Institute of the Shadow Fae Box Set

by C. N. Crawford

  “I’m not doing that. The Institute can stay vulnerable. Right now, you and I are leaving for The Skull and Crossbones.”

  Chapter 71

  In my little white dress, I gripped the straps of my bug-out bag as we skulked down Crutched Friars. The night air skimmed over my bare arms and legs, tension hunched my shoulders, and I kept looking behind me. At any moment, another jackdaw might run out of an alley to blow himself up.

  We now had about twenty-one hours left until everyone died of the Plague.

  “Gods, I want a whiskey,” I muttered.

  Ruadan let the comment hang in the air. One of these days, I was going to get him drunk, assuming that was even possible.

  As we walked, he loomed over me, his silhouette indistinct. He was doing his wraith thing where you couldn’t really see his outline.

  I swallowed hard. Twenty-one hours until rotting bodies filled the streets, eaten by rats….

  The hair stood up on my nape. Around the Institute, the roads were eerily empty tonight. These streets were thousands of years old, with strange names like Savage Gardens and Seething Lane. For thousands of years, the streets had teemed with people. Not now.

  We walked down the long, curving road called Crutched Friars. These streets had been around the first time the Great Mortality had hit the city. What stories these streets would have to tell—ancient as Baleros. Older than the Wraith….

  Shadows climbed the walls around us as Ruadan kept us hidden with his magic. What stories did he have to tell after all these centuries?

  “How old are you, exactly?”

  “What difference does it make? That has no bearing on Baleros.”

  “That vampire woman, Elise, said six hundred.” I plowed right on. “Is that true?”

  “Six-hundred ninety-six.”

  “That’s bloody ancient. Surely you need to go to bed at seven-thirty, after a quiet night of soaking your feet and watching gardening shows.”

  He grunted.

  I couldn’t do the mental math, exactly, but I thought he was born sometime in the thirteen hundreds. “So you were around when the Great Mortality hit? The big one? The fourteenth century one?”

  “Yes.” His dark magic snaked over my skin. “It seemed as if the world was ending.”

  I swallowed hard. “How often did you leave Emain to come to London?”

  “Once I escaped some of my training with Baleros, I was married here in London.”

  “How old were you when you joined the Shadow Fae?”

  “I was raised among them from birth.”

  My blood stirred. A rare flash of openness from Ruadan, but these memories didn’t seem like happy ones. Cold magic poured off him, rushing over my skin.

  I should have left it there, should have heeded the warning—the air frosting, the shadows thickening. But I had to know more.

  “What happened to your wife?”

  “She died.”

  “How?” I’d missed some tact with my question, like telling him I was sorry for his loss.

  “Killed by Adonis. Horseman of Death.”

  His words slid over my skin like cold rain. “Oh?”

  “I’m almost positive, yes.”

  “But you’re not entirely sure?”

  “I’m certain that a monstrous creature like him doesn’t belong on Earth.”

  “But aren’t many of us monsters in our own way?”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Along with the other horsemen, he created the apocalypse twenty-five years ago.”

  “But I thought he worked to stop it. He fought against the Horsemen of Pestilence and War. He tried to stop all the destruction. At least, that’s what I heard.”

  “In the end, yes. But his very presence on Earth led to it. Without him, none of that would have happened. Not to mention the fact that he can still slaughter entire populations just by losing his temper. I think he was responsible for the Black Plague.”

  “But you don’t know that he was.”

  “And he’s probably responsible for this most recent plague in the Isle of Dogs. He is Death, and he has no place here.”

  I fell silent.

  “I can hear your heart racing,” Ruadan said quietly. “Why?”

  “I’m just wary, that’s all. There could be jackdaws with explosive vests in any of these alleyways. Anyway, my point was—Baleros seems to be drawing from the old days. The Plague stuff, the skeleton murals, the cloaks. You and Baleros were both alive then. I wasn’t. What was London like in those days?”

  “Is there a point to this?”

  “We’re undercover. We’re supposed to be blending in. I’m not sure if you’ve ever spent time around normal people in your six hundred ninety-four years of life, but they do this thing called chitchat. They talk about the weather, or sports, or the mystery persons who stole their cheese at work.”

