Chapter 89

“You want permission to take Oonagh to S’a a’Fae to look for the deceitful weapon in a concealed vault, the whereabouts of which you have no idea?” Verenestra asked, looking somewhat bemused at the request we had put before her and the small group tasked with the transport to and the archaeology of that blighted world.

“Yes, though Dhunvael has maps which showed the extent of the Oddrassi holdings as well as the reclusive society where Nhuvla lived for a while, so we’re not entirely clueless,” Roxanne replied.

“Is this wise?” Mage Sofya asked. “The technique we use is not something Oonagh knows about and could possibly be used to escape from Jingol once she gets some sort of ability with it.”

“That’s why we’re also proposing some sort of subterfuge,” I added. “We simply use the new Fae cap Artello has designed to block off her magic, disguise the tachyon transference portal as a wormhole entrance and go for it.”

“That might work,” William nodded.

“Yes, it may not completely fool her, but at least she won’t know how we did it,” Verenestra agreed.

“How is the work on S’a a’Fae going?” I asked.

“Steadily. We have repaired the tower where the transfers are made and have removed all items of interest from it,” Dhunvael replied. “We’ve now begun small scale excavations in the ruins of the city of Keldronon, the once capital of that world. Though we have to be careful, as the beasts still attack without warning or mercy.”

“We’re also constructing two quantum driven refrigeration units at the poles to begin to cool down the atmosphere and perhaps return the planet somewhat to what it was in the past,” Verenestra added. “Though this may be the work of centuries.”

“Transferring the heat to space I presume?” I asked.

“Yes,” William nodded. “Though again it will take time as it’s a big planet and it could take decades to lower the temperature by even one degree.”

“A worthy goal,” Roxanne agreed.

“But not relevant to the discussion,” Verenestra stated. “I am reluctant to allow Oonagh any sort of concession or to claim any sort of success in her now life. However as she may be the only one to be able to detect and open any vault, you, reluctantly, have my permission to attempt this. Providing,” she emphasised, “all possible security measures to ensure she does not glean any clue as to how we do this are maintained.”

“This we will do,” Roxanne nodded. “Mage Hermes also wishes to come and observe, he has been most useful in translating the various sub-texts in the works of Nhuvla.”

“Granted. Mage Hermes is not a risk. I will also be sending a Seer along with you to monitor both Oonagh and your progress.”

“Thank you, Queen Verenestra,” Roxanne replied with a formal bow.

“Just keep an eye on Oonagh,” Verenestra warned. “Though I doubt she’ll attempt to escape whilst on S’a a’Fae.”

“We will. We now need to speak to Artello to see how his device is coming along.”

“He has a working version that is portable enough for travel,” William replied.

“Good, we’ll make the arrangements and then contact you, Mage Sofya.”

“We will be ready. I’ll have my Fae staff hide the evidence,” Sofya chuckled.

“No! Absolutely not!” Oonagh raged. “I will not submit to being drugged and taken away from here!”

“It’s the only way you’ll get to S’a a’Fae, because we are definitely not going to show you our refined way of doing it,” I replied.

“Then I will not go!”

“Well then, sooner or later the Vultoqi will get you,” I shrugged.

“Besides, it might be your only chance of a holiday for centuries,” Roxanne added sardonically.

“S’a a’Fae is not a holiday destination! You forget I was born there during the torment!”

“Well then, a nostalgia trip.”

“I. Will. Not. Go!”

“Sorry, that isn’t an option,” I shrugged and raised a finger.

Oonagh slapped a hand to the side of her neck where a dart containing the mild paralytic neurotoxin had hit her before slowly sinking to the ground as I slipped a Null medallion over her head and Roxanne placed the Fae modified Artello cap onto her and let it calibrate.

“Done,” she murmured as the calibration was successful and the device activated.

The look on Oonagh’s face was priceless as I took the Null off and she realised that she could no longer do magic.

“What have you done?” she asked in fearful tones as I cuffed her with some cable ties.

“Prepared you for travel,” I replied. “Would have been much easier if you’d just said yes.”

“I will kill you for this!”

“No, you won’t, not unless you want to go back to the arrondistrium permanently,” I replied as I gently hauled her to her feet and cradled her in my arms. “Ready,” I informed Roxanne as the Drow guard uncloaked.

