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I really wanted to tell him about the obsidian shards, but since I hadn’t even reported them to Qianru I really couldn’t. “Not very productive to tell the truth. The new method my patroness started doesn’t seem to be having the results she’d hoped for.” Qianru had seemed unconcerned that the chimeras would hurt people, but there was no way those fanged creatures we saw were harmless. I really hoped she hadn’t been expecting them.

He waved his hand again and the barmaid vanished into the kitchen. “I cannot say I am terribly surprised. It has been many years, mind you, but I seem to recall that most of the city itself was further in. The area you’re in was more…farmland.” The pause told me he was going to say something else, but thought better of sharing.

“So, what was really out there?” I leaned forward in case he didn’t want others to hear what he was going to say, but also just because it was nice to be close to him.

My questions were interrupted by a small parade. Both barmaids and Amara were coming through with platters filled with food. Well, the barmaids held platters, Amara actually held a small gravy bowl. But she directed the other two on placement of all the food, dished appropriate amounts onto each of our plates—appropriate for an army at any rate—and added the gravy over most of it. Then she stood there beaming.

“Thank you, lovely lady. This repast looks, and smells, like food fit for a God.” Glorinal bowed from his seated position and took a bite.

Her smile got wider and she turned toward me. I wasn’t even sure if I liked her yet, but it was clear I needed to appease her before I could get to eating. Liking her or not was becoming moot since the smells coming from my plate were heavenly. “Thank you for this lovely meal. It will be very much enjoyed.” I wasn’t near as gracious as Glorinal, but it was as good as she was getting.

The smile she gave me wasn’t quite as wide, but she obviously was happy enough and went back to her kitchen.

My plan had been to talk to Glorinal about his people and maybe also find out more about him. But the food was so wonderful that all of us, the girls included, ate in almost complete silence.

It was almost scary how silent the entire pub had become as dinners had been brought out.

Foxy came by, beaming at everyone and their food. “I don’t be knowing how I survived without Amara and her cooking.”

I was enjoying my food, but there were other Amara issues still tickling the back of my mind. “This is great, Foxy, really it is. But do we know anything more about that troll?” I dropped my voice a bit; the silence in the pub was disturbing. “And what did you guys do with the body?”

“I took care of the latter.” Glorinal dabbed the corners of his mouth as he spoke. He’d done an impressive job on the food, not that myself or the girls had been slackers, mind you. But he ate like someone who’d not eaten for weeks. He must have been doing some heavy magic for whoever he worked for. Covey told me magic users could starve to death if they weren’t careful as the stronger spells took too much energy from their life force. “Let’s just say I was able to get him somewhere he’ll never be found.”

“And we are eternally grateful, fair elf.” Amara had snuck up behind Foxy and slipped in under his arm before I even noticed she was there. “As for why he was here, I am afraid it is as I told you the night of the attack. My former captor wants me back and will stop at nothing to either recapture me or kill me.”

Foxy allowed himself a few mindless moments of doe-eyed staring, then turned to Glorinal. “Aye, that’s the truth of it, and we was a wonderin’ if we could hire you for some magic? Just a little to help guard the pub until I can get a magicsmith in?”

If I hadn’t been doing some serious staring myself at Glorinal, I might have missed the look of panic that flashed across his face. It vanished in a second, so maybe I’d just imagined it.

“Ah, alas, I have come down with a magic bug, the Krillian flu, I believe.” He held up his hand to forestall worry. “Fear not, the contagion level is almost non-existent. Most likely I was exposed on my journey here and the events of the other night triggered it.” He leaned forward and motioned all of us in closer. “I don’t want it spread around, and I am very capable of protecting myself without magic, but I’d rather people not know. It could be a week or so before my magic comes back.”

He said it with a bit of wounded pride, but he wasn’t feeling sorry for himself. He just trusted us with his secret and didn’t want Foxy to think he was refusing to help. I swooned a little inside.

The faeries heard everything and immediately swarmed him. “We help!” was being chirped so fast and so often I wasn’t sure if more than just my three were saying it.

They had a point, even if they were driving me crazy with how they were stating it. Or they might. One of the reasons Covey never hated the girls was that in some of the elven scrolls that had been translated long ago there was a little statement on faeries helping magic users. Covey studied magic users and the fact faeries could help them raised them up in her eyes.

I looked toward Glorinal, happy that my little drunken miscreants could be good for something.

But he shook his head sadly. “Alas, tiny ones, this is a strain that you can’t help with. I appreciate your offer though. This will just have to pass on its own.”

I’d have to take his word for it. There weren’t too many magic users in Beccia as strong as him, so he probably had a better idea than most what would work. The Krillian flu must be quite powerful.

