Chapter 16 - Aftermath

It was on a bad mood that I left the commander's office. It has been three days since the raid on the vampire infested gnome lair, and I’d just got our new marching orders. And the aftermath of the whole thing still left a bad taste on my mouth.

As I leave the headquarters I see my squad waiting for me. I had asked Erick to gather everyone when I learned we would receiving our next mission. Pyralis is missing, considering she lives on the summer court and not on the Forces base, it’s no surprise Erick couldn’t get to her in time.

I turn back to the still open doorway and tell the clerks “Once Lady Pyralis shows up, can you inform her that we are meeting at the bar.” Not waiting for an answer I turn around again and move outside. Johnson, Lilian and Erick join me as I walk past them.

“So, what's the new gig cap?” Johnson asks as we cross the plaza. “Not now kid, later at the bar when Lis is with us.” I answer him a little harsher than necessary, but hey, I’m on a bad mood and Johnson is one responsible. If he didn’t force me to do a scene on the headquarters when we were reporting our last mission, the commander might have singled out someone else to deal with the Guard request.

Yeah, right. True is the commander had already decided to give it to me anyways, probably. Just that instead of asking as a favor, she managed to give it to me as a punishment. Still, the kid spent the last 6 days on leave while I spent three days dealing with the whole mess, one recovering and the last two being debriefed and questioned on everything that happened.

After I managed to summon the Lord of the Tylwyth Teg and his retainers and they hunted every single living, well undead, thing on that burrow. I was all sore from the beating I took from the changeling turned vampire and completely drained of magic, but nothing serious. Hendrickson had a broken arm and had also taken a beating and Pyralis had a few cuts on her arms and a bruised face from when the vampire shoved her against the wall. West had finally started to give signs of recovery. She was still out but, looked more like sleeping now instead of fainted.

When Gwyn returned he had only this two giant hounds with him. “Thank you Wizard, what a great hunt you have provided.” His tone was bright with excitement and he looked as pristine as the moment he first arrived, if it wasn’t for the bloodied longsword he carried on his hand, you wouldn’t say he just came back from hunting down a half dozen vampires and I don’t know how many ghouls. “You should have joined me Wizard.”

“I would have loved to my lord, but as strong as it was my desire to do so, I wasn’t in condition to join the hunt.” I answer. “I also didn’t want to steal your revenge my lord, having already claimed a share of our prey.” I gesture to all the dead bodies on the room.

The fae lord then flicks his sword removing all blood from it and sheathe it before getting down and picking up the body of his daughter. “Come with me Wizard, for there is something you must see.” Gone was the energetic and thrilled tone he used to talk about the hunt, replaced by a stone cold one. Well shit, I wasn’t going to disagree with the seemeling bipolar Fae Lord, so I got up and started to move.

Pyralis tries to follow me, but I wave her to take care of the detectives. Gwyn leads me on further on the tunnels and the signs that he and his enforcers passed through the halls are clear. Blood, gore and body pieces are explatered on the corridors. None from the hunters.

“My lord. What is that I need to see? Have the vampires not been dealt with?” I ask him while struggling to keep up the pace with him.

“The night dwellers are all dead but for the one who killed my daughter.” Fuck, did one vampire actually escaped? “How did it managed to escape my lord?” I quickly ask, my mind already starting to think on how could we track him before he start spreading the infection again.

The fae lord laughs at my question. “No wizard, he is not dead because his punishment is just beginning. He will suffer a thousand times and more for the pain he caused me. Even if his mind is long gone the point he can understands why he suffers.”

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That shuts my train of thought on the spot, he had kept a infected vampire alive. Fuck if that thing gets loose somehow it could started all again. I was about to object, but one look at the sidhe lord face was enough for me to decide to pass it up the chain of command and let the higher ups deal with it.

“I’m glad to hear that our hunt was a success and our pact complete then.” I tell him just as we enter what looks to be a big storage room. “I’m afraid the hunt is not over yet Wizard.” Gwyn tells me.

I notice it just as I was trying to make sense of the sidhe lord words. There at the back of the room sat an open coffin. It was made of wood, but engraved with a lot runes, the lid was broken from inside. A quick use of my magic sight tells me that the rune purpose were both concealment and containment. The vampire didn’t manage to slip through the barrier and the outer wall, someone brought it inside.

