Blood of the Fey (Morgana Trilogy) (23 page)

“You heard me, Irene,” I hear Arthur say as I tiptoe to the entrance.

“You thoughtless fool!” Irene yells. “You know better than to train
her
, especially out in the open, where anyone can see!”

These are words I’ve already heard, but with a completely different feel.

“Nothing happened,” I say before Irene can hit him again. “And we were—”

“Was I speaking to you?” Irene snaps at me. She returns to Arthur. “And you, don’t think because your father’s away to deal with the hurricane that—”

“Am I or am I not the president of KORT?”

“I don’t see how that’s relevant!” Irene snaps.

“It’s very relevant, Mother. It shows that people trust my judgment, not my money. Which is a lot more than I can say about you, especially after you hired that lawyer of yours.”

There’s a resounding slap, and I see the imprint of Irene’s hand darkening his cheek. I gasp.

A car honks outside. “I’ve got to go,” he says as if nothing’s happened.

“Lucky for you that the girl’s worthless,” Irene tells him as he heads out the door, “but don’t ever let me catch you doing that again.”

Arthur waves at us, slams the door shut, and then it hits me; that little twerp’s leaving me alone with our mother, who wants nothing more than to skin me alive!

“Where are you going?” I ask, following him outside before she can catch me.

Out on the gravel pathway that leads to the house’s front gates is a fancy sports car, Percy at the wheel.

Arthur gets in the passenger’s seat, while the latter waves at me with a big smile. Percy says something to Arthur, but Arthur just shakes his head, and the car leaves in a spray of gravel.

Oh no you’re not!

I dash back inside, looking frantically about. Irene’s nowhere to be seen, and I take my chances.

I grab her car keys and head outside. The car’s waiting at the side of the house, a sleek, small thing as black as her temperament. Inside, I find her purse and a map of the region marked with small crosses. Evidently, she is planning on going somewhere.

“Sucks for you,” I say, turning on the motor. “Guess you’ll have to get a taxi.”

It takes me a moment to adjust the seats, and then I move on to the next step, getting the car to move while hoping my little experience driving a boat on Lake Geneva will prove useful.

I shift the lever into the drive position, and the car moves forward. I press my foot down to stop, but hit the gas pedal instead and floor it. I nearly screech when the car bursts forward and
comes two inches from taking down a creepy, modern-art statue. Panting, I finally manage to get the car to stop. I keep my hands on the wheel to keep them from shaking.

In the rearview mirror, I see Irene run out of the house, her skirt billowing after her. It’s clear she doesn’t approve of my little outing.

I don’t wait for her to make it all the way to the car, and instead hit the accelerator again. I manage to destroy only a couple of rosebushes lining the road before I get the hang of it. Then I’m past the gates and on the main road.

With a loud cry of exultation, I tear along the streets, toward the lake. Thankfully, the rain’s abated, and it doesn’t take me long to spot Percy’s vivid burnt-orange car swerve out of the traffic and get onto the freeway that leads to Oshkosh.

The only time I almost lose them is when I have to slam on my brakes to avoid running over an old lady crossing the street with her ugly dog. But the offensive canine and its mistress survive without a scratch, and I make my way onto the freeway without another hitch.

Arthur will soon find out he can’t just keep me out of the fun.

Just so long as I don’t get stopped by the cops…

I nearly miss the exit, but manage to swerve through three lanes to make it without causing any accident. The sun is low on the horizon when I finally see Percy pull into a parking lot filled with trucks and motorbikes. I drive in after them, nearly toppling a whole row of those bikes like dominoes.

I park far away from everyone, fearful of causing some damage. Despite the lack of sign, I can clearly tell from the sounds spilling out that this is a bar.

I stay in the car for a while, contemplating what to do next. The boys are already inside. How they’re managing not to get kicked out is a mystery. Surely they can’t have come here to get drunk. Though this might be something up Percy’s alley, I can’t imagine Arthur breaking the law.

I decide to wait for a while longer. Perhaps they’ve come to pick someone up and are going to reappear soon.

Soon turns into minutes. When I see a group of three girls barely older than me exit, I decide to go in as well. I rummage through my mother’s purse and find her makeup kit. With an
unsteady hand, I manage to slap some on and look passable. Just so long as they don’t ask me for my ID, I should be fine. As a precaution, I do leave my school jacket behind.

Doing my best to look tough, I stride up to the door, past a couple of burly men who eye me with caution and curiosity.

The inside of the bar is louder than I had expected. A lot of the conversations die down the minute I appear, but after a quick glance around, I find Arthur, Percy, and Lance seated at a booth around a really short man, intent on their conversation.

“Hey, sweetheart,” a man calls out. He’s wearing a black-and-white bandanna around his head, and his handlebar mustache is dusted with beer foam. “Didja get lost?”

“Nope,” I say with a tight smile as I make my way toward the bar.

“Can I offer you somethin’, miss?” a younger man asks, his tight muscles making his shirt bulge.

“Just some juice, for starters,” I say, throwing the bartender a dazzling smile. “Long night ahead.”

The man doesn’t return my smile, and hands me a glass of cranberry juice.

“Haven’t seen you around before,” the man continues.

I turn around to look at what Arthur and his friends are doing. “Just passing through,” I say without paying much attention.

The man inches closer until I can feel his breath on my arms. “Oh yeah? A travelin’ girl, huh? I like the roads myself. Where you been?”

The little man with them is gulping down a pint of beer like he’s been stranded on a desert island for too long. He doesn’t seem too happy with his present company, though, no matter how inebriated he may be. Percy’s talking to him, Arthur and Lance quietly brooding around them, but the man doesn’t answer and instead reaches for another tankard.

A new group of people arrives, crowding in the bar next to me and forcing me closer to my neighbor. The guy seems to like the change, for he places his arm around my shoulders.

