Kayla opened the bathroom door and stepped out, still drying her hands on her jeans. She paused, and took a second look, head tilted. “Ali? You look worried.”
Alison hesitated, then shrugged. They’d gotten used to keeping things to themselves, but Kayla was unique. And essential. She needed information. “Arguing about where to put bad guys and who does what. Erica and Suzi and Des are hurt. Theo needs water. JC doesn’t know where the house fae are. Zach isn’t willing to go out unless bad guys are secure enough. I can’t do all stops in reasonable time alone and I’m nervous leaving too.”
“Okay. Do we have any ideas for a secure location to hold them? Riley and all will be back pretty soon.”
“Five minutes there is still over two hours here. That’s too long to wait. Too much can happen. We have several ideas for where to leave them, but none are ideal. JC might have a solution. Needs you though.”
“All right. Get everyone together by the fountain and let’s figure out what to do.” Kayla checked her phone again for any replies, shrugged, and put it away. “Lead on.”
Alison had come with her to find the ground-floor half-bath, and had assured her that with JC doing the cleaning, it was safe to use. Now, she escorted Kayla back outside via the front door, across the green groundcover and past several trees, to the fountain.
Theo pulled herself up to sit on the broad chest-height wall of the fountain. Alison wasn’t entirely sure what that was made of: it looked like well-worn limestone, and had that smooth texture, but it was absolutely seamless and utterly massive. But then, with the whole island wizard-created, why would it be a stretch to create an immense seamless basin all in one?
Suzi, Des, Zach, and Erica all joined them from the direction of the round building where they’d been confined the first two weeks. At worst, they could keep their five captives, later six, under observation there, and they had already moved Lloyd and Nestor from the stables, Felix and Barry and Isabel from the house. All should be sufficiently restrained for it to be safe for Orfeo and Paz to keep an eye on them briefly.
“JC?” Kayla said.
“Getting something,” Alison said. “Coming.”
“Right. So, there’s some argument over who’s going to the outer parts of the island to do a couple of things, because we don’t have a clear decision yet on exactly where to confine the bad guys?”
Theo nodded. “We don’t know how long it will take your new friends to come back or what they’ll do when they get here. We have no idea whether or when Isabel and Felix will wake up, but we aren’t willing to take any chances on any of them. And as little as I would mind seeing Nestor lying in a pool of his own piss, I suppose realistically there’s a limit to how long we can keep him cocooned head to foot with his hands wrapped and a gag in.”
“Do we have candidates for location?”
“That’s where JC is. If that works, it would be as close to ideal as we’re going to get. If not, we’ll have to leave them all in one room and make sure they’re being watched at all times. The building they’re in now held us for two weeks, except for Jace’s tricks. But we’d rather they were separated. Look what happened when they left us together.”
“Can’t argue with that, although obviously they also weren’t observing you very closely.” Kayla climbed up the steps to the top of the fountain wall and sat down on the outer edge near Theo who had her feet in the water on the inner edge. “Given the way you’re all twitching and all glancing intermittently in the same direction, I hope Jace doesn’t take long.”
“Won’t,” Zach said.
The silence that fell was oddly comfortable. Kayla reached out to play with a heavy lock of Theo’s bright blue hair, twining it around her fingers, and Theo just smiled. They’d gotten used to silence alone. It was interesting that Kayla could so simply be a part of it, not speaking but showing no sign of searching for something to say—just being here with them.
Sure enough, JC arrived only a moment later, holding a blanket-swathed bundle close against her body with both arms around it. Very carefully, she set it on the stone wall of the fountain and unwrapped the blanket.
The mirror within looked rather unprepossessing. It wasn’t terribly large—Alison figured it might be around eighteen inches on the long side, maybe a foot along the short ends. It had a fairly simple frame of deep reddish wood, with silvery wire embedded in an intricate design and five hemispherical stones of different colours set into it, one in each corner and one in the centre of one long side.
“We can’t use it,” Theo said. “Not sure whether Phrixos did something or it’s just a wizard thing that won’t work for fae. But JC’s research says that this is the control centre for the whole island. It might work for you. The building they’re in now... the first night, Phrixos made extra rooms around the outside of one room, and we were each locked in one alone.”
“From what I’ve read,” JC said quietly, “all the effort goes into actual design and creation the first time, and the template is saved, so it might be possible to bring it back up.”
Alison watched Kayla’s deepening frown smooth out as she swallowed hard and deliberately refocused her attention. “Right. Okay, let’s see if I can make this work.” She reached out and touched the frame; nothing happened, nor when she touched the glass, but when she touched the striped green stone in the centre of one side, light shimmered across the glass and intensified. “Oh my. That’s an impressively clear aerial view of the area, near as I can tell. What building?”
JC pointed wordlessly.
Kayla tapped on it, and smiled. “Okay, sweet, this seems like a fairly simple interface, for something probably designed long before touchscreens. It made that building visible inside. No labels, though, just icons that currently don’t mean much to me. That one’s a flat horizontal line which might mean something like ‘Remove’ so let’s not touch that one. Um... maybe this circle one? Nope, that just has a bunch of further confusing icons, but at least there’s an arrow that looks like it might be for going back... yep, that’s good. Maybe the fork? Oh, that looks promising. Hm, if I touch this... it shows a kind of ghost image over the building, and still shows the icons. How about this one... no, that’s four rooms in an arc around the outside of the inner large room... is that seven? That looks like seven.”
