Sun Broken (The Wild Hunt #11) - Yasmine Galenorn Page 0,10
tell me what happened and I’ll write it down for you.”
I stumbled over what I could remember—giving him every detail that I could think of. “I felt…like I was inches from shattering. You know how you feel when you’re burned out and running on the last dregs? I felt scorched.” I accepted the water from Talia. “Thank you. I have no idea what it pertains to, but I was staring at the stack of files, so it may relate to this case. Either way, I’m dreading diving into another serial killer case, although the last one ended up with us meeting Raven, so at least it had a bright spot—” I stopped as Herne returned to the table.
“What happened?” he asked. “Are you all right?”
“I had another vision.” I told him what I had seen.
“Lovely. Well, keep it in mind. Meanwhile, we have yet another headache to deal with. That was my mother, Morgana. Ember, she wants to see you tonight. You’re to go through the Fantastica again. She’s expecting you around eight p.m., our time.”
I jotted the note down on my steno pad. “All right. I take it that Aoife is still the guardian of the boat?”
He nodded. “Yes, Aoife’s still there.”
The Fantastica was Morgana’s houseboat. Or rather, it was a portal into Morgana’s realm, and Aoife was the gatekeeper. She was an Undine, one of the Light Fae.
The trip actually sounded pleasant to me. It was a beautiful day, and a trip down to the docks would be a welcome chance to get near the water.
“What else did your mother want?” Talia asked.
“That’s the headache. Saílle and Névé are up to their old tricks again.” He tapped away on his tablet. “Sending you all the information now. Looks like the truce is officially over.”
For a while, the two Fae Queens had called a truce when they—and we—were facing a common enemy. But the Tuathan Brotherhood had been shoved back into the gutters of the Dark Web, and now the Fae Queens were at it again. This was what I had primarily been hired by the Wild Hunt for—to help run interference between the warring courts. Both sides had been fighting since time immemorial, since they had first divided into the Light and Dark Courts. Back in Annwn, the Celtic Otherworld where Herne came from, the great kingdoms of Navane and TirNaNog fought tooth and nail, long bloody battles that never truly ended.
Here in this realm, the cities of Navane and TirNaNog that mirrored their namesakes—though on a much smaller scale—fought more underhandedly. We stepped in when their collateral damage threatened to affect innocents outside of their courts, meaning humans, shifters, and anybody else who wasn’t of Fae origin.
“What the hell are those two up to now?” I asked, finishing my coffee.
“The Light Court started it, as usual. You’d think being called ‘light’ they might be a little less prone to incite violence, but no such luck. Anyway, it seems that Névé is out to retrieve Callan, who is still hanging out at TirNaNog.” He grunted. “She sent a party to try to ambush him. He was with a group of guards and they were driving down I-405. This resulted in a multi-vehicle collision.”
“Injuries? Fatalities?” Viktor asked.
“Seven seriously wounded shifters and five humans in critical condition. We’ve been charged with collecting Callan and returning him to Annwn so Morgana can deal with him. Now that the Brotherhood is no longer a factor, neither Névé nor Saílle can offer any objections when Morgana sends him back to the time period he belongs in.”
“Good luck on that,” Viktor said. “I don’t think either one of those broads has any clue as to what constitutes a reasonable request.”
“Not to mention, now that he has a taste for the modern age, is Callan even going to want to return to his own time?” Talia asked.
Callan was an ancient Fae warrior/hero, who had single-handedly driven the Fomorians—a race of giants who were the Fae’s mortal enemies—back into the mountains. This was in Annwn, during the beginning of the Tuathan-Fomorian Wars. Névé and Saílle had combined forces when the Brotherhood had the Fae under duress, and they had retrieved Callan’s spirit, bringing a statue of him to life to act as a vessel. He was flesh and blood all right, but he wasn’t supposed to be part of our timeline and the gods had been very testy