Amber Moon

By

C.L. Bevill

Amber MoonPublished by C.L. Bevill at Smashwords

Copyright 2010 by Caren L. Bevill

Chapter One

The prophecy of the elfish Court says that when the half breed prince meets his match in both magic and flesh, the court shall flourish…

“He doesn’t look like an elf,” came the usual sardonic comment. “I thought elves were short, really short. Big ears, big noses. Wings, too. Doesn’t look like he has wings under that silk shirt.”

Mirie looked through the high powered binoculars and thought that the man that they were watching was powerful with leanly corded muscles. The pale blue silk shirt he was wearing showed every ripple of his physique. Mirie had seen her fair share of handsome men, but Samson Anarion was easily the forerunner on her top ten list. He had long hair, as straight as night, and as unfathomably dark as sin. It fell to the area between his shoulder blades when it was loose and when it was tied back, as it was now, it looked positively wicked. He was a tall man, standing well over six feet, but it was his face that was the most arresting. His cheekbones slashed to his chin and his eyes were the color of diamonds, sharply stunning, dynamic, and utterly enthralling. It was an attractive face even with a slicing white scar that ripped through one of his eyebrows, crossed over his eye and faded down his cheek, intersecting with the well-defined cheekbone.

He looked like an elfish pirate.“I don’t see how anyone can think he’s human,” she murmured to Jack Drake, her

partner on the surveillance team.Jack was tall, and gray eyed as well, but he was rough and hewn from stone, a

man who was on a mission, and nothing else. His hair was the color of silver, prematurely gray, but he had once said it had always been that color. And he was only a few years older than Mirie. He was also utterly human and full of arrogance and declaration. “He’s a pretty boy,” he said lowly. “For a fairy.”

“Elf,” Mirie corrected. “A prince of the High Court. Son of the king. He’s an eighth son, however. And half human by all reports. His mother was quite beautiful and very human. Still, they trust him in this world to take care of business investments.”

Jack scowled and Mirie sensed it without looking at her partner. He didn’t think much of otherworldly creatures, whether they were vampire, werewolf, or elf. If he knew what she was, she wasn’t sure if he would continue to trust her. Jack had issues with the paranormal, and for good reason, considering that his family had been slaughtered by something otherworldly, leaving him an orphan when he was twelve years old. The Committee had taken him in, and as an adult, trained him to be a field agent, just as they had Mirie. Mirie had come by her skills in a different manner, albeit more mysteriously.

“They come from another plane of existence,” Jack said grimly. “Yet they want to do business in our world, unbeknownst to the general public. What do they invest in? Stocks and bonds? Microsoft? It doesn’t seem right.”

“The elves don’t cause harm to humans. You need to read your research briefings better.” Mirie glanced at Jack and then back at Samson Anarion. They were perched on a roof top five hundred yards away from Anarion’s penthouse suite. Anarion had come out onto his luxurious patio in order to perform his daily exercises. He stripped off the silk shirt and Mirie got another look at his toned and compelling form. She also got a look at the rash of white scars across his back. Fully a dozen crisscrossed his skin, and gave him the appearance of a man who had been whipped into near death.

“They have their own agenda,” Jack said. “Not one that supports humans. If it comes down to them or us, they’re going to screw us over every time.”

Mirie shrugged. She didn’t think elves were the worst of the otherworldly creatures that walked in humanity’s shadows. Vampires, shapeshifters, djinns, and ghouls were all worse in that they preyed on the human population. Often they left only pools of blood and bizarre questions for clueless, unauthorized authorities. Only the mysterious Committee, of which Mirie was an active field agent, made advancements to protect the human race. The Committee had numbers of paranormal experts and field agents and an agenda that Mirie mostly agreed with. But there were always exceptions.

Moving into a more comfortable position, she braced the binoculars on the edge of the building. Jack shifted uneasily beside her. He could see Anarion’s figure and didn’t need the binoculars to understand that their quarry was performing his exercises on his outdoor patio. Mirie took a deep breath and watched Anarion move with precision and skill. The routine seemed like a combination of Tai Chi and Karate, but she had an idea that it was really an Elfish martial art that required superior concentration. Anarion moved in a manner that men could not. He jumped higher, his kicks went on longer, and a leather punching bag on the patio appeared as though it would soon need to be replaced because it was very well worked.

It was the third time she had watched Anarion do his practice, but she still stared, fascinated. After forty minutes of elaborate exercise, he stopped to take a deep breath, his chest heaving with exertion, and he looked directly at Mirie. A tiny smile crossed his face and she suddenly knew that he was aware of their observation, that he had been aware of them for some time. She nearly dropped the binoculars. Then she noticed something else.

“Is he looking at us?” Jack said quietly.“Yes,” Mirie said immediately. “And he’s got the artifact.”Jack perked up immediately. “On him, now?”“It’s his belt buckle.” The two faceted amber gemstones mounted on a golden

plate decorated the belt at Anarion’s waist. “The Eyes of the Amber Moon has been molded to be a fashion utensil.” Mirie brought the binocs back up to Anarion’s face and saw that he was still watching her. She knew that the elves had superior vision, but it seemed as though he wasn’t surprised that they were there. Furthermore, she thought she could see a touch of triumph in his expression. Uneasiness filled her

being. Elves didn’t like unnecessary attention to their activities and the Committee had squabbled with them before. “Uh-oh. Jack. Time to go. He’s too unassuming.”

Mirie jumped to her feet, damning herself for her gullibility. Elves knew things; some were clairvoyant. How he had known they were watching him wasn’t a huge question to answer, but it meant that obtaining the Eyes of the Amber Moon would be all the more difficult.

They had use of clairvoyants themselves. One of their best had said that the Eyes of the Amber Moon was connected with the Elfish princeling. Consequently they had set up a loose surveillance of Samson Anarion, the half-elf who lived like a wealthy lord in the city of angels.

The first part of the otherworldly triumvirate had been acquired by Isabella Morgan a month before. The thought had made Mirie smile because she knew that Isabella was a diehard bibliophile. The Book of the Black Moon had been retrieved from a werewolf clan who didn’t have a clue what they had possessed. On the other hand, Isabella had reputedly nearly died at the werewolves’ hands and had been saved by the bite of one of the cat clan’s most fearsome warriors. The Committee didn’t mind that one of their librarians was now a shapeshifter, but they did mind about her impending marriage to the same warrior and her resulting resignation from the Committee.

It didn’t matter to Mirie either. Isabella deserved her happiness and if a werejaguar was the cause of it, then power to her and her newfound love. Mirie just hoped for an invite to the wedding. She’d never been around a shapeshifter clan and she was very interested in the prospect.

If she managed to make it through the rest of this particular day. “Head in the game, kid,” Jack muttered. “Evacuation plan Alpha Charlie. Meet you at Starbucks in ten.”

Mirie gathered up her sparse equipment and cast a glance at the Elfish prince again. Anarion was still staring at her. If she wasn’t mistaken, he wasn’t looking at Jack at all. He was staring at her. Only her.

Even across the distance between the two buildings their eyes connected. For a long, endless moment she could feel herself falling into those diamond colored eyes. A shiver of sensation billowed down her back and made goose bumps appear on the skin of her arms. An odd sensation of power and sensuality coursed over her as if they had an intimate linking. The expression on his face wasn’t discernable without the binocs, but Mirie knew that his shoulders suddenly straightened and he stepped toward her, as if he could reach out and touch her trembling flesh.

Mirie knew what Anarion was seeing and she didn’t imagine that her appearance abruptly riveted him. She was a young woman in her late twenties, apparently human, with pale blonde hair twisted efficiently into a French braid at the back of her head. The clothing was simple and utilitarian serving. A nondescript T-shirt covered her shapely top and pencil legged jeans her bottom. The autumn day had allowed a leather jacket that ended at her trim waist. A black pack sat on her back.

Jack murmured, “Oh, crap.”Mirie finally broke away from Anarion’s intent gaze to glance over her shoulder

and saw the Elfish trio of bodyguards was positioned at the stairway entrance to the rooftop they were standing on. All three topped Jack’s six feet two inches and were

as broad as barns. All held elaborately decorated weapons of some form or another. One had a katana style knife. One had a broadsword. The third held nunchucks. Their intense expressions revealed that not only that they knew how to use the weapons, but that they were ready to do so at the slightest provocation. “Shit,” she said.

“Evacuation plan Bravo Charlie?” Jack ventured with a quick grin at her. He adjusted the pack on his back, ensuring that the buckles were secured.

Mirie glanced downward and swallowed. Heights were fine and dandy as long as she was standing on something solid. Thirty floors up were great as long as one stayed on the building. She looked across to Anarion again and saw that his hands were braced on the retaining wall of his exterior patio. She couldn’t make out his expression but his body language appeared consternated; it was almost as though he had an idea of what they intended and was concerned for their safety. No, her safety.

“You first,” Mirie said with a quaver. Maybe if Jack went first and the bodyguards started toward them, then she wouldn’t hesitate.

Jack blinked at her.“Stop!” one of the bodyguards yelled. Mirie looked at the elf with an expression

of distaste. Thirty feet away and closing fast, they had figured out that Jack and Mirie didn’t exactly need to use the stairs and the elevator.

“As if,” she said. I can do this, she told herself.Jack spun and jumped off the side of the building.Mirie was a heartbeat behind him. She stepped back two steps to make sure of

the clearance from the side of the building. She didn’t want to slam into the glass windows below, nor did she want to fall into Jack. She heard him yell from below. There was a distant whoosh that indicated the compact parachute on his back had deployed.

Simultaneously there was the pounding of footsteps behind her. The bodyguards were to capture them and ascertain their threat level. It was possible they’d been onto the two agents from the first day and curious as to their intent. Mirie knew that meant that Anarion’s pretty patio was ensorcelled from weapons. That meant that the elf court valued his life more than the Committee had deduced.

Mirie had no time left. She let loose with her legs and took one step before she plowed into a figure that hadn’t been there before. Anarion let her bounce off his hard figure without so much as a grunt. It was like hitting a wall. She counterbalanced with her legs and attempted to go to one side. He stepped to the side even as she did. His hands actually went up to her shoulders to help steady her, but she wasn’t standing still for him. Mirie went backwards so fast, she nearly tripped.

But she wasn’t down. She turned the motion into her advantage, whirling her body around and kicking up at the same time, the side of her heavy boot coming in contact with the jaw of the nearest bodyguard. The second one came in with full speed, his sword turned to the flat side, determined on disabling her. Effortlessly, she shifted to one side and he flew past her even as the first one hit the deck.

The third one checked, his black eyes darting toward Anarion. Mirie sidled to the left, so she could see both elves. If she could get off the roof, she could make it to

the street. The Committee wasn’t jazzed on agents getting caught by their subjects. But the Elfish court wasn’t jazzed about the mostly human group spying on them, either.

Anarion suddenly smiled at her and his attractive face became indescribable. Mirie was caught in his gaze for a moment. He’d teleported to the building from his. It was a bit of intel that the Committee didn’t have before. It meant that while Anarion was half-human, he was still one of the more powerful elves. Eighth son or not, he was a potent elf, and they were making certain he stuck around for the interim. His gemstone eyes glittered at Mirie. “Who are you?” he said and his voice was throaty and lyrical at the same time, not a hint of an Elfish accent.

“Just checking the roof,” Mirie snapped back. The bodyguard to her side, the one with the nunchucks, was trying to corral her between the one who had almost body checked her and Anarion. “Earthquakes in the area and all that.”

Anarion snorted.Mirie didn’t like being herded. She feinted left and moved to her right. One of

her arms shifted inside her jacket and in the next second a ten inch blade appeared in her hand. It glowed with a dim violet light that was equal to the color of her eyes. It was her only protection and one she wouldn’t use lightly. It was a distinctive weapon that had been created with her blood and tears by a Master Warlock who worked for the Committee. Mirie had worked on her immediate boss, Nehemiah, for weeks in order to get him to agree to the blade. It had been worth the effort; the weapon hadn’t let her down yet.

“Witch blade,” Anarion breathed. The bodyguard with the nunchucks froze for an instant. The other one with the katana knife moved into position on Anarion’s side; the weapon was raised on a forty-five degree angle to the ground, ready to strike immediately.

Unexpectedly Mirie was overwhelmed by the scent of lavender and clover and sunshine, all wrapped up into one. It caught her by surprise and her eyes went wide. She backed up another step and shook her head slightly to clear her head. The Committee wasn’t going to appreciate that their surveillance had gone so far south. Furthermore, if she had to kill one of the Elfish court to free herself because of her inability to focus, they were probably going to put her in a magicked cage or have her working in the lowest basement for the next thirty years. Or worse they would give her to the Elfish court for their brand of retribution.

“Is she a witch?” said Nunchucks with a grim tone. The word ‘witch’ was said with the denotation of something truly evil.

“Kill her,” said Katana Knife definitively.Anarion inhaled deeply. His muscled chest expanded exponentially. His face

turned to the breeze wafting across Mirie and toward him. “Not a witch. Something else. Something very interesting.” He shook his head in an apparent mimicry of hers.

Mirie took another step back. By this time Jack was on the ground and realizing that Mirie wasn’t with him. He would be calling for reinforcements. All Mirie had to do was refrain from killing anyone and from revealing what her mission entailed, and rescue would be coming within minutes.

“Tell me who you are,” Anarion said and his voice was a breathy incantation. He was using all his power to influence Mirie.

Mirie edged to the side and Anarion mirrored her moment. She brought the enchanted blade around and Nunchucks growled at her. She used the moment and feinted again. They should have learned. The unconscious elf was falling to the ground before she put both feet to the ground again.

“Obviously, I need to reassess my security,” Anarion said with a wry grimace.Katana Knife said, “Sire, you should return to the hold. There’s no telling what

one like this could do.”“Maybe you shouldn’t back a girl into a corner,” Mirie countered. “Then she

wouldn’t have to put you down.” There wasn’t enough room to run to the side of the roof and Katana Knife looked really pissed off.

