She stayed still. “Or take me to Sorcha?”
He laughed, a delicious sound as shadow-heavy as any of the Dark Court’s own. “No, definitely not that.”
Then he relaxed his hold, letting her pull away.
Once she was several steps away from him, he held out a hand as if to shake hers. “As I said, I’m Devlin.”
She stared at his outstretched hand and then lifted her gaze to his face. Her heartbeat thrummed in time to the cacophony of fear and anger inside her. “Am I to say ‘pleased to meet you’ or some social pleasantry?”
Heart still zinging, she turned her back and walked over to her steed.
She cuddled against it. It was a smaller beast now—not much more than double the mass of its equine form—with a leonine body, reptilian head, and feathered wings. It tucked its wings close to its side and lay flat on its belly, so she could climb astride its back if she wanted.
She didn’t, but she did lean closer to it.
I’d like a name now, Ani, it murmured.
“After this,” she promised her steed without pulling her gaze from Devlin. “I live here. Your queen has no business—”
“She didn’t send me after you today.” He stood stiffly, not lounging as comfortably as he’d been before he’d restrained her. He reminded her of things she usually found beautiful: deadly power and contemplative violence.
“I don’t want anything to do with the High Court.” She was screaming inside, but her voice was even. “Just go—”
“Are you planning to help Bananach?” Devlin asked. “Will you give her your blood?”
“No. I won’t help her, or you, or the High Court.” Ani had spent her life refusing to give in to fear; that wasn’t going to change because of some genetic fluke that made everyone want her blood. She straightened. “You can kill me, but I won’t ever betray Irial.”
Devlin’s expression softened for a moment, too briefly to notice if she hadn’t been used to studying faeries who hid their expressions. The softness was gone just as suddenly as it had appeared. “I see.”
Ani shivered. He’d said he wasn’t there on Bananach’s orders, but he knew about her blood, knew that Bananach wanted it. She didn’t feel particularly inclined to stand around asking questions. Getting out of town sounded wiser by the moment.
“So if that’s all, I’ll be going,” she said.
She started to turn, but his voice stopped her: “I’m the High Court Assassin. Trust me when I say that running from me is not in your best interest, Ani.”
CHAPTER 17
Devlin waited to see how Ani would react. A sliver of excitement hummed inside him. If she ran, he’d chase. Despite an eternity of being bound to his sister’s court, he still hadn’t subdued that particular instinct. As the High Queen’s Bloodied Hands, he could sometimes let loose that urge with impunity, but that was business—with killing at the end of the chase. Chasing for pleasure, chasing Ani, was exceedingly tempting.
She didn’t run. Instead, she cocked her hip and glared at him. “Do you have any idea what would happen if you killed me?”
Bemused, he watched her face him with challenge clear in her every movement and word. “Tell me,” he said.
“Irial, Gabriel, Niall—they’d all be after you.” She had a hand on each hip, chin raised, shoulders back.
“You invite attack with that posture.” He gestured at her hands. “The footing is good though.”
“What?”
“Your feet. It’s a steady stance if I were to attack you,” he clarified. He wanted to train her. He’d tasted her blood: he knew she was well on her way to becoming equal to a Gabriel in strength.
“Are you planning on attacking me?”
“No, I’d like to speak with you. It’s a bit more civilized,” he said.
“Right. Civilized conversation after you track me, grab me, and suggest killing me. I guess you are High Court after all, huh?” She shook her head and glanced at her beast. It pressed its still-reptilian muzzle against her shoulder as she spoke. Whatever conversation they were having was locked from his hearing.
He waited.
“Fine… let’s talk.” She tensed, but other than that, her aggressive posture was unchanged.
“Come.” He turned and walked into the brightness of the street. He didn’t offer her his arm, didn’t wait to see if she followed.
He repressed all of those untidy things he felt, hid them away, and kept his expression stoic as he’d long since learned to do. It was foolishness, his urge to protect her, but he very much wanted a solution that didn’t involve Ani’s death.
Especially by my hand.
