The Wild Ways (38 page)

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Authors: Tanya Huff

Tags: #General, #Fiction, #Fantasy, #Epic

BOOK: The Wild Ways
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“Don’t worry about it,” she murmured soothingly.
And he didn’t.
In the old days, when a man saw a Selkie dance in the moonlight and lost his heart, he grabbed her sealskin and hid it. As long as he had the skin, he held all the cards. The seal-wives did as they were told in fear of being trapped forever in a Human life—the same blackmail Carlson Oil had perpetuated, only they hadn’t gone so far as to demand regular sex and housekeeping. Maybe a few of them fell in love with their captors in some kind of weird Pinnipedia Stockholm syndrome—Charlie wasn’t judging—but they sure weren’t there by choice.
In this new age, although the Selkies remained bound by ancient Rules, they followed only the letter of the law. They danced in the moonlight and ensnared the hearts of men, but they did it now without handing over control. Paul may have gotten his hands on Eineen’s skin, but Charlie doubted he’d held onto it for long.
On the surface, Selkies seemed to still be all about the traditional relationship. One man, one woman, two point five kids, all four and a half of them living happily ever after. Well, happily ever after until the tears and betrayal if Tanis could be believed, but the point was, all the attention on the seal-wife thing, on the little woman in the kitchen sliding the fish and chips into the oven with a bun or two in the oven herself, masked a fundamental point of the relationship. The Selkies were Fey and the Fey considered Humans more playthings than partners. And not playthings in a fun and kinky kind of feathers and whipped cream sort of way, playthings in a cat with a catnip mouse kind of way—it’s all fun and games until the stuffing comes out.
Without the protection gained from holding her skin, modern man didn’t so much get a beautiful and compliant wife as a wild ride with teeth and claws and attitude. Tanis had Bo wrapped around her little finger although Charlie had missed the full extent, masked as it was by the constant weeping. Eineen didn’t bother to hide that she called the tune Paul would dance to.
In spite of their adherence to outdated gender roles, Charlie had to admit she admired the way the Selkies played the system.
“Just out of curiosity,” she said, ignoring Paul and watching Eineen, “where did you have Goblins? And how did you get away? That’s not the sort of infestation you can clear up with a few antibiotics.”
“We ran. And we got lucky.” Her fingers tightened on Paul’s arm, dimpling the skin. Goblins weren’t very big, but they swarmed their prey, overwhelming larger creatures with numbers. “They were in the mine where the skins are hidden.”
“No.” Charlie shook her head, thinking back to the blank verses in Tanis’ song. “I could have found them in a mine.”
“The tunnel they’re in goes out under the bay.”
“Under the water?” The Gales had their roots sunk deep in the Earth. They didn’t do water and, until Jack, barely did air. Auntie Ruby’s attempts at skywriting aside. “That might be enough to do it.”
Had been
enough to do it. Obviously. “So you were trying to get the skins back. Mr. Belleveau’s switched teams?”
“I’m not gay!”
Charlie and Eineen turned together to stare at Paul.
“And I’ve got news for you, caring about personal grooming has nothing to do with sexual orientation.” He brushed a bit of dust or something equally invisible off his shirt. “I know gay men who wear flannel for God’s sake.”
“Okay. Not those teams. I meant you’ve switched from supporting the evil oil company to throwing in with Two Seventy-five N’s protest.”
“Oh.” Paul squared his shoulders. “No.”
“No?” Eineen’s reaction cut Charlie’s off, so Charlie waited. He couldn’t refuse to answer Eineen. She wondered if he could lie to her.
“Taking the pelts, well, that was wrong.” Paul turned to stare lovingly into Eineen’s eyes, their fingers laced again. “It was wrong even though it was in the best interests of the company and I am truly sorry that we caused so much grief to your family.” His free hand rose to cup her cheek. “But the well, there’s nothing wrong with that well. There’s a substantial oil field off Hay Island, and it only makes sense to exploit it. It’s deep, sure, but the rock’s stable and unlike deepwater wells, it’ll be easy to sink, remarkably safe in comparison, and entirely profitable as it’s so close to shore it’ll make transportation costs negligible. We’re in talks about a pipeline to a processing center on Scatarie Island and we’ll be bringing significant numbers of jobs to Cape Breton.”
