IDA Chapter Three

Chapter Three

         Ain gave Amy the pen, pointing at the line where she needed to sign.  She squinted, poised her pen above the paper, and signed her name.  As soon as she lifted the pen, she felt something.  It was barely anything, but it made her shiver, and not from the air conditioning.  She gave back the pen, her brow furrowed.
         
“You felt that, didn’t you?”  Ain asked, picking up the signed contract.  After Amy nodded, he continued.  “That was a binding charm.  Now that you’ve signed, you can’t quit the company.  This also means I can tell you what you’re in for.”
         
Amy felt slightly nervous at the ominous sound of that, but was resolved.  She wanted this job and couldn’t see how she could possibly be scared out of it.  Then she started.  Charm?
         
Ain stood up to file the papers.  Amy didn’t mind the silence, but she was almost bursting to ask what he had meant by charm.  She did have an excellent view, though, and not just through the window.  As Ain sat down, he looked back up at her, placing more papers he’d grabbed from the cabinet on his desk.  “Ready to learn everything about this job?”
         
Amy nodded.  “Yes.”  She could barely hear the quiver in her voice.
         
Ain looked at her, as if looking for something, and then nodded once to himself.  “Very well.  First, have you ever noticed anything about yourself that may be considered odd?”
         
Amy’s eyes widened slightly in surprise.  She thought her questions were going to be answered, not more asked of her.  “Yes, actually.”
         
Ain smiled.  “What, exactly?”
         
Amy told him about the puddle and pool incidents, as well as the quivers and feelings she would sometimes get.  Ain nodded as she spoke, never breaking eye contact, encouraging her to tell him everything.  When she stopped talking, he made notes on the form.  Amy tried peeking at what he was writing on, but all she caught were some words that she had said, and part of the question: untrained abilities.  Abilities? she thought to herself.
         
“Is there anything else, anything at all?” he asked her.
         
She looked up from the paper.  “No.  I mean, there were the small things that happen all the time, like feeling like being watched, but nothing big.”
         
He nodded, making another note.  She tried getting another look at what he was writing, but this time he noticed.  He moved only his eyes, catching hers.  Before Amy could hastily sit back and look innocent, something strange happened.  For a split second, she wasn’t in the office anymore.  She saw Ain, but not the Ain sitting in front of her.  He was standing, surrounded by power, with sorrow in his eyes, not humor.  The vision lasted for a second, and then she was back in the office, blinking, and wondering if she had just imagined it.
         
“Amy, are you okay?”  She heard Ain say. 
She looked back at him and made an attempt at a smile.  “I’m fine.  Just zoned out for a second.”
         
Ain continued giving her a puzzled look, but let it go.  Before Amy could muse over what had just happened, he asked her more questions, mundane things like age, degree, etc.  Amy pushed the incident to the back of her mind, like she always had when other strange things happened to her.
         
After he finished, he put down the pen and sat back in his chair.  “Well, no more stalling.  Time to tell you what’s going on.  And I’m warning you, I’m not going to beat around the bush.  Just straight to it.  And remember this, everything I tell you is true, not a joke or an exaggeration, no matter how fantastic it may sound.”
         
Before Amy could ask what he meant, he continued.  “I’m sure you have many questions, such as about the table at the job faire, you’re strange incidents as a child, that feeling after signing the contract, but there is one underlying answer to all of them.”  He leaned forward, looking intensely at her.  “Magic.”
         
Amy blinked.  “Excuse me?”
         
Ain leaned back again, but didn’t move his eyes from hers, nor did his intense look change.  “Magic.  It’s real.  Let’s start with the table.  You must have wondered why no one was approaching it, or even noticing it.”  He waited for Amy to nod before continuing.  “The reason why is because it was enchanted.  Only a person with magical abilities would see it, and from those only people adequate enough for the job would be impelled to approach it.”  Ain pointed at the cabinet where he’d placed her contract.  “Now the contract.  That sensation you felt after signing it was the setting of a spell.  After signing, the spell bound you to this company.  This is to make sure that once you hear everything, you don’t go running away in terror, or off to the news stations.”
         
