“Sorry,” she told Bria, pulling back and tamping down her power. “I’m not doing great. It’s been two days since Daisy was taken right under our noses. We were in the fucking car, Bria! Our whole team was with her, and we couldn’t keep those…thingsfrom grabbing her unconscious body.”
Her stomach filled with lead at the memory of those disgusting, shadowy fae things swooping in and scooping up Daisy’s limp form. Lexi had felt the bright effervescence of her soul, so she knew her ward was still alive, but the image still haunted her and racked her with guilt. She was supposed to be protecting Daisy, not offering her up to the enemy. To the creatures—fae— they’dknownabout but hadn’t done anything to fortify against.
They’d failed her, and they all knew it.
“Self-loathing doesn’t get the job done,” Lexi mumbled dutifully, quoting Zorn. He’d said that to her a lot over the last couple days. To himself, probably, too.
“No, but it does help us make terrible decisions, like buying every tub of ice cream in the store and eating until you throw up. The good news is, I’ve found a couple new favorite flavors. Bad news…well, last night didn’t end well. It’ll be okay. You’ll see, Lexi. That little gremlin is adept at staying alive, Kieran is amaze-boucheat complex planning, and our team is excellentin the trenches. With Zorn’s lifelong collection of notes on all things Faerie, we’ll get her back and hopefully kill a great many fae as we do.”
Their inner crew,what they’d all come to think of as their family, stood around the oval table in the conference room. Kieran glanced up when she entered the room, his blue eyes fierce and his hair mussed from running his fingers through it. The others continued to look at the documents rolled out across the large table.
“What’ve we got?” she asked as Jack scooted over to make room. He wore a tan suit that barely fit around his huge arms.
It was Amber who spoke. “I’ve checked three well-known portals to the fae realm. All are open and operational. None are guarded by fae—not on this side or the other. If the fae mean to set a trap, it isn’t around the portal.” She paused for a beat. “But the people who service the portals say there has been a lot of activity in the last few years. More and more each year.”
“Do we know why?” Lexi asked.
“The attendant who asked the fae, a year back, was killed for the question.” Zorn straightened. “No one else has dared. But given the other information we’ve been able to collect from various fae entering this realm—creatures as well, however they are getting through—we can assume the Celestials aren’t doing what they are supposed to do. I can believe there is one very clever, very powerful fae, but bands of them?” He shook his head. “This problem goes beyond Daisy. We’ve seen more death and violence recently, as well. The fae coming over are not trying as hard to fit in. The longer they are ignored, or the more that are let through, the bigger the problem we’ll face until their magic takes root. In which case…”
Disaster.
If that magic rooted and grew, it would change the face of their world. They were seeing the beginning stages. If they allowed this problem to linger, it would turn nasty in a hurry.
She nodded, waiting for more.
“We think we have a lead on her, but…” He put his fists on the table. “The fae that took her into the portal seemed to be from the Sapphire kingdom, given their skin was greenish. They smelled like…sea salt and kelp. The fae we saw on our cameras, when the body was dropped off on the lawn, didn’t match that description. We have multiple factions of fae interested in Daisy. We don’t know where she was taken.” He paused, and she could see his struggle to keep his emotions at bay. “We don’t know where to go to look for her.”
Lexi bit her lip. This was her piece of the puzzle. She could slip into spirit, leaving her body behind, and track a soul. Once she found it, she could figure out where the person was in the world. Time was of the essence, though. Leave the body behind for too long and it would die without its soul. It wouldn’t allow the soul to re-dock. Have someone else find her body without her soul in it, and they could kill her as easily as a sleeping person. Maybe more so, since she’d have to travel back to re-inhabit, and a sleeping person would just wake up. For those reasons, extra precautions were always required.
She wouldn’t have given a shit about those precautions the night Daisy was taken except for being in a moving vehicle. She’d never chased her body while in spirit. She didn’t want to try and fail—and die—when Daisy needed her. By the time she’d gotten home and safeguarded herself, Lexi couldn’t find Daisy’s soul. She could feel it, but it was a strange…echo, almost. Neither in existence nor gone. She hadn’t known what to make of it. Then the next day, the soul was gone entirely. Vanished.
Based on the time frame, they were guessing the echo must’ve been when Daisy had crossed the portal. In this worldbut…not. She wasn’t in the underworld—Lexi had checked. No one could hide a soul from her, save for Hades himself, and she knew the undertaker personally. Hades didn’t know what was going on.
Then, when her soul vanished, Lexi could only guess—dearly hope—that Daisy had crossed into Faerie, a place ruled by other gods. Older gods with a different spirit plane. One Daisy was hopefully not in. Lexi had to believe her kid was still alive. Shehadto believe she could still get Daisy back.
To do that, they had to go after her. Lexi desperately hoped she could track Daisy once in the other realm. They didn’t have time to blindly check several kingdoms. Daisy’s life was dependent upon Lexi’s being able to use her magic across the portal.
3
Daisy
Tarian climbedup onto the large beast after her. He scooted forward as far as he could, fitting into a groove between Stratow’s ribs and the start of his back. He then put his hand against her lower back and shoved, sliding her until she was basically bowing around Stratow’s head, with her legs curved around his thick neck and applying a lot of extra weight.
You weigh nothing,the beast countered within her mind.
“Grab his mane tightly,” Tarian said. “Really tight. If you feel like you’re going to fall off, think it as loudly as you can. Takeoff is dangerous for us on his back, and there aren’t usually two riders. The storms are the most dangerous of all, though he’ll afford us some protection through those, as will I.”
“Storms?” Daisy tried to look back at him as muscles bunched and moved beneath her. “What do you mean,storms?”
Images flashed through her mind of blistering lightning, turbulent skies, freezing cold, and rushing winds.
“Yes, I know what a storm is,” she said as Stratow huffed and clawed at the ground. “Why are we going to fly through one?”
“They are stormbacks. They create the storms. Now hold on tightly and squeeze with your legs. He has assured me that he won’t let you fall, but…do what you can to help.”
“Why is he assuring you? Why isn’t he assuringme?”
“He is. You’re just not understanding him.”
