Free Agent (17 page)

Her eyes flashed the same way Grimm's did, and the silverware on the table rattled. “Don't think I can't harm you, girl. My wishes are weapons, and I can destroy you with your heart's own desires. Indeed, it is the only way. Or perhaps I grant the wish of those you love. Does the blacksmith wish to forget you? You mother, does she ever wish she had more time to herself? Without a young child she'd have all the time in the world.”

I shook with sudden anger, and my hands clenched over something in my pocket. I slipped my hand in and found a few stones from the vase, and I started to laugh.

“How would you like to work for me? I pay your debt. You work for me. You could be free before the end of the year.”

I did want it. Anger welled up in me like a fever. Anger at myself for wanting to accept her offer, rage at her for knowing how much I did. I shoved the anger down inside me with that same cold wall of emotion I'd practiced so much.

“I'm not going to skip out on Grimm. All the magic I need comes in ammo boxes, and I'd rather plunge an ogre's toilet every day than work for you.” I stood, taking the rocks from my pocket. They were solid black, polished. I picked up a pitcher and threw it across the room. She retreated to the mirror.

“Child, do not raise your hand to me.” Her face became stern, her mouth pulled back in a grimace, and her eyes narrowed.

“You threaten my friends or my family, and I will find a way to kill you, if it takes me a lifetime.” I threw the stones. They struck the mirror and it shattered, splitting like a spiderweb. The mirror bled, blood gushing from the cracks like I had sliced an artery.

She screamed in rage, a word that spun past me like the wind, and rooted me to the spot. I strained against the spell but it pinned me in place. The table shook and silverware went flying. The lights exploded in a rain of sparks. My blessings, it seemed, didn't like her any better than I did.

Then something appeared in the air. It popped into existence. A bottle, and a brush, and the brush began to paint the mirror. As it did the blood turned black and disappeared, and the mirror was flawless. The stench clawed at my nose, the smell of fleshing silver. As the brush wiped the last drop of blood clean, she formed again in the mirror.

“I return your blow threefold, foolish girl.” Her skin was pulled back so tight she looked like a talking skull, and her flowing white dress now looked like woven bones.

“Get it over with,” I said, steeling myself.

Instead the spell released me, and when I looked up she stood there, her normal self.

“Not yet, darling. A blow struck in haste is a blow wasted. When the time is right, I will give you my gifts.” She faded out. “Only when you have received the third may you ask, and I will grant your request. Only then will I kill you.”

The giant clock in the ballroom rang over and over, and as I counted it, I realized it was midnight. I had lost hours to the fairy's voice. I ran out the door to the ballroom, and heard the shouting before I could see them.

“You will come home,” said the queen. Most of the guests were huddling near the entrance, but Ari stood before the coffin, between it and the queen.

“I don't think you understood my friend,” said Evangeline, and I knew her tone. It was the harbinger of pain and violence coming.

I ran down the stairs. “Leave her alone.”

The queen turned to face me. “Hold your tongue, fairy whore. You turn cheap tricks and pass them off as magic, but you would make more Glitter on your back.”

She looked to Ari. “You choose them over me? Then I decide. Until you return to my house and accept my training, you are not my daughter, and you're not of this family. I cast you out of this house and Kingdom.”

Ari let out a sharp cry as if she had been punched in the stomach, and Evangeline grabbed Ari's wrist. The doors to the ballroom slammed open and the reapers entered, sending guests rushing to the walls. They marched through the ballroom toward the coffin, and the queen stepped aside as they passed, their robes trailing. They seized the coffin and marched out, and the head reaper waited. Evangeline seemed to be wrestling with Ari, trying to put something on, but my view was blocked as the head reaper approached me.

He didn't speak. He looked at me with his empty skull, and I felt his gaze on me, like when Grimm is watching. He bowed before me and followed the others out. Evangeline pulled Ari out the front door, and I followed, running up the stairs and out the door.

Evangeline ran to the valet booth, dragging Ari with her. “We've got to get out of here. She's fading.”

The valet wandered off at his normal pace. I realized what was wrong. The queen couldn't change who or what Ari was. Sadly, she'd be a princess and seal bearer for the rest of her life. The magic of Kingdom did follow strict rules though: Stripped of her family title, Ari wasn't just thrown out of the family. She was being removed from the place. As I watched, she faded from view, disappearing completely.

“Where is she?”

Evangeline looked around, checking the street signs. “You don't want to know. That part of the city isn't somewhere you go in daylight, let alone midnight.”

“I'm going after her. We'll meet you at the gates. Grimm, if you can hear, let me go.” I pulled my Agency bracelet off and threw it at my feet. The world wrenched sideways, and the shimmering lights of Kingdom disappeared. Abandoned cars sat against the curb, missing tires and burned.

