I told Joey, “This pizza is great. So much cheese.”

“Fuck no,Sammy! This is just fucking bread with cheese and they threw some …what’s that shit… some tomato… stuff. They threw tomato stuff and cheese on this fucking bread. This isn’t fucking pizza. No fucking way.” Joey had been my best friend since I had started school. He had lived in a tight rowhome two doors down from my own family’s cramped little number. “This fucking bread with cheese and stuff. Fuck.”

Joey used fuck when we were kids the way other kids used jacks and jump ropes. The nuns at the small local parochial school we attended in Center City, Pol-Adérfia, broke more wooden rulers over his little behind than they had scowls on their scaly, bitter, angry faces. A few years later, he would learn a few new words, and get booted from Central High School after twenty-too-many times getting detention for inappropriate language. But that had been later.

He had been the oddball out in our class since day one. His scales were mixed shades of green and a pale tan color. Usually goblins favored their mother’s scale color, and their fathers bone structure and features. Joseph Eziah Cozzeti had a mother with bright green scales and dark green skin, with a head of thick light green hair. She had been a model in those days before the war, before she had gotten married.

To a dwarf.

It was a marriage that upset too many people in the neighborhoods all over the city. The goblins hated the idea. The dwarven community under the city, in Underberg, were livid. Or at least as livid as those stoic’s ever got.

And Joey was the kid that never should have been.

And, as nobody ever let him forget it, he had decided that by the ripe old age of 6, he would never let them forget it, either.

“But, this bread. Look at it! It’s so thick!” I had said. “It’s got all these nooks an’ holes in it. Some of them have garlic in them. Whole pieces of garlic!” I was excited. I like garlic, especially when it had been baked and roasted like this. I had simple needs, especially in grade school.

“Oh, yeah, That’s cause its fuckin’ focaccia.” He said around another bite of his “pizza.” “Yeah. It’s fucking GREAT focaccia, Sammy. You can see that they let it rize twice, and was well proofed.”

Joey had known more about food than any other kid I knew back in school. His mother had, before Joey and his sisters had come along, been the spokesmodel for several food brands in the city.

Until she had met Joey’s father, who had been a professional chef at one of the ritziest, glitziest hotels in the Underberg. Now, she and her husband ran a small diner, and while neither the local dwarves nor the local goblins would ever admit to frequenting their eatery, the Cozzetti’s weren’t going out of business, either.

Joey Cozzetti now ran the day to day operations in the kitchen at the Sandbox, standing in for his pops; while most evenings, he worked a second shift as the head chef at The Jewelry Box over on Sansom street.

It was an upscale restaurant on the edge of Jeweler’s Row, and the owners may have been part of The Families.

I’d heard that for a place without prices on the menu, it was reasonably priced. But, you had to either make reservations, or be invited. And if the owners didn’t see the benefit of you dining under their roof, your reservations may be impossible to make. Just walking into the front door and asking to be seated would get most mooks laughed right back out that same door.

If you didn’t leave under your own power, the doormen would see to it you made it into a cab, conscious or not.

Joey had come to my table this afternoon in the Sandbox as I had been treating myself to lunch. There are only so many peanut butter sandwiches one goblin can eat in a week.

My old childhood friend had not only bulked up like an adult dwarf would have done, they’re a much brawnier race than goblins; with the way he was flexing his jaw muscles he also looked like he wanted to chew through the wall of the diner. I was surprised to see him out front in the diner like this. I haven’t said more than ten words to him at a time in ages, and suddenly, he’s pulling out one of the chairs across from me and adjusting his apron with quick, sharp tugs.

“Hey, Sammy!” He was smiling at me, but his face didn’t quite agree with the sentiment. “I need a favor.”

“Hey, Joseph! How’re you doing? How’re your parents? Your sisters doing well? Your kids? Wow! That’s great to hear! What are they up to?”

He gave me a disgusted look, but relented at the truth of it. We hadn’t been close in more years than we had been the only kids who would hang out with…well, us. In all my asking, I didn’t ask about Maria. ‘Cause I’m just that classy.

“Okay, okay. You... I get it. I fucking get it. Okay?”

I looked at him, raising an eyebrow.

He looked back, his jaw flexing, eyes wide, and chin jutting.

Then we laughed a little.

“Okay. What do you need, Joe?”

“Sammy, someone is trying to take away my restaurant.”

“What?” I was, I will admit, a little confused. His father had opened the Sandbox when we were kids, and he had been successful enough that he and Joey’s mom had bought the building around the time Joey and I had just gotten into high school. “How are they taking away YOUR restaurant? Your pops owns the Sandbox, and the entire building. Free and clear.”

Joey looked confused for a moment, before his beetled brows rose, taking his confusion with them. “Oh… no. Fuck, Sammy. No. Not this. Pops wouldn’t have anybody putting their fingers in his pudding without losing a few. No. You know I been working nights at another place, okay? A classy place. And I know I’m not the ‘owner’ there, but I got a lot invested in the place. I built that kitchen for them, and they know it. But, now someone’s trying to ruin it. And not just ruin it all for me, ‘cause if I go, Sammy, if I go then a shit-ton of the staff goes with me, and then the food suffers. The clientele will not be happy. For REAL not happy, not just this shakedown bullshit happening now.”

“What’s goin’ on Joey? Ruin it, how?”

“Here’s the thing. The management come to me last night and they tells me that the Owners aren’t happy with how the place has ‘been received by the public.’” He had adopted what he thought of as a “fancy” accent to convey how the management had spoken to him. It sounded like a well heeled Bohemian might impersonate a snooty Anglian. Probably his pops’ influence, as his mom, looks aside, is Center City born and bred, and to her “fancy” is a Lanape accent. Not a cultured woman, but an amazing woman regardless of her love of the good ol’ Pol-Adérfia “pretzel wit’ cheez” as “high cuisine.”

“I don’t mean to pry, and maybe there are things I’m missing here, but The Jewelry Box doesn’t cater to ‘the public,’ does it? I thought it was more of a very private venue for an entirely exclusive clientele.” I watched as my oldest friend chewed something over before he finally answered me.

“Look. It’s like this. We cater to a specific set of family owned businesses, if you will, and also to those employees of theirs who have reached a certain level of status in those firms.” This startled me, as it was the most politically savvy comment I had ever heard Joey make. Ever.

“These fucking people work hard, and when they come to my place, the kitchen has all the best. Ready from the moment we open the doors every night. They pay for the best, and that’s what I and my staff deliver.” He looked like he would fight a mountain if that’s what it would take to get his point across to me, his hands curling into thick fists on the table as his arms flexed in the tightly rolled up sleeves of his button-up.

Looking closer, it was a quality shirt. I doubted I could keep such a shirt clean working in a kitchen, apron or not. And when I say quality, I mean that was as fine a linen dress shirt as worn by any of the hob-nobbers who traded stocks at the New Amsterdam Stock Exchange.

“Okay. And they like your food?” He nodded at that. “So what changed?”

“All I know, Sammy, is that some fucking guy is complaining about my kitchen to the Owners. And the Owners are leaning on the management. And the fucking management…”

“Is leaning on you. Got it.”

I thought about it briefly as one of Joey’s nieces brought out my lunch. Delia was a petite little doll, who was built on the thicker dwarven lines of her grandfather’s ancestry. Her muscled physique just added to her beauty, and she was as exotically pretty as her grandmother, she even had a head of lustrous brown curls, like a human or a dwarf. She was the kind of young woman who made me wish I had a son to marry off to her.

But then I remembered how awkward I was as a twenty year old. Even joining the Army hadn’t made me suave, nor given me any real direction in life. Any son of mine would have been just like me, I bet.

As she walked away with her serving tray, the long tail of her braided curls swaying in rhythm to the movement of her hips, I regretted how clumsy and clueless my completely imaginary son was, the lousy bum.

I sipped my refreshed coffee, and looked at my oldest friend.

“Okay, Joey. I’ll see what I can dig up. Aside from ‘the public,’ what’s going on? It has to be more than just somebody talking trash about you to the owners. What’s doin’?”

Joey looked angry, with a side of defiant. And then he lowered his eyes to the table. “They have fired some of my staff. Someone up the chain to the Owners has dropped three people from my kitchen, without asking me. Each time, they spread some flannel about my employees wasting food, or being disrespectful, or, just yesterday, they dropped my sous chef! They fucking canned Anthony!” He said the name as “Ant’ney!” but I knew what he meant.

“Hold on, isn’t the sous chef your, like, what…” I groped for the right term, and lacking anything else, my old Army training kicked in. “Your ‘second in command?’”

Joey nodded enthusiastically at that. “Yeah! He was my right hand, and he managed a lot of the day to day bullshit so I could get to the job of arranging menus and cooking. He made sure the staff showed up on time, and he clocked all of the deliveries from our suppliers.”

He looked like he wanted to kill someone.

“Yeah, okay? And last night they fired him. Came in, walked him out, and when I asked what was going on, the management took me aside and told me Anthony had been ‘found wanting, and had inappropriately spent some of the kitchen’s funds.’ Like Anthony would ever fucking steal from me.”

He sipped some water from a tall glass he had brought along.

“And then, management tells me that the Owners have already found a replacement for Anthony, and ‘isn’t that just perfect?’”

“Okay. Sounds like they’re attempting to take over your kitchen, but can’t justify dropping you. Sounds to me like the management is attempting to run all of this past the Owners, and ultimately take over the entire restaurant from them. Who are the players?”

Joey looked confused for a moment, mouthing the word players… before he got it. “Oh, fuck, Right. Okay. Uhm… Giancarlo Scaffetti, Lorenzo Meloni, and Abe Kirkwall are the three managers. They oversee all of the different businesses jointly owned by the Owners. Each one has a stake in the Jewelry Box.”

“I will look into it for you. See what we can do.”

The big goblin looked relieved. His shoulders dropped a little as he released some tension.

“You mean it?” I nodded. “Fuck, Sammy, that’s great!”

“Hey,” I warned him. “No promises, though. These guys aren’t my usual world. I’m going to need some introductions. And I will need a few days to chew on the thigh bone of the problem here.”

“Okay. Fuck, Sammy. I’ll see what I can do. I doubt I can do much, but I’ll see if anyone I know can haul some salt here.”

Before leaving, I also got Anthony’s full name and address, as well as some names and addresses of others who had been let go. It never hurts to ask some questions.

An hour later, I was standing outside of the door to a flop on East Wildey Avenue, near the bad part of the river, talking to a thin, nervous looking goblin with red scales over chocolate brown skin. It seemed Anthony had not been prepared to lose his job last night, and now he was calling everyone he knew in every kitchen around the city to see if anyone needed his talents and services.

And he wasn’t too happy to have to spend time talking to me about his being goose-walked from the kitchen he had worked in for almost a decade.

“Look, I ain’t gonna spend all day with you here, I have to find a new slog, right?”

“Mr Clancy, I’m not here to breathe all your air, I just need a few moments. I’m a friend of Joey’s, and he wants to find out why you got the bump. The real reason.”

