“Yeah. That. And why did you come? And who the hell are you?”
Diana exchanged a speaking glance with Claire. If the, well, elves—for lack of a better word—could still swear with impunity, then they were influencing the Otherside on a subconscious level only. However they’d changed, they remained Bystanders, and the Lineage worked very hard at keeping Bystanders unaware of their existence.
“Your Summons,” Claire murmured. “Your choice.”
“The Rules…”
“Diana, there’s a sign in that shoe store window advertising ruby slippers for half off. Unless they’re trying to attract the Otherside drag queen business, I’d say that the Rules have already been twisted pretty far out of shape.”
“O–kay.” Claire had been a total Rule follower her entire life. Dean had obviously loosened her up a lot more than Diana had suspected. Bad, bad mental image. Think about…
Kris folded her arms and glared. Her expression promised violence if she didn’t get an answer soon.
Yeah, that works. “My name is Diana. This is Claire. That’s Sam. Essentially, we’re a sort of wizard called a Keeper.”
“We’re not wizards,” Claire sighed.
“Okay,” Diana muttered sotto voice, not the least surprised Claire’d had to stick her two cents in regardless of what she’d said about choices and whose they were. “You explain to the mall elves exactly what we are in three thousand words or less.”
Claire’s eyes narrowed, then she sighed again. “Essentially,” she told their fascinated audience, “we’re wizards. It’s our job to make sure that metaphysical balances are kept.”
“That the magical stuff between the worlds doesn’t go out of whack,” Diana clarified as half a dozen pairs of eyes stared at them blankly.
Kris shook her head, dreadlocks bouncing. “You’re wizards?”
“Essentially wizards,” Claire amended reluctantly.
“They’re wizards,” Sam snorted. “I’m a cat.”
“Right.” Kris acknowledged him with a quick smile and turned her attention back to the Keepers. “Well, since you’re here and since we’re here and since our candle throwin’ friends with the negative number IQs are here and since this is a fuckin’ shopping mall, I’m guessin’ that the magical stuff between the worlds is way whacked.”
“Good guess.”
“Yeah, well, we’re not stupid.”
“Kris.” One of the others, a skinny, dark-haired, androgynous kid probably no more than fifteen jumped the barricade. “The meat-minds have retreated back past the food court.”
“Thanks, DK. All right, the rest of you go back to what you were doing before Jo gave the alarm. Me and Will’ll take these guys in to Arthur.” She jerked her head down the concourse toward the anchor store at the far end. “Let’s go.”
Will turned out to be the redhead.
“Actually,” Claire announced in a tone that suggested she’d neither forgotten nor forgiven the earlier too old and too well fed observation, “we’ve got to get back to the other end of the mall. We appreciate your assistance, but we have a job to do here.”
Kris shrugged. “So do I. And my job says I take new people in to see Arthur.”
“Claire…”
“Diana?”
She flashed Kris a smile, grabbed Claire’s arm, and yanked her close enough to mutter into her ear. “I know that time is a factor, I mean, it is my Summons and all, but these guys are a factor, too, because whoever’s running this segue isn’t going to be able to finish it while they’re still here. I mean, we weren’t expecting indigenous life.”
“They aren’t indigenous!”
“Maybe they didn’t used to be, but they are now.”’
“All right, fine.” Claire pulled her arm free. “But if this thing goes critical while we’re talking…”
“Then we’ll be in the right place because it can’t go critical until the forces of darkness attack and destroy this last bastion of the light.”
“The forces of darkness are throwing scented candles!”
“Yeah, but they’re throwing them really hard. And besides, you know as well as I do how fast things can change on the Otherside.” Diana patted Claire’s bare shoulder in a comforting sort of way and turned back to Kris. “So, take us to your leader. He is your leader, right?”
Claire sighed. “Well, if he isn’t, you’ve just wasted that line.”
“He is our leader,” Kris told them, and this time when she indicated they should start moving, there was very little room for arguing with the gesture.
As the Keepers stepped away from the barricade and Sam jumped down to walk between them, Will fell in on one side, Kris on the other. They were clearly being escorted. Diana decided to think of it as an honor guard.
“So,” she prodded after a moment. “This Arthur; what’s he like?”
Kris glanced over at her and shrugged. “Not like us.”
“Like you are or like you were?”
“What’s the diff?”
“You know; the whole ears, thick flowing tresses thing.”
“The what?”
Bystanders could lie to Keepers; they just couldn’t get away with it. Kris honestly didn’t know what Diana was talking about. Apparently their perception of themselves had changed as they had changed. Now why they’d changed the way they had; that was a whole different question without an answer. “Never mind, it’s not important. So, how is Arthur different from you?”
“He came from outside.”
“Outside?” Diana was beginning to have a bad feeling about this.
“Yeah, outside the mall.” Kris waved to the tall, slender girl standing guard at the intersection of the main concourse and the short hall leading to one of the outside doors. “We don’t know how he got in, ’cause we can’t get out, but he understands this place. He keeps us together; he made us strong. We were getting our asses kicked by all sorts of strange shit until he showed up.”
“And he made you the captain of his guard?”
“Yeah. He did. You got a problem with that?”
“No. Of course not. You’re obviously really good at it and you, you know, you’re in charge and um…” Babble much? She’s going to think you’re an idiot. Get a grip! Diana took a deep breath and ignored Claire’s raised eyebrow. “So, were you the first one who crossed over?”
A muscle jumped in Kris’ jaw. “Second.”
Something in her tone made Diana remember all the things Austin had listed that were worse than
