Date: 2016-10-19 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Urban Fantasy; Fantasy; Paranormal; Magic; Fae; Demons; Romance; Paranormal Romance
Description: I have a simple arrangement with the Faerie Court: I track down the beings they want found and in exchange for that, they let me live. But a girls gotta eat, even a banished banshee, so I do what I have to, even if that means working for humans. Rent money doesn’t grow on trees. Darcey Thorne is one of the last of her kind — a banshee, harbinger of death — but due to a past indiscretion which saw her imprison her ex-lover, she now works as a bounty hunter for the Faerie Court. When the Court jerks her chain and tells her to hunt down MacNa, an old friend, Darcey has no choice but to obey. Cons
Rights: Copyright 2016 Bilinda Sheehan. All rights reserved.

Banshee Blues

Bones and Bounties

Bilinda Sheehan

Contents

Also by Bilinda Sheehan

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Banshee Bones

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Want to know when the next book is coming?

Also by Bilinda Sheehan

Copyright © 2016 by Bilinda Sheehan

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Also by Bilinda Sheehan

Bones and Bounties Series

Banshee Blues

Huntress Moon - Coming soon

The Shadow Sorceress Series

A Grave Magic

Blood Craft

Grim Rites

Wild Hunt

Touch of Shadow - Coming Soon

Bond of Blood and Shadow Series

Violet Line - Book One

Violet Code - Coming 2016

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For Gran.

Beannachtaí libh go bhfeictear arís sibh

Banshee Bones

Bilinda Sheehan

Chapter One

Clomping through the office into the tiny cubicle I called a bathroom I stared woefully into the mirror at the streaks of dirt covering my cheeks. The stuff was in my hair, on my hands, and I was pretty sure I could even feel some of it dripping down inside my T-shirt.

After turning the faucet on full belt, I waited the obligatory three minutes for the water to go from freezing to mildly manageable. Hey, it wasn’t as though beggars could be choosers, and all I truly cared about was scouring off the worst of the Faerie swamp mud before it hardened into cement.

Ducking my head below the spray of water, I did my best to scrub the worst of it from my hair. There were Fae out there actually stupid enough to pay to have this goop scrubbed into their skin, but I definitely wasn’t one of them.

Instead, I got to be the lucky Fae who traipsed around the swamp looking for the Mamuna who had disobeyed a direct order from the Unseelie court. She’d been desperate enough to run when she saw me coming, and I’d been stupid enough to follow her straight into the goddamn swamp. That crazy cow owed me a new pair of boots…

Well, she would owe me a new pair of boots if the Unseelie ever decided to let her go. Ignoring a direct order and hunting in the human realm was way up there on the Unseelie’s list of no-nos. Great—not only had she ruined my favourite boots, but if I wasn’t mistaken I was actually beginning to pity her. There were fates worse than death, and the Unseelie were better than most at inflicting such punishments.

I knew from experience that she would wish for death long before they would ever consider granting it. And if she were like me, that death would become a life of perpetual servitude spent hunting disobedient Fae through the Faerie swamps.

The water turned murky as I fought to pick the twigs and hard clumps of swamp from my hair. If there was one thing I hated—aside from my indentured servitude—it was being dirty.

The little bell over my office door tinkled and I jerked up, the side of my head catching on the faucet. A small yowl escaped my lips and lights danced in my vision. A bump like that would definitely leave a bruise.

“Hello?” a woman’s voice called out. I jerked a towel off the rail next to the sink and scrubbed my face, then poked my head around the door and spotted the woman examining my extensive library of occult books and general mythology. They were human books—I kept all the really good stuff in the back room behind a spelled lock.

“I’ll be out in a second if you want to grab a seat,” I said, a flicker of satisfaction winding its way through me as she jumped and glanced over at me. My tainted nature made itself known to me, and I fought to suppress the voice in my head telling me I could do so much worse than make her jump.

