Page 45

Ezra spread his hands. “Ya said yerself that his power has to have grown. I’ll help where I can, but I won’t directly engage him. Maybe the right answer is for ya to wait until yer Shadow Breakers branch is fully staffed and more functional. Go after him later.”

“So ya want me to wait even though Hisser is likely amassing more cult followers every moment?”

“Don’t get yer dander up, woman. It’s only a suggestion. I wouldn’t dare tell the mighty Aran of The Dagda how to do her job. Go ahead and rush out there if ya must.”

I nodded tightly. It was hard to nod when your jaw was clenched. “So if I go after him now, ya’re limited in the kind of help ya can offer me.”

“Yes. That’s a fair statement.” Ezra’s exasperated sigh echoed in the room. “This meeting was illuminating but I have to go.”

He looked at Dylan as he stood. “I suggest ya drop that dead relic off a cliff or into the sea, far darrig. Ya’re harboring all manner of trouble carrying it around with ya. Dead means something different to angels. Who will the angel blame if he returns? Don’t say I didn’t warn ya.”

Dylan blinked up at Ezra but shook his head. “I can’t dispose of it yet. I’ll take my chances.”

“Suit yerself,” Ezra said.

Conn rose to walk out with him. Mulan and I watched them heading to Ezra’s waiting car.

“Fairy lied,” Mulan announced. “He came here for you. He wants to takeyouhome with him. He imagined bedding you but also plotted your snake shifter attack plan in his head. He knows we will ignore his advice to wait.”

I shook my head at her. “He doesn’t want to bed me. Ezra and I are nothing except old friends and barely that. Are ya reading minds too now?”

“No. It is feeling I get when near him. He keeps many secrets. His energy hides in blurry bubbles.”

I chuckled at her description. “Blurry bubbles, eh? I believe ya about his secrets but I don’t think what he feels for me is one of them. We were lovers once but we ended well before I married Jack. I barely remember being with him.”

“Fairy is equal to high demon in power—very dangerous being. I find him sexy in strange way. His power excites my woman parts.”

Ezra attracted females all the time but I was immune to his allure. He’d been a selfish lover and I held no fond memories of our time together. The second fairy I’d slept with had validated Ezra’s selfishness. Maybe it was because of Rasmus or maybe it was because I didn’t believe Ezra capable of being faithful. Whatever the reason for my immunity, Ezra’s desire to rekindle what we had didn’t interest me at all. The fairy wasn’t even good fantasy material.

I turned my head and watched Ezra’s car drive away. “How can Ezra be more powerful than Conn? The Dagda said only djinn were more powerful than the demon king.”

Mulan shrugged. “There is big lightning in fairy aura. He shines like god but hides it well.”

“Ezra? Are ya saying Ezra shines like a god?” I repeated it because I didn’t sense anything at all like that from Ezra.

“Yes,” Mulan said with a nod. “Fairy glows with power like your wicked ancestor.”

Part of me wanted to laugh at the idea of Mulan comparing Ezra to The Dagda. She didn’t feel the same level of respect for him as I did. The other part of me wanted to know what Ezra’s deal was with his fairy family and what his true agenda was for spending hundreds of years in the human realm.

I still considered Ezra and I friends of some sort and wished I could ignore Mulan’s observation. But I’d never known the Wu Shaman to be wrong when she was reading a person.

Why would Ezra hide his true power from all of us? Why was he able to hide it from me?

Fairies liked bragging too much to hide anything. Or at least, that had been my observation. He’d bragged about bedding me to all who would listen about our lackluster time together. We’d stayed friends and partners in our work, but I’d moved on to other men without any regrets. Once I’d stopped being angry, Ezra’s infidelity hadn’t been worth being upset over.

My attention got snagged by Dylan talking. I looked down the table at the far darrig. Dylan had kept quiet while Ezra was here and I’d nearly forgotten him. His size seemed like that of a child’s today but it wasn’t only a matter of stature. Dylan’s energy was diminished. His depression over the relic had made him nearly invisible.

“Sorry, Dylan. I was still thinking of what Mulan said. Will ya explain that again? I want to hear what ya have to say.”

His smile was full of understanding and I felt guilty for making him repeat himself. “Fairies collect power from our realm. That’s why they come here. They don’t care about us. They pretend to care. After their time ends here, they return to the mound portal and take their collected power across the veil to their people.”

“Seriously?” I asked.

Dylan nodded. “Harvesting the power is a painful process but a good deal of them still volunteer to come collect it. Here—your fairy has a lot of power. There—he will hand his power over and be less than normal for a while. This is what his people do to keep each other in check. Only a rare few are allowed to travel back and forth without that agenda.”

My brain hurt again. I was going to have to start carrying headache pills to survive what I was learning. “Why is this information about fairies not common knowledge?”

Dylan smiled patiently. “I didn’t learn this in school. My great-grandmother was part fairy. She was told she could live among the fairy folk if she brought them power. But she knew all fairies lie to get their way. She was the one who told me that a fairy is only given one chance to walk among humankind.”