Page 55 of Tooth and Nail

“Space fairies actually, and I later learned that they were rivals of Oberon and Titania’s. As it turns out—if you believe everything those two tell you which is suspect simply on its face—their rivalry began a long time ago back on their planet or within their star system. They’d lost a big battle of some kind and had escaped to Earth along with their offspring. They intended on starting a new colony here with others who’d come with them.

“They were living up north of us in Visalia and only their space fairie friends knew the new neighbors on the block weren’t human. They pretended to be normal humans, cutting their lawns, having barbeques, and borrowing cups of sugar from their neighbors. They appeared to be a nice couple with triplets. Except when they took their offspring out to vacant land near the Sequoia Forest and met up with other space fairies who’d also come to Earth with their families, no one knew who and what they were.”

“What did they do on this vacant land?”

Eoghan smirked. “They did what you’d imagine fairies were good at. They ate too much sugar, drank too much sweet wine and honeyed drinks, and had massive orgies with other space fairies.”

“With their kids there?” Ari sounded utterly astonished and almost before the words left Eoghan’s mouth, he knew Ari should be right to be alarmed.

“Well, their kids weren’t kids. They were offspring but they were fully grown. To their neighbors, they looked like an older couple with three adult kids who still lived at home with their folks. The Agency puts the age of Oberon and Titania at around eight hundred and their offspring at about five hundred.”

“Years?” Ari exclaimed.

“Yes, years,” Eoghan replied. “So, you see, having the kids at an orgy was no biggie.”

“I should say not.”

Eoghan chuckled. “Anyway, I had gone on this date.”

“Yes, sorry for interrupting. Please go on.”

“We were in a dark parking lot, walking to my car when suddenly we were attacked. My date, Devon, was killed. I was the lucky one. I was hit over the head and passed out but not before I got a glimpse of my attacker.”

“How awful,” Ari said, reaching across the console where he took Eoghan’s hand.

Eoghan looked over at him and offered a small smile as he squeezed his partner’s fingers. The expression on his face was so sad.

“Thank you. It was scary as hell, though. Space fairies in their true forms are the most hideous things I think I’ve ever seen. They make Carmine the alien, Charlie has locked up down in the tombs, look like a kitten you’d want to snuggle.” He turned to look at Ari and saw the man’s jaw hanging open.

“You’re kidding. That scaly ten-foot-tall creature with the rattler on his tail and fangs? That guy?”

“Yes,” Eoghan said. “Anyway, space fairies are about as far away from what we think of as a fairie as they can be.”

“You’re telling me a space fairie is no Tinkerbell,” Ari said with amusement.

“No.” Eoghan shook his head emphatically. “Let me put it this way. What I saw was basically an oblong head, a mouth full of a hundred, pointed teeth, a two-foot-long blue tongue, three clawlike fingers on each hand, and a bulbous body that looks like a python who’s just swallowed an antelope.”

“Oh, my God!”

“Yeah, imagine one of those coming at you. If I hadn’t been hit on the head by something, I would have probably had a heart attack. It was just hideous. Oddly enough, though, I remember their fairie forms undulating…almost as if…” He trailed off, trying to remember what he’d seen all those years ago. It still didn’t make any sense to him. “It was almost like they were having trouble holding a solid form.” Eoghan shook his head. “Anyway, it didn’t make sense then and it doesn’t make any more sense now.”

“So, these things attacked you, and killed your date but why?”

“Well, it turns out that my date looked a lot like the I.S.R. marshal which had been assigned to work with Oberon and Titania on the disappearance of one of their three triplets. Anyway, while it was true that DevonwasI.S.R., he worked in IT with Night, the snow leopard shifter you met. He’d never worked in the field.”

“How awful for him and for the other marshal. Does that guy still work in the office?”

“No, that agent was Tony Alvarez and he transferred out of the I.S.R. back to the civilian Marshals Service after the incident. Anyway, the offspring, whose name was Miranda, had been dragged into the Sequoia Forest—completely unnoticed—during one of the family outings on the vacant land nearby. Basically, while Mom and Dad were fucking other space fairies, their kid was snatched.”

“Their five-hundred-year-old kid,” Ari said with a chuckle.

Eoghan chuckled. “Yes. Anyway, since the rivals of those two were the ones who had captured, tortured, and as it turns out, murdered Miranda, they couldn’t take a chance that the I.S.R. marshal assigned to helping them find the offspring would somehow point fingers back at them. So, in a case of mistaken identity, they killed my date, Devon, the innocent guy from the IT department who just happened to work for the same marshal service where Tony Alvarez worked. And during the attack, I just happened to get in the way and was left for dead along with my date. I was lucky to have survived.”

“God, that’s awful. It’s so sad to think that Devon was killed just because he looked like an I.S.R. marshal. We sign up for these assignments, the guys who work for IT definitely do not.”

Eoghan frowned. “Yes, and sadly enough, when I saw a picture of Deputy Marshal Alvarez, I have to agree. He does look strikingly like Devon.”

“So, what happened? How did you end up becoming a U.S. Marshal with the I.S.R. units?”

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