Rosana’s warning played in his head. Was he walking into a trap?
He can’t see you. He doesn’t know you’re here.
The foyer stretched two stories up, and was completely empty except for an extravagant arrangement of white flowers in a large black bowl.
He hesitated, his uneasiness increasing, as Luc stepped across the threshold.
Then he scented Rosana. Faint but distinctive, and with an underlying tang of fear that made his chest clench.
His lips drew back in a silent snarl.
Thrice-damned, fucking fae.
He followed Luc into the foyer. Behind him, the wood door thudded shut.
29
On the level below, a door opened and closed. Claws clicked on a marble floor.
Rosana’s gaze flew to Langdon, but he didn’t seem to have noticed. Instead, he set cool fingers on her wrist and urged the spoon toward her mouth.
“Eat.” So soft, almost gentle, but steel edged his tone.
The portly butler appeared in the door. “My lord.”
“Yes, Olivier?”
“There’s a fada in the foyer.”
No. Rosana froze, the spoon clenched in her hand. You stubborn ass.
Langdon’s mouth turned down. “Deal with him.”
Olivier inclined his shiny bald head. “As you wish. However, I believe he is one of Blaer’s people. A wolf.”
Not Adric, then. Rosana let out a breath.
The prince flicked her a look, no doubt detecting her agitation with those eerie senses of his. He rose to his feet.
“Alone?” he asked his butler. “You saw no one else?”
“No, my lord.”
“I see. Well, let the wolf upstairs, and then inform Captain Quade that our wards have been breached.”
Olivier gave a discreet cough. “The wolf has permission to pass through the wards.”
“But the man with him does not.”
The butler’s eyes widened slightly. Then he nodded. “Very good, my lord.” He made his stately way out of the room.
Rosana was still holding the spoon. She set it back on the linen napkin and stared unseeingly at the table.
The man had to be Adric. But why hadn’t Olivier seen him?
Langdon pushed his chair in but remained behind it, his long, elegant fingers curled around the seatback. She felt him eyeing her downturned head.
When she glanced up, he arched a single diamond-studded brow. “Nothing to say? Perhaps you know why Lord Adric is here?”
She blanked her face. She couldn’t let him know what she’d Seen. It could be the very information that tipped the balance and led to Adric’s death.
“I don’t speak for Lord Adric,” she parried. “But I can tell you his animal isn’t a wolf.”
Langdon sighed. “I’m aware of that. And I didn’t say Adric was a wolf. He’s the man who entered with the wolf.”
Rosana spread her hands in genuine confusion. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know anything about a wolf.”
Or did she? She stilled.
The wolf had to be Luc. And more, she’d bet a month’s pay that he was Adric’s former lieutenant, the fada who’d been with Blaer in Lewes. In fact, it was probably Luc who’d been seen at Rock Run earlier this week. The question was, why was Adric with him?
The wolf was outside the door now. Langdon strolled across the room to a bookcase and removed a small packet from an inlaid ebony-and-ivory box.
Rosana came to her feet as the wolf entered the library. She’d never seen Luc as his animal, but the scent fit. And damn, he was big. His head was almost level with hers, his eyes a deep amber just a few shades away from the gold of his man-form.
Her nostrils twitched. Adric was here. But why couldn’t she see him?
Langdon’s mouth turned down. “Does Blaer know you’re here?” he asked Luc.
The wolf peeled his upper lip in a tooth-baring snarl.
“And you, Adric,” the prince added. “Did you think I wouldn’t know the instant you crossed through the portal?”
No reply.
But in the silence that fell, Rosana detected slow, almost-imperceptible breathing to Luc’s left. Without moving her head, she slid a look in its direction. There was an odd, man-size disturbance in the air that made it difficult to see the bookshelf behind it.
Her heart jumped—and then sank. She smoothly turned back to Langdon. “All I see is a wolf, and I told you, Adric’s not a wolf.”
“Yes,” the prince returned with a chilly little smile. “You did tell me that.” He tore open the packet and tossed an acrid-smelling gray powder right at the man-sized disturbance.
