“It’s not like that—” I started to protest.
She shushed me. “Sizing up some gargoyle’s stone salami isn’t being unfaithful.”
“Shaw is missing.” I sobered. “I’m not going to find him dangling between a ’goyle’s legs.”
Mai’s grip gentled. “He’s going to be okay, Tee.”
I nodded because it was easier to agree with her.
“I mean it,” she said, missing nothing. “The Morrigan needs him to control you.”
Steps lightening, I grumbled, “That’s a happy thought.”
With a lopsided smile, Mai flung her arms around me and squeezed until my lungs deflated.
“Watch yourself over there, okay?” Mai sniffled. “Best friends don’t come along every day.”
“I will.” I hugged her back. “Hey, if something happens, tell Mom to cut you a check for the money she owes me. There’s one made out to me on the dresser. Just tear it up or something. Use the cash to pay our rent through the rest of the year and to cover my half of the utilities.”
She withdrew, brow puckered. “Money your mom owes you?”
“Long story.” I shook my head. “Just do that for me, okay?”
“I’m not taking your damn money.” Her delicate jaw set. “You’re coming back and paying your own damn rent, damn it.” She settled her hands on her hips. “Rent’s due in two weeks. Remember that.”
Two weeks was a blip of time, but I bobbed my head like I was agreeing. Across the way, Mac cleared his throat, signaling it was time to go. I wiggled limp fingers at Mai and stepped onto the path.
Nervous about walking the gargoyle-lined gauntlet stretching between the tether and me, I spent the next several minutes staring at the tops of my shiny boots as I kept to the exact center of the stone-marked trail. The other gargoyles appeared more animal than human, and I didn’t want to know if their maker had overcompensated there too or if the mischievous, human-like ’goyle had gotten the long end of the...
Never mind.
Eager for a distraction, I inhaled the scents of the waking world and categorized them.
A pungent tang hit the back of my throat, and I slowed to identify the source. The walkway was packing heat. Far more than a standard glow spell required. I wondered if, like the gargoyle imports, the glowing path was a new addition. Or if Rook, with his glamour-shredding magical pipe, had guided me to the windmill down this exact way with such care I didn’t stumble or bump any of the stones out of line?
Rook.
The closer I got to the tether, the harder Branwen’s plea to save her brother tugged at my heart. She had kept me sane while we were trapped in Balamohan’s caves, and I owed her for her kindness. For all the trouble Rook caused me, for what he did to my mother alone, he deserved what the Morrigan had done to him. But he wasn’t evil, just self-serving and egotistical, and I wondered if Branwen could redeem him.
Ahead of me, Mac stood beneath the towering windmill.
“Almost ready.” He flipped open a narrow panel fused onto one of the legs, and his fingers tapped out a complex sequence on a series of flat keys etched with glowing green runes similar to ours. It was almost, but not quite, what Rook had done. Mac’s initiation sequence required more time, which was odd considering the tethers were his own work. I had figured he could speed dial them or something.
“All right.” He waved me forward absently. “Stand inside the circle.”
He checked to make sure I was where he wanted me then jabbed a final button before slamming the panel shut, stepping inside and tilting his head back to gaze up through the guts of the windmill.
A gust of air stirred a warm breeze that raised chill bumps of anticipation.
I wrapped my arms around my stomach and whispered a prayer.
Mac kept to himself, his knees loose and braced for impact, a smile twitching his lips.
Happy, I thought, to be going home.
Chapter Eight
I tumbled from everywhere and nowhere, consciousness scattering like dried leaves on the wind, blowing away thoughts before they formed. Twisting, swirling through a vortex of whirling reds and oranges and greens, I smelled crisp fall days and warm apple cider. The trip lasted forever and only a second before the ground rushed up to meet me, and my back smacked damp soil.
Air whooshed from my lungs, and when I inhaled, I breathed in Faerie’s magic-rich atmosphere. I exhaled as the lush fragrances soaked into my bones, welcoming me back with breezy kisses from a stiff northerly wind and the warm embrace of the sun on my cheeks as though I belonged to this place.
