Read Carlotta and the Krius Scepter (Carlotta Series Book 1) Online
Authors: John Booth
“Oh, for fucks sake.” I raised my gun and aimed it at Peleus’s head. An incredibly bright light shone in my face blinding me, as two attack helicopters appeared behind Peleus. I fired off four shots before a commanding voice blasted at us loud enough to make the din from the helicopters seem like the sound of butterfly wings.
“This is the FBI. Put your guns down now. You’re surrounded.”
I heard guns dropping behind me.
“We will kill you, Cear Lotha.”
“Damn you all to hell!” I shouted as I dropped my weapon onto the ground.
The men who disembarked from the helicopters carried grenade launchers and heavy-duty rifles. They wore helmets with protective visors over bulletproof vests. You couldn’t see their faces for their visors and the protective cloth that covered their chins. Everything had the FBI emblem on it, but I wasn’t fooled for a second.
A rifle thrust into my ribs and my hands were fastened with special handcuffs, titanium and electronically self-adjusting. Well beyond the power of any Fey to break, and it didn’t matter what you changed into, these handcuffs would remain locked to you whatever your wrists became. I’d helped to specify the design some years before.
“This is not necessary and I’d like to remind you of who I am,” I snapped at one of the men. I got the stock of his rifle in my face for my trouble. Spitting blood, I glared at the man.
Brian and I were bundled into a helicopter and I saw Peleus and the Thampthis Box being taken to another. I thought he’d moved as soon as the spotlight hit me, but it was annoying that he was still alive and aggravating that all my shots had gone wild. He wasn’t even limping, the bastard. The man had more lives than a cat.
As we rose into the air, I wasn’t surprised to see that
The Don
and his men were still on the ground. I saw Mike staring after us in bemusement, probably wondering what exactly was going on. This hadn’t been their fight in the first place and they’d come through for me in the end. I was glad they were leaving the battlefield alive and in one piece. Good old humanity. Even their crooks do something right once in a while. It was one of the things that made me like them so much, that and their cinema.
Brian and I sat on one side of the helicopter and our captors the other. Their guns were pointed at us. They made no attempt to remove their helmets or engage us in conversation, undoubtedly terrified that I would be able to identify them and come looking for them later. They had good reason to be terrified because I was very angry with them.
“What’s going on? What’re the FBI going to do with us?” Brian shouted.
“Nothing, these aren’t the FBI. And don’t try to shift, the cuffs will stay locked to you,” I shouted back over the noise of the engine. I don’t know who built the first helicopter, but I was certain he died as deaf as a post.
“Not the FBI?” Brian screamed back.
“Fey. Working for the Council.”
Brian nodded, though I was sure he didn’t have a clue what I was talking about. He’d decided that conversation was impossible and it was best to wait until we arrived. That would be a few hours as I was sure we were heading for
Boston
.
There aren’t that many Fey in the world, less than two thousand of us in the
USA
. We had a single headquarters to cover North and
South America
. I helped supervise its construction in the early 1860’s. It was a large building with impressive cellars designed to hold rogue Fey we couldn’t bring ourselves to kill. It was where the Council of the Fey for the continent held court and I was certain it was where we were going.
They woke me up when we arrived. It was morning and grey light shone through heavy cloud cover. As we were bundled out of the helicopter and across the immaculate lawn, I called to Brian.
“Welcome to
Boston
. You ever been here before?”
Brian shook his head.
“It’s a nice place, except it sometimes feels like you’re in
England
, which always struck me as odd.”
Another rifle butt drove me to the ground and I gave the man wielding it one of my best stares. He was covered head to foot in protective gear and I couldn’t see his eyes, or even that he had eyes.
I growled, “Keep it up. I always repay my debts.”
He stepped back as though I’d hit him and another one of them helped me to my feet. As I expected, we were taken to the cellars and thrown into a cell. At least they took off our handcuffs before they chucked us in. The metal door slammed shut behind us and we were alone.
The room was lit by a single electric light bulb dangling from the stone ceiling. There was no on/off switch. Beside the door were two metal grills, one near the ceiling and one close to the floor. They were ventilation holes bored through a solid six inch thick steel block. My idea, no amount of shifting would get you through one of those.
I had reason to be pleased when I saw they hadn’t stripped out the elegant metal gas mantels that once provided the lighting in the cell. They looked like twin candleholders and I’d taken a lot of trouble in their construction. The wall they were on was raw brickwork that looked as though it had been untouched since 1862 when the Council opened the building for business.