“Blake, can’t you get that mutt of yours to stop barking all the time?” one of the men says, slouching against the bar. “It’s been nearly a whole week I can’t get my shut-eye.”

“Trust me, Todd,” another man responds, “if it weren’t for Maddie, I’d have shot the darned thing already. It got so scared from all that strange wailing wind the other night, he peed all over the bed, and the wife won’t believe it’s him now.”

The man behind me grunts as if sharing in his misery.

“Did ya hear about Hornby?” another cuts in. “Got his pants all in a twist over some joke some guys have done him.”

“What joke?”

“Haven’t ya heard?” the third man continues. “Said some kids took it in mind to play a trick on him and cut out some circles in his crops or some shit like that.”

“Well at least we still got crops, eh?” the man with the peeing dog mutters. “Not like those poor folks down in Iowa and Nebraska.”

All three of them take a long swig out of their beers.

“Just glad those locusts didn’t get further north,” the man named Mike finishes.

The guy next to me tightens his hold around my shoulders.

“You’re a real hot piece of a woman,” he says. I try not to frown at his breath reeking of alcohol. “Am sure glad you decided to stop by my neck of the woods, or we’d never have met. It’s not every day we see someone as…fine as you.”

On the other side of the bar, Arthur suddenly looks around, and his eyes meet mine across the crowd. Now that I’ve been spotted, I expect him to get up and march me back outside, but something the little man says makes him look away again. It’s
obvious now that they’re trying to get the man drunk, but why I have no idea.

“So, sweet cheeks,” the man whispers in my ear, “it’s getting crowded in here. How ’bout we go someplace more private, huh? You and me?”

Without taking my eyes off what’s happening in the booth, I raise my hand and push the guy’s face away from me. “A minute,” I say, getting up.

I weave my way around the crowd, narrowly missing a few perverts trying to feel their way up my skirt. I do so wish I were wearing heels for once, but I think my heavy boots are doing the trick, because people give up immediately.

“So he grabbed the b-bottle and s-s-s-smashed it on his own h-head, but it d-didn’t b-break,” I hear the short man hiccup. A wide grin stretches his flushed cheeks, and his ginger hair stands up in hirsute tufts. “Then he tried it again, and again, and again, and
still
it didn’t break! He ended up p-p-passing out!”

The man roars in laughter, banging his tiny fists on the table. But none of the three boys joins in the fun.

“Tell me what happened to the people on the island, Nibs,” Arthur says. Though his voice is low, I can hear him distinctly over the overwhelming drunken buzz that fills the bar.

The laughter dies abruptly. The little man doesn’t look drunk anymore. Even his cheeks aren’t flushed. “I wasn’t there,” he says, eyes shifting to the side.

Unfortunately for him, Lance is sitting next to him, blocking his exit.

“I didn’t ask if you were there,” says Arthur. “I asked what you knew about it.”

The man’s tongue darts out to lick his lips. Lance pulls a knife out of his boot, and the whole bar goes quiet. But the silent boy then pulls out an apple from his pocket and starts peeling it.

Though the rest of the patrons return to their drinks, the little man’s more nervous than before.

“T-T-They’re g-gone,” he says. He drinks the remainder of his beer in one long swig, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down like a yo-yo.

“We know that already,” Percy says. “What we want to know is how, who, and why.”

The stranger sets his tankard down, wipes his chin with the back of his hand, and shakes his head.

A heavy hand grabs my waist, and the drunk man from before pulls me tight to his side. “Where’re you goin’, sweets?” Apparently he’s managed to down a couple of shots of liquor before looking for me again.

His hand travels farther down my back, and I freeze. This has never happened to me before, thanks to my years at all-girls schools, and for an instant, my mind blanks.

“Get your hands off me,” I whisper, my throat so tight I barely produce a sound.

The man tries to kiss me, but misses and goes for my neck instead. It’s only been three weeks, but my recent training takes over, and I find myself kneeing the guy in the guts before cracking my elbow into his temple. The man drops to the floor, bringing a whole table with him in a resounding crash of breaking glass.

“He’s getting away!”

I see a man, no taller than my hips, run out of the bar as fast as his little legs can carry him, a bright red hat anchored firmly on his head.

Lance rushes after the man, followed by Percy.

“You look great!” Percy yells at me, taking off after the other two.

Someone grabs my arm roughly, and I’m about to throw another punch, when I realize it’s Arthur.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing,” he says, dragging me out of the bar under the intense scrutiny of the patrons, “but when this is over, we’re going to have a talk.”

I look back at the mess we leave behind. “Sorry about that!” I yell before the cold night air hits me like a punching bag.

“Go home,” Arthur growls.

Percy and Lance are waiting for him in the car. To my surprise, I notice the little man’s angry face staring at me from the back window.

“And put some clothes on!” Arthur yells, getting in the passenger seat right as Percy floors the pedal.

“Crap.”

I run to Irene’s car, fumble with the keys, manage to turn it on, then leave the parking lot without running over anyone—a real feat in and of itself.

Thankfully, there aren’t many cars in this part of town, and none of them driving as crazily as Percy, so it’s not too hard to pick out where the boys are going.

I follow them north, past the nuthouse where we go every Monday morning to catch the boat to school, down a series of empty fields, then finally stop in between a row of houses, close to a private wharf.

“Where are you going?” I ask, getting out of the car and running after the three boys, who are dragging the little man with them.

“Morgan, go back home,” Arthur says.

I cross my arms, glad for my school jacket. “I don’t think so. I want to know what you guys are doing to this poor man who obviously doesn’t like water. Who is he, anyway?”

“He’s just a clurichaun,” Arthur says. “Nothing important. Now go away.”

The little man glares at him.