Amy understood the logic, but was having difficulty grasping everything else he’d said.  Did he really mean magic?  “So, is this a business of witches or something?”
         
Ain chuckled.  “No.  I’m not a witch.”  He looked thoughtful for a moment.  “Gwyn is, though, so you’re not too far off.”
         
Amy just stared.  Gwyn was a witch?  But not him?  “So, are you a magician?  Or wizard?”  Ain shook his head, a mischievous gleam in his eyes.  “So, what?  I thought only witches, magicians, or wizards could perform magic.  At least, in books.”
         
“How much folklore do you know, Amy?”  Ain asked.
         
Amy grinned to herself.  “A fair bit.”
         
Ain furrowed his brow slightly.  “That can be a help, and a hindrance.”  He sighed.  “If you thought what I just told you was fantastical, what else I have to tell you is going to be even more so.”  At that, Ain tucked his hair behind his ears.
         
Amy stared.  His ears were pointed.  Honest to God, pointed.  “But…uh…”she sputtered.  She stopped staring at his ears.  “Folklore?  Are you an elf?”
         
Ain chuckled.  “Yes and no.  From your legends and myths, I suppose I would be considered an elf, but that’s not what my people call themselves.”
         
“So what do you call yourselves?”
         
“Before I can explain that, I need to fill you in on a lot more background information.”  He paused.  “Do you have any other plans for today?  This is going to take a while.”
         
Amy shook her head, but inwardly laughed.  She had the social agenda of a chair.
         
“Good.  Then we can cover everything today,” he said.  “Let’s start with the really fantastic stuff.  As you probably guessed, I’m not from around here.”  He smiled at his own joke.  “None of my kind are.  I’m from a place called the Land.  Just the Land.  It’s where magical creatures call home.  What you would call Faerie.”
         
Amy stared.  “I’m assuming that’s not on Earth.”
         
Ain chuckled.  “Correct.  I suppose you could call it an alternate dimension, or another world.  It’s parallel to this one, what we call the Human World, with magical links to it.  Through these links, Lander’s (those people and creatures who live in the Land) have wandered into this world, and that’s where your folklore, myths, fairytales, legends, and other stories come from.”
         
“So, our fairytales are true?”  Amy asked breathlessly.
         
Ain shrugged.  “So-so.  What you have are variations, mostly.  However, a lot of what you have written down is wrong.  You humans got the concept, but not the big picture.  For instance, leprechauns.  You’re whole pot-of-gold theories are cute, but way off the mark.  Leprechauns were guarding treasure, but that treasure wasn’t gold.  They are our running crew to guard different magical links, at least the one’s we know about.”  He shook his head, a look of slight exasperation crossing his face.  “You did get their fondness of drink and mischief down, though.  They’re not always the best guards, as I’ve been discovering.”
         
Amy suppressed a laugh.  Who would put leprechauns as guards?  Ain gave her a look that said he had an idea of what she was thinking.  “Like I said, you humans got a lot of your lore wrong.”
         
Amy immediately sobered, making a mental note to take absolutely everything out of his mouth literally and seriously.
         
He sighed, rubbing his eyes.  “It’s been so long since I’ve had to teach someone this stuff.”  He looked at Amy.  “You’ll learn everything about the Land soon enough.  Now, on to witches and wizards and so on.  Contrary to your belief, magic isn’t an innate human ability.  Only those people with some sort of Lander blood in their background can perform magic.  Usually it only takes a small drop; it’s been about 50 years since the last time a Lander had a child with a human.”
         
Amy’s jaw dropped.  “Wait, you said I had magical abilities.”
         
Ain nodded.  “Yes I did.  Which means, somewhere in you background you have a Lander ancestor.”  He looked over her.  “Judging by your physical appearance, I’d say it’s a few generations back, though genetics could have been very human for you.  I’m assuming your parents weren’t, since you didn’t know that your strange abilities were magic.  Not to mention you would probably have a pointed ear or strange hair coloring if either of your parents were Landers unless your genes were extremely biased.”
         
