A Fair Fight (Fair Folk Chronicles Book 3) Read online

  "See, that's what I thought, too," Ashling said. She sighed again. "Giving up on his budding operatic career already."

  "Caw, caw."

  "I don't care what Mario Lanza said about you," Ashling replied to the bird. Megan and Lani exchanged a glance, then Megan just shook her head.

  Since they'd first met a year and half before in Findias, Justin had filled out some. The Claiomh Solais sheathed at his hip, with the case left behind in the car, no longer looked a little big for him, and he'd needed to have Lani and Mr. Kahale reconstruct his chainmail a couple of times. Over the chainmail was Justin's 'formal livery,' Seahawks garb. The way he walked here was different than in Seattle. There, he stayed aware of their surroundings and Megan's general safety, but made some attempt not to come across as weird for a friend or boyfriend. Here, he was an official bodyguard. Megan was watching him and deciding that she distinctly approved of his decision to grow his hair out.

  "Stay behind me," Justin said, heading towards the castle. "There's a lot of noise up ahead. I'd rather be careful."

  True to his observation, the closer they got, the more Megan picked up on the sounds of armored figures moving about, and occasional shouts in a language she didn't understand. Nearing the edge of the trees, she turned, hearing a noise to her right.

  “Caw! Caw!”

  “What did he say?” she asked Ashling.

  The pixie, however, was looking further to the right. “That wasn't the Count,” she said. “And besides, you're too young for that kind of language.”

  They emerged from the wooded cover to find an unfamiliar crowd on the lawn in front of An Teach Deiridh.

  “Lani,” Megan asked quietly. “Who are the fancy-looking Goliath types with the wooden shields all in a row?”

  “Those are trolls.”

  “They are not. I've met plenty of trolls. I had goat sandwiches with Finn during the Sax & Violins concert at The Showbox. Trolls do not wear fancy uniforms and stand in straight lines.”

  “Some Scandinavian trolls do.”

  “Scandinavians.”

  “Yep.”

  Justin eyed the armored group up ahead, holding the group up while he assessed them. Eventually, he started moving again, though he did move to one side of the road, giving the huge fae creatures a slightly wider berth, and kept himself between them and Megan.

  Megan continued looking around. Just past the trolls were several rows of tall, fair figures, not quite as lithe as the sidhe, who looked a lot like General Inwar. She figured those were ljosalfar, light elves like him. Megan tried to remember anything she could remember hearing about the General's original people. Mostly that boiled down to the implication that they were even more hardcore than he was, the use of warrior-bards called skalds, and the concept of something called wardenwood. “So those shields may or may not have ghosts in them?”

  “Uh-huh.” Lani did not seem to be feeling very talkative as she looked around.

  “Are the possible ghosts bothering you?” Megan asked.

  “The ghosts are definitely not what is bothering me.”

  “Do we need to talk about this before we walk pas—hey, who are those people over there?”

  Megan had almost missed the figures among their large colleagues. At first she thought they were the same size that Lani's dad and other full-blooded menehune were in Faerie, but she soon figured out they were taller than that, nearly five feet. They were just slouching considerably. The older men and women wore their hair in long braids, while some of the younger ones had styled theirs into frazzled pompadours and mohawks, some bright purple, in evocation of children's toys. The death metal tattoos were distinctly less cutesy.

  “Those are also trolls,” said Ashling.

  “You're kidding.” Megan looked to Lani to deliver her from nonsense.

  “She is not,” Lani said.

  “Trolls from where?”

  “Scandinavia.”

  “They're Scandinavian trolls. And so are the huge fancy guys.”

  “Yep.”

  “This is one of those things like Cassia being a faun and a satyr at the same time, isn't it?”

  “Yep.”

  Megan got back around to her original question. "So, if the ghosts aren't what's bothering you, then what is?"

  “We need to find out where the Scandinavians came from."

  "Scandinavia?"

  "I'm serious, Megan. They brought some full-scale war parties."

