivendell?”

He smiled. “It is.”

“Okay, let’s check it out.” If he’d transported into it from Eugenie’s, he should be able to transport out with a quick reset.

We went down the narrow stairwell that opened into the front part of the Plantasy Island retail area. The cash register sat on a wooden counter, and every inch of wall space sported some type of outdoor doodad: garden gnomes in colorful outfits, flags, faux-classical statuary, ceramic birdbaths. “Don’t you get tired of all this cuteness?”

“Yeah, but humans love it.” Rand straightened a couple of oversize verdigris-painted metal frogs. “And when people come in to buy this junk, it gives me a chance to talk to them about plants and how to take care of them.”

We walked through the wide door behind the counter, and the chill of the greenhouse went straight through my hippie dress. I’d been carrying my lambskin jacket, but pulled it on. Who the hell cared if it matched? It still beat the orange and purple nightmare I’d been wearing.

Rand fingered the soft leather. “You should’ve gone with imitation. It’s more environmentally responsible and nothing had to die to make it.”

Nice way to make me feel like a selfish lamb-murderess. “You do remember your promise to be considerate and sensitive to people’s feelings today, right?”

“Of course.”

Good grief. Things could go south so very easily.

“Is the transport still in the gazebo?” I eyed the confection of white-painted gingerbread trim with wariness. Rand had kidnapped me in this freaking transport, after which his Synod—including his mother—had inflicted mental torture on me I could only liken to rape. It had been physical and visceral and painful. Rand hadn’t known that was going to happen, but I still blamed him for taking me against my will. And I’d never, ever forgive Mace Banyan, who engineered it.

“I’m sorry.” Rand touched the delicate bloom of an orchid. “About the part I played in what happened to you.”

“It’s done.” I knelt and touched a hand to the transport etched lightly into the floor of the gazebo. The magic still tingled but had weakened. “Could you bring my bag from the front counter?”

Once Rand retrieved the bag, I took out my portable potions kit and blended a bit of anise and clove in a solution of holy water, injecting just enough of my native physical magic to activate it. I spread it over the existing transport, waited a few moments, then touched my hand to the transport again. All traces of its magic had disappeared. Convenient thing, that deactivation potion.

Next, I recoated the transport symbols with iron shavings, touched the corners with dots of mercury, and used Charlie to inject a bigger dose of magic into the redrawn transport.

“This one should last awhile and take you to any other transport, as long as it’s open.” I looked up at him. “I deactivated the one at Eugenie’s house so don’t get any bright ideas.”

He quirked up the edge of his mouth in an approximation of a smile, but didn’t say anything. I’d have felt better with an
Of course I won’t try to see the woman who’s carrying my child, Dru,
but I probably wouldn’t have believed him anyway.

I checked my cell phone. “Council meeting starts in half an hour. You ready to give the greatest elven performance of the ages?”

“I will dazzle them all with my earnest and heartfelt words,” he said. “Although I still think it would be easier and faster to just kill Zrakovi.”

It was going to be a long, long day.

CHAPTER
22

Within seconds, Rand and I arrived at the third floor attic space of F. Edward Hebert Hall, located near the front side of the Tulane University campus. Home to the history department, the late nineteenth-century yellow-brick building smelled of books, polished wood, and rarefied academic types.

I hadn’t been here since my undergraduate days, when I’d dragged myself across the quad with my fellow chemistry majors, all unsuspecting humans, to do our prerequisite time in humanities hell. I’d developed an interest in history I hadn’t expected, especially Louisiana history.

The transport had been drawn in a heavy chalk line outside an elevator that looked odd. I had to study it a moment to realize it had no up or down buttons. The handiwork of the Blue Congress team, I was sure. No prowling PhDs would be wandering up to the third floor of Hebert Hall today.

“Well, isn’t this interesting?” The soft Mississippi drawl of Jake Warin came from behind me as soon as we arrived in the attic hallway, where he leaned against the wall in a discreet alcove just made for a security lookout. “You’re keeping strange company these days, sunshine.”

I glanced at Rand, who shrugged and walked down the hall without a word.