Autumn, I thought. We’re in Autumn.
Gnarled branches stretched skyward as if the trees were rousing for the day. Foliage rustled and songbirds trilled good morning. Of course, Faerie being Faerie, I spotted fanged slugs gliding up tree trunks, trailing glistening slime. A pair of green mantis chittered in conversation as they sprang from leaf to leaf decked out in teeny silk vests, balancing thimble-sized teacups so as not to slosh while conducting their acrobatic tea party. Not to mention the tiny clusters of squidgy mushrooms farting hallucinogenic spores into the air, because Faerie wasn’t weird enough already.
Still, Autumn wasn’t where I’d expected us to enter. We came and went through Spring last time.
Mac kept a den near here, though. This was where I first met him—as the saber-toothed cat, Diode—and where my odds of staying alive had doubled by winning him to my side. Except, being my father, he had been on my side all along. More or less.
I groaned. Thinking about Mac/Diode made my head hurt. Worse.
“There you are.”
Speak of the devil.
I waved a hand. “Here I am.”
“That’s what I said.” Mac approached from the south, stopping when he loomed over me. “How do you feel?”
“Like I rode the Tilt-A-Whirl after eating a fully loaded sausage dog with a funnel-cake chaser.”
He cocked his head. “Was that in English?”
“I’m dizzy,” I managed. “I have an upset stomach and might puke.” Puke. Hearing the word clenched my stomach muscles. “How are you?”
Mac’s expression, which seemed to say, Fine, why wouldn’t I be? was answer enough.
Raising my head sloshed my brain around my skull and threatened to spill it out of my ears.
“Walking will help shake the effects.” Mac reached down and clasped my forearm, lifting me onto my feet slowly. From a pocket, he produced a thin, reddish roll the length and thickness of my pinky finger and extended the fragrant stick to me. “Until then, chew this. It will dispel the disorientation.”
Thinking it looked familiar, I accepted and scratched it with my thumbnail. “Is this tree bark?”
He nodded. “Cinnamon bark.”
I rubbed it between my fingers, heating the wood and warming the oils inside until its fragrance burned my sinus passages. Huh. Guess my tolerance was increasing. My first trip left me head-blind, unable to smell or process what my oversaturated senses were telling me. This was an improvement.
While I chewed, Mac drew a penny-sized charm out of another pocket, dropped it and crushed it under his heel. Ears popping, I winced as all ambient noise vanished, leaving us in deafening silence.
“Forgive the precaution. The woods are full of spies.” His gaze slid past my shoulder and back. “The Morrigan will have Unseelie patrolling the grounds near my den and guarding the door, I’m sure, but the grounds are warded and no other magical defenses can be set.” He drew in a scenting breath. “Dangerous as it is, we must take the den.”
I expected as much. “We need access to the Hall of Many Doors, right? That’s your plan?”
“The Hall of Many Doors,” he said, lips twitching with amusement, “is our only hope of finishing the job we came to do before madness takes your mate.” He gripped my shoulder. “I know this is difficult, but I trust you to think with your head, not your heart.”
I clamped my lips shut and nodded. I had a job to
do. I would do it. And then I was going to find Shaw. The sooner we cut the Morrigan off from the mortal realm, the more pissed she would get and the easier it would be locating her feathery ass. Five minutes. That’s all I wanted. Five minutes alone with her to...negotiate.
Hall of Many Doors, here we come. I had suspected each door operated its own tether, and Mac had all but confirmed it. Diode once told me they only worked for Mac and me, so the doors were useless to everyone but us. Using them, we could finish severing the tethers in a few days, I hoped, in plenty of time to find Shaw before hunger turned him feral.
Otherwise it would take days—if not weeks—to trek to each location and disable each tether.
Then again, maybe useless wasn’t accurate. Just because the Morrigan couldn’t operate them didn’t mean she couldn’t use them against us. Blocking our access to those doors would cripple our efforts.
