“You can see her!” I exclaimed in delight.
“Wow,” she whispered, “that’s a faerie.”
I harrumphed. “Gold star for you.”
“What’s the matter with her?” she asked me out of the side of her mouth. She reached forward as if she intended to poke Lorien, who was still lying prone on the coffee table, clutching her sides in fading mirth as the last of the hiccup-bubbles popped out of existence.
Lorien guessed Sunny’s intention and darted upright and away from her to hover next to my glass with a fierce glower. “Hey! Watch the poking there, Sunshine!”
“Sorry!” Sunny said contritely, jerking her hand back, but continuing to stare at Lorien in fascination.
Lorien brushed herself off and righted her jug on the table with a disgruntled expression.
“So sparkly…so pretty,” whispered Sunny in a fawning voice.
I looked at her askance as she made another grab for Lorien, who again darted out of the way.
“Oh, for the love of the Seelie Court! She’s a grabby one, isn’t she?” Lorien, apparently having recovered from her inebriation, zipped over to hover in front of Sunny’s face. She made a snapping motion and a colorful burst of sparks exploded from her fingertips, making Sunny blink in rapid succession.
“What the…” Sunny muttered, her eyes sharpening into focus. She shook her head as if to clear it. “What happened?”
“Faerie magic.” I grinned. “Makes us humans go a bit addle-brained. You just needed a little fire dust to jolt you back into reality. You’re lucky you didn’t get any up your nose.”
Sunny’s eyes followed Lorien with avid curiosity as she scooped up another jug of champagne and settled herself back on the edge of the coffee table.
“Don’t you think you’ve had enough? Just a minute ago you were rolling around on the table spewing bubbles and cackling like a lunatic,” I pointed out.
“I have a quick metabolism.” Lorien shrugged.
I followed her lead and topped off both the Waterford flutes with the remaining champagne, gently placing Sunny’s in her hand. She looked a bit stunned and I knew exactly how she felt.
“What was that you said before…‘for the love of some kind of court’?” I asked, wondering about the unfamiliar phrase.
Lorien looked at me without comprehension for a moment, then said, “Oh, you mean ‘for the love of the Seelie Court’? Right. That’s an expression you might hear me use when, say, some lumbering human comes along and tries to crush me in her sticky, oversized hand.”
She shot a dirty look at Sunny, who had the grace to appear chagrinned.
“What’s the Seelie Court?” I asked.
Lorien blinked at me in astonishment and shook her head. “Sometimes I forget how woefully ignorant you humans are.”
“Thanks,” I drawled. “I guess I neglected to read that comprehensive guide to the faerie world you gave me.”
“You have a ‘Comprehensive Guide to The Faerie World’?” Sunny whispered in amazement.
I gave her a half shake of my head to let her know I was kidding. She looked a little crestfallen.
“Here’s a lesson, then,” Lorien drawled. “The Seelie Court is the most powerful body of faerie folk in existence. Simply stated, its members are responsible for keeping the balance of good and evil in check. Without them, the magical entities aligned with evil would take control and chaos would overcome all the realms. You humans wouldn’t stand a chance.” She snorted derisively.
Lorien intercepted the look of shock Sunny and I shared and folded her arms over her chest, her still-dangling bare feet twitching out an annoyed rhythm. “What—did you think faeries just flitted about all day watching to make sure you got a good parking spot? Humans,” she grumbled, “they always think they’re the center of the universe.”
“What kinds of evil entities?” I asked, ignoring her slight.
Lorien took a swig from her jug, throwing her free hand up as if to indicate that there were too many to list, and then surreptitiously using it to cover another bubble-inducing hiccup.
“There are a few races that are predisposed toward evil…trolls and goblins, for instance, are generally rather nasty creatures.” She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “But anyone or thing can align themselves with evil—mortal and immortal alike.”
“Well, death djinns must be evil, right?” I asked slowly, a thought beginning to form in my muddled brain.
“Yeah,” Sunny agreed, catching on. “Anyone who tries to steal your soul must be evil. I bet this Seelie Court would overturn Balthus’ contract in a flash!”
Lorien pursed her lips and gave us an apologetic look. “I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. Balthus’ contract for Sydney’s soul was legal. And the Seelie Court isn’t like one of your human courts of law—they don’t deal with such mundane matters.”
“Mundane?” I sputtered.
“As much as I don’t want to see you lose your soul, Sydney, I guarantee you the Seelie Court isn’t going get involved in the details of a standard death djinn contract,” she replied ruefully.
“But Balthus was arrested—he’s a criminal!” I insisted.
“And for that, he’ll go before the king of his tribe and a tribunal assigned by the Court to answer for any laws he’s broken. I have it on good authority that he was arrested for being in possession of an unaligned soul. It was just lucky for you that Agent Sparrow stopped him when he did.” She shot me a meaningful glance.
“Unaligned soul?” I asked, shuddering at the reminder of how close I’d come to becoming Balthus’ eternal sex slave.
“A living soul that’s lost its ties to a mortal body—kind of like a lost soul, I guess you’d say. There are strict guidelines for the soul trade. A soul can only be legally taken if a mortal has willingly given it up. It’s possible to take an unwilling soul, of course, but only a dark mage would attempt such a thing. Possession of an unaligned soul is a serious crime.”
“Sydney wouldn’t willingly give up her soul!” Sunny cried. “And you just said that if it’s not willingly given, no death djinn can legally take it. They can’t hold her hostage forever to a wish she doesn’t even want, can they? Can’t we talk to the king of the tribe, or whoever, and get the contract cancelled?”
Lorien grunted, earning frowns from both of us. “You want to appeal to the king of the death djinns in order to overturn a contract for which he himself created the terms? His people have been profiting from the soul trade for millennia. You can bet your sweet wand that he’s not going to do anything to jeopardize the legal status of their standard contract.”
My shoulders drooped at her words. I had begun to believe that we were on to something.
“Can’t you at least put a spell on her to keep her from saying the word ‘wish’?” asked Sunny.
I brightened. “That’s a great idea! Why didn’t I think of that?” I beamed at her.
“It would violate the terms of the contract,” Lorien said with a sigh, dashing my hopes yet again. “And before you start racking your brains for more clever little loopholes, she can’t wish for anything that will interfere with the contract, either.”
I was suddenly ashamed that I hadn’t spent the last week thinking up witty third wishes that would outsmart the death djinns and leave my soul, and preferably also my