“Let’s go,” Roxanne nodded as we all teleported to the secure location where the ongoing work on the Fae home-world was done and the transportal ring, using tachyon emitters to enable faster-than-light transportation, was.

The ring itself had been modified by a glamour to look like the original wormhole form that Oonagh had used to banish Arwen to S’a a’Fae.

“It’s ready,” Mage Sofya informed us as she and Verenestra stood watching and smiling slightly at the indignity being performed on Oonagh.

“Thank you,” Roxanne nodded as we were joined by Hermes, Beanfeasa Nesta and Dhunvael, all in Mage designed armour.

“There is armour waiting for Oonagh on the other side,” Verenestra confirmed, “Good luck.”

“Again, thank you,” Roxanne replied as we stepped through and onto S’a a’Fae.

The tower looked in pristine condition compared to the last time I’d been there with Arwen. The wards as well as the crumbling upper platform had been repaired. I gently lowered Oonagh into a comfortable seat, removed her cuffs, placed a Null amulet around her neck and then removed the Artello cap. I gave it to one of the Fae archaeologists who took it away to a safe location where Oonagh couldn’t get at it ... should she be silly enough to try.

Oonagh’s guard then administered the antidote to the neurotoxin before cloaking and I removed the Null medallion.

“There, not so bad was it?” I chuckled.

“I hate you!” was all she said, before standing and catching me off guard with a stinging slap on my face.

“Guess I owed you that one,” I replied with a grin.

“You have armour over there,” Roxanne pointed to a curtained off area. “Put it on and we’ll get busy.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then we drug you again and carry you around to the various sites we intend to search.”

“Fine,” Oonagh muttered, seeing no compromise whatsoever in our eyes.

It didn’t take her long to change, the armour fitted perfectly as it had been designed from earlier scans we’d made. It wasn’t quite in the same class as the battle armour we Mages, Dhunvael and the cloaked Drow guard wore as it had no offensive capability wards built in, though it had all the latest defensive ones.

“Stop staring at me. I feel naked,” an embarrassed Oonagh stated when she emerged.

“You look fine,” I replied. “Now shall we?” I added, pointing to a portal frame.

One of the modifications the Fae had done to the tower had been to set up fixed portals to all the various sites where they were digging for clues as to their past. We had been informed that the one we were taking led to Keldronon, the old Fae capital, and the location for a known Oddrassi complex.

We emerged onto the surface into the almost near black of the S’a a’Fae day as cloud over a mile thick shrouded the planet and kept the heat in. However, as we could now use magic fully, having turned off the dampening field emitting from the tower, we were able to illuminate the area around the portal and soon had our bearings as we trudged over the thick matted vegetation that covered every square inch of the planet.

“Amazing,” Hermes murmured. “Just whereabouts are we?”

“A planet orbiting Kepler 62 in the constellation of Lyra,” I replied. “It’s 1200 light years from Earth, has a mass at least 2.8 times that of Earth, and has a radius of around 1.41 times, not a lot of iron, but quite a bit of magnesium which is why, as it’s part of the Fae make-up, they crumble to dust when they die.”

“Fascinating,” he nodded.

“The Oddrassi compound should be below us now,” Dhunvael announced.

“Detect anything?” I asked Oonagh.

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“Ah, going a bit monosyllabic on us,” I chuckled. “Still, it beats a temper tantrum I suppose.”

“You kidnapped me!”

“Yes, and?”

“Now you expect me to put up with it in good grace?” she huffed.

“No, but I do expect your co-operation. Plus, you can name a fee for your lost time here,” I shrugged.

“A fee?”

“Yes. We didn’t expect you to come here for nothing,” Roxanne chuckled, clearly enjoying the spectacle of the out of sorts former queen trying to maintain a bit of dignity in the Mage form-fitting armour.

“Why didn’t you say so?”

“You refused point blank. We didn’t have time for protracted negotiations, and hence, here you are, kidnapped.”

“I really do hate you all!” she sniffed. “But no, there’s nothing here.”

“Well, onto the next site,” Roxanne shrugged.

The next site turned out to be somewhere I recognised as it was centred over the badly eroded humanoid statue that Arwen and I had trudged past over seven years before. This, apparently, was the site where the reclusive society had been based and was one of the few places where we could actually confirm the presence of Nhuvla.