“Wait—what about the tether we just used?” Behind us, a sagging bridge spanned a crevice that might have once been a dry creek. We’d landed near where its rotten planks began. “Should we start here?”
“Yes.” A grin twisted Mac’s lips. “You should.”
“Me?”
“This is one of the skills you must learn. One of many I hope to teach you before...” Mac’s jaw bunched, emotion hot behind his eyes. “If we are separated, it is imperative the work be continued.”
Wiping my hands on my pants, I stepped forward. “Okay, how do I do this?”
Mac reached for me, and a strange comfort rippled up my arm when our fingertips brushed. His skin was warm against mine, rough where I slid my hand into his larger one. His palms were thickly calloused, reminding me of paw pads on the hound he once was and sometimes still pretended to be.
Leading me onto the bridge, he stopped when we stood balanced on the first rickety plank, and a spark of bone-cold energy froze my palm. His runes ignited against my bare skin, feeding me power.
“Tell me.” He turned his head toward me. “What do you sense?”
With him ramping up my power, there was only one thing to feel. “Magic.”
“Faerie is magic.” A hint of a smile. “What else?”
I let my free hand hover over the splintered railing, and waves of subtle power caressed the underside of my palm. “There’s a complex enchantment on the bridge.” I squinted. “It’s like a bluish-green net rolled into a tube. This end of the tunnel is wide open, and it’s almost as tall as we are. The far end—and this might be part optical illusion because of our perspective—looks like it’s six inches around.”
His grip sparked brighter. “Anything else?”
“There’s also a faint compulsion inlayed into the wood to help camouflage the bridge’s magic.” My gaze cut left each time I focused. It made distinguishing between what my eyes saw versus what my magical oversight perceived that much harder. “To deter the wannabe tether jumpers, I assume.”
“Go deeper,” he coaxed. “You’re almost there.”
Shutting my eyes, I blocked out everything except the pulse of energy flowing through the tether into us. “I see a flare of some kind. It’s bright blue with pinpricks of white.” I opened my eyes, and I knew. “Two planks up on the right, at the base of the railing, there’s a compartment.” I pointed it out like Mac was the blind one though it was his magic coursing through me. “The control panel, right?”
Seeming pleased, he nodded. “One step more.”
I scrunched up my face. “The symbols...I see them in my head. I can read them.” Shock pinged through me. “I see the coordinates for where we are and where we came from. It recorded our trip.”
“You did well.” He squeezed my hand once before releasing it. “Now, try it again.”
The magic Mac lent me vanished the way it had come, leaving me off balance with a slight headache.
“It’s gone.” I sagged, almost too weak to move my lips. “All of it.”
“You have seen the path,” he said. “Remember it. Take it.”
Blowing out a frustrated breath, I did as he asked. I shut my eyes and opened myself as fully as I knew how, so that each wisp of magic brushing my skin left its own faint impression. Even knowing where to search didn’t make it easier. I turned my attention to the magical net cast over the bridge. The imprint was faint now, transparent, instead of the shining beacon it had been while I drew from Mac. Once the tunneled structure coalesced, I latched on to the tether’s magical signature and followed the steady flow of energy through the complex enchantment to where it pooled above the second plank.
“I see the board, the switch.” Eyes squeezed tight, I strained for more. “I see...” I growled under my breath, but the intricate runes failed to appear even as I trembled. “That’s it. That’s all I’ve got.”
Knuckles rapped against the side of my head.
“Ouch.” My eyes sprung open. “What did you do that for?”
“Think,” Mac admonished. “Pull the knowledge from your memory.”
Keeping my eyes open and on him this time, I reached inside my thoughts, to the place Mac’s power had kindled. Specks of green flared in my memory. Delicate runes matching my hand—our hands—danced before my eyes in translucent waves over the bridge. Slowly, slowly, their meaning returned.
“Got it,” I breathed. “How is this possible?”
