Realm Book One - To Tell of Darkness Read online

  Hours seemed to pass. He faded in and out of consciousness as horror and blood loss made him too weak to move, his body ripe with pain. When he finally felt it safe to even take a breath, he opened his eyes and the creature was gone.

  * * * * * *

  “Gimlit!” I shouted as I kicked my front door shut behind me. “Where the hell’s that damned Ogre when I want him?” I asked an empty living room as I tossed my keys on the brass and glass coffee table, their loud clanking shattering the silence as I headed for the fridge.

  I needed a drink.

  One might wonder what a half-breed Pixie drinks after a long night of work. Several things came to mind--whiskey or scotch sounded good, to name a few. And I was technically off duty. But in my line of work, one never knows when the Court might come a-calling. Besides, I hate hard liquor, so those options were both out. This particular half-breed drinks only elderberry tea. Love the stuff. Can’t seem to drink enough of it. Might have something to do with being from the clan Ivy Tenna-ai, The People of the Forest. We seem to thrive on anything that comes from the earth.

  “Gimlit!” I yelled for him again as I stood in the middle of my kitchen and poured the dark liquid into a tall tumbler. He really had some explaining to do.

  I had just spent the evening getting my ass kicked by two Ogres, and then I got to spend the last three hours at the Silent Court filling out paperwork so I could turn over my two hapless prisoners. And for what? A measly thousand bucks.

  We really needed to have a talk about our rates.

  “Really, mistress. Must you make so much noise? One would think you were waking the dead.” The cool, sultry aloofness of his voice really set my nerves on edge.

  Gimlit was such an Ogre contradiction. At a whopping seven feet tall with hands bigger than my head, feet longer than my thigh and teeth as sharp as one of my axes, his calm demeanor was astounding for such a huge monstrosity. That, paired with the fact that Gimlit was actually rather easy on the eyes for an Ogre: gray skin, turquoise eyes and a major toned body to boot. Yummm. His skin was so soft. It made you want to rub up against him like a cat just to get that feel.

  Yep, definitely an Ogre contradiction. All the others, compared to him, were the nappy monster under the bed. Made me wonder who or what his ancestors crossbred with.

  “Why do you insist on sneaking up on me?” I was annoyed, and there was no way in hell his serenity was going to calm me out of my bad mood. It was his fault, anyway. They were his kin. He set up the stupid bounty. It was his fault I’d about got my ass kicked too. And his fault I’d scorched Glum. If I couldn’t be pissed at him, who the hell could I be pissed at?

  “I never sneak, mistress,” he replied. Gimlit’s voice was like a cool brook flowing over me, and I could feel my anger dissipating with every word he spoke.

  “Stop it.”

  “As you wish, mistress,” he said with a slight nod. He was always just so damned agreeable. I know he did it just to irk me. So far, it was working.

  “So I take it by your early return that the Grimm Brothers have been safely retired to the Silent Court’s halls.

  “Pfff. No thanks to you.” My sarcasm was returning in bounds. Gimlit just looked at me, the icy turquoise of his eyes cool and steady on mine as he waited for me to continue. It was no fun trying to fight with him. He just did not argue.

  “And would it be safe to presume that mistress has acquired something to Tell?” He looked at me knowingly. How he knew was beyond me. But it seemed that whenever I learned a new Tell, Gimlit always knew about it. He had a strange affinity to me, and I to him. He kept me calm, and he knew my secrets.

  It’s said that he holds most of them in a spell in his heart. It’s some strange hou-ha Other World magic. Supposedly, as the story goes, when I find my one true Tell, all my powers will be released and my guardian will be set free. Until then, Gim is stuck with me, and I him.

  Not a hard bargain for me, really. Gimlit is the poor monster getting the bad deal--I mean, I sure as shit wouldn’t want to live with me. I’m bossy, stubborn, a total slob, I never do what I’m told. Poor Gimlit, he doesn’t stand a chance.

  Thank the Prophets he’s had a couple hundred years of knowledge and training under his belt. That, and he’s the most patient creature I’ve ever met.