Very large, almond shaped eyes the color of an angry sunset looked hard at me for a good ten count before he said, simply “Joey sent you. Joey Cozetti.”

“The very one and fucking only.” I confirmed, emphasizing that one word Joey loved so much. “Joey and I go way back. I’m an investigator, and Joey has retained my services to try to find out why the Owners of the Jewelry Box are pulling his kitchen apart.”

He looked at me for a few more ten counts before I saw him slump slightly as he relaxed.

When I knocked, it had put him on edge, and he didn’t want anything to do with any more drama from that quarter if he could help it. But, now he figured talking to me wouldn’t do him any worse than he had been done last night, so why not?

He pulled out a pack of Marley’s, which surprised me. Marley’s were usually a ladies’ brand. During the War, I had smoked a lot of Chesties, and some Auros, but only because they were part of my regular field ration packs. I had quit smoking when the War ended, since Uncle Sammy wasn’t buying mine anymore. Like most of the guys I had served with in the OSS, I found that it was easier to give up smoking than it was to give up magic. The cravings may have been similar, but they were very different in intensity.

He saw me watching him as he lit up his Nail, and offered me one. I shook my head no, and just mumbled a quick “Thanks, though.”

“Look, I can’t say for sure that I know exactly what the real carp is here, but… This is only my guess, okay? There was an incident one night. And after that night, things started getting tight at the Jewelry Box. It all started a few months ago. Someone, a guest of one of the members, was really happy with their dinner and wanted to give their compliments to the chef.”

I nodded. People being happy with a good meal wasn’t beyond the pale of believable scenarios.

“The Management said they would convey their compliments.” I nodded, nothing too weird here. “But, the guest, some foreign nobjob, must have some pull, because they said ‘No, I need to thank the chef in person.’ Like their one on one would be the highlight of Joey’s night or some shit. I never get why folks think meeting the chef to say ‘good job’ is such a big deal. But they do, ya’know? And so after poking at the Manager in the House that night, he went into the kitchen and brought out Joey. Joey was as polite as I have ever seen him, and thanked the guest for their praise. All good, right?”

More encouraging nodding on my part.

Now Anthony’s eyes bug out like he’s about to burst a vein and drop cold on me. “But, NO!” He says. “The guest, some elderly dwarf in WAY too much gold tinsel for anyone with sense gets all quiet and creepy silent. The Manager that night, Mister Kirkwall, gets all awkward, and tries to appease the guest. But this old dwarf is just staring at Joey like Joey owes him money. Finally he thanks Joey for the excellent meal, and turns his back on Joey, and thanks the members who invited him to dinner for the meal, but the way he says ‘Thanks’ ain't any kind of nice. He throws a wad of bills on the table, and walks to the coat check, and is out the doors as quick as he can.”

I looked at Anthony a moment before I asked, “Any Idea what put a hair up his nose?”

“No idea. But he w’an’t no kind of happy. And the members who were left at the table looked embarrassed.” He shifted uncomfortably.

“You recognize those members? They in often?”

“Yeah. It was Rizz, and Clarke, and their usual crew. They come in every week or, at least they used to. After that night, I’ve seen them come in individually, but not all together every Thursday like they used to.” He got a look in his gaunt face at the mention of something he had just said, and stared off into the Nether for a few moments before I prompted him.

“You got daisies in your hat, Anthony?”

“Oh.” He said, coming out of it. “Sorry. I just realized that Clarke was one of the guys that walked me out last night. He was even the one who handed me my walking papers. Aside from the whole losing my spot at the counter, it was generous.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. The envelope they handed me had three bills.”

I whistled. Three hundred dollars would keep the lights on for a few months, especially in the little riverside box he was living in. He didn’t have anything else to say, other than to fill in that Clarke looked ashamed, for whatever reasons, and that ever since that night, they had lost some of their best people week by week.

I asked if he had called Joey, maybe see if Joey could get him a job at the Sandbox. I knew it wasn’t the high end kitchen he was used to slinging hash in, but it might be someplace he could go to keep his lights on. Anthony stared at me like I was suggesting he take a job licking out blockages in the sewers.

I thanked him, and as I left, told him that if nothing else, Joey would appreciate knowing he was okay.

It looked like Joey could actually do a lot.

I had been, it seemed, invited to the Jewelry Box that very night.

Which was a surprise to me, as I had been walking toward Gio’s Place over in Sharktown when the car pulled up next to me on the sidewalk. A very muscular, well groomed human in a well tailored suit had stepped from the car, and held the door open for me while saying in a light Umbrian accent, “Mr Archer, if you please. I have been asked by my employers to inform you that you are invited to dine this evening at The Jewelry Box with Mister and Misses Faunetti.”

He smiled down at me, and I noted that his expensive dark gray suit was beautifully tailored to hide his two guns, and possibly a blackjack snugged into the belt loop over his right hip. His tailor was good.

And with that, I was whisked away back to Center City to have dinner at one of the most exclusive restaurants in the city, with a Fey couple I had never met before, but, like everyone else who grew up in the City of Brothers At War, had heard of.

We didn’t park, the driver just pulled the luxurious black car up in front of the old brick building on 7th at the corner of Sansom. There was a sign next to the door, a rectangular brass plaque no bigger than a foot wide and half a foot tall.

“The Jewelry Box”

It had some smaller writing underneath, but I didn’t catch what it said as I walked past. The local guide was setting a brisk pace, and I didn't want to fall too far behind lest the tigers get me.

Walking into the building proper, I could see that the place was originally built before the year 1900. It had been designed and built for goblins, and other normal sized people, but in recent years they had converted the place for use by taller peoples. By the simplest of expedient methods: They had knocked out every other floor, making a reasonable eight story goblin structure into a much harder to heat four looming, high ceilinged stories.

There was a short set of steps that led up to another set of interior doors, and in this foyer two large, blue skinned, bald men sat in chairs on opposite sides of the small room, the one who was reading a ragged paperback nodded to the man leading me. Both wore suits similar to my guide. I made some assumptions about their employment status, and what they liked to keep in their pockets.

I was ushered past the maitre di’s stand, and directly to a table. I sat alone, while my guide went off to wherever guides went once their expedition found the Great Northwest Passage, the Mountains of the Moon, or El Dorado. Most likely just to make a quick trip to the potty.

Six people came out of the kitchens, a mix of races, and set about doing individual tasks in readying the table, such as providing me with water, asking if I wanted the house red or white, (to which I answered ‘coffee, please’) setting out flatware and silverware, and then placing a heaping basket of steaming fresh bread at my elbow, before a goblin man in a well tailored suit introduced himself and then took the seat across from me. He named himself as “Giancarlo Scafetti. But, please, call me Johnny.”

His scales were green and his skin blue. His dark blue hair was trimmed and styled close to his skull with a light pomade that looked almost natural. He kept his ears pulled in tight to the sides of his head. It was either a strong affectation or a nervous habit he had been doing for so long it was just natural to him now. It made me think he was facing into a strong wind I couldn’t see.

He looked like he wanted to wink at me as he said it, like it was something he did so often, it was just muscle memory, and currently he was working to resist the habit.

“Mister Archer, I know you have never been a guest here before, so let me be the first to welcome you to the Jewelry Box.” Again, the smile with the forced “non-wink.” The guy had charisma issues. “The Owners are happy to see you have joined us this evening, and would like for me to convey to you that knowing you represent some of the more vaunted Interests that preside near Arch Street, please know that the House would also be happy if you would convey to those you for whom you work as an intermediary exactly how much we would like to extend our hospitality. It would be in the interests of all concerned if the Owners here at the Jewelry Box and their related business interests could develop a firm and cooperative working relationship with those Primaries whose have as yet kept themselves separated from the day to day workings of this lovely and profitable city…”

Shit. He was nattering on and torturing his sentence structure to tell me “They” knew that I did a little work for the Tongs and other Controlling Interests of Elftown.

“Thank you, Mister Scafetti.” I smiled, letting him see all of my teeth. “This is the first time I have ever had the pleasure of an invite. Will Master and Mistress Faunetti be joining me soon?” Ignoring entirely his overtures to the people in Elftown that I have done a very, VERY, little work for.

I gave him my best wide-eyed innocent look, raised eyebrows and all, as I sipped from the glass of water I had been served. I knew I was laying this on a little thick, but “Johnny” was too.

I’m petty. Shoot me.

This made him laugh. It was a light laugh, and showed he was a good sport. He wanted everyone at each of the other tables in the place to know it, too.

And the smile he then turned on me was absolutely dazzling.

When I say that, I mean that it was artificially bright, shiny, and alluring.

Someone had spent some time and money on a high-end Glamour to make this guy’s smile into a bonfire to attract moths. And not just a dentist, though, with teeth that straight and that white, I’m certain some jaw-jockey in the city had been involved on the ground floor. It was good spellwork, too. Top quality.

And I’m immune.

I was trained up as a wizard during the War for the OSS. The Office of Spectral Services needed special units for special work, and lucky me, I had the spark. Rare in goblins. I was transferred from my Infantry Unit to the OSS, and spent the war learning to see through illusions, cast spells, and ignore Glamours.

And this mook was trying to roll me. He was ready to make me pliable to suggestions, in the hopes of making me into something he could use. A puppet. Some kind of stooge.

In the War, we called them Marionettes. It's not easy to make someone do your bidding without being caught. It’s not easy to make people do things they don’t want to do, either. The mind is a slippery fish at the best of times.

Then, people notice when you're off. They get nosy. So, to make a Marionette that was useful for more than a cool minute took talent. We had one member of the OSS who specialized in that. She was a real peach for a Naga. She saw and did some things in the War that stuck too close to her when we all left the Service. I miss her, almost daily.

So, was this thing his grift? Or was this his bosses’ plan?

He stayed smiling at me for longer than felt comfortable. I couldn’t tell if he was making this awkward, or if I was; either way…awkward.

I was guessing, but there may have been some cue, either magical or physical, he was looking for to make sure I had fallen for it.

A server came walking by the table in a graceful arc of steps to drop off a perfectly brewed cup of coffee, and that broke the silence. “So, Johnny,” I said. “How’s business?”

He stared at me for a moment, still wearing that dopey 100 watt grin before he sat up straight, and adjusted his jacket.

“Well, Mister Archer, we’re doing well. We pride ourselves on being the best Family restaurant in the city, and we take care of Family. Family is the cornerstone of Our Society! Full tables every night, and happy faces from full bellies. Putting on a good spread is what it’s all about here at the Jewelry Box, and so that’s what we do. The best wines, and we not only have an in house brewer for some of the finest Ales you will ever taste, but we also have an extensive list of favorite imports from all over the world. Better and more than anyone else.” The goblin’s blue-green face was radiating pride now. “If you ever have a meal here that isn’t the Tops, you let us know, and we’ll see that you get the best.”

His hands played nervously across the table cloth, smoothing out wrinkles that weren’t there.

“I’ve heard great things about your chef!” I said, knowing I was pushing it, but I couldn't help myself. “I honestly can't wait to see what he puts on some plates for me tonight. I’ve heard he was classically trained by one of the best chefs of the last generation. Some folks say that anyone who worked in his kitchen for more than a year or two knows more and better ways to cook than any other trained chef this side of the Eternal City.”

