Three Parts Fey (6 page)

Benny asked,
“Don’t you have to take a test or something regarding other
species?”

Smith shrugged.
“We all specialise. Tremble knows more about stuff because he is
simply so old.”

Benny looked at
him and smiled. “Would you have an objection to learning?”

A slow spark
bloomed in his gaze. “Would you make it worth my while?”

Benny chuckled.
“We will discuss it at home.”

He shrugged.
“Fair enough.”

Argyle
chortled. “That is one way to get him interested in higher
education.”

“It is that or
hand him over to my father. Either way, he is going to learn. We
have a paranormal census back home, so it will be easy to focus on
species he may actually interact with.”

Smith sighed.
“I am not an idiot. I am just more interested in the physical
effects of transformation.”

She sighed. “I
don’t want to nag you, but we really do have an excellent library
if you are interested.”

“I will think
about it.”

It was fair
enough. “Well, if everyone is ready, I will finish the reports and
we can be on our way to the Mage Guild holding centre.”

The SUV was
loaded up, and they were on their way.

Smith grinned.
“You type faster than Argyle does.”

Benny nodded
and kept her focus on the screen. “I used to write for a living. It
rubs off after a while.”

Each time they
completed an incident, a blank report was generated with the time
the encounter was started and ended. She had to recap all of the
events including the agents who enacted the control action. Benny
then had to sign each report, and it was time stamped with the
filing time.

She nodded at
the amount of reports she had filed. “Busy night.”

Tremble patted
her on the shoulder. “You did well for your first night out
participating as an agent.”

She smiled and
kept typing up the mermaid report. “Thanks. I did try. There is
just something about that poor girl being influenced by a demon
that bothers me.”

Argyle nodded.
“Like Jennifer Langstrom.”

“Yes and no.
But that is what has me worried. Demon influence is insidious. It
won’t end just because she didn’t manage the raising. He will come
after her again.”

Tremble asked,
“How do you know that?”

“Because demons
seek out the weak-willed and vulnerable who contain power that they
haven’t realised. Just because she is in custody doesn’t mean that
she will be safe from him. Her existence tempts him, and as we
know, demons don’t believe in self-discipline unless there is sex
involved. Even then, it is easier with a partner to do the
disciplining.”

Smith scowled.
“You think she has been sexually interfered with?”

Benny shook her
head. “Nothing like that. She was given hope, and now that it has
been removed, she will be looking to replace that vacancy of need
and want that drove her forward. She will be more vulnerable than
before.”

Smith asked,
“Can her brother’s ghost be turned?”

She sighed.
“No. That I can be confident of. Demon magic repels demon magic. If
anyone tries to hack through that spell, I will feel it.”

“Can they trace
it back to you?”

She snorted and
completed the arrest report on the mermaid.

“Yes. He can
definitely trace the spell back to me, but he won’t. As strong as
his spells were, I could pass through them without trouble. He is a
manipulator and I am way past being susceptible to that kind of
bullshit.” She watched the streets flow past.

Argyle broke
the silence. “Were you susceptible once?”

She nodded. “I
kept the silence for a while, but eventually, I told my parents. It
was the last demon incident recorded in Redbird City before my
parents’ abduction.”

“What did he
offer you?”

“Normality. He
said he could take my power and leave me a nice, normal, teenage
girl. My father had changed, and my mother...well, she was still my
mother, but it was different. Her illness had changed us all. Since
they were sharing a soul, I felt lost, out of the loop. He said he
could change it, make it like it was before. It was my lowest
moment and I agreed, but not before I told my dad.”

Tremble reached
forward again and squeezed her shoulder.

“Harcourt
intervened, and I found the motives of Jimhal the demon as they
were brought into the open.”

Smith asked,
“Could this be Jimhal?”