JC nodded, one precise motion. “That one.”
“Right. So let’s see what happens if I tap that one again and try to activate it. What can go wrong? I mean, we’re only playing with wizard gear we don’t understand after I had some weird reactions to Riley’s toys.”
Theo’s eyes widened in alarm, and she wasn’t alone in that. “What reactions? Kay, wait!”
Too late: Kayla had already touched the screen again.
It was just as well the mirror was flat on the stone: Kayla scrunched her eyes closed and shook her head so hard she would have tipped herself backwards into the water, had Theo not caught and steadied her.
“Holy shit. I don’t think I want to do that very often. Wish I knew how to describe that—a bit like a hangover that hits instantly without the fun bits and then just disappears, but wow that’s tiring.”
“Do not risk your safety!” Theo scolded, wrapping both arms around her. “I just got you back! Plus we do kinda need you. What was that about weird reactions?”
“Huh? Oh, Riley thinks I’m highly sensitive to wizard magic or something. Need to ask her about that later. More importantly, did it work?” Covering a yawn with the back of one hand, she leaned over the mirror. “If this is reliable, then it now has seven extra rooms, but I would check in person.”
“And hide that mirror,” Zach said. “Checking.” He darted off in the direction of their old building.
“Yeah, definitely put that somewhere safe, Jace,” Kayla said. “Let’s not have unauthorized users screwing around with the island functions.”
“You’re tired,” Suzi said in concern.
“Hm? Oh, yeah. I mean, I got about two hours of sleep before Heather’s phone call woke me up, and I’ve been awake ever since, however long that is... uh, twelve, sixteen, eighteen hours? God only knows. Riley had a neat toy that tricked my body into thinking I’d slept for eight hours but she warned me that it would mess up my sleep and give me weird dreams after it wore off. Might’ve just used up whatever that gave me. But I’m okay. Not sleeping until Riley and all get here.”
*Ali? Even from outside I can tell the shape of the building changed,* Zach said. *Come help me move them so we can get on to other important things.*
*Coming.* “Zach says it worked and he needs help moving them.”
Suzi sighed in relief. “Oh, good, then we can check on the other wisps.”
“An’ ask Callie to help,” Des said. “Le’s go.”
“Erica and Des and I are enough to help Zach,” Alison said.
JC picked up the carefully-rewrapped mirror. “Hate the house but it’s our only kitchen. I’ll start making some stew or something to feed all of us plus a few more. Other than Des. I have pork tenderloin for you.”
Des’ ears perked forward. “Yummm.”
“Once the bad guys are separated, you’re taking a couple of trips?” Kayla said. “Are you going to be okay alone? And how long is it likely to take?”
Alison shrugged. “Island is only thirty-six square kilometers. From right here, any point on the edge is about three and a third kilometers away.” JC had worked out the math days ago. Gamer skills had oddly practical uses.
“I’m old-fashioned, what’s that in miles? Multiply by point six...”
“A little over two,” JC said.
Alison nodded. “Even with no road and variable ground and detours around obstacles, maybe an hour from here to the edge? House fae are not at the edge but near. Wisps are maybe two-thirds out? Dulce’s closer but off to one side from them.”
“Right,” Kayla said. “So roughly two to three hours each, round trip—you might be back by the time we have company but not necessarily, depending on how long they take.”
“Yes.”
“Will you be safe?”
“It’s pretty unlikely anyone will mess with Zach,” Theo said. “Word gets around.” Erica and Des glanced at each other, and nodded agreement. “Ali will have friends with her, Paz and Orfeo are looking forward to it enormously, but it should be a safe route and she can defend herself. Nothing to worry about. That way the rest of us can protect and help you and keep an eye on the bad guys. And make food.”
“All right. I’ll trust you to know what you’re doing. Not sure what I’m going to be useful for, and I hate having nothing to do. Jace? Can you use extra hands for chopping things?”
JC shrugged. “Sure.”
“I can come help too,” Theo said. “I’ve been in here swimming for a bit, and I can get wet in the laundry room again if I need to. For a while, anyway. I can’t spend the whole rest of my life sitting in water.”
“Be good,” Suzi said sternly. “Don’t push it.”
“I won’t, but right back atcha. At least I’m not hurt.”
After so long fervently hoping for Kayla to find them, Alison wasn’t surprised Theo didn’t want to be far from her, even to the point of risking physical discomfort. She wasn’t going to argue. Having at least two of them near Kayla was safer anyway, just in case any less-friendly faelings came to investigate.
Suzi, on the other hand, was holding her folded wings at an awkwardly-stiff angle, doing her best to keep the edges from brushing against anything. Even without contact, it was worryingly clear that she was in some pain and doing her best to push it away.
Theo pulled her legs up under her and swung around so she could hop down on the outside; she and JC and Kayla headed towards the main house. The others went towards their makeshift prison.
“Suzi, you don’t have to come,” Alison said.
“Just in case,” Suzi said. “No Theo to sing to quiet them, maybe I can help if anyone gets aggressive.”
Distraction would probably help more than leaving her to ruminate.
“Okay, but don’t even think about spreading your wings unless it’s genuinely urgent.” Alison wasn’t about to let that happen, though. “Grab hold, and let’s go stash our bad guys in their own private cells.”
They're back!!
They are!
Shame I can't literally, physically, write multiple stories simultaneously. So many stories in line!