Exile: Sídhí Summer Camp #3 (7 page)

"Yeah, it was great until the dragons stuck
their nose into our business," Brianna said irritably.

Hiding a calculating smile, she decided to
take a page out of Mitch’s book. With luck, and a little extra
prodding, the girl might be temperamental enough to attack. For
better or worse, defending against an attack remained the age-old
way to gauge the strength of a Sídhí.

“Until I learn your strengths, I'll ask
questions. Only idiots make assumptions.” Sarah smiled, a slight
tilting of her lips revealing the mockery her words implied. “You
know, the whole ass-u-me scenario, but then again, being stuck in a
restricted valley must have been mentally damaging for such a small
society. I imagine the inbreeding after several thousand years has
had a major impact on IQ and mental stability.”

Brianna hissed at the implied insult, but she
didn't snap back. Her light blue eyes flashed with tiny sparks of
silver. The effect lasted less than a split-second.

Keeping her face immobile as Brianna's
heritage flashed in the girl's eyes proved almost impossible.

The dragon's peace camp was turning out to be
educational to say the least. Who would've guessed the girl was a
phoenix?

“I can just imagine all the wolf shifters
running around with khatt tails or vise-versa for that matter,”
Sarah said, covering her slight pause as she absorbed the new turn
of events. She wondered if Mac knew Haven Valley had a secret, a
really big secret.

She didn't think so. Mac, and his people, was
fanatically loyal to her, more so than the pureblood elves within
Trellick Valley that accepted her as Chi'Kehra.

No, if Mac had known Haven Valley had a group
of phoenix, powerful winged fairy, in their midst, he would have
told her.

The girl needed careful handling, very
careful indeed. Talk about a ticking time bomb. Thankfully, some
races didn't gain all of their Sídhí abilities (or power) during
puberty. Phoenix fell into that category.

Brianna's background was certainly something
to look into, but not at the moment.

“Very funny,” Brianna said, baring her human
teeth in a soundless snarl.

“It seemed like a very real possibility. So,
while you’re in human form, can you follow a scent or not?” Sarah
asked again, maintaining the girl's guise of being a
shapeshifter.

Brianna turned toward another sealed tube.
“What I can or can’t do isn’t in question. Since you’re the one who
caught Clarisse's scent, you find her.”

Sarah gave the girl points for keeping her
temper.

“Then let's finish and get out of here.”
Sarah glanced at the discarded blue furble branches wrapped in
mint. The teens had been creative when making weapons to use
against the mites. “I guess you and Beth came back just in
time.”

“Yeah, you could say that,” Brianna said. Her
face twisted in a scowl of distaste.

Sarah motioned to the silly looking weapons
the teens made. “All that mint came in handy.”

“Yeah, mites don't like it. It burns them,”
Brianna said, a sharp glint appeared in her eyes. “You know Haven
Valley cultivates mite poison. We use it for crowd control. Even
diluted, it’s really nasty stuff. I mean, even if one of our elders
got shot by a low dosage of mite juice he couldn't have gotten out
of that tube without help, not like you did.”

Sarah kept her face void of emotion, refusing
to show the slightest concern.

“You’re a halfling with silver on your wrist.
You shouldn’t have the strength or the claws that you obviously
used to free yourself. So, how did you get out?” Brianna demanded.
Her legs spread, holding herself in a stance capable of attacking
without warning.

Hours
after setting a fire under the gnome, Clarabelle relaxed against
the soft, spongy bark of a giant furble tree. Some twenty feet away
was a cabin, a small sanctuary hidden from the sky (and the
occasional dragon) by a thick canopy of giant furble and pine
trees.

Using the hidden, state-of-the-art cabin
tickled her funny bone, especially since the carefully crafted
cabin was a guardian safe house. What pleased her even more was the
guardians had built the little cabin on her recommendation that the
area was a restricted zone and away from prying eyes.

She hummed to herself in pleasure. Guardian
Alexander would wet himself when he found out he assisted the
Khr'Vurr even indirectly.

Movement within the cabin captured her
attention. A female vampire stomped past the narrow window of the
cabin. Her hip swinging form disappeared only to briefly reappear
in the next window as she paced in a circle. With each turn around
the room her short, red hair, matted from the yellowish fairy
water, glinted orange in the beams of the setting sun.

