“You certainly are,” Nathaniel replied.
Through the haze of my bewilderment I became aware of something. Nathaniel was angry. He was very, very angry. The connection between us was choked with his rage. He kept such a leash on his emotions that I was almost never aware of him and our connection. But now I felt it acutely.
I took his hand, forced him to look at me before he did anything foolish.
“Don’t,” I said. “I’m already in trouble. Don’t give him an excuse to hurt you, too.”
His eyes were brilliant blue in his fury. “Do not ask me to stand by and watch harm come to you.”
Puck watched us with avid interest. “And what will you do to prevent it, my son? The evidence points in one direction only—toward Madeline.”
“Quite conveniently. We are all very well aware that Madeline would not and could not have murdered Evangeline,” Nathaniel said through his teeth. “Lucifer is allowing this farce to continue for reasons of his own. I know what you wish to do with Madeline.”
“At the moment I wish her in a cell,” Lucifer said. “Which is where she will go, to be held until the court of the Grigori can be assembled for her trial.”
Samiel looked at me in panic. He’d been captured by Lucifer’s men and held once before. I’d intervened on his behalf and ended up as Lucifer’s Hound of the Hunt. The outcome had been better than Samiel’s execution, but had saddled me with another connection to Lucifer. No matter what was decided at this trial, Lucifer would get something he wanted out of it. Lucifer always got something he wanted out of every situation.
“You haven’t asked Alerian about the shifter yet,” I said. “Wait until your brother gets here before you decide to lock me up for no damned reason.”
Alerian appeared at that very moment, silently entering the hallway.
“Waiting for your big entrance?” I said.
He did not dignify my remark with a response. Instead, he looked at Lucifer with no small amount of resentment. “You requested my presence?”
It was pretty clear that Alerian didn’t think much of Lucifer’s request.
“Yes,” Lucifer said, passing the “evidence” back to his servant and waving him away, along with anyone else hanging around. “What do you know of this shapeshifter that Madeline claims has been lately in Chicago, and now here?”
“I know nothing of this creature,” Alerian said calmly.
“I thought you couldn’t lie to one another,” I said.
“I am not lying,” Alerian said, narrowing his eyes at me. The sound of the ocean crashed inside my head. Every time Alerian got angry with me, I felt like I was about to drown in some metaphorical sea.
“If you’re not lying, then you’re definitely parsing the question,” I said. “You know something about this kind of shifter in a general, if not specific, sense. Especially since it’s your personal Frankenstein’s monster.”
“I answered the question my brother asked,” Alerian said.
“Ask him more directly,” I told Lucifer.
“I do not take orders from you, my granddaughter. It is, in fact, the exact opposite. You are beholden to me and my will, as my Hound of the Hunt.”
The implications were clear. Because I carried this curse as Lucifer’s Hound, he could make me do whatever he damned well pleased. And that meant that if he ordered me into a cage and told me to stay there, I would have to do it. I’d been afraid for a long time that it would come to this, and now it finally had.
The second implication was that he would not challenge Alerian, or make him answer any further questions. Lucifer was steering this event so that he would get the outcome he wanted. All that remained for the rest of us was to wait.
The only people left in the hallway were my group—Nathaniel, Samiel, Jude, Beezle and myself—and the three brothers.
And Evangeline, whose body had been left in the middle of the floor like an accusation.
“Don’t you want to cover her with a sheet or something?” I said to Lucifer.
“Cannot bear to see the evidence of your crime?” Lucifer asked.
“No, I just think it’s unseemly to leave her out in the open like that, all carved up,” I said. “You were going to marry her. You’d think you would have more respect for her remains.”
Lucifer reached for me then. I don’t know what he would have done—slapped me or grabbed me or just put his hand on my chin—but Nathaniel stepped in front of me before he could do it.
“Do not touch her,” he said. His voice vibrated with an intensity I’d never heard before.
Nathaniel had always been the one who counseled calm, who recommended the wisest course. He always kept a lid on his feelings. He was always impatient when I lost my temper, or when I defied a being much older and more powerful than I.
Now he was facing down Lucifer, practically chin to chin. Lucifer had finally crossed some line that Nathaniel would not tolerate.
Or maybe it was just that he really, truly loved me. But my head was already on the chopping block, and I didn’t want his there, too.
“Nathaniel,” I said, taking his face and turning it toward mine. “Don’t. Don’t do something that can’t be undone.”
His anger was a palpable thing. I was shocked that Lucifer hadn’t struck Nathaniel down for insubordinate behavior already.
Nathaniel’s eyes searched mine. I wished desperately for the ability to read his mind, and for him to see into my own thoughts. Everyone in the hallway was watching us with varying levels of concern and curiosity.
Lucifer had taken a step away from us. He was probably calculating how to turn this to his advantage, but I didn’t care. I needed Nathaniel to know that it was not acceptable to me if he died defending me from Lucifer’s wrath. I would not go through that again. I would not watch someone else stand in the path of a sword meant for me.
There was only one way I could show him without speaking, and so I kissed him.
