Rituals

by Kelley Armstrong

  "Yes, and please don't ask if I have an ulterior motive. There are no strings on this gift, Eden. I want you to be happy, and this is the one thing you lack. So I offer it. No, I give it. Freely." She started to rise. "I've already asked to speak to someone. It'll be done today. That won't get your father released instantly, but I have evidence. He'll be out as soon as it can be done. I would like to speak to Gabriel about that."

  She walked toward the door, and I looked at her, speechless.

  Then, as the guard was about to take her, I said, "Mom?"

  She stopped. Just stopped, as if not sure she'd heard right.

  "You don't need to do that, Mom," I said. "You have the appeal. I was coming to tell you that. You and Dad. Gabriel was notified yesterday. The appeal has been granted, and it's strong. It's really strong."

  She turned and looked at me, her expression unreadable. Then she shook her head. "I don't want strong. I want guaranteed. For him. I'm going to do this, Eden. Please let me--"

  "No."

  "I'm asking--"

  "No. I can't stop you, but I'm asking. Let this go to court. Please. If you can get out..." I took a deep breath. "I'd like you out."

  Silence. Such a long silence. I could feel her gaze on me, assessing. Then she said, "And how will Gabriel feel about that? He may prefer my option, given what I did to him."

  "He's never cared. I'm the one you hurt."

  She flinched at that, but I didn't regret it. It had to be said.

  "Let him get you out," I said.

  "All right," she said finally. "But if it doesn't work, I will confess."

  I got up and hugged her. "Thank you."

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  I was outside the prison, looking for Gabriel. He'd had business at the office but was coming to pick me up. Then I heard the familiar sound of a very different motor as Ricky pulled up.

  "Hey," he said, taking off his helmet. "Change of chauffeur. Gabriel got held up at the office."

  "He could have just texted. I'd have been fine taking a cab." I caught Ricky's look. "Ah, he's not really held up, is he? And you're not taking me back to the office. We're going to see Ioan."

  "You need to do it. Rip the bandage off before the sliver starts festering." A pause. "Yep, that analogy totally didn't work. But you know what I mean."

  I smiled. "I always do. And yes, I get it. Is Ioan waiting?"

  "He is."

  I took a deep breath. "All right, then. Off we go." I looked at the bike and hesitated. "Maybe...I should probably stop riding..."

  A look passed over his face, eyes beginning to shutter. Then he stopped. Waited a beat and said, evenly, "Okay. If you'd prefer that."

  "Not at all. But I don't know what's right, and I don't want to keep doing something that might put you in a bad position--"

  His finger pressed to my lips and he said, "No." Then he looked at me. "You have a spot on the back of my bike for as long as you want it. The only question is whether you want it."

  I grabbed the helmet, swung my leg over the back seat, and climbed on behind him.

  --

  "Have you told them?" a voice asked behind me.

  I looked up from petting Lloergan, both of us sitting in front of the roaring fire. I rose, along with Brenin, as Ioan walked in.

  The Cwn Annwn leader stopped to pat the hound's head. "Have you?" he asked.

  I shook my head. "I wanted to talk to you."

  "Ah." He tried for a smile. "Inform the losing party first. Best they hear about it directly, and not through the crowing of the winners." He shook his head and lowered himself to a chair. "No, that's unkind. The Tylwyth Teg won't crow. This isn't that kind of battle. It may have been once, but it is no longer."

  When I sat on the sofa, he said, "If you're going to apologize, don't, Liv. You couldn't make any other choice after what Ida did. I'd love to claim she snuck in and stole the banner after we'd won the war, but that, too, is unkind. We assisted. We did not win. We never could have won against that thing. She did."

  "She asked me to choose the Tylwyth Teg. Those were her final words."

  A sharp laugh. "Of course they were. While I'd like to fault her for that, I can honestly only say that I hope you agreed in time for her to hear it. She did deserve that."

  "I told her I wouldn't turn my back on them. But I'm not turning my back on the Cwn Annwn, either, Ioan. I can't."

  He looked over at me, frowning. "You have to choose, Liv."

  "So I've heard. I've also heard that the Persephone solution isn't an option. Too bad--I'm making it one. And yes, I know what that means--that neither of you gets the golden key to survival. If I split myself between you both, I split whatever power I have. The sum may not even equal the whole. Patrick has explained it. But that's my choice. Live in Cainsville; hunt with the Cwn Annwn. Give enough power to both sides to buy you time while you figure out your own survival plan. Because I'm not it. I won't be it. Stick together--that was the lesson Gwynn and Arawn and Matilda taught us. That's what I'm applying here. Matilda divided her time between the fae and the Hunt. That's how it was. How it should have been. And how it will be. Even if it's not what either side really wants."

  He rose and walked over, motioning for me to get up, and I braced for a lecture on how I had to choose.

  "This is a choice," I said. "It's my choice."