There was a toilet bowl and washbasin at one end of the cell and two single beds at the other. All the comforts of home.
“What are they going to do to us?” Brian asked.
I shrugged, “It’s unimportant. The only question that matters is what they do with Peleus and the Box.”
He grinned. “I thought you worked for the Hawks?”
I laughed. “The Hawks and the Council are very different. The Council enforces our laws, tries to keep the worlds of the Fey and humanity apart and generally makes life difficult for me.”
“Have we broken many laws?”
I closed my eyes for a second as I thought. “Killed and injured several humans, robbed a museum, exposed our abilities to the Mafia, though I not sure that one counts, went to war with another Fey, and last but not least, tried to killed another Fey.”
“A slap on the wrist and they’ll let us go?”
“Have you ever been spanked?” I asked amused by his cheeky grin.
“I prefer to give rather than receive.” Not a hint of a blush, the kid does
straight-face
really well.
“Close enough,” I said, starting to take off my clothes. He was quick on the uptake and was out of most of his before I reached him.
We were still at it forty minutes later. The boy’s stamina was coming on well and he could spank
hard,
I’m very pleased to say. The door opened just as I managed to get on top to ride him cowgirl fashion.
A Fey who had stopped ageing in her mid-twenties stood watching us with a frown of disapproval on her face. She wore a power-suit that was more eighties than twenty-first century. It’s one of the things that give us away, our tendency to be behind the times. Her frown increased as I upped my tempo on Brian and showed no signs of stopping.
“My name is Ms Downs. Do you have to do that?” Despite her tone, I could see from the way she licked her lips and squeezed her thighs together that she was appreciating the action.
“I missed the opportunity when I shifted back last night.”
“But surely you…to yourself…after it happened?”
I enjoyed her discomfiture. Fey are heavily influenced by human culture and the last few hundred years have been very straight-laced. It looked as though she was young and unable to call a spade a spade. I shook my head and watched the look of horror spread across her face. Not being able to obtain relief after shifting is a recurring nightmare for us.
She pulled herself together and stared at the toilet rather than me as she addressed me.
“The Council has asked me to inform you that you and your consort will face several charges as a result of your recent activities. The most serious of these is that of attempted murder of another Fey. They are prepared to reduce these charges if you are willing to provide them with information about the Thampthis Box.”
I stopped moving and Brian moaned in disappointment. I stroked his face as I stared at Ms Downs and felt my anger rise.
“There is nothing to say about the Thampthis Box except that it was a gift to me from a pharaoh a long time ago.”
Ms Downs became flustered at the strength of my anger. “I’ll tell them. They’ll want to speak to you in person.”
I nodded. Brian had lost the moment and I felt him slip from me. The girl knocked on the cell door and turned back to me before it opened.
“They say you were worshipped as Aphrodite. Is that true?”
I smiled at her eagerness and memories flooded through my mind as my anger slipped away. “Some of her statues were carved in my likeness, but a girl wearing a sword is never going to be seen as a goddess of love.”
She nodded and I knew she wanted to hear more. However, the door opened and she had to go. I saw the reluctance in her eyes as she pulled herself away from us.
“You were a Greek goddess?” Brian asked.
“I’ve been more goddesses than I care to remember, and how dare you collapse on me? A girl has her pride.”
He levered himself up on his arms and stared down at the sorry sight.
“Perhaps if you…”
I had already thought of that and lowered my head.
“Eeiii,” he yelped.
“Never forget that goddesses have teeth,” I said primly like a schoolteacher. It was an important lesson the Council would be wise to remember.
Then I resumed my activity and Brian sighed with pleasure.
You would have thought the Council could have installed a shower in the cell when they put in the electricity. After my long sweaty session with Brian I needed better washing facilities than a sink with cold water could provide. Humanity prides itself on inventing spaceships, airplanes and the computer, but their greatest invention is the power-shower followed closely by the Jacuzzi. Let no one tell you different.
I stood precariously with one foot in the sink and the other on the floor trying to clean bits that other positions wouldn’t reach. Brian lay on the bed watching my naked antics. A man can clean himself adequately with a wet cloth in a pinch, but it just doesn’t work for a girl.
“Stop laughing at me,” I cautioned him.
“Can’t help it,” he admitted sheepishly before rolling over and convulsing silently. At least he made the effort to turn away.
The cell door opened and Ms Downs walked in. She took in my situation with a glance and then proceeded to ignore it.
