Adam now saw that, since his arrival in the human realm, he'd been surrounded by elven guardians. His "mother" Sammi, Spence, Moira . . . when school was in session, they had been inseparable and made excuses or explanations for each other's "allergies." When Adam started working at the Yaz, Jimmy hired Spence the same day, even though there were several applicants more qualified.
Hmm. Looks like my best buddy has already been using elven magic to influence the human realm. Maybe that's why he made straight A's when I had a B average.
I'm going to have to talk to him about that. . . .
They seated themselves in the living room, Adam on the chair, the others on the couches. Spence took a seat to his left, looking grim, a disturbing sight on his otherwise light-hearted features.
"Something happened over at the Wintons' mansion last night," Spence began. "I don't think you've learned of it yet, and I wouldn't mention it now, except that it has a bearing on this Court."
Sammi leaned forward, glanced at the others, and said, "Adam, you didn't know about that?"
"About what?" he said. He didn't like the look his mother had at all. Moira looked interested, too. Apparently she hadn't heard the latest. "I knew there was a big party over there last night," Adam said, feeling like he'd been left out of a big secret. "We were there until things started getting a little out of hand."
" 'Out of hand' is not the phrase I would have chosen," Sammi said. "I was over there this afternoon, saw the results of last night." She looked at Adam, hesitating before continuing. "You wouldn't know what had happened, I suppose."
Spence said, "Several humans died. Steve was one of the victims."
"Died?" Adam said, horrified. "What
happened
over there last night?"
Sammi rummaged through her purse, pulled out some pictures, and handed them to Adam. "
This
is what happened. Not long after you left."
Adam took the pictures, started going through them. He got halfway through the stack before he stopped looking. The ones he saw sickened him; he had even known a few of the now-dead kids.
"Nineteen dead," Sammi said. "Or was it twenty? Your friend Daryl was the only survivor." She shook her head. "It wasn't a homicide, but I paid a little visit anyway, in part because you were involved, or almost involved. Good thing you left when you did."
Adam shrugged. "I never would have done the drugs in the first place," he said. "Neither would Moira or Spence."
Sammi's grin was wicked. "That's right, you wouldn't have. But if you had, I would have known. Spells. Like little alarms. I would have heard them a thousand miles away." She paused, reflecting. "I'll bet human mothers would appreciate something like that."
Adam didn't know what to think about those particular spells, but was glad Sammi had the foresight to place them.
As a human, I would have human weaknesses. No telling what might have happened if I'd been a little less resolute.
"I'm not concerned with the drugs, per se. Yes, they killed the humans. And yes, you were in the same house, but—"
Marbann interrupted, "The humans are not our concern. We are their superiors in every way," he said. The comment brought strange, accusing looks from all assembled.
"We have lived among the humans for some time," Spence said. He seemed visibly angered by Marbann's statements, but appeared to be holding it in. "We have even
become
humans, to a degree. It has been five human years since we Gated here. You have only arrived today."
"The humans are very much a part of our world now, Marbann," Sammi said. "It has been many years since I arrived here, but I do remember what my first impressions of this race are. I didn't much care for them. They enslaved their own kind, the ones with dark skin, though they later fought a great war over it. Slavery ended. The race improved. They are far from perfect, mind you, but . . ."
Sammi's words trailed off, as if she were seeking the right words to express herself.
"What I think Samantha is trying to say," Moira said, "is that humans are not the lesser race we once thought them to be."
Marbann didn't look convinced. "Are you telling me they are our equals?" he said, and looked around, seeking support for his side. He found none. "They only a live about hundred years. They have
no
possession of magic. They scoff at our existence, or anything else that doesn't fit neatly into their narrow sciences. They are cattle, so far as I am concerned." Marbann folded his arms resolutely.
"You forget, my dear Marbann," Sammi said ominously, "that King Aedham Tuiereann has lived among, and believed himself to be one of, these cattle, as you so indelicately call them. Where does that leave our new ruler?"