Benny closed
her eyes and remembered the blood and dismemberment. “No. Jimhal
will never appear on this plane again. He is extremely dead. Dad
offered him a chance to give up the prize he was seeking. Jimhal
wanted to fight Dad for the territory of my mind and body; he
lost.” Benny chuckled weakly. “I don’t think he ever realised that
he was facing my father. If he did, he realised it too late.”

Smith hissed.
“That would be a mistake. Harcourt looks like he can take a
hit.”

“You have no
idea.”

She glanced
back at Argyle, and he was opening and closing his fists.

“We are
here.”

Her attention
was brought around to the building in front of them. “I don’t know
how long I will be. If I am too late, head for the agency and send
Pooky to bring me home.”

“We will wait
for you. We are a team, Benny. We won’t leave you behind.”

She flashed a
smile and left the car, covering herself in human-based magic.

She showed her
credentials to the desk sergeant. “I am here to see a woman
arrested earlier this evening. Miaka Horrocks.”

He flicked
through his records and nodded. “She is in holding.”

“I need to
speak with her. I am concerned for her wellbeing.”

He blinked. “We
know how to treat our own here.”

“She may well
be a target for a demon, and I am better equipped to deal with that
than you are.”

“Why is that?”
His smug look told her that he wasn’t going to let her in.

“I was raised
by one.” She let her eyes flare demon green, and then, she flicked
them into brilliant fey colours.

By the time his
startled shout brought backup, she looked like a half-elf.

It was easy to
get his superior to let her in. The desk sergeant was obviously in
need of a break if he couldn’t tell the difference between fey eyes
and demon eyes.

She was
escorted in to the holding area, and she sought the pen. “Excuse
me. She was brought in with a pen.”

“It has been
logged into evidence.”

“Unlog it. It
has her brother’s soul in it, and he will be able to keep her calm.
Consider him a second witness.”

“She didn’t
mention it.”

Benny sighed.
“She didn’t know, but I explained things in detail to the
transporting officers. I am guessing that they just got busy and
didn’t mean to drive her mad. Please bring it and put it outside
the cell.”

Benny was let
into Miaka’s cell, and the woman was rocking violently, pulling on
her hair.

“Oh, Miaka.
What are you doing?”

“He’s gone;
he’s gone. He’s lost and it is all my fault.”

Benny touched
Miaka’s cheek to get the young woman to look at her. “He isn’t
gone. He is nearby. Wait just a moment.”

Benny waited
until the officer opened the door for her, and she smiled politely.
“Where is the pen?”

“There is no
record of it.”

“Do you mind if
I find it?”

The officer
smirked. “Go for it. The officers who brought her in are back on
the street.”

Benny held out
her hand and summoned the pen, and just to be nasty, she pulled the
uniform of the officer who had it on him. Dark fabric landed in her
palm, and with a little investigation, she found the pen.

The officer
across from her was staring. “You took their uniform?”

“Oh, you know
XIA magic. It is messy.”

“Can you put
the clothing back?”

Benny sighed.
“I am afraid not. I don’t know who it came from. I just tracked the
pen and pulled everything around it to keep it safe. I didn’t want
it to snag on anything.”

She looked at
the pen and whispered, “Michael, she needs you.”

The ghost
appeared and walked through the door to his sister.

The sobbing
turned from panicked to delighted. Miaka was coming back to herself
and swirling into her new reality.

The
conversation between the twins began, and Benny looked around for a
safe place to put the pen.

The officer was
digging through the clothing and found the identity badge. The call
was immediately placed and the nearly naked officer located.

When the
officer questioned why the pen had been on his person, Benny could
clearly hear him say that he wasn’t going to take orders from an
XIA agent.

Benny raised
her eyebrows at the officer on this side of the call. Colour crept
into his face.

Benny used a
small charm to stick the pen to the wall next to the cell.

“I will be
checking in with her later, and I will file paperwork to get her
transferred to the XIA. We actually do know how to handle our own,
and we have compassion for those who end up in a place that their
genetic inheritance put them in.”

