Page 14 of Beyond the Veil (Endangered Fae #4)

Chapter Six

Phoenix – Classification: Dual-natured fae shifter

Phoenix sightings are rare due equally to habitat, wariness of humans and reported numbers. Some sources claim only one or two phoenixes exist in an eternal cycle of self-immolation and rebirth.

“ W e’re going to need a location.” Sick with worry and frustration, Zack rubbed at the side of his face and tried to calm the screaming in his brain. “I’ll try everything, but it’ll be better if we know where.”

“Fucking prison’s a state secret! Nobody has a clue where the thing is!” Kurt bellowed. “Sorry, sir. I’m just— Damn it. There should’ve been something we could’ve done.”

“Like what? The ambassador said we could trust the meeting location. We had to trust someone’s intel on the ground. Once the police arrived, you couldn’t light up the place. Or are you James Bond now?”

“No, sir.” Kurt’s response was so sullen and defeated Zack knew he had to come up with something.

“Look, you handled it the best way possible. We were set up. Proper authorities handled the arrest. You got four of your original party to safety without casualties and two more remained secure.” Zack began typing instructions to Carol, trying to plan his next steps.

“Stay low. Stay quiet. No movement unless it’s on my say so.

But if you or that Bakkal guy can come up with where this senmaj prison is, you call me.

I don’t care if it’s freaking three in the morning. ”

“Sir.”

That’s our Kurt. Better.

He hung up and leaned back against Lugh, wishing he could just break down and cry. “I should never have let him talk me into letting him go.”

“And make him feel that his help was unwelcome and that he couldn’t be trusted?” Lugh smoothed a hand over Zack’s hair. “We’re all worried, you know. But you couldn’t trample Diego’s shaken pride that way.”

“A real leader has to know when to trample.”

“Still, we will find a way, through one means or another. It is merely a prison and not a witch-burning, after all.”

“God, I hope so. What if they change the laws again and decide to have bonfires instead of prison sentences? Shit.”

“We can’t look at what might be, my braveheart. Prince Faisal was very apologetic. He had no idea his father was sending the police and he promises to help in any way he can.”

“Yeah, ’cause he’s been such a big help so far.”

Lugh sighed, his huge hands moving down to knead Zack’s shoulders. “Is our Theo all right?”

“He’s fine. That selkie kid stowed away on the plane, hell only knows how that happened. But he’s the one who fed Theo after that disaster at the airport.”

“Good, as far as Theo’s concerned. Though I don’t look forward to telling Limpet’s pod when they arrive searching for him.”

Zack completely understood wanting to think about a confrontation they could handle, but he said the obvious anyway, “Somehow, I don’t think that’s our biggest problem right now.”

Gray. Something had leached all the color from the world. Had he hit his head and lost his ability to perceive color? Diego curled up on his side, trying to make sense of things before he attempted to move. A gray cinderblock wall four feet away connected to another, shorter wall…

Ah. A cell. Right. We were being arrested. “Finn?”

No answer. He pushed himself up on one arm, sitting up with muscles that felt bruised on the inside.

It wasn’t the same as the pain after a seizure.

Some sort of loose gray pajamas had replaced his clothes.

The sleeves were too long and when Diego rolled them up, he found dull gray metal cuffs around his wrists.

This can’t be good.

Cuffs encircled his ankles and when he felt a cold weight on his collarbones, he reached up with shaking fingers to find a metal collar around his throat.

He got to his feet, trying to make sense of his surroundings.

If this was a prison cell, it was an odd one.

Both longer walls were solid. Both shorter walls had featureless metal doors.

A single, bare bulb burned overhead. A single speaker crouched in one corner of the ceiling.

“Hello? Can someone hear me? Am I allowed a phone call?” As he spoke to the ceiling, the cinderblock walls and concrete floor gave him some hope. If he could gather his magic carefully, he could make a door. He could…nothing.

No. Esta de pinga. Not again .

Diego refocused and reached outward from his center, only to run up against barriers at his throat and limbs.

The cuffs and collar contained lead, most likely lead-cored steel from the looks of them.

Iron weakened the fae and blocked their magic but one of the only things that kept a human from reaching the flows was lead.

