Free When the Stars Threw Down Their Spears: The Goblin Wars, Book Three by Kersten Hamilton Page A

toward the kitchen door. Once the angel got started on engines, you couldn’t shut him up. Her mind was moving almost as fast as it had in the cafeteria. First, she was going up to her room to change out of the pajamas she’d worn in the park overnight. Then she’d try to call Molly, then check in with Agnes at the zoo, because Molly wasn’t the only one who was missing—Oscar had been taken, too. And Agnes could check on the cultures Teagan had collected from Maggot Cat while she was at it. His corpse had been putrefying at an unreasonably fast rate. Teagan stopped. Gil was in the backyard with a cut on his throat where Mab had tried to slice it open. If Maggot Cat’s condition was any indication, it was possible that an infection would be much, much worse for the phooka than it was for creatures of this world.
    Teagan was sure that Maggot Cat had died because he had little, if any, resistance to the tiny fauna in this corner of creation. She wanted her phone, a shower, and clean clothes desperately. But she couldn’t have them until she’d taken care of the phooka. She’d need to get her first-aid kit from the bathroom and get out the back door without Seamus following. She didn’t want to explain the wounded phooka to him. Not yet. She eased out of the kitchen.
    Thomas was still sitting on the couch staring at the stairs. Roisin had clearly not come back down.
    “Thank you for coming to check on me, Thomas,” Teagan said.
    “What?” He dragged his eyes away from the stairwell. “When?”
    “When I was at the police station. You landed on the window—”
    “Afraid not.” The shape shifter shook his head. “I was watching Aiden, remember?”
    Terrific. Her dad talked to hat racks and she talked to birds. No wonder Seamus thought they were an unusual family.
    “Did you see someone who looked like me?”
    “Never mind.” Teagan headed down the hall. “I was just getting the first-aid kit.”
    She took her small emergency kit—the one she carried with her if a neighbor called with a sick or injured pet—from the bathroom closet and checked the contents. There were nitrile gloves, sterile bandages, hand sanitizer, saline wash, scissors, tweezers, Q-Tips—everything she might need for a minor emergency situation with a small animal. She found a clean washcloth, filled a plastic basin with hot water, and tried to walk back through the living room and kitchen without anyone noticing her. Thomas was still staring morosely. In the kitchen, Mamieo was filling Raynor in about the police station while her dad and Aiden listened; Seamus was still mesmerized by the motorcycle. She made it all the way to the back door before she realized that she couldn’t open it. Not with her hands full.
    “Where are you going?” Mr. Wylltson asked.
    “Just stepping out to take care of Gil’s neck.” Teagan held up the supplies.
    “Gil?” Seamus shook himself away from Raynor’s motorbike. “The phooka?”
    “Yep,” Aiden said sadly. “I’m not allowed to play with phookas.”
    “I’ll come along,” Seamus said. “I’ve never seen a phooka.”
    Aiden started after them, but Mamieo caught his collar.
    “I wasn’t going to play with him,” Aiden said. “I was just going to watch Teagan.”
    “We’ll watch from the window,” Mr. Wylltson said. “You are not allowed to go into the yard.”
    “Rats,” Aiden muttered.
    Raynor opened the door for her, and Seamus followed. The smell of burnt wood was noticeable as soon as she stepped into the yard. Joe was in the far corner, all seven feet of him leaned up against the fence, his brows drooping like Spanish moss above his round yellow eyes. He had been well camouflaged in the park, his bark-like coat as well as his skin blending into the shrubbery. Now half of his body was darkened and charred, his long, lichen-gray beard as singed as Mr. Wylltson’s eyebrows.
    Joe was indigenous to this corner of creation, made of the stuff of this world. Anyone who looked