  “It would be safe to presume,” I said, a secretive smile on my face that I tried to hide behind a sip of the elderberry tea. When I acquired a new power, once learned, Gimlit would help me hone it.

  I’d only acquired four since I’d passed into adulthood. It was said amongst my people that as I aged, my Tells would strengthen. The Way would be shown and my powers would multiply as I aged and practiced their magic.

  My first Tell I acquired when I was nineteen. I’m a natural hunter, or at least that’s what I thought. But that was my first Tell. If you lose it--whatever it is--and need to find it, I’m your girl. That’s part of why I became a hunter. I’m good at tracking. I know where you’ve been. I can see what happened when the item or person you’re looking for became lost. And then I can find the trail.

  It’s all a weird sort of hooey glamour. But it’s mine. And it works.

  The only downside--I get rewind with scent. Not pretty when there’s blood and gore involved. The muck stays with you, like rotted sludge dripping through your senses.

  My second Tell came when I was twenty-one. I think it’s part of my father’s gifts to me--if you want to call it a gift. I can call the tides. I just about drowned in my own damned bathtub the first time that one decided to offer itself to me. The water just kept rising and rising. I ended up flooding my entire apartment building, all twelve floors. To say the Super was pissed doesn’t even begin to sum it up.

  Needless to say, I don’t live near other people anymore. And I don’t take baths. Don’t even own one. Showers only, for this girl. Well, I do own a tub--it’s out in the shed for emergencies. But it’s not in my house or hooked to any water. We have to schlep it in if we need to use it.

  My third Tell isn’t nearly as moving. I can glow. Call it having your own nightlight or glow stick. I’m part Pixie, and part child of a Druid Priest who worshiped the moon. I glow, but only when necessary…or really annoyed…or aroused...or I need it the most...or I’m tapping into one of my Tells. Yeah, yeah, I know, lots of glowing. Shut up.

  Moon-glow, they call it.

  And I’ve only glowed once during sex. My human boyfriend was totally wigged out by it. Oh, he knew what I was. The green hair and red eyes are a dead giveaway. Humans and Others have been mixing since the turn of the century. But the glowing really creeped him out. He broke up with me not long after that. Said it was him, not me. Whatever.

  Until tonight’s little glowing ball of power, my final Tell was that I could speak to trees. Don’t laugh. The trees know secrets--lots of secrets. They see all kinds of interesting things. People do the damnedest things when they think no one is looking. It comes in quite handy, being able to talk to the trees. Besides, they really appreciate hearing a new voice every now and then.

  So, until tonight, I’d received a new Tell every other year since my nineteenth birthday. I was still only twenty-six, and I’d received a new Tell early. What the hell did that mean?

  “I wonder what that means, mistress, for you to receive this new Tell so early.”

  Gimlit was all but reading my mind again. “I don’t know, Gim. I just about torched an Ogre, and I don’t even know how the hell I did it.”

  He looked at me with his wise, pale eyes. “Time will tell, mistress.”

  He always was so cryptic. Just call him Ogre-Zen.

  The night was waning and for once, I was getting tired. It was three a.m. and I had just kicked my clothes off and thrown them across my room when the phone rang. All the Whos down in Whoville were supposed to be locked up in the Silent Court, and I was supposed to be off duty. So I stood in the middle of my bedroom in my underwear and a tank top and wondered if I should get dressed or turn off the p
hone.

  I mean, I don’t care who you are; a phone call at three a.m. is never good news. And I really wanted to go to bed. But it was already too late. I could hear Gimlit through the door as he spoke softly on the phone. “Yes, Inspector Cage, I will tell her. And good evening to you.”

  Shit and double shit. What the hell did Adam Cage want? Whatever it was, it did not bode well for my remaining in a semi-decent mood. Reluctantly, I grabbed my pants and headed for the door.

  Accursed be the soil because of you.

