Artemis and Matt stood in shock as Holly ended the call.
"What just happened?" Foaly asked, voicing the thoughts of everybody on the shuttle.
"She just mocked him after he stabbed her," Artemis said quietly. He turned to look at Matt. "Is that typical Aurora behaviour?" he queried.
Matt seemed to snap out of whatever daze he was in because he shook his head. "Aurora is pissed. He holds all the power, by the looks of it, and she's trying to upset him every chance she gets to show that he doesn't have power over her. She used to do that to the guys who tormented-"
He seemed to remember something halfway through the sentence because he stopped himself.
"You mentioned she was bullied before," Artemis noted dryly. "You are doing a really bad job of keeping her secrets."
"She didn't want him to see she was scared," Butler remarked from the corner he was huddled up in. "That's why she did it. Artemis, you are an expert in body language and you didn't see that? By the dwarf stabbing her, she realised they would hurt her if they had to, or even if they wanted to."
"She's hurt," Matt whispered, almost to himself. "You promised me she wouldn't get hurt!" he yelled at Holly.
"I didn't foresee her hijacking a shuttle and flying directly to him," Holly replied. "If she had followed our plan-"
"She would have been dead," Matt interjected. "Is this about saving Aurora, or is it about preventing humans from finding out about fairies?"
He went into the sleeping quarters, slamming the door as he disappeared. The silence that remained was deafening.
*********
Aurora woke up in a small concrete cell, lying on top of a pile of hessian sacks. She let out a groan as she glanced down at her leg, running a hand over the smooth, unblemished skin.
"Good, you're awake," Finch said from where he leant against the bars of her cell. "The auction begins in four hours, and we need to get to the location."
"Screw you," Aurora spat, as both Nexxio and Vernix appeared, flanking Finch.
Finch unlocked the cell, and Vernix walked in. "Turn around," he ordered, removing the handcuffs from his belt.
Aurora sucker-punched him, watching him drop to the ground like a sack of potatoes as she silently thanked the self-defence classes Ronny had insisted they attend all those years ago. Nexxio rushed forward, and she managed to hit him hard enough in the jaw that something cracked. He stumbled back into the wall of her cell, cradling his face.
"Tut tut, Miss Carter. That's sneaky," Finch scolded, watching as Aurora rushed toward him, fireballs appearing in both her hands. He pulled out a handgun and pointed it at her, smiling sinisterly.
"You know, I never wanted to sell you- I was going to keep you, as you are the first human-fairy hybrid we have ever seen. You'd make an adorable pet."
"There's no way in hell I would ever be your pet!" Aurora shouted.
"That's good then," Finch said, a sadistic smile lighting up his face. "Because we need to get you ready!"
Nexxio tagged her with his stun gun, and she collapsed to the floor, lying vulnerable at Finch's feet. Finch and Nexxio dragged her to his office. Here, they bound her ankles and pulled her hands behind her back. Nexxio slapped tape across her mouth and shoved her into a specially-designed cage that was made of metal impervious to goblin fire. Finch pulled an expensive fire-proof sheet over the top of the cage and together they rolled it out of the house to the truck that Finch had hired especially for the event.
Finch smiled as they secured it in the back of the truck, hearing the sound of Aurora as she came to and began shouting through the tape.
He turned to Nexxio. "Get that stupid elf and let's go."
*********
Artemis brushed non-existent lint off his suit as he checked his appearance for the final time in the bathroom of the shuttle. His hands were trembling as he did up the bottom button of his suit jacket, and he forced himself to take a deep breath.
Butler had finished cleaning his guns and was busily holstering them in the various places he kept weapons on his person, Matt watching in fascination.
Holly and Foaly looked up from where they were going over the logistics of the plan when Artemis emerged from the bathroom.
"Are you ready?" Holly asked softly.
Artemis nodded.
"Why can't I go?" Matt pouted.
"Are you the heir to a fortune?" Artemis snapped. "Do you have enough money to buy a human?"
Matt shrunk a little under the Irish teen's glare. "Well, no. But at least I care about Rory."
"I care about Aurora," Artemis growled. "That's why I'm doing this."
The two boys began sizing each other up- Artemis looking murderous, while Matt looked like he was ready to flatten the Irish boy.
"Artemis, you need to be down there in ten minutes, so I suggest you leave now," Holly said, jumping in to prevent a fight.
Artemis nodded. "Well, wish me luck," he said, straightening his tie and nodding at Butler as they exited the shuttle.
Butler had arranged for a hire car to be dropped off around the corner from where the shuttle had been hovering for the past fourteen hours, and while it was a short walk to the meeting place, Artemis needed to look as though he had travelled.
"Are you going to be okay?" Butler asked as they drove to the abandoned warehouse that Finch had chosen on the very outskirts of the London industrial area. Large concrete and brick structures that had fallen into disrepair over the years of neglect passed them by, surrounded by chainlink fences with worn-out security signs zip-tied to them.
"If we don't get her back..." Artemis began uncertainly but shook his head as if to dislodge the thought that had been there. "When we get her back, it's more how I'm going to explain to my parents where the money disappeared to."
Butler smiled. "She will be fine."
"That's not what I said, Butler," Artemis replied.
