“J.B. is my friend,” I said. “I wouldn’t leave any friend in Titania’s hands.”
“Keep telling yourself that,” Beezle said.
Samiel tapped my shoulder so I would look at him. It’s worth a try. It doesn’t mean you don’t love Gabriel.
Samiel’s consent made me feel even more embarrassed and confused.
“I don’t…I can’t…” I said.
“We’ll all give you some privacy if it makes you feel better,” Beezle said. “But the only way we’re going to get out of here is to fly. And the only way to fly is if J.B. can move under his own power.”
“And what if this doesn’t work, smarty-pants?” I asked.
“Then we’ll try something else,” Beezle said. “But I’m betting it will work. And you know I’m always right.”
“I don’t know how you fit such a huge ego in that tiny head,” I said.
“The same way I can fit a pound of chicken wings in this tiny body,” Beezle said. “Mad skillz.”
“Okay, fine, I’ll try it,” I said. My cheeks were on fire, and I couldn’t look directly at Nathaniel. I pointed toward the mountain. “Everyone just walk that way for a while.”
“How far?” Beezle asked.
“Just keep walking until either I call you or we catch up,” I said. “I am definitely not doing this with an audience.”
“You know, Jude can hear everything for about a mile in any direction,” Beezle said. “Privacy is really an illusion.”
“Just go!” I said.
“All right, all right. No need to get huffy,” Beezle said.
They all left except Nathaniel, who stood there for a moment while I determinedly stared at the ground.
“This doesn’t mean I’m choosing,” I said finally, looking up at him.
He looked back at me with Puck’s eyes. It was disconcerting to see those eyes in Nathaniel’s face.
He said nothing, just nodded and turned to follow the others.
J.B. lay still on the ground. His eyes were closed, his breath smooth and even. I’d been so focused on his injuries that I hadn’t noticed his clothes. Now I realized that he was dressed for work in his favorite gray pants and a blue button-down. Both pieces were torn and liberally stained with blood, and his socks and shoes were gone.
He looked so unlike himself, lying there in the grass. J.B. was always moving, always shouting, always calculating the solution to the next problem. He wasn’t a beaten thing, a broken toy that Titania had thrown away. He was J.B., and Beezle was right. I did love him.
I just didn’t know what kind of love it was, and Gabriel’s shadow was still with me. It was too soon to make any kind of decision. It felt like circumstance was forcing me to move on, to choose. I didn’t want to choose. I wanted to do things in my own time and in my own way, the same way I did everything else.
Nathaniel or J.B. J.B. or Nathaniel. Part of me just wanted to not have to choose at all, to have Gabriel back.
I knelt beside J.B., brushed my hand over his forehead. I didn’t have to decide now. I just needed to wake him up, to get us all home safely.
I bent closer, until I could feel his slow exhalations on my mouth. This had to work.
“Wake up, J.B.,” I said, and I kissed him.
His lips were warm but yielding, and it seemed like it wasn’t going to happen. And if I kissed J.B. for nothing, then I was going to hide all the popcorn from Beezle for the next month.
J.B. groaned, and shifted in the dirt. I pulled away, grabbing his shoulders.
“J.B.?” I said, shaking him a little.
He opened his eyes. They were bleary, and it took a second for him to focus.
“Maddy?” he said. “Were you kissing me?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Now you kiss me? While I’m unconscious?”
“Beezle said it was the only way to wake you up.”
“I’m going to buy that gargoyle all the popcorn he can eat,” J.B. said.
His arms wrapped around my waist, pulled me on top of him and rolled us over until I was underneath him. He did this so fast that I didn’t really have time to process what was happening.
“Um, J.B.?” I said.
“Shh,” he said. “I was asleep for the last one.”
And then he kissed me. The sun shone down on us, warm and comforting. The grass rustled in the wind. All that was between us was breath and air, and I felt a sweet peace, one I hadn’t felt in a long time.