Amy’s face fell.  She had no idea what to think.  She didn’t know who her family was, so she had no way of researching to see if any of her ancestors may have looked a little odd.
         
Ain continued.  “There are 5 people employed in this agency now, including you.  You are the most human out of all of us.  Gwyn, as I have told you, is a witch.  What I did not tell you is that her grandmother was a Lander.”
         
Amy’s eyes widened.  Gwyn’s grandmother was a magical creature?  “She looks so human.”
         
Ain smiled.  “Yes.  The problem is, she has no idea what, or who, her grandmother was.  And surely you must have noticed that she is a very striking woman.”
         
Amy nodded.  Gwyn was an incredibly beautiful woman.  And come to think of it, Amy said to herself, she did have very, very green eyes.  Before she could ask another question, Ain continued.  “Through her grandmother she gained the ability to heal, as well as doing magic.”
         
“Who are the other two?”
         
“I’ll introduce you in a few minutes.  There’s Zash, my cousin.  And then there’s Foxinaku, or Fox.”  He looked thoughtful, and then shrugged.  “Well, you’ll see shortly anyway.  Better to warn you.  Fox is, well, a fox.  A demon fox, to be precise.  He’s our resident psychic.  He was actually at the job faire, under the table.  He always goes along with Gwyn to do a psychic scan of anyone who may come up to the table.  No one ever did, though, until you walked up.”
         
Amy thought back, and remembered her itchy palm.  She laughed aloud.  Ain gave her a look, and she sobered, but still had a gleam of laughter in her eye as she explained.  “Gwyn kept looking down at the table as if listening to someone talking.  I had the biggest urge to yank up the table cloth and see what was under it.”  She frowned.  “But, I didn’t hear anyone talking.”
         
“As I said, Fox is a psychic,” Ain explained.  “He can speak, yes, but when he’s in public he speaks to us telepathically so as not to scare anyone.  It’s rather unnerving, actually,” he said with a slight shiver.  “You have to completely trust him not to invade your private thoughts.”
         
Amy lifted an eyebrow.  “Don’t people question having a domestic fox around?”
         
Ain grinned.  “I wouldn’t really call him domestic, but I understand what you mean.  People will write-off many fantastic things, to an extent.  They’ll justify a pet fox, but not a talking one.”
         
Amy nodded absently, but then looked up at Ain.  He still hadn’t explained what he was.  “Okay, so I know about Fox and Gwyn.  But what about you?  And this Zash, for that matter?”
         
Ain sighed.  “I can’t put it off anymore, I see.  My people don’t have a proper name.  We are simply Landers.  As for myself and my cousin, we are royal Landers.”
         
Amy blinked.  “Royal?  As in like king, queen, ruler, that kind of thing?”
         
Ain nodded.  “Yes.”  He reached up to the back of his head and untied the bandanna.  On his forehead was an insignia, what looked like five diamonds in a peacock tail formation.  Now I know why he wears the bandanna, Amy thought.  Aloud, she asked, “Does that signify royal blood?”
         
Ain looked mildly surprised.  “Close.  Very close.  Actually, what it means is that I’m the heir apparent.”  He looked slightly uncomfortable.  “I’m the future king, actually.”
         
Amy’s jaw dropped.  “You’re a prince?”
         
Ain nodded.  “Yes, as it were.”  He looked very uncomfortable now.  Amy’s nervousness doubled.  I’m in the presence of royalty, she thought.  Ain spoke again, probably noticing her reaction.  “Please, don’t treat me as one.  Here, in the Human World, I am simply a detective.  Yes, I’m the boss, but I’m a normal guy.”  He smiled shyly.  “Except for the ears.”
         
Amy started to force herself to calm down.  He obviously wasn’t going to lord over her, so she shouldn’t change her perspective of him.  Her mind reasoned it out, but she still felt awkward.  She’d never met a royal person before.  “So, you’re going to rule all of the Land someday?”
         
Ain started to tie the band back on his head.  “Yes and no.  Actually, my father rules only a small portion of the land.  Most of it is wild country.  My family has been trying to bring order to the chaos of the Land for millennia.  My father expanded our territory to its present size 400 years ago.  Then my mother died, and he slowed down his warring to raise me.”  After he finished speaking, Ain’s eyes widened.  He looked at Amy.
         
