Chapter 14
"Welcome to my humble abode," pronounced the Yaga with a sweeping gesture over a crumbling cabin elevated on a pair of curiously shaped leg-like struts.
"For once not a socially approved understatement," Tamsin sneered, taking in the below modest appearance of the hut.
"Only a fractional improvement on your last residence," Kenzi intoned and gave a low whistle of admiration, "A real Baba Yaga's chicken-legged hut in the woods, the quintessential fae smart house. The fables say it can walk and understand orders."
"Well, it used to, back in the day, on the native soil, but since we immigrated it has gone deaf," the Yaga explained, patting the wall of the cabin with an affectionate hand. Both girls gave an involuntary flinch when the construction seemed to shudder as if responding to the caress. The door creaked on its rusty hinges opening of its own and the Yaga climbed inside followed by the two other fae, who suddenly grew hushed and slightly abashed. The interior of the hut turned out significantly more spacious than the outside view might have suggested and unexpectedly light and airy. No traditional Russian oven, no rustic wooden chairs and table – a modern-looking fitted kitchen, a softly humming fridge and some practical Ikea-style furniture instead were strewn around the multi-purpose ante room with a few doors at the back leading to possibly private Yaga-quarters. The only thing hinting heavily at the occupant's unorthodox practices was a collection of dry herbs and unidentifiable organic looking pieces of something on the shelves lining one of the walls. One of the corners sported two big bowls with milk and kibbles and a small off-white rug haired over with black patches of fur.
'That's my Vasiliy's place," the old fae whined in a surprisingly plaintive tone, "The apple of my eye, the joy of my depressed days." She whirred round to face the blonde and practically barked up into the taller woman's arrogant high-cheekboned face, "I"ve done what you asked of me – got you out of your charmed prison, now do your part – find my Vasya!"
"Yeah, you've got us out and into … what? A cabin in the back of nowhere? Are we still in the same realm we started out in this morning?" the valkyrie scowled letting her unease show.
"You're less than 100 miles from Toronto, silly girl," the Yaga muttered disparagingly, "Who do you take me for? My crazy curse-wielding cousin who chose to retreat to a realm of her own cos the authorities here disagreed with her diet? She has a taste for fresh human meat, female preferably, you know." She explained for Tamsin's benefit while Kenzi nodded knowingly.
"She had," the kitsune couldn't stop herself from sticking her oar in. "Before Bo cooked her au jus."
"Good," the Yaga replied curtly, "One person off my Christmas-presents list and no more ugly scarves from her at birthdays."Clearly unfazed by the news the old fae drilled the valkyrie with a heavy stare and the younger woman gave a resigned sigh, "Ok, but how should I find the damned cat? Smother myself in catmint and stroll the woods?"
"My cucumbers, my precious salted cucumbers made to a unique old folk recipe, there's nothing Vasiliy likes more," the Yaga explained proudly extracting a glass jar filled with yellowish vegetables form one of the shelves.
"Oh, pickles," Tamsin looked in surprise at something which she had clearly never considered a good cat snack.
"Not pickles, stupid, Babushka's salted cucumbers, the best vodka chaser ever," the Yaga corrected and added nostalgically, "A glass of vodka, a bite of my cucumbers and you feel like you are still at home. Me and Vasiliy, we like our five-o'clock Russian way."
Kenzi cut her eyes suspiciously to the cat's water bowl and sniffed the air. "I do hope it's water in that bowl," she muttered and sneezed when her recently boosted nose got a whiff of something much less innocuous.
Minutes later Tamsin, with a confident set to her shoulders, made her way out of the cabin and into the woods with a cucumber in her hand and the Yaga plopped herself into a recliner and measured Kenzi with a sullen gaze. "Now, to your sick wolf, girl," she started in the language of the cucumber-land.
