The Changelings by Elle Casey

  "Exactly. So they had a trial, and Amber and our foster parents were witnesses for me. They all said I was protecting the family from him after he killed the dog and abused Amber. It's called 'defense of others', where you can kill someone if they're about to kill someone else. And there was also self-defense, although I stabbed him in the back, so that one wasn't so popular with the jury."

  "Wow. Just…wow. That is…unbelievable."

  She shrugged, obviously very sad. "Yeah. That's my life. That's my past. That's what I was running from when I found Jared and then Finn and Chase and Sam and Spike and you and Tony." She looked at the door. "I love Finn so, so much, Jayne. If he left me…" She couldn't finish.

  I reached over and hugged her. "You do not have to worry about that. He loves you forever, and I guarantee you he would not fault you for what you did. You're a fucking hero, and he'll see that just like I did."

  "But I killed another human being, Jayne. Even though I know he was a terrible, evil creature to hurt Binkley and to hurt Amber…"

  "And all the other people and animals he hurt before them…because you and I know they weren't the first."

  "No, probably not. In fact, I knew they weren't, because he liked to brag. As if that's something to brag about, hurting innocent people and animals."

  I had to swallow a few times to keep everything down. I prayed she wasn't about to give me details. "I think it's time you try to let this go." I pulled back to look at her. "I know it's easy for me to say and probably almost impossible to do, but you should try. You have a new life now, and D.J. has his bed that he made that he's lying in down in the Underworld."

  She stared into my eyes, her gaze super intense.

  "What?" I asked.

  "I was wondering…do you think you could contact him down there. Through Biad?"

  I was speechless for a full minute before I could finally find my voice. "Uhhh, I don't even know how Biad is doing." I showed her my palm and the dark scale embedded in it. "I have seen no signs of life from her since coming back here."

  "Oh." Becky swallowed loudly. "I didn't realize."

  "What was the favor?" I asked, not positive I wanted to know. But if it would bring my friend peace, I'd probably be willing to try whatever it was she wanted me to do.

  "Could you ask her if he…if he…if he regrets what he did?"

  I nodded. "Sure. If I can, I will." I thought about it for a few seconds before I asked my next question. "And what would be the best case scenario, here? Do you want him to regret it or not?"

  She shrugged, sighing loudly and going back to the computer. "I honestly do not know. I just…need closure, I guess." She paused and looked at me sideways. "Did I mention his parents apologized to me?"

  My eyes went wide. "They did? You mean his real parents?"

  "Yeah. They said they knew what he was capable of, and they were sorry they hadn't had him committed. They blamed themselves."

  "Well, they should have," I said, feeling no pity for them. "Jerks. Passing off their shithead, twisted kid on the world and walking away. Especially if they had the money to get him treatment."

  "Ooooh, yeah, they have money." She laughed bitterly. "Gobs of it."

  "Assholes." I looked down at my belly. "Spike and I should probably go to some parenting classes or something."

  Becky smiled at me. "Don't be silly. You're going to be awesome parents."

  "How? Neither of us have seen or experienced great examples of parenting done right. Mine were neglectful buttholes and his were abusive."

  She shrugged and gave me one of her brighter smiles. "Just do the opposite of whatever they did and you'll be golden."

  I smiled back, turning to face my computer again. "I guess I can do that."

  The door opened and our friends practically spilled into the room, one after the other until we had a full house.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  "WHAT'S GOING ON, Jayne?" Jared asked, taking the seat next to me. Spike took up a spot behind me and Finn did the same with Becky. Becky and I exchanged a look that said confidences would be held before I answered Jared.

  "We're trying to figure out where the Forsaken are going to show up to try and destroy the world." I jiggled the mouse again to wake my screen up and Tim flew down to force my index finger to click it. The screen brightened with a list of answers to my earlier query.

  "What have you found?" the pixie asked, floating up in front of the screen.

  "You'd make a better door than a window, Tim," I said, trying to encourage him to move to the left a little so everyone could see what I'd found.

