No Quest For The Wicked

“Still, I’m on assignment. Can’t blame me for trying.”

“As long as you don’t blame me for making sure you don’t try again.” Owen used one of the discarded napkins to tie Thor’s hands behind his back and then rolled him under the nearest table. “He’ll probably be able to work his way out eventually, but that should keep him out of our hair for a little while.” Then he frowned and said, “Hey, what’s this?”

He bent to pick up a brooch of ornate Celtic knotwork in gold, with a spherical sapphire set in the middle of it.

“The Eye! It must have fallen out of his pocket,” I guessed excitedly. “But how’d he get it? He must have been on his way back from grabbing it, and we didn’t notice.”

Owen shook his head. “I don’t think so.” He raised it to the light and turned it from side to side, then wrapped his hand around it. “I don’t think it’s real,” he said. “They must have made a duplicate and he was going to try to pull off a swap. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d planned all along to give Sylvester the fake.” He held it in front of Granny. “Does this do anything to you?” he asked.

“Not a bit,” she said with a shake of her head. “I don’t have the slightest desire for it.”

“It’s definitely a fake,” Owen concluded.

“You’re good at sleight of hand,” I said as an idea took shape in my head. “How are you at pickpocketing?”

“I’ve never tried.”

“Well, maybe we can use this—see if we can get a chance to swap this out. It might buy us time if Mimi doesn’t realize the real one is gone.”

“But we’d have to find the real one first,” he said.

We both turned to watch Mimi as she continued yelling at everyone who displeased her. Although she’d seemed surprised by the subservient responses at first, she now looked like she was enjoying the power and had gone into full-on czarina mode. Then I noticed that she kept putting her right hand in the pocket of her suit jacket. Every time she did so, a look came over her face, as though touching whatever was in there gave her strength. I pointed it out to Owen. “Does it look to you like she’s got a ‘my precioussss’ thing going on with something in that pocket?” I asked him.

He watched her for a while longer, then said, “Yeah, I think that’s where it is. Let’s see if we can move in on her. You and Granny create a diversion, and I’ll make the switch.”

I looked up to signal our colleagues, but I couldn’t find Earl. He was too tall to disappear easily. Then I saw him crouching and darting from sculpture to sculpture, on his way to the exit that led into the Arms and Armor section. A glance at the other entrance explained why: Sylvester, Lyle, and a few other elf flunkies had entered.

“Oh, fun, the gang’s all here,” I said.

“We need to get it before they do,” Owen said.

Rod gave Owen a “What should I do?” signal, and Owen waved for him to stay back. Owen and I headed closer to Mimi. As we moved, I thought of ways to distract her. I wondered if I could signal Rod to drop my illusion disguise. Seeing me pop up here would certainly distract Mimi, but I preferred not to resort to that.

I picked up one of the flower arrangements that looked like it was meant to be a centerpiece and carried it toward Mimi. My plan was to “accidentally” drop it right in front of her so she could be distracted by the need to berate me. I figured I might even be able to shock her by not falling on my knees or begging her for mercy. If she was enjoying her newfound power over people, she might find open defiance disconcerting.

Oh, yeah, this was the best mission ever.

I was already anticipating sweet revenge when something stopped me in my tracks.

I smelled something familiar—a scent like a spice factory explosion in a pine forest. That was the cologne I’d used as a weapon in Macy’s. It came from the assistant to Mimi’s right—the same side as the pocket she kept touching. The smell was so strong that either the guy had marinated in it or he’d recently been hit in the face with a heavy blast of it. I suspected it was the latter.

The puritans had infiltrated Mimi’s inner circle. We didn’t stand a chance of getting close enough to her to make the swap.

Chapter Eleven

I tried to warn Owen to abort the mission, but he was so focused on finding an opportunity to pickpocket Mimi that I couldn’t get his attention without also drawing the attention of both Mimi and her puritan protector. All I could do was not create the diversion Owen was waiting for. I returned the centerpiece to the table and hoped Owen figured out that there had been a change of plans.