“The Council wishes to see you both. Do you need a delay or should I wait while you get dressed?”
“Wait,” I said before Brian could tell her to go away. “Get dressed,” I commanded him. Rather than try and hide his nakedness, Brian made a point of revealing himself fully to Ms Downs as he stood up from the bed. He put his hands on his hips and pulled in his tummy.
“You have good taste,” Ms Downs told me.
“Have you worked for the Council long?” I asked her as I slipped my panties over my wet skin. The air was warm and I’d soon dry out.
Ms Downs looked embarrassed. “Only for the last ten years. I’m very young, less than a century old.” She made youth sound like a curse.
“Brian’s sixteen, but I suspect he’d make a better councilor than those we’ve got. Refresh my memory, Ms Downs. I haven’t been in contact with the Americas Council for decades.”
The girl blushed. “Call me Cathy. They all know you. The Head of the Council is David Mersey, of course.”
I looked at her blankly as the name meant nothing to me.
“I believe you knew him as Nevin?”
I nodded. Nevin and I met during the early days of the
Roman Empire
. We’d travelled together for a time. He hadn’t shown any inclination to seek power back then. He hadn’t been a member of the Americas Council at the beginning of the nineteenth century, which was the last time I’d had any dealing with them. I wondered why he’d decided to get involved in Fey politics; I’d have thought he had more sense.
“The other two Councilors are much younger. Greta Hoon and Peter Yorn, but they’ve been on the Council forever.”
“I met them both when this house was being built. It was Greta who persuaded me to get involved at the time, though I dislike all the Councils, whichever continent they’re administrating.”
Greta was a little over a thousand years old and Peter about eight hundred. It wasn’t surprising that I knew all the Council members even though it was well over a hundred years since I’d had any contact. There were very few Fey and I got around.
Cathy looked surprised. “But didn’t you start the Councils back in Ancient Greece?”
I pulled on my trainers and laughed. “The Councils can be useful, but we only need them because the Fey sometimes forget their role. Give anyone power, even the best Fey, and it goes to their heads eventually.”
Brian chose that moment to enter the conversation with a thought of his own. “If you’re the oldest of the Fey, shouldn’t you be in charge?”
“Bite your tongue!” I said, a bit more abruptly than I’d intended.
Cathy giggled at the thought. “Cear Lotha has always refused to serve.”
“I very much doubt they’re going to invite me to take charge of them today,” I said sourly.
As we were ready, Cathy knocked on the cell door and we were let out. Two guards followed a safe distance behind us with their guns aimed at our backs and ready to fire. From the way they behaved my reputation must have preceded me. They looked terrified for all they were the ones carrying the weapons.
The Council sat behind a table on a raised dais. Two wooden chairs faced the table on our side beyond the platform, so we’d have to look up at the Council when we sat down. All three members stood up as I entered the room.
I almost didn’t recognize Nevin. He had allowed himself to age into his forties and he looked wearier than I’d ever seen him. I don’t know why people seek power if that’s what it does to them. Greta and Peter looked much as I had last seen them in 1901, though Peter had dyed his hair black. Fey dye their hair a lot as it makes us look more human.
“Welcome Cear of the Lotha tribe,” Nevin said in perfect Latin.
“English will do fine,” I replied. “I understand you are David Mersey now, or do you prefer Dave?”
He didn’t smile. “David.”
Greta did. “It’s good to see you again, Cear. I’m sure we can soon clear up this little misunderstanding.”
“You could have asked our permission before embarking on this insane mission, killing humans and stealing artworks,” Peter said defensively.
Now that was a stupid thing to say. “I don’t need your permission to do anything, or haven’t you read your charter?” I wrote that particular charter a long time ago.
David thumped his gavel on the table and sat down. “Our charter is irrelevant, Cear. Times have changed. We have more responsibilities now.”
“Powers you’ve taken without consultation? I’d heard a rumor this Council was overreaching itself.”
David banged his gavel again. Much harder than the last time.
“This Council is not on trial, you are.” his spittle flew between us.
“For what? Doing what I always do by stopping a rogue Fey from trying to rule the world? You saw the damage Peleus did to the Britons last time he tried. Should I let that happen again?” My anger was rising and getting difficult to control. “It was the reason the Council\s were set up in the first place. It’s your job and you did nothing. You should be disbanded.”
“He was hardly going to rule the world,” Greta said calmly. “A science lab and the theft of an ancient artifact don’t make him a super-villain.”