Luc surged forward, aiming for Langdon’s throat, but the prince threw up an arm to block him. The two fell to the floor, Luc on top, his teeth sunk into Langdon’s forearm.
The gray powder outlined Adric and the dagger in his right hand. Swiping the powder off his face, he stalked across the library floor. Langdon was on top now, his hands wrapped around Luc’s muzzle, the gash on his arm spattering blood everywhere.
“Go,” Adric growled at Rosana as he circled the two combatants, searching for an opening.
“I don’t think so,” she muttered. She shot a longing glance at the brown bat that had once been her stiletto and then grabbed the raven statue from its pedestal instead. It made a nice, solid weight in her hands.
She eyed the fighters. Adric was completely visible now, his body coated in the bad-smelling gray powder. He sliced at Langdon with his dagger, but the night fae rolled, shoving Luc in front of him. The blade slashed through the heavy muscles of the wolf’s left shoulder.
Luc turned and snapped at Adric, and then froze.
A horrorstruck look crossed Adric’s face. “Fuck. I’m sorry, bro.”
He eased the knife out just as the prince grabbed Luc’s ruff and slammed him headfirst onto the floor. The wolf made a final, jerky movement before collapsing, motionless.
Langdon flowed to his feet and faced Adric, taking a martial arts stance, arms raised and knees bent with one leg forward.
Adric prowled forward, the dagger loose and ready in his hand. His eyes were a cougar-blue, his expression hard, predatory. Rosana could almost see the big cat overlaying the human.
Langdon stepped backwards. He was at his desk now. Reaching behind him, he grabbed a paperweight and flung it at Adric. It turned in mid-air into a thick, hissing snake with a copperhead’s distinctive hourglass markings. With a growled curse, Adric slapped it away. The snake landed on the floor, and he bent and chopped off its head with a single stroke of his knife.
Langdon’s eyes flickered red and Rosana growled.
Oh no, you don’t.
She regripped the raven, palms sweaty, and moved to the prince’s left.
Adric indicated her with his chin. “Let Rosana go. This has nothing to do with her. She’s not even a member of my clan.”
Langdon tilted his head. “A trade?”
“What kind of trade?”
“Your sister for Rosana.”
Her head jerked back. “No!”
Neither man looked at her.
“And if I say yes,” Adric asked, “what would happen to Marjani?”
“That’s between me and her. But I swear, she’ll have a chance. More than she gave my son.”
What were they talking about? Rosana clenched the raven, her gaze darting between the two men.
Adric’s jaw clenched. “No fucking way. You get me, not my sister. And no matter what, Rosana goes free. That’s non-negotiable.”
Rosana had heard enough. She lunged, swinging the statue like a club at Langdon’s head, but he ducked and flowed sideways so the blow glanced off his shoulder instead. A long leg swept out, knocking her own legs from beneath her.
She landed on her ass, the raven clattering to the marble next to her. But she’d given Adric an opening, and he pounced, dagger aimed at Langdon’s throat.
The prince threw up an arm to block him, and with
an agile twist of his body, used Adric’s own momentum to throw him into a bookcase. Rosana scuttled backward as books showered down around her.
Catlike, Adric turned in mid-air so that his shoulder hit the bookcase instead of his head and landed on his feet, still holding the dagger. He stalked back toward Langdon, and the two men started circling each other again.
Rosana scrambled back to her feet.
Adric jerked his head at her without taking his gaze from the prince. “Get out of here already.” To Langdon, he said, “You’re dead. Nobody touches my sister. Nobody.”
The prince went whiter, if that were possible for such a pale man. “Olivier!” he called.
Adric lunged, slashing the dagger through Langdon’s shirt, drawing the poisonous iron across his torso.
Langdon sucked in a breath and danced backward. His eyes narrowed. “Kill me, and you’ll never get out of here alive.”
“You think I fucking care?” Adric shook his head. “You fae just don’t get it, do you?”
