"It's an apartment. Seanna? If you don't wish to be sedated, I would suggest you accompany these two quietly. Remember, you can't escape if you're unconscious."
"I don't think you should give her ideas," Alexios whispered.
Patrick only shook his head. He knew Gabriel was advising her to stay alert because she had no actual chance of escape and sedation was merely inconvenient. Which was not entirely true. Gabriel was bluffing about the sedatives. He certainly didn't keep them on hand. If he did, there'd be far too much temptation to use them on far too many people.
The dryads started toward Seanna. Then they stopped, pursing their lips in unison as they looked about.
"Oh, let me guess," Patrick said. "You hear something. And we need to run and hide, leaving you..."
Patrick kept talking, but Gabriel no longer heard him. No longer heard anything except the softest beating of wings against glass.
The dryads had gone as still as trees. They heard it, too, that soft sound, slowly escalating--
"Down!" Gabriel shouted.
Dozens of windows shattered in one deafening crash. Gabriel ducked, arms over his head. He heard Helia shout "No!" as she ran toward him, Alexios following her. Patrick turned on them, his face contorted in a snarl, his glamour rippling, a flash of light keeping Gabriel from seeing what lay beneath.
The light arced and Helia fell back, knocked off her feet. Then came a tremendous crack, as boards were ripped from the walls. Black smoke rushed in. Patrick saw it, his eyes rounding. Gabriel lunged at him. The smoke hit Helia and the dryad screamed, and blood sprayed, and Alexios shrieked--an inhuman shriek of rage.
The floor shattered under Gabriel's feet, and he plummeted, one hand striking jagged wood, a flash fire of pain, yet still he dropped, so fast it wasn't even like jumping from the bridge, where he'd had a moment to think, to move, to position himself. The floor gave way and he fell, and then he hit the next floor so hard that he broke right through, another flash of pain.
Falling again, hitting again. Still plummeting through darkness.
He slammed down on a pile of debris, the wind knocked out of his lungs, leaving him flat on his back, gasping and wheezing, his brain screaming at him to get up--stop this nonsense, breathe, and get the fuck up, because the sluagh was here, and he was lying on his goddamned back--
"Gabriel?"
A hand touched his shoulder, and he twisted, snarling.
The fingers fell away and the voice became Patrick's, saying, "It's me."
Gabriel had to resist the urge to snap that he didn't give a damn. He was lying on his back in the darkness, and everything hurt, and the sluagh had attacked, and why the hell hadn't he told Olivia where he was?
At this moment, hers was the only voice he wanted to hear--the only person he trusted to help him out of this. That wish lasted only a heartbeat until he realized that, no, he very much did not wish Olivia was here with the sluagh attacking.
"Where are they?" he said as he started to push up.
"Don't move," Patrick said. "Let me check you--"
"I have this." When Patrick's hand touched Gabriel's arm, he yanked himself away, saying, "I said I have this. I know enough not to leap to my feet. Just step back, and let me get up."
"You don't need to be so damned self-sufficient, Gabriel..." Patrick's voice trailed off at the end, as if he realized what had made Gabriel that self-sufficient. "I'm sorry. I--"
"If I insisted on doing everything myself, you wouldn't be here. I simply would prefer to assess my own condition. Please step back and allow me to do so. If you can manage some form of light..."
Patrick turned on his cell phone. Gabriel rose slowly. He'd landed on the debris of the floors he'd crashed through, which kept him from hitting the concrete of the basement. He was only lucky he hadn't impaled himself on the broken wood.
It hurt to rise. Hurt to breathe. But nothing prevented him from doing either, meaning he had not sustained any mobility-threatening injuries.
Patrick cursed under his breath and said, "You've sliced open your arm."
As he remembered cutting his arm, he felt it, both the throbbing pain and the dripping blood. He glanced to see a gash about three inches long. While he'd had the forethought to roll up his sleeves, it hadn't saved his shirt. He sighed softly, and twisted his arm for a better look at the damage.
"You need to bind that," Patrick said. "I'll look for a rag."
"Anything you find down here will be filthy. I'd be safer bleeding. I can bind it with my shirt, which is already ruined. I've done this before."