I glared at her. “Your youth and inexperience are showing. There are powers in the universe you know nothing about. I lived in Atlantis, I know.”
David banged his gavel repeatedly. “So the Krius is in that box, you admit it?”
“Surely the Krius is a myth?” Peter asked. “The issue here is whether Cear Lotha broke our laws.”
“The Thampthis Box belongs to either the Egyptian Government or to me,” I shouted. “It is not the property of Peleus and it does not belong to this Council.”
David banged his gavel so hard he broke it. I ducked as part of it flew passed me. “The Thampthis Box belongs to the Council now, as does the Krius, if it’s inside. Such power needs to be in the hands of those who will use it wisely. Guards, take these two back to their cells.”
“That’s the whole point, you moron,” I shouted as the guards pulled me out of the chamber. “No one is wise enough to use such power, especially not an idiot like you.”
When they flung us back in our cell, Brian turned to me in anger.
“What’s going on, Carlotta? You could have taken those guards easily, Fey or not. Why did you let them drag us back in here where we’re helpless?”
What do you know? The boy has a brain and was using it. I pulled him close and whispered in his ear.
“This cell is bugged. I need to find out what they’re up to before I act.”
Then I spoke loudly for the microphones. “They can’t keep me locked up here. They have no case.”
Brian pulled away from me and thumped the wall in frustration. I knew how he felt. When he turned back to face me, he winked.
Some time later the door opened briefly and Greta entered the room. She passed me a piece of paper on which were written the words, ‘Room bugged, be circumspect.’ I nodded and gave her the paper back. To my surprise she put it into her mouth and ate it. She really was taking no chances.
Greta looked over at Brian and smiled at him. “It was a Council decision to keep you from your heritage, young man. But it seems you have come into it in a manner that will become the stuff of legends. Not many Fey have bedded Cear Lotha, and none of them so young.”
“Brian has proved adequate in all respects,” I said grudgingly. I certainly didn’t want him getting a big head over our relationship.
Greta sat on the side of a bed and sighed.
“These are difficult times. The Fey are constantly aware of the climate changes the humans have caused. They breed and destroy without thought for the consequences. The world may soon descend into chaos and we can feel the forces at work. Some think that the time has come for us to act.”
Greta was right about the feelings of doom. We were born from the magicians’ desire to see the tribes of humanity protected. While we didn’t possess their magic, I could feel the winds shifting, the temperatures rising and the storms brewing. It was a shadow of the power the magicians intended us to possess.
Humanity overran the planet and was destroying its balance. I had seen such things before. The shift in climate in Africa and
Egypt
a few thousands years ago, the end of the ice age before it drowned both Atlantis and the fertile plains between
England
and the continent. This time the consequences were going to be so much worse. However, that didn’t mean I agreed with Greta’s solution.
“It isn’t our job. We aren’t here to enslave humanity for their own good. And millions of them will die whatever we do. Do you want their blood on your hands?”
“David wants the Krius. Peleus has convinced him that the Krius is in the box. Philips has reinforced that belief with her claims. David will share the Krius with you if you help him to get it. The Fey can work together.” Greta shook her head as she suggested that David would share the Krius, not that I needed to know it was a lie. Anybody who wanted the Krius didn’t deserve to have it and certainly wouldn’t be willing to share it.
“Where is my box now?”
“In the Vault.”
“Is David working with Peleus?”
“Of course not.” Greta shook her head as she spoke.
“What happens now?”
“If you don’t cooperate, David has decided to let the scientist try melting the box using lasers. Legend says the Krius Scepter in indestructible so it shouldn’t be harmed.”
“And what will he do with us?
“I’ve no idea. You’re much too influential to let you go. Many would do anything you asked, if only because of the legends surrounding you.”
As she spoke she drew her index finger across her throat in an unmistakable gesture. As Greta said, I could easily persuade the Fey to turn against the Americas Council if I was free. David couldn’t risk that. He’d have to arrange a fatal accident.
“I think you should cooperate with David. At least that way you’ll be able to moderate his actions should the Krius turn out to be as powerful as legends say.”
She was shaking her head again.
“Thank you for explaining things, Greta. It’s good to see you again after so many years.”
We shook hands and then she shook Brian’s hand. He’d been watching the interplay between us and I wondered how much of it he’d caught. Probably most of it. He was turning out to be bright for a man.
Right, now that I knew what was going on it was time to escape.