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"Yeah," I said. "Trouble is, we aren't going to get Feddrah-Dahns into the back of my car, so I'll have to ask him to stay here."
As we headed into the living room, I thought about the chaos unfolding in our lives. The unicorn horn, the third spirit seal, Smoky, the civil war at home, a Raksasa and a djinn, pixies and trolls and elves… If we didn't get some of this under control pretty soon, we'd never sort ourselves free from the confusion.
Chapter Ten
Hunting pixies wasn't exactly child's play. When I was training with my magical mentors, they'd taught me how to charm a pixie, but that only worked about 50 percent of the time.
Back in OW, pixies were considered pests in the cities and, in fact, a few of the villages had banned them. Lethesanar hadn't gone that far, but they were fair game if they came inside the city limits.
For one thing, most pixies live to annoy. They love causing havoc and mischief; the cliche pixie-led wasn't yanked out of thin air. Pixies steal, pixies prod and poke and scatter their various dusts to cause havoc and, in general, are irritating little nuisances. I was surprised that Feddrah-Dahns had entrusted a valuable artifact to one, but then again, there was a first time for everything. Perhaps Mistletoe had gone astray of his nature.
We arrived at 10226 East Parkland Drive on the cusp of nine A.M. We'd brought both our cars in case we needed to run errands afterward. The clouds had parted, allowing a trickle of sun to pass, and everywhere the nubs on the budding trees sparkled where the light refracted through the raindrops that still clung to the branches.
The house was a small cottage type—very New England and out of place in Seattle—set back off the street. The ever-present rhododendrons had been allowed to grow to tree height, and the creeping moss overshadowed the grass, turning the front yard into a wild place. Here and there, lady ferns clustered together in patches, fronds reaching waist high and taller. The cobbled path to the door was broken in spots, with weeds thrusting through the stones. Another path—this one dirt—branched off to the right, leading around the side of the house to what looked like a weathered picket fence. Rising in back of the house, twin maples towered up over the roof, one on either side of the yard.
I motioned to Delilah. "Come on, let's see if they're home."
We took the porch steps two at a time, and I knocked gently. Elves had fantastic hearing. I wouldn't need to pound on the door.
Sure enough, a moment later a lithe, willowy elf peeked through the screen. Her face lit up when she saw us. "Oh thank gods! You've come for the pixies!" Quickly, she stepped out to meet us and gestured to the yard. "See what they've done? No matter how hard we work, they're turning this place into a jungle."
Delilah and I glanced back at the front yard. From this vantage point, if I looked closely enough, I could see the telltale sparkle of residue pixie dust dappling the leaves and ground. Sure enough, they had an infestation, all right.
I turned back to the woman. "I'm Camille D'Artigo, and this is my sister, Delilah. You told my sister Menolly you have a strange pixie hanging around?"
She nodded, blushing. "I'm sorry, I should have introduced myself. I'm just so excited you're here! My name's Tish. Yes, we do have a new one hanging around, and the creature's causing an uproar. It was bad enough before, but he showed up last night, and now everybody's up in arms. I can't even step into the backyard without getting pixie bombed. My husband's in bed with a headache. He went out to try to dislodge the whole lot of them, and they ganged up on him."
While pixie magic wasn't terribly effective against the Fae, they could cause one hell of a headache if they sprinkled the right dust in your eyes. And with the natural animosity between elves and pixies, I had no doubt that both sides had been up to some nasty tricks.
"Why don't you show us to your backyard?"
As she led us down the porch steps and around the path leading to the fence, she told us a bit about herself. "I came over Earthside first, two years ago, and my husband followed last year. We're studying human society for the Academy of Anthro-History, back in Elqaneve. I'm a healer, and my husband is a historian. When the Academy offered to send us Earthside to get in some hands-on study time, we agreed to a three-year term. I came over first, since I needed extra time to observe healing techniques here." She made a face.
"Something wrong?" I asked.
Tish nodded. "While their technology is brilliant, it's a sad state of affairs here. Far more die from hunger than back in Otherworld, although more die at home from disease than do here… at least in the civilized areas. There's so much potential to ease suffering here, but it's all caught up in warring ideologies and moralities. Tragic, really." She paused, opening the gate. "Right through here. Be careful—the dust is thick today."
As I passed through the gate, I saw what she meant. A layer of pixie dust covered everything, from the tiny lettuce seedlings that were just peeking out of the ground to the marble birdbath to the stone bench in the corner with a gargoyle-shaped crest in the center of the back.
Instinctively, I coughed and covered my nose. Delilah sniffed twice and then sneezed. Loud. With a sudden shimmer of color, she shouted, "Oh crap!" and shifted before I could stop her. It was a lot quicker than her usual transformation. Within seconds, a golden, long-haired tabby cat stared up at me, her eyes wide and confused.
Wonderful. Just what we needed. Tish sucked in a deep breath, covering her mouth with her fingers. "Oh! I'm sorry!"
"Yeah, that usually happens when we're under stress. There must be something in the pixie dust today that forced it," I said, reaching for Delilah. But she was in rare form, and she darted to the left as she saw me coming.
"Come here, Delilah! Now." I gave chase around the yard, jumping for her as she took a flying leap into one of the lilacs. She scrambled up above my reach. I tripped over a tree root, landing splat on my face in the damp moss.
"Hell's bells…" I pushed myself to a sitting position. My skirt had caught on the root, resulting in a small rip that threatened to spread. I was covered with a layer of pixie dust from head to toe. The shimmering powder glistened on my clothing and face, and I hoped to hell that I was immune to whatever effects it was enchanted to produce.
Trish raced over to my side and helped me up. "I'm sorry. Are you all right?"
I gingerly shook myself out. No broken bones, no bloodied knees or nose. I felt a little woozy from all the magical sparkles I'd been decorated with, but other than that… nada.
"I think so. Can you try to coax my sister out of the tree? I'm going to look for Mistletoe."
While Tish made chucking noises at Kitten, I began hunting through the overgrown foliage. Pixies could be hard to spot when they chose, and I had the feeling that Mistletoe was trying to keep well out of sight. The gang of pixies who had already marked their territory here were probably waiting for him to come out in the open so they could attack him and drive him off. Maybe calling him by name would work.
"Mistletoe! I've got a message from Feddrah-Dahns for you." I whistled, hoping to catch his attention. Sure enough, on the third try, there was a rustle from beneath a huckleberry bush, and out flitted a pixie. He was no bigger than a Barbie doll, but pale, almost translucent, flickering with specks of neon light. He flew up to look in my face. I slowly held out my hand, and he lighted on it, warily playing with the bag strapped to his side.