There was no madness of magic and desire like there was when I was with Nathaniel. J.B. didn’t push me. He didn’t ask for more than I could give.
He kissed me one last time, and then lifted his head. I opened my eyes to look at him. He brushed his hand through my hair.
“Your hair grew back,” he said. “How long was I gone?”
“Only a day,” I said, and pressed his shoulders so that he would get off me.
“I imagine there’s an interesting story about why your hair is back, then,” he said.
“Yeah, interesting,” I said. And I have no intention of ever telling it to you.
He rolled to the side and then to his feet. He shielded his eyes from the sun, squinting in the direction the others had gone.
“Is that Chloe?” he asked. “I can see a purple blob kind of floating above the grass.”
“Yeah, and Jude and Samiel and Nathaniel and Beezle,” I said, standing up and brushing dirt from my pants.
“Where did you get those pants? I never pegged you for the leather type. Although I like them,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively and peeking around me. “They make your backside look good.”
I punched him in the shoulder. “Just because I kissed you does not mean you get to be a lech.”
“Well, what does it mean?” he said.
“Right now, not much. This isn’t the time for a heart-to-heart,” I said. “We took you from Titania but we’ve got no way of leaving this place until we can get to the borders of her lands and call for Lucifer’s help. We can’t walk there without killing a lot of time, and time is something we don’t have much of.”
I told him about Therion’s message and what was happening in Chicago. Then I told him about the harpies.
“Are you out of your mind?” J.B. asked. “If the harpies detect us, they will rip us limb from limb and eat us, and not in that order.”
“We’re pretty much out of options,” I said. “If we stay here, Titania will rip us limb from limb and then feed us to one of her pets.”
He rubbed his forehead. “Why is it your plans are always insane?”
“Maybe because we’re always in insane circumstances,” I said. I saw the others approaching us. “Listen, J.B. Titania punished you because of me.”
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “Don’t worry about it.”
“No,” I said. “I can never make it up to you.”
He looked down at himself. “You seem to have already, since my previously broken parts are no longer broken.”
“J.B., she tortured you,” I said. “That doesn’t just go away.”
“Don’t worry about me, Black. I’ve got a sturdy constitution,” he said.
Beezle landed on my shoulder. “Told you it would work.”
“Are you going to be insufferable now?” I said. I was a little annoyed that J.B. wasn’t taking his trauma and my guilt about it very seriously.
“No more than usual,” Beezle said. “So, how are we going to do this, then?”
“I will carry Madeline,” Nathaniel said. “And Samiel can carry Jude.”
“I can carry Maddy,” J.B. said.
“You were just unconscious a second ago,” I said. “And you can hardly see without your glasses.”
“I’m fine,” he said in that tone that men get when you imply that their manliness might be less than optimal.
“We are not going to argue about this,” I said. “You’re still recovering. All I want you to do is get yourself safely to the top of that m
ountain.”
He screwed up his face. I knew he couldn’t see the point that I was referring to, and there was no way in hell he would admit that.
Chloe and J.B. pushed out their wings. I watched them with no small amount of jealousy. Nathaniel and J.B. tried to prove who was the better man by carting me around, but I would have preferred to be able to fly without assistance from either of them.
Nathaniel scooped me into his arms and Beezle shifted from my shoulder to J.B.’s. Samiel slung Jude over his shoulders.
“Fly as fast as you can,” I said to all of them. I looked at Chloe. “Stay close to J.B.”
She nodded. J.B. looked insulted, but he was half-blind at the moment and I didn’t want him veering off course.
Nathaniel shifted me in his arms. It was going to be difficult for us to defend ourselves from the harpies with me in this position.
“How do you kill a harpy?” I asked curiously.
I didn’t know much about them except that they were half-bird, half-woman and that there was one in the film The Last Unicorn. That harpy had scared the bejeezus out of me as a kid.
“Play to your strengths,” Beezle said.