He walked through the streets, following the twists of the poorly laid-out city design until he reached the warehouse district. The few faeries who saw him would undoubtedly report his presence to Niall and Irial. Most faeries wouldn’t be foolish enough to carry the news to Gabriel, but would leave that to their king or former king. Hounds’ tempers were easily sparked and slowly quelled. Only a faery looking to be injured would deliver news of Devlin’s contact with Ani to Gabriel. As order keepers of opposing courts, Gabriel and Devlin didn’t mesh well.
Devlin paused at an intersection. Mortal cars raced by, and he marveled at the appeal of traveling in the tangled cages of metal. Much of the mortal world seemed unnatural.
Unlike Faerie.
He wondered, as he had for centuries, if he could adjust to living in the world of mortals. Bananach had. Many faeries had adjusted when the Dark King pulled them out of Faerie so long ago. Others sickened. Some died or went mad. Still others flourished. Devlin, for his part, felt too closed-in by the pace of it.
Too much information was always bombarding the senses: horns and engines, neon glows and blinding lights from signs, smoke and perfumes from mortals. It was jarring, and when it wasn’t, the peculiarity of visuals and weather left him off-kilter. It was a curious world where nothing but ice or water fell from clouds, where food tasted the same each time, where the climate was sorted by location and the spin of the planet. Faerie’s fluidity made more sense to him.
He paused. Across from them, a window was filled with brightly colored shoes. Cars were careening down the street. Voices clashed, and sirens shrilled.
“What are you looking at?” Ani was beside him then. She appeared tinier up close, or maybe she only seemed that way because she wasn’t radiating aggression. The top of her head was level with his shoulder; the edges of her garish pink- tipped hair brushed against his upper arm as she turned her head to look down the street.
A woman too thin to be healthy stood on the other side of the window looking at shoes; her face was illuminated by the harsh lights inside the store. She glanced outside, but her gaze flickered away before fully settling on him.
Devlin turned his attention to Ani. Like Rae, she was unafraid of him. Even his queen found him frightening: it was the order of things. Faeries should fear him. Death in Faerie—or by order of Faerie—was his function. Ani seemed foolishly nonplussed by this. Once she’d learned that there was no immediate fatal threat, she’d become bold. Is that why Rae wanted me to see Ani? Did she know? It couldn’t be. There was no way for Rae to know that Ani would be unafraid. Still, such fearlessness near him was rare, and he cherished it.
“Hell-o?” She nudged him. “What are you looking at?”
“We need to cross here.” He wasn’t sure how fast she could move, but he’d noticed that mortals were slower. She wasn’t a true mortal, and her sire was one of the fastest sorts of faeries. Thinking of her getting crushed by the metal racing past them was disconcerting.
She matters.
He gripped her arm just above her elbow and started walking, forcing her to scurry to keep pace with his longer stride.
She yanked her arm free. “What are you doing?”
“Helping you cross the street.” He narrowed his eyes at her tone. Boldness was only amusing so long. When it interfered with his objectives, it ceased being ent
ertaining. “The vehicles speed, and you are still somewhat mortal. I’m not sure how fast mortals—”
“I am a Hound.” She raced down the block.
From a distance, he could see her belligerent posture. It was foolhardy, but not unexpected. He should’ve kept a better grip on her.
She’s unrestrained. It’s— He froze. Thoughts, action, everything around him seemed to stop as he watched Bananach come up behind Ani and slide an arm around the Hound’s shoulder.
NO.
Before the objection was a completed thought, Devlin stood in front of them. “Step away, Sister.” “For what coin?” She curled her hand around Ani’s shoulder so that her talon-tipped fingers furrowed skin, not piercing but deep enough that the Hound would bruise.
He had chosen to be ruled by logic, and logic said there was an answer here that would get Ani safely out of War’s reach, but it wasn’t logic that rode in his words. “She’s mine. I have taken her into my keeping.”
“She’s alive.” Bananach rubbed her face against Ani’s hair in a feline gesture that seemed peculiar for the raven- faery. “This is good. I find that I need her not-dead. She has a mission now. Don’t you, puppy?”