Johnny was starting to get that deer-in-the-headlights look I always associate with people who bite into a peanut butter sandwich but suddenly realize it’s a THICK layer of tahini, and now they don’t know how to extract themselves from the bite without looking like a cat with a hairball. Essentially like a buffoon.

A fucking tahini hating buffoon.

“Ah… well.” He stumbled verbally for a moment, turning his yellow eyes aside. “It’s always lovely to hear our reputation for quality is spreading so wide and so well.” He paused a moment before looking over my shoulder and saying with obvious relief, “And look! Here are your hosts.”

He and I both stood. He so he could bolt as soon as possible, I so that I could make my mother proud that I remember at least one of my manners. Occasionally. Sometimes.

When I had been picked up, I had guessed at the race of my hosts this evening. And I had nailed it. Taller than goblins and dwarves, shorter than the average human, satyrs averaged about four and half feet tall.

This was a well to do, slightly older, couple dressed for a night out on the town. Mister Faunetti was even wearing custom spats on his hooves. How fancy!

His wife, technically a Nymph, female Satyr where ‘Nymphs,’ was a delightful looking woman at least a decade younger than his easy seventy, who had as femininely a curvaceous figure as her husband was ruggedly handsome. He looked like he might have just put on his suit after a day of slaying hydra with his broad shoulders and physically fit physique. His goatee accenting a square jaw and high cheekbones, balanced by a pair of black horns poking out at his mostly-salt and a little-pepper hairline.

She was dressed in a slinky slip of a dress that showed off her very lovely Hominid top, as much as it showed off the exaggeratedly wide hips of her Caprinae lower half. Long, dark honey hair piled high, almost obscuring the little gold accented, tan horns that poked out from the curls, and then a wide braid left to trail down her shoulder to coyly cover the top of her left breast.

Okay, I was staring a little too hard. But, in my defense… fuck off.

They looked, if anything, like idealized drawings of the pure sex appeal of Satyrdom, rather than just a pair of Satyrs just off the boat from Rome.

Unlike some of the local Satyrs born and raised here in the city, these folk actually WERE just off the boat from somewhere in the Mediterranean.

As they stepped forward, Johnny introduced them as “Julien and Mauvi Faunetti.”

They both greeted me in voices strongly accented with hints of Umbria, probably Rome itself; and, if I had to guess, slightly flavored with hints and traces from other points in the Mediterranean as well.

I spent some time during the War in and around Umbria.

Mostly blowing things up, and killing people who served the Queen and her Empire, but I remember my visit well.

I shook his hand, and gave her a slight bow as I clasped both of her hands in mine.

Looking directly into his steel gray eyes, and her large, round, violet eyes as I did so seemed to surprise the couple. This made Julien laugh lightly. It was a warm, rolling, inviting sound, and I swear I could hear the tinkle of silver bell just on the edges of his laughter.

Mauvi smiled at me.

And I’ve stood in the Atlantis Ocean along the New Guernsey coast as the incoming waves crashed against me. Her smile would have knocked me down harder than any of those waves ever hit me on that little vacation I took to gamble at the casino resorts on the other side of the state just across the river and to the East of Pennsterria.

The casinos in New Guernsey are great. As the saying goes, “Everything is legal in New Guernsey.”

But the Sight isn’t just for visual Glamours. It covers all of my senses, thankfully. The smell of her perfume, the sight of her magically enhanced smile, and his musical laughter. They may as well have pulled out a set of Panpipes and a drum and started up a dance reel here among the guests in the restaurant. I don’t know what they had planned, and I wasn’t certain as to how all the other diners, made up of a smattering of other races, were holding off the effects of this attempt to roll me. And part of me wondered if they knew they were doing this, or if this was just something this couple did as naturally as breathing.

But, I have training and years of practice. Otherwise I have no idea what kind of hoops these well-hoofed satyrs would have me jumping through. But, if they did manage to make me a puppet, it wasn’t going to be with these greasy little tinsel tricks.

I turned, and gestured for them to sit, and moved to hold out the chair for Mauvi.

Mauvi graciously and gracefully took the seat, and let me scooch her into the table. Julien looked a little miffed, and with a head tilt sent Johnny running off to wherever it was that he spent his time here at the Jewelry Box when dismissed by his betters.

Sitting back in my own chair, I looked toward my hosts. “Thank you both for inviting me here tonight. I had wondered what it was like on the inside for a while now.” And I smiled at them both. No teeth. Just dripping with sincerity.

Julien looked a little put out. He was taking his failure to roll me a little harder than he had self control to cover.

“Mister Archer,” Mauvi started, causing me to swing my gaze back to her. “Thank you for joining us tonight. My husband and I have a small problem that we have been told you may be able to help us with. Your services came very highly recommended. Some of our contacts in the city have been so helpful to us in recommending you for your skill and your discretion.”

So, me getting in here tonight had nothing to do with Joey. Okay. Adjusting my stance. “Signora Faunetti, I am happy to hear you and your husband out, and if I can help you, I will be more than happy to take you two on as a client.”

Julien chimed in finally, “And if you cannot help us, Mister Archer?”

“Then,” I said, turning slightly to see Julien. “Then, Signor Faunetti, I will direct you to those who can more properly help you.”

“Oh, so formal! And your accent is so pleasant Mister Archer. Please call us Mauvi and Julien.” Her eyes fairly sparkled in the subdued ambiance of the dining room.

“Only if you two call me Sammy, Mauvi.” Then I smiled at the two of them, and flexed a metaphysical muscle I haven’t used in ages. I sent their own Glamour back at the two of them.

It wasn’t a great effort on my part. As I said, I’m rusty as the fine, fiddly little bits of magic. Their Glamour was like making fine jewelry, all finesse and detail oriented; while my effort just now was me swinging a baseball bat. I was getting tired of the constant illusion spells these people, and Johnny before them, kept trying to sling at me.

I watched Mauvi for a reaction.

As I did, Julien slumped gently in his chair.

Mauvi and I watched as his head slowly sank to his chest.

She looked back at me, surprise writ large across her dusky olive complected face. “Oh, Sammy! Look what you did!”

And then, violet eyes wide enough to swallow me whole, she giggled.

An honest to goodness, high pitched, girlish giggle.

Whipping her eyes with a napkin, “How ever did you manage that?”

“It was a simple αντανακλάται.” I said, spitting out the Greek for the basic reflection spell form. “I haven't practiced in years. I may have overdone it. My apologies, Mauvi.”

She stared at me like I had just given her the best birthday present of the year. “Oh, my! Mister Arch… Sammy, you have formal training in the Arts? One of our Elftown contacts said you were a mage, but I had just thought that was some kind of dry, elven humor. Where did you train? Are you a Full Staff Mage?”

She was pretty excited now. And it was honest excitement, not the painted-on spell work she had been shoveling earlier.

“Well Mauvi,” I said in a voice much more warm, charming, and confident than I felt. “I spent the first half of the War with a rifle and a wand.” I sipped my coffee. “And by the end of the War, I had a staff, a wand, and twelve other Spell-Slingers and a tank division at my back.”

Her large dark eyes widened even further, as her smile crawled wider across her face. Her teeth were as white and straight as if she had a deal with the devil, and the devil was a dentist. “Oh, my! How exciting! Julien and I spent most of the War in Rome, and so missed much of the worst of the fighting, thankfully.”

This gave me pause, though I hid it. Not all residents of Rome during the War were part of the Empire, but…

Then the servers descended on us then with a veritable fleet of small bowls and little plates filled with an assortment of foods. Nuts, several kinds of cheeses that had all been carved into fanciful shapes, and a selection of fruits, also carved into shapes. It was artistry of a kind I was rarely ever in the presence of.

It made me wonder what kind of work was going on in that kitchen of Joey's that somebody had to carve cheeses into little dragons and birds, and then maybe that same poor soul has to carve fresh fruits into rabbits and fish, and monkeys. Honesty, bits of apple carved into the shapes of monkeys. I was a little relieved that the nuts had been left "nut” shaped.

A chilled glass of prosecco was set next to my nearly empty cup of coffee. It smelled of apricots and mild white grapes, and was fizzy and bubbly as a bottle of pop. I tried a sip, and it was as light, refreshing, and tasty as I could have imagined. I briefly wondered what would happen if I asked for a lemon wedge to squeeze into my glass of wine. Joey would probably come running out of the kitchen with a knife.

My time in Umbria informed me that this was the "aperitivo."

Realizing now exactly how much food would be on the way, I nibbled accordingly.

Mauvi made more small talk. She was pleasant and engaging. I wondered how much of this was just flannel, and how much was her natural charisma. Her smiles and small talk were more charming than the spellwork she and her clueless hubby had tried earlier. Maybe it was that deadliest of combinations of me being lonely, and her being extremely pretty.

I’m as Goblin as the next guy. Fucking sue me, as Joey would say.

At some unseen signal, the wait staff descended on us again, and plates of thinly sliced preserved meats, smoked fish, pickled vegetables, and fresh breads. Again, trying to not gorge myself like a fiend, I picked my battles and ate sparingly.

Mauvi was asking a lot of questions about my work in the War versus my work here in the city. It was gratifying to have an audience who could at the very least pretend convincing sympathy. I had rarely run into it in the wild, and wondered where else I might go to find it.

The “primi” part of the meal came out of the kitchen with a graceful rush of wait staff carrying slightly larger plates of fish risotto, and gnocchi with roast peppers.

My coffee had been refreshed, too.

I began my own quest for knowledge. “So, Mauvi,” and here I pushed just the barest hair of Will into the speaking her name. “You and your husband need something found. And my name was recommended to you.” I toasted her with my coffee cup, and smiled. “As wonderful as learning I and my abilities as a P.I. are well thought of, I have to wonder. With your,” and here I gestured to both her and the sleeping Julien. “Contacts, are you certain you want an independent little gumshoe like me? There are at least three above board firms in the city with better reputations. And there have to be a few with… less savory firms who have a higher reputation for effectiveness.”

She lowered her eyes with a devilish smile, and a light and musical giggle. “Sammy, we have access to many of those exact groups. Some, like Tyne & Sons, because of money, others we know through our very exclusive friends. But,” and here she paused and looked directly into my eyes.

“Sammy... Mister Archer, the family heirloom that has gone missing was last seen in the presence of a member of the Council of the Mists.” She said it.

Just like that.

She said it just out loud.

Like it was a regular collection of words.

The psychos who ran the Council of Mists wanted to kill off humans in Europe for not being Fey. They wanted to remove Goblins, Dwarves, and Lesser Fey in North America for having the audacity to leave their servitude to the Elves in Europe and Asia. Preferably back to the Eldritch Halls in Eurasia to “serve” Ol’ Queeny. Otherwise they want us all to either cede all of our property to the Council of the Mists, or to just die, leaving those same properties to those same Council members.

They’re an All-or-Nothing kind of group that had gotten their start in Europe before the War, and while they had picked the wrong side in that War, they had survived where the greater members of the Axis Powers thankfully had not.