“You want me to set them on fire?”
“It’s probably the most efficient way of getting rid of them,” J.B. agreed. “And you’re the only one here who can throw fire.”
“Nothing like the fate of the whole party resting on your shoulders. You’d all better fly ahead of us, then, so you don’t get caught in the cross fire,” I said. “All right, let’s go.”
We waited for the others to take off first. I looked at him.
“I’m not going to get much done if you carry me like a baby,” I said.
“If you shift to the position you were in when the Agents chased us, I could hold you steady while you fired behind me,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said, and climbed up, wrapping my legs around his waist. Nathaniel put one hand under my butt and the other around my waist. I could see over Nathaniel’s shoulder in this position, and both of my hands were free. Please, don’t let J.B. look back.
I felt that same electricity between us again, that crazy burning lust that had settled just under the surface of my skin. Nathaniel felt it, too. It was there in the flare of his eyes, but he didn’t say anything and neither did I.
Nathaniel spread his wings wide and lifted from the ground. I focused intently on the sky behind us, watching the trees in the forest that we had left hours ago. There was no sound, no movement.
“How quickly could the harpies catch up with us?” I shouted to Nathaniel.
“Very quickly,” he said. His hand shifted, pressing me tighter against him.
I was getting breathless, and not from the stress of watching for harpies. “Nathaniel, now is not the time.”
“I know,” he said.
It was like we were in the grip of insanity, both of us knowing that our lives were in danger, that we had friends depending on us to keep them safe. And even with all of this I still could think of nothing but him, his heat, his skin.
Then there was a terrible cry floating on the wind, from far and away across the field, and that sound was finally enough to break the spell of lust.
I saw black shapes rising from the trees, and the harpies came screaming for us.
Their cries permeated my blood, danced over my nerve endings. It was the most horrible sound I have ever heard. It was the sound of death on wings, death without mercy.
“How far away are the others?” I asked Nathaniel.
“They are ahead of us, but not far enough.”
I couldn’t risk turning around to see. The harpies were moving fast, much faster than I would have thought they could, and I needed to be ready. They were still far enough away for their faces to be indistinct, but they were no longer formless blobs. I could distinguish their heads from their bodies and their wings.
My magic had flared high when Nathaniel had lifted me against him, and I was still riding that surge of power. I felt more than prepared to take out some harpies.
“They are only a little ahead of us,” Nathaniel said. “We are over the foothills of the mountain now.”
That was what flying could do for you over walking. It had taken us hours to get halfway across the field on foot, and in a few short moments in the air we had covered the remainder of the distance.
The harpies screamed as they came closer. I could see their faces now, and I wished I couldn’t. They were the faces of beautiful women, but contorted by a hate so fierce that it made them horrible to look upon.
I let loose the fire that blazed in my blood.
The vanguard fell screaming and smoking to the earth. Their sisters took up the cry with twice the ferocity, and I thought my eardrums might burst. I let the flame pour from my hands, and harpies plummeted to earth. The air was filled with stench of burning flesh and the howls of burning women. But still there were more, and more. There was a stream of harpies flowing from our wake back to the forest, and it seemed to have no end.
“How much farther?” I said, still loosing flame, still burning harpies with all the power I could muster.
“It’s farther away than it looks,” Nathaniel said.
“There are so many of them,” I said, and I wondered whether we would make it in time.
“Madeline,” Nathaniel said, and he put his lips on my neck.
I felt his magic flow from the place where his mouth touched, felt his power twining around mine again. And as it did, there was a blaze, as there was the first time our powers had touched. Heat blasted from my hands, uncontrolled, and then everything seemed to explode.
We were blinded by white light, and for a moment I was afraid Nathaniel would drop me. But he held me close, and my arms wound around his neck, my power spent. We hovered in the air, our eyes closed against the light.
When the light seemed to recede I opened my eyes and looked over Nathaniel’s shoulder toward the harpies.