Which might suggest he should start carrying a roll of bandages. Or buying cheaper shirts.
He pulled the shirt off, trying not to wince. While he didn't appear to have broken anything, it felt as if he'd broken everything. When he went to rip the fabric, the tensing muscles made his arm gush fresh blood.
"Give me that." Patrick took the shirt from Gabriel, tore a strip off the bottom, and said, "Now your arm," and seemed surprised when Gabriel complied. "There. Looks like you've got a few other scrapes, and you'll probably have--" He swore as he circled Gabriel, shining the light on him. "You've scratched up your back, too. They're shallow, though. They look more like...Um, unless the floor also nipped your collarbone, I'm guessing that's preexisting damage. Please tell me it was Liv."
"As opposed to...?"
"Anyone else."
Gabriel gave him a look.
Patrick raised his hands. "Hey, I write romances. I know that old saw. Try to get a woman's attention by messing around with someone else, making her jealous and proving that other women find you irresistible."
Gabriel shrugged on the remains of his shirt. "I would hope it's obvious I have both the intelligence and the self-respect never to consider such a moronic stunt."
"Good. Wait. So...Liv? Yes? You're telling me that you and Olivia--"
"I'm telling you that we were just attacked by the sluagh and fell through three floors, and this may not be the time to discuss my love life."
"Love life. You said love life. Not sex life. Meaning it wasn't a heat-of-the-moment tryst followed by oh-no-we-really-shouldn't followed by another whoops--Yes, I write romances."
Gabriel ignored him and concentrated on the door, which naturally did not open. He shone the light from his miraculously-still-functioning cell phone at the gap, and when he turned the knob, he watched the latch retract. So there was no lock. Instead, dark horizontal strips on the other side suggested the door had been boarded shut.
The hinges indicated the door swung out. Gabriel heaved on it, and then hissed an involuntary gasp of pain.
"Here, let me," Patrick said, which Gabriel did, but it was clear that whatever gifts a bocan might possess, extraordinary strength was not one of them.
Gabriel backed up to the hole in the ceiling and circled the perimeter. "You'll need to get on my shoulders," Gabriel said.
"Not in the shape you're in."
"Shall I climb on yours, then?" He didn't wait for an answer, just gave an impatient wave beckoning Patrick over. "The only exit is boarded over. Unless you can burrow under concrete, this is the answer."
Gabriel positioned himself beside the heap of debris, laced his hands, and gritted his teeth. Patrick started to lift his foot. Then he said, "Wait."
"We don't have time--"
"Just hold on."
Patrick closed his eyes and took a deep breath. As he exhaled, his glamour rippled, and Patrick's true form appeared.
"Yes," Patrick said. "It's not quite as conventional as others, so let's get this over with before anyone sees."
Patrick's bocan form was indeed not conventionally human. Yet given the illustrations Gabriel had seen of hobgoblins, it wasn't nearly as bizarre as it could have been. The biggest difference was his skin. Which was green. A light green, but definitely that color. His hair was longer, wilder, and also green, a dark shade that appeared black until the light hit it. He was taller than his human height. Slighter of build, t
oo, so lean he seemed all ropy sinew. That was why he'd shifted--it was a lighter form, easily boosted onto Gabriel's hands and then his shoulders.
Gabriel still felt the weight and winced at it, his battered body not quite up to this feat. But he gritted his teeth, and Patrick gripped the floor above and--
"No," Gabriel said, backing up so fast that Patrick let out a "Cach!" and grabbed the ceiling edge, hanging there.
"Some warning, please?" Patrick's glamour snapped back in place as he struggled to heave himself up. "At least give me a boost."
"Get down. Now."
"I'm almost--"
"I said get down."
Patrick glanced at Gabriel's expression and dropped to the floor. "What's--?"
Gabriel motioned him to silence. A moment later, footsteps sounded. That hadn't been what stopped him, though. No sound. No sight. Just a feeling, cold dread seeping through his veins.
They're coming. The darkness. The unforgiven.
"Probably one of those damned dryads," Patrick said.
"Helia was hurt."
"There's two of them."
"Alexios won't leave her if she's hurt."