My skepticism must have shown on my face, because she stopped talking.

“Now, I don’t want to get too far ahead of myself, but that’s not exactly your run of the mill gang of toughs. And, I’m fairly certain, you know the Council isn't willing to let go of anything they may have decided they own.”

“Sammy,” Her voice went low, sultry, suggestive. She was trying to lace Will into her words again. I had never dropped my light effort of Reflectum.

“I just… need you… to find the people who have what we are looking for. You… find them, then tell us where they are. No recovery. We will handle that. You… just tell us where.” She was speaking more slowly now. Starting to breathe heavily. Her eyes were now mostly pupils, as whatever she had been pumping into her Charm she was now basting in like a turkey in November.

“Simple.” She almost breathed the word, as her eyes went half lidded.

“Now, Mauvi,” I leaned in now, and added a hint of my own Will to push in on her. I laced her name with all of the energy she had been pushing at me. It was only fair. “Mauvi. You can tell me, Mauvi. Who are you representing here? Is this your and Julien’s dance, or are you two stepping out to dance on someone else’s dance card?”

We paused as more food came to the table. It was both the “secondi” and the “contorni.” The servers brought out a selection of small plates with grilled and roasted meats, and they smelled amazing. The air around the table was filled with toasted herbs and meaty, hot charcoal scents. Several other plates appeared with roasted and raw vegetables.

Honestly, the smell of the roasted raab was almost as good as the little grilled lamb chops.

Mauvi, without breaking eye contact with me, reached out and grabbed a little grilled lamb chop. Never looking away from me, she tore into the juicy meat with more enjoyment than I think the dish might have warranted.

I may have pushed her a little too hard.

Around the bone of the chop she was gnawing on, Mauvi said, “We’re in town looking for the heirloom, following who we think took it from a business associate’s home. It is an old statue, dating back to the time of the Last Queen. A falcon. Finely wrought, and heavily spelled. The Owner’s of the Jewelry Box were kind enough to offer us their assistance. They recommended …you.” Another huge bite of lamb. A moment of chewing, followed by a long swallow. “You know people …in the city… they won’t talk to us, but they will also never love the Council of the Mists.” She meant the Old Blood in Elftown, the Tongs, the Dynasty, and all of the other players who tended to avoid the census.

A third of the way around the table Mauvi stared at me, breathing heavily in ways that just made my green blood move a little faster. Before this got out of hand, I pushed my Will through a quick banishment spell, chanting my mantra three times under my breath, sending all of the energies that Mauvi had flung at me and then got herself tangled up in herself, dissipating in the air around us.

Some of the wait staff wandered through the tendrils of magic before they could completely disperse, and their moods shifted slightly. With my Sight, I could see a painfully thin Nymph server walk through the light mist, and both her sense of wellbeing and her libido went through the roof, almost making her drop a tray. She followed a thin young, blue skinned fey lad, probably a Wisp, in waiters togs back into the kitchen with a hungry look on her face.

From two seats away at the table with me, Mauvi blinked her big brown eyes at me as her breathing slowed back down, and she let out a tinkling, musical little laugh that could have charmed a saint into slapping a nun with a salmon.

I walked out of the Orpheus Hotel just before noon, and unlike its chump of a namesake, I did not look back. Just like the little love-lorn lyre-monkey of legend, I thought about it, though.

Hades had told him the cost; Human’s just aren't made of the same stern stuff as Goblins.

I was starving, and knew there was a fine little eatery just around the corner and down the street on 9th. Resettling my hat on my weary head, I made my way to Georgi’s. Sometimes a good bit of food in the belly can substitute for a lost night’s sleep.

The lurid red sign with yellow letters proclaimed that this was, indeed, Georgi’s, and here was the place to go to get a sandwich. He had been a Ground-Pounder in the War, and had made it back without any physical damages. But, just like me, he didn’t want to talk about what he had seen and had to do while he was overseas.

I could respect that.

In fact, I could live by that.

When I walked in, his son, Gene, nodded to me. And held up a pad and pencil. I spat out my requirements, Gene wrote them down. I wandered down the counter to pay, and grabbed a bottle of pop.

Within moments, a hoagie of slow roasted beef tongue, with onions, roast rabe, tomatoes, sharp provolone, and peppers wrapped in paper was slid across the counter to me by an elderly looking goblin named Mike.

“Hey, Sammy, when you have some time, you need to swing by and say hi to Georgie-Pie. He needs to bend your ear for a bit.”

Mike looked serious. But his younger face had never met a fist it didn’t like, so now his old man face always looked serious. I nodded to him.

“Georgie-Pie gonna be around on Wednesday? I can convince myself to need another hoagie this Wednesday.”

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Mike nodded at me, and smiled. Not just happy, but the old goblin looked relieved, like a huge weight had been lifted. “He opens on Wednesdays. You come by around noon, I’ll see to it he has some spare time to talk to you .”

“Good man. See you both on Wednesday.”

On the corner, I juggled the sandwich and soda, so I could write a note to myself to come talk to Georgie on Wednesday. The little brown notepad was safely tucked back into the inner jacket pocket just above the secret, long slender pocket only my tailor and I know that I kept in all of my coats and jackets. I am a very average sized goblin adult, and can buy off the rack whenever I need a new suit; I just always insist on a little alteration to my clothing. It makes my life easier if I have a few extra, special pockets.

Magic, even for the well trained and disciplined, can be addictive. Like the worst drugs out of Elftown, magic will wreck your life. If you let it.

The irony is, if you keep up the practice, you’re less likely to slip up and die a horrible death, but the more you practice, the more you… indulge… the more likely you are to think that you’re completely in control and untouchable. All those stories of Wizards who slip up, become warlocks and worse? Yeah. I’ve seen it.

And not just in The War.

A quick hop onto a bus, then a trolley, and I was back in my own ends, and walking into my apartment. A clean space, with little in the way of furnishings. I liked it uncluttered. The messiest bit was my small table by my “reading chair” that sat near the largest window.

Some guys liked music, and had a wall case filled with records. I have a radio across the room from my chair near the entrance to the kitchen. The local station has classical in the morning and jazz at midday. I’m partial to the classical, myself. Though I have been hearing some great music in the evenings lately. Blues. Completely Human made music, I understand, coming up out of the Southern States.

Some like to tinker with things; I have a toolbox in the kitchen that I pull out to fix things that I can fix when they break, otherwise I call an expert. It sits on the shelf above the coffee maker.

I read. I have a library card, and I visit the local libraries every week to get new books and to turn in old ones I’ve already poured over. And the little side table by my reading chair was usually covered in those books. It also held a few tattered notebooks which I used to take notes on what I had read in those books. Some of it is for work, technical things that I need to read up on to be able to do my job better. Others… just to a mix of my own curiosity, and the occasional Western or Science Fiction. My mother said such books would rot my brain.

Let’s hope they take me out in one fell swoop, I wouldn’t want to linger.

There was a coat rack by the door, and a wooden chest which houses an extra blanket or two, and some of my mementoes of the Bad ’ol Days of the War by the door to my bedroom. There was room for a table and chairs to make half the room into a dining room, like most people did, but I left that area clean and uncluttered.

I have a small table with two chairs in the kitchen to eat at. The second chair is so rarely used, I have to dust it most weekends when I do my weekly cleaning.

Putting my hat and jacket on the coat rack, I headed to the kitchen table with my wrapped hoagie and bottle of pop. It was a brand of ginger ale I had never tried before, and was a little excited to take a sip of.

My little table had a pretty red envelope sealed with red wax on it, waiting for me.

“...fucking elves…” I said as I sat and started my lunch.

Half the sandwich gone, and the ginger ale completely gone, replaced with a glass of water, I opened the envelope.

“Greetings, Esteemed Intermediary;

Your presence is requested by the August Light of Heaven and the Daughter of the Spring Moon upon this glorious and lovely day.

You may call upon Us at Our Humble Place of Business.

We are Housed in the Greene Manor by the Generosity of Our beloved Brother at 10th and Arch Streets.

Present this letter and you shall be admitted promptly.”

…fucking elves… I thought to myself, and sighed as I stood to reach for my coat.

I stood at the corner of one of the most prominent of the borders with Elftown, holding a small, white paper bag I had thought to bring with me just as I left the apartment. One never knew when a bribe might help move matters along.

The Elvin Friendship Arch was peak artistic irony built to draw in tourists, if nothing else, at Arch Street and 10th. I had heard it had been built by elvin artisans in 1884, just after a law prohibiting the immigration of any more elves into the country had been repealed.

The era right after the Incivility War had been a weird one here in the States. Humans who had not come from the native population had been granted citizenship, and then elves had started to pour in with the promise of open trade, labor equality, and a lack of any kind of “Royal Hierarchy” in the country. Some historians said that this had been a part of what had prompted the fading colonial empires of the Old Country to start stewing for war, which ultimately led to the actual War.

I don’t know what “Arch Street” was before they built the Arch, but there are still plenty of goblins and dwarves around who remember. Not to mention elves, those long lived bastards, it’s like the standard 500 years isn’t enough for some people. Tall, goofy, fancy jackasses.

I tried to shake off my feelings of hostility towards the elves. Individually… well, they were still condescending asshats. I have never met one who didn’t enjoy making backhanded compliments to the smaller people around them.

My mother, bless her soul, used to try to tell me that people who insulted me without knowing me were jealous of me for something I happened to have that they lacked. She was always trying to get me to see the good in other people. A kind woman, who had life kick her in the teeth way too many times for her to still be so kind, and to want her son to be kind, too.

Shaking off my misgivings, I entered the Greene Manor. No doorman, which surprised me, until I saw all of the wards they had placed on the doors and walls of the entryway. Only someone with the Sight would see them, and only someone who had their Sight up would even notice.

Much of the spellwork wrapped around the entire building, and I wondered who had the time and wherewithal to sit and doodle every square inch of the building while also casting spells into the drawings. It didn’t really matter, though. They had done it. And so anyone not invited in, or anyone who didn’t have PEACEFUL business to conduct there wouldn't get in.

The wards may have noticed my hostility toward the elves in general, or known my simmering disdain for the specific elves who had invited me, but that was the key here, I had been very specifically invited.

Walking through the doors, I could feel all of the (invisible) stylized knotted vine paintings heat up in the magical spectrum as I stepped through. Not uncomfortable, physically, but worrisome to anyone who has seen wards like these go off.

And then, just like that, they calmed down as I planted my right foot inside.

Invited. Makes all the difference.

Before I could take another step inside, a tall elf stepped through the door at the other end of the vestibule, and held the door open for me to pass through. He wore “traditional” elf garb. Which is to say, silks, linens, and lots of gold. All of it covered in minutely detailed designs of knots, serpents, and floral motifs.

A bit of an eyesore to a plain suit wearing goblin like myself, but it probably serves to remind local members of “the Family” that they’re all elves, and have a common background, and the hammer will fall on them HARD if they step too far out of line.

Policing their own is a big part of the Elven Way.

