CHAPTER 55: NEVER-ENDING CATCH-UP GAME

After the organized confusion of several teams leaving, the small group sat down to discover

everything they’d missed.

“Where does the time go? How can it take so long to get everything done?” Aria stared at her

phone in wonder.

“Because we are the least magical creatures of the supernatural world. A one-trick pony, if you

will. We got the party trick of turning into a critter. What do we have here, anyway?” Yolanda pulled a

yellow envelope from a pile Gregory tossed their way before storming into his office. He wasn’t angry

with him. No, that anger’s reserved for the mother of his future pups. He’d found out she’d made a

break from their apartment without Catherine or another Hell Hound beside her. He’d informed Yolanda

she wasn’t to worry about it. Her instructions were in the envelope in front of her. There’d be no

screwing around since this was now an all-out war.

With the Fae now boldly entering human towns, a video began showing up on various websites

and news outlets. They needed to combat this before it got out of hand. The mages claimed they

possessed various solutions for that, and tonight, the Vampires would send out their people to fix

things.

There was something frightening Yolanda felt at the thought of an army of vampires would go

about changing humans’ memories. But what else could they do? The mages could alter technology

and make things disappear. But they couldn’t alter a population’s belief in monsters as a vampire could.

But between a mage and a vampire, now that was truly frightening. Suddenly, no one saw anything and

there’s no video to prove it ever occurred. Murdered people became accident victims and victims of

muggings by assailants that never existed. It was far from perfect, but it’s easier to accept than the

truth. Far safer for everyone, too. How many relatives of these victims would seek justice on the Fae?

How many police with hero complexes would make it their life’s mission to deal with administrating

justice to the Fae? How many of those would come home in the end? Yolanda knew the total of

survivors to return would be zero. They couldn’t let that happen.

“They have me fielding a campaign of disbelief in the video with a group of mages. Not sure

what I can do that they can’t.”

“Find the crap hiding in the dark recesses of the net? You’re very good at that.” Jaxon stated as

he looked down at the papers before him. “They have me working with our old division once they are

up and running here to field this away from conspiracy theory territory.”

“Now I’m questioning all the conspiracies we’ve dug into. How much did we miss the first time

around?”

“I know it’s weird with an insider’s perspective now. It’s a similar job but with a whole new

outlook and mandate. Keep them dumb, not find the truth.”

“Well, not quite. We find the truth; we just don’t advertise it to the public. Look at it this way. We

find out the truth, fix it, and it’s a need-to-know basis. You encountered what happens when the public

sees what’s real. Your division made you the brunt of their jokes. You’re not taken seriously, passed

over for promotion too, I bet.”

Ian looked at Desire. “I’m hoping you’re assuming a few things.”

“It happens far too often, not to be true. Just remember now we’ll respect you in the morning.”

She tried to joke, but Yolanda growled at Desire. “Sorry, poor joke. Okay, too early for that.” Desire held

her hands up to display her acquiescence to Yolanda.

“What about you Aria what do they have you doing?”

“I’m with Hal in searching the net and media sources.”

“Yolanda? What about you and Ian?”

“As expected, we’re in the basement, keeping the weapons flowing with the Fianna down

there. I don’t think they’ll be disappearing anytime soon.”

* * *

Shaylah watched through the Bogart’s eyes at the hunt as they searched for even a tiny shred

of magic. What happened to this place after they left? This realm should brim again with magic.

Everywhere they’ve gone so far, the magic elusively evaded them. The humans appeared to know

nothing about magic or where to get it. The few wells they’d visited didn’t even possess a spark of

magic. It’s like when they left, they took magic with them. How could that be? The elders always

claimed magic flowed like water here. They’d lied to everyone. This was an insult that she couldn’t

tolerate. The hunt found no reference to the existence of their serfs. No wolves or witches. No

vampires, or any annoying druids. This wasn’t the world of gold and honey. It stank, humans ruled

everywhere, and the wilds weren’t wild. This world bored her already.

The humans were pathetic. They didn’t believe what they saw standing before them. Many

accused Shaylah of being a human in a costume, and her displays of magic were slights of hand. She

removed them from her path with an irritated flick of her hand.

* * *

The Council of Ambassadors met formally now for an evening session. The session possessed

all the high drama of a reality television program, and somewhere the formality disappeared. For a

moment, Edith pondered whether the addition of the zoom calls contributed to the lack of formality.

Either way, for Edith, it was a welcome respite from it all.

“I say we need to clear this blight from the Earth and let the chips fall where they may

regarding the humans finding out about our presence. It’ll be easier to change their minds if they see

we are looking after more than just our interests.”