Her eyes widened a little as she took in my appearance. Clearly, she wasn’t expecting to see a half-drowned banshee covered in Faerie swamp. But she couldn’t know I was a banshee just by looking at me, unless she was also one of the Fae. That just wasn’t the vibe I was picking up from her, though.

Upper-class suburban socialite, maybe. I could already see her hosting soirees by candlelight but standing in the middle of my office, didn’t seem as likely and yet there she was.

“Are you Darcey Thorne?” she asked. The steadiness of her voice instantly elevated her in my opinion.

“The one and only.” I ducked back into the bathroom before she could continue questioning me. She looked like a woman who would have at least a thousand questions, and there was no way I was answering them without first fishing the last of the swamp mud from my bra.

Grabbing the spare shirt I kept on the back of the door, I ripped off my muddied Panic! At the Disco T-shirt and dragged on the clean one. I stared at my reflection and sighed—the French Bulldog in a bow tie had seemed like a great idea when I’d bought it, but it wasn’t exactly what I wanted to wear whilst meeting clients. Without a doubt, I needed to get better at leaving appropriate clothing in the office for times like this…

After dumping the last twig into the sink, I strode into the office and plopped down into my swivel chair behind the large desk I’d managed to salvage from a yard sale when I’d first decided to open my doors as a private investigator. Indentured servitude was notoriously bad at paying the bills, and my exile to the human realm left me with no choice but to get a very real human job. Oddly enough, there weren’t that many job opportunities for a bad-tempered, half-depleted banshee.

I’d contemplated getting into retail, but quickly changed my mind when I’d imagined what I might do to the customers if they annoyed me… Death was pretty bad for business.

“Well, since you already know my name, I feel at a disadvantage, Mrs…” I deliberately trailed off.

The French Bulldog T-shirt had definitely been a bad idea, since the poor woman couldn’t take her eyes off it. She probably thought I was some sort of lunatic… or a joke. It wouldn’t be the first time—and it definitely wouldn’t be the last time—a client thought I was nothing more than an elaborate joke.

“Mrs Archer. You’ve probably heard of my husband.” Her fake, posh accent grated on my ears, but I fixed my face into a smile and nodded. For the first time, I noticed the large sparkling rock on her ring finger.

Everyone had heard of her husband, and anyone who said they hadn’t was either lying or had been living under a rock for the last ten years.

“Okay, then, Mrs Archer, what is it you want me to do?” I asked.

“I want you to find my husband, of course.”

Her request wasn’t unsurprising since I was renowned for my ability to find missing people, but I couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed. This sounded like just another run-of-the-mill case.

“And why can’t you find him?” I said, cringing as I caught sight of the dirt beneath my fingernails. “Did you consider that maybe he doesn’t want to be found?”

“He went out two nights ago to see his mistress and he hasn’t come home. Henry doesn’t do that…”

Pushing up in my chair, I cut her off with a raised hand and a shake of my head. “Whoa, he went to see his mistress? And you know this how?”

“We have an open relationship. He has his dalliances and I have mine, but in the end we always return to each other. It’s part of what makes us work so well.”

“And he couldn’t just be lying low with this mistress of his?”

She shook her head, her perfectly coiffed blonde bob barely moving—she had used enough hairspray to trap a small child on her head if one wandered too close. “No, there was an important shareholder meeting this morning that Henry wouldn’t miss. Not without a reason.”

She seemed sincere enough, and Goddess knew I needed the money. Run-of-the-mill or not, the case would be relatively easy and guaranteed money. No one on this earth could hide from me for very long; I might have been half-depleted, but at least that gift hadn’t faltered.

“Fine, I’ll go and find him.” I pulled open my desk drawer and fished out a standard contract. “What exactly do you want me to do with him when I find him?”

“Can’t you just bring him home?”

My eyes widened a little as I stared at her. I could bring him back, whether he wanted to return or not but I’d learned that humans tended to object to being manhandled against their will.