  He shot me a sharp look. “That’s asinine.”

  I loosed a sigh. “Well, when we get into The Skull and Crossbones, how about you let me do the talking? We don’t need Baleros tracking our movements, and you don’t have a chance in seven hells of blending in. And anyway, that time period seems to interest Baleros. Maybe it’s important. Maybe he liked his life back then.”

  Shadows snaked around us, and the silence stretched out for so long that I was certain the conversation was over. At last, he said, “London was full of death and beauty. Elegance and depravity.” His gaze flicked to mine for a long moment, and I had the inexplicable sense he was talking about me. “An intoxicating combination.”

  A smile curled my lips. “More details, please.”

  “Murders, executions. Towering, spindly churches that reached for the heavens. Human heads on pikes. Pageants, maypoles. Claret and beer. A royal menagerie with lions and bears. On this road, a king marched his brother’s mistress through the streets half-naked as penance for her sins. Her hair was golden in the sunlight. Those with strength ruled. Kings led their troops into battle. And most of all—chaos and death ruled the streets.”

  “Ah. And there’s our answer. Chaos. What a glorious time for Baleros.”

  Captivated, I was about to push for more information, but Ruadan stopped walking. His violet eyes burned as he stared across the street. I turned, catching sight of what he was looking at.

  A mural of black and ivory with splashes of red—skeletons dancing with kings, queens, and soldiers. And behind the skeletons lurked cloaked men. Jackdaws. No. Not jackdaws … I think they were … were they supposed to be us?

  “There’s another one of his murals,” I muttered.

  “The Great Mortality.” Silver flashed in Ruadan’s eyes. “Those pictures were everywhere once.”

  I scrubbed a hand over my mouth. “Could be a message for us. A reminder. We have just over a day to deliver you, or he unleashes the godsdamned Plague.”

  Ruadan cocked his head. “He already delivered that message. What else?”

  I felt like I was being tested here. I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to get in Baleros’s mind.

  Baleros’s twenty-fourth rule of power: Win their hearts by slaughtering their oppressor.

  “Frightened people are easier to control. When the humans are scared enough, they’ll turn on us. When Baleros kills you in a giant spectacle, they’ll be thankful. It’s quite brilliant, really.”

  “Brilliant,” he repeated.

  “I mean, he is very good at planning ahead.”

  Ruadan started walking again, fog and shadows curling around him, until he reached a blank brick wall. He halted, staring at it. It took me a moment to register the faint gleam of magic that shimmered over the wall. A glimmering red—the same color as the magic we’d seen at the Institute.

  The wall was glamoured, and the magic belonged to King Locrinus.

  Ruadan reached out, stroking his fingertips over the wall, and the glamour fell away. Now, we stood before a warped wooden door. Just above us, a pub sign creaked forlornly in the breeze—an ivory skull and crossbones
on black paint.

  Ruadan pushed through the door, into a pub where candlelight wavered over crooked stone walls and oak benches. The stone walls were hung with stags’ antlers, skulls, and framed pages from alchemical texts.

  Three humans sat at a table, dressed in black cloaks and star-flecked wizard hats. They hunched over tiny, pewter figurines and colored dice. A human man with long, blond hair in a ponytail rose, knocking over his chair. “I am Boradrion, Dark Fae Lord of Hellbania! I will smiteth mine porcine enemy with a roll of—” He rolled the die across the table.

  A bearded man sighed loudly through his nose. “You rolled a natural one. The boar bites your dick off.”

  Boradrion’s face reddened. “Methrior rocked the table with his meaty dwarf hands!” He slammed his fists on the table. “I need a re-roll. Dungeon Master Ethan, this is bollocks.”

  “What the hells,” I muttered.

  My heart sank. I’d kind of been hoping for a good fight, but I would not find that here. And yet … someone with magic had glamoured the door. Maybe they were more powerful than they appeared.

  It was at this point that Boradrion of the Ponytail realized we’d come in, and he pushed his glasses up on his nose. His face still looked pinched and red. “Who enters The Skull and Crossbones?”