Amy was staring at him.  “400 years ago?”  Her jaw dropped.  She looked over him again.  “How old are you?”
         
Ain squirmed.  “I was going to wait to drop that particular information.”  He sighed.  “Oh well.  I am a little more than 400 years old.”  He attempted a smile.  “I know, I look pretty good for my age.”
         
Before Amy could ask anything more, he continued.  “I don’t want you to get that shock again, so I’ll explain.  Your lore has said how many fairy creatures are immortal.  That’s partially true.  We’re not truly immortal, however.  We can die.  We just can’t die of old age.  And we’re much harder to kill by other means.  Some humans with Lander ancestry can also live much longer than normal human years.  Usually these humans are discovered by other Lander’s and brought into the Land, if they so wish.”  He made a gesture towards the door.  “Gwyn is an example.  She is in fact over a hundred years old.”  He looked sad.  “She and her brother inherited that ability, but her mother (her Lander grandmother’s daughter) did not.  So both of her parents have died.  We found her and offered her this job when she said she wanted to stay on Earth for her brother.”  He brightened slightly.  “Then there’s Fox.  We have no idea how old he is.  He won’t tell us, but he’s been a court advisor since at least my grandfather’s reign.  And I can tell you that that’s a long time.
         
“Lastly, there’s my cousin, Zash.  He’s a couple hundred years older than me, but doesn’t look a day older.”
         
Ain thumped the table.  “Enough background.  Let’s get to specifics, then after that, I’ll introduce you to Zash and Fox.  Now that you know about the Land, I’ll let you know the objective of this detective agency.”  He opened a drawer and pulled out a business card.  “We have a few functions.  First off, we help the human police solve crimes that they are stumped on.  That’s our front to keep in business and stay inconspicuous.  We also do some private detective work, though most of our clients are Lander’s or humans of Lander descent with specific magical problems.  Our most important job, and why this agency was started, is to find rogue Lander’s and bring them in.  Some are just people who skipped over the protocol for immigrating into the Human World and moved in illegally, but most are malevolent creatures who crept into your world to wreak havoc.  We work with police most of the time to find these creatures before they do and bring them in.  Our biggest objective is to keep the humans from knowing that the Land exists.”
         
“Why is it so important that humans are kept in the dark that magic exists?”  Amy asked, slightly affronted.  “I loved fairytales as a child.  I actually considered majoring in folklore in college.  I would have loved to have known magic existed in this mundane world.”
         
“Amy, think about it,” Ain said, spreading his hands.  “Power corrupts, as we all know.  Magic is power.  Do you honestly think the world wouldn’t go into chaos if it was publicly known that magic existed?  Not to mention the jealousy people would feel for not having magical abilities.  Then there is the threat of humans trying to find and invade the Land.”  Ain shook his head, a sad look in his eye.  “The two worlds actually coexisted at one time, thousands of years ago.”  Ain leaned back, eyes closed.  “Long before my time, or even my father, or his father.  Where do you think the ideas for gods came from?  But the humans were jealous of our magical abilities and tried to steal our magic, killing magical creatures and keeping there bones in the hopes of being able to utilize their power.”  Ain opened his eyes and looked at Amy.  “Not all humans, of course, but enough to make it not safe to allow any humans to be aware of us.  My ancestors did what they had to do to save themselves.  Now do you understand?”
         
Amy nodded.  She understood.  It was sad, but she understood why humans had to be left in the dark.
         
Ain stood.  “Well, my throat is dry.  How would you like something to drink?”  Amy nodded.  He picked up his phone and hit one button.  “Hey Gwyn, we’re done in here.  Can you grab Zash and Fox and head over to the break room?  It’s time to introduce Amy to everyone.”  He paused, and turned slightly away.  “Tell Zash to buck up and be friendly, okay?”
         
Amy didn’t like the sound of that.  Ain hung up the phone and smiled.  “Let’s wait a minute for everyone to get there, and then we’ll head over.”