She checked on
Miaka again, and the woman was eagerly speaking to her brother.

Michael glanced
at Benny and inclined his head. She nodded back and left them to
their reunion.

A small
enchantment to tie Miaka to the pen was the same one that Lenora
used to use so that Benny didn’t lose her homework.

Benny inclined
her head to the officer walking her around, and she left the
building. One more batch of paperwork was in her future, and the
sooner she got to the SUV, the better.

The guys saw her coming
and straightened from their positions loitering on the SUV. Tremble
summed it up. “Uh, oh.”

Benny got into
the seat and fired up the computer, writing a scathing report and
request for prisoner transfer. When it came to the reasoning, she
smirked and wrote that as the XIA agents had had to fend off the
ghouls, it was their jurisdiction that had been impinged.

The rest of the
prisoner torture was recorded, including the name of Mage Guild
Officer Ambrican, who had removed the pen and kept it for his own
purposes.

She outlined
her summoning of the pen and the uniform that came with it,
culminating with her attaching the pen to the prisoner via spell
work, while the others climbed into the vehicle.

“What happened
in there?” Argyle asked cautiously.

Smith pulled
away from the parking spot and headed around the block to the
XIA.

“They had her
in an isolated cell and didn’t put the pen close enough for
activation. She was going insane at an accelerated rate, and the
break in her spell only made it worse.”

Tremble’s voice
was soft. “So, you are angry.”

“Furious. I
would have taken her out of there if she hadn’t been on record with
all agencies.” Benny kept typing until she had assembled a complete
assessment of the situation and her actions. When she sent the
file, she closed the computer and her hands formed fists in her
lap.

Cautiously,
Argyle asked, “Why are you so angered by this?”

Benny worked at
calming herself. Her eyes were flicking between glowing demon green
and rainbow fey with rapid cycling. She could feel it.

The new change
to her social structure was a source of stress. She hadn’t found a
normal balance and now something was hitting one of her hot
buttons. Too much too soon.

Tremble put his
hand on her shoulder again, and she breathed slowly, using his aura
to calm herself. Between him and Argyle, she could probably anchor
her mood to theirs and keep herself stable, but if either of them
pitched a mood, she would go along for the ride. It was better to
figure out a way to calm herself.

When they
returned to the agency, she headed inside with her team and changed
back into her normal clothing. Her locker hadn’t been tampered with
while she was gone, and it was one relief in a messed-up
evening.

“Ganger. In my
office.”

The captain’s
voice rapped out. She turned and headed to the sound of the
irritated commanding officer.

“Close the
door.”

She stood in
front of the captain’s desk. “Yes, Captain.”

He looked at
her and cocked his head. “Why did you do that? The Horrocks woman
was off our books.”

“She was going
insane. In a matter of hours, she would have been catatonic, and
from there, she would have been prime psychic fodder for the demon
who was sponsoring her.”

Matheson leaned
back in his chair. “How do you know that?”

“I was once the
target of a similar pattern of attack. Demons go with what
works.”

“How was it
resolved in your case?”

She stared
straight ahead. “My father intervened.”

“And you
intervened in the case of Miss Horrocks. Well, since you have
legitimate reason to believe that a demon is involved and the Mage
Guild does not want to draw the attention of one unless necessary,
we are taking possession of the woman and her brother.”

Benny nearly
collapsed with relief. “I can help with warding a safe spot for
her. She will need help developing mental skills and defenses to
keep him out.”

Captain
Matheson held up a hand. “We call in specialists for that sort of
thing, but it has been so long since there was a demon on the books
that I will have to dig out the contact information.”

“She will get
help?”

“You can come
in early and check on her tomorrow. For tonight, just put a ward
around the room we are putting her in. Is that acceptable?”

Benny nodded.
“Yes, Captain. Thank you.”

Matheson sighed
and ran a hand through his hair. “You were very careful to not
incriminate your partners.”