Hell Hounds novel Chapter 54

             Most of the people left the room. In the entrance lobby of the packhouse, several tables lay set up. One filled with various snack foods, another with an array of hot and cold drinks. The last two had nothing displayed yet. Yolanda assumed those were for the meals to come. The line formed up the stairs as people picked up their drinks and snacks, then moved on. It took a few minutes to get there, and they all grabbed a drink.

             “Did I miss how long before we reconvene, or was it not mentioned?” Jaxon frowned over a hot mocha chocolate coffee.

             “Normally, these ambassadors like a half an hour break. This lets them get their asses together. I swear if you listen to Edith talk sometimes, they make it their missing to screw up everyone else’s plans and send them into a tailspin, trying to recover gracefully from it. We should get back there in about ten minutes because I think that game just went out the window. As we were leaving, I heard one mage say they’d patched in the Vampire Ambassador and staff from the storage bunk that they are using while they are here.” Aria kicked off the conversation with this.

             “Good. She might have information from some of their elders about this. Between the Dragons and Vampires, there are a few old enough to remember the Fae leaving this realm. Maybe, they can shed some light on this better.”

             Desire snorted in agreement with Yolanda’s words. “Really? Do you believe any of those elders will change their story from the party line they’ve fed us for all these years? I highly doubt that. This makes them look terrible in the eyes of everyone. People will start asking questions like, how come you didn’t hunt for these portals and such and destroy them before this?”

             Desire was right, and Yolanda angled her head and nodded, acquiescing to her point. “That would be an interesting question to hear the answer to.”

             “I don’t know about any of you, but it’s clear to me that someone dropped the ball, or at the very least didn’t do their due diligence in the cleanup. Asking questions is the least of their worries. I still want to know who the humans are, and how they got the power and knowledge of the ritual to perform it. If they’ve opened over one portal, that would mean they’re organized, and that spells out in the end that they are a greater threat than anyone believed before this.” Hal pointed out, effectively changing the subject.

             “Agreed, that’s another problem. I think we might want to make a list of questions like that to see how they want us to proceed. Someone must look into these, and if there’s no one, then they need to assign someone.” Aria mentioned, pulling a large phone from her ever-present bag. She tapped away at it. “I think I’ll cc Edith and Dean with this, so it doesn’t take them by surprise. The last thing we need is them balking at the question because they’re not prepared. It wouldn’t make them look good to anyone. Just too unprofessional.”

             “Good point. Also, Ian came up with an idea. We aren’t sure it can happen by maybe one of the other factions can put their heads together and remember something, or create something that can do it. He posed the question, what can we do to limit the Fae’s use of the Dream realm? What about limiting their magical use? Force them to use hand-to-hand fighting styles. We have superior weapons in this day and age. It can’t hurt to level the playing field or at least attempt to.”

             “I’ll add it. But I think that they’ll shoot down as putting too many people in harm’s way. But it’s a logical thing to do too. However, I don’t see how we can’t do that to some extent. It would protect some if it weren’t the only thing we relied on.”

             “Best to say something like that with the question so that we can skip the lecture on why it would be foolhardy and just rack up the unnecessary deaths.” Aria nodded absently as she continued to type.