A squawk came from the speaker, followed by a voice speaking what Diego assumed were several Middle Eastern languages in succession.

When Mandarin followed, he was certain it was the same repeated message, though he had to wait until the French portion to glean even a sense of what it meant.

Door, exit, now —those words were ones he could pick out.

Finally, the message repeated in English, “When the door opens, step through immediately. The intake chamber will be chemically cleansed. For your safety, you must vacate the intake chamber now.”

The door to his left slid open and closed behind him after he stepped through.

He had assumed he was moving into another cell, but a long hallway of the same dimly lit cinderblock walls and concrete floor as the cell stretched before him, though these walls soared at least twenty feet up into the gloom.

No further instructions followed, so Diego started walking, his bare feet whispering in the oppressive silence.

The anxious emptiness of separation hadn’t hit him, so Finn had to be here somewhere.

Finding him had to be the first priority.

He pulled at the collar as he went, hoping that its lead core might make it weak, running his hands over it to find a catch or a lock. The thing wouldn’t budge and only bit into his neck as he yanked on it. He couldn’t even find a seam where it had been fastened.

The hallway led into a cross-corridor, the walls here dotted with recessed, empty rooms. None of these small spaces had doors or bars. No guards appeared at any point to impede his progress or tell him he wasn’t allowed to go on. Was he alone in this prison? It was a prison, wasn’t it?

Diego continued on, slowing as he passed larger spaces, ominous in their darkness.

When the path turned right, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye, a whisper of cloth, but whoever it was had vanished when he spun around.

A brighter light shone farther along, so he hurried toward that, suddenly fearful of the darker spaces.

When he reached the three rectangles of sunlight on the floor, he followed the shafts to three slits fifteen feet up on the ceiling, openings so narrow they wouldn’t have served as arrow slits in a medieval fortress.

If he had been able to access his magic, he might have considered those an escape option. But then, if he could have ripped holes in walls with his magic, he could have simply built a magical door and gone home.

The whispers returned, just at the edge of hearing, the owners nowhere in sight.

An odd anticipation hung in the air. A klaxon blared, heart-stopping as it sliced through the silence.

Dark rectangles began to drop from the windows and Diego took two involuntary steps back to avoid them.

Suddenly the corridor exploded with human activity.

People in gray prison pajamas raced toward the rectangles, bulging packets maybe eight inches long.

The prisoners shoved each other out of the way, tripping those too far in front.

One man, larger than his fellows, tossed people aside as he waded through to claim the majority of the largest pile.

Others, furtive and quick, snatched single bundles from the edges and darted away into the gloom.

A group of prisoners with covered heads swooped in, maintaining a tight phalanx to snatch up packets and hand them into the center of the group. They successfully fended off the few prisoners who tried to steal from them and vanished as swiftly as they had arrived. Men and women in the same prison?

It was over within moments. Every one of the dropped items had been seized and most of the prisoners had scurried off into the dark.

One man lay moaning on the floor a moment before he managed to stagger away empty-handed.

Then the only people left in the eerily quiet space were Diego and three young people huddled by the wall with one packet between them.

Thoroughly confused, he walked toward them.

“Hurry up! Before someone comes!” the one on the left whispered.

The one on the right twitched and glanced up at Diego. “Fuck. Too late.”

“Don’t look. Don’t pay any attention.” The third one with the packet said. “Just do it fast. He can’t take what we’ve already scarfed down.”

Apparently, he was a threat. Diego stopped and sat down cross-legged, still a good ten feet from them, with his hands on his knees. The trio huddled close with their heads bent over the packet, scooping things into their mouths. The whole series of events began to make sense in horrible ways.

“You three aren’t from here,” he said in what he hoped was his gentlest tone.

The triple-headed double-take was almost funny. Almost.

“English. And he sounds American,” the middle one whispered, his eyes huge in what might have been hope or sheer terror.

Diego hazarded an educated guess. “My name is Diego Sandoval. I am American but I was here with Tearmann Island staff to try to negotiate the release of three Canadian college students. Could that be you?”

“Oh my God. It’s him.” The one on the right tugged at the middle one’s sleeve. “The guy from…you know, the TV. You’re getting us out?”