Being escorted down the hallway, I noticed that he took a pause and a stutter-step at every third junction. Having my Sight up and running, I wasn’t fooled by illusions and Glamours, but he didn’t know that. I learned in the War how to use the Sight, and I learned to be paranoid about everything and anything, especially anything Elven.

He thought I was being gulled by the magic laid down by their spellweavers, but I was seeing the reality of the hallway. We walked straight back to the last door on the right. No turns. He, and whoever might be watching, probably thought I was seeing this trip as winding our way through an impenetrable maze.

Happy to let them think that, I wasn’t about to say anything to the contrary.

He gestured that I should sit on the bench outside of the office and wait. I did so. While I waited, curiosity got the better of me, and I dropped the Sight, just to see what they thought they were handing me to see.

It was insane.

A fully immersive expanse of some idealized forest from the Olde Worlde. Something from the Black Forest region, or possibly Caledonia. There was even a small spring burbling merrily away just outside of a very dark cave entrance, where I knew there happened to be a modern water cooler standing by an opened office door.

A small fawn walked past me between two trees, giving me that wide eyed “Drawn By Disney Animators” look as it passed. Like something out of that Fantasia flic, great music and smooth animation; those humans can make their own magic when the other races leave them alone long enough.

I snapped my sight back up, and saw the “fawn” was a very young elf woman carrying a large, awkward stack of folders and papers. She looked as frazzled and worn down as the fawn had looked timid and frail; both images, I noted, looked ready to bolt off into the wilds.

After another ten minutes of cooling my heels, I took out a paperback book I had stashed in my back pocket before I left the apartment. It was “First Lensman,” and while I liked the story, and the concept behind the story, the character of Virgil Samms was a Grade-A stiff and a square, as the kids were now saying.

His job in this novel was to go out and find suitable people to join him in being Space Cops. Incorruptible souls… as someone who deals with the police all too often, ya gotta laugh. I had read some of the lead up stories by Smith in a magazine that collected sci-fi stories back in the thirties and forties, saw this at the library and decided to give it a go, since I knew where it had started.

His writing reminded me of guys like Azimov, in that he had come up with a neat idea, and then he wrote a story around it to explain it all. Not exactly character driven, and so the hominid element was missing in most of his work. No Soul, as they say. Sometimes that works great, other times, we get long, boring slogs like the story series “Foundation” Azimov had written. There was word that next Spring the kid would be putting out a full length Foundation book. I knew I would probably be reading that too, and probably grumbling my way through it.

No sooner had I pulled the bookmark from page 20, and read half of that page, than one of Her Highnesses’ bully boys stepped from the office and introduced himself in a flowing, lilting voice. This elf was Luathael, one of Heshuo Tenzin’s “Bronze Dragons.”

Not just a bit of hired muscle, but an educated elf, with connections to some of the oldest Houses in the Olde Worlde. But make no mistake, the guy was ready to fight at the drop of a hat. That was part of what being a Bronze Dragon meant, you were a diplomat, and a thug, depending on what the boss needed at any given time. I had seen Junzhu Maethrega, the Heshuo’s younger sister, escorted about town by two of them. The thing is, just one Bronze Dragon had a lot of mystical power invested into them by their Patron. Two of them working together could pull down a building if they had cause.

Maybe if the building looked at them funny, or maybe called their fathers Sugar-Goblins.

I didn’t see any of the telltale sparkling aura around Luathael, so I was guessing he wasn’t playing the Glamour the Goblin game today. Nice. I didn’t think it was respect, as such, but I would take it as a glance toward respect.

Stepping into the office, I was directed to a comfortable, goblin sized chair in front of a fancy, and very large desk. A woodworker had probably spent the better part of a year on this thing. What do you know? Money, it buys nice things.

After a moment, maybe as many as two, Junzhu Maethrega stepped into the room from the opposite side of the desk, and smiled at me as she sat at the large desk.

I stood as she entered, knowing that a little respect could go a long way in the Courts. She was actually smiling at me now, and it was looking genuine.

I was worried.

As she had entered, I stood. You stand when a lady enters a room, elf or otherwise. As my mother always said, Manners are the Gift a Good Man Gives the World and receives back himself a thousandfold.

As I may have mentioned before, she had been raised in Sudan.

As we both sat, Luathael stood off to my right, just within my peripheral sight, and within HIS arms reach of me.

The Junzhu leaned forward, and in a soft voice, “How are you today, Emissary of my Older Brother and his August Rival?” The tall young elf, probably barely a century old, was just barely on the feminine side of androgynous, and only visibly female due to her slight curves. The Glamour that she usually wore when out and about the town was, by contrast, hypersexualized in appearance. She also lacked her usual glittering Glamour induced aura.

So noted, neither was Glamoured up for this visit, which I found interesting all on its own.

“Junzhu Maethrega, may the Light forever Shine upon you, I am happy to have been able to make myself available to your Splendid Presence once I had received your invitation. How may I be of Service to Those for whom I humbly serve as Emissary?” Being polite might keep you alive, but being certain to not offer anything, or everything, to these people would keep one alive even longer.

I was their “Emissary.” That was true. Paid up to the end of next month, in fact. But I was also the Emissary representing their chief rival, Shizi Huan. Huan styled himself as “the Prince in Waiting” to Tenzin’s “Prince of Heaven and Earth.”

Tenzin ran the On Bing Tong. An actual Tong with roots, and associates, spread all across the Olde Worlde and the Far East in places like Old Cathay.

Huan, by contrast, ran a local gang here in Pol-Aderfia. A good ol’ American street gang, filled with thugs, and running numbers and and hot-and-cold-running vice.

One elf had power and a fine veneer of respectability; while the other was a smart, canny, cunning, cut-throat, sociopath in charge of a small, slippery battalion of the same ilk. Elftown was balanced on the finest of knife edges as these two elven men tried to out maneuver one another without starting an overt terfwar.

Those of us who lived here thought it was might presumptuous of the two factions to fight over OUR city, but here we were.

Maethrega looked at me, a slight tilt to her head, and sighed.

“You couldn’t make this easy for me, could you, Mister Archer?” She sounded very unhappy with how this conversation was going, and we had just started. All the better, if you ask me.

With what looked like an effort on her part, she drew up a veil of Glamour. Peeking, I saw that she was now wearing her illusion of “Super Vixen,” but with a thin coating added to it just for me. She looked now like the tallest, sexiest young goblin woman in all of Pol-Aderfia. If anything, as she looked now, she reminded me of Nicola, who worked at Gio’s. Coloration of scales and sweep of the ears all pointed to her knowing I spoke with Nicola regularly. And maybe even she had sources that said Nicola and I were “close.”

…yeah…No dice, Elfy…I lost that particular dream long ago…

“Junzhu Maethrega, may the First weep at your beauty, I hope you will tell me how we may work together in harmony.”

Not “what can I do for you,” but a polite “What do you want from me.” Very different messages, and the look on her face said she read between those lines perfectly well.

There was a laugh from Luathael where he stood by the wall. The enforcer was looking at his shoes and grinning like a cat. He then said in one of the old Gaelic languages, Proto Welsh or Pictish, “The Pickle Farmer will not be caged so easily, Mistress. He has lived too long among those who know our ways. He also has been trained by several of Our kind in the Arts during the Unfortunate Days. Might I suggest, on behalf of your brother, being honest and forthright with Mister Archer?”

I was guessing that “Unfortunate Days” meant the Great War. Leave it to the Elves to come up with that kind of diminishing term for a horror like The War.

Without turning her head from me, Maethrega looked hurt. And a little stunned at the rejection, no matter how diplomatically phrased.

To ease the pain, I leaned forward and placed the small white paper bag on the desk in front of her. “Junzhu, I have brought a treat for you and your associate, if you would like to take a moment to refresh yourselves. I know your tasks set for you by those above us all can leave one tired.”

I sat back and watched. Her eyes widened.

And widened further.

She looked both overjoyed, and trapped like a fox in a cage. Luathael reached past me, and lifted the little sack, opening it to peek inside. “Donuts!” His voice was suddenly that of a happy teen. “Oh, and cookies!”

I had picked up the selection of treats at a little bakery near my office as a treat to remind me of my mother. The bakery was Sudanese, and my mother had come to the states from Khartoum. As a little kid, these sugared goodies always made my day. I had planned to eat one each night with my tea as I read in my comfy chair by the window. But, looking at the faces of these two, you would have thought I had offered them true immortality.

Luathael had a Shaaria out of the bag and crunching merrily away at the fried treat before even passing the bag to his Mistress, who looked outraged at not getting first pick herself.

Unrepentant, the broad shouldered elf said around a mouth of fried goods, “Not poisoned, My Lady. You may proceed!”

She grabbed up the bag, and looked inside, her face, her REAL face, melting into a mask of joy. Then she folded the bag closed, and pushed it back toward me, with a sour look she said, “Once I ask you what I need to ask you, I fear you will take these back from me, Emissary.”

“Well, then I guess we will just need to hear what you have invited me here to hear, and see how this all falls out, then.” I wasn’t budging an inch here. And she saw the resolve on my face, in my posture that nothing would be accidentally offered.

She sat still as a statue and stared at me for longer than was comfortable.. for me. Then came to some kind of conclusion. I don’t know what she may have been wrestling with, but she figured something out and made her choice.

“Mister Archer, my brother is worried that a new element has entered the city that may disrupt how harmonious business has been done for decades now, and He wishes to not see this come to pass.” She reached timidly for the bag of treats, then thought better of it, curling her elegantly long fingers back into pensive fists upon her desk.

“My brother and the gentle fellow who styles himself as my brother’s rival, both agree that this new faction represents chaos and disorder for our beloved city.”

She looked at me with her wide, doe eyes, and then said the most straightforward thing I have ever heard a High Elven Official ever say. “The Family Restaurant and Social Club known as The Jewelry Box, which are owned by Our Center City Rivals for business interests here in Pol-Adarfia, is hosting members of the Queen’s Own Royal Ravens. They are assessing the ease with which they might bring over a Baronage from Turkish lands to the United States. Minions and Ambassadors have been sent from Umbria.”

The eyes of this princess looked hollow and lost as she watched me, watched for my reaction. I was trying to hide any reaction to the “from Umbria” part of that sentence. Most likely the Satyrs I had dined with, and other entertainments shared with a Nymph, were those very same Minions and Ambassadors.

“Oh, Gentle Light of the Rising Sun, and this has been sanctioned?” I asked. “Fully sanctioned?”

“Mister Archer, The Queen herself has set this into motion.” Maethrega dropped her gray eyed gaze back to the bag. But now, not because she wanted treats in exchange, but because she didn’t want to meet my eyes.

In a voice gone hollow, “The Queen is willing to forget and Forgive those of her People who fled the Olde Worlde to come live in the New World. She Who Lives in Darkness and Night wants to reunify her People, and bring Those Who Are Lost back under Her reign. Having seen these last seven decades how well the Social Organizations, such as that operated by my Brother, have been able to work with and influence other such Organizations across the globe, Her Majesty feels it is time to bring her wayward children back under Her rule.”

