“You have to be careful,” Zoey chided, following him in.
I stopped Quinn at the edge of the barrier. The whole time we’d been walking, I’d been thinking the problem through. There was one simple solution. “You going to stop me if I have to do it?”
Quinn didn’t misunderstand. It seemed he’d figured out the solution, too. “Not at all. I would greatly prefer it was you who kills Daniel and allows him to turn again, but first we have to figure out what’s happening. We can’t simply stick a sword in him and hope he’s a vampire again.”
“His DNA hasn’t changed.” At least I hoped it hadn’t. That was a problem that was way beyond my skill level.
“We don’t know anything about the condition, yet,” Quinn replied. “The minute I’m certain Daniel will turn, poke away. We need the king.”
Dean’s head made a reappearance. “Uh, the dampening doesn’t work both ways. We can totally hear you.”
I sighed and walked through. The queen was staring at me, a frown on her face and her arms crossed over her chest.
“You are not killing Daniel.”
“Hear me out,” I said.
She sent me what I like to think of as her “mom” look. It stopped many a child from doing stupid things. “No.”
“Zoey, it might be the best way,” Daniel said quietly.
I found myself standing in front of a pretty cottage. It obviously had taken some damage but unlike the rest of the village, someone had fixed this place up. Night had fallen and a warm glow came from the windows. It was some pretty sweet magic that hid this place from the outside world. I had to wonder if it would have fooled my wolf. Or Daniel when he was a vamp. They had super-enhanced senses. I would have to check and see if I could sense it when I opened mine.
“No one is killing you until we understand what’s going on,” Quinn said, sounding more forceful than I usually heard him when Daniel was around. He tended to take Daniel’s crown seriously. I wasn’t sure if he deferred to the king in private, but he did in public.
“We need to find Summer and save her. I can’t do that as a human,” Daniel said and winced as though his head was pounding.
“What’s happened to Summer?” a feminine voice asked.
I turned and there was a petite female standing on the porch of the cottage. She wore a long skirt and white tunic, her golden hair up in a loose bun. I would peg her age at around fifty, but if she was a supe she could be so much older. She turned to the queen and gasped. “Summer, what happened to your charm?”
“Erna, these are Summer’s parents,” Dean began to explain.
Erna’s eyes had gone wide and she approached the Queen of all Vampire. “But they’re from the Earth plane. Only a Planeswalker can get there. Did you sell your souls? Not very bright.”
“They fell in,” Dean said. “Through a painting or something. I don’t know. It seems kind of weird to me, but they’ve been arguing about it for hours. Also, the human dude claims he wasn’t always human, the tall guy is a Green Man, and I don’t know what to call Kelsey, but she’s pretty badass. I’ve checked out the Green Man and Kelsey. They’re cool.”
The woman named Erna raised a brow. “I should hope so since you’ve brought them to our home. Where is Summer?”
Dean’s eyes found the ground in front of him. “Taggart got her.”
Erna gasped. “You let a mercenary take her? Dean, how could you?”
“It wasn’t the boy’s fault,” Quinn said.
“No, I suspect we’ll find it was yours,” Erna shot back. “Years she’s gone without getting caught and you people show up and she’s suddenly in custody. Do we know who he’s going to sell her to?”
“Sell her?” Zoey looked to Quinn. “If they’re selling her, we can buy her. It might be the easiest way. I don’t want to risk her life.”
“I don’t think they take cash,” Donovan pointed out. “Not that we have any. We have to break her out.”
“Or she could simply have wished this Taggart person out of existence,” Quinn offered with a long sigh. “I am confused. Summer Donovan-Quinn is a magical being. She is literally made of faery magic. Why is she so vulnerable? She was being pursued by a military unit when we found her. Why was she fighting hand to hand? She doesn’t have to.”