by E. A. Copen
I felt a tug at the edge of my psyche, a warning, and then a lightning flash of pain. Rather than hold on as I’d done at the amusement park, I let the zombie go. The haze of magic suddenly lifted and left me exhausted. I staggered until I fell against the wall. Every inch of me ached, and the throbbing in my head surged to an unbearable level.
Even worse, more undead had shambled into the house. Too many to count. How the hell was he controlling that many at once? It’d taken almost everything I had just to grab onto one.
More hands shot through the hole in the door. Gray, undead fingers pulled at the edges of the hole, widening it.
I backed away. “Emma, how many bullets do you have?”
She swallowed. “Not enough.”
My feet caught on something rolling over the floor. I looked down. It was the pipe from the elementary school. Not an ideal weapon, but it was better than nothing, and it wouldn’t splinter like a bat. I picked it up. We might not have had a chance of taking out every zombie wandering into the hallway, but I’d be damned if I wasn’t going to try and take as many as I could with me.
“Lazarus, if we don’t make it—”
I lifted the pipe, ready to swing it at the first zombie through the door. “We will. We have to. Remy is counting on us.”
“But if we don’t…” Emma’s voice trembled. She squeezed her eyes shut. “Goddammit, Laz. I love you.”
I twisted to look at her over my shoulder. This was an important moment, wasn’t it? Those three little words were supposed to be a turning point in a relationship, though I didn’t pretend to understand how. It felt significant, but I didn’t know what to say back. My brain was on fire, both from the start of the hangover and the effort of holding the zombie earlier, and there were undead literally knocking on our door. We might’ve had only seconds left to live. And yet…
“I didn’t get to say it before when I thought you weren’t coming back.”
“Emma, I…” There was so much left to say. So much that didn’t involve magic, or zombies, or monsters. Normal things that normal people said to each other in moments like that, but the words were out of reach for me.
Before I could find the right words, someone screamed in the hallway. It wasn’t a zombie noise, either. Zombies mostly just gurgled and snarled. The sounds of a struggle renewed in the hallway, drawing the zombies away. Whoever had just crashed into the house shouted a word in a language I didn’t know. The tiny hairs on my arms and on the back of my neck stood on end as magic sliced through the air, magic that felt both familiar and strange at the same time. It was almost like the magic I had when I’d been the Summer Knight, except instead of being angry and fiery, this was cold and sharp.
Emma and I exchanged a glance before I gripped the doorknob and threw open the door, pipe in hand, ready to take on whatever new monster Bizarro Laz had thrown at us. The monster in the hall wore gleaming silver, form-fitting armor. Two huge silver swords flashed in a circle, taking zombie heads two or three at a time. Undead blood splashed up, staining platinum curls and slid off her armor. The bodies of the slain lay behind her like footprints leading to the door.
She stabbed her sword through the neck of the last of the zombies. It gurgled and reached for her. With a smirk, she took its head and kicked the twitching body away before turning to me. She eyed me, then pushed some of her hair out of her face. “Looks like I came just in time.” She spoke with a heavy accent that might’ve been Swedish? Icelandic? Hell, if I knew the difference.
I tightened my grip on the pipe. “I don’t know who you are or what you want, but you should know I haven’t had a very good day, and I’m fully prepared to take it out on you.”
“Really?” Her eyebrow quirked, and she nodded to Emma behind me before shouldering one of her swords. “And what’s your girlfriend got to say about that, Horseman?”
So, she knew who I was. Armed as she was, it would’ve been easy for her to cut Emma and me down. Instead, she stayed just out of reach with that knowing smirk on her face.
Emma cocked her gun. “I say you’ve got exactly thirty seconds to convince me not to shoot you.”
She eyed Emma with a bored look and then turned her attention back to me. “My name is Noelle Islana, knight of the Winter Court of Faerie, and you shouldn’t shoot me because I’m your best chance at getting your children back.”
