I shrugged. I had my sincere doubts that the bugbear would have wished me any better luck, so I wasn't going to waste any tears on him. I turned back to the mayhem on the sidewalk.
"Well…" There wasn't much else to say. It wasn't every day a bunch of Otherworld creatures got themselves mowed down in front of my bookstore.
The unicorn trotted over to my side. I glanced up into his face, mesmerized by the swirling vortex of colors in his eyes. Pretty. Very pretty. And, unless I was off the mark, he looked a little bit pissed, too.
"You might want to call a constable," the horned horse said, sounding mildly concerned. He nodded in the direction of the flattened bugbear. "Somebody could slip on that mess and hurt themselves."
He had a point. The sidewalk looked like a scene out of Pulp Fiction or Kung Fu Hustle. I could hear Chase now. He was going to just love getting my call. He'd been swamped lately, trying to keep up the facade that we were still on the official up-and-up with the OIA—the Otherworld Intelligence Agency—and not running the whole show ourselves. Cleaning up after a trio of Otherworld thugs was probably the last thing he wanted dumped on his plate.
I let out a long sigh. "You're probably right. Would you like to come in while I make the call?" I motioned to the shop.
If unicorns could shrug, this one would have. "All right. You wouldn't happen to have anything to drink, would you? I'm thirsty, and there don't seem to be any public watering holes around."
"Sure, I can get you some water. I'm Camille, by the way. Camille D'Artigo. I'm from Otherworld." I unlocked the door and punched in the security code to turn off the alarm system that I'd just armed.
"That's rather obvious." The unicorn's words rippled with a droll tone, and I realized we weren't speaking English. We'd automatically switched over to Melosealfôr, a rare dialect of Crypto that all witches who were pledged to the Moon Mother learned during their training. "I know who you are. You stand out in the crowd, my lady. How do you do? I'm Feddrah-Dahns."
"Feddrah-Dahns, eh? You're from the Windwillow Valley then." Something about the name rang a bell, but I couldn't quite place it. I did know that every unicorn coming out of the Windwillow Valley assumed Dahns as their surname. The area was teeming with Cryptos, and there were rumors that huge herds of the horned beasts roamed the plains, nomads who migrated across the vast valley during the summer months.
"You know your geography, Camille D'Artigo."
"Yes, well… What about the pixie? Where did he go? I noticed pixie dust a little while ago."
"I hope he'll be all right. He retrieved something from the bugbear that belonged to me. Technically, he was simply reclaiming stolen property, but the bugbear and his accomplices apparently didn't see it that way." Feddrah-Dahns blinked those beautiful big eyes of his.
I grinned. "Thieves rarely understand the concept of ownership, be they bugbear or human." I opened the door as wide as I could. As the unicorn cautiously stepped over the doorstop, he bobbed his head, a curious glint in his eye. Life in Seattle might be gloomy and wet, but nobody could ever convince me it was boring.
Chapter Two
Before Chase and his team arrived, the wounded Fae managed to crawl off, leaving a trail of blood spatters that disappeared into the alley behind my building. I had glanced down the gloomy passage, but it was too dark to see to the end, and I had no inclination to wander down there by myself. Chase and his men could explore it if they wanted to.
I did, however, decide to drag the unconscious goblin inside, into the room next to my office. He stank, which was gross, and his clothes were greasy, which was even worse, but I finally wrangled him into the back where I hog-tied him with some strapping tape. He woke up and glared at me as I was wrapping the clear tape around his wrists and ankles.
I immediately slapped a piece of tape across his mouth before he was able to speak. Nasty looks wouldn't hurt me, but whatever came out of his mouth just might. Some goblins used magic. And they were all dirty, filthy little liars.
The bugbear, on the other hand—or what remained of him—could stay right where he was. Way too nasty. No way I was going to clean up a slick patch of roadkill, especially not while wearing velvet and lace.
Ten minutes later, Chase leaned against the counter, staring at the unicorn, while Sharah and Mallen scraped the bugbear off the road. I had to hand it to them. The two elves looked ready to gag, but they finished their job without complaint.
Feddrah-Dahns was busy drinking his water from a bucket I found in the back. Iris used it for cleaning, so I rinsed it out and filled it with fresh spring water from the water cooler. He looked about as contemplative as I'd seen a unicorn look. Not that I'd seen too many unicorns, even back in Otherworld. They usually preferred the company of their own kind.
A few of my regular customers who'd been passing by noticed the open shop door, and they wandered in to see if everything was okay. Eyes wide, they immediately glommed onto the horned beast, surrounding him as if he were some sort of god.
When I thought about it, in a way he was a god. Few unicorns had shown any interest in coming through the portals, and the Earthside species seldom showed themselves. Considering the wonder with which they were revered in human legend and mythology, it didn't surprise me that people immediately opened their hearts to him.
Henry Jeffries, one of my best customers, gently reached out to touch the wild mane that cascaded down the ridge of the unicorn's neck, a look of wonder rippling across his face. Feddrah-Dahns glanced at him, gently whinnying. Henry shuffled over to me and rubbed his hands across his eyes. He looked teary.
"I never thought I'd live to see the day. Do you think Mr. Beagle ever really met a unicorn?"
er One
There was pixie dust in the air. I could feel it seeping in from under the door of the Indigo Crescent, my bookshop, as it wafted up to tickle the back of my throat. There was no mistaking the stuff; it was different from just about every other manifestation of Fae magic there was. Sparkling, the dust shimmered on the astral, hovering in that in-between place. Not quite physical, not quite ethereal. And yet pixie magic had more effect on humans and the human realm than it did on anybody else.
Curious. The fact that I could sense it all the way back in my office meant it came from a pixie with strong magic. Otherworld magic, if I wasn't off my mark. I hadn't seen an Earthside pixie near my shop since I'd been here. Or at least, I didn't think any were around. The creatures usually gave me a wide berth, partly because I was half-Fae and partly because I was a witch. Either way, they didn't trust me.
A number of witches back in Otherworld made a habit of trapping pixies to harvest their dust. The pixies weren't hurt, but they took a severe blow to the ego during the process, especially when some of their captors sold the dust for profits that would make even a leprechaun blink. Of course, the pixies didn't get one penny from the transaction, and sometimes they banded together to raid a shop with some success. But for the most part, they just tried to avoid us altogether.
Of course, I didn't trust them, either. Pixies were born troublemakers, and they enjoyed every minute of it. They weren't usually dangerous, not in the way your average pain-in-the-neck goblin was, but they were trouble all the same.