Chapter 19

 

 

WE FOUND OURSELVES about a third of the way down the dirt road to the clearing where I’d come into the Duergar realm earlier that day, and about twenty feet off to the side in the brush.

“Wait here,” I said to Nicole, who stood panting next to me.

I went to a tree near the edge of the road and peered around it to see if anyone was pursuing us from the direction of the palace. Seeing that the road that way was empty and quiet, I let out a long breath.

I was just about to return to Nicole and suggest we make a break for it and go hard down the road, rather than keeping to the cover of the forest on either side, when I caught sight of a lone figure hurrying up the road toward us from the other direction.

I stood where I was, watching. By the light of the moon and the stars, I saw it was a woman. Something about her looked familiar. Right about the time I realized she was going to veer off the road to come my way, possibly to use the tunnel Nicole and I had just exited, I recognized her.

“Well, well, look what we have here,” I murmured to myself, feeling like a cat watching an unobservant mouse.

It was Bryna, King Periclase’s bastard daughter who’d sent the wraith after me, blocking me from capturing my mark.

I quietly drew Mort and then kept stone-still as I waited for Bryna to pick her way over the uneven ground. She was still in her cocktail gown and heels, so she had to go slowly. When she got within a few feet from where I stood, I stepped into her path and drew magic to light up Mort with violet flame.

“Whatcha doing out all alone, Bryna?” I growled.

I’d clearly surprised her, but she moved with unexpected quickness, and two knives appeared in her hands. She flipped one at me, and I barely dodged it, feeling the metal whir past my ear. I saw the second one coming and used Mort to deflect it. She threw two more knives, and then realizing she was out of weapons, she turned and tried to run away. I was on her in a blink, with my hand clamped around her slim upper arm.

“Not so fast,” I said.

“If you harm me, King Periclase will have you executed,” she spat out.

I snorted. “I doubt that. He doesn’t even claim you as an official member of the royal family.”

That really pissed her off. She swung out with her elbows, trying to jab me in the ribs and twist out of my grasp. With snake-quick movements, I got her in a one-armed chokehold and pulled her backward a few steps. The combo of pressure on the airway and being yanked off-balance sends most people into a mild panic.

But I’d slightly underestimated her. Keeping her cool, she turned and slipped down and out of my hold. She kneed me in the solar plexus, and I let out a grunt, bent at the middle, and sucked air. Her movements were strong and practiced. If she hadn’t been wearing a dress and heels, she might have been a decent opponent in hand-to-hand combat. She tried to dart away, but I was faster.

I stomped a foot on the back of her gown that trailed on the ground. Fabric tore but didn’t break free. It stopped her in her tracks for the split-second I needed to snake my arm around her neck again and pull her back against me.

“You’re not going anywhere,” I hissed in her ear.

I squeezed her throat and lifted Mort, bringing the blade close enough to the side of her neck that my magic licked at her skin, making tiny papercut-like slices.

She scoffed. “You’re not going to kill me,” she choked out.

“Not yet,” I said. “Not while I still need you.”

She tried to claw at my arm and twist away again. I nicked the side of her neck with my blade, and she inhaled sharply and went still.

Bryna swallowed with a dry click of her throat. “What do you want?” she asked.

“A binding promise. I want you to take me to Van Zant.”

I wanted her punished for her violation of the netherwhere, but I’d survived that ordeal and could take it up again later if I felt the need. Right now, there was a vamp dealing deadly blood, and I wanted him off the streets so he couldn’t endanger any more innocent people.

She started struggling again, and we fell to the ground together in a tangle. A dumb move on her part. I could have easily sliced her neck by accident.

“Oh for the—” I grumbled.

I leaned back to make a little space, lifted my sword, and smacked the flat of the blade against the side of her head, as if swatting a fly. Bryna went down in a heap.

I heard Nicole gasp behind me. “Oh my god, is she dead?”

I pressed my fingers to Bryna’s carotid artery and felt a faint thump of pulse. “Nah, she’ll be fine.”

I quickly released my magic, sheathed Mort, and then hauled Bryna’s limp body up and over my shoulder.

“We need to go before the guards think to come looking for us out here,” I said.

I trotted out to the road and went at a fast clip toward the clearing. Nicole jogged along beside me.

“Who is this girl?” she asked.

“The illegitimate daughter of the man who kidnapped you,” I said. “And she’s the wench who sent a wraith to kill me.”

“And who’s the Van Zant person you mentioned?”

“My mark. He’s a vamp.”

“Mark?”

“I’m a freelancer with the Mercenary Guild,” I explained. “Van Zant is a bounty I’m supposed to bring in. He’s been a real slippery bastard. Bryna’s working with him.”

