I pushed out the power I'd gathered and called into the thunder and rain, "Godmother! Vente, Leanansidhe!"
A sudden presence appeared beside me, and a woman's voice said, "Honestly, child, it isn't as though I'm far away. There's no reason to shout."
I jerked in surprise and nearly fell into the lake. I turned to my left to face my faerie godmother, who stood calmly upon the surface of the water, bobbing up and down a bit as waves passed under her feet.
Lea stood nearly my own height, but instead of dark contrasts and harsh angles, she was a creature of gliding curves and gentle shades. Hair the color of flame coursed in curls and ringlets to below her hips, and tonight she wore with it a gown of flowing emerald silk, laced through with veins of ochre and aquamarine. A belt made from a twisted braid of silken threads of gold wound around her waist, and a dark-handled knife rested on a slant at her hip through a loop in the belt.
She was one of the high Sidhe, and her beauty went without saying. The perfection of her form was complemented by features of feminine loveliness, a full mouth, skin like cream, and oblong, feline eyes of gold, cat-slitted like those of most fae. She took in my surprise with a certain reserved mirth, her mouth set with a tiny smile.
"Good evening, Godmother," I said, trying for a proper degree of politeness. "You look lovely as the stars tonight."
She let out a pleased sigh. "Such a flatterer. I'm already enjoying this conversation so much more than the last."
"I'm not dying this time," I said.
The smile faded. "That is a matter of opinion," she responded. "You are in great danger, child."
"Thinking about it, I realize I generally have been whenever you were around."
She clucked reprovingly. "Nonsense. I've never had anything but your best interests at heart."
I barked out a harsh laugh. "My best interests. That's rich."
Lea arched a brow. "What reason have you to think otherwise?"
"For starters, because you tricked me out of a big evil slaying magic sword and sold me to Mab."
"Tut," Lea said. "The sword was just business, child. And as for selling your debt to Mab ... I had no choice in the matter."
"Yeah, right."
She arched her brows. "You should know better, dear godchild. You know I cannot speak what is untrue. During our last encounter I returned to Faerie with great power and upset vital balances. Those balances had to be redressed, and your debt was the mechanism that the Queen chose to employ."
I frowned at her for a minute. "Returned with great power." My eyes fell to the knife at her waist. "That thing the vampires gave you?"
She rested her fingers lightly on the knife's hilt. "Don't cheapen it. This athame was no creation of theirs. And it was less a gift than a trade."
"Amoracchius and that thing are in the same league? Is that what you're saying?" Gulp. My faerie godmother was dangerous enough without a big-time artifact of magic. "What is it?"
"Not what, but whose," Lea corrected me. "And in any case, you may be assured that surrendering my claim on you to Mab was in no way an attempt to do you harm. I have never meant you lasting ill."
I scowled at her. "You tried to turn me into one of your hounds and keep me in a kennel, Godmother."
"You'd have been perfectly safe there," she pointed out. "And very happy. I only wanted what was best for you because I care for you, child."
My stomach did a neat little rollover, and I swallowed. "Yeah. Uh. It's very ... you. I guess. In a demented, insane way, I can understand that."
Lea smiled. "I knew you would. To business, then. Why have you called to me this night?"
I took a deep breath and braced myself a little. "Look, I know we haven't gotten along really well lately. Or ever. And I don't have a lot to trade with, but I had hoped you'd be willing to work out a bargain with me."
She arched a red-gold brow. "To what ends?"
"I need to speak to them," I said. "To Mab and Titania."
Her expression grew distant, pensive. "You must understand that I cannot protect you from them, should they strike at you. My power has grown, poppet, but not to those heights."
"I understand. But if I don't get to the bottom of this and find the killer, I'm as good as dead."
"So I have heard," my godmother said. She lifted her right hand and extended it to me. "Then give me your hand."
"I need my hand, Godmother. Both of them."
She let out a peal of laughter. "No, silly child. Simply put your hand in mine. I will convey you."
I gave her a sidelong look and asked warily, "At what price?"
"None."
"None? You never do anything without a price."
She rolled her eyes and clarified, "None to you, child."
"Who, then?"
"No one you know, or knew," Lea said.
An intuition hit me. "My mother. That's who you're talking about."
Lea left her hand extended. She smiled, but only said, "Perhaps."
I regarded her hand quietly for a moment, then said, "I'm not sure I can believe that you're really going to protect me."
"But I already have."
I folded my arms. "When?"
"If you will remember that night in the boneyard, I healed a wound to your head that may well have killed you."
"You only did it to sucker me into getting you the sword!"
Lea's tone became wounded. "Not only for that. And if you consider further, I also freed you of a crippling binding and rescued you from a blazing inferno not twenty-four hours later."
"You charged my girlfriend all her memories of me to do it! And you only saved me from the fire so that you could put me in a doghouse."
"That does not change the fact that I was, after all, protecting you."
I stared at her in frustration for a minute and then scowled. "What have you done for me lately?"
Lea closed her eyes for a moment, then opened her mouth and spoke. Her voice came out aged and querulous. "What's all that racket! I have already called the police, I have! You fruits get out of our hall or they'll lock you away!"
I blinked. "Reuel's apartment. That was you?"
"Obviously, child. And at the market, earlier this eve." She lifted her hand in the air, made an intricate motion with long, pale fingers, and opened her mouth again, as if singing a note of music. Instead, the sound of police sirens emerged, somewhat muted and indistinguishable from the real thing.