I am not usually a fan of public displays of affection, especially when I am being so closely observed. But if Nathaniel and I were physically joined, it tended to strengthen the emotional bond formed by our magic. So I kissed him, and I poured all of the things I could not say into that kiss. I told him that I cared, that I needed to protect him as much as he needed to protect me.
In that kiss I felt his love, his anger, his frustration and, finally, his resignation. He would not challenge Lucifer. For now.
I pulled away from him, put my mouth close to his ear. Everyone except Samiel and Beezle could probably hear us anyway, but I wanted at least the illusion of privacy.
“I’ll need you to get me out,” I said.
He nodded, though his anger had merely been banked, not eliminated.
Then I moved away from Nathaniel and toward Lucifer. “All right,” I said. “Arrest me, since that’s what you obviously want.”
“No,” Jude said, and Samiel shook his head rapidly. Beezle watched me carefully. I couldn’t tell whether he approved or not. I know Nathaniel didn’t.
His eyes narrowed in suspicion. “What game do you play now, Granddaughter? First you proclaim loudly to have nothing to do with Evangeline’s death, and now you quietly permit me to lock you away?”
“I did have nothing to do with Evangeline’s death,” I said. “And I’ll be proven right. In the meantime, you can stop wasting everyone’s time with this farce.”
Puck looked at me like he was trying to figure me out. “I cannot tell if you are being very wise or very foolish.”
I shrugged in what I hoped was a mysterious fashion. Let Puck and Lucifer try to fathom my motivations for a change.
“I am certainly not going to allow the opportunity to imprison my fiancée’s murderer to pass,” Lucifer said. “Particularly not if you are going to be cooperative for a change.”
He snapped his fingers, and for the third time two servants appeared. I didn’t know whether he could communicate with them telepathically or what, but these two appeare
d to be just what the doctor ordered—big, burly characters that looked like prison guards.
For a moment I thought Nathaniel would not go along with my half-assed plan. The sight of the two men flanking me seemed like it might be too much for him to take. But he stayed in control.
Outwardly, I did the same as the two guards led me away from the scene in the hallway. Inwardly, I was trembling. I hoped that I was making the right decision.
It had been pretty apparent that Lucifer wanted me to take the fall for Evangeline’s murder. I didn’t know if it was an act or if he sincerely thought I had done it. But I did know if I stood in that hallway any longer, he would have continued to marshal “evidence” against me. And my best chance of wriggling off this hook that Lucifer had me on was to go along until Nathaniel and the others found the shifter—the real culprit.
The creature was still somewhere in Lucifer’s mansion. What I found shocking was that, if they were to be believed, neither Lucifer nor Puck nor Alerian could feel the shifter’s power or identify him when he was in disguise.
For creatures so old and powerful, this struck me as suspicious, particularly in Alerian’s case. If this shifter was like the ones Alerian had created so many centuries ago, then he should have been able to detect traces of its power signature. Alerian had expressed a decided lack of interest in the shifter. Lucifer, too, had been dismissive of the idea that such a creature could exist. All the evidence seemed to point toward the theory I’d developed earlier at dinner—that Lucifer was the shifter’s master, that he was using the shifter to corner me.
If Lucifer was manipulating all this, then I might have made a huge mistake by quietly offering myself up for imprisonment. But if Lucifer was simply using the circumstances to move things in his favor, then there was hope for me.
It was a gamble, but I hadn’t seen any other way to get out from under Lucifer’s microscope. Any other way that didn’t involve bloodshed, that is.
I was so involved in my thoughts that I’d barely noticed where we were going. Now I realized my two escorts were leading me down—and down, and down. We were on a curving stone staircase in a narrow passage, almost like one that would lead up to a high tower in a fairy tale. Except that in this case, the princess was going in the wrong direction.
We descended into the earth, far below Lucifer’s mansion. I wasn’t sure that any house built near Los Angeles could possibly have a foundation like this—more evidence that Lucifer magically manipulated his home to suit his needs. For all I knew this part of the house could be in a completely different dimension.
At the bottom of the stairs was a short row of cells on both sides of a hallway—metal bars that blocked rooms made of cold stone. There were no windows, and only a few flickering torches of flame provided light.
“Where did Lucifer learn about prison decorating? The Count of Monte Cristo?” I said.
Neither of the two men with me responded. One of them took out a bunch of keys on a metal ring. The feeling that I was suddenly trapped in a Dumas novel persisted. He opened the metal door and the other jail keeper ushered me in. There was a stone bench to sleep on, but nothing more.
As the door slammed shut behind me, I felt a moment of profound panic. I was trapped, pinned like a butterfly on a board. Lucifer finally had me where he wanted me—under his thumb and unable to do anything about it. My baby, who had been so unusually silent and still during the events upstairs, fluttered his little wings in time with the rapid thrum of my heart. Would Nathaniel even be able to find me down here?
Lucifer’s goons drifted back up the stairs. I was underground, in the dark, and alone. But I didn’t have to stay here. I knew that as soon as I put my hands on the bars. There was no magic binding me, nothing to stop me from blasting the doors off and fighting my way out of the house.