Anarion looked considering. “Just tell us who you are and why you’re watching me.”

“Would you believe I’m a journalist?” Mirie asked mirthlessly.“No,” he said shortly. “A beautiful woman who crackles with inner power, one

who has the influence to control a witch blade, a weapon with intense energy, isn’t just merely a human with a hack job.”

“Hey, I have friends who are reporters,” she snapped. “They’re not all cockroaches.”

Katana Knife inched closer.Mirie shot him an ugly look. “Don’t. I’ll put this blade right through your boss’s

throat.”Anarion cursed at her words. One hand slashed the air in front of him in a stern

gesture. “Don’t, Laris. She doesn’t mean the threat.”Obviously Laris was Katana Knife’s name. He didn’t look away from Mirie’s face.

The snarl on his face was the answer to her verbal threat. Mirie didn’t blink. It was true that she didn’t mean the threat, but how had Anarion known that? The Elfish nobility had certain well known powers. Some were clairvoyants. Some of the more powerful could teleport as Anarion had done. Others were known to be able to raise great magicks. But the Committee had zilch on Anarion. As far as they were concerned he was a lower level son with an artifact that they wished to acquire before it could be used to end the world. He wasn’t a telepath or he wouldn’t be asking questions at all.

Mirie slowly appraised her options. Clearly Anarion didn’t want to let her go without finding out what he wanted to know. And the elves weren’t known to be all warm and fuzzy about humans sticking their noses in Elfish business.

Her eyes flickered to the belt buckle. Perhaps she could take the prince hostage and simply take the Eyes of the Amber Moon. The thought very nearly made her chuckle. Anarion wasn’t going to let her ‘take’ anything. Certainly not the Eyes and certainly not him. In addition if she turned her head for even a split second, Laris was going to be on her like stink on a pig.

One of the two unconscious elves groaned. Mirie really didn’t have any more time. She pretended another movement that she knew Laris wouldn’t fall for and then instead of pulling out of the ploy she continued through with the movement, her speed otherworldly and a recognizable clue to her nonhuman status.

“Of course I mean the threat,” she lied baldly as the witch blade twisted through the air. What Mirie actually meant was to take the bodyguard out before the other

two woke up and hope that Anarion wasn’t going to practice some of his Elfish karate on her.

But there was an abrupt crack of noise that made her wince. And then the witch blade fell from Mirie’s hand mid-movement. It fell as if slow motion, turning over and over before striking the surface of the roof and bouncing once. She couldn’t comprehend the actuality of the event. There was a pounding noise that nearly deafened her that was followed by a hoarse murmur emitted from her throat.

Her eyes came to rest on Anarion. It was his Elfish name. Samson was the human add on so that he could sign paperwork that appeared aboveboard in this particular realm. Anarion suited him. He watched with his glittering gemstone eyes as her blade dropped from her hand. Then his insistent gaze followed her other hand as it went to her chest. A burning insistence there called incessantly for her attention.

Curiously Mirie drew her hand back and was shocked to see it dripping with garnet clarity. Lucidity came to her. Someone had shot her. It was high in the chest on one side, making her right hand and arm useless. Silly Mirie. She’d brought a knife to a gunfight, but she hadn’t known it was a gunfight. Her head twisted and saw one of the downed bodyguards with a lethal pistol held capably in his hand. Lying prone on the rooftop, only feet from her, and his gun was aimed for center of mass on her body, ready for the killing shot. His eyes studied her, trying to read whether he needed to shoot her again.

The inane thought that Mirie had was, I knew I should have worn the ensorcelled body armor.

But Laris didn’t need or want that moment of assessment. The bodyguard was moving toward her, his katana knife held adroitly to make the takedown and Mirie’s perspective was twisting. The world was rising or she was sinking. There was a roar of noise that didn’t sound like another gunshot and Anarion was there.

With her eyes as wide as saucers, Mirie observed as Anarion ripped the katana knife from Laris’s hand and threw it off the roof. A blur of insensible repositioning followed and the gun was kicked from the prone bodyguard’s hand. Then Mirie was looking up from the ground and the clouds were whipping past.

His stunning face was suddenly there, staring down at her. The scar that ripped across his eyebrow, eye, and face was white with strain. The remainder of his visage filled with horror and concern, and Mirie didn’t quite get it. If the security threat was no longer a worry, what was the problem?

“What are you?” he said urgently. Ah, the question changed, Mirie comprehended. He could see it in her eyes, her pale violet eyes that weren’t like any human eyes that could be found.

“Huldufolk,” she said without thinking. The word was Icelandic for hidden folk. “My mother was one of them, until she married an Icelandic man.” She thought she added on the words, but they were barely a whisper of noise. She silently added the rest, Before they were murdered by their own kind for their alleged transgressions.

There was another movement that she couldn’t follow with her eyes. Anarion gathered her into his arms and the motion made the burn inside her intensify. The pain made her want to scream with agony. “Thank the Gods,” he muttered in her ear.

Then the world blurred away.

Chapter Two

When violet and diamond meet the prophecy has begun…

Mirie woke up with a scream. She scrambled out of the bed looking for enemies and found a black and white cat that also scrambled away under a piece of furniture. She quickly scanned the room and found…no one. There were no threats to her. There wasn’t anyone else there.

It was a distinguished room. The curtains were embroidered silk. The rug was hand-woven and older than written history. The bed had ebony wood posters and rails. The bedspread, which was now on the floor, was some kind of shimmering black material that looked as soft as down. The windows were open and a soft breeze was being pulled in by a huge overhead fan. Everything was antique or high end or expensive. It was like being inside a movie set, about as diametrically opposed from her small studio apartment as it could get.

Curiously, Mirie went to the window and looked outside. It was daylight with the sun coming up in the east. There was a forest beyond the window that stretched out endlessly. Wherever she was she had been out of it for over twelve hours, perhaps closer to twenty-four. It had been early afternoon when Jack and she had surveilled the elf prince.

Memory came back with an immediacy that would have brought her to her knees if she hadn’t been hanging on the window ledge. Her hand went to her chest and found nothing there. Under a silk night gown that was the same violet color as her eyes and the witch blade, her chest was whole and unmarked. Mirie grimaced and pinched her arm viciously.

The pain and almost immediate bruising informed her that she wasn’t walking in a dream world induced by sorcery. The world she stood in was real.

Her pale hair spilled over her shoulders, unbraided. Her arms were bared by the spaghetti straps of the night gown. Her toes peeped nonchalantly from the bottom of the gown. She felt good. Normal even. She felt as though she had never been shot.

Glancing around the room Mirie saw the cat peek out from underneath a chair in the corner. Its gold eyes sparkled at her in a way that reminded her of Anarion. What are you? Huldufolk. Thank the Gods.

On a table near the door was a pile of clothing. It was hers. The jeans, jacket, panties and socks were cleaned, ironed, and neatly folded, waiting for her. The boots were polished and sitting on the floor underneath the table. A new t-shirt with tags still attached sat in another pile.

Mirie stared. Understanding came. She had been shot through the t-shirt. Presumably the t-shirt and the bra had been history and unsalvageable. Had someone felt a little uncomfortable providing her with a new brassiere? Her shoulders squared. Lying next to the piles of clothing was her witch blade.

Curiouser and curiouser. She checked her leather coat and found the pockets emptied. Some of the gear a Committee agent typically carried was missing. The

sat-phone was gone. The locater was absent. The compact digital camera and PDA were gone as well. Did they know that no one else could use the witch blade but her?

Dressing while the cat watched from under the chair, Mirie settled her mind. If they had wanted her dead, then she wouldn’t have woken up. She certainly wouldn’t have woken up healed. For sure, the elves wanted answers from her.

She finished lacing her boots and stuck the witch blade into her waist band. The knife magically compacted itself into a dagger size. Braiding her hair with deft hands, she looked around and took account of her situation.

Then she tucked her braided hair under itself to hold it in place and tried the door. It opened to a long hallway with similar decorative qualities. Everything was luxurious and well appointed. Surfaces gleamed as if polished a minute before. Perhaps a talking candlestick and clock would come dancing up to her, taking the time to break into a Broadway equivalent occasion.

Behind her, the cat yowled plaintively and did a drive by with its tail streaming upward, leaning into her leg but not really touching it. Then it trotted off to the left, pausing at the head of the stairway there. It looked over its shoulder at Mirie and meowed as if asking a question. Then it trotted downstairs.

“Okay,” Mirie answered. She followed the cat. Downstairs opened up into a wide expanse of windows and halls. The sun seemed to shine into every window no matter what its position was in accordance to the four directions. The floor was made of a substance that seemed to glow substantially. It looked like marble with a million veins of gold.

Mirie suddenly had an idea of where she was located and it wasn’t in Kansas with a dog that answered to the name of a 70s/80s band. Anarion and his band of merry bodyguards had brought her over to the Elfish court, a land located in another dimension, another plane of existence. The human world was mostly ignorant of it, but the worlds outside their world were numerous and varied. The Elfish court called theirs the Light Land. It was the elves’ home realm and she was smack dab in the middle of it.

The black and white cat meowed at her again, standing at the entrance to a room. Its doors were large and made from a wood that had streaked blonde and black woods. One paw raked the door restlessly.

Mirie joined the cat. “Should I knock?” she enquired politely of the cat. “I should hate to interrupt afternoon tea.”

The cat coughed and it sounded like muffled laughter.With muzzled determination, Mirie pushed the doors open and found the High

Court. Not only that, it was in session.About fifty elves turned to look at her in unison. The words died away to a

startling silence. It was quite disconcerting. However disconcerting that was, it was more disconcerting that Mirie’s eyes

immediately located Anarion and locked on him. His jewel-like eyes glinted at her in a manner that she would have called possessive if she felt like putting an adjective to it.

And more uncomfortably no one moved. They simply looked at her while she looked at Anarion.

The impatient part of Mirie couldn’t help herself. “Do I have something on my face?”

The cat coughed again.There was a strident voice that said something demandingly. Anarion waved his

hand and a wave of magic was tossed in her direction. It rolled over her with a surge of tingles that touched every inch of her skin. It was as if she were being caressed everywhere at the same exact moment. It rolled away just as suddenly. Abruptly she understood the words.

“She doesn’t need to be here,” said a tall elf with green hair. “She is untrustworthy. She works for the Committee.” ‘The Committee’ was said like something a visiting dog had left on the lawn that was brown and stinky.

Another firm voice answered and Mirie looked to the left where there was a throne with a regal elf sitting in it. His consorts sat beside him in lesser thrones.

“Is this a trial?” Mirie asked conversationally.The regal elf glanced at her and a small smile quirked at his lips. He was an older

version of Anarion. The hair was laced with gray and although the features were starting to decline with age he was strikingly beautiful all the same. “Perhaps we should ask her motives,” he suggested.

“His name is Artuntaure,” said the cat beside her in a throaty whisper. “He’s the King of the High Court of the Land of Light.”

Mirie sighed. She should know very well that things weren’t always as they appeared. I.e., a cat that wasn’t really a cat. “You watched me get dressed, you wanker,” she whispered back.

The cat shrugged in a manner befitting all felines and stretched. The form kept on stretching until a petite woman with black and white hair smiled sardonically at Mirie. Jewel toned robes flowed over her form and she stepped forward. “My Lords,” the woman said loudly. “May I present Mirie Baldursdottir, lately of Earth, Security Agent of the Committee, and accomplished expert in three martial art aptitudes.”

A know it all cat that wasn’t really a cat, Mirie thought.“Baldursdottir,” repeated the King. “A good Icelandic name. Daughter of Baldur,

the God of Light. The glorious one.”Not many people understood the distinction of Icelandic names. Last names were

not the same as one’s father but instead given as the son of an individual’s first name or the daughter of an individual. The son of Jon Finnsson would be Ingi Jonsson. Or it would be Anna Jonsdottir. It was a traditional manner of naming.

“There are many of the hidden folk in Iceland,” Artuntaure continued knowingly.“So who are you?” Mirie said to the cat slash young woman.“Guardian, lookout, keeper,” she murmured back. “You pick. My name is Asta.

And you need to curtsy or bow or something to show a sign of respect to our Lord.”Mirie looked back at the king. Anarion was still watching her with restless

diamond eyes. More of the elves in the room looked at her with silent expectation.The Committee had included a few classes on etiquette. After all, they dealt

with many different races and not all of them were the enemy. Some of them were even allies. Her chin rose to an aristocratic degree, she swept into the room and stopped at a point twenty feet away from the thrones. The distance was enough to be deferential and far enough away that she didn’t present a threat to His Majesty.

Her back straight, she performed a low curtsy with a grace that was not all practiced and kept her eyes on the King’s feet. The action was elegant and deliberate, performed as if she bowed to a king on a daily basis. There was a wave of urgent murmurs among the gathered elves.

“Well done,” said Asta admiringly, who had trailed beside her. “A princess couldn’t have done better.” The words were serenely satirical.

With her body bent, she could see that Anarion was smiling. And Mirie was suddenly at the end of her repertoire of Elfish functions. She could have tossed her witch blade in the air and made it change colors as it pierced a half dozen juggling balls, but somehow she didn’t think the elves would be appreciative.

“Rise, daughter of Baldur,” Artuntaure intoned.“We cannot trust her,” the green haired elf said again. “She was raised among

the humans. She has human values. Committee values.”“And does the Committee’s values differ so radically from ours, Lord Kavin?” the

king asked politely, a little ice flowing into his words.Mirie had brought herself upright and turned slightly to see the tall elf glaring at

her. It didn’t matter what the species was; they all seemed to have the same foibles. Lord Kavin wanted power of some kind. He had determined that by excluding Mirie he would gain some kind of upper hand. Probably against Anarion for bringing Mirie to the Light Land and to the Elfish court.

“I know that the Committee has treated me kindly,” Mirie said solemnly. “Their actions have been ever toward protecting Earth and its allies. They have otherworldly allies as well as the Elfish Realm does. The Cat Clan and Seelie Fae Courts count among them.”

