“Lazy,” she muttered.
The doors to the big building burst open and a flood of humans rushed out, laughing and yelling at each other, shoving and milling.
It took me a minute to zero in on what I was seeing. They were all teenagers, to the last one. Their life forces hummed around them like a buzzing beehive; they were like bees, not ants. Not unlike a beehive, they kept pouring out of the large boxed building.
I backed up a few steps until my back was pressed against a large tree that shaded a portion of the road we stood near. “How will we ever find her in this mess?”
Cactus took the paper from me. “I’ll see if any of them know what this means.”
Before I could tell him to wait, he ran into the crush of humanity. He wove between them with ease, and with a shock I realized in some ways he fit here. There was no fear in him. But for me the place was overwhelming. “Peta, why is it so hard for me to stand here? I feel like I have all these emotions, and—”
“That is Spirit. Human teenagers are rolling with emotions: angst, fear, hope, love and hate. You’re getting a rather large dose of it all.” Peta pressed her cheek against mine and some of the anxiety flowed away from me. Having her there was enough to help calm the emotions.
“I could never live among them, even if I were banished.”
“Do not even joke about banishment,” she said. “It isn’t funny.”
“Well, I’d still have you.”
Her silence was enough to send a chill through me. “Peta, if I was banished, would you not still be with me?”
“No. Banishment from the elemental world strips you of all your rights and familiars.” Her voice dropped. “I had one charge who was banished, Lark. You do not want that to happen. The madness would take you and then you would end up killing yourself one way or another.”
“What did he do?” I wasn’t sure I really wanted to know, but the talking helped keep the emotions of the humans at bay. Helped me pretend I wasn’t feeling the press of hundreds of teenagers’ fluctuating feelings swirling through me.
“He was an assassin of Fiametta’s predecessor.”
“How successful was he?” I didn’t recall ever hearing about an assassination attempt that had actually succeeded.
She snorted. “He was banished and Fiametta became the queen. What does that tell you?”
Cactus spoke with a trio of girls who even at a distance I could see he’d charmed. They giggled and flipped their hair this way and that as they batted their eyes up at him. My mind, though, was still on the conversation with Peta, about her charge who had been banished.
“Did you know what he was going to do?”
Peta let out a hiss. “I did not.”
“Don’t get your tail in a knot. I ask only because I know you. If you’d known, you would have tried to stop him. Right?”
“Of course.”
But there was a hesitation in her; she wasn’t sure. Her loyalty ran deep to her charges even when they were idiots. “I will do my best not to put you in that kind of position.”
Another snort, but she said nothing more. Cactus jogged back to us. “You won’t believe it, this add-dress is right here. This is a school, which means Giselle is somewhere in this madness.” He waved a hand behind him. “The three girls didn’t know her, though. I did ask.”
Peta’s head swiveled back and forth. “Look for her aura. It will glow like fireflies.”
I scanned the crowd. “There has been nothing that looks even remotely supernatural.”
“It’s not like she’s going to have wings and be speaking in tongues, Lark,” Peta said.
We stood there scanning the crowd for many minutes. Two older humans in suits approached. The one in the lead had mostly gray hair and a bit of a gut. “Can I help you two?”
“We’re looking for someone, a friend of ours,” Cactus said, his smooth talking coming into play. Perhaps he was the best companion for this journey. Ash would have glared at them and expected them to go away.
The two human adults raised their eyebrows. “A friend? Do you have a name? This is private property.”
Something in their tone, the way they held themselves, made me reach out and touch Cactus on the arm. “We’ll catch up with her later. Let’s go.”
I knew a territorial stance when I saw one. Either of us could have forced the men to their knees and made them beg for mercy, but that was not our way when dealing with humans.
Cactus gave me a questioning look and I tipped my head. We walked away, but the feeling of being watched lay heavy across my shoulders. “Peta, can they see you?”
“Yes.”
“But they can’t hear you.”