Elfhome

“We’ll just call the bets off.” Syn scrambled out of the way of a kick.

“We can’t!” Tommy shouted. “The fucking anal elves and their frigging honor! A bet is a promise to them! If we welshed on the bets, they’d be all over our asses because they know we’re half-oni!”

“Someone is suckering us!”

“Don’t you think that I know that? I’m going to fucking find them and kill them. Spread the word. No more bets!”

#

Whoever planned the strike against them had done it with great precision. It had only taken an hour to close down the books but the damage had already been done. Twenty bets, all at cap, all made within minutes of the phones going dead. Ten thousand dollars with a payoff of half a million dollars.

“The bets are to win,” Bingo pointed out as they gathered at the warren.

“Because to ‘show’ and ‘place’ gave lower odds,” Tommy snapped.

“How the hell do they expect Team Providence to win?” Bingo said. “Team Big Sky was creaming everyone before the elves locked the city down. And there’s Team Tinker, and Team Banzai and Team Eh?”

Tommy had talked to all the teams. They assured him that they were all racing. Some of them might have been lying, in on the scam, but not Team Tinker nor Team Big Sky. They were tied too closely to the honorable elves to cheat, and they were the favorites to win. “Whoever the hell they are, they’ve got something else planned then. They’re going to cheat somehow. We’ve got to find out how.”

9: Thorne Scratch

Oilcan had washed four battered souls, seen that they were dressed in simple gowns, fed, drugged and put to bed. He was trying to determine his obligations to them when Thorne Scratch found him.

“Take the children and go home,” she said.

Her command was fairly clear, but still he said, “I don’t understand.”

“The children can not stay here. Take them and go.”

“Why can’t they stay? Is the staff trying to throw them out? Tinker won’t allow…”

“The Wind Clan is not the problem,” Thorne said. “Forest Moss has learned of the children. He will be here shortly to claim them. He cannot be allowed to take them. Take the children and go.”

He sat down mostly because his knees suddenly didn’t want to support him. “I–I don’t know — all of them?”

Thorne went to her knees in front of him and caught his hands tightly. “Please. He is mad. If the oni did not drive him mad with their torture, then nearly three hundred years of isolation has. He is desperate for physical contact. The prince has given Forest Moss only male Wyverns to guard him, and he has pressed his suit on them. None of Ginger Wine’s staff will be in a room with him with good cause; his actions are as close to rape as they can come and not be worthy of charges. Within an hour of Earth Son’s death, he tried to corner even me. These children can not be given over to him, not after what they’ve been through.”

“Can’t we just tell him no?”

“He’s domana. If he comes prepared for a fight, then only Wolf Who Rules and Prince True Flame could stop him. The Viceroy has no grounds to deny Forest Moss access to the children since they are Stone Clan and the prince would sacrifice them to keep the peace.”

What the hell was he going to do with five children, four of which had just been dragged through hell? But she was right — he couldn’t give them to Forest Moss. They were more than a head count to him now. They were the emotionally fragile Fields of Barley, little Baby Duck who no longer knew her real name and nervously quacked, Rustle of Leaves who only cared that Merry hadn’t been captured despite the fact the oni shattered the young musician’s left arm, and stoic Cattail Reeds. Oilcan knew their names and faces, seen the breadth and width of their strengths and weaknesses. Even Fields of Barley, once he stopped crying, had shown incredible resiliency, but none of them would be able to deal with an adult male demanding intimacy from them.

“Okay. I’ll take them home.” It was a big city. It was unlikely Forest Moss would be able to find him — but the elf did have magic. “How long do I need to keep the kids hidden from Forest Moss?”

“Once they wake and have the situation explained to them, they can choose what to do. If they decide to stay with you, they’ll be safe from him. The Wyverns will not allow a holding to be broken by an outsider.”

“Even if I’m human?”

“A precedence must be set and protected if humans are to be part of our society.”

Knowing that she wasn’t lying to him didn’t help; he also knew that people often deceived themselves into believing they were telling the truth.

#