The prince took another step back until he could reach his desk again. This time, he grabbed a handful of pens to fling at Adric. They turned into hornets and swarmed his head. Shoving the dagger into his pocket, Adric caught and crushed them with shifter-fast speed, one after another.
Meanwhile, Langdon had circled around Adric. He aimed a kick at Adric’s knee cap from the side, which Adric only just evaded. Catching the prince’s arm, he jerked him forward and down. His hand chopped down on the back of Langdon’s neck. The night fae rolled with it, coming smoothly back to his feet.
The two men turned in a tight circle. Langdon flicked his fingers at the dagger and it turned into another bat that dove for Adric’s head. He grabbed it in mid-air, flinging it to the hard floor where it lay, dead.
Adric let his claws and fangs slide out. With a guttural growl, he backed the prince into a corner.
Langdon’s eyes narrowed. Shadows gathered at the room’s edges.
Despair crawled over Rosana’s skin. Hopelessness descended on her in a suffocating cloud. You can’t escape. Why even try?
Adric gave a hard swallow.
Rosana clenched her fists. “Breathe,” she whispered, speaking for herself as much as Adric. “It’s him, not us. Don’t let him win.”
The shadows receded. She sidled along the bookcases, watching for a chance to help Adric. Her foot slipped and she looked down to find the hornets had changed back into pens.
Olivier rapped on the door. “My lord? Is everything okay?”
“Send for the guards!” Langdon called back.
“Pardon me?” The elderly butler opened the door, blinked.
“Send for my guards,” Langdon gritted.
“Immediately, my lord.” The door closed with a decided click.
Oh, no, you don’t.
Rosana sprinted across the room, throwing open the door. She caught Oliver right before he reached the stairs and shoved him face-first against the wall.
“Don’t move.” She wrenched his arm up, ignoring the pinch of guilt at manhandling an elder. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will if I have to.”
Beneath the natty yellow bow tie, the butler’s throat worked. “Yes, miss.”
“This way.” She urged him back down the hall. “What’s in there?” She jerked her head at the door opposite the library.
“The prince’s bedroom.”
Behind her, she heard grunts and a crash. She shot a glance over her shoulder, but all she could see was the still unconscious wolf. If Langdon managed to get a message out to his guards, they were fucked.
“Open the door,” she snapped at Olivier, then waited impatiently as he turned the knob with agonizing slowness. “Inside.” She punctuated the order with a small shove. As she kicked the door shut behind them, her gaze lit on the sturdy four-poster bed. Perfect.
“Take off your belt.”
Olivier undid the buckle, slid the belt from its loops and handed it to her.
“Hands together.”
A pained expression crossed the butler’s broad face. “Is this necessary, miss?”
“Yes,” she snapped. “Now do it.”
His mouth thinned, but he presented his hands, palms together. Quickly, she wound the belt around his wrists a couple of times and then looped the rest around one of the bed’s thick black posts.
“It’s better this way,” she told him as she cinched the belt. “You can tell the prince you had no choice.”
His mouth lifted in a wry arc. “Next you’ll be saying I should thank you.”
Their eyes met. So the man had a sense of humor hidden behind that stone face.
“Sorry,” she said with a shrug and shot out the door.
Downstairs, the front door crashed open. She darted down the hall long enough to see what looked like an entire cadre of warriors pouring inside.
Langdon had gotten a message out.
She sprinted back to the library, slamming the door shut and turning the key.
The entire room was roiling with shadows. Luc was still unconscious, but Adric and Langdon were in another corner now. Langdon was bleeding from the torso and favoring the arm the wolf had savaged, but he looked better than Adric, who wavered drunkenly from side to side.
He had the dagger again. A quick glance at the floor told her the bat had disappeared.
Unfortunately, the dagger wasn’t doing Adric any good. He had it gripped in both hands but could barely keep the point turned up. Blood dripped from a gash in his temple, mixing with the gray powder streaking his face. He looked like a crazed clown.