Chapter Sixteen
If I knew anything about the fae, it was not to trust them, especially when they were offering their help. Of all the fae in existence, I trusted fae knights the least, partly because I knew they were beholden to their court. I had fought alongside the Shadow Knight—who’d turned out to be Khaleda’s brother—and while he was a badass in his own right, he tended to disappear at inopportune times. His help mostly consisted of getting me into more trouble every time he showed up. In the end, I’d killed him by killing his queen. His life was linked to hers. Not that it was a bad thing. He wanted to go, or at least it seemed like he did. His last act had been to thank me for killing him.
I’d also been a knight to the Summer Court, even if it was only briefly. It didn’t turn out too well for me, especially since I didn’t want to play Titania’s power games. To be a knight meant to be linked to the fae queen and do her bidding. Since most of the queens were crazy and powerful, you can guess at the things they made their knights do for them. Nothing good, that was for sure.
But there was another reason I couldn’t trust Noelle. Winter and Summer were bitter enemies holding together a fragile peace. Remy was the Summer Princess. There were all kinds of nefarious reasons Winter might want to put me in their debt. Getting to Remy was just one of many, but it was probably the worst one.
“Winter Knight?” Emma looked to me for an explanation.
One of the zombies on the floor groaned. Noelle lifted her sword and stabbed it between the eyes. “We shouldn’t stay here. Your location is compromised. He will find you.”
“He?” I asked.
“Your fetch.” Noelle jerked the sword out of the zombie’s skull.
Emma elbowed me. “Ha! I told you it was a fetch.”
“Whatever he is, he’s bad news.” I nodded to Noelle. “What is it you want? Fae don’t help for free.”
“I am happy to kill these abominations for nothing more than the sport of it.” She nudged one of the dead zombies’ arms. “And I will guide you to safety if you agree to hear the rest of my offer. That is more than fair, no?”
That offer didn’t seem to have a drawback, but I was sure she had her own agenda. Fae always did. Either way, she was right. We couldn’t stay there, and I didn’t know where else to go.
Emma finally lowered her gun. “What guarantee do we have that if we leave, the zombies will stop coming here? We can’t just leave this mess for Darius to clean up either, can we?”
Emma was right. If someone walked by and saw the bloody mess, they’d call the cops. I didn’t want more bodies to explain away.
Noelle slid one of her swords back into its scabbard, lifted one hand, and snapped. The bodies all around us vanished. “It’s only glamour,” she advised, “but no mortal will be able to see the mess. To your senses, it will be as if nothing is here.”
“Unless someone trips over a body,” I grumbled. That seemed a likely possibility with as many zombies were lying around. Someone might also slip in the blood.
“I’ll send people,” Noelle promised. “It’s the least I can do. My queen will be upset if I leave a mess behind for mortals. So, do we have an agreement? I will take you safely somewhere beyond the reach of the Summer fetch, and you will hear my offer?”
Emma grabbed my shoulder and turned me so my back was to Noelle. “We can’t trust her. Not if she’s fae.”
I nodded. “We can trust her to be fae. That’s about it. She can’t lie outright, which means she’ll have to do as she promised. However, if we don’t accept her offer, we might find that safe place isn’t so safe anymore. I don’t know what else to do, thoug
h, Emma. Everywhere I can think of to hide out, he probably knows about.”
A fetch was more than just a physical copy of me. He’d have my powers, my knowledge, and my memories. I couldn’t hide in any of my usual places. He’d just keep sending zombies after me or come after me himself. The last time I confronted him without preparing, he’d almost killed me. Now that I knew there would be no coming back if I died, I wasn’t willing to risk it. We had to be smart, smarter than him. Considering he was me, only twisted by whatever fae had created him, that wasn’t going to be easy.
I took Emma’s hands in mine. “You can back out of this if you want. You don’t have to go. This isn’t your fight.”
“The hell it isn’t.” She pulled away. “Those bastards took Remy just when I was starting to get the hang of this babysitting thing. They don’t get to do that and walk away. I’m in. Wherever you go, I go.”
