Page 100 of The Tribes of Magic
He nodded. “Yes. It’s definitely your voice. There’s something in it when you’re controlling the Cursed Ones. A spell of some sort. I haven’t the faintest idea what it is, but there’s something there for sure.”
“There’s some kind of spell in my voice? How can I cast a spell without even knowing it?” I looked at Conner.
He shrugged. “It must be instinctive.”
“Whatever it is, it’s weird,” Harlyn said. “I’ve never known anything, foul or fair, that scares the Cursed Ones. You’re kind of a freak.”
“Thisfreakjust saved your life.”
“Na, supernaturals are immune to the Curse. I was never in any real danger.”
“Which explains why you were hiding in a bush.”
Harlyn didn’t seem to know what to say to that, but he did blush.
“You might be immune to the Curse, but you aren’t immune to fangs and claws and all the damage they do. If we hadn’t come around, the Cursed Ones would have ripped you to shreds.”
Harlyn stood taller, puffing out his chest in indignation. “I can handle three Cursed Ones.”
“Except there aren’tjustthree Cursed Ones out there, are there? There are hundreds of them. You could have picked a better place to hide out.”
“No, I could not. That wily General has soldiers everywhere. There’s nowhere to hide. And I can’t run either. There are only two Spirit Trees within any reasonable distance, and the General’s soldiers have both locked down good and tight.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that. I got past them.” Conner smiled at him.
“You did? How?”
“I set several of the Watchers’ vehicles on fire, and then when they rushed over to put out the flames, I slipped past them under a cloak of invisibility.”
“I can’t make myself invisible.”
“That’s unfortunate.” Conner’s smile stretched wider.
Harlyn grunted. “What do you want?”
“Information.”
“And in exchange, you’ll get me past the soldiers to the Spirit Tree, so I can leave this accursed realm?”
“That can be arranged.”
“All right then. What do you want to know?”
“You can start by telling us who hired you. Who sent you to Gaia?” Conner said.
“No idea. I never saw his face. He was always hiding in the shadows. Like I said, I was just the hired help for the kidnapping, and so was Starling.”
“Where is Starling?”
“No idea. When things went sideways, it was every man for himself, you know? We hightailed our way out of there before the General’s soldiers or the Knights arrived on the scene. I lost track of Starling. But he can’t help you anyway. He didn’t see the man’s face either.”
“But you heard his voice?”
“That’s right,” I said. “You told us you have excellent hearing. If you heard his voice, you would recognize it, right?”
“Sorry, sweetheart. The guy’s not stupid. He knew who he was hiring. He wore one of those voice-modulating devices.”
My hopes deflated.