“Why pursue the prince, then,” Lord Kavin snarled at her, stepping closer. “Why watch him as if he were a criminal. No laws have been broken in the human world.”

Unless one included shooting me in the chest, Mirie thought imprudently. But the Elfish bodyguards were justified in their actions. She had said she would bury a blade in Anarion’s throat and the elf had taken her at her word.

Mirie turned back to the king. “Our clairvoyants saw the end of the earthly realm. That destruction would have dire consequences on all realms that are connected. And dark magick objects were involved.”

King Artuntaure frowned. “What objects?”“There are three. The Book of the Black Moon which has already been acquired

by the Committee. The Eyes of the Amber Moon is an artifact from the Unseelie court, black arts contained in a relic fashioned to be worn by its owner. It was reputedly lost in the Magick Wars of a millennium ago.” Mirie restrained herself from casting her gaze at Anarion and the decorative piece he wore at his belt.

“Our people call them ‘The Fae Wars,’ the monarch committed quietly. “Their aggression against the Elfish lands was most vicious. Thousands of elves were lost. My own father was one of them.”

“The humans’ written history of those battles is most insufficient,” Mirie said.“And the third item?” Lord Kavin said loudly. “What is it?”“The Silver Moon’s Mystery,” Mirie said to the king. “Knowledge of it is sketchy.”“Why haven’t our seers foretold of this?” demanded Lord Kavin. “Why do we hear

of this from this whatever she is? And what does she have to do with Prince Anarion?”

“You forget, Lord Kavin,” Anarion said bluntly. “There have been omens from the seers. Omens for darkness and destruction to come. There is evidence in her favor.”

The king stared at her with his eyes so similar to Anarion’s. One of his consorts was staring at Mirie with pale green eyes. Her brow knitted together in a frown of concentration. She started suddenly and placed tentative fingers on her lord’s arm. Artuntaure leaned toward the woman while Mirie waited.

Murmurs skated around the room behind her, but Mirie didn’t dare look.Asta whispered, “Nice shooting, Tex. The king doesn’t usually waste more than a

minute on things not Elfish.”“What are you?” Mirie asked Asta out of the side of her mouth. “Not an elf. A

changeling? Some sort of shifter we haven’t seen. You’ve got magick flowing all around you. I can see it changing from darkish blue to light greens.”

“You can see my powers,” Asta muttered. She stepped back from Mirie with an expression of disbelief.

“Yes, I see it,” the king murmured to his consort, while his eyes settled on Mirie. “Daughter of Baldur,” he said loudly. Mirie started. “Tell us about your parents.”

“I don’t recall much,” she admitted. “My mother was Huldufolk and she would whisper tales to me at bedtime. She married an Icelandic man who took me as his own daughter. I was named after him in the Icelandic tradition. They died when I was four years old.”

Murdered by other Huldufolk for exposing their secrets to those who would hurt them. Her mother was conspiring with the members of the Committee to help the Huldufolk who were still slaves in the Unseelie court. At least that was what Mirie had been told. She didn’t remember that night very well. There had been blood and screams and she had hid in the bathroom that had a cabinet with a false backboard. Three days later Committee members had pulled her out, half dead and unable to speak for months. She was raised by Halflings in the Committee’s shadow, trained to be one of their agents. Their dogma was for protection of the human race and their allies.

“Is it possible?” Anarion said loudly. His voice held excitement and knowledge. “All this time we’ve searched and she simply comes to us? To me?”

Mirie turned to look at him. His eyes were gleaming pools of lightlessness. They were speaking about her. There was something that was happening that she didn’t know about, something that was important to them.

“Ruaora?” Lord Kavin interjected ominously. “Slaughtered by the Halfling, Zyvana. There was the evidence of blood. We all recall the tragedy.”

“Ruaora,” Asta breathed as she took a step toward Mirie. “Promised to the prince five hundred years before your birth.”

Mirie swallowed nervously. “Wrong girl. My mother was Huldufolk. She never told me about my father and she didn’t leave anything that wasn’t destroyed that night they died.”

“Do you know what Huldufolk are, little daughter?” the king asked slyly. “Offshoots of the elves who lived in Iceland a thousand years ago. They went with the Norse over a millennium ago. Does your Committee not educate you well enough?”

“Like many secretive subjects knowledge of the Huldufolk is limited,” Mirie said slowly, glancing at the king again. There were many offshoot species, and some the Committee knew next to nothing about. She tried to absorb the information that was coming to her. “Why would you think that I’m this long missing Ruaora?”

“Ruaora’s nanny was the Halfling, Zyvana,” Anarion said behind her. He had moved closer. She could feel his breath on her neck. “One day she took the baby child, Ruaora, for a walk in the Gray Forest. It was discovered later that Zyvana wished to hold the child ransom for her Elfish father’s release from the King’s prisons. Zyvana and her father were both party to Elfish political groups that encouraged the overthrow of Artuntaure. Zyvana’s father killed many elves in guerrilla attempts to instigate civil war and was imprisoned accordingly.”

But Zyvana vanished into the Gray Forest. A pool of blood and some of Ruaora’s baby clothing were the only evidence of their passing found.”

Mirie closed her mouth. She could smell Anarion behind her. The same scent that had overwhelmed her on the top of the building, lavender and clover and sunshine. Her stomach clenched in silent recognition. She could almost feel the touch of his sensual lips on the bareness of her shoulder, as if he were stroking his mouth across her unadorned skin. She was unexpectedly lost in the moment.

“There’s no evidence that she is Ruaora,” Lord Kavin suddenly announced loudly, brusquely yanking Mirie out of her reverie. “She doesn’t have the appearance of the Sumrah Clan.” He circled in front of Mirie, glaring at her. His green hair was flying behind him as he shook with mute ire.

Mirie was thinking of her mother. She didn’t remember much about the woman, except that her hair was midnight black while Mirie’s was platinum blonde. Her eyes had been the green of summer grass. She had been short and rounded. She had been Mirie’s opposite and not unkind. Not someone who was holding a child for ransom.

“What happened to Zyvana’s father?” Mirie asked. “Why was the ransom not claimed?”

“He died in the prisons,” King Artuntaure answered solemnly. “Not a week after Ruaora’s disappearance. Even there, rival factions exist that hold their own black justice. He had killed too many elves for cries of prison vengeance to be silenced.”

“And there was no trace of Zyvana or the baby?” Mirie went on.“Not until now,” Anarion whispered close to her ear.“Look at her eyes,” the king’s consort said loudly. She had been the one to

whisper in Artuntaure’s ear first. “Violet eyes. The color of sun ripened grapes. Unmistakably Sumrah. No other clan has those eyes.”

Lord Kavin hooked Mirie’s arm and twisted her toward him so that he could look into her face.

But Mirie had had enough. There was a ripple of movement from her. One of her long legs shot out while her arms twirled Lord Kavin’s form. A second passed and he was lying on the marble floor with her crouched above him, the witch blade at his throat. The glow from the weapon was as violet bright as a spotlight. She heard the gasps behind her and knew that Anarion was crouched at her back, as if he were protecting her.

Mirie glared into Lord Kavin’s face. “I don’t want you to touch me. I don’t have ‘bitch’ written on my forehead,” she hissed.

The Elfish lord gaped at her, understandably confused at the sudden turn of events. As she perched above him, he got his first clear vision of her face and eyes. His expression changed from confusion to incredulity. “Amycate,” he murmured. “Forgive me, child. I did not believe it could be you.”

Mirie drew the witch blade back from his neck. “Who’s Amycate?”“Amycate Sumrah, the lady of the duchy of the Midsummer Lands,” King

Artuntaure answered. “I gather she is your mother, a lady I am happy to report is still very much alive.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Mirie said, standing up straight as Lord Kavin gathered himself to his feet.

Asta tittered helplessly.

Chapter Three

Identities will be tested and violet will set her resolve…

“Why were you watching me?” Anarion asked politely. His voice was throaty and intense. His attention was fixated on her exclusively.

Mirie sat at a table in the dining hall, thinking about human sayings. The hall was empty save for Anarion and herself. After Asta had laughed her guts out, Mirie had lamely professed her hunger and one of the elves had stated that concentrated healing caused healthy appetites.

Anarion had led her to the dining hall and called out one of the servants to attend them. He drank something that looked and smelled like coffee. Mirie was eating something that she thought was chicken. She was a little afraid to ask. Elves had been known to serve brownies and pixies as delicacies.

“Didn’t I make that clear?” she said glibly. “The clairvoyants say you have the Eyes of the Amber Moon or you’re connected to it.” She was proud of herself in that her eyes didn’t dip toward his waistline.

“I have a piece of dark magick object left over from the Fae Wars?” he said, clearly surprised. “There are several pieces that could be seen as the…” His handsome face abruptly cleared and his hand went to his belt. Long fingers strummed over the elaborate buckle. His diamond eyes glittered at her knowingly. “A gift from a courtesan. There is no magick within it.”

“A courtesan?” Mirie repeated. “You mean a mistress gave it to you?” She was proud that the tiny notes of immediate jealousy were kept from her tone. It was a jealousy that she resented herself for feeling. Reality hit hard. The human saying that Jack often repeated to her was, ‘If it’s too good to be true, then it probably is.’ This entire situation was just that, too good to be true. She didn’t have a secret family who had been searching for her for decades. She didn’t have a drop dead gorgeous Elfish prince who had been waiting for her for centuries. That was something right out of a bad soap opera.

Shrugging elvishly, Anarion didn’t seem embarrassed. “I’m five hundred years old, Mirie. Human years. She was cherished for a time, until her possessiveness became readily apparent.”

“The Committee wishes to secure the pieces so that the vision does not come to pass,” she went for the political method instead of focusing on the prince’s past love life.

Anarion stared at her. “And your mind is still engrossed with the Committee’s wishes?”

“Perhaps you’re suggesting that I should throw my entire life away based on your hunch that I’m a girl that was promised to you five hundred years ago? A prophecy given to you at your birth?” Mirie asked sardonically. “You know, I like a good love story and all but that seems farfetched. I’m not sure we would even suit. You know, I’m a little bit country and you’re a little bit rock and roll, and all that.”

His long fingers tapped the table’s glossy finish. Eyes gleaming with amusement, he asked, “You don’t believe that you are she, you are Ruaora, the one I have waited for, my entire life?”

“My name is Mirie Baldursdottir. I know that my mother and adopted father were murdered by other Huldufolk for their political beliefs. I know that the Committee has fostered me and never held me back. They’ve kept no secrets from nor closed any doors to my inquisitive nature.” Mirie put her eating utensils down on the table. “And I need to contact them. Perhaps we can negotiate for the piece. The end of the world should be of interest to the Light Land.”

His interesting lips twitched. “Like many prophecies it can be said that when one attempts to interfere is when the events are often set into motion.”

“You mean that the Committee’s actions might be instigating the apocalypse,” Mirie frowned.

“Precisely,” Anarion gleamed as he said the words.“And the Eyes of the Amber Moon would be safer around your midsection,” Mirie

went on.Anarion’s eyes widened. “Unless there’s a valid reason for me to take it off.”

The words were sultry and inviting.“What a line,” Mirie scoffed. “Do you ask girls if they want to come in and see

your etchings, too?”“Etchings?”“Yikes,” Mirie muttered.Anarion’s shoulders straightened. His face composed itself into seriousness. “My

father, the King, will decide the Eyes of the Amber Moon’s fate. Perhaps it would be best if the piece was thrown into the volcanic fires of Mount Tartarus.”

“Destroyed would be great, if I were the one who throws it in,” Mirie announced. “Not that I don’t trust people, but well, hey, I don’t trust people.”

“Truly,” Anarion said. “You should eat more. You’ll need your strength.”Mirie glanced at the food and back up at his disingenuous expression. “Okay,

you’re like the Fae. You really don’t like answering questions do you?”“Don’t compare us to them,” Anarion said swiftly, nearly a snarl. “We are the

worst of enemies.”“Okay then. One, why is it that you all think I’m this missing girl, Ruaora? Is it

my violet eyes or something else? Two, I need to get in touch with the Committee so they don’t send a team into the Light Land and kick ass. Three, why in the name of Jumping Jehoshaphat do I need my strength? And fourth, what is this that I just ate, because it tastes just like chicken.” Mirie crossed her arms over her chest. “There’s also the question of how you healed me and why you healed me and why you were so mad at your bodyguards for shooting me when they were protecting you.”

“You’re defending my triumvirate’s actions?” Anarion asked curiously. “I would have thought you’d be shrieking for vengeance.”

“I did threaten you,” Mirie said. “The son of the king. Bad idea on my part, but I was backed into a proverbial corner. How did you know I was bluffing?” She clicked her tongue. “I guess that’s a lot more than four questions. Perhaps if you answered some of them, the list would shorten.”

Anarion gestured at the food in front of her. “That is chicken. What? You don’t think we have chickens here?”

•Probably because the elves didn’t know what else to do with her, Mirie sat in a

large library and looked at books. Interestingly enough there was a significant number of English language tomes included. Some were classics. The works of Shakespeare were included. Some weren’t. Someone had an affinity for Stephen King. Then there were hundreds in Elfish that Mirie was only moderately fluent in.

“They keep the really dangerous books in the dungeon,” a fluid voice said.Mirie turned her head and saw Asta. Her glowing powers weaved patterns around

her body, as if protecting her. “Oh, it’s you. Don’t you have a ball of yarn to chase instead of pestering me?”

Asta perched on the edge of a chair. “I’m a Mirmir,” she said. “Not very common. We’re born human, but attain the ability to change into multiple shapes as we mature. We tend to be stuck in several forms. I have three, so I’m considered accomplished.”

