Totally Spellbound (36 page)

“In a minute,” Travers
said.

John crossed his arms, looking
something like his old powerful self. The floor pulsed beneath Rob
almost as if he were inside yet another machine.

All those warning
movies he’d seen about the future—from
Metropolis
to
Matrix
—came to mind somehow. He never
thought of Faerie as a place as soulless as the inside of a
machine, but that’s how it felt.

“Okay,” Travers said as
more and more Faeries moved away from them, heading to the exit.
“Creepy.”

“No kidding,” John said.

Rob stared at a nearby slot. Lives
rotated on it, not cherries. But in the middle of the machine he
saw a faint map, and on it, a white glow.

Megan.

His heart went out to her. How was she
holding up, suddenly as the center of all this attention? He hoped
she was doing all right.

The sooner he finished this, the
sooner he would find out.

He glanced around the large—and now
mostly empty—main room. “We need to do this thing,” he said
softly.

Travers nodded. “Follow
me.”

He led them through a maze of slot
machines. Sometimes it seemed like Travers was walking them through
a wall, only to have the wall dissolve into nothing as they
approached. Travers walked through video poker games and baccarat
tables and even a stage with a very confused stand-up comic still
clutching a mike.

The comic, who was clearly human and
looked like he was dressed for vaudeville, saw them and said,
“Where’d the audience go?”

“They’ll be back,” Rob
said.

If the situation were different, he
would have spelled the poor sap to the surface. But he didn’t dare,
at least not yet. Mage magic: he wasn’t willing to risk
it.

But he asked Travers to make a note of
where this guy was so that they could rescue him if they got the
chance.

“Softie,” John whispered, and then
grinned.

Rob didn’t smile back.

After a few minutes,
they reached a fork in the path that actually appeared in the fakey
visuals. A sign post grew out of a bank of slot machines. The
signs, like the ones in
M*A*S*H
, pointed every different
direction. Some showed the way to a buffet, others to a bar, even
more toward various parts of the gambling floor.

And one, pointing
up, said simply
The
Circle
.

Rob’s breath caught. “This is
it.”

“Don’t let that fool you,” Travers
said. “The arrows point the wrong way.”

Rob nodded. That didn’t surprise him.
“But we want to go there, right? That’s the Faerie
Circle.”

Travers looked at him
sideways. “We want to go there, but I have no idea what it
is.”

“Faerie Circle,” John
repeated loudly—that old dodge: if they don’t understand, shout.
“You know, where the Great Rulers used to sit and rule Faerie. You
know, the Seelie and the Unseelie Courts?”

“Noooo,” Travers said.

“Where the Faerie Kings overthrew them
and started the Great War that ended only when all the pixies
died?”

“No-
o
-o,”
Travers repeated.

“History doesn’t matter,” Rob said.
“Getting this done does. Let’s go.”

Travers headed down a flight of
stairs, and suddenly Rob recognized where he was. It was the room
of Zoe’s memory—and it was a circle, a big round area filled with
games (not at all like the ones she had seen) and dozens of small
roulette wheels, and a large pari-mutuel betting area—all set up to
bet on future human events.

Rob didn’t look at the
odds; he didn’t want to see any of it.

But he did turn toward the center of
the circle, and there, just like he expected, was the giant
spinning wheel, done up like a giant roulette wheel.

And there, next to it, but not at all
like he expected, were three men, sitting in those three chairs
he’d seen from the vision.

They were Faerie, but they
looked almost satanic as they sat in those big thrones next to the
wheel, their hands gripping the armrests. They wore black clothes
that accented their dark hair and dark eyes, and when they smiled,
they did so in unison—shades of the Fates.

Rob shuddered.

“Welcome to Faerie, Sir
Robin Hood,” said the Faerie farthest to the left.

“And his Merry Men,” said the next,
nodding at John and Travers.

“We’re the Faerie Kings,” said the
third, “and we’re here to prevent you from dismantling our
home.”

The dining room was getting unbearably
warm. A drop of sweat ran down the side of Megan’s face, stopping
on her chin before leaping to freedom.

The cigarette girl reached out a hand
and caught it, grossing Megan out.

How long had she been here? One day?
Two? An entire century?

Even though she knew that wasn’t the
case. She’d probably been in her seat an hour, maybe
less.

A sea of black heads filled the room,
with more arriving all the time. If there was a fire, no one would
get out, least of all Meg. She’d never been claustrophobic before,
but she was now.

At least, the Faeries
didn’t seem to sweat—or perhaps they didn’t stink when they did.
The place smelled faintly of cloves—or maybe that was all her nose
could pick out after that liberal dosing of cigarette
smoke.

What she wouldn’t give for a glass of
water. Or a cool breeze. Or someone to talk to, someone who didn’t
end every sentence with “Wow.”

If she hadn’t heard how scary these
people were, she wouldn’t have believed it—scary smart, that is.
Right now, they were scary zombie, which actually worked up close
(it had never worked for her in the movies—but oh, boy, had she
been wrong).

Not looking at her watch
was becoming a big issue. She kept her hands clenched in her lap,
just so she wouldn’t be tempted to look. She was afraid the Faeries
would catch on then, that she was a diversion and not the main
event at all.

And then—suddenly—a bright
blue light exploded in the room. Only the Faeries didn’t seem to
notice. Megan blinked hard, seeing yellow and green reflections on
her eyelids.

When the reflections cleared, a man
sat in the chair across from her.