"Unless that so-called injury was planned. This whole thing still smacks of a setup, Gabriel. Helia tried to attack you."
No, she'd tried to shield him, but Gabriel wasn't arguing with Patrick. Those footsteps were getting closer, and they sounded nothing like a dryad's scamper.
Gabriel strode to the door and threw his shoulder against it, ignoring the crack of pain.
"Come help me," he said, and Patrick did, without a word, both of them pushing--
"Are you trying to flee, Gwynn?" A voice floated down through the hole. "Hardly befitting the most famous king of the Fae. But you're not Gwynn, are you? Just a boy who thinks he's a man. Barely thirty years old. Yes, we know your birthdate, given our role in helping you enter this world. How is your mother, Gabriel?"
The voice gave him pause. It bore a note that plucked at his memory. But it was like hearing an actor who voiced a children's cartoon--those notes of similarity weren't enough to trace the thread back to the associated memory.
As she talked, Gabriel walked along the wall, shining his light and looking for a weak spot.
"Would you like to know how your mother fares?" she continued. "Or don't you care? I suppose you don't. Not much of a mother, was she? One cannot be a mother without a soul, without some trace of humanity. When you were a child, such a mother was a terror. Now, though, she's merely an inconvenience. Would you like us to rid you of that inconvenience, Gabriel? As a favor? We will. She has played her role, and it's time for her to come home."
Gabriel found a gap between wallboards and tried to pry one off, but it was nailed tight.
"Do you think you can escape?" she said. "Where would you go? There isn't a door that can stop us, Gabriel."
"What do you want with him?" Patrick said.
"Is that the bocan? Like Seanna, you have played your role. You may be silent now. Your voice is but a reminder that we failed to ensure Gwynn had a more fitting sire. A half-bocan Gwynn ap Nudd is terribly disappointing. There are so many more worthy types."
"Sticks and stones..." Patrick said. "If you'd like me to shut up, you'll need to tell me what you want with him. Otherwise, if there's one thing bocans are very good at? It's not shutting up. What do you want--?"
"Nothing. Everything. It depends on him. But for now, like you and his mother, he is simply a means to an end."
And that end was Olivia.
Gabriel peered at the dark hole in the ceiling. Then, pushing against everything that shouted at him to stay clear, he cautiously approached it. When Patrick reached out, Gabriel ducked his reach and kept going.
Once under that hole, he looked up and saw nothing but darkness. Even when he lifted the light, the wall of black swallowed it.
The sluagh. The darkness.
"What do you want with Olivia?" he said.
"What we're owed."
"What are you owed?"
"Our fair share."
"Of what?"
"Of what indeed? Tell me, boy, what is Matilda's role?"
He hated giving the answer, feeling like a twelve-year-old being asked the sum of one plus one. When he didn't respond, Patrick moved past him.
"Matilda prolongs and improves the life of the local Tylwyth Teg or Cwn Annwn," Patrick said. "She chooses between the two branches of fae."
"Does she?"
Patrick's voice sharpened. "If you want me to explain exactly how her presence cleanses the elements for her chosen side, I fear that answer is above my pay grade. Elemental forces of nature, blah, blah, blah."
"No, my dear bocan. I want a correct answer, which I would have hoped I'd get from such an illustrious scholar. You said she chooses between the two branches of fae."
"Fine. You're arguing that the Huntsmen aren't fae. They are, but if you insist on mincing words--"
"No, I insist on not mincing words. The Cwn Annwn are fae. But you say two branches. Is there not a third?"
"You mean the sluagh? That one is definitely debatable. The Cwn Annwn and the Tylwyth Teg share a common ancestry. They were, at one point, the same species, and the Hunt was only a vocation within it. Then the Cwn Annwn broke away, and like any group that severs ties, they eventually became a separate race, with characteristics--"
"I did not ask you for a history lesson, bocan."
The snap in her voice made Gabriel flinch, but Patrick only said, "Mmm, anthropology really, with some biology. The point is that there's no evidence of a common ancestry with the sluagh. They are actually more human than Gabriel here, the majority of their ranks being comprised of human souls--"
"Do not lecture me." Her voice whipped around them, setting every hair on Gabriel's body rising. "I am as fae as you. I am the sluagh. The darkness. You call us the unforgiven. That is incorrect. Our melltithiwyd are the unforgiven. They are human souls that serve us. We are the sluagh, and we are fae, and we are tired of being forgotten. We want our share."