Clarisse had been ranting for a solid hour.
For once, Clarabelle felt a twinge of sympathy for Harry. No one
deserved the girl’s shrill rants.

Wasn’t it enough the trolls delivered her
without gnawing her up a little? No, of course not. The silly girl
screamed non-stop after seeing the jagged claw marks running down
her face. The marks would disappear soon enough. The girl was
overreacting.

The young voice coming from the cabin grew
louder and more agitated by the moment. “I tell you that gray
dragon is setting us up,” Clarisse said, waving her hand around the
room. “Why else would she keep us here in the troll’s hunting
grounds? She had me change the warning signs, getting my scent all
over the place then had those hideous trolls bring me here! This
will be the first place the guardians search!”

“My sister would never...”

“Sister!” Clarisse shrieked. “That over-sized
lizard is your sister?”

“Dragons are not lizards!” Harry bellowed,
stomping toward the girl he glared down at her. “We are the most
intelligent of all Sídhí races.”

Clarisse snorted. “Right, that's why – when
you’re in dragon form – you can’t talk without setting something on
fire.”

“I’m allergic to smoke,” Harry bellowed in
the girl’s face, baring his teeth at her. “It makes me cough.
That’s not my fault.”

Clarabelle turned from the theatrics going on
in the cabin to greet the man who suddenly appeared at her
elbow.

“Did either of them see you in human form?”
Clarabelle’s mate asked worriedly, concern lashed her brain before
she answered him with a small shake of her head.

He pulled her tightly against him, smashing
his lips against hers. When he finally released her, his simmering
arrogance swarmed her. “Well then, things are coming along nicely.
Did Harry find the missing shifters?”

Clarabelle snorted. “No, I'll look for them
myself this afternoon.”

“No, you've taken enough risks for one day,”
he said quickly.

Clarabelle bristled at the order, but
submissively nodded her head in acceptance. She hated orders. Even
an order from her mate stuck in her craw, but she'd found arguing
with him did no good. She took stock of the situation and changed
strategies. “What about the Clan brat?” she asked, nodding toward
the cabin.

The girl’s shrill voice continued screaming
at Harry non-stop.

“I’ve had the portal near the olitiau nest
recalibrated to exit into a rarely used portal within the Dhark
Empire. Tell Harry to take the red haired brat to the portal and
make sure she gets through safely.”

“The Dhark Empire?” she asked, surprised he
was willing to give up a trump card that could be used against the
girl’s high council father. “I thought we wanted to keep Councilman
MuskLeke’s support.”

“We do, but Councilman MuskLeke and Duke
PhñDick of the Dhark Empire have joined forces. It seems the duke
is thrilled with MuskLeke’s genetic research. They are hip-deep
creating a strategy to enslave the mundanes after releasing a
genetic attack that will bring the population down to a manageable
size. It will keep them busy for months. For my generosity in
freeing MuskLeke’s eldest daughter, the councilman has given up the
location of the Rshk’Garr ruins.”

Clarabelle sucked in an excited gasp. Now she
understood why her mate was vibrating with excitement. Flooding the
Rshk’Garr ruins with liquid synth would take them one move closer
to returning to the home world. “That will make six Ancient ruins
we’ve flooded. According to my calculations, we need a minimum of
ten active ruins.”

“With one minor detail,” he added somberly.
“I had one of my men do a quick survey of Clan Valley’s Rshk’Garr
ruins. Numerous tunnels end abruptly.”

“End? What do you mean, they end?” she
demanded.

He smirked at her rising panic. “One of the
tunnels has a hidden gateway emerging into another valley. The
ancient Rshk’Garr ruins continue, undamaged, in the next
valley.”

They were getting two valleys for the price
of one. She smiled at their incredible luck. “Which valley?”

“None other than Trellick Valley,” he
answered. His dark chuckle sent a thrill through her. “I already
gave the order to fill Rshk’Garr.”

Irritation tightened her lips. It was her
plan. She was the one who figured out how to fill the ruins with
energy. He knew that.

“Once Harry returns from delivering Clarisse,
have him search for the shifters. With that prissy Alpha Prime
dead, Haven Valley will fall into line with our plans.”