  Baleros’s third law of power: Always let your enemy underestimate you.

  I blinked. “Yeah, so, like, this door just kinda appeared in the wall? It was kind of weird.” An American accent again. Always with the American accents. “And it looked like magic or something? And so we just came inside. You know what I mean? Do you guys have vodka and Red Bull?”

  Boradrion glowered at me, then turned to his friend. “Gods damn it, Methrior. I told you the glamour wouldn’t hold. You’re a terrible mage.”

  Methrior scooted out from the booth, glowering through his spectacles. “I thought it was a solid spell,” he said quietly. “King Locrinus helped me with it.”

  Did he, now? Quite the little alliance Maddan’s father had formed with Baleros and his human idiot crew.

  Still, no one had noticed Ruadan. With his Wraith fog around him, people just didn’t see him.

  I cocked my head. “You guys seem to know a lot about magic and stuff.”

  Methrior’s chest puffed. “I’m being instructed by a real fae king.”

  The bearded man—Dungeon Master Ethan—strode up behind Methrior, wiggling his fingers. “He’s not the only one. Watch this. Ekkimu.” Red light glowed from his fingertips, and he grinned.

  Methrior grunted with disapproval. “Yes, but he’s spent more time on me, because he has recognized my innate talent. I can do real attack spells now. Look.” Methrior lifted his hand, staring at his fingertips. “Baraqu!”

  Lightning shot from his fingertips, striking the ceiling. Instantly, the wood ignited, flames roaring above us.

  Boradrion covered his head with his arms. “Put the fire out, you bloody donkey! I told you to stop doing that inside.”

  Coughing, Methrior called out, “Malititu!”

  Water rushed down from the ceiling, quenching the fire. It soaked my hair and my clothing before petering out to a brown trickle. I stopped myself from kicking the living shite out of all of them.

  With water dripping off me, I widened my eyes. “Amazing. How did you get a fae king to instruct you?”

  “Something big is coming,” said Boradrion. “A reckoning. Something that will change the world we know. And we’re the foot soldiers. When the change comes, we will rule by his side.”

  Sure you will, fuckwit. I licked my lips, shivering a little in my sodden clothes. “What’s coming, then?”

  “The Great Mortality will come for us all. Death, the great leveler. Corpses will litter London’s streets once more, bodies falling so fast there will be no time to bury the dead. Only those with magic will survive. Or those we take under our protection. You have but one more day to make the most of your existence before you begin to rot.” He cocked his head, grinning. “Unless you want to join us as our serving wench. If you would like to come to my abode for cheese sandwiches and some sexual intercourse I would be happy to oblige.”

  The mage rolls a critical failure, no charisma modifier. The serving wench imagines ripping off his head at the neck.

  I pouted. “But I thought a boar bit your dick off?” Wrong move, but I couldn’t help myself.

  His face reddened. “I assure you, everything is in working order.”

  “I’ll think about it.” Or, more accurately, I’d sooner be buried in the earth up to my neck and pelted to death with twenty-sided dice. I crossed my arms. “And while I’m thinking about that tempting possibility, can you tell me how the Great Mortality will come to London?”

  Chapter 72

  Boradrion’s eyes shone. “He will bring it. And I am his soldier.” His eyes widened, and he took a step closer. He pulled up his cowl, which got caught for a moment on his ponytail.

  Now we were getting somewhere, and there was no doubt in my mind that he was talking about Baleros. “And where do we find him? If I wanted to serve him, too?”

  Boradrion tapped his fingers on his arms, wrinkling his nose. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone that. Not even sexy wenches.”

  “Where is your leader?” Ruadan’s voice rumbled through the room.

  Boradrion’s beady eyes shifted to Ruadan, his body tensing. “What the hells? I didn’t notice that one, did you, Methrior? He’s bloody enormous.” He stepped closer, squinting as he tried to home in on Ruadan. “Are you…. Are you fae? Are you the Wraith?”

  He’d just signed his own death warrant with that realization. Now, there was no way we could leave these three alive.