Flustered, Marbann replied hastily, "I meant no insult, Your Majesty. It's just that . . ."
"It's just that you're repeating the same line of
caca
we were taught in Underhill," Moira said. "We've been here long enough to know there is much to this race, which our kind has ignored for too long. Now we have been forced to learn about them, and we have even learned to appreciate them, in the course of our own preservation. Tell me, Marbann of Avalon, have you ever met a human? Have you even seen one?"
Marbann said nothing for a long moment and looked down at the carpet, avoiding everyone's eyes. "No, I have not," he said grudgingly. "I've only just arrived here." Then, "I have much to learn."
Adam remained quiet during the discussion, his mind returning to the previous evening at the Wintons' mansion.
It was Moira, Spence and I. Daryl was having a birthday party. The place felt wrong from the beginning, but we stayed anyway. I had a wine cooler. As the evening progressed, the human children starting acting stupid, which often happens at such parties, but there was something else underlying the stupidity. I knew then something bad was about to happen. Today when I talked to Daryl, who couldn't find his ass with both hands if he had to, I knew something bad
had
happened.
He regarded the Polaroids as if they were some sort of time machine; they had nothing like photography in Underhill, and even though he'd been in the human realm a few years, and photography and video had become commonplace in his human life, the technology seemed alien now.
All those humans dead. No, there's more to it than just an overdose of recreational drugs.
As he reviewed the events, he recalled some other strange occurrences the last few days, aside from his raging hormones and his lust for Moira. There was that stoned kid in the mall, and that black feeling he got from him. And then the experience in the vacant store.
The lost time. What happened back there? What else happened that I don't remember?
While Adam's thoughts trailed off, the conversation became chaotic, with everyone speaking at once. But he heard through the chaos something which seized his attention.
"Is it any surprise that the Unseleighe followed us here?" Samantha said loudly, clearly.
All conversation ceased.
"Go on," Adam said, intrigued. "I think you now have our ears."
Moira groaned, as if in response to a bad pun. But Adam had intended none.
"You do not know Zeldan Dhu as I do," Samantha said acidly. "Before our late King died, he told me of Zeldan and his family. Our ancestor killed his ancestor long ago. Our great-great-grandfather fought against his. They had been plotting the invasion for centuries. Zeldan Dhu had vowed to kill every last one of the Tuiereann family and will not hesitate to come here, to the human realm, to do it."
Marbann didn't seem convinced. "They could not have traced us back to this human city in this human time. The spell our late King and I wove was not detectable. It left no trails for our enemy to follow." He stubbornly folded his arms again, an action which was becoming irritating to Adam.
Is he forgetting who's King here?
Adam thought, holding his tongue and temper.
Spence said, "If the Unseleighe have pursued us here, what evidence have you?"
Again, that terrible silence fell in the room. Adam wondered if he should attempt to exert some royal influence to calm things down, assume a leadership role, but at the moment he didn't feel much like a leader. The transition to his true self left him a bit muddled, and he still didn't feel, well,
royal.
Not yet. His only link to royalty was his family, who were all dead except for Samantha.
Things were so much easier when I was a human kid. . . .
Samantha continued, "At the Wintons' mansion I felt Unseleighe magic."
Marbann stood up, his height towering over the others. "Certainly not here, milady . . ." he said, amid gasps of disbelief in the room. "We have only just arrived. I doubt the Unseleighe's ability to find us in a year, much less a day."
"We don't need Unseleighe to have evil around here," Moira said haughtily. "Humans do just fine all by themselves! Besides, there were enough bad boys and girls at the party last night to fill a prison. Losers. Troublemakers . . ."
Samantha calmly held a hand up, gently urging all to be silent and listen. Once the gesture restored order, she continued, "Granted, evil forces exist in abundance in the human world, but these forces are of a different flavor from Unseleighe evil. They are . . . human. For all the good humans do, they have their evil as well. As a human, I am an officer of the law, a profession I have chosen so that I can study the humans. With my authority, I have access to records that most humans do not. I can use this access to cover my elven identity should I need to. In this profession, I investigate crimes, murder mostly, and I am very good at it." She gestured toward the room, the house in general. "This is an above-average human abode. And none of this has been raised by magic. I earned it all, the old-fashioned human way."
