“Here’s the deal,” she told Lenorae.“First of all, I did not accept that platinum coin in payment for anything.”She patted the pocket of her pants where she’d safely stowed it.“You gave it to me freely.”
“I did not…” Lenorae’s face reddened further—most reminiscent of her demonic coloring—as she trailed off.
“A mistake, perhaps, but done,” Cha offered with a shrug, but doing a secret, internal dance of joy at outbargaining the fae.“Now, my partner and I are willing to answer this call frommyfriend, but our talent is riding the ley lines.He knows that.So, if my friend indeed sent you to find me and added this coin by way of proof of who sent you, then he expects us to ride the leys to get there.You just need to give us directions.”
“Humans can’t ride the leys into Citrine,” she spat.
Cha’s hopes, meager and not terribly buoyant to begin with, sank like unpopped lead bubbles, Dy made a quiet groaning sound.
“Aren’t there ley lines in Citrine?”Cha asked, trying for innocence.“Must be a barbaric place.”
Lenorae glared at her.“Naturally there are, but humans can’t survive a Citrine ley line.”
“Well, duh,” Cha drawled.“Why do you think we invest in these expensive fae-designed animal carriages to ride them?And we’ve coasted yellow pixie dust plenty of times.”
Lenorae had leveled a confused look on Katu, as if she’d never seen an animal carriage before, which Cha knew she had, Katu in particular, as she’d given Azul a ride to the human lands mansion where he’d met up with his former bride to do fae-knows what.Get abducted into Citrine, apparently.
“Pixies have nothing to do with ley lines,” Lenorae informed them with testy loftiness.
“They don’t?”Cha widened her eyes in incredulity.“I thought ley lines were made of ground-up pixies.”
Dy snorted at her sarcasm.Just because humans called the magic substance “pixie dust” didn’t mean anyone actually believed it had to do with pixies, but the same thing that rendered the fae unable to lie gave them a certain literalness and made them dense to humor and metaphor.Azul had been much the same, at least at first.After a while, however, as he’d thawed and revealed more of the person beneath the icy, regal façade, he’d demonstrated surprising wit and sensitivity.
In fact, he’d seemed so plausibly human even at the beginning that Cha only briefly doubted his cover story.Yes, he’d used glamour to disguise the fact that he was fully fae as opposed to being a noble human with fae blood cosplaying to look more exotic—a common practice among an elite set of humans.But most fae, with Lenorae being a prime example, simply couldn’t fake humanity.Azul could and had.
Which made her wonder if he had lied when he said she meant nothing to him.
Wishful thinking,she chided herself.That the fae can’t lie is established fact.You’re just listening to the pussy sparkle and your stupid heart which you should never have lost to him in the first place.
“We’ll worry about safely traveling the ley lines,” Dy was telling Lenorae, admirably keeping on topic.“Your job is to tell us what we need to know.Where are we going and why?”
Lenorae fumed, but didn’t flounce as Cha had half expected her to do.She’d been braced for the fae demon to tell them to fuck off and leave Azul to whatever dire predicament consumed him.She seemed invested, however, in Azul’s wellbeing and rescue—if that’s what this mission was—if only because her own agenda rested on wedding him.Politically tricky,Azul had called the situation.Boy howdy, as it turned out the Obsidian pixie dust she and Dy had smuggled out of Moonstone had been fully interlaced with agnicurna, an explosive substance that could be used to circumvent fae magic and serve as a devastating weapon in the wars between the fae realms.
Considering it had been one of those ancient wars that shattered the barriers between the fae realms and the human ones, any kind of leveling up in the hostilities between the fae royal families boded no good for humans.
Worst of all, the agnicurna contamination ruined the black pixie dust, rendering it useless—and worthless.Instead of a huge payday, Dy and Cha had returned broke, without even Phinny’s chest of bribery jewels, and—in Cha’s case—a little broken-hearted.But they’d escaped with their lives, which had been a narrow thing.Phinny wasn’t wrong that they were crazy to consider going back.
“The Citrine palace,” Lenorae finally bit out.“My fiancé is trapped and requires your assistance in extracting him.”
“Ruby outranks Citrine,” Dy pointed out, after exchanging a confused look with Cha.“So does Amethyst, for that matter.Why don’tyou‘extract’ your fiancé?Or why doesn’t his family bring leverage at this point?”
“We have our reasons,” Lenorae answered stiffly.And said nothing more.
“Yeah, I’ll bet you do,” Cha drawled.“Anything actually helpful you can tell us?”
Lenorae smiled, and it wasn’t a pleasant look at all.“I suggest you bring bribes.Big ones.”
She sashayed away, seeming to glide just above the lavender-tipped grass, though that was no doubt the glamour.Disappearing into her golden bubble, she rose into the air and was gone.
~3~
Kitchen Table Conversations
Phinny brandished awooden spoon a finger-length away from Cha’s nose.“This,” she hissed, “is why I didn’t want to let you back into our lives.”
“Phin,” Dy said placatingly.
“Not another word from you,” Phin said to her wife without looking her direction.She drilled into Cha’s gaze with her furious one.“You are like a natural disaster, Arantxa Evermore.You bring destruction with you.I’ve never known another human who could bring so much trouble.”