She looked close to tears now, “Where aggression and might was unable to solidify Her hold upon lands She has never been able to claim Herself, She still believes that all of the lands her Mother, and Grandmother held are, by Ancient Rights, hers to rule as well. My brother and a thousand others, in their ingenuity and cleverness, have shown that what Might may not be able to take and hold, Commerce and Politics can. And once she has done so, She will bring these lands and its peoples under Her Munificent Rule, as well. It may take decades more, but She Who Sits the Throne of Dreams has all of Time with which to plot and plan. She would plant seeds in cities around these United States, and then watch them grow. She will tend them until it is time to harvest them all, and at that moment, We, all of Us, will be Hers.”

This was one of the reasons The War happened in the first place.

Four thousand years ago, the Queen’s Grandmother, Maerisi, ruled all of Europe and Asia. When she had been killed trying to bring the African Continent under her rule, Her Daughter, Terphaenna, lost her grip on most of Asia, and much of Northern Europe. When Terphaenna attempted to take back Eastern Asia, the relatively young Northern European countries attacked. Humans with iron weapons make elven lives difficult. She died in those wars around the year 1000, and her daughter, Meave, the current Queen, Inherited Most of what is now England, much of the Mediterranean, and Central Asia.

The old bat has spent almost all of those 900 years since trying to get the lands her Grandmother had owned back. When the New World was discovered, there was a mass rush to colonize here, and set up new countries not bound by anything touched by the Old Kingdom, the Old Empire, or The Olde Worlde.

My people, usually on the very bottom of most pecking orders, got here first. We built most of this country, and the idea of the, THE, Elven Queen coming over here to steal it from us is … Well, I can tell you the average American goblin is uneasy with just non-Empire Elves living in their cities. The Queen’s Empire flunkies coming here to take over? This is going to get messy.

When the Old Bat tried to get her claws into North America last time by taking over Canada, we joined with our allies, the Frankish, and kicked the Old Queenie’s sycophants out of Canada.

So, to sum up these last two days, I have now been dragged into the Old Queen trying to get her hooks into the New World, a group of racist zealots stealing a magical doodad, and my best friend from childhood being harassed by, most likely, people doing the bidding of either group one, group two, or both.

I honestly miss the days of just taking pics of cheating husbands and wives, catching thieves or returning stolen property the police have decided not to bother with, finding missing and kidnapped people, and finding evidence of fraud for insurance agents.

Most of this nonsense is way above my paygrade and not being covered by my daily rates.

I asked Maethrega about the Artifact. She looked blank at first, but when I described the “jeweled bird statue” both she and Luathael tensed up like I had just told a dirty joke about their mothers.

As I gave it a moment’s consideration, I may have done just that.

“Mister Archer, while We may not, as my August Brother’s voice in this matter, say anything pertinent about the Artifact you describe, I can say on behalf of the Heshua Tenzin that there was a courier in His employ that went missing in these last two weeks, and the parcel that courier carried has not been found. The courier’s body was found in the Schuylkill River this last week. The man was a trusted retainer of my brother, and now he is no more. There were rumors that have reached my brother that this courier was waylaid by a pair of humans who work for the city, and that they may have taken a parcel from my brother’s retainer.”

She looked incredibly uncomfortable underneath her Glamour. “As to the Council of whom you speak, they may have regular meetings here in the city. One is coming up two nights from now. They will be meeting in a restaurant with The individuals who will attend this meeting of that association are not well known, there are a few notable members who attend regularly. One is Thomas Gibbons, a notable human police officer who has many friends in high places, though it is known that none of them have the power to help Gibbons advance his career in the ways he wants. HIs partner, one Officer Rizzo, known for his cruelty and ignorance, will also attend.”

The rising confusion must have been showing on my face, because she leaned forward and asked if I was doing well.

“My apologies. I was under the impression that this group,” I didn’t want to upset my hostess by directly naming the Council of the Mists. “These Misties,” I said, which got a laugh from Luathael, “Aren’t they an ‘Elves Only’ kind of club?”

Luathael spoke up from his place by the wall, his voice low with menace but still musical, “They are, as you say, exactly that. But, there will always be those who seek power and riches no matter who they have to court to attain it, and there will always be those who will take any coin, any favors, no matter what strings may be attached if it allows them to abuse someone they already loathe. Gibbons and Rizzo are two such humans, and the connections they have made in that organization allow them to do exactly that. There have been several people in the city’s bureaucracy who have gone missing, or just shown up to work with extra injuries that they refuse to talk about.”

I gestured that he should continue.

With a very slight inclination of his head, not enough to actually call a bow, “A Goblin who works so fervently to see that his clients’ needs are served, one who has also garnered a reputation for fairness and is known for his sense of delivering Justice when the Law does not always walk along the paths it should, might be interested in the coincidences of human organizations trying to buy their way into power holding groups of notable …Monarchists. And the theft of an item of both eldritch and cultural significance might be related in such ways through the actions of such… Humans. Some of these collaborating humans may even have risen to positions in …management.”

The pauses the big galoot used were more significant than maybe I had been prepared for, the Elf was almost saying things directly. I wondered how horrified his boss would be at the very idea. But I wasn’t going to be the mug who told on him, thanks. I’d take whatever breadcrumbs I can get.

Both elves now looked incredibly uncomfortable. Which, considering how close they usually held their emotions around outsiders either meant they thought I was one of them, unlikely, or they were so wrung out they were about to cry.

Knowing I wasn’t going to get anything else from these two today, I reached out and took up the little paper bag, and with great ceremony, placed it closer in proximity to where Maethrega sat. I wasn’t crass enough to actually thank an elf, and certainly not a highly placed one like Maethrega, but if I could smooth over some injured feelings with these cookie-fiends by using sugar, I would. Oh, yes on my cookie buying soul, I certainly would.

Walking back out the door as the kid and her bodyguard ate their treats, I wondered what my next step would be, and why it would be to call a crooked cop I knew.

Detective Mario Graviki, and his junior partner BW (Brandywine) Marsh were two plainclothes cops with the Pol-Aderfia PD. Both were crooked. Graviki, elderly, wrinkled, and as mean as he was smart, was that kind of bent that is actually straight if you look at it from the right angle. His young partner, a plump little goblin with a huge chip on his shoulder and family connections that kept him from getting bounced from his position for incompetence, was as crooked as he was stupid, from every angle; and if both Graviki and Marsh’s family wasn't taking care of him, the kid would wind up at the bottom of the Schuylkill River himself.

Most folks in the know knew that the day Graviki retired was the last day anyone outside of the medical examiner’s office would see of Marsh, family money or no.

Back at my office I made a call to Graviki asking for a meeting. We would meet the next day, around noon, at the Sandbox. My treat, of course.

Cheap bastards.

Graviki came sauntering into the Sandbox as though he had just danced with the prettiest goblin in the city and she had asked for his number after. A thin as water, older goblin, Graviki was slightly hunched, and looked like he was suffering from a wasting sickness.

I had once thought it was a slow working, deadly curse; but my Sight had shown me he was just old and probably had a cup of coffee in place of a good meal at least twice a day.

His tailor made almost as much money as Graviki himself did, and the old detective was sporting the finest silk suit I had seen him wear in at least a year. The gray pinstripe silks complimented his silvering blue-green scales, and his yellow eyes were set off well by a blue tie that had honest to All, Thread-of-Gold patterning.

The man knew fashion like few others. Gods help me, his pocket square even had a hint of pink thread at their seams that complimented the rheumy edges of his eyes. How could a poor younger schmuck like me even compete?

The old goblin literally did a graceful turn and spin as he drew off his overcoat and sat into the booth where I had been waiting for him and his petty portly partner.

“Sammy!” His gravel strewn voice greeted me. “Thank you for the invite! How’re you doing, Gumshoe?”

“Hello, Flatfoot… You’re looking both happy and spry today. Is everything in the world suddenly coming up Graviki?”

The old goblin laughed. It was wheezy, and scarily scratchy coming from his elderly throat, but there was honest joy in it. “Oh, Sammy, you would not believe how good things are about to get for me.”

“Oh?” This was suddenly slightly worrisome to me. “You got a ship coming in, Mario?”

Just then, one of Joey’s nieces glided past the table, setting a fresh coffee in front of Graviki, and pouring some fresh black java over the greatly diminished dregs that languished in my own cup.

Though she was easily my junior by three decades, and so Graviki’s by at least two hundred, she asked, “Are you boys ready, or do you need some time?”

Graviki turned to the young woman, and smiled with ALL of his teeth, the old wolf, answering, “Dolly, I need your best burger, extra pickles, and an entire plate of fries.”

She giggled and turned to me. “Dorothia, I’ll have the same. And a slice of raisin pie, if you have any left.” I looked at Graviki, “Is Brandywine joining us?”

He chuckled at that. “Just call him ‘BW’ if you have to. He doesn't like his name for some reason. But, no. Someone assigned him to accompany a pair of visitors the mayor wants to keep happy. He’s out of my hair all week. Maybe next week, too.”

“Yeah?” I said. “You’re Marsh-free for a while, I guess that would make me walk on clouds too.”

The old goblin cackled at that, and pushed back his thin white-ish hair with one craggy old claw. “That boy is so far over his head, I might never see the top of his head again. These knobs are from Umbria. From Rome, I hear. They’re throwing more weight and money around than I’ve seen in a decade.”

“Not since the War, huh?” I took a guess, and made a leap. “ Umbria? Would those bigwigs happen to be the Fauneittis?”

His old face looked surprised enough that I could see the entirety of his gold-yellow irises surrounded by their slightly jaundiced, bloodshot sclera.

“You know these high-rollers, Sammy? Doesn't seem like your crowd.”

“I met them two nights ago. At the Jewelry Box.”

The detective let out a whistle at the mention of the Jewelry Box, looking impressed. “That’s some rarified air you’re breathing Sammy. I feel like you suddenly have more pull in this town than I was aware. Can you afford that kind of company these days? Being a Private Dick is certainly paying better than I thought.”

It was my turn to laugh now. “Not in the slightest. I was working on a case for an old friend, a labor dispute. And I wound up getting an invite to dinner by the Management. They wanted to soft grill me on some of my contacts who work around Arch Street.”

“Huh.” He said, with a slight huff, and narrowed his eyes. “Well, yes. That’s who Marsh is showing around town. He should be busy with that for a few days. Leaving little old me to soldier on without the rich little prick.” Graviki smiled even brighter at the idea of more time away from his incompetent partner.

With confirmation Marsh wouldn’t be joining us, Dorothia and her notepad wandered with a graceful sway back to the kitchen to put in our orders. As petite as any goblin girl, just barely twenty if she was that old, she had the markers of her grandfather’s family in her broad shoulders, thick arms, and incredibly thick hair, which she kept pulled back in a stunningly complex braided tail that bobbed behind her as she walked. Unlike a few of her cousins, her mother and her uncle, who all had that odd dwarven khaki coloration to their skin, her scale and skin patterns were all reds and blues of her Frankish Goblin grandmother and her British Isles Goblin father. Lucky kid, too many people were making things hard for her cousins, uncle and her mother. Purists that were screaming for standards that almost nobody here in the states could actually adhere to, and in the coming decades would never be able to. I certainly couldn’t. If pressed. But I didn’t stand out, I was part Hobb, though I didn’t let that cat out of its bag. And Graviki, he was part Merrow, though I wasn’t supposed to know that. But Hobbs and Merrows were both just other kinds of Goblins, distant cousins on the family tree. We would both be treated like street rats if people knew, though.