"Of Matilda," Patrick said.
"Yes."
"Fine. There's not a hope in the Otherworld she'd choose to keep you lot alive. But sure, why not. Join the fun. Sit at the table. Make your case. Just tell me where to send the invitation."
The room rocked, as if with sonic boom, setting the concrete under Gabriel's feet quivering.
"Do you think you are clever, bocan? You are a fool. You have played your role, as has your epil. He plays it even now, graciously summoning Matilda for us."
Gabriel shook his head. "Whatever threat you plan to employ, you may save your breath. I won't summon her."
"But you already have." The voice slipped around him again. "Check your phone, Gabriel."
He glanced at it. The home screen showed no new messages, but when he clicked on his text conversation with Olivia, their exchange now continued past her smiley face.
Gabriel: I could use your assistance if you aren't otherwise occupied.
Olivia: Just waiting 4 you. What's up?
Gabriel: I may have found my mother. It seems unwise to proceed without backup.
Olivia: Good call. Give me an addy & we're on our way.
Their current address followed. Then,
Olivia: Be there ASAP!
Gabriel: I'm inside. Text when you arrive.
Olivia: Yes, sir. :)
Gabriel stabbed the button to call her back. Nothing happened. He checked his connection. No service. He typed a message anyway.
Stay where you are. I didn't call you. Do NOT come here.
The text appended at the end of the conversation, with the exclamation mark to show it hadn't sent. He flicked on the wi-fi and watched until it showed no service found.
"The next step is to raise it over your head," the voice said. "See if you can get signal that way. Then ask your father if his is working...Oh, I see he's already checking. I'll leave you both to that. I have a new arrival to greet."
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
It took longer than expected to reach Gabriel's location. Snow was falling along with the temperature, which meant Ricky couldn't travel at his usual speed. He had an old car at his dad's but didn't put the bike away until he absolutely had to.
The address Gabriel texted led to an abandoned school. And the moment I saw that, my brain screamed, Fae.
The school looked as if it'd been empty for years. Nature had already reclaimed the playground, asphalt erupting with greenery, half covered in snow, an ancient swing set strangled by dead vines. Now, that greenery had begun its assault on the school itself, moss and vines tentatively cracking the foundation as they crept up the walls.
Seanna hadn't wandered here on her own. Someone had put her here. Someone fae. Set her up and waited for us to take the bait.
I called Gabriel as soon as I got my helmet off. When he didn't answer, I sent a text. Then I walked to his car, where the key fob in my purse automatically unlocked the doors.
"Someone was in the backseat." I held out a wrapper from candies Lydia kept in a jar. Ricky didn't suggest Gabriel had grabbed one and tossed the wrapper in the back. That was about as likely as him putting down the windows and cranking the tunes.
"And if there was a person in the back," Ricky said, "that means someone else occupied the passenger side."
I checked the front passenger side and found a pen wedged behind the cushions.
"A Montblanc refill in a cheap pen," I said.
"Champagne tastes on a Budweiser budget?"
"Not exactly. This particular someone can afford a drawer of Montblancs. He says they write like a dream and feel like a grade-school pencil. He buys more comfortable pens and sticks in the good ink." I looked up at the school. "So Gabriel came here with Patrick, which suggests he got a tip on Seanna and needed backup. He also brought someone else. Meaning he showed up with at least two other people...and then texts me to come help him?"
"Looks like you're getting false messages again. You guys need to come up with a secret code."
"No kidding." I surveyed the building. "But he is here. And he's not answering his phone." I typed in another number and listened while it rang. "Neither is Patrick."
"Whoever sent that message wants you here," he said. "Shall we accept the invitation?"
"We shall."
--
I could see where Gabriel and Patrick had gone in--there were footprints beneath a window. Inside, the dusty floor bore more prints. Gabriel's were obvious, given the size. I could guess at Patrick's by the sneaker tread. There were two other sets, smaller than Patrick's.