Lauren walked into the room, her nose buried into her clipboard, and came to an abrupt stop when she realized the bed was empty. Seized with panic, she whirled around nearly dropping her chart and with a painful thud against her ribs her heart settled into a less elevated beat. Dyson was standing at the wall with his one hand against the bedside table and the other one gripping the IV-stand for support. Despite the double prop it was obvious the wolf was on the brink of nose-diving any minute and the doctor rushed over to him. Between the iv-stand and the desperately sweating woman Dyson managed to limp his way back on his disobeying legs to the bed and crashed onto it in utter exhaustion and no small amount of pain.
"What the hell you thought you were doing?" Lauren yelled, finding her voice and fuelled by worry.
"I thought I should take your advice and stop feeling sorry for myself," the wolf panted, "Tried a pro-active approach."
"It's too early, Dyson," the woman turned her indignation down, "Your body needs more time."
"Before I can start hobbling around like a one-legged duck?" the shifter retorted and saw Lauren's face darken. "And more importantly, where's Kenzi? Don't tell me she's gone to change and refresh, you've used that one already."
"She might be a while," the blonde admitted in a low voice.
"A while? Why?" Dyson hoisted himself up in a semi-sitting position and the doctor distractedly made a mental note that the shifter seemed to be regaining his strength faster than she had expected. In view of that observation and of the amber-flashing eyes of her patient she chose to take a step back, out of claw-sprouting arms' range, before replying.
"She's been taken, Dyson, arrested by Hale," she started tentatively, "after what Courtaud did to you, she went a full homicidal kitsune on him despite the Ash's orders."
"She killed the Red Wolf," Dyson muttered astonished.
"And attacked the Ash," Lauren added grimly, "for setting you up." She detailed that shocker to the wolf with clinical precision devoid of personal opinions and low on adjectives and stopped for breath watching the man's face set into an unfathomable mask.
"Bo is working on getting her out," the blonde tried to sound consoling. "Right now she's our best bet."
"Hale personally handed me the gun," Dyson finally gritted out, "But why? My best friend?"
"Age-old classic story – jealousy," the doctor signed, her own thoughts diverted to one cheeky valkyrie by association, "He is in love with Kenzi."
A turmoil of disbelief, rage, a tiny flicker of guilt played out on Dyson's face in a quick succession and then all emotion was gone. "That means he won't hurt her and we have some time," the wolf remarked in a matter-of-fact way and went on with unwavering resolution, "Drug me up to the eyeballs, if need be, doc, but get me out of this bed. I need to be functional."
"To do what? Storm the Ash's compound, go plead with Hale?" Lauren answered sensibly, "You're caught at a huge disadvantage, the best you can do is bide your time and recover in the proper way. If we rush it, we'll just aggravate your injury and you might end up even more crippled."
"The king that betrays me is no longer my king, the Ash who tries to kill me and steal my girl-friend is dead. First to me, later he'll be just that for the rest of the world. My disablement is my only advantage, Lauren, it gives me the element of surprise," the fae tried to convey his reason and his sense of urgency to the woman who was his only possible ally at the moment.
Whatever Lauren was about to reply to that was interrupted by the semi-entrance of one of her assistants. "Doctor Lewis," the nurse poked her head into the room, "There's a special delivery for you in the lab. Your need to sign for it."
"But I didn't order anything," the blonde said astonished, "What is it? Medical supplies?"
"Doesn't look that way," the nurse shook her head, perplexed, "It's something rather big and rectangular. Like a big standing mirror and there's a card attached to it."
Lauren hurried out and faced a burly delivery man holding the object in question with a clipboard pressed under his arm. The doctor looked doubtfully over the thing and zeroed in on the card stuck in a fold of the wrapping paper.
"I'm from the Internet shop, Ma'am, will you sign for it?" the delivery man asked pointing with his eyes at the clipboard and the blonde dutifully signed for the questionable windfall, proceeding to snatch the card. "Get well soon, my wolf," it read, "This is something for you to see." There was no name and the handwriting was most probably that of the shop-assistant or a clerk but Lauren had little doubt about the provenance of the gift, there was only one person who could have called Dyson that. Unless it was another ruse by Hale. But Lauren figured if the Ash wanted any more harm inflicted on his former partner there were easier methods at his disposal.