  He reached out and pulled me into a tight embrace. "Then it's the right one."

  --

  My first Solstice in Cainsville. First of many, I hoped. I'd bought the house. There had never really been any question that I would. It was, as the little girl in my visions had said, mine before I was born. I belonged there, as much as I belonged in Cainsville, as much as I belonged with the Hunt. Some things are not choices. We tell ourselves they are, but they aren't--not if we want to be happy.

  The Solstice celebrations had ended an hour ago, the streets empty, bonfires still smoldering. Gabriel and I had escaped the festivities earlier--staying for as long as he could stand being sociable, before I suggested we celebrate in our own way at home.

  But we'd come out after the music and the laughter died down, after people headed home. Our night wasn't over. Gabriel had promised to show me the last gargoyle, the one he'd found twenty years ago on a night like this.

  We walked, bundled up against the cold, snow crunching underfoot, more falling while we headed along the empty street.

  As we neared the town hall, Gabriel steered me into the park instead. In the bushes behind the bank, he found a conveniently placed metal hook--too conveniently placed, suggesting he'd put it there earlier. With the hook, he tugged down the fire escape. Then he motioned for me to climb up.

  "Seriously?" I said. "You're voluntarily climbing something?"

  "For you. I would only ask--"

  "That I go up first and don't watch you, lest it requires serious effort."

  "It's been a while since I've done this."

  I smiled and went on ahead. Once I reached the top, he directed me to the ledge that let me climb onto the roof. I crawled to the top and sat, legs dangling as I looked out at the town hall bell tower. A few minutes later, Gabriel joined me, still catching his breath.

  "Not as easy as you remember?" I said.

  "Definitely not. But this is the best vantage point. Do you see it?"

  I grinned at him. "I do."

  The gargoyle was right across the road, leaning from its tower, its grin as wide as mine.

  "Do you think it's actually there all year?" I said. "Hidden from sight? Or does it fly in on Solstice?"

  "No idea. But you can ask the elders now. You're entitled to answers, if you want them. Or you can savor the mystery."

  "Or figure it out myself?"

  He smiled. "Or that."

  "We'll figure it out for ourselves. Far more exciting."

  "Agreed."

  He put his arm around me, and I snuggled in against his side, and we sat there, watching the gargoyle in the falling snow, making plan
s for our future. So many plans. So much future.

  When I started shivering, he said, "We should go back down."

  "I don't want to."

  "No? I thought you wanted to find all the gargoyles."

  "I just did, right? That was the last one."

  His lips twitched in a smile, pale blue eyes warming. "No, I don't believe it is. You asked to see one more, for your Solstice gift."

  "Yours. You're actually going to show me-- Where--" I jumped up so fast, I nearly tumbled off the roof.

  Gabriel grabbed me as he chuckled. "Slow down."

  "Uh-uh. If I wait, the rest of that mulled cider will wear off, and you'll never show me. Where is it?"

  "I said you'd need to find it."

  "No, don't you dare--"

  "But, being your last one, you are entitled to a hint."

  He caught my chin in his bare hand, fingers warm against my cold skin as he turned me to face the rear of the building. Toward the park.

  I started scrambling toward the ledge, and he grabbed me again, murmuring, "Slow down."

  I did. Kind of. I was off the roof a good five minutes before him, already scouring the park when he came up beside me.

  "Clue?" I said.

  He smiled and said, "It's there all the time."

  "So it's hidden. Well hidden."

  I surveyed my options. Beyond the park fence there were a few trees, but none wide enough to hide a gargoyle. Which left one option.

  I raced to the fence surrounding the play area. Along it were bushes tangled with ivy that wound over the wrought-iron fence. I went around back and pushed aside branches, checking each spot until--

  I found it.

  Gabriel's gargoyle, hidden by branches and so much ivy that I had to untangle vines to see it, and when I did, I couldn't stop smiling.

  It was Gabriel as a very young boy, not more than a preschooler. He crouched in that tangle of bush and vine and looked straight at me, one hand extended, a baby rabbit on his palm.

  "Yes, I have no idea why they put me in that pose," he said. "It looks nothing like me."

  I saw that statue, and I remembered my vision of Gwynn, crouched beside a hole, showing Matilda a baby rabbit. My eyes filled with tears and I managed to say, "I think it's a perfect likeness." Then I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him.

  KELLEY ARMSTRONG is the internationally bestselling author of the thirteen-book Women of the Otherworld series, the Nadia Stafford crime novels and this series set in the fictional town of Cainsville, Illinois, which also includes the novels Omens, Visions, Deceptions and Betrayals. She is also the author of the hit crime novels City of the Lost and A Darkness Absolute, three bestselling young adult trilogies, and the stand-alone YA suspense thriller, The Masked Truth. Her Otherworld characters also inspired the hit TV series Bitten. She lives in rural Ontario.