He glanced at her, scowled. “You’re s’pposed…to be gone.”
She snatched the dagger from him. “Someone has to save your ass, cat.”
She advanced on Langdon. He faded back into the darkest shadow—and disappeared.
With a frustrated growl, she shoved the dagger into her pocket and ran her hands over the wall, just in case Langdon was still there. But the bastard was gone.
The warriors banged on the locked door, demanding entrance.
“Now what?” Adric asked Rosana with a lopsided smile.
“We get the hell out of here.”
“Sounds…like a…plan.” He walked several unsteady feet and sat down hard next to the wolf. He stroked his friend’s fur. “Luc?” When the other shifter didn’t move, Adric looked up at Rosana, a perplexed line between his eyes. “He’s hurt.”
“So are you.”
“Oh.” He touched his head and then stared at the blood on his fingers.
From across the hall, Olivier was shouting for help.
She gripped Adric’s shoulder. “We have to get out of here. The window.”
“’Kay.” He came onto his hands and knees and then just stayed there, staring at the floor as if he’d never seen marble before.
Outside the door, she heard Olivier explaining the situation to Langdon’s guards. There was short silence, and then a loud explosion shook the library.
Hellfire. They were using fae balls.
The door shuddered on its hinges, but the thick wood held. For now.
Rosana crouched next to Adric, trying to lift him up. But he was heavy, with a fada’s extra solid bones. She stifled a sob.
“Adric.” She tugged on his arm. “Get up, damn it. If they find us here, we’re dead.”
“Yeah.” He nodded sagely—and collapsed. She barely managed to catch him before his head hit the marble. She eased him the rest of the way down onto his stomach. He lay still, head turned to the side, blood seeping out of the wound.
“No.” She pressed a fist to her mouth. What was she going to do now?
Next to him, Luc’s eyes fluttered open. He whined and nuzzled Adric’s shoulder.
The door shuddered with a second explosion, and then another.
Bang. Bang.
The hinges shrieked as they started to give.
She lurched into action, grabbing Adric’s wrists and dragged him toward the nearest
window. Jerking the blind open, she ran her hands around the sash, frantically searching for a way to open it. But the window was one long oblong of glass with no latch that she could detect.
Giving up, she snatched up the poor, abused raven one last time and swung it as hard as she could at the center of the window. The glass didn’t even crack. Instead, she watched, incredulous, as the statue broke instead, its stone head careening sideways and almost landing on Adric.
The door broke from the wall and crashed to the floor. She tossed the raven’s body aside and whipped out Adric’s dagger. Five night fae stormed into the library. One set a foot on Luc’s neck, stilling his weak, half-conscious movements, while the others surrounded her and the still-unconscious Adric.
She moved in front of him, dagger out. “Stay where you are.”
The man who’d led the charge regarded her with icy eyes. “Where’s the prince?”
“He ’ported out of here. Or whatever you call that disappearing-into-the shadows thing he does.”
The warrior jerked his head at one of his men. “Find Prince Langdon. The rest of you, take these two.”
“Yes, Captain.” The three remaining men closed in on her and Adric.
She bared her teeth. “Come any closer, and I’ll rip your goddamned hearts out.” She knew she wasn’t being rational—she was surrounded, with no way out—but her animal wouldn’t let them get any closer to Adric. Not while he was injured.
The captain swirled his hand, magician-like, and held it, palm up, fingers spread wide. A purple spark appeared in his palm, expanding into an orb of dark, pulsating light.
A fae ball, night-fae style.
She swallowed sickly. One of those could burn a hole right through you.
“Surrender,” he said, “or I’ll throw this at your mate, there.”
“He’s not my mate,” she returned dully. But she brought the dagger to her side.
They swarmed around her. The knife was wrenched from her hand. The captain took her arm in a firm grip while two others lifted Adric like a sack of potatoes and carried him toward the door.
Langdon appeared in the doorway.
“My lord.” The captain inclined his head respectfully.
“I see you finally realized there were intruders.”
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