  "Because I'm solid, like oak," he said, lifting up his bicep to kiss it. He took a few seconds to do a muscle-man pose-down before he went back to perusing my search results. "What are we doing? Going to a concert? Not sure that's the best use of our time, but hey, everyone needs a break now and again."

  Spike spoke up. "This looks like a tour schedule. For what band?"

  "I have no idea," I said, taking in the information in front of me. I read silently along with everyone else. Becky had shut off her monitor and was leaning over, trying to see around Tim.

  Aidan pointed to a picture. "Click on that. Enlarge it."

  I did as he ordered, and we were all treated to a blown-up image of what looked like a big television screen mounted over a stage. "What in the heck is that?" I asked no one in particular.

  "Oh, damn, I read about this," Spike said, sounding excited. "Have you guys heard about it? Virtual concerts? Worldwide exposure for a band, everywhere all at once?"

  "No, what is it?" Aidan asked.

  The door opened and Long stepped in as a normal looking girl and not a wyvern. Mike was behind her, but there wasn't anymore room for him to fit. She nodded at me and I decided not to play around anymore with the idea that she'd set me up in the mental hospital and worked with Malena to do it. I had never sensed her lying to me and I was pretty good with that skill.

  "You can hang there in the doorway, Mike," I said, looking past Scrum, whose face was strangely pink. The only time I'd ever seen him get that exerted was when he was doing his daemon thing, squeezing the hell out of someone until they passed out. He must have sprinted here from somewhere far away. "Just leave the door open."

  "Okay," Mike said in his typical dull voice.

  "What's happening in here?" Long asked, hanging onto Scrum's shoulders while trying to see over him.

  Scrum's face went nearly purple, and he seemed to have frozen into a statue.

  I smiled at his reaction. If I didn't know any better, I'd think he was suffering a serious case of girl-cootie-itis. Does Scrum have a crush on the wyvern? I prayed he didn't, because Long was not the type to be gentle if she wasn't also interested. He'd be liable to get sliced with those gnarly claws of hers if he wasn't careful. And that would be ten times worse than the fifth grade letdown he'd told us about. Poor Scrum. I really wished someone would finally see in him what the rest of us saw: pure unadulterated goodness wrapped up in cuddly bear doofus. All he needed was a girl to convince him that shampoo was not the enemy and he'd be all set.

  I went back to my computer, knowing that Scrum's love life was second on my list of priorities, right behind not allowing the destruction of the world to become a reality. "Spike, explain to us what we're looking at here," I said.

  He leaned in and clicked on a link, pointing to the screen. "This is a new concept in concert promotion that I heard about a while back, but it looks like they're finally putting it in place. See…you got this band, Dem Grave Diggers, right? And they're huge. I mean, they've rocketed in popularity practically overnight. And honestly, I can't figure it out. They're a death metal band, like big time, which is usually a real niche area of music, but they've somehow gone mainstream. They don't even play very well, but it doesn't seem to matter to their fans."

  "They look like grave residents not grave diggers," Tim said, zooming in close to see the photo Spike had brought up. "Are they zombies?" He tapped on
the screen near one of their eyes. "Look. No soul. I don't see any soul behind that eyeball."

  I swatted him gently out of the way. "They're not zombies; they're just rockers."

  "I have to agree with Tim," Aidan said gruffly. "They look undead."

  "Okay, fogies, we're not here to judge the young 'uns," I said, faking Finn's accent. He totally didn't pick up on it, though. He was just staring at the photo on the screen, dumbfounded.

  Spike clicked another link. "See? What they're going to do is simultaneously broadcast a concert in eight different cities—New York, London, Istanbul, Hong Kong, Rome, Sidney, Johannesburg, and Moscow—in huge stadiums, using the biggest screens ever erected. Tickets are half the price of a normal concert, but the sound quality will be stellar. Literally hundreds of thousands of people will be there live to see the concert, and millions will see it in other places, like on TV or whatever. That's the concept, anyway."

  Becky leaned in really close and whispered in my ear. "He said erected." And then she giggled.

