The Glass Gargoyle (The Lost Ancients Book 1) by Marie Andreas Page B

around.
    So why wasn’t she buzzing lower? And the other two were still chittering to themselves as they hung onto my hair.
    “Why don’t you two go join her?” I pulled Garbage Blossom free of my hair and reached around to try and grab Leaf. Neither seemed happy about my request, but after a few moments of pulling them away from me they both joined Crusty. None of them went lower than Crusty had been.
    In my years of dealing with faeries, I’d learned it was always better to wait until they were ready to tell you what they felt you needed to know. Asking them what was going on could be confusing or worse. But at the same time, waiting around a suddenly surfacing corpse in the jungle wasn’t a grand idea either.
    I moved toward the body, pulling back when all three zipped in front of me and fluttered their wings to push me back.
    “What?” I let a bit of irritation slip into my voice.
    “No going near very dead, very dead is protected.” Garbage took charge, folding her arms as if she was scolding a young child. “Protection is trap.” As if that said it all. Faery was a complex and twisted language that no other species could speak. Unfortunately many of their concepts and words didn’t make the leap to the common language.
    “What kind of trap, Garbage? Will we explode?”
    The other two giggled, but Garbage frowned and folded her arms tighter. “No being silly, protection traps make trouble. No boom.”
    I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. After all I’d been through in the last few days I really didn’t need to be playing ‘guess the fatal trap’ with a four-inch-tall faery.
    “What is the trap, Garbage?” I opened my eyes to find a tiny orange head inches in front of my nose. She pulled back when I opened my eyes, but not far.
    “Is trap to catch stupid people, stupid animals. You touch body, go through trap lining, trap grabs you.” She shrugged her tiny overall-clad shoulders. “You very dead too.”
    I wasn’t going to get anywhere trying for more details, and if Garbage said it was something that could kill us, I had to believe her. As close as any of them could be, Garbage was the brains of the bunch. But even my little party animal Crusty stayed hovering well above the body.
    Time to clear out. “I want you three to remember as much as you can about the body. Everything you can, right?” The faeries had good, albeit short term, memories. At least when they were sober. “We need to tell Covey, but you have to remember it all.”
    Garbage gave me a serious nod, satisfied that I wasn’t going to run forward into the trap. Then all three did elaborate fly-bys over the body. After a few minutes they came back, but didn’t slam into me this time.
    “Is good, we go now,” Crusty chirped as she drifted down to my shoulder.
    They stayed quiet the rest of the way out, which fortunately wasn’t nearly as far away as I’d feared. I thought about asking the faeries if they’d seen Marcos, but I needed them to focus on that body long enough to talk to Covey. Maybe I’d ask Karys about him. She knew most all of the handsome men around town.
    I’d never been this far east in the jungle before, but coming out I recognized Mhegen’s tannery so I had a good idea where I was. Thank the gods and goddesses that Mhegen was fastidious about her odor spells—I only saw the tannery, I didn’t smell it.
    My stomach took that moment to remind me it hadn’t had breakfast, nor for that matter the previous day’s dinner or lunch.
    The distraction about my stomach’s empty condition almost cost me my little assistants. I looked up just as Crusty began to lift off my shoulder, her tiny golden eyes locked onto something in the alley next to the tannery. Grabbing her, I cocked my head and gave her my best glare. With a smile only the truly deranged or very young can get away with she patted my arm and settled down. The other two hadn’t noticed.
    My stomach rumbled again and I picked up my pace.