  "Well good. No matter what kind of advanced freezing magic Dad does to the ice, it doesn't stick. So we're about to have a full-scale war on our hands, right? I'm glad they're here."

  "I might be. But I might not be. Let's just... let's not panic until I know more, okay?"

  "You're the one who is all worked up."

  "Fine, okay. Let's just find Cassia. She'll know what's going on, until your dad is free."

  The first sign of Cassia turned out to be the leopards, Jude and Maxwell, racing up to greet the teens. Jude balanced on hind legs, putting his hands on Megan's shoulders to offer a nuzzle with his aviator helmet, while Maxwell just raced around the group enthusiastically. Cassia followed, in full horned, hooved, and horse-tailed form, not far behind. "About time you got here," she called.

  "Nice to see you too," Megan replied.

  "Cassia, did General Inwar invite them?" Lani asked.

  The satyress shook her head. “Nobody invited them. The ravens appeared with the message they were coming, and their forces were right behind them.”

  Megan looked between the two. "What? How did they come if nobody told them what was going on?"

  "You know how pixies find paths, and sprites find interesting events, and redcaps can follow blood, and things?"

  "Sure, so the Scandinavians have something like that?"

  "Their ravens. They're fae creatures. They know when battle is coming."

  "Oh. Okay then. We knew battle is coming. Just a matter of when."

  "That's just it. If they're here, it means it's coming soon. And if they've shown up in force, it means it's going to get bad really, really quickly."

  "How bad is bad?"

  "Have you ever heard of Ragnarok?"

  “Sure, I've heard of it, but I've never been really clear what's involved. Especially since Ashling keeps citing it as the inspiration for an REM song called “Orange Crush” and then starts talking about football.”

  “I was really disappointed in your inability to follow that conversation,” Ashling said. “And in your narrow NFC milieu.”

  Lani sighed. "Ragnarok is the Scandinavian story about the end of the world. All of the evils of the world start breaking free, and there's one last battle for everything. Almost everybody dies."

  "Okay, but don't they have a bunch of evil things of their own?"

  "Exactly. They do. Lots of them. And they're on pretty much constant watch for them. Sure, they'll send out scouts, parties of heroes, and things like that. In fact, they love that stuff."

  "This isn't a few scouts. That's an army." Megan was getting more worried by the moment.

  "Exactly right. Most of the folk around the world have their own things to worry about. The Greeks worry about the Titans, or, let's be honest, the Gods coming back. The Japanese have Susanoo, and the Oni. When the Scandinavians say all the evils of the world, they mean all of them. The dokkalfar coming out of their underworld. The dead coming out of Hel in ships made of fingernails. A giant wolf eating the sun. And, of course, their giants, the Jotuns, who right now are kept sealed away until their Gods come back.”

  “Okay. That's a lot of evils. But the giants are like their equivalent of the Fomoire?”

  “Basically. If they're sending an army here, it means their ravens are telling them that there's a chance our Fomoire are the start of a chain reaction, and all the evils everywhere might kick off soon."

  Megan paled. "Oh."

  Chapter 4: A War Council

  As she walked into the Ballroom, Megan could tell that
her father was not enjoying the meeting, because he was sitting on his living-wood throne with his feet firmly on the stone floor. Riocard of the Unseelie, at that moment, could not even remotely be described as lounging, and that was never a good sign.

  He put forth an effort, though. “Megan!” He called over. “A delight to see you, dearest. You of course know Her Majesty and General Inwar, as well as Peadar and the Dullahan and some of Inwar's knights—you'll note I manage to retain an actual knight myself, General.”

  Megan did indeed know them. Queen Orlaith of the Seelie was an imposing presence, with eyes so bright it seemed as if they might catch fire at any moment and light scars across one side of her face. General Inwar, formerly of the ljosalfar, loomed just behind her right shoulder, in full armor, looking as much like an avenging angel as ever. Peadar was as threatening as usual, looking out of place near the thrones with all of his ratty clothing, the 49ers cap, and with a grin that no one else shared, showing off his horrible need for dental work. The Dullahan was more formal, in his full armor, but no less creepy, holding his head under one arm while listening.