" 'Abode'?" Marbann said, clearly confused.
"This
home.
This . . .
elfhame.
Our new one, for now. While I was at the Winton mansion, the magic I sensed was not human. It was Unseleighe."
"
Zeldan?
" Moira whispered.
"I don't think so. More likely a minion. I doubt he would have the courage to show himself, though I don't know how long they've been here in the humans' world."
Last night's close call made Adam shudder. Not only had he been a defenseless human, he was an oblivious one as well.
Perhaps they would have discovered me, perhaps not. The risk is still too great to repeat. But then, that was the whole idea of hiding my elven identity under a wrapping of humanity.
"Where
are
they?" Spence asked. "Among us?"
Then, it all became clear to the new King. "They're here, all right. In Dallas."
Samantha stared at him. "Do tell, young King," she said. "Have you encountered them already?"
Adam straightened himself up in the chair; he had begun to slouch. While he did this, he gathered his thoughts.
How to put this?
"I think that what I encountered was their results," Adam said. "First, I ran across a young human, stoned on some drug, in the Marketplace. He said, and I think I have this down correctly: 'It's like, the sky opened up, and Gabriel tore loose with horns of brass,' " Adam began, feeling his voice change to match that of the stoned boy's, a pitch higher, and slurred. " 'And Armageddon was here. And the black Eagle saw the ruined castle, and all the dead within waited for the mighty to take the palace.'
"Then he looked at me, and said, 'And you were there. And you did not die.' "
Adam considered this, remembering something now that he didn't before . . . because it hadn't happened yet.
The black Eagle. Ruined palace . . .
Fear rippled through him.
He couldn't have known!
Adam leaped to his feet.
"Gods, Samantha. That boy described the Dream. The Dream I just had! How did he—?"
Marbann said, "Do not confuse time, young King. What is before and after, here in the human realm, does not fall necessarily in that order in Underhill."
"He's right," Sammi said softly. "Was he Unseleighe? Would you have known?"
"No, I . . . don't think so."
The boy was Cory, and I've known him for years. But I guess that doesn't really mean much.
Samantha looked uncomfortable, as if a disturbing thought just came to her. "You said the boy was stoned. On what?"
Adam returned to his seat, feeling reassured, though he did not quite grasp the time concept Marbann was trying to explain.
"Black Dream," Adam said.
The black-stoppered vial.
"The boy was on Black Dream."
Samantha exhaled loudly. When Adam looked up, she had her face in her hands.
"That's the drug you warned me about," Adam said. "Was that the drug that killed all those humans last night?" It was a wild guess, but his hunch was unusually strong.
I knew there was something different, evil and magical, about that envelope.
"So that's
why,
" Samantha said cryptically. "It's been on the street for a year, but it has to be."
"My dear lady, you are making little sense," Marbann said. "If this is a human
drug,
it is a human
problem.
"
Samantha glared at him. "There lies the problem.
It isn't a human drug
."
"The Unseleighe," Moira said. "Zeldan. That's his style, all right. A
year
, you say?"
"At least. Narco has been going crazy lately with a new wave of the stuff, particularly after last night at the Wintons'. I think Black Dream is responsible for the deaths. And Black Dream has been around since last summer."
Marbann of Avalon yawned.
"A year," Adam said. "The time—"
"—doesn't matter here," Moira said. "The human realm doesn't intersect with Underhill on any level. Five human years ago, relative to you, you Gated. Marbann has only just arrived, but left immediately after you and Samantha did, am I correct?"
Marbann nodded. "You are. For me, the King . . . died only moments ago."
"So it is possible," Adam said, "that the Unseleighe have been here not only a year, but perhaps longer."