“I don’t go hands-on unless it’s for my own safety,” I said. “But when I find him, I can tell him you want him to go home…”

“Just tell me where he is, and that will be enough,” she said with a sigh.

I pushed the contract and a black pen across the desk, and she stared down at the ballpoint as though I planned to use it to murder her. Popping open the top of her small but expensive clutch, she lifted out a gold gilt pen and scrawled her name across the bottom of the contract before pushing to her feet.

“As soon as I have something, I’ll contact you,” I said as she dropped her card onto the desk and turned for the door.

She nodded almost absentmindedly, then crossed the floor with the grace of a woman groomed for the public eye. When she pulled open the door, the small bell tinkled once more.

“Sooner rather than later, Ms Thorne,” she said, leaving me alone to swivel around on my chair and ponder her strange adieu. This wasn’t the goodbye of a woman who was concerned about the welfare of her husband; she sounded much more like a woman who cared what the press would think if his absence carried on unanswered.

Chapter Two

I picked up the iron blade, hefting its weight in my hand before flicking back my wrist and then jerking it quickly forward again. The weapon flew from my fingers and landed with a satisfying thump in the chest of the mannequin I had propped against the wall.

One day, I planned to get myself a proper training dummy. The old shop mannequin I’d found in a skip outside one of the downtown department stores worked fine, but its chest cavity was beginning to collapse under the damage caused by my iron blades.

Iron and Fae didn’t mix; it was one of the only things capable of putting a permanent stop to their immortality. And from the look of poor Boris the dummy, cold iron and plastic mannequins didn’t mix either. My exposed skin tingled where the metal had touched it, but at least contact with iron didn’t hurt as much as it used to. The rough callouses across the tips of my fingers and my palms made it easier for me to handle the blades, but handling iron still wasn’t without its downsides. Too much contact and the callouses would very quickly break down and become welts once more.

The sound of my computer dinging snapped me out of my thoughts. Time to go to work…

I crossed the room and dropped into my chair, my eyes scanning the pictures and names on the screen as fast as I could absorb them.

“Got you,” I muttered beneath my breath as I double-clicked on one picture in particular. That was the problem with being in the public eye all the time—a man like Henry Archer was much easier to track down.

Dropping back into my chair and propping my feet up on the edge of the desk, I closed my eyes, holding the image of the pretty, dark-haired woman in my mind’s eye. How the press hadn’t picked up on Mr Archer’s affair with his secretary was beyond me, though it probably had something to do with bribes in brown envelopes and threats in dark alleys. There was nearly always something nefarious behind a situation like this one where humans were concerned.

I picked up on the dark-haired woman’s thread, the very essence of her being, and my heart sank. The thread was severed, which only meant one thing.

“Am I interrupting something?” A voice like sin itself caressed my skin, sending a shiver of desire lancing straight through my core.

“What do you want, Lunn?” I said, forcing as much boredom into my voice as possible. Not that I could ever be bored where Lunn was concerned… Even knowing he was in the same room as me set my heart racing. And Goddess damn him if he didn’t know it.

He laughed, and the sound drew a small moan up my throat that I swallowed before it could pass through my lips. The last thing I needed right now was for Lunn to know just how much of an effect he had on me.

Opening my eyes, I sucked a deep breath in through my teeth and dropped my booted feet back to the floor. He was closer than I’d thought, his muscled thigh brushing the edge of my desk as he towered over me and his bright gold and green eyes watching me the way a cat might observe a mouse before devouring it whole.

“You’re working on something?” he asked, and the nonchalance in his tone sent my suspicion into overdrive. Lunn was never nonchalant. And he wasn’t named for being mild-mannered and apathetic either, and that was for sure and certain.

“Nothing I can’t put aside if the Court needs something from me.” The words tripped from my tongue as I curled my fists. It wasn’t a lie, which bugged me far more than I cared to admit.