  Kerr entered the room, moving as unobtrusively as possible, aside from when offering tea and coffee—or, given that this was Faerie, who-knew-what concoctions that looked and smelled like tea and coffee—to the people present. Riocard, continuing the trend of being very unlike his usual self, refused. Peadar gladly accepted, as did the Dullahan, once he'd put his head back on. The others passed as well.

  "As I was saying," Riocard said, noting the brownie serving, “We have longstanding communication open with all of Polynesia, thanks to that always unexpectedly useful of arrangements, the Brownie-Menehune Alliance of 1801.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, Megan saw Lani and Kerr smile and do their weird little salute at each other.

  "The General's allies from the north are more than ready to lend us military aid, in exchange for an oath that will similarly support them," Orlaith answered.

  "Most generous, especially considering our relative levels of battle-readiness, currently." Riocard said.

  “They believe that this may be the start of a very long fight,” Orlaith said. “We have significant magical resources, as well as potential for spycraft that they can't match. As such, they'll lend us their military expertise, as long as they're certain we'll back them should the Jotun emerge, or the black ships arrive."

  "Don't they have promises from their Gods to return to battle the Jotun, the dead, and all else, when they break free?" Riocard asked.

  "As do we. Do you really want to count on that?"

  "I recall the Gods leaving, but I don't seem to remember any such oaths. Implications, perhaps, but in truth, I think that while the Gods left to ensure the Fomoire were contained, any certainty that they will return to save us if that imprisonment is undone is a fireside story to comfort the frightened. The ljosalfar, however, have something of a prophecy to that effect."

  Orlaith's expression hardened. "Yes, yes they do. They, and their Gods, also have a lot of enemies. And the fact remains, they are willing to help reinforce us militarily if we will do our part to back them, should their enemies emerge."

  Riocard nodded, eyes shifting between Inwar and Orlaith. "Then it seems we have allies."

  "Not nearly enough," Orlaith said. "You know what's coming."

  "We have ongoing talks with some groups. Not all of them helpful. I have some friends among the nimerigar, the nunehi, the gada'zhe, and na'hni'as," He paused, glancing at Megan. "The bakwas, near you, have been less diplomatic,” he said. “But they rarely drown anyone anymore, so there's that. Outside of America, well, there's the mankara-waka-ya-pirna girls from Australia, but they're not really much for fighting. The dancing might do some good for morale, though."

  Orlaith interjected, before Riocard continued his list of friends. "The Greeks also have a potent contingent, and we have some contact with them."

  Near Megan, Cassia rolled her eyes and muttered, "The closest they'll come to being any help is not making things worse."

  Megan missed some of the ongoing conversation and accounting for potential allies to get more information from Cassia. "That bad, really?"

  "Think of it this way, the faeries here, the ones of the North, lots of others, still kind of revere the Gods. And sure, some of them were kind of violent, or lecherous, or this or that. But they could come together to face a bigger problem. They were against the Fomoire, the Jotun, stuff like that. The faeries of their land sort of follow their example.” Cassia frowned. “And then there's us. Sure, the Greek Gods did the right thing regarding the Titans—when left with no other alternative. But people sort of lived despite our Gods. I've heard plenty I like about Pan, handsome devil that he was, and Athena was an okay sort, but most of the rest of them were petty, vengeful, self-absorbed... anyway, you get the idea. The fae there are just as opposed to the Gods coming back as they are the Titans. And the way the Gods were barely a step better than the Titans, a lot of us are barely a step better than them, in terms of self-centered."

  "Wow... that does sound pretty bad. But it sounds like they need all the help they can get." Megan gestured to the royalty.

  "We need, not they," Cassia reminded her. "The Fomoire, the Jotun, the Titans, none of them would stop here. If we can't kill them or put them back in their bottles, or the Gods don't come back to deal with all the things they locked away, we're in big trouble. And we all need to deal with it. That's what my cousins never got."

  "...That's part of why you affiliated here? Because they had some sort of plans for things like this?”