“We might have caught the one who killed my child Wizard, but the one responsible is still at large.” the lord says. And I realize that my promise to catch the ones responsible for his kid death is still in place.

That is the main reason why I’m on a bad mood, that and the whole questioned we had to go through after the incident. The guard higher ups were peeved that I went over them and called the Forces, the commander wasn’t very happy that I forced her to mobilize the forces for nothing. But she understands that it was the right call, better safe than sorry.

A lot of people weren’t happy about Gwyn ap Nudd keeping a junkie on alive inside the city, but nobody wanted to pick a fight with him over that. The chance of it getting a way, being laughable.

The detectives were fine, West was cleansed from the virus in time and Hendrickson would recover from his wounds.

A happy ending overall, if not for the fact that nobody knows who brought the vampire inside and for what reason. Did it escaped before it could be smuggled in town? Was the burrow the target? Who has the power to trick the barrier and evade the Fae diviners that keep watch over it? And the worst of all, is that I’m still bound to finding the responsible.

Fortunately, the sidhe understand time differently, so Gwyn isn’t demanding I solve it right now, but I’m sure he will come to collect one day.

All of this aside, the good news is that the wild magic storm is finally losing strength and should end any moment now. Well, that is good news for the enclave, but for me it means back to work without even a few days of leave. That is another reason for my bad mood.

As we reach the cafeteria building, I place my hand on a collector and feel it start draining my magic. Collectors are one of the ways we try to keep our diminishing stock of magic. Basically it’s a gem, like the ones we use on our missions, stuck in a pedestal enchanted to drain the magic of anyone who touches it and store at the gem. Erick and Lilian stop to the same. Any mage who is not on duty or doesn't have a project that requires magic, is expected to help fill these devices.

I hold my hand on it until I feel at least two thirds of my own magic being drained and then remove it. Once Erick and Lilian are also done with it, we move to the bar.

They order a round of beer, but I asked for a shot of whisky. Beer is not really my thing. Whisky, vodka and even wine is more my thing. I tell them an abridged version of my trouble with vampires as we drink and wait for Lis to arrive.

Lilian sits close to Johnson, and the kid is has an stupid smile on his face. The cynic in me, can’t avoid thinking she only does that so other guys won’t hit on her. I don’t blame the guys, Lillian is beautiful. She is tall, has blonde hair, blue eyes and a nice smile. She is no old world model, or have the sexy appeal like many of the sidhe ladies around the enclave do, but she has nice girl charm and a beautiful smile.

I need to talk to her about leading Johnson on, I don’t want trouble inside the squad. I mean, in case I’m just jealous and she is really in to him, I don’t mind it. Hell, I’d be happy with it, people should grab what little happiness they can find. But knowing Lilian past, I’m pretty sure she is doing it as a defence mechanism to avoid being hit on.

Pyralis arrives as I ponder how to approach the subject with Lilian. After greeting everyone she sits very close to me. If she wasn’t sidhe, I’d say she is in to me, but I’d be only tricking myself like the kid is with Lilian. Still everyone on the table stares at her, me included.

She raises one eyebrow as if asking why everyone keep staring at her. The silence last for a score of seconds until Lilian breaks it.

“Did something else happened in your little adventure your not telling us? She asks me hinting at the way Lis is sitting very close to me.

“Lilian, I don’t even understand women most of the time, how do you expect me to understand the Fae ones? If you want to know why she does what she does, it’s not me you have ask.” I answer in my best deadpan tone. True is I’m also curious as hell, but I got an image to keep.

Lilian turn to Lis who tilts her head sideways a little and asks. “Am I doing something wrong, isn’t how two colleagues act on a meeting?” She gesture to the way Lilian is also sitting close to Johnson. Her tone is perfectly innocent, but I notice she can’t keep a small smirk from her face.

Lillian and Johnson face turn red instantly and she immediately adjust herself to sit further from him. At that Erick and I lose it and starts laughing our asses off.

At that moment, with Johnson and Lillian dying of embarrassment, Lis with a mischievous smirk on her face and me and Erick laughing I realized that I was worrying about things too much. I needed to follow my own advice and enjoy what happiness I could. Sure there were a lot of problems in my life at that moment, I still had to find out who smuggled the vampire inside, we had a new crazy mission and everything out there wants to kill us. Not even mentioning all my problems with the Winter Court. But at least I was alive and had good friends.

The irony that it took a push from Pyralis for me to realize that was lost at the moment.