“I’ve never seen you so willing to obey before.” There was an edge to his voice that made my core ache; he’d clearly seen my reaction and was now toying with me. Would I ever get over my ridiculous crush? As I stared up into his face, I already knew the answer. Not even a saint would get over a man like that, and I was as far from a saint as one could get.

I hopped to my feet with a groan and pushed past him, but realised my mistake the second my body was forced to touch his. Tension sang through him, vibrating across the surface of his skin where we touched before it passed into my body. I froze, my breath caught in the back of my throat as I glanced up at him.

Mistake number two.

Lunn had been worshiped as a god in a past so distant the art of storytelling was something the frightened humans did to pass on their history when gathered around the fire as the darkness of their unforgiving world crowded in. And while he wasn’t really a god, and definitely no longer had the power of one, when I stared up into his eyes I felt my world shift. The urge to throw myself at his mercy washed through me.

Reluctantly, I broke free of his hold and flung myself as far from him as the cramped basement would allow. I ended up on the other side of the room with my back pressed against the broken mannequin, pinned in place by Lunn’s gold-green eyes.

“I didn’t know you could resist me?”

Under normal circumstances, I could have come up with a witty comeback to quickly put him back in his place. But this time, Lunn wasn’t messing around. It was a genuine question, and I could see the question in his eyes.

In a way, Lunn was my boss—a sort of go-between for the Fae Court and little old me. If I stepped out of line, he was there to make sure I hopped back in double-quick. Of course, the Fae Court were a nasty bunch of assholes who thought screwing with people’s heads until they were infatuated with someone so utterly out of reach as Lunn was a nice little added bonus to go alongside my sentence of eternal servitude.

“It’s not really resisting you, but I definitely think better with a little distance between us,” I said.

Lunn studied me thoughtfully, his eyes raking over me from head to toe, causing my mind to wander to far more interesting things we could be doing. Things that involved a distinct lack of clothing and a lot of heavy breathing.

“Are you even listening to me?” The irritation in his voice snapped me out of my perverted thoughts, and I tilted my head to the side with a sigh.

“No, but you can’t exactly blame me for that, now can you?” The distance between us was finally allowing my head to clear a little.

“The Court wants you to look into something pretty straightforward. Even you should be able to stay out of trouble with this.” His lips curled slightly as he spoke.

“Okay, what is it?”

He dropped an envelope onto the desk and gave me his best hundred-watt smile. It was a damn good smile. “No idea, I’m just the messenger.”

And then he was gone.

There was no magic puff like in the movies, but between one breath and the next he simply vanished. I’d always admired his ability to do that. I could move fast—faster than the human eye—but I couldn’t just disappear into thin air no matter how much I wished I could.

I dropped back into my seat and flipped open the envelope. MacNa’s name instantly caught my eye, and I sighed. The only thing worse than having a crush on someone you didn’t stand a chance with was being forced to hunt down someone you had once called a friend. We had a history; granted, MacNa had tried to kill me the last time we’d come face to face, but that didn’t change the fact that I’d once looked up to him like an older brother. Handing him over to the Court just didn’t sit well with me.

Not that I had a choice.

Chapter Three

The Faerie Court expected me to jump whenever they commanded it, and for the most part I obliged. This time wouldn’t really be any different; I would do as they asked, no matter how much the thought of having to track down MacNa filled me with dread.

There was a reason we hadn’t laid eyes on each other in years. A damn good reason.

But there was something else I needed to do first. Money was nice, and a necessity for living in the human world. Keeping my head firmly attached to the rest of my body was also helpful, and as long as I didn’t dilly-dally there wouldn’t be a problem. But above all else, I valued holding on to my sanity. Banshees had a knack for losing their minds, and I wasn’t about to let that happen.

Tucking the hardback book under my arm, I tugged back my hair and deftly wrapped the silvery strands around one another until they hung down my back in a tight braid. I crossed the street to the sunnily painted yellow building, picking up my pace as power crowded the back of my throat. A familiar ache filled my chest as I stepped through the electric doors that whooshed open in greeting.

