The woman smiled, obviously pleased that I recognized her in spite of her human form. "So lovely to see you," she said in a honeyed voice that should have been much deeper coming from a human-sized throat but wasn't. I missed her pixie form. Tiny, but fierce. "These are my associates." She lifted a hand and leveled it in front of the chest of the goon to her right before saying: "Dee." And then moved it fluidly to the other. "And Dum."

"Pleased to meet you," I muttered, really unsure of what else to say. I was pretty sure they weren't alive anyway. Or, well, they were alive. Moving, breathing, the whole nine. But their vacant stares lacked consciousness. Either Mari Belle had somehow found the world's dimmest twins, or these were created somehow.

The extent of pixie magic continued to elude me.

I'm sure Mel would have known.

I simultaneously regretted sending her away, and lauded it. Things would have been really awkward with the two of them here.

Mari Belle smiled in a way that told me I was being dense, although for what I wasn’t sure. "And who is your friend, Mister Emerson?"

I didn't correct her. Go me for knowing when to not piss off an all-powerful adversary. "This is, um, my father?"

The pixie's eyes grew cold. Okay, so maybe I wasn't getting too much smarter. "He looks nothing like you."

"And nor do I want to be associated with your defunct family line." Duncan puffed out his chest, adjusted the collar of his shirt and took a step forward with a hand extended in greeting. "Duncan Buchanan, of Kinon, at your service."

If I had thought Mari Belle's gaze was cold before, it was now frigid. She glanced down at Duncan's extended hand and her upper lip curled. "Buchanan. Of Kinon." Her eyes refocused on me. "Oh, Harper. Have you done something very stupid?"

I didn't know how to answer that. Honestly.

I mean, obviously, the answer was yes. She was thinking I played her, and I did. Maybe not in the order she thought, but I wasn't exactly about to correct her.

Thankfully, Duncan ruined the moment anyway. He laughed, the fucking dickhead. "Have you met Harper? Doing something stupid is his goddamn class." Duncan stepped back from Mari Belle, obviously trying to hide that he was irritated she wouldn't introduce herself to him. He looked over his shoulder at me. "Who's the lady?"

"Pixie," I said, the word barely leaving my lips. "Not lady."

Realization dawned in Duncan's eyes. They narrowed on me like I was a smear of dog shit that had somehow ruined his fanciest shoes. "You little asshole. She's Mari fucking Belle?"

I swallowed back some really inappropriate laughter. "Just the first and last. Not the middle. I assume."

Duncan whirled back around to face Mari Belle. "Look, pixie, he's mine."

But she wasn't looking at him. Or even acknowledging that he spoke. Instead, her eyes bore into mine, piercing my very soul and making me quiver in terror. "Harper Emerson. I'm not sure if I should rip you limb from pitiful limb, or congratulate you. Pinning two lenders from two different towns against one another. Brilliant. Stupid and perhaps the last thing you will ever do, but brilliant."

"Don't fucking compliment him for being an idiot, pixie." Duncan stepped in between the two of us, although Mari Belle stood nearly a foot taller than him and so was able to maintain eye contact with me over Duncan's shoulder. "I told you, he's mine. I don't know what agreement he has with you, but mine was in place first."

Those eyes slipped from mine and I wanted to hide so they'd never find me again. Now they pinned Duncan to the spot, and I could see his frame shiver from the refined and barely constrained anger her gaze held. "Mister Buchanan. I believe you have this all wrong." She smiled thinly. "The laws of man have no sway in my book. Mister Emerson might have signed a contract with you long ago, but it was voided when he entered the contract with me. An agreement with a pixie trumps all others."

"That's bullshit," Duncan said, but the words had no fire behind them. "Did you fucking know that, Harper?"

I shook my head. "News to me." It did make me curious about my agreement with Mel. Was that a contract? Were... if I were married, would my commitment to my non-existent wife be destroyed by my agreement to help Mel?

There were suddenly a lot of questions and none of them had to do with Mari Belle or Duncan.

Well, maybe one.

How the fuck was I going to smooth this over?

I took a single step back from Duncan, just to put some space between me and the lender. Mari Belle's eyes snapped to me, and so I didn't take a second step.

"I am unsure what to do with you, Mister Emerson. While I would love to tear your arms off and beat you about the head with them, I'm afraid I'd be out the money I invested in this place. Or the potential future investment we had discussed."

Duncan snarled, apparently having regained his confidence. "Don't touch a hair on his head, pixie. You might think you have ownership, but his ass is mine to beat."

"Oh, are you two intimate as well?"

I almost threw up in my mouth.

Wait. Maybe I did.

An acidic taste washed across my tongue and I physically recoiled. "Oh hell no!"

Duncan seemed to have a similar reaction. "Not like that!"

Mari Belle smiled thinly. "Oh, good. I'd hate to ruin an intimate relationship as well as a business one."

"Do you… what… Alright, you know what? No. We're fucking done here." Duncan stepped towards Mari Belle, his fists balled up at his sides. "Pixie, take your two lifeless little fuck buddies and head on out, okay? Harper Emerson is mine. He owes me sixteen thousand gold from his time as an adventurer, and unless you're willing to foot the bill on his behalf, you can just fuck right off."

"I am not giving you sixteen thousand gold."

"Then you can fuck right off!" Duncan shouted, getting uncomfortably close to Mari Belle.

She smiled.

It was not a nice smile.

I'd seen a similar smile on Mel's face moments before something very bad happened to someone who deserved it very much.