"Could you please carry it in there," the doctor finally decided and motioned to the door of the patient's room.
Hale was roused from his Ash business by a shrill sound of the phone on his desk. "Morrigan's here to see me?" he asked, astonished, into the receiver, "Let her in, would not be courteous of me to keep the leader of the Dark waiting in my … ." Before he could finish his sentence, the door opened and a lithe figure in the customary aggressive red made her theatrical entrance.
"Oh, my little Ashy ally," the Morrigan drawled floating across the room towards the siren and giving him a hug of uncalled-for affection before sitting gracefully down into one of the plush chairs. "Though I have to admit, "ashy" doesn't really go with your skin tone, darling."
Hale frowned straightening his jacket after Evony's bout of touchy-feely. "To what do I owe the dubious pleasure?" he asked with no pretense at cordiality.
"Just dropped by to ask how my girls are doing?" the woman intoned, making a careful study of her scarlet finger-nails and flicking an imaginary speck off her fur mantle.
"Your girls?" the siren asked.
"Yes, the unaligned kitsune, who is strictly speaking no one's as yet but I might have a shot at converting her to our Dark cause, and the rebellious dark fae who is my subject temporarily entrusted to your keeping," the Morrigan obligingly clarified.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Hale replied dispassionately looking straight into the heavily-mascara-ed huge eyes.
"The ones we agreed to capture and hold prisoners as the ultimate weapon against one powerful succubus, who happens to have a soft spot for them?" Evony was not looking amused any more. "I want at least one of them in my hands, it was ways too magnanimous of me to let you get both. Give me Tamsin back."
Hale's blank stare didn't waver, "With all due respect to my opposite number I don't understand what you're talking about. Your people are your people, I am not holding any of them. Tamsin might be binging it somewhere. As to the kitsune, her whereabouts are a mystery to me, too. Remember she's searched for killing my prisoner."
"We've agreed," Evony hissed leaning forward in her chair.
"Have you got a copy of the agreement with you?" the Ash enquired smoothly.
The woman rose sharply and measured the siren with a half-respectful glance. "The little siren is maturing into an unscrupulous Light Ash," she gave a short laugh, "Fool me once … well, you know the saying. Was a pleasure to have business with you. Just make sure you don't get too big for your Ashy britches."
With a disdainful look Evony sailed out of the office, leaving Hale internally jubilant at another smooth move of his. "The Ash does have teeth, suck it up, Evony. Daddy would be finally proud," he murmured to himself sitting back to his papers but a slight unease was churning inside. The Morrigan didn't value Tamsin too much and was practically careless about settling on an oral arrangement, why bother pay a personal visit, why give up so quickly if it was important enough to drag her skinny label-clad ass over to the light fae compound?
His hand went automatically to his breast pocket, where his recent anti-succubus acquisition was, but found nothing – the pocket was empty. Hale flashbacked onto the Morrigan's hug and sprang to his feet. "Bitch!" he exclaimed as loudly as his recently damaged throat would allow and grabbed the receiver. "Stop the Morrigan! Don't let her out of the compound!" he yelled into the phone and sprinted out of the office and along the corridors towards the front door. He stopped panting on the stone porch of the front entrance to his residence, accompanied by several guards, and scanned the drive – there was no Morrigan, no dark fae vehicles in sight.
"The Ruler of the Dark exited through the back door where her limousine was waiting to collect her, sir," one of the guards belatedly informed the Ash, "they left a couple of minutes ago."
"Morons!" Hale swore at his subordinates, "Why didn't you stop her?"
"We rushed over here first, sir," the second guard joined in with a guilty air, "We thought this is the entrance for important guests."
"Exactly, very important guests," came from the left and right out of left field and a feminine dark-clad figure stepped out of the shadows and onto the stairs. Before Hale had time to put a face to the voice his guards were down with blissful smiles and Bo gripped the siren into another far-from-friendly restraining hug. "Now we'll talk," she announced with a wink full of promise.