The hall was sterile; the walls painted a pristine white that hurt my eyes and smelled of bleach that burned at the back of my nose. The pine reception desk sat directly in front of the double doors and was manned by a woman wearing a white uniform. She glanced up at me, her brown eyes warming in instant recognition.

“Back so soon?” she asked, the barest hint of a Spanish accent lending richness to her voice.

“You know I would come here every night if I could,” I said with a wide smile as I raised the book into view. I meant it, too. The retirement facility for the elderly, which I had happened upon by accident during one of my more uncontrollable moments, was one of the loneliest places I had ever set foot inside. My power was not what it once might have been, but if I didn’t pay enough attention to who I truly was it had the nasty tendency of getting completely out of hand. But coming here prevented that and I was more than grateful.

Many of the residents were too sick or frail to care for themselves, so their families had handed them off to professional care.

I’d often wondered why many of them never visited. One of the nurses told me that it was simply too painful. Personally, I thought that guilt played an even bigger part.

She waved me through the main doors, and the sound of the buzzer echoed in my ears as the locked doors swung wide to admit me to the inner sanctum. It was for the residents’ safety, or so I’d been told.

My boots squeaked against the floors, ringing in the silence, and I sucked in a deep breath that was laced with bleach and floor cleaner. The door to the room I was looking for was closed, and my hand hovered above the handle until a voice from within cut through my indecision.

“Son of a bitch…”

Pushing open the door, I smiled as I caught sight of Dolores sitting in the chair nearest her small, flat screen television. Her greying hair was swept back from her face, and her lively umber eyes were trained on the television that cast a glow across her rich brown skin.

“Anything good on?” I asked as I stepped into the room.

“Jeopardy!” she said, her gaze flicking in my direction. Her eyes narrowed as she caught sight of the book in my hand. “You take that book on out of here. I don’t need no one reading to me!” Her emphasis on the word “reading” sent a flash of discomfort down my spine.

No one here knew what I was, or what it was that I did, and yet I could have sworn from her tone that Dolores knew more than she was willing to admit.

“I’m not here to read to you, Dolores. Esme isn’t doing well, so I thought I’d read her her favourite book.”

Esme often spoke of how much she adored The Great Gatsby, and how it reminded her of being young and watching her parents get ready for parties. Her voice held the kind of wistfulness that belonged only to true romantics. Not that The Great Gatsby was particularly romantic, as far as I was concerned. But betrayal didn’t sit well with me and had a tendency to leave a bad taste in my mouth.

“I see.” Dolores dropped her gaze to her lap and smoothed down the wrinkles in her cream skirt. “Well, don’t stand in the door all day dawdling,” she said suddenly, schooling her features into her usual scowl. “Come in if you’re coming in.”.

Moving inside, I let the door swing shut behind me. I took the wooden chair from the other side of the television and moved it so it was opposite hers. Her gaze had returned to the game show playing out on the screen, but there was an eagerness about her that suggested she was holding back all the questions she wanted to blurt out to me.

The silence stretched between us until Dolores sighed and clicked off the television with a flick of her wrist.

“How long does she have?” The bluntness of her question caught me off guard, and my jaw dropped.

I stared at her, my mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water before I gathered my wits and shook my head with a smile. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter, Darcey. I might be in a retirement home, but that doesn’t mean I’ve lost every brain cell in my head. I know you come here to read to the dying.” There was a slight catch in her voice, the only indication that she was feeling any emotion beyond her usual irritation.

But her words sent guilt swarming through my chest. She was right—she’d asked me a straightforward question, and pretending I didn’t understand it was beyond insulting. I respected Dolores far too much for that.

“I don’t know when, exactly, but soon…” Just because I respected her didn’t mean I had to tell her everything.

She nodded again and dropped her head, focusing in on her fingers fidgeting in her lap.

“Can I see her?” she asked suddenly.