“A cat, a human, and what else?” Mirie said inquisitively.“Bad form to ask about personal magicks,” Asta grinned at her. “So what else can

you see besides my powers?”“Bad form for me to ask, you mean,” Mirie said promptly.Asta shrugged.“I see magick powers. I see the forms they take, the paths that have been

weaved. When you change forms you construct magicks to help you, and that’s what I see.” Mirie sighed. “It’s different with other species. Some are less magicks and more genetics. Werewolves and werecats, for example. Some sort of virus. Not magicks at all, but I can see something in their eyes.”

“Baninois,” Asta breathed. “Not only can you command a witch blade, but you have the sight.”

“What is Baninois?” Mirie repeated. She closed a book and replaced it on the shelves. She wasn’t impressed with her own powers. Sometimes it helped with her activities with the Committee. Sometimes it got in the way.

“Witch blooded,” answered another voice. Asta jumped and Mirie repressed a smile.

Anarion strode across the room. “Asta, you’ve got a big mouth.”“Meowrrrr,” Asta said gleefully. “Mirmirs aren’t known for diplomacy.” She

shrugged helplessly.“More questions for me,” Mirie said. “So if I’m Baninois, what difference does it

make?”“It means you’re a royal protector,” Anarion said grimly. “One who guards the

High Court.” Then he smiled and his face became instantly beautiful. “Another notch in the evidence that you are Ruaora. It’s said there was once a witch who was a distant ancestress. Many heroic protectors have come from the house of Sumrah.”

“I have a job,” Mirie asserted. “Will you please let me contact the Committee? My boss, Nehemiah or the agent who was with me before I got shot. You know, before an Inter-dimensional incident causes problems.”

“Come with me,” Anarion said bluntly. “You’ve a visitor.”

•“Jack!” Mirie yelled happily. He grinned at her cheerfully. Large and shaggy

silver haired, Jack looked her up and down as he shifted restlessly in the grand hallway where the High Court had met previously. However, there was only Mirie, Jack, Anarion, and several Elfish guards who hovered.

“Nice to see you whole,” Jack said to her and enfolded her in a generous hug. Mirie could see Anarion stiffen beside them.

Mirie patted Jack affectionately then withdrew out of his embrace. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Blood on the roof,” Jack said, his expression grim. “Lots of it. Yours, too, according to the mages we sent over there. And the Elfish contingent was portentously absent. They all went AWOL, just like that. We’ve sent our envoys here to find out that the royal house had you and that you’ve been healed by the best that they had. Also they don’t want to let you come home. Something about spying on His Majesty Prettyboy, here. And something else that they’re real mysterious about.”

Anarion growled under his breath.“I think we’ve moved past that,” Mirie said quickly. Somehow she didn’t think

that telling Jack about the bodyguard shooting her in the chest would help the situation. “Your Highness,” she said to Anarion. “This is Jack Drake, my partner. And Jack, this is His Highness, Anarion.”

“Partner,” Anarion repeated ominously.“Sheesh,” Mirie muttered. “Agent partner. We work together. The operative

word being ‘work.’ The Committee sends us out in twos. We get to protect each other’s backs.”

“You didn’t do such an adequate job with Mirie’s back,” Anarion commented slyly. “Or her front, for that matter.”

“I hesitated,” Mirie said hastily. Belatedly she realized they were all speaking English again and wondered what happened to Anarion’s spell. “I don’t like heights all that much. And since when do elves carry guns? Definitely not in any of the briefs I’ve read.”

“Next time, you’ll jump just like you’re supposed to do,” Jack said irately. “And guns? What the hell happened? You got shot?”

“There won’t be a next time for her to jump anywhere,” Anarion announced arrogantly.

Jack frowned. So did Mirie. But she was the first to say, “We’ll see about that.”“W.T.F.?” Jack said. “The High Court only just let me through to see you and

ascertain your health. But what is going on here?”“I think it’s a misunderstanding about my identity,” Mirie glanced at Anarion and

saw that his eyes were glittering in that way that denoted bad things to come. “They think I’m this missing Elfish girl.”

“Her Ladyship,” Anarion corrected. “Ruaora of the Duchy of Sumrah. And I don’t think anything. I know.”

Mirie made a face that Jack could see but made sure she was turned away from Anarion.

“And the High Court seems open to negotiation about the Eyes of the Amber Moon,” she added pseudo-cheerfully.

Jack was frowning again. “An elf? But you’re as human as I am, Mirie.”Mirie shuffled uncomfortably. She’d known the day would come. Jack had

worked with her for years, but he’d never known that she wasn’t human. He knew about her hunches that concealed her actual magicks, and probably suspected that her bloodlines were smattered with the odd otherworldly creature, but because of his bias, she had kept mum. Don’t ask-don’t tell worked well with Jack until she had proved her trustworthiness. Add to that, she hadn’t wanted to ruin their friendship. “My mother was Huldufolk,” she admitted quietly.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jack demanded indignantly. “I would have-”“Not Huldufolk,” Anarion interjected. “Elfish. To the last drop. With all the

powers of her family.”“Okay,” Mirie said loudly. “That’s enough of that. Unless you have a DNA test

that will work on elves, you can just shut it about the Ruaora crap, Anarion.”One of the Elfish guards gasped noisily.But Anarion abruptly grinned at her. “I like that. It’s the first time you’ve used

my name.”Jack gaped at the two of them. Then Mirie realized that he was looking behind

them.Asta strolled up and her eyes went up and down Jack’s length. “Hubba hubba,”

she said. “I think humans are getting better looking all the time.”“Asta,” Mirie gritted, thinking that Asta’s English had a little rasping accent, as if

she was ready to purr at a moment’s notice. “Jack Drake, another agent from the Committee, but you probably already know that. Jack, Asta, last name unknown. She’s a Mirmir, and don’t ask me to explain what that is, but if you see a cat that’s the same color as Asta’s hair, it’s probably her. And she likes to play peeping tom.” Mirie considered. “No pun intended.”

“Spoilsport,” Asta purred at Mirie. “It’s no fun when they’re forewarned.”Jack snapped back to Mirie and Anarion, disregarding Asta. “Your Highness, the

Committee formally requests the return of our agent.”Anarion shifted slightly. “I believe Asta can answer for me in a very human

fashion that will be instantly recognizable of the High Court’s feelings in the matter.”“Not only no, but hell, no,” Asta said jauntily.

Chapter Four

Trust will be their greatest issue…

“The Baldur’s daughter shall be our guest until certain issues are resolved,” King Artuntaure told Jack Drake craftily.

Mirie admired the wording. Anarion had cast his translation spell again for her and then grudgingly for Jack.

“What issues?” Jack demanded. “Our surveillance of the prince was aboveboard. We did not interfere with him or his in any fashion. We were watching to see if we could ascertain the whereabouts of the Eyes of the Amber Moon. The Committee’s envoys have made it clear that the item in question is crucial to the prophecies.”

They were still in the grand hallway but the king and all his courtiers had returned to allow Jack his nickel’s worth.

“Perhaps the Committee could explain why it didn’t approach the Elfish contingent and simply ask for the object?” Lord Kavin threw in silkily.

Mirie would have sighed but she thought that perhaps it would have been taken in the wrong light. The green haired elf had done a turnabout and was determined to see that the human, Jack Drake, be put under the spot light and sweated for perceived injustices. Mirie was guiltless but other members of the Committee weren’t so fortunate.

But Jack wasn’t a delicate little flower. “Perhaps the Elfish High Court could explain why the Committee’s agent was nearly killed by one of the prince’s bodyguards when she was merely observing the prince’s activities in her own realm.”

“Not her realm,” Anarion interjected.“Old argument,” Mirie muttered loudly. “Asked and answered. Better move on,

Jack.”“The Elfish Court and the Committee have not always seen eye to eye,”

Artuntaure admitted with a sly smile. Then his crystal like eyes settled on Mirie and she straightened in an involuntary manner. “Mirie Baldursdottir,” he said. “Her Grace, the Duchess of Sumrah, will be joining us in a matter of hours. Would you not like to at least meet with the lady?”

Mirie glanced at Jack who stood like a stone faced golem. Then her eyes went to Anarion who stared at her with silent expectation. She turned her eyes back to the king. “I would like to meet with Her Grace,” she said slowly. “I don’t know that I’m this Ruaora but I do know there are questions that need to be answered.”

Jack said lowly, “No shit.”Artuntaure smiled. “Good. It’s settled. The Baldur’s daughter shall remain with

us.”“And the Eyes of the Amber Moon?” Jack insisted.“I have spoken with our most accomplished clairvoyant,” the king said carefully.

The sly expression on his face faded to something resembling granite. “You may tell

your Committee that the Eyes of the Amber Moon will be safest in our dominion, not connected to the first artifact.”

“And the reason the clairvoyant didn’t see the destruction of the earthly realm?” Jack went on.

The granite countenance of the king became stonier. “I did not speak with the clairvoyant’s actual person, but her immortal essence.”

Mirie started. There was a round of gasps from the elves assembled in the grand hallway.

Jack began to say, “What in God’s name does that-” before Mirie cut him off.“It means the clairvoyant is dead,” Mirie said solemnly.“I thought elves were immortals,” Jack muttered.“The clairvoyant was murdered,” Anarion said. It was almost a question. Mirie

could see that his eyes were trained on his father.Jack took a step back. “You’ve a murderer in your court and you believe the Eyes

of the Amber Moon will be safest here.” The statement was partially insult and partially incredulity.

Lord Kavin started to demand that the human, Jack Drake, be drawn and quartered by Elfish griffons, for suggesting that King Artuntaure was wrong in his decision, when the king interrupted and pointed at Mirie. “We have a protector here,” Artuntaure said ingeniously. “And protectors owe allegiance to the throne of the Land of Light. She will protect the Eyes of the Amber Moon unto her death and beyond.”

Anarion began to argue with his father when the king cast him an icy gaze that shut his mouth nearly instantly.

Jack looked at Mirie and shrugged helplessly. “I know how the Committee is going to rule on this, Mirie. If the Eyes of the Amber Moon are here, and the High Court is amicable to your presence then you should remain here to guard the relic.”

“And we’ll find the murderer,” Anarion promised.•

“If your father spoke to the clairvoyant’s essence why didn’t he ask who killed her?” Mirie asked Anarion after the session had abruptly ended. She was thinking, I would have asked.

Anarion looked at Mirie grimly. “The king was limited to a single question and he decided what was most important.”

They were walking in the gardens and Mirie blinked at the golden light that seemed to come from everywhere. A sun glasses company would make out like hotcakes in a cheap diner in this dimension.

And didn’t Mirie want to distract herself from certain feelings she was having by making rotten jokes? Why, yes, yes she did. Being close to Anarion was like standing in the heat of a warm sun on what was once a cold day. It felt good. Her flesh tingled with pleasure and her stomach clenched with nameless emotion.

Certainly Mirie had been in love before. But the distant relationships paled in comparison to how Anarion made her feel. She was readily aware what he was, an elf, and worse, an elf who had been around for five hundred years compared to her measly almost three decades. He’d had mistresses, consorts, and the Gods only knew what else. The elves’ social society was somewhat different than the human world.

They largely believed in marriage as a societal counterpoint. If Ruaora, the missing Elfish lady, had been promised to Anarion, then there was a political reason for it, and unquestionably not some romantic reason that some long ago clairvoyant had pulled out of a top hat.

But all of Mirie’s logic didn’t explain her unfathomable attraction to the prince. Not that she was going to act on it. Glancing over her shoulder she saw that there were not three bodyguards trailing behind, but Jack and Asta bringing up the rear. It wasn’t three making a crowd, but seven.

Mirie exhaled. “What happened to the bodyguard who shot me?” She saw the other two in the group behind them. Laris, towered over the rest, with his Katana knife, tucked in its scabbard at his waist, and who stared at Mirie as if he were examining a particularly interesting bug under his microscope. Fascinatingly enough his hair appeared black in the human realm while it was a vivid purple in the Land of Light.

Anarion gritted, “His name is Fermil. The human weapon he used was not authorized. Human weapons tend to be more destructive than necessary.”

“You’re punishing him for shooting me when I threatened you?” Mirie asked curiously. Alarm made her flesh break out in goose bumps. “It wasn’t his fault that he didn’t know I was bluffing. He was protecting you.”

Anarion paused mid-step. “Once I had made my determination of your identity, Fermil should have been protecting you.”

Mirie took three steps and paused, her face screwing up in a scowl. “Your determination of my identity? Well, yes, we haven’t discussed this and by the way, an apology from your man will work. You don’t have to stick him in a dungeon or in the stocks or whatever you do.”

A low laugh came from Anarion. “Fermil paid in blood and there’s naught that can be done about that. Especially now.”

Mirie frowned. “He’s not dead, is he?”“The healer used his essence and blood to bring you back from the brink of

death,” Anarion said seriously. “Fermil will recover eventually. It was just.” Her mouth opened. “You used your man to heal me because he shot me.”“It would have been me otherwise,” he commented.“Are you sure he’ll be all right?” Mirie insisted. “And was I really on the brink of

death or are you just-”“Your eyes were glassy.” Anarion’s expression was grim and fixed. “Your pulse

was thready. You were dying. There was nothing that could be done except that I brought you here and Fermil volunteered to be your vonrion, your ice walker. That term means the one who takes your pain and returns a part of his essence. He threw himself into the path of death to assuage his honor. Make no mistake, he is ill now, but he will recover and live to serve the High Court again, his mistake rectified.”

“And your determination that I’m this other person,” Mirie couldn’t help herself. “How is that possible? You were surprised about it when it was brought up by the king. You couldn’t have known that I was Ruaora on the rooftop.”

“Then, I didn’t know that you are Ruaora,” Anarion stepped closer to her and smiled at her. The smile made her insides clench in a very pleasing manner. “But I knew that you are she, the one I’ve waited for. All elves have the sense of the one

they are destined to be with. Some are unfortunate enough not to meet the other half of their souls, and some have lost the ability, but not I, and not you as well.” His hand came up and brushed across her cheek, causing her knees to tremble. “You feel it as well. The scent that smells so wonderful in your nose. The prickling of the skin. The knowledge that individual is the special one to you, your complement.”