“The mantle of the Black Dog is knowledge.” Mac gazed out at the tether with me. “In an instant I was lifted up, transformed, reborn as the man you see before you. All that I knew was ripped from me as the collective knowledge of the sidhe nobles responsible for my gift wedged all that they were into me.” His brow puckered. “My mind and body were broken to pieces before they were reforged.”
I flinched. “That sounds painful.”
A wry twist of his lips was his answer.
I studied him from the corner of my eye in the dappled sunlight, comparing our features and our magic, awed by him despite myself, waiting for the old anger to resurface, but it was slow to rise and easily shoved aside when it did.
Yes, he had hurt my mother. He was hurting her even now. But I was raised as a human, and it wasn’t fair to hold Mac to human standards. Not when he obviously loved my mother, and not when his responsibilities in Faerie had been greater than any love he had for her...or for me.
I tilted my head. “Do you remember what it was like...before?”
“I do.” A melancholy sigh escaped him. “I miss the simplicity of that life.”
Another question came to my lips, but he hushed me as he would a child.
“Later, you and I will talk, and I will answer any questions you have.” He drew himself up taller and rolled his narrow shoulders. “For now, we must focus on the task ahead. Time is running short.”
Seven days—six and a half after our slow start—until hunger turned Shaw rabid. Bonded as we were, even raging in his incubus form, I was his only food source. The circuit he burnt into himself during sex with me meant he could be faithful. Had to be, actually. He was now dependent on me to keep him alive, a job I would normally relish, but finding him starved meant he might kill me.
“We’ve stood exposed too long.” Mac scowled. “We need to sever this one and get moving.”
I blew out a breath. “What next?”
“We find out if the Morrigan’s fear is justified.” He held out his hand. “You have to bleed.”
Slapping my right palm into his, I grimaced. “I thought you might say that.”
Metal rasped as he drew a dagger the length of my forearm from his thigh holster. “Look away.”
He sounded exactly like Mom when I was about to get a finger pricked at the doctor’s office.
“I can handle it.” Swallowing, I uncurled my fingers and braced myself. “I’m a big girl.” Sharp as his blade was, I still winced as faint pressure sliced open my index finger. “Freaking monkeys.”
Blood rose along the seam of the cut, but none fell. The cut crusted over as I began healing.
“I was afr
aid of this.” Mac sheathed his blade. “You heal almost as fast as I do.”
“How do you control your bleeding for spellwork?” I wondered.
A chuckle slipped from him. “I keep a never blade I confiscated in a cabinet in my office.”
Removing my left hand from his, I flexed the right, which was marked by my own never blade wound, and wished there was another way. I really didn’t want to bleed out. “Can you remove the enchantment?”
“I can.” He took my hand, palm up. “It’s an original spell of mine crafted for the same reason.”
“So you willingly cut yourself with a never blade often enough you had to figure this out, huh?” I watched as pink spilled onto his cheeks. “Yet you still can’t heal the wound. Isn’t that dangerous?”
“Unless another source of magic is introduced into our blood, interrupting our own, our gift mends us too quickly.” Mac’s expression turned pensive. “There are a few fae who have natural immunity to us. It was their blood used to spell the first never blades. It’s a necessary failsafe that must be broken once in a while in order for us to do any good with the gifts we have been given, but as in all things, we pay a price.”
Thinking back on the past year, I got an inkling. “Hobgoblins are immune, aren’t they?”
“Yes.”
“Redcaps too.”
“Yes.” His head lifted, eyes softening. “They are.”
I was about to ask why he would let me go a few rounds with one of the rare fae who could hurt me, not to mention leaving him with plenty of my blood he could use as a focus object for dangerous spellwork later, but Mac pressed his palm to mine, and a pulse of searing pain dropped me to one knee.
Forget ripping off a bandage. This ripped off the top layer of my freaking skin, and I screamed.
Mac slapped a hand over my mouth until I could clamp my jaw shut and get it under control.
“The original spell grafts skin.” His voice thickened. “The counter spell removes it.”
So I was right about the reverse tearing off skin. Yay?
With a jerk of my chin, I signaled I could handle it. Please, let me be able to handle this.
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