“Of course,” I answered, surprised by the request.

Dolores pushed up out of the chair, and I retrieved her walking stick from where it had fallen. Leaning heavily on it, she slowly made her way to the door.

* * *

She moved quietly through the hall toward Esme’s room. Other than Dolores, I’d never socially visited the residents in their rooms. I mainly knew the others, including Esme, from meeting them in the common areas. But from the moment I met Dolores, I knew she was different. She possessed a wisdom that was unusual in most humans. That, along with her honesty, had drawn me to her. Humans had a tendency to lie and exaggerate everything; untruths tripped off their tongues faster than they could keep up with. But Dolores spoke her mind without hesitation—no art, no deception to who she was. Not even the Fae could compete with her in that respect.

I watched her hesitate when we reached Esme’s door, and a series of emotions flitted across her face. Esme had been her friend—that much I knew. Dolores drew in a long, shuddering breath and squared her thin shoulders. Grabbing the door handle, she pushed it open and then stepped inside, casting a glance over her shoulder to make sure that I was following.

Esme looked different, but then they always did right before the end. No one ever went easy; the idea that you could simply slip away in your sleep was nothing more than a lie told to keep the fear of dying at bay. The truth of the matter was that no one slipped away. They all fought in their own ways, clinging to life with every fibre of their beings. Even those whose time was cut short by their own hands fought somewhere deep down inside themselves to stay.

Esme’s sheets were tussled around her as though she’d fought against what pinned her to the bed. Her grey-blonde hair was matted to her forehead and neck with the sweat of her exertion, and her nasal prongs were askew as oxygen poured uselessly into the room instead of where it was supposed to be going.

Moving past Dolores, I went to her, my hand taking hers as I worked to quickly refit her oxygen. Her body was small and birdlike in the bed; she’d shrunk since I’d last seen her. Her skin was cold and clammy, but there was no denying the strength in her grip when her eyes opened slowly and she glanced up at me.

I stroked her papery skin, the familiar ache in my chest spreading as I saw the fear in her eyes.

“You have nothing to fear,” I whispered, my voice low as the beginnings of my power crept into it. It was all I could offer her until the time was right.

I could see the pleading in her eyes as she tried to speak, and the dry croak of her voice hurt my ears. Reaching over to her bedside locker, I grabbed the small plastic cup and headed for the hall to fill it from the ice cold spout on the water cooler. As I returned to the room, I paused at the door. Dolores had taken a seat next to Esme’s bed, and their hands were entwined as Dolores’s lips moved soundlessly in prayer.

Rounding the side of the bed, I gently lifted Esme’s shoulders from the pillow and pressed the plastic cup to her lips. The sip she took did nothing more than wet her lips, but it seemed to be enough. Laying her back down, I smoothed the tangle of hair back from her face and pulled a comb from my back pocket, working quickly to remove the worst of the knots until her hair fell about her shoulders in soft waves.

Through it all, Dolores watched me soundlessly, the heavy weight of her gaze the only way I knew she was still in the room. Once satisfied that I’d made Esme as comfortable as I could, I cracked open the copy of The Great Gatsby and read the first line aloud.

Esme’s eyes fluttered shut, which Dolores took as her cue to leave. I didn’t hesitate or pause in my reading as she left the room. I knew she was upset, but there was nothing I could do to comfort her. It was my job to bring that comfort to Esme, to make her passing as smooth as I could. Once that happened, I would mourn her as only a true Banshee could.

The hours ticked by slowly, and still I read. The nurses came and went from Esme’s room, checking and rechecking her as though they knew all was not as it should be. Humans had an uncanny knack for knowing when Death was near and it made them antsy.

The moment Esme’s breathing changed, I stopped reading and listened. The slight hitch in her lungs told me everything I needed to know. Taking her hand in mine once more, I stroked her skin until her eyes fluttered open.

“It’s time,” I said, but from the way her unfocused eyes stared past me, I could tell she already knew.