I glanced at Nicole. She shot worried looks at the limp girl I carried over my shoulder.

“Don’t get too sympathetic,” I said. “Aside from trying to murder me, she’s working with a man who’s selling VAMP3 blood on the black market. It turns people into murderers after a couple of highs. If Van Zant hasn’t already been responsible for the deaths of innocent people, it’s only a matter of time, and Bryna’s trying to protect him.”

“Oh,” she said. “I’ve heard of the Guild. I didn’t know about the VAMP3 blood.”

We’d reached the edge of the clearing.

“There’s a doorway over there,” I said, nodding at a very old-looking stone arch. “It’s a sort of magical portal that connects to other doorways. The three of us are going into it.”

“Are you taking me back home?”

I shook my head. “We’re going to the stone fortress. It’s the home base for the New Gargoyle Fae.”

Her brows drew down in anger, and she flicked a look back up the road. Her muscles tensed as if she were ready to spring away.

“My advice is not to run,” I said, my tone heavy with warning. I really wasn’t in the mood to dump Bryna to chase after Nicole. Carrying two unconscious women into the New Gargoyle stronghold, especially when one was technically one of us, would raise the kind of attention I didn’t enjoy. “You’re King Periclase’s captive here, and Unseelie territory isn’t a safe place for a changeling. It’s not a particularly safe place for anyone. At the stone fortress, you won’t be a prisoner. You’re one of us, there.”

Her mouth tightened into an unhappy line, but she unclenched her fists and her shoulders slumped in a posture of defeat.

I wasn’t being quite a hundred percent forthcoming with her. She wouldn’t be a prisoner at the fortress, that much was true, but she also wouldn’t be allowed to leave right away. Once a changeling was brought into Faerie, there was a protocol to follow. It involved staying on this side of the hedge for a certain length of time before any other decisions could be made. I didn’t think Nicole was in the right frame of mind for that news. But it didn’t matter, anyway. We couldn’t just set her free in the Earthly realm because Periclase would kidnap her again. And the next time, he’d probably make it a hell of a lot harder to bust her out.

We went up to the arch, and I shifted Bryna’s weight so I had one hand free to trace the sigils in the air.

“Hold onto my arm or my shoulder,” I said to Nicole. “You’ve got to be in contact with me to go through the doorway, since you don’t know how to do it by yourself. It’ll all be over in a second, so just try to relax.”

She gripped my forearm that was clamped over Bryna’s legs so hard I was pretty sure Nicole would leave indentations in my skin. I didn’t blame her. The doorways were some freaky shit, even when you were used to them.

I drew the symbols and said the magic words, and we stepped through into the void.

We entered the stone fortress through a doorway that was near some administrative offices.

Nicole spun around, slipping a little on the marble floor. Her eyes were huge and wild, and her chest was heaving. She was on the verge of hyperventilation.

“Hey,” I said softly. “It’s okay. Take a breath. You made it, and you’re still in one piece.”

She cast me an accusing look. “Why didn’t you tell me it was like that?”

“Would you still have gone through?”

She pressed her lips together and looked away, clearly angry. But at least her panic was subsiding.

I hiked Bryna higher on my shoulder. “Come with me to get rid of her, and then we’ll get you some food and a place to rest.”

It was late enough that most New Gargs were in bed at this hour, and during the short walk to the fortress holding cells, we didn’t encounter anyone.

The guy on duty at intake was young, and he drew back a little when he saw me come in with a limp body slung over my shoulder.

“You want her locked up?” he asked, giving us the side-eye.

“Yep.”

“Charges?” He was already tapping and swiping away at his tablet.

“She tried to kill me in the netherwhere,” I said.

That made him pause. He flicked another look at Bryna.

By Faerie law, I could have her held for a day as long as the charges met certain requirements. Attempted murder definitely made the list.

“Accuser is Petra Maguire, by the way,” I said.

I glanced at the nameplate—Patrick.

He spent another minute or so filling in the paperwork on the tablet and then held it out for me to sign with my finger.

“Where should I put her?” I asked.

“I need to scan her for charms first,” he said.

He quickly waved a slim divining rod over Bryna, finding a ring, a necklace, a hair clip, and a brooch that were charmed. He removed all of them.

He beckoned me around the counter to the door that led to the cells and held it open for me. The lockups were all empty, their doors standing partway open down either side of the hallway. He gestured to the first cell.

I went in and dumped Bryna on the bed, which was little more than a metal pallet with a thin mattress, and Patrick closed the door and traced the sigils that sealed Bryna inside.

“I’ll be back in the morning to speak with her,” I said. I still needed her to get me to Van Zant.

As Nicole and I left the fortress jail, I rolled my shoulder, trying to work out the tightness and fatigue from carrying Bryna.

