“Naida!” Sebille screamed, her hands aglow with energy that couldn’t knock the nasty little guys back fast enough.
I panicked and threw my energy toward the suitcase. It flew off the ground enmeshed in a thin veil of silver energy and twirled around three times before slamming back to the ground.
I expelled a frustrated breath. “I told you I couldn’t…”
The suitcase popped open.
Oh…
The interior was a swirling black nothingness, interspersed with silvery strands of magic that formed a coil which narrowed as it moved from the rim of the bag to its center. “What is that?” I asked.
“Portal.” Lea stepped closer, one leg lifted over the vortex. Her eyes met mine. “Croakies,” she said. And then she was sucked down into the vortex and was gone.
Sebille had popped into her sprite form while I was opening the bag. Her magic seemed to have more power when she was in that form, and she’d managed to create some space between us and the oncoming hordes. She flew backward until she was inches away from me. Without glancing my way, she said. “Step into the bag and think of Croakies.”
Behind us, a roar went up and the ground shook beneath massive, thundering footsteps.
We were out of time.
“I’m not leaving you…”
“You won’t,” she screamed, turning to blast Gerrard Gnomish with an energy bolt that knocked him back a few steps.
But not far enough. He regained his equilibrium in the space of a heartbeat and threw himself toward us, hand outstretched toward the open suitcase.
“Now!” Sebille screamed.
When I didn’t move, she popped into full size, wrapped herself around me, and leaped into the hole in the suitcase.
The world went black and shimmery for a long moment, the sights and sounds of unidentifiable objects occasionally flashing past as the vortex carried us to our destination. Hopefully, Croakies, though I’d been so discombobulated, I forgot to think my destination as Sebille dragged me into the whirling miasma.
Without warning, our feet slammed into thin, dirty carpet and we stumbled forward, barely staying on our feet as momentum carried us away from where the portal had spit us out.
A heartbeat later, something slammed to the ground behind us.
I turned to find the suitcase lying on the carpet where Sebille and I had come through. It was closed again.
“By the Goddess’s ratty toilet bowl brush,” I groused, turning and sliding down the wall to my butt. “If I ever suggest that we go to Gnomish again, please hit me upside the head with something big and heavy until I’m in a coma.”
Lea was sitting at the table in the center of the room, her head on her arms.
Sebille staggered over to the tea counter and started making tea.
Crazy sprite.
But I’d definitely have my hand in the air for a cuppa when it was done. Yes, I would. “What just happened?” I asked nobody in particular.
Lea groaned.
Sebille set the freshly filled teapot on the stove. “That wasn’t Alice.”
I’d figured that out, or at least considered it a possibility, but hearing the words was still startling. “Then who was it?”
“I’m not sure,” Sebille said, “but I’ve been following her since yesterday, and at some point between her leaving here tonight and ending up at Gnomish, something changed.”
I thought about what she’d said, remembering how Alice had been weaving around even more than usual on the drive over. And how she’d slowed at the entrance to Enchanted Park but hadn’t turned. “Alice got into her car intending to take that suitcase to the PTB,” I said.
Lea lifted her head, nodding. “I’m pretty sure that was her.”
Sebille didn’t respond. She busied herself with the tea things.
A thump rattled the dividing door. A long, angry yowl filled the room. I groaned, realizing I’d neglected to feed Fenwald. I got to my feet and shuffled to the door, already apologizing to the cat. “I know. I’m sorry…” When I opened the door, the big cat came flying out of the artifact library, but he didn’t run to the tea area as he usually did, begging for food. He flew toward the front door instead, yowling and flinging himself against it as his tail snapped angrily behind him.
“Fenwald, what…?”
The door flew open, slamming against the wall behind it.
Lea surged to her feet, hands out in front of her and energy dancing over them.
Sebille popped into sprite form and raced toward the door.
I stood there with my mouth hanging open. Helpful as always.
Alice stumbled through the door, collapsing to the carpet in a limp puddle.
18
Beware The Implements Of Travel, For They Oft Be Deadly
“I’ve never seen him before in my life,” Alice said.
We were all in her apartment, watching her bite gamely into a two-day-old scone that had been like granite when it had first been baked and had to be like biting into a diamond after two days. However, I noticed she’d soaked it in her tea for a couple of minutes before biting down on it.
Somehow the rock-like pastry gave way under her teeth with a brittle sounding crunch. Those suckers had to be like T-Rex choppers.
Sebille eyed Alice with an expression filled with doubt. “You say he was in your car when you got inside?”
Alice nodded, chewing as if she had four inches of leather between her teeth.
“What did he look like,” Sebille asked.
The keeper shrugged. “No idea. He must have given me a Forget spell.”
The way Sebille’s gaze was narrowed, I got the impression she wasn’t buying it.
“I don’t understand why he didn’t just take the suitcase and go,” I said. Nothing that had happened to that point made any sense. And it was giving me a headache. “Why’d he use a spell to look like Alice?”
Alice swallowed, sipping tea to flood the rigid combination of flour and butter down her throat. “Before he knocked me insensate, he said something about me and my merry band of idiots…” She