“Do not be afraid, your journey is done. Your rest is your reward, the world’s weight lifted from your shoulders. He will guide you home…”

Many believed the He I was referring to was God, but as far as I was concerned it was Death. I’d never met him, despite working alongside him so closely, but I could feel his presence whenever he was near. Now was no different.

I laid Esme’s hand back on the covers, picked up the book, and hit the alarm button above her bed.

Death was older than time itself, and a rite of passage. Though the humans still fought against it, we would all someday die. I was required to play by their rules, no matter how futile they might be.

Two nurses quickly appeared in the doorway, and I stepped back from the bed to allow them access.

“Her breathing changed,” I said, my words dropping into the room. Not that I needed to tell them—they could hear the change for themselves and began working on her.

The nurses barked orders and ushered me from the room. I made my way down the hall, pausing next to Dolores’s door. I didn’t go inside. I could feel her grief from the hall, and I didn’t want to get any closer to it… at least not until my job was done.

I hurried out into the parking lot and crossed the grass the led down the side of the retirement home, cloaking my glamour tightly around my body so no one would notice me. There had been a time when I could have remained in the room without anyone knowing I was there, but not anymore.

The ache in my chest had become a knot of anxiety. I paused next to Esme’s window, a wail building in the back of my throat. The smell of human fear, grief, and pain filled the air, drawing forth my scream. Only those sensitive to what I was would hear me, so I had no reservations about giving over to my true self. I poured everything I had into it, and the moment Esme left her mortal coil behind my wail cut off and dropped down into wracking sobs that shook me to my core.

I collapsed to the grass, ignoring the dampness soaking through my jeans, and cried for the woman I’d met but for a moment. I cried for her lost memories, her regrets, every hope and dream she held dear. I cried for those who loved her and for the ones she’d loved in return. And I wailed for the moment of relief she’d felt as her soul departed, the release from agony she’d experienced as she finally let go.

Death brought her freedom. A pause in time only I felt as the moment between her body ceasing its struggles to hold her on earth and the essence that had been Esme slipped away.

Silence flooded around me as power coursed in my veins. Indulging my true nature had that effect on me, and I welcomed the strength it brought. Too often, I used my power to protect myself, to fight off and to overpower those the Faerie Court demanded I bring in to face their justice. But not tonight. Tonight, I had done what I was born to do.

I glanced down at my hands, at the silvery magic coursing through my blood. It wouldn’t last, but at least for now the weight of what I’d given up didn’t sit so heavily on my psyche.

Chapter Four

The motorcycle purred beneath me and I ran my hands lovingly over its polished bone body. It had a life of its own—practically a living, breathing creature in its own right—and I was the only one it obeyed.

I had almost been overwhelmed by the urge to curl into a ball outside the retirement home and revel in the warm feeling of power rippling through me, but there was still work to be done.

The city streets zipped by in a blur as the bike slid through traffic like a warm knife through butter. As much as I needed the money, the case involving MacNa had to come before I tracked the elusive Henry Archer down for his wife. It was my job to obey the Court’s orders, and I was a good little soldier.

The bike came to a halt, the engine’s purr slowly dying as we rolled into a space and I pushed down the kickstand. Climbing from the bike, I stared up at the dark building that was MacNa’s last known address and sucked in a deep breath. This wasn’t the place I wanted to be, but I had no choice in the matter.

According to Lunn’s file, MacNa had agreed to a challenge set forth by one of his customers down at the bar he owned. But when it came time for the challenge, MacNa hadn’t turned up.

He might have gotten away with it had the customer been human. Honour was very important among the Fae, but humans didn’t tend to have a whole lot of it. The challenger had been Fae, which had opened up an entirely new can of worms.

To ignore a challenge was simply unheard of, and the Court was of the opinion that perhaps MacNa had spent a little too much time in the human realm. They believed that a trip back behind the Veil might be just what he needed to remind him of what truly mattered.