Charlie really wished she had a camera. The expression on Eineen’s face was priceless. “I’m guessing you two lovebirds didn’t talk about this.”
“There’s nothing to talk about!” Eineen jerked back until she was standing far enough from Paul to work up the volume. “Scatarie Island is a protected wilderness area! If, no,
when
there’s a spill, it’ll destroy entire ecosystems. If it happens during storm season, and that’s likely when it’ll happen . . .”
“Because of the storms,” Charlie added helpfully. “Being in the North Atlantic and all.”
“A spill during storm season will be impossible to contain,” Eineen continued, ignoring her. “Impossible. Not difficult! And that’s not even mentioning the disruption of a protected seal rockery just putting the damned thing in! And,” she added, cutting Paul off as he opened his mouth, “deep or shallow, all water wells leak. We’re raising children in those waters.”
“We?” he managed.
“Not you and I, personally!”
He didn’t look reassured.
When Charlie pointed that out, Eineen told her to shut up and locked eyes with Paul. “If you are with me, you are not working for Carlson Oil. If you are with me, you are not supporting a company that wants to destroy my family’s home.”
No contractions, Charlie noted as the proportions of Eineen’s face shifted between Human and not.
Reaching out, she pressed her palm over Paul’s heart. “Are you with me or are you with Amelia Carlson?”
When a full thirty seconds passed, Charlie realized he was actually thinking about it. She was impressed. He had bigger cajones than it appeared. And he’d need them if the expression on Eineen’s face was anything to go by.
“We are together,” she growled.
“I know. But I worked hard to get this job. I’m good at it and I’m paid well for doing it. I mean really well.” He held out his wrist. “This watch cost me eight hundred dollars. My father never owned a watch that cost more than twenty.”
“You are not your father!”
His smile looked more like a snarl. “That’s my point. My father wore thrift shop clothes and smelled of fish. At forty, his arthritis was so bad he could barely open his hands. When he died at forty-three, we had to sell the car to pay for the funeral. I’m not going back to just getting by.”
“Daddy issues much?” Charlie muttered under her breath.
Eineen closed her eyes and visibly composed herself. When she opened them, she was more Human than Fey and the line of Paul’s shoulders visibly eased. “I told you, but you didn’t listen. Ships uncounted litter the floor of the sea,” she said. “Some are coffins only, some are wrecks of no value, but some have spilled silver and gold from between rotting timbers. My people harvest dead men’s treasure from the sea and then invest it. Our holdings are about seventy/thirty low-risk/high-return funds. We’re loaded.”
“Seriously?” Charlie didn’t expect an answer, but to her surprise, Eineen flashed her a triumphant smile.
“Seriously. How do you think Two Seventy-five N can afford such kick-ass lawyers?”
“Hadn’t actually thought about it.”
“Wait.” Paul seemed to be having a little trouble finding the right words. “You said there were investment bankers. You never said you were
rich
.”
“I have as much as I need, or want, but if you need or want more, it’s there. And there’s a job for you taking care of it, making more of it if you want that. Strangers manage it now. It’s been years since one of us has ended up with a mate who wasn’t a fiddler or a fisherman. Or a German tourist, but we’re fairly certain that was an accident; they own a lot of land on the island.”
“Wait,” Paul said again. “I’d work for you?”
“You’d work for the money. You need give up no material pleasures for love. That leads, in the end, only to resentment.” She closed the fingers of the hand pressed over his heart and tugged on his shirt. “You’d have power of your own. Power I wouldn’t interfere with.”
Somehow, Charlie managed to keep her response behind her teeth.
“I’d need to think about it . . .”
“Of course. And while you think about it . . .” Human features slipping, Eineen twisted to face Charlie. “Call His Highness.”
“Excuse me?”
“We need to speak with the Dragon Prince. Call him.”
Charlie raised a brow. Eineen seemed a little confused as to just who she’d danced for.
“The Goblins,” she continued, as though it explained her tone, “are guarding the skins. Until they’re removed, we can’t get them out of the mine. The Goblins might not obey his command, but the Prince is what he is and he is terrifying.”
