Chapter 42: 42__Return of the badass fairy

Maia cracked her knuckles with a sinister smirk on her face as she looked down at Jaxton Black. She was going to teach him the lesson of a lifetime.

“Sit, Ms. Cranberry,” he bit out.

Flicking back her hair, Maia lowered herself onto the chair across him and crossed her arms, back as straight as a rod.

“What are you doing?”

Maia blinked, looking up to see his icy little blue eyes focused on her.

“You told me to sit, didn’t you?” she demanded.

She stared at him. He stared at her.

“What are you doing?” Jaxton asked again, his tone and the look in his eye not changing one bit from when he first posed the question.

Maia gave him a funny look.

“I’m sitting down…”

With an impatient sigh, he pushed himself up and stalked over to her side, towering over her with his six foot frame. Maia blinked as he snatched up a chair, stalked back to his side and dropped it besides his own chair.

He pointed at the chair. “Didn’t I tell you that this is where you should sit?”

She opened her mouth to speak, but he raised a hand. “Save it. Whatever excuses you want to make for your lacking brains. Save it.”

Her mouth curled into a sneer. It was always words like that that made her want to tear apart the book when she’d been reading it. He was such a jerk and for the most unnecessary things.

With a huff, Maia stood and stomped around the table to plop herself crossly onto the chair beside his.

Jax took his seat and immediately swept a tower of folders to her side of the table. “The woman who was just here. Find me every record of dealings we’ve had with her father’s company. Now.”

Maia scowled at the folders then scowled at him. “You mean the skank you were… rocking the table with?” She cringed from the memory. “I thought I’d go blind from what I saw. Anyway, why must I find those records?” A strange thought came into her head like out of someone else’s and Maia frowned. “Don’t tell me you’re planning to find evidence of fraud to threaten her father with once he gets pissed about your breaking his little girl’s heart? Like you did last time.”

Last time? Maia frowned at herself. Had she really assumed this character in the novel? Why did she feel like she was really Elaine Cranberry?

“Once you’re done,” he continued like she hadn’t said a word. “Run across the street to the Deli and get me a cucumber sandwich with black coffee. Make sure to get it right this time. One grain of sugar in that coffee and you’re fired.”

His words had been clipped and his tone precise. Precisely rude, that is. She gave him a look.

“Do it yourself.”

The Maia stared at him after having spoken the bold words, but saw no reaction from him. The man only looked at a document on his desk like she hadn’t said anything.

“Hello?” Maia called, waving a hand vaguely. “Do you hear me?” Was she disappearing again? Would she reappear in some other portal? Oh, no.

A bit of panic seized her heart for a moment, but Maia forced herself to relax. It was fine. As long as she didn’t appear on the Planet of Apes, it would be all good. Not that she couldn’t converse with apes. Sure she could, but she would rather not. They were such a rowdy bunch.

Like the noisy jocks of the animal kingdom.

When Jax only continued reading the document and then began typing on his computer, Maia feared, she really had disappeared.

She leaned forward cautiously and slowly raised a hand to wave it before his face.

Jaxton’s face snapped up to look at her and Maia gasped, snatching back her hand.

“W-what?” she croaked out.

His face was impassive as he looked at her and he, again, dragged forward the same document he’d been reading.

“Once you’re done,” Jaxton said. “Run across the street to the Deli and get me a cucumber sandwich with black coffee. Make sure to get it right this time. One grain of sugar in that coffee and you’re fired.”

Maia blinked.

Done with his monologue, Jaxton picked up the document and began reading from the top, before turning to his computer and typing.

Maia was puzzled.

Had he just repeated his words and actions to the tee and the dot as though he were on stage? What the hell was going on?

*******************

“Maia’s been kidnapped?!” Claudia gasped, forgetting that she had on a mask and slapping her hands to her cheeks.

Cecile pushed her glasses further up her nose in a nervous habit. “B-but… but, I was certain it was you, Master Rogan. You two even… you even seemed to be bickering as usual while you walked off.”

Cassie nodded. “That would have fooled me too, Cecile.”

“Same,” said Claudia.

Rogan shook his head, his hair swaying and brushing his forehead from the movement. “Wasn’t me, Cecile." He looked at her. "Where did they go?”

Cecile shrugged helplessly, her eyes wide behind the wire-framed glasses. “I didn’t see where they went, but they did walk a little along with the crowd away from the Hostel. They could have taken any route from there.”

Rogan ground his molars together, turning away from them as he clutched his hair with both hands, his eyes squeezed shut behind the dark shades.

Aiden eyed him and turned to the women. “Okay, firstly, we should all just calm down. The first thing we need to do is look in, around and outside the kingdom. Question people and try and figure out where the girl could have been taken.”