Mirie took a helpless breath. Abruptly she could feel everything that Anarion was saying, as if something was twisting her heart into an untidy knot. The discomfort was almost tangible. It was as if only Anarion’s embrace could put the feelings into perspective. She didn’t care for the thoughts tumbling through her head as if she was a brainless teenager lost in the throes of an elaborate crush. She stepped back and Anarion dropped his hand.

“We should look at the crime scene,” she said.Anarion had a surprised look on his face that was nearly priceless. Apparently in

five hundred or so years, he wasn’t used to having women turn him down. “Crime scene?” he repeated.

“The murdered clairvoyant,” she reminded him. “We are seasoned agents, used to criminal investigation. Typically we scrutinize otherworldly crimes, not the least of which is homicide.”

“Of course,” Anarion replied after a lengthy lapse. “We have investigators as well.”

Minutes later Anarion was leading Jack and Mirie into a segregated wing of the castle. “Arisar, the silver seeker and seer, resided in these rooms. Her remains have already been cremated as is our custom.”

Jack said something nasty under his breath. One of the bodyguards trailing behind said, “Careful human. There’s no roof to jump off here.”

“Bring it, asshole,” Jack snapped immediately. “If we can’t examine the remains then how can you tell if the woman was murdered?”

“Elves die in two ways,” Anarion explained. “One is an accident, which does happen. The second is murder, which also happens upon occasion. It’s clear that Arisar did not die in an accident. There was a knife stuck in her back, which precludes an accident, wouldn’t you say?”

“Who has access to her rooms?” Mirie stood back as she asked, looking through the airy rooms. “Was there signs of anyone forcing their way inside? Is anything missing?”

Another elf joined them. “I am Ridon, the spear keeper,” he said to Mirie, with a slight nod to Jack. He was as tall as Anarion, with pale blonde hair one shade darker than Mirie’s. His bluish eyes were intent as he stared at her and she wondered why he was so interested.

“He is the principal investigator,” Anarion conceded.“Your Highness,” Ridon bowed to Anarion. He rose up and continued to speak to

Mirie. “Arisar’s rooms showed no evidence of struggle nor were there anything broken. Her maid states that some of her journals are missing. Perhaps Arisar had recorded her visions there and the offender felt that he or she would have been implicated.”

“And who had access to the seer?” Jack said.

“The entire court,” Ridon grimaced. “Perhaps a hundred. Then one can add retainers, maids, visiting diplomats, and their retinues, and the number could be easily doubled.”

“No security cameras,” Mirie stated.“Electricity doesn’t work the same on this realm,” Anarion told her with a slight

smile. “There are spells that could reveal who has come and gone from these rooms, but it wouldn’t narrow the number considerably. Arisar was a popular seer and since she had the king’s ear, there were many who wished to consult with her, including visiting dignitaries.”

“We need a list of names,” Mirie said. “So that each may be questioned.”“Impossible,” Ridon declared. “The king and three of his consorts would be on

the list as well as half of the High Court. It would cause the highest level of dissention.”

“Your Highness,” Mirie turned to Anarion. “Clearly your court is unused to murder within its midst. Do you really wish to continue with a murderer walking around scot free?”

Anarion stared at Mirie. Finally, without looking away from her, he said, “I’ll need the list, Ridon. It will be for my eyes alone until the king and I have decreed otherwise.”

Mirie rolled her eyes and Ridon’s mouth opened at her action.“It’s true that you’ve spent too much time in the land of the barbarians,” Ridon

avowed sardonically. “You’ll never be Sumrah.”Mirie didn’t have time to think of an appropriate retort before Anarion had the

investigator on the floor with one of his hands wrapped around the elf’s throat. He growled at Ridon, “If she has, then it wasn’t her fault, and she has thus acted blamelessly. Can you say the same for yourself?”

Ridon struggled to get out from under the prince, but Anarion had him truly pinned and his thighs clamped around the investigator’s ribs until he groaned with pain. “My apologies, Your Highness.”

“Not to me,” Anarion hissed. “Apologize to your cousin.”“She’s not my-” Ridon started to say and then the words were cut off as Anarion’s

hand convulsively gripped his throat tighter.“Cousin?” Mirie repeated. That was interesting. She might have a cousin who

hated her existence. Then she shook herself. When did I start thinking that I might really be this Ruaora?

“My apologies, Cousin,” Ridon gritted when Anarion marginally released his throat.

“I don’t know that we are cousins,” Mirie said slowly. “But if we are, Ridon, I won’t need the prince to kick your ass. I’ll do it myself.”

Anarion laughed. Then he launched himself up and offered a hand to Ridon. “I think she might be able to do it, too.”

Ridon glowered then accepted the hand. “Your confidence is refreshing,” he said, keeping his tone moderate.

Jack sighed loudly. “All this political, touchy-feely crap is giving me a headache. Why can’t we just talk to another clairvoyant about who they see us catching in a few hours?”

Mirie smiled. “It doesn’t work like that. They don’t always get to see what they want to see.”

“Well, I guess that would make it easy then.” Jack grimaced. “I could go back to the Committee and talk with our clairvoyants. You’ve got someone in the Court here that doesn’t want us to know something and is willing to kill for it. Am I the only one who’s disturbed at that?”

Anarion stepped around Mirie, almost as if he were protecting her from the rest of the group. “Of course, the Court is disturbed. Otherwise, no humans would have been allowed here at all.”

Jack said ironically, “Well, that shows me my place, doesn’t it?”Mirie studied the room. “It was someone she knew. Someone that she didn’t

mistrust. She turned her back on the person. She didn’t see this person in her visions nor did she foresee her own death?” The questions were meant to be archetypical but Anarion answered.

“Arisar would have subjected herself to death if she knew that was the only manner in which fate could proceed. Her death brought about investigation and her visions only brought quiet murmurs of discord.”

“She allowed herself to die to bring about a vision she saw?” Jack rephrased. “Why not just tell someone? Jeez. I’ll never understand otherworldly politics.”

“It was a matter of honor,” Ridon said softly. “Your Highness, Cousin, Jack Drake. I’ll get that list put together.”

Mirie stared at the pale haired elf as he walked from the room. She took a moment to check for magicks with her special powers and saw many old lines of power twisting around the great room. Some were old and faded. Others were new and vibrant. Many reminded her of some of the restriction spells that the Master Warlock had taught to her.

“Why would there be spells of restriction in this room?” she murmured.Anarion snapped about and stared at her. “You see those?”“Many, like tangled knots, wound so tightly even my witch blade would have a

hard time cutting through them.”Jack said, “Restrictions on the seer? Or spells by the seer?”“What colors are the spells?” Anarion asked softly.“Purples, all shades of purples. Some are very old, years perhaps.” Mirie

hesitated. “I’d have to see Arisar’s personal magicks to make a comparison, but from what I can see, it looks like her colors were more in the silver range. Silvers and grays.” She pointed at the desk. “There’s something hidden in the desk protected by a personal magick spell. Something that was not affected when she died. It must have been a blood spell.”

Jack approached the desk carefully. “Is this what you’ve been doing for years, Mirie? Seeing magicks in the air? Is that how you had some of your ‘hunches?’ ”

Mirie said, “Yes,” without compunction. She knew that she should apologize to Jack for pulling the wool over his eyes for all the years they’d been partners but she couldn’t do it front of Anarion and his bodyguards.

Jack shrugged. “Makes sense now,” he said simply, without rancor. “With your permission, Your Highness?” he said to Anarion, gesturing at the desk.

Anarion nodded. “Go ahead.”

“Will the magick bite me?” Jack asked.“You’re not supposed to see what’s there,” Mirie said. “It’s like a don’t-see-me-

spell. Look at the drawer in the front.”“What drawer…oh,” Jack murmured. Then he yanked it open and ducked, more

out of habit. When a dragon or a sprite didn’t materialize to engage in battle he looked inside. Carefully he pulled out a piece of parchment. “I guess Arisar had a vision that she kept here. It’s addressed to me and in English.”

Mirie watched as Jack unfolded the parchment and read it. Then he handed it to Anarion who tilted it for Mirie. “Another riddle,” she said. “ ‘The cat and the man shall uncover the Silver Moon’s mystery, but only together shall they overcome.’ ”

She handed the piece back to Jack and shrugged. “What does it mean to you, Jack?”

Jack grumbled, “It means elves are as ambiguous as politicians.”Mirie looked around. “I think it means that Arisar was cursed to keep her mouth

shut about her visions. These binding spells are proof that someone didn’t want her talking or doing something, so she probably had to be ambiguous.”

Anarion snapped something to his three bodyguards and they left the room without a word. Then he unbuckled the Eyes of the Amber Moon and handed it to Mirie. “You are the protector, Lady,” he said formally. “This should be under your protection.”

Mirie took the piece and nearly dropped it. “The magicks have been so spelled that no one would know, except one who could look at the colors binding it,” she said. “No wonder you didn’t know that it was what it is. But dear God, it feels rotten. Do you remember, Jack, that the Cat Clan said the same of the Book of the Black Moon? The magicks are twisted, corrupt.”

“I felt nothing,” Anarion said softly. He produced a handkerchief made of blue silk and handed it to Mirie. She wrapped the buckle in the cloth and stuck it inside her pocket. Looking at the piece made her skin crawl and it was wrapped in variations of purples the same as the restrictive spells in the room.

Jack’s eyebrows went up and he made a face. “I think I’ll see if I can pick a fight with one of your bodyguards,” he said idly and left the room in the same direction.

“You trust me with this?” Mirie asked.“And more,” Anarion said affirmatively. “Much more.”“Why?”“You are Amaias, my beautiful mate. Who should I trust more?”Suddenly Anarion was so close to Mirie that she could feel his breath on her face

as he stared down into her features. She had to tilt her head back to return his look and she made herself not look away. “I don’t understand your certainty,” she whispered.

Anarion pressed closer, his lips a fraction from her own. “I know, but you will,” he murmured against her lips. For a long moment it was the only contact they had. His warm lips surged against hers. His mouth opened and the tip of his tongue tantalized the curve of her mouth, enticing her until hers opened in return. When she allowed her tongue to play with him, he groaned audibly and his arms circled about her figure, so tightly that she thought he wouldn’t let her go. Everything was crushing together in a delicious friction that caused those butterflies in Mirie’s

stomach to go wild with desire. The scent of him and the press of his flesh against hers were insidiously undermining her sensibilities. The moment became a minute and all she could feel was the drag of his marvelous mouth and the curves of his muscles flexing against her lusciously sensitive body.

Then someone coughed indelicately from the door and Anarion set Mirie aside with a panting groan that nearly did her in. She had to shake her head to free the cobwebs there before she looked at the door and saw…

A woman with platinum blonde hair and violet eyes, and features that very much resembled Mirie’s. She was trying to catch her breath but Anarion was too close and the fragrance in her nose too tantalizing.

“Lady Amycate Sumrah,” Anarion said hoarsely and Mirie blinked.Oh, great, someone who might be my mother saw me playing tonsil hockey with

the hottest hunk this side of the Elfish borders. Mirie pushed her lips together and wished for a bucket of ice water to be poured over her entire body.

Chapter Five

Blood will reveal treasonous activities…

Mirie stared at the lady as if she had been blind and suddenly could see. It was as obvious as looking into a mirror. Even Jack murmured a stunned, “God damn,” as they passed him in the hallway.

The Lady Amycate had beckoned to Mirie to follow her and Anarion had nodded at Mirie encouragingly. She led Mirie out into the gardens and stopped beside what appeared to be miniature rose bushes. Mirie stared at Amycate and then deliberately looked at the rose bushes. Their tips were made of gold and silver and sparkled metallically in the gilded light that was so abundant in this realm.

Mirie didn’t have a doubt left. If this woman wasn’t her mother, then she was her sister or something else almost as close. She didn’t know what to say to this person who was probably her mother, someone she hadn’t seen in nearly three decades and could not even remember. Instead she remembered her mother, not a woman called Zyvana, but one who called herself Korrah, an odd name especially in Iceland, but Mirie’s stepfather hadn’t complained, at least not that Mirie could remember. Then Mirie was wondering if the Committee had gotten their story straight about their deaths. Would the elves have tracked Zyvana to Iceland and murdered the pair in bloody vengeance, unable to find the child, or perhaps unaware of Mirie’s presence? Had the blood left in the Gray Forest convinced them that the child, Ruaora, had been murdered?

Amycate stared at Mirie in turn, perhaps unable to comprehend the reality of her adult daughter. “You’re not as I envisioned,” she said finally in English. “Sturdier than I would have thought.”

And Amycate was softer, the lady in silken gowns with jewelry draped around her neck and at her wrists. The same size as Mirie, she seemed more delicate and refined than Mirie could ever hope to be; Amycate appeared to be a similar age to Mirie and more in line with what a prince would marry. She began to walk again and Mirie trailed uncertainly after her, not sure what to say.

Finally, Mirie said, “I did what I had to do, in order to fit into the world I was in.”“An agent for the Committee,” Amycate said and it wasn’t a question.“They have good intentions,” Mirie defended unconsciously.Amycate cast a look over her shoulder at Mirie. It looked like the cunning smile

that elves were found of giving. It said something about knowing something that Mirie could never know. It made Mirie’s hackles rise up.

“When I was barely of age I became a consort to a powerful man,” Amycate said. “My family disapproved and made a match with another family of power. I had you barely two years later. One day I spoke to Arisar, the silver seeker and seer, about what would happen to you in your future.”

They moved into the deepest part of the garden. The green shrubs grew tall here and cast long shadows as if the sun were setting somewhere in this world. Amycate

moved delicately forward and moved through the gardens as if she had the place mapped out in her mind. She cast another look over her shoulder at Mirie. “You’re not overrun at the mouth like the humans you were raised with.”

Mirie was somewhat shell shocked. If she had to take a guess, she would have said that the lady, Amycate, was not thrilled that her errant, missing daughter had abruptly reappeared in her world. It didn’t bode well for their future relationship. “You want me to prattle on about nonsensical notions to make you happy?” she asked flippantly.