The girls looked hurt, but then he started petting them and all was right in their little drunken world again.

Foxy and Amara went back to their work, and the girls went to go find a bottle of ale of their own. I was finally going to get to talk to Glorinal about his people, the Breaking, and more importantly—him.

Then the door burst in and a very drunk chataling stumbled in. One who had just commandeered residence in my home and as long as I knew him had never been drunk.

Chapter Eleven

Harlan stumbled into the pub, then spun around as if he was looking for someone but trying not to seem like he was. He stopped spinning when he spotted me.

What was I going to do with him? Either he was drunk, which was doubtful by the practiced way he’d found me. Or, worse, he’d had an idea or epiphany that he felt was worthy of interrupting me. Or he’d managed to burn my house down and was coming to tell me.

“Do you know this person?” Glorinal wasn’t looking pleased as Harlan got closer.

I winced and tried to force a smile. “Yes, unfortunately my cousin has come stay with me for a while. He’s adopted.” Not that that wouldn’t be obvious, but I didn’t know what else to say. “I’m afraid he has a serious drinking problem. And he hates being around people, so I’m sure he’ll leave quickly.” I said the last part loud enough for Harlan to hear. Hopefully he’d take the hint.

“Ahh, Cousin Taryn, I wondered where’d you’d gone.” He slid into the only empty seat at the table. “I’ve got a—oh, who is this?”

I rolled my eyes. “This is my friend, Glorinal. Glorinal meet my cousin Sheplock. Shep, meet Glorinal.” Harlan hadn’t established his persona’s name and looked less than pleased with my choice. Good.

“Hello, you’re an elf.” Harlan’s drunk act waivered as his excitement at meeting a real elf temporarily overwhelmed him. Of course he also shot me a quick menacing glare for not telling him I had met a real elf and was actually joining him for dinner. I’d explain the whole romantic date concept to him later on.

“Yes, yes I am.” Glorinal didn’t wrinkle his nose at Harlan, but he did successfully dodge Harlan’s attempt at a handshake.

“I’ll explain everything to you later, Sheplock. Why are you here? I know how hard it is for you to be in crowds.” I needed to get Harlan out of here before I blew what could be a wonderful relationship defending his persona’s honor. The logic of that sounded weird even in my head.

“I think we have a problem with the house. The faeries are missing…oh, there you are!”

I knew he knew where the girls were—he’d told me they were coming here. I also knew that he hadn’t come all the way here, risking exposure of his persona, to find them. Which meant something else had been about to come out of his mouth before he realized Glorinal was an elf.

Which meant I wasn’t going to find out what he really came for anytime soon, at least not from him.

Harlan ignored my attempt to pierce his head with my glare and waved the faeries over. “Come along, ladies, we should get back home.” The girls were full of booze and food and tumbled happily into his jacket pocket. He nodded to Glorinal, who barely acknowledged him, then nodded and winked at me. He was just turning toward the door, when he froze and cocked his head, then turned back to me. “Oh, I almost forgot. That lady you worked for sent a message, saying she’d be needing you in the morning. Something about broken pieces.” With that he stumbled, in a not terribly convincing manner, out the door.

My gut dropped. First off, she’d been pretty set on not having me come in on Saturday. Granted, she never said that, but she could have told me to come in before she left this morning. Secondly, I hadn’t told anyone about the shards, not even her. Which meant she must have gone back to the site and found something that I had missed.

Damn.

“I am so sorry, Glorinal. But if she wants me at the dig site….” I let the words trail off at the look on his face. He looked annoyed and confused, but his eyes were on Harlan’s departing form.

He shook his head and returned to me with a smile. “It is I who am sorry. I had hopes of a longer acquaintance this evening and perhaps a picnic tomorrow afternoon.” He kissed my hand and looked up into my eyes. It was amazing what peering through eyelashes did, especially when you had eyes like his. I all but melted and was about to ignore Qianru’s command.

“Maybe I’ll get done early?” I couldn’t help it, I was trying to get to know this man, at least find out about his people, and the Universe itself seemed to be fighting me on it.

“Perhaps. If that is the happy outcome I will meet you here and we can at least speak of my people. I know you have many questions.”

Yeah, like what my name was again. I smiled and pulled back my hand. I really had pissed off some deity for them to keep dangling such an amazing man in front of me, then keep pulling me away from him.

I waved to Foxy, who was in a heated discussion with a tribe of gnomes—most likely they were trying to get a group discount on their ale—and headed home.

The walk was only about fifteen minutes, but that was plenty of time to get my mind all worked up. Qianru had left the dig early, with stuff of her own to do, so why would she have gone back? And the shards weren’t just lying about. Granted, I hadn’t gone into the holes themselves, but I had been shifting through the dirt that erupted out of them. And while I knew she was capable of doing that, I just couldn’t see Qianru digging in dirt.