“I’m going to kill them,” Rogan whispered.

Aiden tensed. “You should calm d—”

“I’m going to fucking kill them!” Rogan repeated, his voice transforming into a non-human growl that made Claudia clutch herself.

“Who’s Rogan going to kill?” asked a voice that sounded like sparkles.

Everyone turned to the stairs and gaped.

“Clove!” gushed Cecile and rushed to the woman’s side and burying her in a mama bear hug. “You’re awake!”

“Suddenly?” said Cassie with a puzzled blink.

Clover smacked a kiss onto Cecile’s cheek before prying her way out of the vice-like hug and hopping down the last few steps.

“Yup!” she said with a flip of her rainbow coloured hair. “I’ve been awake for about a day, but it just felt so good to lay there, getting everything and anything done for me. Ha-ha!”

Claudia’s expression went from relief and joy to rage. “You deceiving like minx!” she growled. “You’re toast!”

Before she could be made toast of, however, Clover had latched onto Rogan’s arm, gazing up at him with rosy cheeks.

“Was it you, Rogan?” she beamed. “Did you save me? With Sorcery, wasn’t it? Or maybe you bit me? That’s why I feel so damn invincible, right? Am I going to be a Vampire now and become your slave to follow your every command?”

Rogan blew out a heavy breath, letting his eyes fall closed. “Do you want to go back to sleep for a month?”

Aiden drew Clover away, eyeing Rogan. “Do not threaten my subjects.”

Cassie scowled and stalked over, pulling Clover out of the King’s grip. *We’re* not a part of your subjects, remember?”

“There’s no time for this!” Rogan barked at them, clicking his tongue. “Can you bicker afterwards?!”

Cassie nodded. “Right! Okay, Cleo and I will check outside of the Kingdom, Cecile can fly over Geminor and look around. Claudia, you stay here and look after the Hostel.”

Claudia pouted at the boring task, but nodded either way.

“I’ll have my guards comb every inch of the Kingdom and question the people on what they’ve seen,” said Aiden.

Rogan nodded, agreeing with the tasks assigned as Clover looked around at them in puzzlement.

“Wait, what’s going on?” she asked flatly. “Aren’t you going to throw a party because I woke up and didn’t die?”

Cleo grimaced. “Not at the moment, kid. Maia’s missing.”

With that, they dispersed, each heading to prepare for his or her task.

“I need to conjure some spirits,” said Rogan. “I want to know exactly what those Shifters are doing.”

With that, he vanished into thin air, leaving Clover to stutter around, looking for anyone to explain the situation to her.

Cassie hurried by and Clover gripped her arm.

“Cass!” she breathed. “What about me?! I don’t want to stay here, I’ve been laying still in that bed for days!”

Cassie smiled sweetly. “In that case, you can comb the gigantic forests with me and Cleo as punishment for pretending to still be in a coma.”

Cleo stalked past to the door, giving a deflated Clover an encouraging pat on the shoulder.

Five minutes later, the Hostel was empty, save Claudia who was carefully rinsing off her mask in the bathroom.

They’d all rushed out to look for Maia, falsely believing that she was still present in their world.

At the moment, they had no reason to believe otherwise. There was nobody to teach them better.

And then there was.

The Hostel front door flew open, slamming against the wall so loudly it made the walls shake.

Claudia squeaked, staring wide eyed at her face in the mirror, half of it still covered in the purple mask and the other half washed.

“What the hell was that?” she whispered to her reflection.

“Cassidy!” came the yell from downstairs.

Claudia frowned, tense with alarm. Didn’t she know that voice?

Carefully, she tiptoed over to the toilet and gripped the plunger. The thing had been used multiple times and was gross enough to scare away even an ogre, because, no matter what anyone thought, Unicorns did not shit rainbows. Clover had proven that.

Claudia inched her way to the upstairs hallway, peaking over the wooden banister at the silent Hostel living room.

“Cassidy!” came another shout.

Claudia jumped, nearly dropping her plunger. It was at moments like these that she really cursed her Gemini form for having no frightening or monstrously strong powers.

Making up her mind to attack first, she hurried down the stairs as silently as she could until she came to the Hostel front hall where she froze, her eyes wide.

Before her stood a black denim and boot-clad body of sexy tattoos and piercings which, to Claudia’s eternal horror, was all too familiar.

The woman grinned her mega-watt smile and ran a black-nailed hand through her short black hair. “Hello, Seductress. You missed me?”

Claudia gulped. “F-fairy… Fairy Godmother.”

The woman threw back her head and let out laughter that sounded like the rumbling of a stormy sky. “Oh, honey,” she said. “Call me Laurel.”