Amycate smiled coldly. “How little you understand of our society. You, Ruaora, were promised to the Halfling prince, the day of your birth. The prophecy came from Arisar’s mother, another seer of unimaginable power. She died in one of the many wars that came after the Fae Wars. It was the same one that saw Anarion captured by the Fae and tortured mercilessly.”

The scar on his face and those on his back, Mirie now understood. She would have never asked him and it was possible that he would have never told her. It explained some of his hatred for the Fae.

“Do you understand that he was betrayed by his own?” Amycate asked fastidiously as if the question pained her.

“Do you mean that the Fae captured him because an elf betrayed him?” Mirie said, horrified.

“Ai-eee,” Amycate murmured. “And the High Court never knew who did this terrible thing. It made Anarion a suspicious man. Embittered as well, unable to trust.”

You are Amaias, my beautiful mate. Who should I trust more? Why trust a woman because she was promised to him? Why bring this up at all? Mirie frowned. I mean, what the hell?

“Anarion was never the same after that,” Amycate said.Mirie wasn’t sure what it was that triggered her. She knew that the sight that she

possessed enabled her to see people’s magicks and sometimes it told her other things. The seer’s rooms were tangled in restrictive spells. Someone had cursed Arisar to prevent her from telling all that she knew. Furthermore, the same range of purples was wrapped around the Eyes of the Amber Moon.

“I thought that he would be the one to lead us away from the cursed Artuntaure and his thrice damned political methods.” Amycate had stopped in a deep shadow and all Mirie could see was the curve of her back and the silver of her flowing gown. “The Halfling prince would not stand for the machinations of the human realm nor would he ever allow the degradation of those with witch blood in them.”

Silently Mirie willed the Lady Amycate to return to a position where the golden light would fall on her fully. She was listening to her words but items were niggling at Mirie’s subconscious like worms burrowing into the black earth.

A mistress had given the Eyes of the Amber Moon to Anarion, someone he had held dear at one time but later cast away because of her possessiveness. Not Amycate certainly. What man would have an affair with the future mother of his Amaias, his beautiful mate?

“Her name was Tia,” Amycate turned slightly and Mirie could see the gleam of her violet eyes. Clearly Amycate could follow the train of Mirie’s thoughts. “My father’s

by blow, and another Baninois. My half-sister, and your half-aunt. She is Ridon’s mother, the son of her first husband. Our father gave the Eyes of the Amber Moon to Tia for safe keeping, to protect, and she became Anarion’s mistress, as our spy.”

Mirie stepped backward and bumped into a solid figure behind her. Hands fell on her shoulders and held her firmly. Abruptly she was frozen in place and understood that some kind of spell was binding her. There was an elaborate set of purpling lines cast from Amycate to herself. Amycate was smiling now and stepped out into the light. The magicks were revealed and Mirie could tell that it was she that had ensorcelled Arisar. Previously she had kept out of the brightest light and out of Mirie’s direct line of sight, and Mirie knew that more enchantments were involved in masking Amycate’s natural magicks. Especially from Mirie, who might connect them to what was in Arisar’s rooms.

A voice muttered into her ear, “Let me kill her now.” It was Laris, one of Anarion’s bodyguards who had stared at Mirie so oddly.

Amycate’s smile grew larger, an amused predator. “Anarion declined our group’s invitation. It was he who turned Zyvana’s father in. Zyvana took you in vengeance.”

“Not against you,” Mirie said. “Against Anarion.”“Of course,” Amycate said, almost surprised at Mirie’s understanding. “The seers

promised you to him, as his Amaias, his truly beloved, and not Tia, who wanted him so desperately. He wouldn’t even take Tia as his consort because he was waiting for you. It was she who betrayed him to the Unseelie Court after he turned her out, much to our displeasure.”

Mirie’s muscles were like stone. She strained until she could feel beads of sweat popping from her pores and she couldn’t force herself to move. “You’re trying to overthrow the High Court,” Mirie said and thought, Well, duh, Captain Obvious. Can anyone ask for a stalling much moment here?

“As my daughter you would be the perfect queen for our court, but Zyvana took you instead, for her own agenda, and you were ruined in the human world,” Amycate murmured, her voice containing the icy whip of anger. “Tainted by their vainglorious ways.”

“I wouldn’t say I was ruined,” Mirie said before wishing she could have bitten her lip. “I would say I wasn’t brainwashed into thinking that a certain group of people is better than the rest. And btw, pot calling the kettle black.”

Amycate shook her head. “We thought you were dead and we conspired to move Anarion to our side of the lines. After twenty years of waiting, it was nearly time. The human realm would be destroyed by the three Moon artifacts, and the High Court of the Land of Light would be abolished and replaced by those who are more suitable. Anarion unknowingly kept the artifact safe until it was needed and Laris kept watch.”

“But the Committee sent you to spy upon him,” Laris growled. “An elf, one who did not realize she was an elf, and without the honor of her line. His instincts told him that you were his Amaias. An elf who had been raised human.”

Mirie wished she could spit in his face or at the very least, plant one of her booted feet in an area that make him sing falsetto for a good thirty minutes. “I have honor,” she said firmly. “I don’t stab others in the back like a foul coward. Like Arisar, and like Zyvana and her husband. It was you who came after her, not knowing I was still alive. You made it seem as though Huldufolk murdered them out of

political rage. You didn’t know that Zyvana was playing both sides, cooperating with the Committee. You suck.”

Then she did the only thing that she could do. She screamed bloody murder, until Laris twisted her about and struck her so hard that the stars she saw almost immediately became a pool of blackest darkness.

•

Mirie woke up again and wished she hadn’t. Her head, neck, and face all pounded like congas at a particular intense drum festival. She tried to hold her head in her hands but her hands were tied behind her. She was lying on her side on a hard floor and the room was ominously dark. Crap, she thought. Just crap buckets. I meet my mother and she’s a complete hag bitch. I’m never complaining about being raised by the Committee ever again.

Testing out her bonds, Mirie found she was particularly secured. Her feet were tied. Her wrists were double looped and then strapped to her feet. She was pretty much helpless. Even if her witch blade was still at her waist, she couldn’t have reached it. So she looked around the gloom and waited for her eyes to adjust. After a few minutes she could tell where the door was located. There was a less gloomy outline of light that revealed its contours. The remainder of the room was darker than the rest and she rolled awkwardly over to see what she could.

Nothing. There was nothing else there. It was some sort of closet sized space that had been emptied out. The walls were wood. The floor was more wood. Everything was roughly hewn and not at all like the palace of the High Court.

Duh. Not in the palace anymore. They took me. My mother, that bitch, and Laris, hope he falls in a bottomless well. Mirie took a deep breath. She wasn’t gagged. They weren’t worried about her making noise. So she wasn’t in a place where someone could hear her scream.

“That’s just peachy keen,” she muttered.Mirie took a deep breath and concentrated on relaxing all of her muscles. The

breathing exercises that the Master Warlock had instructed her in helped her to focus her personal magicks. Her eyes drifted shut and when they opened again she knew her eyes were glowing. The space she was in was adrift with glimmers of old magicks. Some were her mothers and others belonged to people long gone from this place. They were tinged with black and deteriorated so badly that she knew that whoever had cast them had passed into death. This place was filled with old death and black enchantments that boded ill for even the casual visitor. She felt icky by association just from lying on the floor.

And something tugged at her to move slightly to the left and back. Mirie shifted her body and searched with her fingers, clumsily inching backward to find what it was that her powers were prodding her about. A moment later and she found the sharp end of a board that was warped. It had split sometime in the distant past, leaving something she could use. She pushed herself against the wall and began to saw back and forth.

It wasn’t easy and it took a long time because the blood caused by the wood slicing over her skin helped make her wrists slippery. The rope parted and loosened marginally and Mirie was able to pull her wrists loose. A minute later and she was

free, the ropes a pile at her feet. She checked herself and found that the Eyes of the Amber Moon was missing as was the witch blade.

Protector, she berated herself. Hah. Apparently I can’t even protect a wet paper bag. Mirie rose up and ignored the pounding in her head. But Mom made a big mistake when she left me still breathing and I’m getting my stuff back.

•“She can be used,” Amycate was saying.Mirie had slipped out of the unlocked room and into a large building with dozens

of empty rooms and an air of antiqued neglect. It had been some fancy manor once and now it was musty and decaying with emptiness. Outside the windows she found to her surprise that it was dusk and knew she was no longer in the Land of Light. The ground was black with death and skeletal trees pointed to the skies in the background. It didn’t look like anywhere she’d been before, so she discounted Earth. It was another dominion where Her Ladyship, Amycate Sumrah, and her criminal posse were taking refuge while they planned the revolution.

Another voice said, “You mean Prince Anarion will do our bidding if she remains alive.”

Laris said, “His Highness has formed an instant attachment to the girl. The connection is there. Mirie Baldursdottir is his Amaias. His beloved mate, just as Arisar’s mother predicted. He would do anything for her.”

“I wonder if Anarion would be more willing to cooperate if we sent part of her back to him in a golden box. Perhaps a finger,” Amycate said emotionlessly.

So not getting her a mother’s day card this year, thought Mirie mutinously.“We’ve experienced the prince’s anger before,” the unknown voice said. “He is

resistant to such maneuverings.”“You were torturing him, not his beloved mate,” Amycate said. “The difference

will be that he will make his fingers bleed to do our bidding. As long as my daughter remains breathing.”

It dawned on Mirie rather suddenly that the three were conversing in English and that the third unknown person had an American accent, much like any newscaster on a public network had. The unknown person was not an elf, but a human.

Easier to kill then, she thought coldly. First, retrieve the Eyes of the Amber Moon. Then teach Mom about familial obligation. Mirie reconsidered. No, first, find a weapon. A large, sharp, lethal weapon.

The group of three continued to plot. Mirie cast her personal magicks about and found two other living souls nearby. One was an elf unfamiliar to her. The other was another human. They were close but not so close that Mirie couldn’t take them out without Amycate, Laris, and the other human hearing.

Easing down the hallway, she found a great room that reminded her of a ball room. The ceilings were high and arched, the floors were crumbling stone. Once there had been elaborately painted murals on the walls of lords and ladies dancing through a starlit night. Their costumes were reminiscent of the human realm’s 1800’s with long courtly dresses and starched high collars. Now it was dimpled with black mold and large patches of paint were falling away. The overlarge windows were cracked and broken with a chilled dusk wind blowing its way through.

Mirie inched her way around the room, listening to the faintness of Amycate’s voice as it grew distant from her. The opposite side of the room held three doors. One to an anteroom, and the other two doors led to a cavernous kitchen with rusting iron stoves and debris of remote meals. Ratlike animals skittered away from her as she entered, their claws scratched along the floor as they eagerly departed.

She could feel the elf nearby and she suspected the person was in the next room. The door hung halfway off its frame and the man was crouched on the floor, fiddling with her witch blade. The weapon was cold and nescient. Did the elf know that it needed Mirie for its activation?

Her approach was silent. The fact that the elf was alone and untied, and playing with her blade had condemned him to his fate. She stood behind him as he brought the blade close to his face, examining the intricate shapes and lettering on the sides of the handle. Swiftly and gracefully Mirie reached around and touched a single finger to the handle, and said, “You shouldn’t play with it if you don’t know what it’s capable of doing.”

Once her finger made contact with the metal, the witch blade was triggered. There was a burst of violet light that blinded the elf before the blade elongated to its normal length. As the business end of the weapon was inches away from his face, the blade sliced efficiently through his eyes and into his brain. He was dead before Mirie finished her initial criticism. In fact, her fingers ably grasped the handle of the weapon before his dropped away.

His body crumpled to the ground and Mirie looked around her before she rolled the dead elf into a dark shadow. Putting the witch blade into her belt, she took a moment to search him. There was another knife and a pocketful of odd coins that she didn’t recognize. She took the knife and stuck it in her belt.

Minutes later she found the human. He was in another antechamber, sitting on a rotting chair, fiddling with a Blackberry that wasn’t working. Mirie was on him, with the witch blade at his throat, about to slice through it without compunction when she recognized him.

Chapter Six

Violet will be tried beyond all measure…

“Nehemiah,” Mirie breathed. Her direct supervisor at the Committee stared back at her with growing horror. The older man wasn’t bound and he didn’t look like he was in any way a prisoner. But what he was, was a traitor, a traitor to the Committee and to Mirie. There had been rumors of a mole or moles in the Committee, someone who was interested in the Moon Trinity, and the power they contained, but Mirie thought it was only rumors.

He stared up at her as she crouched over him. The witch blade trembled at his throat and a crimson drip of blood slithered down his flesh. Nehemiah knew exactly how deadly Mirie could be with a blade, after all, he had overseen her training for years. “It’s not what you think, Mirie,” he said hoarsely. “They have my family.”

Mirie’s hand shook minutely. Nehemiah had a wife, Alicia, and two sons, both of whom were under the age of ten. “Here?”

“On earth,” he said. “Kept at our house for several days now, until I could come up with the Book of the Black Moon.”

There was a hiss of noise that escaped Mire’s mouth. “You let them have the Book of the Black Moon,” she said and it wasn’t a question. “You stole it from the Committee’s secure facility.”

Nehemiah’s head dropped a little and the shock on his face was expressive. Mirie knew it meant someone had died in the theft, someone at the facility. Not even Mirie knew where the site was located, but Nehemiah had been motivated. “Sean is eight years old,” he said pleadingly. “John is only six. For God’s sake, Mirie, you’ve had dinner with us.”

“That’s why you pushed the clairvoyants about the Eyes of the Amber Moon,” she said, trying to not think of the two precocious boys who loved to play just about every game ever invented. “That’s why we were put on Prince Anarion’s surveillance. You had to come up with the goods while you stalled about the book.”

