Sindari? I touched the charm.
Nothing.
2
“It got away?” the man asked as he and his wife stopped, glancing at the blackberry brambles.
Worried about Sindari, I struggled to focus on him. “Yeah. Sorry.”
The middle-aged couple didn’t look much like my mental image of farmers—or orchard owners. He wore a Microsoft T-shirt and glasses, and she was in yoga pants and a hoodie displaying a stick figure doing the splits under instructions to Stay flexible.
Ayush and Laura were their names, I reminded myself. Colonel Willard had given me information on them and their lavender farm/apple orchard/cider house/winery when she’d given me the job.
“I told you we should have cleared all this.” The woman pointed to the brambles and frowned at her husband.
“And I told you we’d need a hundred goats and a skidsteer with a brush-saw attachment to make any headway. It’s been an epic battle just to keep them from encroaching on the orchard.”
“I didn’t object to the idea of goats,” she murmured.
“Just the forty-thousand-dollar machine?”
“Yes. That’s not in the budget.”
“But goats are?”
“Goats are cute.”
I was barely listening, my gaze scanning the orchard for signs of Sindari, even though I suspected he’d been dismissed from this world. Usually, that was something only the holder of the figurine could do. But I’d once seen a powerful dark-elf mage force him away.
“Is this how they’ve been getting in and out?” Ayush pointed at the hole. The brambles had stopped rattling, and the kobold was far away now. “What are they?”
“Kobolds. I was trying to capture one to question. It wouldn’t surprise me if they were the ones that stole and ate your pigs. I’m not sure about the children. They are known for playing pranks—” I resisted the urge to rub the incipient bruise on my left butt cheek, “—but they’re usually smart enough not to pick fights with humans.”
“Kobolds,” the woman mouthed, looking at her husband.
From her face, it was clear she hadn’t encountered magical beings before and wasn’t sure she believed in them. Lucky her.
Her husband’s expression was more grim and accepting. “You can find them, right? And find the children?”
I hesitated, aware that the missing children could be as eaten as the pigs, but I didn’t want to steal their hope. “I can find the kobolds, and I’ll question them about what’s been going on.”
I just had to figure out a way around the thorny brambles. I could sense more kobolds in that direction, but they were at least a half mile back. Unless Zav—the dragon who was determined to use me as bait to find the criminals he’d been sent to Earth to collect—showed up and breathed fire all over the place, I wasn’t going that way. Besides, I hadn’t seen Zav in two weeks. It was possible he’d completed his mission and left Earth forever. Dare I hope?
“I’ll find a way around.” I waved at the blackberry brambles and started to turn away, but Ayush lifted his hand.
“I know the government pays you, but if you can find the children, we’ll give you some of our cider and wine and lavender chocolates. As much as you want.”
Lavender chocolate? What strange thing was that? I wouldn’t say no to hard cider, but I wasn’t here for goodies.
“You don’t have to give me anything.” I waved and jogged off to collect my belongings from under the trap and to look for a break in the brush—and Sindari.
As soon as I was out of their sight, I would try summoning him again. And hope that whatever had driven him out of this world wasn’t permanent.
Before I could reach for the charm, my phone buzzed in my pocket.
“Yeah?”
“Ms. Thorvald,” came Colonel Willard’s dry Southern accent. “Did you not learn proper phone etiquette when you were in the army?”
“No. I was a pilot, not a secretary, and then they made me an assassin.”
“Assassins don’t answer phones?” Her connection was spotty, with voices in the background making it worse.
“Not politely. You’re supposed to be fierce and vague in case an enemy is calling. Do you have something new for me? I’m hunting kobolds.” Since the property owners were out of sight, I wrapped my fingers around the cat figurine and mouthed, “Sindari,” to summon him back. I hoped.
“I do have new intel. I’ve lost touch with the forest ranger who was trying to find the kobolds’ den, but the snitch in Port Townsend who first told me about the trouble has updated me. She says they may be taking orders from a leader and not necessarily acting of their own free will.”
“Yeah, I guessed that.”
The silver mist that always formed and coalesced into Sindari was slow to appear, as if it were fighting against some invisible force determined to quash the magic.
“You’ve encountered him or her?” Willard asked.
“Not yet, but someone knocked Sindari back to his realm.”
“Try to find that person instead. Have you killed any kobolds yet?”
“No.” This time, I did rub my butt cheek. “I just spotted them for the first time.”
The mist thickened, and I exhaled in relief as Sindari’s familiar features formed. It was taking longer than usual, but he was coming.
“Avoid killing them unless you can confirm that they’re responsible. We’re trying to create less animosity among the magical community for both our sakes.” There was a grimace in her voice.
“I know. I will.”
Willard’s reply of, “Good,” was almost drowned out by metal clanking in the background.
“Colonel, are you at the gym or are you recycling aluminum cans?”
“I don’t drink anything that comes in a can.”
“That’s what I thought.” I frowned my disapproval at the phone. “Shouldn’t you be resting?”
“I’m doing some walking and light stretching.”
“In the weight room?”
“I’ve been cleared for exercise, Thorvald.” She’d called me Val when she’d been in the hospital dying, but it seemed we were back to formalities now. “It’s fine. I want to get my health back.”
“You had cancer two weeks ago. The best way to get your health back is to rest.”
Finally, Sindari fully formed, once again a solid silver tiger at my side. I’d ask for details as soon as I got off the call but leaned against him and wrapped an arm over his back.
“It was a magically induced unnatural cancer,” Willard said.
“So that means doing squats and bench presses right after is fine? You better not have signed up for a new triathlon.”
“I’m not doing squats. Just light leg presses. And you do know that you’re my lowly civilian contractor, not my boss, right?”
“Lowly? I tower over you.”
“Two inches isn’t towering. If I grew my hair out, I’d be taller than you.”
“I’m positive that you with a six-inch afro isn’t regulation,” I said, though I suspected Willard could wear her hair and her clothes however she wanted at the office in Seattle. The soldiers stationed there were supposed to blend in to more easily monitor and control criminal activity from magical beings hiding out and traveling through the city.