  With suffering shall you get your food from it

  Every day of your life

  Gen. 3:17

  Chapter Three

  It was four-fifteen as I pulled up outside of the nightclub Silence on the Moor. Only this night was no longer silent as the whirl of police lights and radios filled the darkness. So much for the club being ‘underground’. This type of publicity was definitely not good for our people.

  The typical not-so-innocent bystanders filled the sidewalks as they stood around gawking; each one hoping to catch a glimmer of the activity that was going on behind the yellow police tape. I shook my head at their idiocy. Didn’t these people have anything better to do? Like sleep?

  I parked my Chevy truck near the largest cluster of squads and got out. I ended up calling Adam back and told him he better be waiting for me at the yellow tape when I got there, or have the decency to make sure someone else was. Because I was so not doing the rookie cop or hungry news crew busting my ass for information when I arrived.

  He told me I was a hard-ass. I told him to kiss my hard ass and do it, or I wasn’t coming. It was after three in the morning when he rang me, for cripes’ sake. I wanted to go to Pixie sand-land, not help the cops track some wacko. Besides, he was my least favorite cop to help in the first place.

  Old memories, like old boyfriends, die hard.

  Apparently he’d already contacted the Silent Court, because I was officially on the Stephenson County payroll. Damn it! I hate it when the Court busts my chops like that.

  The Court phoned me as soon as I’d hung up with Adam. It was as if they had a direct link to sucking out my soul. The esteemed Judge Xavier Drae, Troll Over-Lord and one of my many bosses, gave me my orders.

  Play nice with the humans, track down the monsters, and question the only witness: one Spit, no last name--Werewolf flunky. Oh, and drill the local Master Vampire as to why he was unaware this was taking place on his turf. And why he did nothing to stop it.

  The flunky was in the hospital. Apparently they were keeping him for observation. His wounds were healing, of course, werewolves have a tendency to do that, but they wanted to keep an eye on him. Seems emotionally he’d checked out, kept rambling on about bloody flesh and burning orbs of light. They had to sedate him so he wouldn’t disturb the other patients. So I guess he wasn’t going anywhere fast.

  As far as the Master Vampire, apparently the Silent Court was not too thrilled these days with the Blood Stalkers, as they so lovingly referred to the local Vamps. Whatever rift in the ranks was going on there, I wasn’t privy to it. But they were definitely sinking me in the middle of it to sniff out whatever corpses were being left to rot in the night.

  Lovely--just my lucky sunset.

  Oh, and let’s not forget the Pixie Dust on top of these orders. I was not to let the current Master Blood Stalker out of my sight for the next three nights. He was to become my personal guest. House arrest, I believe Judge Trollness called it. The Court didn’t care if it was my house or his. They wanted info, and they wanted me to get it. And no, I was not allowed to know why. “Just do your damned job, Rihker,” is what his Trollness ordered.

  Bloody fucking marvelous. My night was getting better by the moment.

  Who was going to tell Sir Snaggle-tooth this happy news, I asked. Xavier volunteered to be the bearer for me. But it was the only assistance he was going to give me. After this, I was on my own.

  Go figure. So maybe, just maybe, when all this Silent Court political crap was done, I might get to go home and get some sleep.

  As I rolled up to the police line, I was met by a very tall, very black officer. Literally the only thing that stuck out of the darkness on him was the glow of his badge in the red and blue flashing lights and the whites of his eyes. His accent was pure Creole, and rolled through my chest like rich New Orleans jazz. “Ma’am,” he said with a nod of his head. “This way.”

  He efficiently lifted the tape and ushered me through to the back of the building, not waiting to see if I followed. I could feel the roll of power that trickled in small currents off him, and wondered if his cronies knew what flavor of magic they were dealing with when they worked with him. If I had to guess, I’d say that Officer Creole was voodoo in the best--or worst--sort of way.

  Made me wonder when the force started hiring this close to the line of Other. Or if they even knew. I sure as shit wasn’t going to tell them.

  As I made my way past the tape and took in the surroundings, it struck me kind of odd that an Other World club would be smack downtown in the District. Apparently the Vamps were moving into the mainstream. If I had to guess, I’d say the building was an old warehouse, dating back to probably the late eighteen hundreds. But I wasn’t an architect. You would think they’d go for something flashier, a little more upscale.