Chuckling, she silently promised to pay him
back for his insult, while nodding her head in agreement with his
plans for Beth. “You mean your new chosen Alpha Prime will lick our
feet after putting her on the throne.”

He grunted. “True. And poor little Beth
doesn’t have a clue that the traitor has been within an arm’s reach
for her entire reign.”

Clarabelle smiled smugly. “And the dragon
council?”

His smile turned dark. Deadly anticipation
flared deep in his eyes. “They couldn't find their backside with
both hands. At the emergency meeting, Cornelia announced she has
made contact with Chi’Kehra,” he said in a snarl, gently rubbing
his hand over her chest where Chi’Kehra's spear had punctured her
right lung, while the second pierced her heart. “If that isn't bad
enough, the high councilwoman announced she is working toward an
alliance with a second extremely powerful individual.” He snorted.
“The rumors in the council range from the ancient Princess Serena
to the phoenix prince.”

“Cornelia will have better luck on an
alliance with Prince McKenzie – who was quite mad before his
disappearance – than with Chi’Kehra.” Clarabelle chuckled evilly,
rubbing her body against his. “The high councilwoman can't make an
alliance with someone that's in our hip pocket.”

Hot air hissed through his teeth, and his
deep satisfaction raced through her blood. “You captured the
Chi’Kehra’s mate? What’s his name? Nick?”

“His capture hasn’t been confirmed, but the
gnome in charge of the trolls watched the attack,” she said, not
admitting her original plan had been messed-up when the mites
attacked. “Lady Sarah ended up with two stingers in her back as she
protected him. The gnome and trolls should reach them in plenty of
time. Even being Chi’Kehra, she won’t be immune to the mite
poison.”

He nodded his head thoughtfully. “If the
trolls fail, we’ll be better off with Chi’Kehra dead than an ally
to the council. See to it that she is either killed before the mite
poison wears off or that we have her mate as a hostage.”

Brianna's pointed question as to how Sarah escaped the mite feeding
tube caught Sarah off guard. Not reacting wasn’t easy, but years of
training kept Sarah’s face unmoving in an emotionless mask. One
wrong step and her house of cards would go tumbling. The worst part
of the entire situation was it wouldn't take a very big step,
because her cards were starting to look like Swiss cheese.

“The other vampires still have their claws,”
Sarah said calmly.

Brianna snorted. “Yeah, half an inch on the
hand opposite of the silver cuff. When you came out of that tube
and started ripping the cocoon off Nick, you had three-inch claws
on both hands. Even with silver on, you could kill a shifter in
animal form.”

“I react oddly to poison. It’s possible the
mite poison enhanced my Sídhí abilities instead of restricting
them.”

“I agree that mite poison is weird stuff. It
causes intense pain and blocks most of our Sídhí abilities, but it
doesn’t stop a vampire’s claws or teeth.” She waved to Sarah’s
bracelet, saying in an argumentative voice, “that much silver
should stop your claws.”

Sarah glanced down, gazing into Nick's
sleeping face. She searched her brain for an answer, but the
sluggish thing refused to spit out an answer. She couldn’t very
well give Brianna the complete truth. She snorted to herself. No,
the truth was not an option. Who would believe her body was flooded
with enough synth crystal that her synth-laced blood reacted
against the stinger and the natural Sídhí poison, violently shoving
the stinger and poison out of her body? Not a soul. At least, not
anyone who wouldn't ask dozens of questions and probably guess she
was Chi’Kehra.

Sarah shrugged and knelt beside Nick. She
took a deep, steadying breath, rhythmically caressing his silky,
black hair. He helped her without his knowledge. She couldn't
explain the odd reaction. They hadn't bonded, but touching him
calmed her.

When Sarah didn’t answer, Brianna continued,
“The guardians in Haven Valley use hollow point bullets. Each
bullet is fairy created and filled with mite juice blended with
silver. The shell bursts after the bullet enters the body. Most
people take an hour or more to wake-up. The more bullets, the
longer it takes.”

Sarah narrowed her eyes, trying to force her
brain to open her mouth, but Brianna wasn't finished.

“You got hit with stingers filled with
concentrated mite juice.” Brianna held up two fingers as she made
her next point. “And your shirt is ripped where the stingers
entered your back in two different places. Without someone to rip
out the stingers, you should still be unconscious.”