Pirate's Alley

Oh good grief. Dueling faeries, plus a roomful of prete politicians who couldn’t figure out how to put out a fire. Could this night get any more ridiculous?

 

I hobbled to my messenger bag, still on the floor beside my chair, and pulled out a container of unrefined sea salt. Ignoring the flapping and shouting around me, I laid down a containment circle to rim the burning table and the section of carpet that was on fire, shooed Elder Sato outside the circle, and touched Charlie to the salt. I watched with satisfaction as my magical barricade sprang into place.

 

Just in time, too. The carpet fire quickly reached the containment circle and climbed an inch or two up the side of my invisible cylinder, but went no farther. Too bad I didn’t have the proper gear to form a bubble. I could have cut off oxygen and killed the fire.

 

I also didn’t have the ingredients for a replenishing charm, or I could have multiplied the water left in the bottle on the witness table.

 

With the fire momentarily contained, I looked for Zrakovi. The flames wouldn’t spread outward, but they would continue to burn until the floor beneath the circle caved in or something shorted out.

 

I found him with a once again earthbound Sabine, arguing. “You must tell him to put out that fire, Your Majesty. In a moment, the human firefighters will be summoned.”

 

“Florian needs to reach that decision on his own,” she said, and her husky voice brought dry grasses and cicadas to mind. She was one creeptastic queen. “This is a test of his judgment.”

 

“But Your Majesty…”

 

I’d heard enough. If Florian was the blond firebug, he had no judgment worth testing. While Zrakovi played diplomat and followed political protocol, the courthouse would burn down around his ears. Not to mention a hundred human firemen were going to rush in and find a serious freak show that would make one think Mardi Gras had arrived a couple of months early.

 

I pushed past the dark-haired faery and pointed the elven staff at his companion. “This is my fire-maker, Florian, and unless you put some rain on that mess you made, I will give you a personal introduction to it. You won’t like it.”

 

“What?” Florian unfolded his arms and looked at me uncertainly, then at Charlie. “Wizards don’t have fire-making ability.”

 

“Yeah, well, I’m a half-breed.” I zapped him on the arm, and he jumped back a foot. Behind me, the dark faery started laughing. “Put it out. Now.” I sent a few tendrils of fire shooting out from the end of the staff to reinforce my point.

 

He rolled his eyes. “Fine, although that fire is pathetic.” With a flourish of arms and a few guttural words, Florian did whatever faeries did, and the heavens opened from the courthouse ceiling. The last time it had rained this hard, we were having a hurricane. Outside. I doubt it had ever rained this hard inside a closed building.

 

Funny how being soaked made people more compliant. Alex and Jake were able to quickly get every soggy person into the transport, and only then did I realize I hadn’t seen Rand or Mace. I snagged Jake as he ushered in a team of newly arrived wizards I assumed was a Blue Congress cleanup squad. “Where’d the elves go?”

 

He rubbed the water out of his eyes. The rain had slacked to a light sprinkle inside, but the room was a mess, the magically powered emergency lights were flickering and sizzling, and I could swear I already heard sirens. “They took off as soon as the vampires and Hoffman escaped, yapping about a conspiracy.” He looked around. “We’ve gotta get out of here. Wonder what the firefighters will make of this shit?”

 

*

 

Six hours later, about 9:00 a.m., I could answer that question. Jake had gone to Old Barataria with Jean so the pirate could lick his new wounds, and after a treacherous ride with Alex through streets of icy sludge, I’d ended up at his house, waiting for Zrakovi. I hadn’t wanted to wake Eugenie by schlepping in looking like a drowned wizard. Plus, although it was selfish of me, I couldn’t deal with baby drama again. Not yet. Rand would be too busy hatching conspiracy theories with the Synod to be turning his elven antennae in my or Eugenie’s direction.

 

After showering, I found a pair of my jeans and a black sweater in Alex’s closet, and stole a pair of his socks. I’d left my waterlogged boots inside the back door, drying on an unfolded section of the Times-Picayune. Sadly, they were my only existing pair of footwear since my house burned. Maybe I’d hit the thrift store and find some orange shoes to match my ugly coat.

 

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