Nicole walked almost tentatively, swiveling her head around as if trying to look everywhere at once.

“This place is absolutely beautiful,” she said quietly.

I glanced around. She was right. I often took it for granted, having grown up here, but the natural marble and other stonework throughout the fortress were exquisite.

“You can use my old room tonight,” I said. “Tomorrow we’ll look into getting you your own permanent quarters.”

I winced as soon as the word “permanent” left my mouth.

“Why would I need my own quarters?” she said, her alarm echoing off the walls. “I don’t need my own quarters here.”

I waved a hand. “Oh, just so you have your own space,” I said vaguely.

Eventually Nicole would have the option to go back to the other side of the hedge and renounce Faerie forever. Right then, given the choice, she certainly would. That was why the homecoming of a changeling was a process. And at the end of the process, changelings hardly ever turned their backs on their true home. It took some time, but being in Faerie seemed to unlock something buried deep within their souls, surfacing a knowledge that they didn’t fully belong to the human race. It was a matter of uncovering something they’d always had but hadn’t been fully aware of.

But for the moment, the fortress was the safest place for Nicole. If she went back to the Earthly realm while Periclase was still hot on the idea that she was a valuable Duergar princess, he’d have her kidnapped again. That, at least, had to be resolved. One way to settle it would be to find out that Nicole wasn’t his blood daughter. Another would be to have her swear to the Stone Order.

As we walked through the hallways, I began to sense Nicole’s exhaustion. Her adrenaline was probably long gone, and it was after midnight. But we had one more stop to make before I could let her rest.

When we reached Oliver’s door, I knocked sharply three times. I half-expected him to be asleep, but I should have known better. He was one of those people who seemed eternally on alert. Even when I was a kid, I never remembered him being in bed. He’d always turned in after I did and rose before my alarm.

After a few seconds, I heard movement behind the door, and then it opened.

“This is Nicole,” I said to him. I turned to my sister. “Nicole, this is your father, Oliver Maguire.”

He blinked at her a couple of times, and his brows lifted maybe a hair, which was the equivalent of a dramatic gasp coming from anyone else. Then he swung the door wider, silently inviting us in.

As I passed him, he nodded at me. A rare expression of approval. I’d completed the task he’d given me.

“I had to tell her we’re sisters,” I said to him in a low voice. “She didn’t want to come with me.”

Oliver’s eyes tightened, but he didn’t say anything.

Nicole had moved into the middle of the room and was watching him, her face suspicious. It was obvious she still didn’t believe she was related to me and Oliver.

He gave her an appraising once-over. “You’re quite old for a changeling. Did you ever have any inkling you were Fae?”

This was a standard part of the questions she’d be answering more formally later.

She folded her arms. “None whatsoever, and I still don’t.” But then her brow furrowed, and she seemed to turn inward. Her face became uncertain. “If I did, I’d feel some kind of connection or . . . known something. Even if it was just in a dream. Right?”

Oliver’s eyes gleamed a little. The fact that she was even asking, and especially the mention of dreams, meant that there was something tickling at the back of her mind. She didn’t realize it yet, or if she did, she didn’t want to examine it.

He tilted his head, regarding her. “Not necessarily. Especially if you’re dead set against the idea.” He glanced at me. “She doesn’t look at all like a New Garg.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Nicole demanded.

I peered at her. I hadn’t thought about it before, but Oliver was right. She didn’t have the strong build or the musculature that were the hallmarks of New Garg Fae. She didn’t even resemble me in particularly obvious ways. We had similar coloring and straight brows, our eyes were the same tawny color, and perhaps we had the same curve of the chin, but that was about it.

Was that why Nicole had been chosen to go to the Earthly realm and grow up as human? A simple twist of fate which gave her an appearance that would more likely fit in with human parents? I couldn’t imagine not growing up Fae. Having an ordinary human life, and like the humans surrounding me, having only the vaguest awareness of Faerie. I was New Garg born and raised, even if I preferred to live and work on the other side of the hedge. My magic. The years I’d spent training with weapons. My stone armor. My shadowsteel spellblade. My very personality. They were all inherent to my identity and molded by being Fae. I couldn’t imagine any alternate Petra Maguire that could exist without them.

“It just means that your—our—other blood, the part that isn’t New Gargoyle, is probably more dominant in you,” I said, trying to speak gently to offset some of Oliver’s bluntness.

I flicked a glance at him out of the corners of my eyes. Had he been the one to choose Nicole to leave Faerie and keep me? Or had it been my mother’s decision?

She sighed, slumping a little, and shook her head slowly. “I don’t know what any of that means.” She sounded near tears.

Oliver shifted a little.

