“You are in a town full of fae—a group of magical races that are all hidden by a glamour so humans will see us as exactly that—human. Kella,” he gestured to me, “is the heir to the fae throne, who didn’t know she was the heir until about a week ago. So, you can appreciate how the fae would have a difficult time just letting her…drive away.”
Deena’s mouth formed a little o. “Are you for real?” She nudged me. “Is he for real, Kella?”
“Yep,” I muttered.
“So, you aren’t going crazy?”
“Well, that remains to be seen,” said Edon. I glared at him.
“It’s true,” he said. “You’ve got a great-grandmother that I’d put in the psychopath category. So, if her type of crazy is hereditary…” Edon shrugged.
“Wait, she’s still alive?” Deena asked. “Because I’ve been looking hard for kin, and I haven’t heard of a living grandma.”
“Where is she?” I asked, but I was more wary. My mom was dead, my bio dad didn’t want to talk to me yet, and Edon already said my great-grandmother was a psycho. I didn’t really have much luck going for me in the family department, so I wasn’t about to get my hopes up with this new connection. “And why isn’t she queen if she’s still alive?”
“Well, ‘alive’ is kind of…relative.” Edon leaned back into his office chair, hands clasped behind his neck. “Do any of us truly die? Perhaps we simply go on to live in a different plane of existence.”
Deena looked like she wanted to slap Edon upside the back of his head. So did I. “Answer the da—answer the question,” Deena said as Officer Louie returned with two coffee mugs and a small manila packet tucked under his arm.
“Here ya go, chief.”
“Chief?” I asked as Edon grabbed his cup along with the packet.
“This the pixie stuff?” Edon asked, tapping the packet on his desk.
“Chief—as in everyone knows who you are?”
“Yep,” Louie said. I wasn’t sure if he was answering me or Edon. Maybe both of us.
“How much?” Edon asked Louie.
“Everyone knows who the chiefs are in small towns, right? You couldn’t have been undercover—all the students would have already known who you were.” But fae couldn’t lie—it was a fact. So how’d he get that one out of his mouth?
“I mean,” I continued, “I had to be the only one in school who didn’t know... Wait, were you spying on me?”
“Double dose,” Louie said, ignoring me.
Edon looked pleased. “And here I thought they were going to be stingy and just give us one for the human.”
Louie shrugged. “They’re both for the human. She’s resistant, so they didn’t want to take any chances. Supply said if one worked, we need to return the second. They’re running low.”
I swung my gaze between Officer Louie and Edon in disbelief. Were they seriously ignoring me right now? Hot anger flooded through me.
Edon had been spying on me the entire time I’d been here. Watching me as I attended classes. Maybe even looking for a convenient way to off me. I was pretty sure the girl who tried to kill me not too long ago was a rebel, too. Did she take her orders from him?
What started out as anger quickly chilled to fear. Edon and Maeve had made it very clear that my life was in Edon’s hands right now—and it might just be in my best interest to stay quiet.
Edon sighed. “Right. Well, let’s get her done.” Edon grabbed a file on his desk, opening it as he leaned back in his chair.
“Right.” Louie grabbed the package, pulled out a packet that looked like a teabag, and stepped behind Deena.
Deena twisted around in her chair. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Louie smiled wide. “I’m doing you a favor, ma’am,” he said as he ripped open a teabag.
“Oh, no you don’t.” Deena jumped up, but before she could move away, Louie poured what looked like yellow sugar on top of her head.
It was as if someone had stunned her. One minute, Deena was standing, the next, she was crumpled over her chair, legs and arms falling at awkward angles.
“What—”
“Louie, can you fix that?” Edon said, pointing a pen at Deena without looking up.
“Looks comfortable to me, Chief.”
Edon glanced over the file he was scanning.
Louie sighed, grabbing Deena by the shoulders, lifting her up, and setting her back down in sitting position.
She slumped over, snoring, but Louie must have figured that was good enough, because he plodded away to his desk on the other side of the aisle.
After a few moments, my curiosity overruled my decision to lay low. “I thought pixie dust made people fly.”
Edon didn’t so much as glance at me. But after he underlined a few things in the file, he said, “How does that make sense? They’re prey. They don’t want their attackers flying after them.”
“Oh,” I said. I guess that made sense. Kind of. “But their teeth—”
“Look, I’ve got a few things I’d like to get done before the council gets here, so if you could be quiet, that’d be great.”
Edon scribbled something on the file and then paused. “What were you saying about teeth?”
“Well, pixies have fangs. You know, curved, gnarly-looking things.” I curled my fingers into claws. “I thought that’d put them in the predator category.”
Edon stared at my hands, an unreadable expression on his face.
“And who showed you what pixie fangs look like?”
“No one. I just—” And then I couldn’t say anything. Not a word about shadows. My mouth simply shut.
Edon folded the file and set it in his desk, still staring at me.
“Did you take an oath?”
I nodded.
“Can you tell me who you made it to?”
“Mickey,” I said.
Edon said something under his breath and spun around in his chair, picking up his phone and stabbing the numbers.
“Hey, Mickey. I got your girl over here. I think there’s something you’d like to tell me. Council will be here in about thirty. So you should probably tell me now…Yes, over the phone…No, I’m
