Page 10 of Shadow Dreaming

“Yeah, why?” Penn sounded preoccupied. “I need to go over there today and check on it. Duran is taking care of it this week for me.”

“I don’t know who Duran is, but I think Brim Fire may be targeting it. I don’t have precise information, but Benny overheard two men he thinks are sorcerers talking about it. He’s clueless on what that means, which is probably a good thing.”

“Did he get their names?” Penn asked.

“No, but he’s going to try to find them again. I told him to be cautious—I don’t want him getting himself killed because of me. But I thought you should know.”

“I’ll talk to Duran about it today.” She sighed. “You know that they reassigned the portal I used to watch to another keeper.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“It’s not good. And I’m only watching this one part time. I have a bad feeling that PortalWatch is inching me out.”

PortalWatch was a part of the Crystal Court—the magical court run by Queen Elsabetha. There were several military branches belonging to the court of the witches, but PortalWatch was kept on the downlow. There were too many chances for disaster if humans or other Supes knew about the interdimensional gates. One other organization knew detailed information about them: Solimentary. Solimentary was the group running the Library of Arcane Wisdom. They gathered info on all things magical and paranormal, and they studied how Supes interacted with humans.

Solimentary was not a part of the Crystal Court, nor were they magical in themselves.

Instead, they stood outside of society, and their members were generally drawn from the older Elven families. The Elves, unlike the Fae, were few in number and stood apart from most other races, valuing peace and knowledge above all else. As far as I knew, Elves could inflict terrible damage when roused, but they kept to themselves. Few people even knew about their existence. As far as I could tell, most people thought they were part of the Fae.

The last thing I wanted was Penn heading to a portal that was a potential target.

“Who are you taking with you?” I asked.

“Who? What do you mean? I’m going by myself. Duran will be there.” She sounded so nonchalant that I wanted to shake her.

“Penn, there could be sorcerers targeting that portal right now?—”

“And it’s my responsibility to make sure that it’s secured. Don’t worry, Kyann. I’m not a little girl,” she said.

“No, but the Brim Fire sorcerers are dangerous—deadly so.”

“Yeah,” she said after a moment. “I know. I promise you, if I think there’s danger, I’ll call you. And I’ll make sure PortalWatch knows. They’ll probably assign extra guards to it.”

“All right, but I’m still uncomfortable,” I said.

“That’s because you’re a Mama Hen at heart for all of your friends, and we love you for it,” Penn said. “Okay, I’ll call you in a bit.”

I wanted to go with her, but we had a client coming in, and I couldn’t always be there when my friends went into tricky situations. I said goodbye and hung up.

As Dante and I prepared to meet our new client—well, potential client—I strove to focus. I told Dante what was going on with Penn, and I also asked Carson to check on the Brim Fire forum boards, where he was keeping watch through a hidden identity.

“Penn may be in danger,” I said, knowing that would light a fire under him, given how he felt about her. “Brim Fire seems to know about one of the portals leading to the UnderRealm—which is the one that Penn watches over. I think they want to take control of it.”

“How could they, though? They’d have the entire Crystal Court after them,” Carson said.

“I don’t think they care. Though, I can’t imagine a brawl breaking out in the park. Nobody wants the general populace knowing about the portals. If they think they can control the portal, they must have some plan to secure that control.” I shook my head. “Brim Fire doesn’t make stupid moves. So, if this is what they’re planning, it has probably been in the making for a long time.”

“Got it. All right, let me see what I can find out.” He turned back to his computer. “Do you need me for the new client meeting?”

“No, Orik’s on his way back. He can sit in with us. I’ll brief you later.” I stood, patting his shoulder. “Get busy. I’m worried sick about Penn but she, of course, is going to do whatever she needs to do and she doesn’t want me worrying about her.”

“You got it, boss,” Carson said. As he turned back to his computer, I headed out of his office, shutting the door behind me.

Orik returned shortly before our new client arrived. “Well, I have some interesting news about our stalker,” he said.

“What is it?” Dante stiffened.

“She’s married. She’s married to a rabbit shifter named Lou. He’s a quiet sort, lowkey and seems like a hard worker. I looked him up, once I followed them back to her place and they both went inside together. So I did some digging into Merry and found out that she and Lou have been married for five years. He’s from another country, so I suspect he may be after his green card and she was the easiest ride there. They’ve supposedly been married for two years, but the way they walked together—well, let’s just say the honeymoon’s long over. After that, I had to head back here, to make the meeting.”

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