Except that I would be leaving the others behind, who would no doubt pay a terrible price for my actions. I realized that I had essentially left my family and friends as hostages, and that Lucifer’s plot to get us all under one roof would make his plans—whatever it was he had in mind—much, much easier.
I really wished Daharan were here. He would never have allowed it to come to this.
“I see that your sins have finally come home to roost,” a voice slurred from the darkness.
I peered across the hallway, trying to make out the shadow hidden in the cell opposite mine.
“Who is it?” I said. “Come into the light.”
The figure moved from the back corner of the cell, shuffling slowly. For a strange moment I thought that it was a zombie, or some other kind of monster imprisoned by Lucifer. Then the person’s face emerged into the flickering light of the torch. The face had obviously been hit multiple times, but I still recognized it.
It was Jack Dabrowski, and I had only one thing to say to him.
“You are a moron,” I said.
He shook his head, though it was obviously painful. “How could I pass up the wedding of Lucifer? Everyone online was talking about it.”
“You could have passed it up by using your brain,” I said harshly. “I warned you over and over again that it was dangerous to investigate things you don’t understand. You’re lucky Lucifer hasn’t killed you already.”
“He didn’t kill me because I told him I was a friend of yours,” he said.
“And as you can see I’m in the cell across from you,” I said. “Not your best move. And we’re not friends. Last time we met you were a little annoyed with me because I’d locked you in the storage area in my basement.”
“Which was significantly more comfortable than Lucifer’s accommodations, by the way. But I thought that saying I was with you was a safe bet. Everything I’ve read has indicated that Lucifer lets you do whatever you want because you’re his favorite. What are you doing in the oubliette with me, anyway?” Jack asked.
“Just how much of my life is discussed on the Internet?” I asked, avoiding his question.
“More than you think,” Jack said. “Even the average nonmagical person would probably be shocked to see what comes up if they Google their own name. And don’t think I didn’t notice that you didn’t answer me. I can see the blood on your clothes, so I bet there’s a body involved.”
“What an investigator you are,” I said. “You should have won a Pulitzer for your reporting by now.”
“No need to be snide,” Jack said. “The way I look at it, we’re in the same boat. We should help each other.”
“We are not in the same boat,” I said. “I can leave this cell anytime I want to. You can’t.”
“You can get out?” he asked.
In demonstration I waved my hand in front of the door. The lock turned under my will and the door swung open.
Jack clutched the bars eagerly. “Let me out, will you? I snuck into the house. I could probably sneak out again.”
I shook my head, pulling the door shut again, although I did not lock it. “You’ll never make it out of the mansion. Lucifer’s got servants everywhere, and he’s going to be on alert now that . . .”
I trailed off, not wanting Jack to know about Evangeline.
“Now that what?” he said. “You might as well tell me. I’ll find out anyway.”
“Then you can ferret it out. I’m not your source,” I said.
“Why are you always so hostile to me?” Jack said. “I could help you. I came to you from the start to help you.”
“I think you’re mixing up ‘help’ with unwanted publicity,” I said. “I don’t want my business published. I want my privacy.”
“Did you ever think that if more people knew about you and what you did, then you would be protected?” Jack said.
“Protected from what?”
“From stuff like this,” Jack said. “The more famous you are, the harder it becomes for someone like Lucifer to make you disappear. People would care. They would look for you.”
“And they would find nothing,” I said. “Even now, even when you’ve b
een beaten up and imprisoned, you still don’t get it. Lucifer didn’t have to do it this way. If you’re alive and I’m alive, it’s because he wants us to be, because it serves his purpose. He’s not showing you mercy. In fact, if he had been in a bad mood when he found you, then you would be nothing but vapor right now.”
“You mean he wasn’t in a bad mood when he ordered his goons to beat the crap out of me?” Jack said. “I think my arm might be broken. It hurts like hell.”
Now that he mentioned it, I could see that his left arm hung at a strange angle.
“Oh, yeah, that’s broken,” I said. “Now, that, I can fix. I think.”
I pushed the door of the cell open again and crossed to the bars of Jack’s enclosure. I hesitated for a moment. I knew the healing spell by heart, but I had never tried to use it on an ordinary human before.
“Having second thoughts about putting me out of my misery?” Jack asked.
“No,” I said. “I was just thinking that the spell might harm you more than it helped. I’m not sure an ordinary human can handle it.”
“I can handle anything,” Jack said confidently. His face was eager, and I could tell he was more excited about the prospect of having magic performed on him than about fixing what was broken.
“Don’t act like a child,” I said. “If I don’t do this correctly, or your body can’t process it, who knows what might happen. You could explode from the inside out, or have a stroke right in front of me, and there would be nothing I could do about it. You would probably be wishing that you had just waited for a regular doctor to set your arm then.”
“I know you won’t hurt me,” he said.
“Three days ago you thought I had mutilated a person right in front of you,” I reminded him.
“Yes, but now I know better,” he said. “C’mon, just fix my arm since you won’t let me out of the cell.”
He was putting on a brave face, but he was obviously in pain. And I could make it better. And I probably wouldn’t accidentally blow him up. Probably.
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