“Yeah, well, right now Jack’s off terrifying answers out of Boggarts. So, sorry. No prince.”
“Boggarts are vandals. Irritants. Cowards.” Eineen dismissed them with a wave. “They’re probably heading straight back to the gate. Chasing them is a pointless waste of time.”
“Chasing them will find the gate and get us—that would be me and Jack—information on who opened it.”
“You know who opened it. Your Auntie Catherine opened the gates and forced the Goblins through so they could guard the pelts.”
“She convinced me they’d be safer in the mine.” Paul answered the question Charlie hadn’t asked. “Who else could add that kind of security?”
“Carlson Oil didn’t pay her to add it?”
“To add
Goblins
?”
Charlie nodded at the woman beside him. “Selkie.”
He acknowledged the point. “No, we didn’t pay her to add Goblins.”
“Well, trust me, she certainly didn’t do it out of the kindness of her heart. Why would she throw her support so vehemently behind stopping Two Seventy-five N and getting this well in?”
“She’s your auntie,” Eineen snarled. “Why don’t
you
ask her?”
“That was rhetorical, right? Or do you want to stand here all night while I tell you?”
“I want you to call the Dragon Prince.” Eineen glanced up at the sky, drawing Paul’s gaze with hers. Charlie didn’t look. Wings the size of Jack’s made a distinctive sound; he wasn’t up there.
“You’re a Gale,” Paul said. “We only have your word for it that you aren’t working with her. For her.”
“Why would I toss Boggarts at a festival I’m trying to win?”
“An accident,” Eineen sneered. “One gate would have done for both the Goblins and the Boggarts. Boggarts often hang around the edges of Goblin gangs trying to look tough, too stupid to realize it only puts them in danger from the Goblins as well as larger predators.”
“And the reason for their appearance here tonight?”
“If you opened the gate, they’d be drawn to you.”
“If I opened the gate, they’d
know
I could kick their collective asses, and Boggarts, as you pointed out, are cowards. Auntie Catherine is a Wild Power. That makes her a wild card. That means if there’s high-level shit disturbing going on and she’s in the neighborhood, she’s probably behind it. Plus we already
know
she was the one who took the skins. We just don’t know
why!
”
“Everything okay over here?”
Charlie turned toward the police officer, suddenly aware she’d been shouting. And waving her arms. And stamping her foot. “Everything’s fine.”
“I was asking Eineen.”
She smiled. “Everything’s fine. A night like tonight . . .” She waved in the general direction of the burned chip wagon and, for all Charlie knew, the mine. “. . . nerves are on edge. That’s all.”
“If you’re sure. So I hear Seanan’s not well.”
Seanan had been one of the Selkies whose sealskin had been stolen.
“She’s a bit under the weather, yes, but I’m sure she’ll be fine soon.” Eineen glanced pointedly at Charlie. Who gave serious thought to throwing a charm on the cop just because she could.
“Well, tell her I was asking after her when you’re talking next. And you,” he turned back to Charlie. “You keep it down, okay? I think there’s been enough shouting in these parts for one night. Eineen.”
“Brayden. Seanan’s husband is his cousin’s brother-in-law,” Eineen added as he joined the other officers by the Visitor’s Center.
Like a small town,
Charlie reminded herself.
“If Seanan’s going to be fine soon,” Eineen began.
“You need to get the skins, yeah, I got it.” None of the Fey were subtle. They thought they were, but no. “I need proof I can confront Auntie Catherine with, and that means I’m not calling Jack back from hunting Boggarts. Plus . . .” She held up a hand, cutting Eineen’s protest off. “. . . the Boggarts attacked a crowd of innocent people. When your people decided to join the environmental movement, not to mention put lawyers on retainer, you joined the game. You’re players now, and there’s risk involved in throwing yourself in front of corporate planning. Sure, it sucks that it bit you on the ass, but these people tonight, they came to listen to music. They’re not playing; they don’t even know there’s a game going on. So we deal with the Boggarts first. Then, for chosen family’s sake, and through Bo for Tanis, we deal with the Goblins.”

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