The silence was surreal.
“Okay,” she said to fill the silence. “That’s a wrap.”
The EIA officer in charge was a big, square-jawed idiot from Eastern Europe. His nametag identified him as Lieutenant Juhan Kukk. He spoke with a heavy accent and lapsed into his own language when addressing his men. He quickly proved that in addition to being a newcomer to Pittsburgh he was both racist and sexist. He ignored Jane because she was a woman and Taggart because he wasn’t white enough. He focused all questions and demands at Geoffrey. Jane really wanted to punch him but kept her fists close to her side.
At least the idiot didn’t try to take Taggart’s camera. He did take all their weapons and had Marc handcuffed after failing to stare down her younger brother.
Worse, Sparrow appeared with sekasha in tow. With elves in attendance, Jane didn’t dare lie but the one person she didn’t want to tell the truth to was Sparrow. Not with the steely-eyed sekasha at her back.
Elves weren’t gender-biased. The female elf knew Jane was the one to deal with. The focus was unnerving. The knowledge that Sparrow could order the sekasha to kill them fluttered fear through Jane. It was one thing to subject her younger brothers to the slow grind of the human legal system, another to expose them to the elves’ swift justice.
“Where did you get this?” Sparrow held up the gossamer call.
The question was in English but Jane answered in Elvish, hoping that any oddity of her story would be discounted as a lack of fluency. Jane cluttered up the story, hiding the truth with other truths. “There was an oni calling the monsters into the city with a whistle. He was making them attack Bowman—the police officer—he’s married to our cousin. The daughter of our mother’s aunt. They’re going to have a baby. The oni was on the roof of the PPG building. My people shot at him, trying to stop him before the monsters killed our cousin’s husband. He fell from the roof.”
She stopped there, leaving it to seem as if they’d gotten the oni’s whistle.
If Sparrow had given the oni the gossamer call, she would realize that Nigel’s instrument didn’t match the oni’s. She wouldn’t be able to prove it without exposing herself. It was a dangerous game of bluff poker.
Sparrow studied her with maddening calm. The female was like some snow queen, dressed in a tight frosty-blue fairy-silk gown and blond hair braided with ribbons and flowers. What was going on behind that beautiful exterior? This female had tried to murder Windwolf and most likely had been behind Tinker’s kidnapping. Yet she stood unconcerned among the deadly sekasha. She had to be very good at this game.
Sparrow flicked a hand to indicate Bertha. The EIA had righted the Humvee. The cannon looked undamaged. “Where did you get this weapon?”
“My father left it to his children. I do not know where he got it. He was afraid that a wyvern or a dragon might attack the city while Wolf Who Rules was not nearby.”
Kukk’s bigotry meant he wasn’t happy that the elves had taken over the conversation. “It doesn’t matter how they got it, it’s illegal. The treaty states that individuals can’t import heavy weaponry onto Elfhome.”
“I didn’t import it,” Jane stated calmly as she could.
Kukk plowed on with the charges. “It’s against city ordinances to fire weapons within a hundred and fifty yards of any residential structures. Our downtown headquarters looks like Swiss cheese. There’s a dead man—who may or may not be oni—splattered on the sidewalk.”
If this idiot got her brothers killed, Jane would make sure he was dead before she went down. “What does it matter if he was an oni or a human or an elf? He was calling the monsters into Market Square. What other reason would he be on the rooftop of that building before dawn?”
“Why were you there?” Sparrow countered.
“We’d promised Director Maynard to kill the monsters. When we heard the report that our cousin’s husband was pinned, we rushed to save him.”
Sparrow pulled out more damning evidence. “You were at the hospital when the oni prisoner escaped.”
The sekasha’s eyes narrowed dangerously. Jane realized that the conversation served no purpose except to sway the holy warriors into acting. If that was the game that Sparrow wanted to play, then Jane could too. In fact, as a TV show producer, she could play it very well. This was, after all, media propaganda.
“Like we told Director Maynard, one of our people had been wounded by a saurus two days ago. His wounds became infected and we took him to be treated. The staff there told us about the tengu. The people of Earth have no idea what the elves are fighting. The only pictures of oni are dead ones. If the people of Earth are to help the elves protect their world, then they have to know what the elves are fighting. An interview with a human turned into a crow, her body twisted by magic, would have been compelling evidence against the oni. She’d stolen a scalpel and gotten free of her restraints before we arrived.”
“Hal Rogers set one of my men on fire,” Kukk complained.
“Hal set himself on fire earlier this week,” Jane pointed out. “He’s accident-prone. I normally don’t allow Hal access to anything that can start a fire because of it. Your man provided Hal the flammable materials. We put him out. He was relatively unharmed.”
“Relatively?” Kukk growled.
“It was an accident which Private Tapper was equally responsible for.” Jane came as close to lying as she dared. She was sure, though, that Hal couldn’t have started the fire without a lighter from the private. “We promised Director Maynard to hunt down and kill the monster. We’ve killed six. There might be more.” Sparrow’s face tightened and Jane knew that was the right track to take. “There was a nest with several hundred eggs at Sandcastle. We’re fairly sure there are two more nests. There could be as many as four more. Those need to be located and destroyed.”
“You have broken the treaty…” Sparrow started.
“If these humans were born in Pittsburgh,” the leader of the sekasha stated quietly, “then they have not broken the treaty.”
“I am the husepavua, Dark Harvest,” Sparrow said.
“And I’m Second of First Hand.” Dark Harvest cut her short. “We are at war. My decision stands. She and her younger brothers were born here. They are ‘natives’ of Elfhome. As such, they are allowed any weapon needed to defend their home.”
“That section refers only to the rights of elves,” Kukk said.
“If you believe that, then you have misunderstood the wording,” Dark Harvest said.
Jane gasped as she realized that traitorous Sparrow had most likely had a hand in translating the treaty into human law. Of course the oni would want the humans only lightly armed.
“Let them go,” Dark Harvest commanded.
“They broke multiple human laws,” Kukk stated.
“Idiotic laws.” Dark Harvest waved away Kukk’s objections. “Monsters do not cooperate and stay outside of the limit you stated. They had no choice. You will not punish them for this. Take off the restraints.”
They fled the North Side. After a stop at Market Square to film the dead namazu there, they headed to Mount Washington to meet up with the production trucks. Jane was glad that Marc was driving; her mind was in a whirlwind. What did she really know about anything? What did the treaty really say—at least as far as the elves were concerned? How many Pittsburghers were actually oni? How many nasty surprises like the namazu did the oni have scattered in the abandoned corners of the city? She wasn’t even sure of things like how Maynard ended up as director of the EIA, which left the question of his loyalties dangerously unclear.