Ani caught his gaze. She didn’t look afraid, despite her situation, and Devlin wondered fleetingly if she was impaired. He’d seen that in some of the mortal-faery mixes, a lack of instinctual fear. Has she no sense of self-preservation?
She widened her eyes, as if she was willing thoughts to him.
Devlin stared at her, trying to make sense of whatever she was trying to convey.
She pursed her lips and almost imperceptibly tilted her head. Her gaze shot pointedly to the left.
Sitting on the curb beside him was her steed, looking like a car now. Her intention seemed to be to use the beast as a weapon. The results of such an attack weren’t likely to be severe, but it would upset Bananach—which would lead to her striking Ani.
Which would result in my injuring my sister.
Devlin moved forward, putting himself between the steed and his sister. He didn’t always like his sister- mothers, but he was sworn to keep them safe to the best of his ability.
Even from me.
Moving as close to his sister as he could get, he made himself a barrier to Bananach’s injury.
Ani glared at him.
“You made mistakes. Sisters know.” Bananach craned her neck forward so her cheek rubbed Ani’s face. “I won’t tell our secrets.”
Devlin weighed and measured the words. He couldn’t tell Bananach anything false. I wish Rae was here. Being possessed so as to allow his lips to form a lie would be incalculably useful just then.
“You won’t tell secrets either; will you, little pup?” Bananach spun Ani so they were face-to-face. “You’ll go to your court. He can help. Is that why you came, Brother? To help?”
Bananach looked over Ani’s shoulder at Devlin.
He held her gaze and said, “Yes. I’ve come to help.”
With most faeries, Bananach would press; she would insist on clarity of word—but it was not so with him. She believed him. Bananach kissed Ani’s forehead. “Trust him, little one. He is wise.”
Some part of Devlin’s long-suppressed emotions cringed at those words. For everything she’d done, she was still his creator. Betraying her today—as he’d betrayed Sorcha fourteen years ago—wounded him.
For you, Ani.
The faery in question backed away from Bananach. She shot a glance at Devlin. Then she walked toward her steed. A tremble in her hand as she reached out to the door handle revealed her fear—or perhaps her anger.
Silently, he turned his back on his sister and followed Ani.
He slipped into the passenger seat and barely had the door closed before Ani peeled out. He could see his sister in the rearview mirror: she stood staring after them.
Ani cranked the stereo; angry guitars and shrieking voices came blasting out of the speakers.
He put a hand on hers.
She jerked away.
“Are you helping Bananach?” Ani didn’t take her gaze from the road. She was speeding between cars and occasionally getting close enough that Devlin braced for the sound of scraping metal. “She said—”
“If I told her I wanted to remove you from her reach, do you think she’d have let us leave?”
She looked over at him. “Why should I trust you?”
“Maybe you shouldn’t.” He had just betrayed his second sister for Ani, but he couldn’t say he wouldn’t kill Ani. If the options were Ani’s life or the good of Faerie, he’d act in Faerie’s best interest. “I did not come seeking your death or injury, Ani.”
Her hands tightened on the wheel. “But?”
He looked over at her, wishing that she’d stayed safely hidden, wishing she’d never attracted Sorcha’s attention before or Bananach’s now. He couldn’t tell her those things, not at the moment, not when she was already so furious and frightened. He couldn’t not tell her anything either, so he said, “But you have something she wants, something she believes will allow her to defeat Sorcha, to become more powerful than War should ever be, and I cannot let her have it.”
“Why?”
He sighed. “Do you want to help her?”
“No, but—”
Devlin interrupted, “And I prefer not to have to kill you. If you help her, I will have to.”
After that, neither of them spoke, not as she blared the music to obscene volumes, not as she drove carelessly enough that he was quite sure of her parentage, and not as she gunned the engine as they departed Huntsdale.
Please let me find a solution that isn’t her death.