“Why don’t we let her get some sleep?” I suggested.

I thought I saw relief flash in his eyes. “Yes, it’s late.”

Then Oliver’s face hardened, and I knew something serious was coming.

“There is one vital thing you must understand,” he said, his eyes serious and his voice commanding. “You cannot, under any circumstances, reveal that you’re Petra’s sister or my daughter. As far as anyone else is concerned, you’re a New Gargoyle changeling of unknown parentage.”

She drew back a little, her eyes widening.

“Do you understand?” he asked.

She blinked and then nodded vigorously. “Yes, I won’t tell anyone. I promise.”

Magic tingled the air, marking the oath. He dipped his chin once, and as she turned for the door, he reached out and touched her shoulder gently, almost tentatively.

“This is a lot to take in,” he said, his voice much softer than before. “It’s a process, and this is just the start. Welcome home, Nicole.”

I tried not to stare at him. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard him speak that way.

Nicole’s lips parted, and her eyes misted with tears. Something was beginning to break within her, the barrier across a natural knowing, the mental and emotional homecoming that all changelings eventually experienced when they finally came to Faerie. But she ducked her head before her emotions could visibly develop any more.

I took her to my quarters, a sparse, tiny, little-used suite that was assigned to me. Everyone who was sworn to the Stone Order had a room in the fortress, even if they lived on the other side of the hedge like I did. It was partly for a sense of community, but also for emergencies. If the sovereignty of the Order or the fortress itself were threatened, Marisol could call in every New Gargoyle and not have to worry about where to house all of us. I suppose many people would have seen my fortress quarters as a great safety net in case my life on the other side of the hedge ran aground. But to me, living in the studio apartment would be worse than moving back into your parents’ basement. My fortress quarters represented the most serious failure I could imagine--breaking promises I’d made to dedicate my life to honoring my mother by getting criminal vamps off the street. My fortress quarters also represented confinement. It was a cell in a literal jail of a building, and with it came full-time obligations to Marisol and the Order.

I told Nicole to make herself comfortable and use any of the things she found in the apartment, and she headed straight back to the bedroom. I quietly let myself out and returned to Oliver’s apartment. He was waiting for me, as I knew he would be. This time, we both sat down—him on the one easy chair and me sprawled on the floor.

As I took off my scabbard and laid it down next to me, weariness began to settle deep in my bones. Oliver sat with one ankle crossed over the other knee, and his hands clasped across his stomach. I hadn’t noticed it before, but his eyes were sunken and lines had settled around them. He looked every bit as tired as I felt.

“I’m still wrapping my head around all of this. Are you absolutely sure she’s my sister?” I asked. “We don’t look much alike, and as you said, she doesn’t have New Garg features.”

His face tightened slightly. “She is certainly your sister. I was there when the two of you were born. Did you have any trouble from the Duergar?”

“Technically, I was kicked out of the realm before I got a chance to grab Nicole,” I said. I knew from a lifetime with my father that Oliver didn’t want to hear about heroics, and he couldn’t stand braggarts, so I kept it as brief as possible. “I got back in, found Nicole, and long story short, we escaped.”

I licked my lips, my eyes flicking to Oliver and then away, as I remembered a little detail I’d thus far left out. The part about how Jasper had helped us escape, and as a result, there was a binding oath between us.

My father immediately recognized the look on my face. “What?” he demanded.

“One of Periclase’s sons helped us get out,” I said. “I owe him, now.”

He’d gone tense at my confession but then relaxed slightly.

“You did what you had to do, and the oath can’t be undone,” he said. “You’ll have to worry about that when the time comes.”

He sounded annoyed, but not as pissed as I’d expected.

I was just about to change the subject and tell him about the servitor attack in the Duergar palace when there was a series of sharp, loud knocks at the door that seemed to pierce through the quiet of the apartment.

Oliver stood and strode to see who was there.

Sensing something was amiss, I rose to my feet. A page stood at the door, and his eyes were wide.

“An urgent message for you, my lord,” the page said. He squinted at me, shooting me a snippy look, as if he were irritated to find me there. “I was instructed to wait while you read it.”

He handed my father an envelope sealed with magic-imbued wax that would only give way under the hand of the intended recipient. If anyone else tried to open it, the whole thing would immediately incinerate. I recognized the color of the wax—Marisol’s seal.

Oliver tore into the message and quickly read it. “Tell Lady Lothlorien I’ll be right there.”

With his back to me, I couldn’t read his face, but his voice was as strained as I’d ever heard it.

He shut the door and turned to me. “King Periclase has made a formal appeal to the High Seelie King Oberon, demanding that we return Nicole to him. He’s claiming that Nicole is his daughter.”