I nodded and turned back to Noelle. “We accept your terms with one small revision. You have to promise that no harm will come to us if we don’t accept your offer. We’re only obligated to hear it, not to accept.”
Noelle smirked. “Clever. All right, then. No harm will come to you at my hands, or the hands of my people, whether you accept or refuse the offer. All I ask is that you hear it. Is this satisfactory?”
“It is.”
“Then let us go.” Noelle turned, took three steps forward, going further into the house, and then stopped, extending her hands in front of her.
Magic flowed out of her and rippled through the air, distorting the image of the surrounding hallway. My breath fogged as a chill settled in the house. Emma shivered.
Noelle glanced back at us before stepping into the magic portal and disappearing.
Emma’s fingers closed tightly around mine. “Together?”
I nodded. “Together.”
We stepped through the portal hand in hand.
The world beyond was coated in a blanket of snow. Skeletal trees loomed on either side of a snow-covered stone path. Ice dripped from the boughs like liquid, frozen in time by the frigid temperatures. The path curved toward a massive structure that looked like it had been constructed entirely of ice. It glowed an ominous, deep blue light. Huge parapets towered high enough to disappear into the swirling gray clouds. Lanterns along the path emitted a soft, violet glow, casting eerie shadows.
Of course, we’d go to the Winter Court. My fetch was in service to Summer, which meant he wouldn’t dare venture here. It was the one place in the entire universe we’d be safe from anything coming out of Summer. That didn’t mean we were safe.
My teeth chattered. I crossed my arms over my chest and wished I had a heavier coat, one meant for sub-zero temperatures and not the mild winters of New Orleans. I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen snow in person. At least not enough to accumulate. Maybe never. We only ever got it once every few years, and even then, never enough to pile up.
The snow ate the sound of my footsteps as I moved further down the path with Emma at my side. Noelle was nowhere in sight. Funny way for us to get to hear her offer.
After we’d advanced a few paces, she appeared on the path ahead, walking toward us. Noelle had shed the silver armor and the swords in favor of a blue gown so pale it almost looked white. Warm, white fur hugged her shoulders and covered her head. She looked every bit the part of a courtly lady except for the sword hanging at either hip.
“Welcome.” She flashed a predatory smile.
“H-h-how’d you change so fast?” I bit down to keep my teeth from chattering more. It was so cold, my fingertips and nose had already gone numb. That was probably a bad sign.
Noelle stopped. “You of all people should remember that time flows differently in different pockets of Faerie. Come. You’ll be more comfortable inside by the fire.”
Winter was eerily quiet. No birds called. No insects buzzed. In Summer, even when it was quiet, there was always some sound. The clink of armor as the guards patrolled, the murmur of soft voices in some hallway just out of sight. Winter was just quiet. Too quiet.
I scanned the walls of the icy palace ahead, searching for movement, and just barely picked up some. The guards were dressed in white armor and armed with swords that matched the glow of the palace. They stood incredibly still as if they were a part of the structure itself.
Noelle led us up an icy stairway and through doors large enough for giants to pass through. The first hall was a work of art, sporting a stained-glass dome depicting snowflakes falling around a sleeping woman. I paced to the center of the huge, empty room. Looking up at it made me feel more than a little dizzy.
“Nice place you’ve got here.” Without the snow and trees to soften it, my voice echoed through the empty chamber, painfully loud. “More like a tomb than a palace.”
Noelle folded her hands in front of her. “That’s because it is a tomb, Horseman. Or it will be.”
I studied her, expecting to see her quirk her full lips up into a smile, but she remained solemn. “There’s no death in Faerie. Why would there be a tomb?”
“Because death is the inevitable result of life. Even we know that. At least the wise fae do.” She gestured to the ceiling above. “Not so very long ago, death was a foreign concept to many fae. Few living fae recalled the last death among us. It was considered too sensational an event to speak of. To bring it up was social suicide. Yet death was the thing we feared most, as everyone fears what they don’t understand.”