  "Exactly. Ric gets it. We have to draw the line here. Even if he's doing it for old time's sake."

  Megan was about to say more when she heard her father's voice raised, making a proclamation, as much as a comment. "It's agreed, then. A diplomatic summit."

  Megan's attention shifted again when she heard Lani whistle, and noticed Kerr lingering by the door with her. "Diplomatic summit?"

  "Yeah," Lani explained. "With a few notable exceptions," she and Kerr repeated the salute, "The various fae realms rarely mix. But there's been times in history where there was something big enough to require multiple courts to talk. That's what he's talking about, calling any allies they can together and trying to convince them to help fight the Fomoire."

  "So many people," Kerr spoke quietly, shuffling from foot to foot. "It's a shame we don't have the Cauldron. From what everyone used to say about the last time, that's how you throw a conference."

  "Good luck trying to get it from the ogres,” Cassia muttered.

  “Cauldron?” Megan asked. “I think I've seen that movie. Didn't we have enough undead last year?”

  “Not that cauldron,” Lani said. “The Dagda's.”

  “The guy who could do all the seasonal ceremonies from his chair with a harp?” Megan said.

  "That guy, yeah,” Ashling said. “Hardcore harpistry, killing nine enemies at a time with his club, inventing beach volleyball and soccer, making the sun stand still, and epic pig farming.”

  Megan blinked at the pixie. "I find that highly improbable."

  Ashling put her hand over her heart, "No one ever believes it, but it's true, pig farming. Of course, there were only two pigs, and a spider. But they were some pigs."

  Megan sighed, and tried to move on. “And where is this conference going to be?” Megan asked.

  “The city of Murias,” Lani said.

  “...Does that go with Findias and Falias and that other place? What kind of awful stuff is there? How is that a good place for an international convention?”

  “And Gorias, yes. And the awful stuff in Murias is that 90% of a city of cleverness was sunk beneath the waves by the Fomoire. Not only is it essentially neutral ground, it gets something of the severity of the point across.”

  “Why'd they sink it? And what's left to meet in, anyway?”

  “Hard to say. All anyone really knows is that they made an attempt to destroy a gold
en statue of the Dagda that was there, failed, and cast the city under the waves. Maybe it was spite. Maybe they wanted to make sure to eliminate access to records that could be used against them. But we'll be meeting at a table that is still intact and available. Now it's a matter of getting people around that table,” Lani said.

  Megan was partially listening to Lani, partially picking up bits and pieces of her father's continued discussion with Orlaith. She looked, however, to Kerr. “And you want a big, non-zombie cauldron? As a chef's opinion?”

  “No. Well, yes,” said Kerr, shuffling. “But not just that.”

  “The Dagda's cauldron leaves no one unsatisfied,” Lani said. “Endless food, yeah, but it's good luck in negotiations, too.”

  “Oh,” said Megan. “Well, yeah, it is too bad we don't have that.”

  Ashling interjected again, looking back at the King and Queen's discussion. "Did you hear them mentioning the Tengu?"

  Cassia shook her head. "Why would they? There were a few who do the Goblin Market, alongside some teakettle spirits… what’s the word?”

  “Yokai,” said Lani.

  “Yeah, them,” Cassia said. “But you know those guys, Tengu included. They prefer to be left alone. We're probably going to have to write them off and hope they hold up the eastern end of things."

  "Caw, caw," the Count said.

  “Let's go for it!” Ashling said adamantly. When the girls' and Justin's heads turned, she patted the crow's wing. “The Count says he knows a guy."

  Chapter 5: Secrets

  Japan, unfortunately, had to wait, as it turned out. Ashling—or the Count, Megan was never quite sure—did apparently have the claimed connections, but it was still going to take a while. This was apparently also going to be a more significant trip than she'd planned on when she checked in with her father.

  So far, she'd been able to balance her school, home life, magic lessons, and trips to Faerie, but she wasn't sure where any of the other things fit in with a war with so much at stake brewing. She was even less sure how she might deal with having to explain that she couldn't lead anyone into battle because she was grounded.