“Have you forgotten about the mass panic of the witch trials? There are still locations where it’s

accepted practice to this day to hunt for vampires.”

“They hunt vampires in regions we left centuries ago, and we would prefer they continue

hunting there and not here. I don’t believe it would be helpful to out ourselves right now. I don’t believe

anyone would benefit from it.”

“It’s happening now. The Fae don’t care. They believe they can walk in and take over. With the

use of their magic, they will take over in no time. If this happens, there’s a benefit for anyone, and no

saving the humans or us from huge losses.”

The clanging of a gong reverberated from the computer’s speakers. She’d need to recommend

they change to something not so disruptive for their next meeting. With a series of wincing expressions

and a few hisses, silence finally reigned again.

“Thank you. I believe we’ve established the need to control this narrative rather than let the

Fae do that. Currently, we have one of the few sources of wild magic hidden from them. However, with

that said, we now have magic-starved Fae monsters roaming the world, exposing our presence to

those who know nothing of us. We don’t know their numbers, how long they’ve been magic starved,

how desperate they are to get magic, or what skills they have to locate such magic. We have records

that some can change the life force of other supernatural creatures into wild magic. This may or may

not work with a human’s life force. We can’t allow that to happen, period, end of the story. Now,

currently, there are only a few incidents right now. I recommend we continue along those lines for now.

They have brought it to my attention that we can truly hit the Fae where it hurts by cutting them off from

the dream realm. If we cut them off from that realm, it will hamper their travel and ability to hide or use it

to spy. I implore all with records or research in this line of inquiry to find out whether your faction may

have any record of this being done in the past, or theory of how we can do it now, to come forward as

soon as you can with this information.” : owner of this content.

Edith watched the speaker of the council reign, everyone, in and redirected the session into a

far more productive direction. Gaining the attention of the speaker. “Remember, we have the Fianna on

our side this time. We are currently not fighting two wars, as we did in the past. If the human population

reacts badly to us, then we would again fight two wars at once. Are we strong enough to risk that?

Please, everyone, think before doing anything that will complicate this for everyone. Many of our

numbers have mated, married, or bound to humans. We would force them to pick a side between their

life partner and their family if the human population reacts badly. There are young caught in the middle

of that war if it comes to be. It’s logical to weaken them by removing what little wild magic is within this

world from them and deny them the advantage of the dream realm. Weakened with only their weapons

and fighting skills, will be hard enough, but with modern technological weapons being blended with

magic by the Fianna. I believe we can remove these Fae from this realm. I believe we must work

together as a show of strength. Turn them back so that there’s nothing but strife awaiting them within

this realm. Send them back and block them again. The ambassador of the Mages believes he’s located

the human group that opened the portals. A group’s gone to find out more about these humans. We

aren’t sure what they believed they were opening or what they’d obtain for doing so, either. The rituals

used obtained their magic from blood and magical items imbued before the Fae left this realm. I’m

curious how these humans obtained the magical items and knowledge of these rituals. I’ve been told

we kept them well hidden from the humans.”

That sent a titter through the group while Edith waited to speak again. To Edith, this wasn’t

something she often did. Speaking to the assembly wasn’t something she did well. It took her off her A-

game. Allan spoke while she sat back and read the crowd. He spoke her words, announced their

intents, and debated like a champion.

“Please have any information you wish to impart ready by tonight. We will compile and

disseminated it to everyone by morning. As always, please submit it to the speaker’s office before

midnight tonight. Thank you.”

The meeting broke up shortly after that. They’d found a human cult connected to these rituals

and sent a group to investigate the leader of the cult. As far as Edith knew, they found no supernatural

ties to this cult, and it was a rather new cult.

Allan popped his head in once the silence took over. “You finished? I think everything’s packed

and ready to go. I just want you to do a once over to make sure I got everything.” After all these years,

her mate still didn’t know where all her hiding places were. It made birthdays and yule presents a

surprise.

“I’m just making a couple of notes right now, and I’ll be there in a couple of minutes. Is our

portal still green-lit?”

“As of an hour ago, yes. I’ll check again in the next twenty minutes.”

“It’ll be good to be home. I feel exposed here.”

“I get it and feel the same way. Home is safe. But what place is truly safe these days? It’s not

the old days where it took weeks or months for news to spread. Now it’s minutes. You know that better

than I do. The Fae won’t be able to keep up. They don’t have any comprehension of what technology is

or how it works. They won’t have any way to combat it or block it without help from the humans. The

Fae has nothing to offer a human, really. I can’t wait for the first one to find out about a gun. Bet that’ll

hurt.”

“I knew I mated you for a reason. You, sir, are vicious.”