Her footsteps echoed through the room as she closed the distance between us. “And then you brought death to Faerie. The day you led the armies of Summer against Shadow, more of our kind died than had been born in a millennium. We were suddenly faced with the very real possibility that we may not be as immortal as we believed.”
“It was Remy’s presence that allowed death to come to Faerie,” I said. “Titania has her hidden away somewhere at the edge of her territory. If you help me get her out, I’ll take her out of Faerie, and you’ll never have to face that fear.”
“I don’t want death to leave Faerie.” Noelle tilted her head up to smile at the mural above us. The move exposed her throat, showing off delicate white skin. “I want to use it to kill my queen.”
I suppressed a shudder. Killing a Faerie queen was no small task. For her own knight to carry out the assassination, that should’ve been impossible. I suddenly realized why she’d approached me. I was probably the only being alive that had done it. I’d killed Nyx, the Shadow Queen, which meant I knew how to do it, even if Remy left Faerie. More than likely, though, her proposal would take the simpler route. She’d want Remy to remain in Faerie, at least until she achieved her purpose. Something I couldn’t allow.
“No,” I said firmly and crossed my arms.
Noelle lowered her head and frowned at me. “But you haven’t even heard my proposal, Horseman.”
“I know what it is you want, and I can guess at how it is you want to achieve that. Either you’ll want to use my daughter or me to help kill your queen. The answer is no either way.”
“Why?” she demanded, hand straying uncomfortably close to one of her swords. “It’s not as if you’re averse to killing. You murdered Nyx and her knight. You killed Kellas in single combat and slew a dozen of his finest warriors in battle. How many gods have fallen by your hand?”
“You’ve misjudged him.” Emma stepped up beside me. “All of that was in self-defense.”
“What about Hades? What threat did your friend pose to you when you ripped his soul out in that boiler room?” Noelle beamed.
I scowled at her in silence.
“Lazarus?” Emma turned to me, her expression worried.
“Oh, you didn’t know?” Noelle’s snake-like smile widened. “Such were the terms of the deal he struck with Loki. His life and my assistance in exchange for three names crossed off Loki’s list. Hades was only the first of the agreed-upon names.”
Her assistance? Loki had promised me a means to get to my daughter. Noelle must
’ve been what he meant. She could move back and forth between Earth and Faerie, and she would’ve known where the palace at the edge of Summer was. She’d also be the one person besides me with the power to kill Titania.
“I didn’t have a choice,” I told Emma without taking my eyes from Noelle. “I was backed into a corner, Em. She’s twisting this.”
Noelle sneered. “If I am, then just deny it. Tell her you didn’t do it. Go on.”
I fixed my gaze on the floor. No matter how badly I wanted to, I just couldn’t lie to Emma. Even if the magic bond had let me, I couldn’t. She deserved better. Better than a killer. All I could do was mutter in a small voice, “I didn’t have a choice.”
Emma slid her hands under my chin and lifted my head, so I had no choice but to meet her gaze. “Why?”
I couldn’t answer her. My throat was too tight, and my tongue was rougher than tree bark. No answer I could come up with would be good enough to excuse my actions. Not to Emma. She wouldn’t buy that the ends justified the means, not even if I explained everything to her. She was too good a person. Asking her to accept what I had done would be like asking her to change the core of who she was.
“I’m sorry.” My voice sounded strange, as if it belonged to someone else.
Emma let me go. Her jaw shook, but she didn’t let me see her cry, choosing instead to cross her arms and turn her back to me.
“Sorry,” Noelle said in a sing-song voice.
It’s always been my policy never to hit a woman unless she hits me first, but I was about to make an exception in her case. What a bitch. I don’t know why I was expecting anything different from a fae.
“Nevertheless,” she continued, “you have killed. Your objection to assisting me cannot be because you abhor murder, especially since you’ve declined my offer without even hearing why my queen should die. You of all people know the queens are…unstable.”