But she was part Dwarf, and that was an even worse offense to the sensibilities of many.

Like her uncle, Joey.

Just like Joey.

Graviki noticed my face fall a little as it occurred to me that some of my problems were all tangled up together. “You okay, pally?”

I shook myself, and felt like a first class chump.

“Oh, I’m fine Mario.” I said, smiling. “I just realized something that was tugging on my toes all day yesterday, and it has just lined itself up for me.” I chuckled, mostly at myself and tried to shake the feeling that I had been chasing my own tail for two days. “So, BW is off showing the mayor's friends the town? Do they need rescuing? We could go say hello, and take them to places real people in this city go.”

Mario loudly cackled again, almost hooting at Marsh’s expense. As we chatted, his red rimmed old eyes tracked everyone’s movements in the diner. I know mine did, too; it was just odd seeing this total lack of trust in our fellow Pol-Arderfians in someone else.

After the burgers, fries, and pie came and went, we talked about crooked, racist human cops of his acquaintance, by name of Gibbons and Rizzo, and how sad it is that they have made new friends with a subversive Elvin purity group called the Council of the Mists.

The detective paled slightly at that, and it was a not so subtle reminder that the old goblin was connected in several ways, and generally knew when to buy an umbrella, and who had the best prices.

Pulling the conversation onto a new track, Mario was sympathetic, but also cautious and initially unwilling to just stick his own hand into this kind of political meat grinder.

“Look, Sammy, I understand your concerns, but here's the thing. There’s Crooked. There’s Bent. And then, on that lofty mount above the heads of all but the most diligently paid-up, there’s the Connected.”

He reached out, and picked up his mug and took a delicate sip of his coffee. HIs desiccated old tongue licked the craggy, graying scales around his lips before he continued. “No amount of scratch will make a human cop fit to rise to Commissioner in this town. No amount of Hooked up will do that, either. Especially not for crooked, knuckle dragging, bigots like Gibbons and Rizzo. You can be as hate-filled as you want, crooked as you want, you can even stupid as you want, and if you're a goblin like Marsh, someday you could be Commissioner. Or mayor. Or grab a seat on the City Council. But, Sammy, some of the humans who join the force think they can climb the ladder just as well as any of us, and I’m here to tell you, it ain't happening.”

The old reptile smiled to himself then, and it wasn’t an expression of friendliness as he let out a wheezy chuckle.

“See, before the turn of the last century, any human who came into the city who wasn’t a Lanape was just asking for trouble. The old Commish, three suits ago, used to have us regularly round them up in vice raids. Some of them would be sent out to sea on steamers as crew. Some put on road crews. Some just…” and here Graviki made a gesture where he raised his fist beside his head. “Some just wound up in one of the potters’ fields out toward Bucks.”

I tasted my own cup of joe, just to give myself a moment to think. “That’s pretty harsh, Mario. City isn’t like that anymore, from what I hear.”

Mario cackled at that. “No. Sammy, no. It's not. It ain’t like in my own Pa’s days, either. We’ve gone soft on the vermin. We let them into the city now. We let them open businesses, and buy homes. They join civics leagues, and rotaries now. In our benevolence, we even occasionally let the tall monkeys run for office.”

And his face pulled a sneer hard enough to give a Halloween mask a run for its money. “But none have been elected, and none ever will be. We can hold the line on behalf of reasonable, civilized people at least that steady.”

He sighed then. “Look, the apes have their uses. I hear they are almost as good as Dwarves at metal work, and almost as good as Goblins at construction and farming, and almost as good as Gnomes at crafts. Almost as good as Elves at music, and woodwork. Not even as good as the fucking elves, Sammy! I even hear they’re almost, but not as good as Merrows at sailing. I’m sure they’re almost as good as other races at whatever those other races do, too. ‘Almost as good at everything, but not as good at anything’ is the best you can say about them. They don’t even have their own form of magic! They steal wands, Sammy. They steal rings.” that got me to raise an eyebrow. I wondered if he would say they stole children next. “Anything even smells of the Eldritch? They swipe it all. You can never trust a human, Archer.”

He was wrong about most of that, especially about the magic. If the War had taught me anything, it was that every race had some magic. And every race was willing to use it to kill.

“But, pound for pound they lack our strength.” Graviki went on. “They lack our intelligence. They don’t live as long as we do, though I’ve heard they kill themselves more than they die of old age. Gods know I see enough of them dead from street violence. That speaks to their intelligence if nothing else does. And their skin is so soft, they constantly get hurt. They’re just a drain on the city’s resources.”

This rambling rant was getting sad. The old guy believed every trope groups like the Council of the Mists would have every Elf believe, and every other hominid race, Goblins included, have a list of complaints against them just like the list Mario just used to describe humans.

But now I had an angle, and his angry ignorance had just handed it to me.

“About that.” I said, drawing his attention. “I heard some breezes blow past me just yesterday that Gibbons and Rizzo might have availed themselves of someone else's Cultural Artifact. Something with a whiff of the uncanny has gone missing, and the pair of Hoofers that BW is walking around with this week are willing to pay good scratch to get it back.” I lowered my voice here, and drew him in close. “Something that they don’t want to end up in the papers, because it might spoil their trip here. Something that their bosses in Rome really want back, and an enterprising detective might be able to garner enough gratitude to properly feather a nest with.”

I could see by the new shine in his yellow eyes that I had him on the line, and I just needed to set the hook.

“Something that Gibbons and Rizzo plan to use to get in good with their Mist buddies. Humans… running around with something REAL, something with power. Eldritch. Something that they, themselves cannot use, but they may be wanting to give it to the Misties, to get in good.” I knew playing on his anti-human ignorance may serve me here. I pulled a little harder.

“You know, they may even try to use that Bird to get their way, even though they can’t. Or shouldn’t. And this might give the two of them some sway with the department they couldn’t get any other way. These Misties might be able to pull some strings for them, if they get that statue.”

He stared at me then, the skeptical look falling slightly from his face to let a little fear crawl in beside it.

And while he stared, I sipped at my coffee slowly, not a care in the world. Just then Dorothia glided around again, her long brunette braid sat swaying to the rhythm of whatever song was in her soul, and gave me the check after asking if we needed anything else.

Mario looked at me, speculation and over a century of hard trust issues at war in his thin old face.

“That pie… Worth eating?” He asked.

“If you like a good sweet and sour pie, it’s even better than their cherry pie.”

The old goblin looked skeptical.

“Dorothia, would you be a doll and wrap up a piece of your cherry pie and a piece of your raisin pie for my friend, Detective Graviki?” I then slipped her an extra bill, and told her to keep the change as I got up and put on my overcoat. After she went to wrap up some pie for the elder goblin, “I hear Rizzo and Gibbons want to make a present of the little bird statue to their Misty-Eyed Friends tomorrow night. If you happen to find that lil’ Bird, and give me a call, I may be able to get it back to its owners, and collect a fee. Aside from giving you credit to those who would listen, I can slide you a bonus that, as a police detective, you would not otherwise be allowed to claim from the grateful owners of a stolen item.” I waggled my eyebrows at the old reptile, leaving the implications hanging as I turned and left the diner.

I went back to my office for a few hours, and found a note had been slid under the front door. It smelled nice in an expensive way. It was from Mauvi.

Sammy;

I wanted to send you a quick note. Julien was furious to find me gone from the restaurant when he woke up, and was even more furious to learn you had taken his hat. I would wish to not see you hurt, and think you should drop this investigation as soon as possible. Forget about us and the Artifact we are searching for. Maybe take a break from this city for a month. Above all, be safe.

Maybe someday we can meet again for another meal like the one we shared.

Mauvi

She is not a subtle little Nymph, even as she was trying to be. And most of the letter just didn't add up for me. Going back over our talk that night, it occurred to me that much of what she was selling me was more dusty paper than flannel. Either she didn’t know who the Misties worked for, or she was throwing up smoke to get me running down the wrong road.

There was a third option.

The Council of the Mists had broken from the Queen, and wanted to pursue the same goal as ever, just on their own.

I settled down to work it out, made a few calls to people who didn’t know me. But that was okay, because I didn’t use my own name. And then I hunkered down and puzzled over a few things before heading home at the end of five o’clock.

I hadn’t been home, back in my comfortable and organized little apartment for more time than it took to take off my shoes and get a pot of tea started when there was a knock at my door. This was too much activity in a day for coincidences. And I’m not one to trust such late afternoon visitors. People like that, who drop by without calling? Might as well be Elves.

Sliding over to the right of the door, I breathed out slowly, and used a slight push of Will, letting my senses expand beyond myself and out into the hall.

A very tall human stood, slightly hunched, in the hallway outside of my door. I couldn’t see who it was, but my power allowed me to sense the shape of the mook. Feel the basics of who they were.

They were bulky in a “I’m young, eat well, and do hard work for a living” kind of way. The suit they wore was well tailored, but the hunched posture was pulling the suit out of shape, and I could feel the gun in his boot, the other gun at his ankle, a cosh, and a switchblade in his pockets.

His wallet was pretty thin, and I didn’t feel a billfold anywhere on him.

And, thankfully, nothing eldritch on him, around him, or about him. That might make my life easier.

The guy reached out, and the knock came again. The doubled up sound of the knocking heard in my ears, and through my Power was discordant, though not disorienting. I had been given years of training to keep exactly that from happening.

I could feel him pulling his piece from the back of his belt. It was a short barreled gun, bulky and wide. It felt “mean” in a way that made me think there was a bit of other people’s blood stuck to the thing.

“Who is it?” I asked through the door as I eased my own piece out of my holster.

“I have a message from the Management for Mister Archer.”

I Hated doing this, but I was going to have to use magic on this punk. Magic, especially for a Goblin, is problematic. We tend to become addicted to using it. More so than magic users from the other races. It led to issues down the road if you couldn’t control yourself. As you gain enough willpower to use the stuff effectively, you lose the willpower to keep from using it for everything.

Absolutely everything.

But I didn't want to have to drill this palooka right on my own doorstep. The gunshot would be noticed in this building, and the 6 foot 2 body bleeding out in front of my door might be, too.

The lousy jerk.

Bracing myself, I centered my thoughts, spinning out the shape of the compulsion I wanted.

“Just a moment.” I said, and let the spell flow out around me and out the door as I Willingly opened it.

I could feel the bruiser on the other side of the door tense, and position his gun. I could feel the hammer being slowly pulled back as the velvety flow of my Will moved over the hardwood, across the threshold and out into the hallway.

When the spell grabbed him by the legs, running up his long pins like hat water in the shower moving the wrong way, he let out a loud gasp, and started to flail a bit before slumping down to his knees.

Swinging the door fully open, I reached out to the stupefied human kneeling just outside of my door and relieved him of the gun he was holding. Then the gun at his ankle, the cosh, the knife, and the wallet. Everything but the wallet, I dropped to the floor.

