Into the Woods: Tales from the Hollows and Beyond(89)
Author: Kim Harrison

"Tink’s panties, I don’t know why I’m helping you. You are such a snot."

Trent came to a halt, silently shrugging into the dull green zip-up jacket the man was handing him, then taking the bike helmet, and finally the package. A knot of tension eased as he slipped the small one-by-two-by-four box under his arm. Maybe he could do this.

"You’re not listening to me," Jenks complained as he darted from Trent’s shoulder, his hands on his hips and his disgust obvious. The irate but tiny man took a breath, then hesitated. "Hey, you guys look a lot alike," he said, and the bike courier smiled silently as he gave Trent a pair of sunglasses and, without a word, tossed his short, almost white hair back and strode for the doors leading out to the loading area.

"Pretty close." The soft sound of feet sliding pulled Trent’s eyes back to the bathroom, and he stiffened, turning halfway around as the would-be sniper staggered out, a hand holding a wad of brown paper to his nose. From the loudspeaker came a final boarding call. The assassin spotted the slim shape of a man in black spandex slip through the doors to the platform, and he staggered into a run, his hand slapping his coat where his two-way had been.

"Pretty slick, you mean," Jenks added, seeming to have forgiven Trent as he put the sunglasses on his nose and headed out the King Street entrance. "That’s good planning right there."

"I have the luxury of time." The temperature shifted, becoming warmer, damper as Trent went through the first set of twin doors. Traffic passed, and people intent on getting where they wanted to be. Just as expected, no one noticed him in his courier uniform, and he zipped his dull green jacket up against the possible rain. Risking a look back through the milky windows, he saw the sniper just make the train. Another knot eased, and then he tensed right back up again. He had hardly started. A sleek bike leaned against a nearby rack, chained with a familiar lock, and he strode to it.

"But you’re as sloppy as Rachel," Jenks said loudly, his dust blown away by a traffic-born gust. "Money will get you only so far, and then I’m going to have to work my wings off keeping you alive. Especially if you don’t unplug your sphincters and tell me what you’re doing."

Setting down the box, Trent crouched beside the bike and looked up at Jenks perched on the bike’s rearview mirror. "Unplug my . . . Excuse me?"

Hands on his hips, Jenks lifted his wings in a pixy’s version of a shrug. "Keep thinking I’m fluff, and I’ll kill you myself. I work best when I know what the general theme is." He tracked a passing man. "Quen at least took me seriously. Let me do my job."

The lock clicked open, and Trent stood, tossing it to the side, unneeded. It would be better if the rain would hold off for an hour or so, but what were the chances of that?

"I can do more than look pretty here!" Jenks shouted, darting back off the bike as Trent fit the package in the saddlebag and swung his leg over.

"I could have made sure that you beaned the right guy," Jenks continued as Trent took his round fabric cap from his belt pack and lined his bike helmet with it. "Saved you five minutes right there. Did you know the camera sweeps are only once every three minutes? You could have been invisible, but nooooo! Ignore the pixy! No dust off my ass, but if you aren’t alive to help Rachel tomorrow, I’ll be pissed."

"It was a negligible risk." Trent fastened his helmet under his chin, not needing to adjust the straps. "By the time someone looks at the tapes, it will be too late."

"You were lucky!" Jenks shouted, loud enough to make a passerby glance up, mildly curious at seeing a pixy arguing with a courier. "You could be dead on the tile right now, leaving Rachel up crap creek without her Kalamack life preserver." The pixy darted close, and Trent refused to back up as a silver dust tickled his nose. "We need to get one thing straight, cookie fart," Jenks said, poking his nose with the tip of his sword. "Either you include me, or you don’t. Tell me now so I can catch the next train south and maybe get there in time to save her ass. I’m not here for you, not here for your elf quest, and not for whatever bauble we’re stealing back from your old girlfriend. I’m here to keep you alive so you can help Rachel."

Squinting at the pixy, Trent sat where he was, wanting to move but forced to deal with this first. Having to explain himself was almost as bad as someone telling him no without options. But he’d been accused of being too hard to work with before, and learning the knack of seeming to include others in his decision making even when he wasn’t would be good in the long run. Or so Quen said.

"Well?" the pixy snarled, and Trent quashed a sudden feeling of angst.

"It’s not a ring we are stealing. It’s my child."

Jenks choked, dropping three inches before finding the wind beneath his wings. Embarrassed, Trent pushed the bike in motion, checking behind him before taking the low curb and entering into traffic. He could hear pixy wings, but he kept his eyes forward, an increasingly familiar feeling of repressed unease seeping into him as his legs took on the stress of a hill. He shifted the gears and stood up on the pedals, the bike swaying from side to side with his weight. He should have worked harder to keep Ellasbeth happy, but by God, the woman was bitter, vindictive, and so smart that she couldn’t get a joke.

"Child?" Jenks said, flying backward two feet in front of him. "You mean like a baby?" He checked behind him and rose up as Trent went around a parked car. "You and Ellasbeth, right?" he asked as he dropped back down. "Eewww . . ."

Trent kept pedaling, his breathing quickening. This had been a mistake.

"He’d be what, five months?" Jenks asked from behind him, drafting. "The marriage Rachel broke up was to make an honest woman out of her? Damn!"

"She’s three months," Trent said, recalling the baby sites he’d been lurking on. She wouldn’t even be sitting up yet, just learning how push up on her palms and possibly reach for things. "The marriage was to solidify the East and West Coast clans divided by the Turn. Lucy is the physical show of that, and whoever raises her will chart the next thirty years until she can do it herself. Ellasbeth would keep us hiding, and to survive the resurgence of our numbers, we must have the strong feeling of community that coming out of the closet would give us."

The pixy whistled, and Trent sat down as the hill crested, easily coasting with traffic. Worry furrowed his brow. He’d been raised by nannies and paid caretakers. His mother and father had been loving but distant figures. He wanted to be more than that to his daughter.