  I elbowed her away, but not before a snort escaped my nose.

  Spike continued on, lost in his world of music concerts and rock bands breaking down barriers or pushing envelopes or whatever. "It's going to be epic. People will be showing up at all times of day and night, obviously, because of the different time zones. Some people will see it at three a.m. and others will see it at nine in the morning, and so on." He stopped and looked at Jared. "Can you imagine? Their music being heard all around the world at exactly the same time? Playing not just there in those cities but online too? They'll be everywhere. Inside people's homes, businesses, cars, on phones, the radio…everywhere."

  "But who'd want to go somewhere to see a concert on a screen?" asked Long.

  "Yeah. Isn't the whole point to see them live?" Scrum asked. He glanced at Long over his shoulder and turned red all over again.

  I sighed and shook my head at him. He and I were going to have to have a talk about the birds and the bees and the girls who turn into badass dragons who might not want boyfriends.

  "Normally, yeah, but these guys have turned everything upside down," Spike said, super animated. "They are redefining what a concert is. They are breaking barriers, man. It's cool." He rubbed his hands together and then launched himself into some air guitar.

  I rolled my eyes. He definitely needed some playing time. He looked like a kid at Christmas, and it had been way too long since I'd heard him play.

  "This would be the perfect way to affect millions of people at the same time, and not in a good way," Aidan said, his voice laced with dread. It brought the mood of the room waaaay down in a hurry.

  "Yeah, but don't you think this is just a little too…out there," Jared said. He sounded very skeptical. "I think it's just a bit alarmist for us to jump to this conclusion, that the Forsaken are going to be at music concerts."

  It was almost like Jared was mocking us for even thinking it could be possible, which was really unlike him. Normally, he was super supportive. I stared at the side of his face, and caught him looking stressed. And pissed off, maybe, too. I quickly decided that he must have other stuff on his mind and probably didn't have time to hang out with a bunch of changelings in the computer room, so it was making him short-tempered. I felt bad that Spike had asked him to come, but that didn't mean I was going to just walk away from what sounded to me like a plausible idea. "I don't know; If I were the most evil being on earth, it would look like a good idea to me. Whatever…it's friggin scary is what it is." I looked at everyone but Jared. "What are they planning on doing? Mass hypnosis?"

  "Mass magical hypnosis maybe," said Finn. "Throw out a spell that's attached to the notes of music or somethin'? Make everyone there go ballistic and kill everyone? They could create an instant army that could go after everyone all over the world."

  The room went completely silent. For a long while we just sat there. I could hear my heart beating and thought it was possible that everyone else could hear it too, it was so loud. I was supposed to be the one with the answers, with the power to handle this mess, but there was no way…no friggin way…I could even begin to tackle that. We were literally talking about millions of people at the exact same time coming together to start a worldwide civil war.

  "We need to get with the Council," Aidan said.

  "We need to get with the entire community," Finn said, shouldering his bow and holding out his hand to help Becky stand from her chair.

  "Where are we going?" she asked him, sounding scared.

  "To the auditorium." He looked at all of us. "What do y'all think? Keep it to ourselves or tell everyone at the same time and get a plan together to kick some ass and take some names?"

  "I vote Option B," Tim said, flying up to land on my shoulder. "And I vote that Jayne gets a shirt on because the view of her in just a sports bra could cause some swooning, and we don't have time for that. Sexy momma alert."

  I sighed and stood, resisting the urge to cross my arms over my chest. "I agree. Everyone needs to be in on this. Not to be harshing on the Council or anything, but this is bigger than all of us, and I want everyone weighing in on it."

  Jared stood and put his hand on my shoulder. "If you're sure."

  I nodded. "I am."

  "Then I support you one hundred percent." He glanced down. "You might want to…uh…get dressed before, though. Your cloak and maybe a shirt, too."

  "Yeah, yeah, I already got an earful from Tim." I held up a finger at my shoulder. "Come on, roomie. Let's go get some clothes on and then face the music in the auditorium."