The spell had hit him harder than I thought I should have, and wondered if he was naturally an idiot, or if he had been rolled under by a compulsion before.

His pale, clammy skin looked like he had been sweating hard before he got to my door. His dark brown hair was pomaded up and back from his homely face. His nose looked like it had been broken a few too many times, though it may have just been a crooked, bulbous mess naturally. But I was willing to bet there were a few breaks involved there.

The guy looked to be in his thirties, and he was getting jowly in that way that well fed, and over fed, humans got as they aged.

Sliding his weapons back behind me with my foot, I looked through the wallet. A few small bills, and some business cards. There was a driver’s license, the smudged name on it read “F. Lazarro Rizzo.” It had a Sharktown address that otherwise told me nothing.

Shit. This guy was here on behalf of the Management. And they sent him specifically to me for some reason.

I reached out and slapped his face lightly, just to get his eyes to focus. “Lazarro…” His dopey grin didn’t fade, and he stayed staring off into the ceiling.

“LAZ!” A quick slap. “You came here with a message for me. What’s the message?” I knew what it was, I just wanted confirmation.

“The Management…” He slowly repeated, his eyes starting to focus. “...they asks that I gives you a message.” Oy…

“Okay, slugger. Concentrate now.” He looked at me harder now, but still not with any real cogency. “What’s the message Laz?”

“Message? Message… Okay. Mister Scafetti said to tells you that you asks too many questions, and now your halfy pal is gonna wind up in a … uhm… the same pit I’m supposed to puts you in tonight.” And then he made some gestures with his hand as if his gun was still in it and he was pulling the trigger as he pointed it at me.

Scafetti, the Goblin with the nice suit and the compulsion spalls laid all over him. That explained how easy my own compulsion knocked this guy for a loop.

Then he noticed his hand was empty. And the big palooka actually giggled. It was high, nasally, and unpleasant.

I concentrated on him again, and let my will flow out with the right push behind it. “Okay, Laz. You did a good job. Message delivered.”

He smiled at the praise. “I did? Oh.. I was worried.”

“Nah, Laz,” I said. “You killed me like a champ. I’m all kinds of dead. And then you threw my broken little Gobbo body into that pit.”

His smile returned. The dopey one.

“Okay, pal. That’s great news. Because Mister Scafetti was mad.”

This was interesting. “Why was Johnny mad, Laz?”

His eyes suddenly looked lost and like he wanted to cry. “Gib lost the thing. He was supposed to bring the thing from where we had it stashed. And he wound up in the hospital. Someone shot him. Took the thing.”

I looked deep into his eyes.

Concentrating, I said in a slow, but cheerful, voice, “Laz. You did your job well. ANd now you want to go on a little vacation. They gave you a bundle of dough.”

He smiled like a goon. “They did?”

“They did.” I told him. “I’m so dead now, you did great. I never saw it coming.”

“Yes. Now, you’re gonna take all your dough and go down to Seminole. To the Keyes. And spend some time where it’s warm.”

“Warm?”

“Yeah, buddy, go on.” I grabbed some blank pages from my notepad, stuffing them into the wallet to bulk it out. Handing him back his wallet, I said, “See, look how thick your wallet is.”

“Oh, wow. This is great!” He looked honestly happy now.

‘Okay, now go on.”

The brute stood then, banging his addled head on the door jam. Then Rizzo turned and stumbled out the door and into the hall. I heard him shambling down the stairs until it faded to nothing.

“Well,” I said to myself in the once again empty living room. “This is bullshit.”

As fast as I could, I called over to the Sandbox, but Joey had already left for the day. Dorothia told me he usually swings by his house to see his kids have their homework done and dinner underway before he runs off to his other job.

So, I had a chance.

Hailing a cab, I paid the guy extra to get me to the Jewelry Box as fast as he could. Five minutes and several new gray hairs on my head I stepped out of the cab along the side of the building that held the Jewelry Box.

I ran to the back, hoping to catch Joey before he went in, and my heart sank as I saw him being walked out the door to the back alley by Johnny Scafetti.

Johnny looked quite put out as he pointed something I was just going to assume was a gun at Joey’s belly.

With an effort that almost made me crack my molars with effort, I spun up a Glamour. It was the first thing that came to mind.

As I jogged to intercept the two men, I could feel the spell wrapping itself around my body like I was walking through thousands of spiderwebs. My outer appearance warped and changed, making anyone near me see a tall, lumbering, doughy human walking down the alley toward the two Goblins who were arguing.

It was difficult to match my short little goblin legs to Rizzo's loping stride, but Joey was depending on me. As I ran toward the two, I called out in Lazarro Rizzo’s voice, “Mister Facetti! I took care of delivering that message for you!”

Both men turned to look at me, and I have to tell ya, it's a little disorienting to have people look two feet over your head at “You.”

But, Joey was more ready for this than I had been, because he reached out and grabbed the gun from Johnny, quickly ripping it from his hand.

Facetti let out a shriek of pain as the gun left his hand, and it took a moment longer than I like to admit that I didn’t realize that what I was seeing was Johnny’s trigger finger fall from the gun that Joey Cozetti was now swinging at his head like a hammer looking for a nail to kiss.

Johnny went down, hitting the ground of the alley with a thud that would have been comical if I hadn’t seen the trail of blood bloom so quickly in a halo about his newly dented nugget. Several of his enchanted teeth rattled past me where I stood, staring.

It was the worst game of back alley craps I had seen played since the War.

Suddenly, Joey had the gun pointed at me, and was stuttering out a demand that I stop where I stood.

So I did.

And with a slow wave of my hand, I let the Glamour unfold around me, dropping away the image of tall, pudgy, Laz Rizzo, to reveal the Adonis that is Samwar Archer. I raised an eyebrow at my oldest friend, and spread my hands.

“Aw, fuck, Sammy. I think I just been fired.” He said, dropping the gun onto Johnny’s back. “Fuck, what am I gonna do?”

“Joey, I think you should consider opening a new place of your own.” I shook myself to banish the feel of being covered with thousands of spiderwebs. “Come on, now. We should move along before any of the other members of the Management or their people should come along, right?” I held out a hand to him.

He stepped toward me, and I walked him out to the street, where we hailed a cab that I used to take him back to his place. He agreed to lay low for a few days. I promised I would sort this all out for him, and I was damned if I was going to let Joey or his kids down.

When I had made it back to my place, I was met by the front door of my building by the elderly, hunched figure of Detective Mario Graviki.

The old cop stepped from his car as I walked up to my door, with a wrapped package in one of his desiccated old claws.

“Sammy, I have come into possession of an item of some recent local interest, and I wonder if you would be so good as to see that this parcel makes it back into the hands of those people who own it?” The guy looked drawn out and on the edge, but he was carefully enunciating every word with careful determination.

Stepping toward him, I held out my hands, and said, “Detective Graviki, if this is the item I remember talking with you about over lunch, I believe I can have it back into the hands of the owners by noon, and there thanks to you for your efforts soon after. I think I might take my lunch at Gio’s Place tomorrow afternoon.”

Graviki’s face split in a smile only a mother trout could love, and handed me the package. As he walked back to his car his voice scrawled and wheezed as he said, “Hrrm, I haven't been to see Miss Gianna in too long, and haven’t spoken with Molly in longer. Well, It's been a long day, and I need to head home to have a good long soak before I go to bed. Goodnight, Gumshoe.”

I walked up the stairs to my apartment, and opened the door to see Lauthael sitting cross legged in my living room.

“Fuck,” I said, suavely, “You people don’t believe in the sanctity of the home, do you?”

“Not yours, certainly. No.” And with that, the pale elvin face split into a large grin. “I hear you have had a busy day. How may my Mistress offer you respite after such a long and trying day?”

I walked past him, setting the taped together box on the table. Then went into my kitchen, and poured two coffee mugs of whiskey from a bottle I kept in the bottom of my fridge. Heading back onto the living room I snatched up a little white paper bag from the counter.

I handed him a mug, and sat in my comfy chair, nudging to the side to better face my “guest.”

“I have the Artifact.” I patted the box. “I will gladly hand it over to you for Maethrega.”

He hissed as I said her name. “That is too familiar by half, Picklefarmer!”

With a span, I let the power flow from me, and grabbed the Elf, spinning him fully toward me. Addressing him without emotion, “You have let yourself into my home twice in three days. You’re not in a position to lecture me on ‘too familiar.’ This is MY home.” ANd with a wave of my hand, I pushed a glamour over the Elf. We now sat in a Sudanese desert, the Sun beating down on us both. Luathael squinting in discomfort.

With a gesture of my left hand, his stiff full mug levitated out of his hand and settled itself on the sand near where he sat.

“So, you are a Staff Bearer.” He said. His voice implied this was something he could hold over my head.

“No.” I said. “I burned my staff when the War ended. What I do and practice now is without a staff. And I will never take up the staff again.” But then I smiled at him, and gestured again with my left hand. His bulky bronze dragon ring twisted itself to life and slithered from his fingers, over the burning sand, and up my chair leg to wrap itself about the end of the armrest of my chair.

Fury crossed his face, and he opened his mouth to shout at me.

And then I gestured with my right hand, and Luathael found himself flat on his back in the sand, staring up at the burning Sudanese sun.

“Illusions!”

“Then why are you squinting, Luathael?”

I waited as he struggled in the sand. Some bad words were said. Mostly in Elfean.

And just as suddenly as he jumped to rage, he quieted, laying calmly in the burning afternoon light.

“I admit, you have power, and I should respect it.”

“Should you?” I asked him, my voice dead and bereft of emotion.

“I should respect you. And the bounds of your domicile, Wizard. You have my promise, ever more I will call before coming to visit, and I will not enter unbidden by you unless there is an emergency I need to address.”

“Acceptable.” I said, releasing the bonds that held the tall Elf down.

“Now,” I said as I took a sip of the whiskey. “I have your item, and I need to secure a few concessions before I agree you can take it.”

I outlined a payout to be delivered to Graviki at Gio’s Place tomorrow, and a bigger payout for Joey, that would allow him to open his own place.

Laughing, Luathael said, his deep voice mocking, “To both of those terms, I have been empowered to agree, in full, with no strings or conditions attached.”

I waited. I sipped. He sipped, as well, eying my little white paper bag.

“We have two conditions…”

“Are there strings and conditions? I thought you just said you offered none.”

His face split into a large grin. “We don't WANT it back. We want YOU to keep it.”

I waited.

“For now. For the moment. We need this item kept in a safe place, away from everyone.”

“Everyone?”

“Everyone. Absolutely.”

Taking a deep breath that was definitely not a sigh. “What will your employer pay me for this service?” I closed my eyes. This was going to be bad, and they were going to laugh as they walked me off this cliff.

“For this service, you will be expected to pay court to the Esteemed Junzhu Maethrega, and to offer your continued service as emissary for one year from this day.” With that, the tall Elf sitting on the sun baked sand before me, bowed deeply, laughing.

The tall prick.

“Well… Fuck.”