  In a blur of black smoke, Ruadan shifted. Within the next heartbeat, he was gripping Boradrion by the throat, lifting him off the ground. “Tell us where we find Baleros, or I crush this one’s throat.”

  Boradrion kicked helplessly at the air, his eyes bulging.

  Methrior began chanting in Angelic, and a ball of fire glowed in his hand. Dungeon Master Ethan chanted right along with him.

  Maybe we would be getting that fight after all.

  “Edin Na Zu!” Methrior screeched, fiery magic blazing from his fingertips.

  I pulled my dagger from its sheath just as Methrior screamed the final word of his spell—Iddimu--and red magic exploded from his body.

  The magic slammed into my chest, and I lost control of the knife. I hit the ground hard, with a loud crack. The force of the magic had knocked the wind out of me. On the ground, I grimaced, fairly certain he’d cracked my ribs.

  My gaze flicked to Ruadan across the pub, and it seemed like he’d taken the brunt of the attack. His body had cracked a stone wall.

  I could feel his rage from here. In fact, his eyes had turned completely black. Shadows billowed around him, expanding and contracting like lungs. Ice frosted the air, the temperature breaking some of the glass bottles. Looking at Ruadan with his nightmarish face on was like looking into the void itself. And he hadn’t even fully shifted yet. No, I was only seeing the phantom wings behind him.

  “Methrior!” Boradrion yelped. “It’s an incubus. Do you know what happens when an incubus loses control?”

  My ears perked up. I didn’t know what happened when an incubus lost control.

  A low growl boomed around the room, and ice spread across the floor. Ruadan stared at Methrior and flicked his wrist. I gaped in fascinated horror as Methrior’s body split in two, starting at the crown and splitting downward, the man screaming until his mouth and throat had been ripped apart. The other two humans began screaming, their hysteria deafening.

  My blood boomed through my veins. Ruadan was more terrifying than I’d imagined.

  And yet still, Ruadan seemed perfectly in control, his muscles tightly coiled. I’m not sure I even wanted to imagine what he’d look like out of control….

  I grunted, willing myself to roll over on all fours. Pain shot through my ribs, but I ke
pt my eye on Boradrion.

  He clutched his throat, wincing. “Get them out of here,” he rasped. His face reddened. “Dungeon Master Ethan, get them out of here!”

  Ethan was trying to chant again, but I could tell he was stumbling over his words, panicking. The temperature in the room plummeted further, my breath misting in front of my face. Then, dark magic snaked across the room from Ruadan’s fingertips. From the magical tendrils, thorny spikes dug into Boradrion’s flesh.

  Slowly, with pain splintering my ribs, I pushed myself up.

  “Where is Baleros keeping Queen Macha?” Ruadan spoke quietly, but his voice seemed to boom around the room, echoing in my skull.

  Blood dripped from Boradrion’s punctured skin, the magical thorns digging in deeper. “I don’t know where she is!” he shrieked. “Ethan! Ethan I will light your fucking dice on fire if you do not kill him!”

  “Where is Baleros?” The quiet control in Ruadan’s voice sent tremors up my spine.

  Dungeon Master Ethan tried to chant, stuttering in a panic. His face had gone completely white. He had about four seconds before he just passed out.

  I scrambled for my knife, wincing as I snatched it off the ground. At last, Ethan managed to summon a red ball of magic.

  He tossed the ball of fire just as I leapt across the room. I touched down behind him and held the blade to his throat, nicking the skin just a little. The bastard was taller than me and the angle wasn’t easy.

  Electric magic crackled the air, and the hair began standing up on my nape. I couldn’t fight with magic. All I could do was leap away and try to avoid it.

  “We’re done playing,” I said sweetly. They were all going to die. “Tell us where to find your leader, or I’ll make sure you suffer at the end.”

  I could feel Ethan’s body trembling. Good. If he was scared, he’d do what I asked. “You don’t understand,” he stammered.

  “Oh, I understand. If you don’t give us the information we’re looking for, I will gut you right here. I don’t usually like to kill humans. It’s not a fair fight. But you made a very bad choice when you decided to work for Baleros, so I won’t feel bad.”