He looked vaguely
familiar, and he certainly wasn’t Faerie. Even though he had dark
hair, his face was too craggy, his ears too round. He reminded her
somehow of a bull, but she wasn’t sure why.

When he saw her looking at him, he
grinned.

“You seem nervous,” he
said.

He had a bit of an accent,
but it didn’t sound familiar to her. The Faeries near him glared at
him, and a few made some kind of warding symbol with their
fingers.

“Are you nervous?” he
asked.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Silly girl, haven’t they taught you
names have power?” He smiled, and there was a smarmy charm in it.
He had charisma, which made her shiver.

Some of the Faeries turned
toward him, as if noticing him for the first time. He waved a hand,
and the Faeries looked back at Megan, as if they had forgotten
him.

“You know, they say you have magic,
and perhaps you do, but what you really have is so much more
interesting. An overflow of emotions. How very female.” And then he
laughed.

She didn’t. He might have charisma,
but that didn’t mean she liked him.

“Of course, you don’t have enough
magic to get yourself out of this pretty little mess.” He tilted
his square head. Definitely a bull. All she needed now was a china
shop, because she felt like he was heading for
destruction.

“I’m fine,” she said.

“Suuuuure you are. That’s why you
wanted ‘this’ to be over soon. Don’t think someone didn’t notice
your little message.” His grin widened. “I do so love coming to the
rescue of beautiful women. Their gratitude always astonishes
me.”

She wished she really did have magic
now. She’d turn him into a real bull and paint this entire room
red. See how he’d like that.

“Ah,” he said, “did I anger
you?”

“I’m fine,” she said, and
that was when she realized she got no emotional hit off of him
either. She hadn’t expected any off the Faeries—she’d been warned
about that—but this guy was as cold as the creatures around
her.

He smiled, but this time, it didn’t
reach his eyes. “You and I have unfinished business.”

“I’ve never met you,” she
said.

“It doesn’t matter. My daughters have.
And you’ve ruined them.”

Megan felt a chill run down her back.
“Ze—?”

He put a finger over her lips. His
fingertip smelled of wine. “No names, little girl. Are you ready to
leave?”

She shook her head.

“Good.” He removed his finger from her
lips.

“I said no,” she snapped.

“And I’m ignoring you. But there seems
to be a reason you’re here, so we’ll just add a little confusion
into the mix, shall we?” He clapped his hands, and a woman appeared
on a chair next to her.

Megan looked. It wasn’t just any
woman. It was a woman who looked just like her, right down to the
extra forty pounds, the too-pale skin, and the mole at the edge of
her collarbone.

“What’re you doing?” Megan
asked.

“Creating a diversion,” he
said.

The Faeries looked at her,
then at the unmoving woman, and they seemed to be waking from their
trance.

“Oh, what a titanic nuisance,” he
said. “Let’s douse her in emotion, shall we? I think all the
emotion from the last five minutes in Chicago will do
nicely.”

He clapped his hands again, and a
sheath fell over the other woman. Then Megan felt like she was hit
with a tidal wave—anger, fear, lust, hatred, love, more love—and
she couldn’t separate it out, it was too overwhelming, she would
drown in it…

The square little man grabbed her
hand, pulled her to him, and grinned.

“Time to pay the piper, sweetheart,”
he said, and together, they disappeared.

“Something’s wrong,” Kyle
said.

Zoe turned to him, her
face filled with concern. Behind her, on the screen, thousands of
Faeries, more than Kyle had imagined possible, crowded against the
entrance of the casino.

The Fates were identifying some of
them by name, calling them long-lost or tricksters in
disguise.

“What do you mean, something’s wrong?”
Zoe asked.

Kyle shook his head. His stomach
wasn’t just queasy, it was rolling. He’d gotten a real sense of
disgust, followed by a sense of panic, and then anger, and then
complete overwhelmedness (if that was a word).

All this was coming from Aunt Megan.
He knew it, even though there weren’t any words. He had expected
words, but for some reason, she was just sending
emotion.

“Aunt Megan, she’s overwhelmed.” His
voice was shaking.

“Of course she is,
Kyle. Look at that building.” Zoe’s lips were set in a straight
line. “I’m not sure how much of that
I
could take, and I’m not new to my
powers.”

“She’s not either,” Kyle said, feeling
the need to defend his aunt. “She’s just new to identifying
them.”

Zoe nodded, but a frown still creased
her forehead. “Should we go get her?”

Kyle tried to send a message to her,
but he didn’t get a response. Not that he could have. He had no
idea if she could just send back at will. They hadn’t tested that
part.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“Are you still getting her emotions?”
Zoe asked.

The Fates had turned in their chairs
too. They had their hands folded in identical ways, and were
staring at him. His cheeks grew warm.

“No,” he whispered.

“Then maybe it was a momentary thing?”
Zoe asked.

“I don’t know,” he said.

“If we break this up too soon, we put
the men in danger,” Zoe said.

“I
know
,” Kyle
said.

“So, you’ll have to tell
me—”

“I’m eleven,” he snapped.
“I’m eleven, you’re the grown-up, my aunt is overwhelmed, and I’m
scared. You decide.”

Zoe stepped back as if he had hit
her.

“He has a point,” Clotho
said.

“You should never put children in
charge of things,” Lachesis said.

“It’s not fair,” Atropos
said.

“Besides, it makes for very messy
business,” Clotho said.