CHAPTER 18
Rae didn’t truly sleep, but she could reach a meditative silence that felt very energizing. She felt as if she floated in a gray nothingness where the world couldn’t reach her.
“You!”
Rae focused her attention on the cave, pulling herself back to the state in which she typically existed, staring at the rock walls she had called “home” these past years. In the shadowed alcove, the queen of Faerie stood waiting. Her left hand held a broken mirror. All around her feet shards of reflective glass were scattered like the bones of the dead on an abandoned battlefield.
“None of these work as the one you made did.” Sorcha dropped the mirror to the floor, where the glass pieces joined the others already there. “You were in my mind.”
How did she find me?
Rae winced. She feigned comfort as if she merely rested on an oblong rock on the floor of the cave. It was an illusion, but it was the sort that made her feel anchored in the waking world. She looked directly at Sorcha and said, “I was.”
“I didn’t give you leave to live in Faerie. You never came to ask my permission,” Sorcha said. The words lilted at the end, a question that wasn’t meant to be. Her eyes were unfocused, her gaze not centered on Rae but on something beyond. She wasn’t as lovely here as she was in the dream world. Here, her imperiousness was off-putting; her rigidity was disconcerting. The flamelike vitality of her dream-self had been muted, like Rae was seeing her through a thick glass.
Rae would feel sympathy, but Sorcha was the queen Rae had feared, the faery who kept Devlin bound to a path that didn’t suit him. At her word, Devlin could die; Rae could die. That reality nullified any sympathy Rae would otherwise feel.
She stood and walked deeper into the shadows, putting more distance between them, standing as if she were leaning against the cave wall. Distance wouldn’t keep her safe, but it made her feel less unsettled by the High Queen’s presence.
“Can I ask permission now?”
Sorcha paused. “I’m not sure. I don’t know that I like your willingness to walk in my dreams…in anyone’s dreams. It’s indecorous.”
Rae kept silent. Once, in her mortal life, being accused of indecorous behavior was a severe charge. Rae’s long-ago instincts made her want to apologize for being inappropriate, but she hadn’t done anything untoward: sh
e’d tried to help ease the pain of a grieving faery. The apology she owed was to Devlin, for exposing herself. So Rae stayed silent, hands folded demurely, gaze lowered. The semblance of propriety seemed a fitting response.
“Yet, I’m not sure how to kill you. The lack of a body to bleed complicates the matter.” Sorcha was as callous as Devlin appeared to most faeries, as unyielding as logic should be. It was chilling.
“I see.” Rae nodded. “Have you tried wishing me dead?”
“No.”
“May I ask—”
“No.” Sorcha was suddenly seated on a silver throne that sat atop a dais. Neither had been there a heartbeat ago. The queen had willed a chair into being, and a floor, and marble pillars, and—
We aren’t in the cave. Rae shivered. Obviously, Sorcha could relocate Rae. Or did she move the world around us?
“Fortunately for you, I have decided that I have use of you.” Sorcha raised a hand in a beckoning motion. Two mortals came forward. They were both veiled. Diaphanous gray gauze hung over their faces and draped their shoulders. Shifts of a similar cloth covered their bodies. Their arms and feet were bare.
Rae wondered if she’d met them when she’d walked in dreams or worn Devlin’s body, but she couldn’t tell from the slight glimpse of bare arm or foot. She stayed silent before the High Queen.
“Sleep,” Sorcha told the mortals. “Here.”
The floor was undoubtedly beautiful; mosaic tiles created elaborate art that they trod on as if it were merely a base surface. It was not soft or inviting, however.
The mortals lowered themselves to the ground obediently. They crossed their bare ankles and folded their hands over their stomachs, looking like cloaked corpses at a wake. Still silent, they were stretched prone at their queen’s feet. What they weren’t doing, however, was sleeping.
Rae debated commenting. If she spoke, there was a chance Sorcha would be further displeased. If they slept, Rae suspected she’d be given direction to invade their dreams for some reason Sorcha had devised but not yet shared.
“Tell me what they dream,” Sorcha demanded.