“Then you vanished, and it all went to hell,” Nehemiah said vehemently. “Now I don’t even know if-”

If they’re still alive…Mirie finished for him silently. “Did the Committee murder Zyvana and my step-father?”

“Zyvana?” Nehemiah repeated in confusion.“Korrah was the name she used, the one who pretended to be my mother,” Mirie

hissed. She kept the witch blade at his throat while she cast a discerning glance over her shoulder. She could hear nothing but that didn’t mean anything. Amycate, Laris and the unknown human could still be plotting, or they could be coming this way to deal with Nehemiah. Mirie didn’t have time for recriminations but she couldn’t really help herself.

“Never,” Nehemiah gritted. “We found them like that. The Huldufolk left certain signs of their displeasure. You were hidden away, but luckily the house had

been used as a safe house for the Committee for decades and we looked for you.” He looked at her intently. “If she wasn’t your mother, then who…”

“Amycate doesn’t keep you informed,” Mirie said coldly. “You yell, you’re dead. If you’re telling the truth, the first thing I will do is save Alicia and your children. If they’re not already dead.” She didn’t like saying the words but the truth was plain. If Nehemiah had traded the Book of the Black Moon to Amycate, she had no reason to keep her hostages alive. They were loose ends, just as was Nehemiah. As a matter of fact, it was odd that he was still breathing after delivering the goods. After all, what else could he do?

“Why are you still alive?” she asked in a voice that could have sliced through an iceberg.

“They want me to spy for them,” Nehemiah said promptly. “They want to know what the Committee knows about the Silver Moon’s Mystery, so that they can obtain it as well. With the three relics in their possession, then you know what they can do, what they can use against any realm they happen to be in.”

“Are you armed?” she said quietly.Nehemiah shook his head. “They don’t trust me.”“How many of them are there?”“The Lady Amycate, an elf named Laris, an elf named Penril, a human I don’t

know, and three unnamed elves outside patrolling the grounds,” Nehemiah answered quickly. He frowned as he suddenly concentrated on her features, adding, “Amycate looks just like-”

“Where are we?” Mirie didn’t bother with semantics. If it were up to her, Amycate wouldn’t be around much longer for anyone else to remark on resemblances.

“A black realm,” he said. “It’s always twilight here. Never day, never night. There was a war here and the curses filled the land. The occupants fled for other dimensions or died. It’s been abandoned for hundreds of years as far as I can tell. The Lady and her crew use it as a hiding place. The manor and the immediate lands are spelled against the things that live here.”

“Where’s the nearest portal?”“At the back of the manor, through a huge stone fireplace. It’s a great hall with

two fireplaces at each end. They’re bracketed by carved beasts at each end. One side has a beast with broken limbs and that fireplace has the portal.”

“Point the direction,” she said.Nehemiah indicated a direction away from Amycate, Laris and the unknown man.

Mirie withdrew the witch blade and stepped back. “Go. Go to the portal and return to your family. Call the Committee on the other side and bring reinforcements for their rescue.”

Nehemiah crawled to his feet and swayed slightly as his wild eyes considered Mirie. “What if…”

“Get Jack to retrieve your family,” Mirie said. “And Nehemiah, if you’re lying to me, I’ll kill you in a very ugly fashion.”

“I’m not lying,” Nehemiah said hoarsely. “What about the Lady and the other elves? The other human”

“If I can, I’m getting the Book of the Black Moon and the Eyes of the Amber Moon back.” Mirie stepped back and kept her eyes on the doorway and on Nehemiah at the

same time. “Go on, Nehemiah. I can’t trust you at my back and I can’t kill you without evidence, so run through the portal. If someone comes to help me, then I’ll know what you did.”

Nehemiah nodded shortly and spun in the direction of the portal at the rear of the ailing manor. In moments he was gone, although Mirie could hear his footsteps leading steadily away from her. She waited for a moment and then took a deep breath.

Knowing what she was going to have to do didn’t make her feel better. Mirie was going to face off against her mother, Anarion’s personal bodyguard, and the unknown human. She was going to be the only thing standing between the artifacts and the use of them by a subversive group of elves and humans.

Mirie went back through the kitchen and the ball room, noticing that the dead elf was still lying in the shadows. As she crept closer to where she had left Amycate, Laris and the human, she could hear nothing. Neither voices nor subtle movement disturbed the silence. They hadn’t passed her in the hallways, so they could still be in the same section they had been in previously.

One thing she was certain of was that she had to get the drop on Amycate, before the elf could start casting her spells on Mirie. Mirie had some protective measures but she wasn’t sure how strong Amycate was, and Amycate was strong enough to be feared. She had frozen Mirie before when Mirie wasn’t expecting it, but Mirie was more knowledgeable now.

Jack and Mirie had faced witches on the wrong side of the Committee before. None of them had the powers that Amycate possessed. Then Mirie knew. Laris had saved some of Mirie’s blood and given it to Amycate to use in her spell. Perhaps the missing t-shirt was the source. It didn’t matter much, because Mirie was forced to act no matter what magicks were in Amycate’s repertoire.

“I should have killed you when I had the chance,” Laris said from behind her. Mirie ducked and the katana knife sliced into the doorframe above her. She whirled and one leg shot out to hit him in the knee. He made a broken noise and his knee quivered.

Then Mirie had the witch blade out and the weapon was glowing fiercely in the gloom. Laris recovered by backing up in the room. She said, “You should have tried, dipshit. Where’s Mom? I want to catch up.”

Laris growled and swung at her again. The knife’s squared end scraped across the top of Mirie’s ribs as she leapt backwards. She felt the sting of skin splitting but was already twirling away. Laris’s large form lurched at her, using the katana knife like a blunt instrument, swinging it down on her body as she retreated into another large room with massive windows. The twilight gloom of the realm had brightened slightly as they faced off in the expanse. More of the ratlike creatures scurried for cover as the pair twisted and turned in silent combat.

Laris made another error that allowed Mirie to whirl past him and use her foot to crush the back of the weakened knee. He fell to the floor on his good knee and cursed her roundly. Mirie took a breath and backed up, casting a glance over her shoulder for the others. However, they remained alone.

Not for long, she thought. They were making enough noise to summon anyone in the vicinity. “So where’s Mommy, Laris? And does Anarion know what you’re up to?

Well, heck I guess not since you’re here with me. I think he’s got something against me oh, say, dying.”

He stood up in a rush and even in the sunset of the land, she could see the flush that flowed across his cheeks. “Like most of the humans, you talk too much,” he said.

Mirie feinted to see if he would remember her favorite tricks and he didn’t fall for it. Then she kept spinning, putting all of her body weight into the turn, aiming for his head with her right boot. Laris didn’t have the time to react. It connected with a dull thud. The next thud was his body hitting the floor.

“Yeah,” she said to his unconscious form. “It’s one of my failings.”Abruptly she heard running footsteps and alerted to someone charging past the

room she was in. Headed for the portal, she thought. She looked and saw the form of a man disappearing down the hallway. To the right was a dim purple glow and Mirie knew that Amycate was waiting for her.

Amycate or the human? Mirie made her decision and went after the human. It was possible that he had the Book of the Black Moon and the Eyes of the Amber Moon, and it was unthinkable that the two deadly artifacts could slip from the Committee’s fingers. She poured on the speed and passed the ball room and the kitchen. Then she was in an unknown part of the manor and the footsteps were increasing their speed. The man looked over his shoulder at her but all she could see was a white flesh and large eyes. There was more as well, in the dimness, for the briefest of instants there was a certain something visible in his eyes.

Mirie was holding the witch blade up and it was glowing fiercely as she ran. Dimly she realized she must look like an armed demon intent on taking his flesh from his body and leaving only steaming entrails. And it was true, she was more than a little ticked off.

Then he put the pedal to the metal and pushed through another door. The room was large and had the two fireplaces in it. The one with the broken limb on the statue of the beast was on the far side and he unerringly ran to it. Mirie cursed as he screamed out a spell, not hesitating as he plowed forward. The portal flared like an iridescent explosion and he vanished into it. A split second later Mirie crashed into the stones of the back of the immense fireplace. The portal was gone.

Shaking her head to clear the pain of head meeting stone, Mirie gasped with the knowledge that she might have lost the two artifacts. “Damn. Damn. Damn.”

Turning back to the room, she stared at the doorway. There was Amycate, staring at her with intent awareness.

“Mom,” Mirie said plainly. “I think there’s some things we need to discuss.”

Chapter Seven

Violet shall overcome violet…

Before another moment passed, Amycate’s fingers moved deftly and Mirie couldn’t move again. Her eyes slipped downward and she could see the purple splinters of power twisting from herself to her mother. They curled around her like a large wine colored python enjoying playing with its next meal.

Amycate walked forward delicately as if reflecting on her next move. “So much trouble,” she said in English. “As a child, always clamoring for attention. Always disturbing me. And what the seer said about your future.” She paused halfway across the room and smoothed her dress down. “It wasn’t something I could have allowed.”

Mirie came into instant understanding. “You wanted Zyvana to murder me,” she breathed. “You wanted her to kill me all those years ago. Instead she took me away. To save me from you.” There was a modicum of respect for Zyvana. What Mirie remembered about the woman wasn’t bad. She had been kind to Mirie, even loving.

Amycate nodded politely. “Well, yes. She was an unpredictable Halfling. The agreement was that I would release her father from his imprisonment. But apparently she had too soft of a heart. Of course, her father died in the King’s dungeons and our agreement became a moot point. When we finally located her, she had married the Icelander and we never found you. We didn’t know that you had been hidden and that the Committee had taken you. Arisar didn’t tell me that.” She touched her mouth finely. “But Arisar kept certain events to herself, didn’t she?”

“Your restrictive spells didn’t ruin her mind,” Mirie said coldly. “Obviously she knew what she couldn’t say to you. She said what you forced her to say and nothing more.”

“An acute mind,” Amycate observed. She stopped about five feet away from Mirie and wrapped her hands together so that they rested on her abdomen. She could have been considering what to eat for breakfast. “You didn’t get that from your father.”

“Did you kill him, as well?” Mirie asked quietly.Amycate nodded. “Of course I did. He wasn’t one to fight against the royal

regime. He would have turned me in and any who had aided me.”Mirie sighed. “Too bad. I would have liked to have known him. Unfortunately

there’s just you.”A little frown wrinkled Amycate’s forehead. Mirie knew that she wasn’t supposed

to be cavalier. She was supposed to be on her knees begging for her life.“Should I kill you then?” Amycate wondered aloud. “If you can’t be used, then

there is no need for you.”Eyes rolling, Mirie said, “As if. You’re not fooling anyone. You took a shot. You

thought it might be possible to control Anarion with me. You thought incorrectly. I don’t believe Anarion is the type to allow that.”

Amycate’s face went blank and she said slyly, “You would be surprised. Laris told me how he lost his bearings when the two of you first touched. It is alleged to be like that with dedicated pairs. He would have killed the bodyguard who shot you if you hadn’t been dying. Probably with his bare hands and hoarse with rage. The Unseelie Fae couldn’t break him, nor did their counterparts with their antiquated torture methods.”

What had the unknown human/shifter said? “We’ve experienced the prince’s anger before,” the unknown voice said. “He is resistant to such maneuverings.” And he hadn’t been just human, had he? Amycate didn’t know that part? “Shifters were in league with the Unseelie Fae against the Land of Light?”

“Not the Land of Light but the High Court, against Artuntaure himself,” Amycate admitted.

Mirie relaxed and thought about what she learned. She was going to have to do something she didn’t want to do, but she was left without a choice. “Do you want to tell me your contact’s name, Lady Amycate?” she asked politely. “Or the whereabouts of the two artifacts?”

Amycate finally appeared surprised. “Why in the name of all the Gods would I do that?”

Mirie’s potencies shifted and she did what Amycate herself had taught her the first time she had ensorcelled her daughter in binding lengths of her magicks. The witch blade came to life with a blinding glare and sliced downward. The magicks split apart as if they were lifeless bits of rope and Mirie was free again.

The older elf’s horrorstruck face expressed her disbelief about the abrupt transferal of power. Amycate started to say something and Mirie’s left hand came about in a roundhouse that knocked Amycate onto her back on the floor.

There was a low moan from Amycate. Mirie ripped a strip from the bottom of Amycate’s dress and tightly gagged her. Then she straddled her body, trapping her arms and chest between her thighs. Amycate wasn’t saying anything or doing anything without Mirie giving her permission. And frankly Mirie was amazed at how easy it had been to defeat her.

“Now,” Mirie said. “Do you want to tell me the contact’s name?”Amycate’s violet eyes glared up at her daughter.“Fine. I’ll tell you something. You should have had Laris kill me before you tried

your restrictive spells on me. Not only can I decipher your magicks, but I turned them around on you. I can do everything you’ve shown me and more that I’ve learned from the Committee’s Master Warlocks.” Mirie smiled serenely down at Amycate. “That was another of your mistakes. Now you can make it up by telling me where the Book of the Black Moon and the Eyes of the Amber Moon are.”

Amycate shook her head.There was a roar of noise that came from the outside of the manor. Then there

were wretched screams. Mirie held Amycate securely as she looked around. Great shapes moved outside of the windows in the twilight world. What had Nehemiah said about the manor and the immediate grounds being spelled against the things that lived here? That was pretty much it. Mirie’s eyes caught Amycate’s again and Mirie knew.

It was Amycate who had spelled the manor and the grounds and it was she who had disabled the spells. Just on the off chance that Mirie came out ahead. Just as she had done so.

Mirie clambered off her mother and stood. “Stupid. You could live. Perhaps Artuntaure would only jail you. Perhaps you could have escaped into another realm or taken refuge with the Unseelie Court. Instead you’ll die here along with everyone you’ve brought.”

Amycate reached up and removed the gag. “Alongside of you. Arisar’s prophecy will never come true. You’ll never do what was foretold.”

“What are you so afraid of?” Mirie asked curiously.Distant doors crackled like toothpicks and something began to rumble through the

manor. Something huge, hungry, and ticked off was coming fast. It was as if it were aiming directly for the thing responsible for holding it back, Amycate.

