"I FOUND IT!"
"You're going to lose it if you keep waking me up," Holly hissed, not really knowing what "it" was.
"D'Arvit, Holly, I'm so sorry," Foaly muttered sarcastically, "but I found the information on April Reichards!"
Holly, despite herself, felt a tiny little leap of excitement in her fairy heart. She'd been perplexed earlier that morning, when Foal had said good-bye to maniacally try to find the file.
"It's quite interesting," Foaly said, "because this April Reichards? She used to be April Rowan..."
Holly was suddenly thrown back several years. Her mind chastised her for not having recognized April Reichards as April Rowan. Because she had covered the Rowan case. She had watched sadly as April tried to cover her shame with a defiant look. And she was the first to comfort April's mother, Katherine, who was also exiled...
*FLASHBACK*
"Captain Short!"
"Sir!"
"How good are you at keeping secrets?"
"Excellent, sir!"
"Good, because not a peep of this case is to get out to anyone, do you understand?"
"Yes, Sir!"
And then a many times less experienced Root proceeded to brief a many, many times less experienced Holly.
So it came to be that a newly promoted Captain Holly Short stepped into the richly decorated hallway of a Sicilian flat. Her voice, oozing mesmer from every sound wave, purred, "Do you know anything of April Rowan?" Her eyes locked with the surprised ones of a middle-aged Italian man, holding something unmistakeable. Something Holly had been drilled on more times than she could remember. Something she could practically recite cover to cover.
The Book.
Not too much later Holly grimly tried to avoid Katherine's bloodshot eyes as she poke of the crimes her daughter had commited. The human in possession of the Book, the reciepts found in a Haven safe, the missing gold from a nearby bank...
*END FLASHBACK*
"Holly, didn't you cover the Rowan case?" Foaly was asking.
Holly barely moved, except to sigh. "Yeah, I did."
***
"Master Fowl!" Butler whispered to the dozing prodigy. "The fairies are watching over Kelp. We have to go now."
"Butler--I'd like to go to the Reichards Manor. I believe it's well worth looting." Artemis replied, rubbing his eyes.
"I must desist. The poison won't last that long--I just overheard a fairy contacting Haven. They're getting the antidote as we speak."
Artemis contemplated this.
"Very well."
And they fled to the speed-yacht, moored by a nearby rock. While Butler revved up the engine, his young master surveyed the island. Well, besides being kidnapped, this venture had been rather productive. He had a tracker chip in April's ahnd and a far richer pocketbook. Why yes, life was good.
Just as he turned away from the rail a shadow slunk aboard.
***
Kashka almost threw her cellular phone onto the rather lovely marble floor of her room. Her Egyptian Mao blinked large amber eyes at her in such a way that only purepred cats can blink. This blink, naturally, did not improve Kashka's mood.
It was lucky that cat didn't understand Russian (or did it?), because if he did he would've been quite perturbed. If the cat did understand Russian, he would hear something like this: (which, naturally, is translated for your convenience)
"You idiotic pile of dirt! I hope you fall into a Murmansk Radiation Vat! I hope you are prey to a starving male Siberian tiger! I hope a drunken fairy blasts you to impossibly small pieces of sludge!"
And so on. Nearby lay a cracked Neutrino 1000, which any half-trained cadet would've known was fake. But unfortunately, Kashka had only seen a shoddy picture of it online. She scowled. Scowled at the box resting near the fake neutrino. Scowled at her laptop, on which yet another email from that swindling Cavar person asked to be read. Scowled fiercely, hatefully out the window. Wherever Mr. Sucio Cavar was, wherever he happened to be standing or sitting or sleeping...she hoped it was cursed forever.
***
You didn't know that much about Agent Kashka Ivanovich, alias Katrina Jackson. You didn't know that she is actually descended from a very powerful Ukrainian witch. She doesn't even know that. You hadn't the faintest idea that the pendant she wears around her neck is actually a mother-daughter heirloom that dates back to the Ukrainian witch. Or that this pendant can call upon the witch's powers if there is enough emotion to fuel it.
But you do now.
***
Mulch Diggums, alas Sucio Cavar, happened to be crouched insde the microscopic storage room of Butler's boat. He was busily pressing buttons on his watch computer, cackling at the figures coming up. He was in an extremely happy mood until it suddenly felt as though the floor beneath him had melted.
He squirmed.
It seemed to melt more. Little known to Mr. Diggums, he had just been cursed.
--- Yes, I'm perfectly aware it's been several months since I last updated. Poor old me. What can I say? I find it hard to do much of anything these days. 7th grade is a bummer...anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Next chapter should be up soon enough!