  Tim high-oned me and then yanked on my ear. "Hyah, mule, hyah! There's no time to waste! Let's cover the boobage and then save the world!"

  We all moved out of the room in a hurry, with everyone but Tim and me going to the auditorium. The two of us went in the opposite direction.

  "You got her?" Spike yelled at Tim.

  "You know it!" Tim yelled.

  "Yeah, he's got me," I said. I took off jogging toward my room, Tim bouncing on my shoulder and chattering the entire way about what a great plan the Forsaken had come up with for annihilating the world.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I DOUBLE-CHECKED my breath against the palm of my hand before I opened up the doors to the auditorium. Why did I bother? It wasn't like anyone was going to get that close to me that they'd smell it. At least, I hoped not. Although tempers were sure to flare during this meeting, I definitely wasn't planning on participating in a full on brawl.

  "Minty fresh," Tim said. "I already checked. Now let's go. Open the doors. Let's make our majestic entrance." I could feel him adjusting his feet on my shoulder to a wider stance, the edges of his cloak tickling my ears. I hadn't seen the need for the cloaks, since it wasn't an official Council meeting, but he'd reminded me that we were better off having them and not needing them rather than the other way around. Sometimes the pixie gave good advice. I was also happy to once again be fully clothed, wearing my normal jeans and white tunic under the shimmering cloak, no longer sporting the shirtless look. I hadn't thought much about the fact that I'd spent half the day running around in my bra until that moment. It was pretty sobering to know that I was such an oddball that no one had bothered to even mention it until that moment when Jared finally spoke up. There goes that crazy elemental again, wandering around without her clothes on.

  I pushed open the doors, and the noise of a few hundred fae talking amongst themselves ceased in an instant. You could have heard a pixie burp in that room, even without the listening spell. And then I did hear one do that and some giggling that followed. It was a reminder that the entire pixie colony was part of our group now. A few of them buzzed around the entrance like flies over poo, trying to get a better look at me. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Tim nodding regally. He was totally in his element, unofficial king of the pixies.

  I walked up the side aisle of the big space, fae parting left and right to make room for me. You'd think I was ten times the size I
was, based on how wide the path ended up being. Maybe they were afraid that if they touched me, some of my bad luck would rub off on them. I had been through a lot of shit over the last year, so I could hardly blame them for being overly cautious.

  Walking past the Council members, I received several nods. I patted Aidan on the shoulder as I claimed the seat next to his. Dardennes and Céline both smiled at me, so I grinned back. I figured I should at least fake having supreme confidence. Maybe I'd even have some of the real stuff before the end of the day.

  "Gentlefae, thank you for coming to our meeting on such short notice," Dardennes said, getting to his feet. "We appreciate that you have stayed close, knowing that our plans are ever evolving and require your input. We have finally reached the point where we believe we know what is happening with the Forsaken and the future of our world." He paused and looked at Jared. I barely held back a fist pump over the idea that the daemon was going to take the heat instead of me. "Jared, could you please stand and give us the information you have gathered."

  I did not care one single bit that he was getting the credit for the sleuthing I did earlier. I was totally fine hanging in the background and nodding my head like the geezers around me. Tim flew down to the table and stood like Superman with his fists on his hips and his legs far apart. His chin was lifted and his head turned so that the audience would have a view of his best side. I was seriously tempted to flick him in the butt and send him sailing out into the crowd, but I resisted. Barely.

  "Thank you, as Anton has already said, for coming and for being patient with us. I'm happy to announce, first, that our Mother has returned and is with us for the duration." He paused, gesturing to me as the crowd broke out in applause. Everyone seemed genuinely happy to see me there, which made me smile warmly. I felt genuinely loved. "We've also managed to get Spike back from a long sojourn in the Gray." More applause followed. "As you have probably heard, however, we lost someone very special to us. So if we could share a moment of silence over the loss of Tony, one of our wraiths and an indispensable member of our gray elf strategy team…" He bowed his head. He added a piece at the end in a softer voice. “Only one of many who was forced to sacrifice for the good of the many.”