Backing away from the great room’s doors, Amycate looked around nervously. Mirie knew she had seen what roamed the exterior of this world and what was coming for them. It had killed the two elves outside and it was apparently still ready to deal some down and dirty with them. She frowned and readied herself, hating to turn her back on her mother. But Amycate wasn’t focusing on Mirie at all. She was pushing herself into a corner and desperately trying to focus her personal magicks.

The thing stuck its head through the opening and sniffed. At first appearance it seemed like an approximation of the beasts carved in stone on either side of the fireplaces. Long and lean, it was over twenty feet in length. Its muscles were catlike and flowed effortlessly down its body. Four feet ended in pads with scimitar claws. Its pink eyes glowed with the reflection of the witch blade. Covered in white fur that went all the way to its pointed tail, it considered her threat level.

Its triangle shaped head seemed almost like a lizard’s. It was half feline and half reptilian and something that had adapted to its twilight world by way of albinism. “Change your mind, Amycate?” Mirie whispered.

Amycate suddenly lost all courage and ran for the open door on the other side of the large room. The beast snapped to when it saw the motion and leaped over Mirie even as she abruptly crouched. It continued its charge at Amycate. Mirie saw it with dismayed eyes and spun to try to counter the animal’s attack. Its great length allowed it to catch Amycate fluently and brought her down without exertion. Its giant mouth opened and there was an audible snap as it bit down on her body.

Then Mirie leaped onto its back, straddling its great neck with her legs, holding on for dear life. The witch blade came down on the base of its skull. She didn’t know what it was, but she knew that it had a spine and that was where she pierced it, twisting the blade as she shoved with all her might. There was a roar of agony and it dropped Amycate while it teetered. Mirie felt the back end of the beast sharply slacken as the spinal cord stopped sending messages to it. The animal fell to the side and Mirie took a moment to finish it off.

Mirie crouched above the beast and listened. There was nothing else. Not yet.But there was a little noise that almost a whimper that came from much closer.Amycate was still alive. Barely. Her violet eyes glittered up at Mirie. Without

hesitating Amycate grated in near whisper, “Arisar said one day the daughter would kill the mother.”

Mirie glanced around slowly. There was no one there. The portal was closed and Mirie knew nothing about how to open one. That was something only certain castes controlled and they bartered with other races to use them. The human or whatever he was had known how to open and close it. It had been open for Nehemiah. He had closed it just as he passed through. But if Amycate knew, she wasn’t speaking, and furthermore, she was dying. Dying slowly and utterly painfully. Her insides had been crushed and Mirie knew that it would be hours before Amycate succumbed to her injuries.

“Amycate,” Mirie said as she stood above her mother. “Tell me what I want to know and I’ll make sure that you-”

“I’ll never tell you,” Amycate said quickly with unholy determination and blood gurgled ominously out of the side of her mouth.

The witch blade slashed and Amycate breathed no more.“Fine,” Mirie said coldly. “All your machinations and the prophecy still came

true. It wasn’t worth all of the deaths. And it wasn’t worth yours.”Mirie checked to see if the portal was open by some chance. It wasn’t. She

heard another distant roar and settled in to wait for visitors.

Chapter Eight

And the cat and the man who is not really a man will follow the next piece of the puzzle…

Anarion was pacing back and forth across the warehouse’s floor. Jack sighed. The prince hadn’t relaxed for seven days. Jack didn’t think he had slept either. Then Nehemiah had contacted Jack on day two and the prince hadn’t wanted them to rescue Nehemiah’s family. After Nehemiah had told the group what he had done, Jack wasn’t happy about it either. But Nehemiah was determined.

Alicia and the two boys had been saved from two elves who had them tied up in the back of their house. Anarion had been in an unparalleled rage as he questioned the two elves. Unfortunately the pair didn’t know much more than that they had been hired by the Lady Sumrah to keep the humans until her word came to kill them. Then Nehemiah had taken them to the abandoned warehouse in a desolate part of Los Angeles.

There were rats, debris, and a few homeless people who had ran at the sight of Anarion and a group of the High Court’s Royal Guard. There were scattered pieces of wood and gang symbols spray painted on the walls. Broken windows allowed a cooling breeze to course through the yawning building. Someone had left a shopping cart in one corner filled with aluminum cans. But there wasn’t a portal. And there wasn’t Mirie.

The portal was dead. Someone had closed it and spelled it to stay closed.The Branwyns, the species that controlled most of the portals, were contacted

and Anarion bartered with them about reopening the portal. On the contrary they didn’t want to barter about this particular portal because, and Jack almost smiled, it led to a cursed realm. What had made Jack smile was not that it was a cursed realm, but that Anarion had threatened to ‘curse’ the Branwyns if they didn’t reopen the portal because his Amaias was in there. The slender Branwyns had renegotiated but it had been short and to the point. Conversely, the spelled portal had proven to be difficult to reopen. They had slaved over it for days without success.

Consequently, Anarion had been striding the warehouse for the better part of five days, wearing a determined path in the dust of the warehouse. The Royal Guard set up camp in the warehouse and Jack had called in favors with the local authorities to ensure that the police didn’t swoop down to break up whatever illegal things they thought they were doing down here. Even Ridon, the High Court’s principal investigator, had proven his worth time and time again by providing the Branwyns with spells obtained from his long dead mother.

Other Committee agents had come to take Nehemiah away to question him. He had gone without protest, only calling to Jack, “Tell Mirie-tell her I never wanted this.”

Jack had grimaced at the words. He knew Nehemiah should have contacted others in the Committee immediately, or at the very least, those he knew that he

could trust, like Jack and Mirie. They would have saved Alicia and the boys first. Mirie loved Nehemiah’s boys and she would have cut the elves into a dozen pieces before allowing them to hurt his family. But Nehemiah’s family wasn’t injured, only frightened, and they would recover. Jack didn’t know what would happen to Nehemiah.

Jack studied the double loading doors where the portal was supposed to be. The pair of Branwyns were conjuring their magicks there, repeating their spells and changing slight variations to see if something else would work. Hell, he wanted to pace too but he wasn’t sure that Anarion would take it the right way. The elf was uber-anxious and ready to take someone apart on general principal, and Jack wasn’t sure if his pacing might seem as though he cared for Mirie in the same way that the prince did.

There was a gentle “Meowrrr,” and a slight little weight rubbed against his leg. Jack glanced down and saw a black and white cat. Gold eyes glimmered up at him expectantly. The little cat began to purr and plump her claws on the filthy warehouse floor. Jack knelt to pet the cat and muttered, “What are you doing here, kitty?”

Anarion paused in his pacing. “Dumbass,” the prince said.It was such a Mirie thing to say that Jack blinked in astonishment. He looked back

down at the cat and the cat winked at him. “Your tushie looks good from down here, too,” the cat said with a feline grin.

Jack stood straight up and grunted. “Asta,” he murmured. “I hope you get a really big hairball.”

Asta stretched and kept stretching until she stood at his side in human form. Fully dressed in t-shirt, jeans and Nikes, she tossed her black and white hair and shrugged. “Hairball, humph.” She indicated the doors with a shoulder. “No luck yet?”

“Nothing gets past you, does it?” Jack said irately, vexed that Asta had pulled the wool over his eyes despite the fact that Mirie had warned him.

Casting him a scurrilous look, Asta tossed a bag toward the Branwyns. It was a little brown bag tied up with a silver cord that looked inconsequential. Jack was wondering where it had been when she was all feline and hadn’t had a stitch of clothing on. The Branwyns abruptly stopped and one said, “Is it-?”

“Yes,” Asta said impatiently. “And you wouldn’t believe what I had to do to get it.”

Anarion appeared beside them and said, “Asta, you’ll have my undying gratitude, if-”

“Forget it,” Asta said promptly. “Your father’s already promised me what I want. And besides I like the little elf witch. She’s saucy.”

“What did the king promise you?” Jack asked curiously.“None of your beeswax,” Asta said straightaway.“Okay what’s that?” He pointed at the bag that the Branwyns were immediately

putting to use.“Ground up dragon bones,” she said impishly and a slyly triumphant smile.“I thought dragons were extinct.”“In this sphere,” she said primly.

Anarion shot Asta an expressive look. “You went into the dragon’s world?”“You needed the bones for the Branwyns’ spell,” Asta stated plainly. “I got it.”The prince nodded at her in a way that Jack thought was regal and grateful at the

same time. Poor shmuck, he thought. He’s got it bad for Mirie. Jack wasn’t worried. Wherever Mirie was stuck, she had probably taken over and was ruling as the de facto empress.

The Branwyns unexpectedly cried out in colorful victory. The double loading dock doors shimmered and then exploded with light.

There was another noise that made Jack look at Anarion. The prince’s formerly cold face filled with hope and expectation and desperation.

Oh, yeah, Jack thought. Baaaaad. He’s a goner. And OMG, aren’t elves immortal? Why yes, they are. He shook his head. That shit will last forever.

Anarion didn’t even wait for the royal guard. He dived through the portal and disappeared. Jack shook his head again even as he was pulling his Japanese broadsword out of its scabbard and following. There was a cry behind him as elves followed.

There was an odd incongruity as Jack went through the portal. It burned and caressed at the same time. It seemed as though it lasted forever but was only a second long. One moment he was in a dusty, filthy warehouse with bright LA sunshine flowing through the windows and the next he was in a huge, dim room with statues of beasts bracketing the two fireplaces at each end. Everything looked old and debilitated. Then there was about ten large bodies lying around. Whatever it had been had been white and mean looking, even dead.

Jack took that all in before he bumped into Anarion, who had frozen in place in front of him. Behind him, several members of the royal guard had stumbled out and were fanning out.

The other fireplace had a fire going and Mirie was sitting next to it, roasting what looked like a very large rat over a spit. She didn’t appear uncomfortable or tortured but just a little tired and even a little bored. Sitting next to her was a very bruised and battered Laris, who was looking back at the prince with a very real fear in his eyes. One leg was splinted with old boards and tied with shreds of rotting material and his wrists were bound tightly in front.

From all the way across the room, Mirie sighed loudly. “It’s been like weeks in this realm. Did you guys stop to sightsee?” She stood up and gestured at all the dead beasts in the room. “Good thing these things respect the ability to kick ass and that they don’t decompose quickly. Did you know that some sorts of shifters are involved in this? They have the artifacts, Goddamnit.”

Anarion made a choking sound. Mirie shut up.Jack grinned broadly. Then he wasn’t sure but he thought he blinked because

suddenly Anarion had Mirie enveloped in his arms and they were kissing as if trying to devour each other. They had met somewhere in the middle of the room, and were murmuring to each other against their lips, things that Jack really wished he didn’t have to hear.

“No consorts for you,” Mirie said firmly and Anarion pulled back to grin happily down at her face.

Beside him, Asta sighed wistfully. “I get to be the first godmother.”

“Hey,” Jack said to the Royal Guard behind him. “Get Laris. He’s a bad guy. Let’s get everyone back through the portal before something else happens.”

Everyone moved quickly except Anarion and Mirie. Finally, Jack said, “Time to go, kids. Mirie, toothbrushes and real, non-rat food back in that direction. And beds, too, if you’ve absolutely got to remind me.” He jerked a thumb back at the portal.

Mirie moved her head back from Anarion and sighed with apparent pleasure. “A bed. Good idea.”

Anarion didn’t even waste a moment. He picked Mirie up and darted back through the portal. Jack shook his head again and knew that they’d be gone before he went through himself. He looked around and said, “Anything else here?”

Asta studied the room and the dead occupants. She saw two more human sized shapes under an old piece of drapery and went to lift up a corner. There was a dead elf she didn’t know and Lady Amycate. “I’ve heard boogieman stories about this realm,” she said carefully. “It’s a terrible place and full of the worst curses imaginable. It’s almost a miracle that the Lady Mirie survived this awful place as long as she did.”

“You don’t know the Lady Mirie very well,” Jack smirked. He looked at the bodies and then at the Royal Guard who was left. “Should we take them with us?”

One elf shook his head. “They’ve lost the right to the honor of being laid to rest in the Land of Light. Let them rot here where they belong.”

“It isn’t over,” Asta said as she paused by the portal.Jack thought of the prophecy that Arisar had left for him. “Not by a long shot.”

He took her arm and wondered briefly at the spark of electricity that surged through him at the transitory touch. But even as his mind wandered briefly, he knew that it was up to him to get the Book of the Black Moon and the Eyes of the Amber Moon back and ASAP.

They waited as the Royal Guard returned through the portal and then Jack went through with Asta at his side. He smiled on the other end because Anarion and Mirie were long gone. The prince had teleported out of there with Mirie in his arms. Then Jack smiled crookedly as Asta giggled gleefully.

TE

Look for Part III of the Moon Trilogy in Silver Moon.

About the Author

C.L. Bevill has lived in Texas, Virginia, Arizona, and Oregon. She once was in the US Army and a graphic illustrator. She holds degrees in social-psychology and counseling. She the author of Bubba and the Dead Woman, Bubba and the 12 Deadly Days of Christmas, Bayou Moon, and Shadow People, among others. Presently she lives with her husband and her daughter and continues to constantly write. She can be reached at www.clbevill.com or you can read her blog at www.carwoo.blogspot.com

Other Novels by C.L. Bevill~

Mysteries:Bubba and the Dead Woman

Bubba and the 12 Deadly Days of Christmas

Bayou Moon

Paranormal Romance:Veiled Eyes (Lake People)

Disembodied Bones (Lake People)

The Moon Trilogy:Black Moon (The Moon Trilogy 1)Amber Moon (The Moon Trilogy 2)Silver Moon (The Moon Trilogy 3)

Cat Clan Novella:Harvest Moon

Shadow People

Sea of Dreams

Suspense:The Flight of the Scarlet Tanager

Black Comedy:The Life and Death of Bayou Billy

Missile Rats

Chicklet:Dial ‘M’ For Mascara