The harpies were gone. So was the field, and a good portion of the forest. The path we had walked was a blackened husk.
“What about the others?” I asked, panicking. “Were they caught in the spell?”
“No, you maniac,” Beezle said beside me. “Although it was a near thing. You should have mentioned that you were going to set off a nuclear bomb.”
“You told me to play to my strengths,” I said, nudging Nathaniel so he would shift me back to our original carrying position. Jude, Samiel, Chloe and J.B. were floating in the air several feet ahead of us, and they all looked a little shocked. And smoke-smudged.
“So I should have expected you to reduce all animal and plant life for miles around to ash?”
“Yes, you should have,” I said. “That’s pretty much my M.O.”
“Titania’s going to be really mad at you now,” Beezle said as we started forward to join everyone else.
“Like she wasn’t mad before?”
“These faerie queens seem to take it amiss when you burn down their forest and their creatures,” Beezle said. “Remember when you killed Amarantha’s Cthulhu-thing and her giant spider?”
“Barely,” I said. “I’ve burned so many things it’s kind of all blurring together. And Amarantha was ready to be pissed at me before that, just as Titania is.”
“Then stop antagonizing her,” Beezle said.
“Maybe she should stop antagonizing me,” I said. “Before I wipe out her whole kingdom.”
“Dark side,” Beezle said.
“I am not going dark side,” I said impatiently as we flew along toward the top of the mountain.
“If you’re not going dark side, then you’ve definitely decided to adopt a scorched-earth policy for dealing with your enemies,” Beezle said.
“And why shouldn’t she?” J.B. said.
We all stared at him in surprise. J.B. was pretty much a rule follower. He was usually one of the first to chastise me when I killed someone or burned something to the ground. Of course, th
at may have been because he’d have to file paperwork about the incident when I was an Agent. Now that I was no longer an Agent, paperwork didn’t apply.
“She shouldn’t because she’s getting a reputation for being ruthless. No one will want to ally themselves with her if they think she might go crazy and blow them up at a moment’s notice,” Beezle said.
“I have never done that,” I said. “I only blow up people who are mean to me first.”
“If Madeline is not ruthless, she will never survive, gargoyle,” Nathaniel said. “Her enemies have no mercy, and neither should she.”
“Well, then, if you want to be a monster like everyone else,” Beezle said.
“I don’t,” I said. “But I don’t want anyone thinking they can have a go at me—or my friends—without consequences.”
The air was getting colder, and as we got closer to the peak, snow began to blow. Nathaniel did not seem even remotely bothered by the weather, but after a few moments I was shivering. I was wearing nothing but the stupid leather pants and the flimsy sweater that Puck had given me. Even Nathaniel’s body heat wasn’t helping.
After a while the snowflakes became a blizzard, and we could barely see a few feet in front of us.
“Stay close!” I shouted to the others. I didn’t want to lose anyone in this mess.
Everyone clumped up so tight that it was difficult to fly. Wings tangled together; people bumped and snarled. Beezle climbed into my lap and huddled there with his wings over his head.
“There’s the top,” Nathaniel said.
I don’t know how he could see anything at all except snow, but since his hearing had been enhanced by the discovery of his legacy, it wasn’t that far-fetched to think his vision would be as well. At least we knew we were still heading in the right direction.
Samiel was a little ahead of the rest of us. Jude was a snow-covered length of fur on his shoulders. The snow swirled for a moment, and we could all see the gray wasteland that was the end of Titania’s kingdom a few feet in front of us.
Then Samiel seemed to smash into an invisible wall in midair, and fell to the ground. Luckily, the ground wasn’t very far away.
“Samiel!” Chloe and I both cried.
Nathaniel and the others flew down to the place where Samiel and Jude had landed in a snowbank beside a large cave opening. Jude shook the snow off his fur. Samiel sat up, rubbing his head. Chloe ran to his side.
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