It started sweet and innocent, but as it grew, I became aware that there were too many teeth.

Rows and rows of them.

Seemingly appearing from nowhere.

And all gleaming and sharp.

"No, you."

I was so focused on the terribleness of that growing shark smile that I didn't see Dee or Dum move.

But they both grabbed Duncan at the same time.

One hand on a shoulder, one on a wrist.

And then his arms were wrenched behind his back and over his head and Duncan was screaming.

It wasn't a pleasant scream.

Normally, I'd be all for Duncan screaming in pain. But this was a high-pitched scream of someone who was caught off guard and was also in a shit ton of pain. I heard two loud pops as his shoulders dislocated, and his screams grew in intensity.

"There. Now you just sit still and let me talk to Mister Emerson."

Dee and Dum released Duncan, and his arms flopped to hang at his sides. He made a high-pitched mewling and then curled forward in on himself.

Holy shit.

I wasn’t exactly sure when seeing Duncan in a lot of pain had stopped being hilarious, but I was pretty sure I was next.

Mari Belle stepped forward and then around the pile of previously raging Duncan. I recoiled away from her instinctively and her face grew somber. "I do hope you know I am not mad at you, Mister Emerson. More... disappointed."

"You say that like it's worse."

She smiled, and I could see she still had too many teeth. "It is."

"Right." I swallowed hard. Fuck. I needed to make this right, somehow. Or something. Because if I didn’t, I was going to die. "Um. I’m sorry. How can I make it up to you?"

"Well, for starters, you can tell me what we should do with that."

She didn't point over her shoulder at Duncan, but she didn't have to.

Immediately, I felt almost giddy. Mari Belle might have been a malicious pixie, and she seemed very keen on me being beholden to her, but she was also potentially giving me a hell of a lot. Was she offering to take away both my debt to Duncan as well as remove him from the equation all together? If I told her to kill him, would she? There would be hundreds of debtors in Kinon that would feel the positive effects of that.

But maybe murder was too much. Would she maim him? Strike him blind and mute?

If that's what she was offering, I'd pledge my loyalty to her in a heartbeat.

As long as it didn't come between me and Mel.

Which it absolutely would.

No. Mari Belle already had enough of me. Just the tiniest little bit of gold between friends was all I needed from her.

"While I appreciate the offer, I think the cost of removal would be too high for me."

"Mm." Mari Belle chuckled. "So you are smarter than you look. Very well." She shook her head and took another step closer. There was barely enough room between us for me to burst into dance. Which, if she asked, I would gladly do. Anything to keep her many-toothed smile away from me. "The purpose of my visit has nothing to do with him or really with you, either. Truth be told, it had been a week since your visit and I had wanted to check in on this place. See how it was progressing. You're almost open for business, it seems."

"Another day or so, and then yeah."

"And after that, you'll begin repayment, correct. Fifty gold a week?"

From the floor, Duncan made a whimpering noise. It didn’t sound pleasant.

"From the date we open, yeah," I said, ignoring him.

"Excellent." She smiled, and this one had way less teeth involved. "I'm so happy to hear that."

"Uh, great. So, is there anything else you need?"

"Yeah, she needs to fucking leave."

Duncan regained his feet, slowly. His arms no longer hung at his sides. They still looked painful as hell, and he didn't raise them farther than the center of his chest.

I wondered if he pushed them back in their sockets, and that was the cause for his whimpering before.

Knew for a fact that hurt like a bitch.

Duncan himself had once ripped my left arm (not my sword arm, oh no) from the socket and forced me to reconnect it, just to torture me after some heist gone wrong.

Mari Belle started to turn towards him, but Duncan ignored her. Instead, he went for Dee. Or Dum. Whichever.

He bullrushed the goon, driving his shoulder into the creature's belly. The action drew a shout of pain from him, but the goon said nothing. It staggered and the other tried to grab Duncan from behind.

But the lender was fast. He stepped to the side, avoiding the large goon's groping arms, and then stepped forward again when the creature staggered. With just a little push they both fell over, tumbling in a pile of limbs and wordless shouting.

Mari Belle turned to face him, her back completely to me.

"How dare you," she said, her words taking on an odd hiss as I imagined her many teeth poofed back into existence. "Insolent whelp."

Duncan produced a very large polearm from his inventory. And used it to pin the two goons to my wooden floor.

Mari Belle screamed. She clutched at her chest, as if the metal and wood had entered her own heart instead of those of Dee and Dum.

I'd say the two goons stopped moving, but they hadn't exactly been moving before then. Instead, they just... faded from existence. Once they grew almost too dim to see, they burst into multicolored lights, which swirled along the floor for a moment before rushing at Mari Belle. The pixie absorbed the glowing power and then snarled, her arms thrown wide.

"Fine. Have it your way, human."

I'd love to say I watched the ensuing fight. I bet it was some over-the-top battle of the ages with pixie magic and fighting techniques heretofore unseen by me. But I fled.

Out into the night and as far away from the battle behind me as I could.

I figured one of two things would happen: I’d either run into Mel, Berry, or a constable and I’d have some fucking backup to deal with the monsters tearing apart my kitchen, or two, I’d collapse into a pile and the scavangers could feast.

A shout erupted behind me as I crested the threshold, and something splintered against the wall just to the right of where my head had been.

I don’t know what it was. Something likely expensive that I would need to replace later. But I was willing to sacrifice any number of things in that kitchen for the ability to live another day.

Hell, I was thinking of redecorating anyway.