That's when I heard someone scream: someone who wasn't Ari. I took off in that direction because any scream is a bad scream. I rounded the corner, and there in the middle of a gang of men was Ari. One of them was rolling on the ground, clutching at his crotch while the others laughed. I cursed this tiny dress purse with no room for my gun.

I whistled as I approached. “I've had a bad night, boys. I think it's about to get better.” A couple split off to meet me. They weren't expecting what happened next. There wasn't any reason to.

I raked the first one in the eyes and followed it with a knee to the groin, grabbed the second and bent his arm until I got a nice clean snap, and let him scream for a moment to give the others something to think about. Ari swung a broken bottle and hit one of them in the head. He fell like a bag of sand and the others decided they were done.

I walked up to her and gave her assailant a kick. “Sorry I missed the fireworks.” She had been crying, but it was anger as much as fear or sorrow. I heard the thugs in the alley. They were coming back, and this time they were bringing friends. “Take off your shoes,” I said, and she did. We ran. I think they followed for a few blocks, but we ran all the way, all the way down and across, and we didn't stop until we hit the gates, where Evangeline was waiting.

As we spun through the city, Ari drooped over and dozed. Evangeline clicked on the light to check on her. “Some night, M. We're going to have trouble with the queen, you know.”

“Yeah, but she's not who worries me.”

“Something worse than an angry royal?”

“You have no idea.”

I GOT TO
the Agency bright and early the next day. The waiting room was empty—Rosa had put a closed sign on the door and hung signs that read “Caution, Biohazard,” “Now Entering Tuberculosis Infection Zone,” and “Jehovah's Witness Meeting Today!” at various places in the halls. Even the most desperate wishers wouldn't risk catching Jehovulosis.

I entered the conference room, which normally only held this many people on poker night. Jess and Clara, Evangeline, Ari, and myself.

Grimm waited while Jess and Clara took turns giving Ari hugs, and then cleared his throat. “We are no closer to finding the Seal, despite your exemplary efforts. The fae, on the other hand, grow restless. The fae realm lies exposed, and they believe someone in this world holds their Seal.”

“Plus,” I said, “there's a fairy godmother in town.” In the silence that followed I watched Grimm digest this.

“Marissa, I would ask if you were certain, but I know the answer.” Grimm crossed his arms and looked at me over his glasses.

“That's crazy,” said Clara. “You gonna let her move in on you?”

“No, I am not.” Grimm kept his voice calm and low, with an unmistakable threat in his tone. “At the moment, there are certain problems. Foremost, that I have no idea where she might actually be.”

“Do the bunny thing, and then mug her in an alley,” I said. “It worked on me.”

Grimm shook his head. “You need to read more. I can't enter another fairy's domain any more than she could mine. The traditional way is to break her original mirror. As I stated, we don't know where it is.”

“Then rumble with her directly.” Clara sat forward at the table like she was giving orders to him. “Even if you can't approach her, you could make it bad enough that she'd move on. These tweens you hire nowadays might not understand, but I've seen what you can do.”

Grimm closed his eyes. “You have seen what I can do against normal creatures. Weaklings, like the fae, or the demons. Fairies cannot directly interact, our powers repel. We cannot approach each other.”

“Her mirror is at the hotel. She spoke to Marissa there,” said Ari.

Jess gave her a look of contempt. I'd gotten that look a thousand times from Evangeline, and learned to ignore it as best I could. Ari, on the other hand, started a Mexican standoff that could only end badly for her.

“No, young lady, her mirror, her original mirror is unlikely to be at the hotel,” said Grimm. “It would be somewhere safe.”

Ari looked at him. “Where is yours?”

Evangeline and I exchanged uncomfortable glances. Grimm would sooner give out his bank account numbers, vault codes, and turn over every bit of Glitter he owned.

“Someplace safe,” said Grimm, and Clara smiled.

“Her name is Odette. That ring a bell?” I asked Grimm.

His eyes grew slightly wider, but he kept his face impassive.

I glanced around the room. “She suggested one of us took the Seal. She offered me wishes, Grimm.”

An uncomfortable silence passed over the table. I kept waiting for Clara to say something stupid like, “You better not have taken them” or “Do you have any idea what you've done,” but she kept looking to Grimm. Grimm fidgeted for a moment. “May I have a word with Marissa alone?” In the stunned silence, no one moved. “That is not a request.”

One by one, they filed out. The jealous glare on Evangeline's face, the accusing look Clara gave me, and the expression of worry on Ari's face only added to my nerves.

I held up my hands. “I didn't take them. She said they are weapons, and she'd hit me three times.”

“Why on earth would she do that?” Grimm's look told me how much trouble I was in. I'd seen that look when people brought frog princes in after a month, when the spell was permanent, or asked if they could visit a baby a year after the imp took them.

“Because she threatened my family.” I swallowed, my mouth dry. “Also I hit her with a few pieces of obsidian. The mirror bled.”

Grimm scrunched up his face like I'd slapped him. “You struck a fairy with obsidian.”