Which meant she’d gone back with another digger after dark had fallen. All of the lovely food of Amara’s churned up in my stomach as the scenario played out. As if that wasn’t enough, then my paranoid mind switched to what Harlan had really come to tell me at the pub. It wasn’t the faeries, nor even Qianru’s missive—but something important enough to make him come to the pub, but then balk at telling me in front of Glorinal. My stomach was really chewing things up by the time I got to my very oddly disguised front door.

Harlan was really going to have to take that down. Now.

I started to push my way in, when I heard talking.

I paused and placed my ear near the door. I could only one voice, Harlan, but it was clear he wasn’t talking to himself.

“You need to come clean about this now. We can’t have you all wandering about willy-nilly.” The person he spoke to said something too low to hear. “And no more shenanigans, this is simply enough. Alric, if that’s who you really are, you need to stop messing around.”

Alric? That man had more lives than a magically spelled cat.

Harlan had his back to me when I came in, which left me facing the very heavily cloaked figure he was arguing with. “What were you talking about at the pub? And who in the hell are you?” I looked around for the faeries in case I needed back-up, but from the ripping snores coming from their little castle they were asleep like tiny drunken sailors on their first shore leave.

“Ah, excellent.” Harlan turned around and the smile he flashed wasn’t a good sign. “I knew telling you of your patroness’ fictitious demands would pull you away from that elf.”

“Fictitious? What do you mean, fictitious?” He had lied to me? I figured Alric, if that was really who was under all that fabric, was going to get an earful tonight from me. I was sick of these games he kept playing even if he’d been taken out of my house against his will the last time. It was still his fault. But if Harlan ruined my date for no reason, I might just have to change plans. Even if I had known Alric was hiding in my house again, I wouldn’t have ditched Glorinal.

“Elf? What elf?” The annoyance and worry in that voice definitely sounded like Alric.

Harlan raised both paws and motioned toward the sofa. “Please, sit so we can discuss this.”

I didn’t move except to cross my arms and tilt my head. “So you lied to me while I was on a date. You have taken this miscreant into my home. You have taken over my home. And you want me to sit down and nicely talk about things?” I turned and waggled a finger at Alric. “And you, whoever you are, take that damn thing off or so help me I will wake up those girls and let them at you. If you are Alric, you’ll be pleased to know they pretty much hate you now.”

“It’s crucial you tell me everything about this elf. He is really an elf? Or do you think he is just a disguised magic user of another type? When did he first come to town? What is he doing here?” The cloaked figure didn’t move but the barrage of questions, and the underlying tone of annoyance, told me that it was definitely Alric.

“I’m not telling either of you anything until both of you are honest about what the hell is going on, and you take off that damn cloak.” I went to take my comfy chair. Harlan was standing by it as if that had been his plan, but I had had enough. “And I’m sitting because I’m tired, not because some over-grown cat told me to.”

Chatalings were very, very distantly related to domestic housecats, but they didn’t like being reminded of it. The low growl I got in response made me smile.

Alric, or the cloaked figure pretending to be Alric, still hadn’t budged however. “I need you both to swear by all you hold dear and holy that you will not tell anyone of what I am going to show you.”

“Look, you’re not in a position—”

“I mean it, Taryn. I will walk out that door and you will never get the answers you want. You’ll spend these last few weeks of survival wondering what happened.”

That got both Harlan and my attention. Last few weeks? Alric was known for creative omission of details and outright lies. But the tone of his voice sounded like neither. He obviously needed us for something. Something that could prevent the end of the world. Again. Yet, he would go out that door and never come back if we didn’t agree to his terms.

I settled back in my chair. The tone of his voice and the whole ‘few remaining weeks of survival’ bit got me. Anytime I could extend my life past a few weeks I was going to be all for it. “Agreed. I will not tell anyone about this.”

Harlan was still giving off a low growl, but it was aimed at Alric. “You say you’re Alric, but you smell off. Different somehow. How do I know we’re not promising to keep the secret of a killer or madman?”

The laughter that came from Alric had no mirth to it. “I am Alric. I am also a murderer and a madman depending on who you speak to. Do you agree not to talk of what I will show and tell you? Only if I am Alric will your word be binding.”

The fur on the back of Harlan’s neck ruffled up a bit, but he stalked over to the sofa and took a seat anyway. “Agreed.”

Alric didn’t sit, but slowly began unwrapping his cloak, and the swaths of fabric he had on under the cloak. Who had kidnapped him and what had they done to him? I was preparing for a horrific sight and was steeling myself not to feel sorry for him, when the final bit of fabric covering his face dropped. I was too shocked to even gasp.