The message clicked off, and I scrambled to save it, exhaling when I hit the right button. Snapping the phone closed, I slumped back to stare at the empty rafters with not a speck of dust or cobweb on them. Frustrated, I tossed the phone to the table for Jenks to debug later. I'm glad she believed me, but what good was it going to do?

Sighing, I levered myself up and headed back to the kitchen to finish up the plans. I wasn't keen on testing Trent's security, but I didn't have much of a choice. I had to get my shunning removed. To do that, I had to survive the coven. They weren't going to back down unless I got Trent to vouch for me without signing that lame-ass paper of his. Which meant blackmail at the worst, and uneasy truce at the best. I was hoping for the truce, but after that Pandora charm had gone deadly, I didn't have a problem with the blackmail.

Getting into Trent's fortress was going to be the easy part. Getting out would be the kicker. But having Ivy and Jenks with me would make this as easy as falling off a log.

Right into the pit of snakes.

I'd never been to Trent's primary stables, just his foaling stables a stone's throw away. But the rough-cut boards and smell of hay still felt familiar after the Pandora charm, even if the memory had almost killed me. It made stealing from Trent really easy on my conscience. Stupid elf. I waited in the glow of the security light, feeling exposed with my back pressed against the vertical boards. There was no moon, but there was nowhere to hide either, and I listened to a sitcom come down from an open window on the second floor. Breeding racehorses, Trent forced an early April foaling, so the staff on hand here would be correspondingly small.

Ivy was a shadow at the corner of the building. Jenks, Jax, and Nick were at the window beside me, more of a door, really, where they tossed the hay in. It was locked, of course, with sensor pads. The pixies were trying to find the right amount of electricity to keep the circuit closed even when it was open. They'd been at it long enough to make me nervous. It never took Jenks this long. The entire job was being run like it was a damn committee, and I hated it.

"Are we there yet?" I whispered, and Jax's wings spilled a silver dust. Sighing, I leaned back and fingered my belt pack, holding a couple of pain amulets, the three potion vials—and Trent's dad's hoof pick. I was hoping that if I gave it back, Trent would realize that it was a game and not kill me outright. Even if Pierce hadn't melted my splat gun, I wouldn't have brought it. If I got caught, it wasn't going to be with a potentially lethal weapon on my person. Using my splat gun without the backing of a warrant would put me in jail faster than Bis could hit Pierce's tombstone with a wad of spit, game or no. Any charm I used would leave a trace that the I.S. could track right back to me. I was going in almost naked, and not happy about it.

It was almost three, right when pixies and elves were about to wake up and witches about ready to crash. Crashing sounded good. I was tired. Evading Vivian this afternoon had been harder than I'd thought it would be. We'd finally resorted to jumping stores in the mall until we all went out different delivery entrances to take the bus to one of Ivy's friends. His car had gotten us to the interstate, and from there, we'd walked in across the pastures where they couldn't use motion detectors because of the horses. Everyone had an Achilles' heel, and apparently Trent's was his horses.

"Got it," Jenks said, making a quick circle around me before darting off to get Ivy. Nick gave me a toothy smile as he carefully opened the wooden door, hesitating to allow Jax to oil the hinges with pixy dust when they squeaked. A horse nickered at the new draft, and we froze, listening as the muted conversation from upstairs continued and the laugh track exploded. The pixies vanished inside, and Nick leapt easily to the sill, disappearing soundlessly.

Alone with Ivy, I exhaled in worry. I didn't like how many people it was taking to do this, but I wasn't going to miss out, and Ivy wouldn't let Nick and me do this alone.

Her hair in a black scrunchy, Ivy vaulted easily through the black window. Her hand without the cast came out, and I took it, using it to find my way inside.

I felt like a thief as I landed, my dew-wet running shoes quiet on the swept concrete. The fragrant hay made towers around us, and the soft, inset lighting of the stables was enough to see by. Jax was gone or not moving, but Jenks came close, landing on my shoulder to whisper, "We've got the alarms disabled and the cameras on a loop. Ivy's going to take care of the two guys and the vet upstairs. Hang tight."

I nodded as I took the cloth that Ivy had used to wipe her shoes. Calm and confident, she headed into the aisle and to the heavily polished stairway to the living quarters. There were inlaid lights on each step, and it looked far too fine to be in a stable. Arm swinging, Ivy looked more like she was crossing a bar to get a drink than going to knock out three men without raising an alarm. But having Jenks with her meant it wasn't going to be an issue.

A horse blew at us, and after handing Nick the cloth to wipe down the floor where we'd come in, I went to calm the animal, finding he was free in a nice-size box stall. The horse wouldn't come to me, but at least his ears pricked.

For no reason I could see, the hair on the back of my neck rose, and the horse's ears went back. "How you doing?" Nick whispered, right freaking behind me.

I tried not to jump, but I figured he knew he'd startled me by his smile when I turned. "I have done this before. Nic-k," I said tightly.

He went to say something, but our attention went to the ceiling at a soft thump. I tensed, relaxing when Jenks flew downstairs, dusting a soft gold. "Remind me never to piss off Ivy," he said as he hovered before me. "She dropped them faster than a slug takes a crap."

Ivy sauntered downstairs, her silhouette confident and slim as she tugged her sleeves down and pocketed something in her belt pack. "We've got ten minutes," she said sounding loud as she broke the hush. "They'll wake up in fifteen minutes thinking they fell asleep. Which they did." She patted her belt pouch and smiled, her fangs making me shiver. "I could have made it longer, but they check in with security every half hour."

Nick was eying her belt. "What is it?"

"It's mine," she said, shooing Jax away before the smaller pixy could get a good sniff.

Nervousness seeped up through me as if rising like fog from the earth. Whatever it was, it had been illegal. We were sliding into this criminal thing far too easily. Did it matter if our motives were good if the means were bad? Or was the real question, did I want to go to Alcatraz and get my ovaries taken out and wind up lobotomized? This was survival against illegal action, and Trent was at the root of it. Guilt could take a long walk in a short shadow.

"Okay. Spread out," I said. "We've got ten minutes to find the door to the tunnel."

Immediately Jenks took off, his wings a slow, depressed hum. Jax was hot in the other direction. It was obvious that Jax was trying to impress his dad with his backup abilities. Jenks didn't seem to care, still hurting about Matalina. I hadn't even wanted him to come, but he needed to be needed right now, not alone in a church.

Ivy started for the front of the stables, and Nick followed Jax to the back. I poked about after Jenks, checking out the opposite row of stalls. Somewhere in here was a passage under the road and back to the main compound. It wasn't on any of the plans, but if you brought up the public record of who got paid during the construction of the stables, it was obvious that there was one here. You don't write a check for the materials and equipment to make a tunnel just for grins. I only hoped it didn't go right to Trent's private quarters.