Butler smirked. "I know."
*********
Aurora lay on the floor of a cage in the dark. She knew it was a cage because whoever was driving couldn't drive well, and every corner she was flung into the bars of the opposite side.
Initially, she had thought she was blindfolded but had then realised that it was just dark when she couldn't feel anything over her face. The vehicle turned abruptly, slamming her into the bars again, then the driver hit the brakes as hard as possible.
After a minute, the sound of muffled yelling grew clearer when a sliver of light appeared under the sheet covering the cage. She felt the cage lift as it was removed from whatever had been transported in before it was being rolled across smooth concrete floors. The cage lifted again, and the sheet was ripped off, causing Aurora to blink multiple times as her eyes adjusted to the sunlight pouring in through the skylights of the huge abandoned warehouse.
The cage was resting atop a large stone pillar, and before she could examine her surrounding further, Finch appeared in her line of sight.
"Hello sweetheart," he said. He shoved a few coloured sheets in her face. "You get some aspect of choice in all this," he informed her. "Which colour?"
Aurora looked away from him, watching instead as Vernix and Nexxio lugged in boxes of sound equipment, Vernix struggling beneath a lectern that was three quarters his size.
Finch pulled out a set of keys, unlocking the padlock on the cage and dragging her out.
Vernix attached two sets of handcuffs to the cage, one on the side and the other on the base as Finch began untying her. Nexxio held his gun to her head as Finch shoved Aurora back into the cage, cuffing her wrist to the side of the cage and her ankle to the base.
"I'm thinking orange," Finch said, holding the orange sheet under her face. "Yes, I think that's the right colour. It just makes your eyes sparkle." He cackled as he walked away, Vernix pressing the stun gun to the back of Aurora's neck and forcing her into unconsciousness.
*********
Artemis watched as the eighth black car pulled into the parking area outside the warehouse. This car, however, was quite familiar to him, and he watched as a man exited the vehicle, a phone pressed up against his ear, yelling at the person at the other end of the line.
"Constantine?"
The man, dressed impeccably in a tailored suit and his long blonde hair tied back from his face, turned to see Artemis standing behind him. He ended the phone call he had been making, smiling at the teenager.
"It has been a long time since we spoke, my friend," Constantine stated in a thick Italian accent.
"What brings you here?" Artemis asked curiously. "I didn't think the Mafia would be interested in a simple girl?"
Constantine grinned. "Finch promised me that she would be worth my time. Why are you here?"
Artemis smiled- a shark-like, cold, business-only smile. "I'm here because apparently, she's a quick healer."
It was if he had been punched by Butler in the stomach as he said it, but if any discomfort showed, Constantine took no notice of it.
He barked out a laugh. "You've done some growing up since I saw you last, Fowl."
"Well, I will be twenty this year," he replied. "I suppose one would grow up by that time."
"We should go check it out before the bidding starts," he said, motioning for his bodyguards to begin following him into the building.
Artemis smiled at he heard Butler begin to compare weapons with Constantine's bodyguards.
They entered the building to see ten other people there. Two of them Artemis recognised to be the head of the CIA- John Piper- and the head of the FBI- John Downer, representing the intelligence agencies of the USA. Then there was the head of MI6, a member of the Yakuza, Constantine, several billionaires that Artemis vaguely recognised, and himself.
And then there was the cage in the middle of the room, covered by a bright orange sheet.
"Alright, gentlemen!" Samuel Finch said from the lectern that he had set up beside the cage. "Shall we begin the inspection?"
His assistant- who looked rather too elf-like to be human, Artemis decided- yanked off the sheet to reveal Aurora. The men in the warehouse crowded around the cage, some even reaching through the bars to touch her. Artemis let out a low growl when he saw her visibly distressed at the contact.
Constantine just laughed. "She's pretty, but not my thing. I'll let you have her," he said.
Artemis looked at the Mafia Don in surprise. "You're letting one go?" he asked eventually.
"Go and have a look then," Constantine urged, rolling his eyes at Butler as Artemis hesitantly approached the cage.
"Is he always like this around women?" he asked Butler.
"Unfortunately," Butler replied, trying to keep a straight face.
The small crowd had dispersed, many of them talking rapidly to people on the other end of their mobile phones as they tried to work out how high they could go with their bids.
Artemis walked over to Aurora, who stared at him with wide eyes. "You're here," she whispered, not loud enough for Finch to hear, although Artemis didn't miss the fear in her eyes as she glanced over at Finch.
"Yes, I'm here to get you back," he murmured. "Are you okay?"
She nodded. "I'm okay. He is going to control me during the auction, make me say things I wouldn't. I can't fight him, they put something in my system."
Artemis experienced the now-familiar feeling of being punched in the gut yet again.
"It's going to be okay," he said gently, covering her free hand with his own. "We're going to get you out of this mess."
"Let us begin the bidding!" Finch said, unlocking the cage and shooing Artemis away. "Who is going to start me off at one million?"
He pulled her out from the cage, his assistant keeping his gun trained on Aurora as she landed on the concrete on her hands and knees.
"We'll get her to demonstrate what she can do."
Artemis smiled ruefully at Aurora. So it was going to be that kind of bidding.