“It’s a long story,” I told Jake.

“Anything I need to be concerned about? Or should I say, is it anything my boss should be concerned about? And that’s a pretty cool outfit, by the way. It suits you.”

“Right.” He didn’t sound sarcastic, so maybe my inner goth girl had some appeal. What I found more interesting was that he didn’t ask if my appearance with Rand was anything his cousin Alex should be concerned about. He did jobs for Alex on behalf of the Elders, but his real boss was Jean Lafitte.

“Nope. Jean only needs to be concerned with Truman Capote today.” Because I had no doubt Alex had gotten the undead author subpoenaed last night before I’d been gone five minutes. My role here today was to testify about Jean’s role in the fire, which meant I had to admit to publicly hibernating and then finding him in the bar. Nothing said “competent sentinel” like admitting you’d hibernated through a preternatural crime. “Is the star witness here yet?”

He shook his head. “No, and that is going to be one interesting testimony. If it goes bad, you better duck. I’ll be helping our friend shoot his way out.” His voice was soft.

Jake had no problem with clarity. His loyalty went to Jean, and never mind that Alex was his cousin or that the Elders had paid for his rehab and training after the loup-garou attack. In a lot of ways, Jean had saved Jake and given his life back to him.

“I met Collette,” I said. “I really like her, and she’s, like, seriously gorgeous.”

He grinned, and those dimples made me smile in return. “That she is.” He paused. “No hard feelings with us?”

“Nada.” Finally, Jake and I could be friends, roles for which we were better suited.

After wishing him luck with the boss and hoping no shots would be fired this morning, I wandered around the hallway that formed a U shape before opening onto a large meeting space. It couldn’t be more different than the courthouse room patterned after the Supreme Court. This one appeared to have been patterned after early industrial warehouse.

The overhead ductwork was exposed and wrapped in foil-covered insulation, which matched the room dividers of corrugated aluminum. Long tables were arranged in a square, and the name placards looked as if they’d been hastily scratched out on cardstock using a black Sharpie on the verge of running out of ink.

Every seat had a placard and a microphone, so I wandered around looking for my name. I’d been placed between “Florian, Faery Prince of Summer” and “Special Guest Truman Capote.”

Awesome. Talk about an odd couple.

I spotted Alex directly across the room, talking to Zrakovi. Make that listening to Zrakovi. Even they were less formal than before. Alex wore a simple black sweater and pants, and Zrakovi a dark gray suit and striped tie. No robes or fake glasses today.

Jean arrived with Jake trailing a few steps behind. Ostensibly, he was working security for the Elders, but Jake took a place along the wall behind Jean’s seat. The pirate scanned the room, paused long enough to give me a small nod, and turned his gaze to Christof, who’d taken the seat on the other side of the one reserved for Florian. They exchanged a long look.

What were those two hatching? I knew Jean well enough that shooting his way out of the meeting would be a last resort; it would close off too many of his options. He’d scheme his way out first, and I’d wager the cost of my blue sacrificial-lamb coat that he and Christof had their own plans A, B, and C.

“Oh good, I asked to sit by the prettiest wizard in the room.”

I was glad I’d learned about the whole faery appearance-changing skill, or I wouldn’t have recognized the black-leather-clad, rooster-haired punk rocker who slid into the seat next to me. “Thank you, Prince Florian, but I am the only female wizard in the room and the only wizard of any gender in the room under sixty.”

He laughed, a grating, tinkling timbre that reminded me of his husky-voiced aunt Sabine. It made my skin crawl. I met the gaze of his brother, who was back in the short dark hair of the first council meeting. He nodded a greeting, and I wondered if this were his real face and hair. How would one ever know?

Faeries were creepy.

Alex left the room abruptly, and I tracked his progress down the hall until my attention was diverted by a pair of blue-gray eyes boring holes in me from the seat next to the one marked for Zrakovi. I squinted to read the print on his name placard, and my heart sped up. Holy crap. With all the drama, I’d forgotten Lennox St. Simon would be here.

We rose from our seats at the same time and kept our eyes on each other as we walked toward the center of the room, inside the square of tables.