  Officer Creole took me down three flights of metal stairs, the last winding around to the outside and through a thick metal door. I paused before I entered and looked up towards the gash in the side of the building where the window used to be. Apparently that was our creature’s exit wound.

  The ground around the hole was littered with brick and mortar; a laborer’s nightmare. I could see the remains of what appeared to be some makeshift scaffolding, like the building was being repaired.

  I let the door swing closed behind me as I caught up with Officer Creole. He had already made his way to the group of men that were waiting at the end of a long hallway. Whispering something to them--my arrival, no doubt--they all turned as one towards me.

  I strolled down the hall, eyes forward, back straight, seemingly not a care in the world. It wasn’t the first time I’d been the recipient of so much scrutiny.

  My biker boots didn’t make a sound on the tiles as I strolled towards them beneath the fluorescent lights. In the back of my head was that little voice reminding me that it’s moments like this that most women either look at the ground or throw a little swing in their sway.

  I didn’t really give a shit either way. And it probably showed, as I looked them all in the eye.

  I was dressed in black leather pants, a tight green tank top and a short-waisted leather jacket. I looked good. What the hell did I care if they stared?

  I mean it was only Adam the cop, who had dumped me, and his other cop friends. Right?

  That’s what my brain said as I continued to stroll forward, my long green-and-silver-streaked hair flying loose behind me. I was able to maintain this semi-cool attitude until the deepest shade of purple eyes I had ever seen in my life met mine.

  Fuck! Did death walking upright have to be gorgeous? He just had to be fucking gorgeous, didn’t he? My heart nearly stopped as six feet five inches of tall, dark and make-me-melt turned those incredible eyes in my direction. So this is my newest prisoner, I thought.

  Just fucking marvelous!

  “Rihker. Thanks for coming on such short notice.” Cage nodded to me as I reached them, his demeanor stiff as his eyes took in my leather apparel. I’m sure he thought my dress code was a bit déclassé for the job. But really, had he looked in the mirror lately?

  “As if I had a fucking choice. Can we just get on with this?” My bad mood was showing again. Blame it on my lack of sleep.

  “That’s you, Rihker. Always the smooth talker.” Cage was shaking his head, obvious disgust marring his flat brow.

  “Stifle it, Cage. You called me, remember?”

  “As if I could forget.”

  I wanted to bash his face
in. And no, time didn’t heal old wounds. He was such a pain in my ass. Shallow, selfish and inconsiderate; that was Adam.

  He was thirty-four, remotely tall with sandy blonde hair and lovely hazel eyes. He had a nice-guy-next-door quality to him; a kind of a perpetual high school jock look that just stuck with him. Not to mention the fact that he was immature and inconsiderate.

  All the qualities you find you detest in a person when they break up with you for something small and petty--like glowing. The asshole.

  “Fine,” he said, pulling a note pad out of his rumpled blazer pocket. Adam never did dress well. He always looked unkempt. Had to be the long hours. Poor baby.

  “Rihker Tennai, meet Kieran, owner of Silence on the Moor. I believe he is to be under your guard for the next few days.”

  I watched, slightly amused, as a tic started in Adam’s jaw. I must say it did my little heart proud to see it there. Jealous? Who, him?

  I turned and faced Kieran, who had silently crossed the short distance between us. He stood in the fluorescent light, black shoulder-length hair gleaming, black pinstriped suit pressed and crisp. His deep purple tie was so straight that I had the horrible urge to mess him up. Everything from his ebony tie tack to his shiny shoes to the perfect wave of his long black hair. There was just something too neat and tidy about him.

  High, strong cheekbones begged me to run my fingers across them. I wanted to take his sturdy jaw in my hands as I lowered those perfect, full lips to mine for a kiss. Even his lean, straight nose made his face more interesting. He was almost too perfect.

  But compared to Adam, he was an exquisite specimen of taste. He smiled at me as though he had read my thoughts, and offered me his hand.