“She fixed the mirror with fleshing silver and the blood just disappeared.” From the way he looked at me, I knew that this was a thousand times worse than the blessings. Maybe more.

“She will never forgive you.” His magic reached out and surrounded me. I felt it pouring through the bracelet like hot water, enveloping me. “While you are under my protection, she cannot so much as scratch you. I worry for you, my dear. There are ways to wound that do not leave a mark.”

“You know, I think it's too coincidental that a fae child goes missing, the Seal gets stolen, and then a new fairy godmother shows up in town. Remember the magic show you took me to?” He once sent me to a theater where I watched it over and over until I could spot the cues and the hand movements that gave everything away.

“I do. If this is what we are meant to see, what do we not see?”

His question reminded me of something else eating at me. “I need to use the Visions Room.”

Grimm rolled his eyes. “Keep playing with those things and you'll go blind.”

“This isn't about my blessings. A witch said something to me. Something I need to check out. If Ari's spirit sight is as bad as her normal vision, I wouldn't trust her to tell me how many arms I'm holding up, let alone details.

Grimm's gaze went to my hand, and I wondered if he was telling me the truth about not being able to see the mark. I'd found an engraving of it in the book, but part of me needed to know if it was really there.

“My dear, the Visions Room is undergoing maintenance. I'll have the contractors work overtime to get it functional again. Someone has been putting tiny stress fractures on the prisms.”

“Grimm, if I had the handmaiden's mark, you'd tell me, right?”

He flashed over to the cream decanter. Grimm leaned in toward me and spoke softly. “Spirit sight is not one of my formidable powers, my dear, but if it were, and if I could see it, and if you did have the handmaiden's mark, I still would not tell you. The mark appeared on dozens of girls during her reign. It was a curse of its own kind. These girls were thrown out of their homes, driven away, sometimes killed for something they could neither see nor control. Most never heard her call.”

At that moment, the world exploded into gunfire and crashing, and I heard screams from the back room. Grimm was gone from the mirror. By the time I made it out the door and down the hall, the Agency was silent. A hole the size of a refrigerator was smashed through the back of the office. Jess lay twitching in a pool of blood, feebly trying to move her hands.

Ari came out from under the table. “It took him. A troll.”

Liam was gone. I glanced out the smashed window, and my stomach churned. Panic flooded my brain, threatening to drown me.

“Run,” said Grimm, in my ear, “straight for the window, and when you get there, jump.” Grimm had never recommended suicide before, so I figured he had a plan. I sprinted down the hallway at full speed to the gaping hole and did a perfect swan dive. I fell toward the ground, and as I did, I passed the troll. It was climbing its way down the building, Liam still in hand. The pavement was coming for my head, and fast.

I saw a glint of gold as the magic took shape, right before I hit the concrete. It felt like pillows, rolling into pillows. I came to my feet wondering why we didn't use this more often. The troll dropped the last story down and landed on the trunk of a car.

Twelve feet tall, wide as a truck, with muscles like chewing gum, the troll looked at me and growled like an elephant and a lion mixed together. His sallow, yellow skin had mottled spots, and each hand had three fingers, long enough they wrapped clean around Liam's rib cage.

“Stop,” I said, putting a bullet in one of its feet. “Or I'll shoot.” I squeezed off a few more shots at the troll's knees. It dropped Liam in a heap and came for me, but I had practiced this a dozen times. I rolled to the side as it stomped at me. I put another bullet into its knee and one in its butt. It roared with rage and kicked backwards at me. I almost made it out of the way. The foot hit me like a hammer. I heard a couple of ribs break and went flying into a windshield. Liability did not cover troll damage.

That's when Liam picked up the bumper from the car he'd been dropped on and swung it, hitting the troll right upside its runty little head.

Troll skulls were mostly bone. It turned to grab him, giving him a squeeze for good measure until he turned blue. It lumbered off, dragging him along. I shook the glass out of my hair and ran. Straight across the tops of the cars I ran, ruining six different paint jobs. At the corner I jumped onto its back.

The troll grabbed me with a free hand, bringing me around to bite with a pair of jaws like a snapping turtle. Troll eyelids were heavy bone as well, but I put one bullet into each nostril, and let that bone hold the bullet in as it bounced around. The troll fell forward and dropped us.

The troll got up exactly once, at which point Evangeline came roaring around the corner at full speed, driving her yellow convertible straight into its chest. That was the sixth convertible she'd destroyed that year. Ari came running from the building to help me up, and as she slid her arm around me, I cried out. Broken ribs hurt.

Liam kicked the troll a few times in the head, managing only to stub his toe. I think he was trying to feel like he had contributed something to its death. He limped over to me, a look of wonder in his eyes. “You jumped out a building? And attacked that thing?” He reached out to wipe a speck of blood from my hair. “Are you crazy?”

Ari put her hands on her hips and looked at him with those blue eyes of hers. “No, you idiot. She's in love.”