I crossed the street and paused in front of the large warehouse-style doors, my skin itching with the use of heavy magic—and not just Fae power. MacNa had himself a witch. If the humans ever caught wind of that, the poor, misguided wretch would find himself on the wrong side of the law. I’d seen what the humans could do when they were afraid, and I never wanted to find myself in that position.

Pushing my hand against the door, I felt the metal strain beneath the weight of the wards and my own power. I was a harbinger—no matter the place, no matter the hour, I was permitted entry. It was a rule that had come long before I’d been born. Just like there was no escaping death, there was also no escaping who I was. When I came calling, people needed to listen.

My power was depleted because of my past choices, not that I regretted the decisions I’d made but some things like this were more important than whether I still had the true magic of the banshees of old.

The metal crumpled in on itself, and the door fell back and landed on the cement floor with a resounding crash. Stepping over the broken hunk of metal, I moved into the warehouse. MacNa’s scent wrapped around me like an old, ratty blanket that needed to find its way to a dumpster.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” I called, my voice carrying through the darkness.

I’d always known him to be a sniveling, whiny sort, but even I couldn’t help but feel that it was beneath him to resort to hiding in a place like this, and with the aid of a witch’s magic.

Something shifted in the darkness, and I ducked a blade that whistled past my ear. Dropping low, I crossed into the darkness in search of my assailant. It had to be him, because I couldn’t sense anyone else inside, but the type of magic being used to ward the building meant he probably wasn’t alone within the walls.

“I didn’t think you were the sort to hide, MacNa!” I said, straining my ears in an attempt to hear even the slightest of sounds. There was nothing, and that was strange in and of itself. I should have been able to hear him breathing…

Something slammed into me, driving me to the ground. I twisted in its grip, bringing my elbow up and into its jaw lightning fast. A grunt of pain told me that my blow had struck home, but my attacker didn’t loosen the grip pinning me down.

Cold iron pressed into the back of my neck and the faint scent of burning skin tickled my nose. Biting down, I gritted my teeth against the press of the blade. I’d grown more used to iron, but it still hurt like a son of a bitch when it was used against me.

“What are you doing here?” MacNa’s voice was rough and hoarse, and I strained against his grip in an attempt to see his face. “Don’t move or I will kill you, history or no history…” His threat was punctuated by the blade piercing my skin.

“I was sent to look for you, to bring you in,” I said, relaxing into his hold. I wasn’t able to go anywhere, so holding my body in a state of perpetual tense panic seemed like an utter waste of my resources.

“Who sent you?”

“Who the heck do you think, MacNa? It sure as hell wasn’t the tooth fairy…” My anger washed over me in a soothing wave, and I instantly felt better.

“You always did have a smart mouth,” he said, and relaxed his grip. The second the press of the blade disappeared, I shifted beneath him, using my momentum to drive him off my body.

Rolling up onto my feet, I had just enough time to catch the blade he flung at me. This one was silver, not iron, but just because it couldn’t kill me didn’t mean it wouldn’t hurt like hell to heal.

“Seriously? When are you going to stop throwing your knives? You’ve never once been able to hit me, so what makes you think you’ll start now?”

There was no sign of him in the gloom, but I could still sense him shrugging in the darkness.

“Just because I can’t hit you, doesn’t mean I can’t try…”

“Why are you hiding, MacNa?” I asked. It didn’t make any sense—he wasn’t the type to hide. He was brash and arrogant, and hiding didn’t exactly fit with the image he was trying to cultivate. It was an image he would never manage to achieve, just one look at MacNa and everyone knew him for the lily-livered fool he was. Since the Fae weren’t exactly the forgiving types and had a particular hatred for the weak and in the grand scheme of things, MacNa was weak, all of his attempts to appear otherwise were in vain.

“Why do you care? You’ll still bring me in.”

“Well, yeah, it’s my job…”

“Do you do everything the Court tells you?” By now, I had the distinct impression he was stalling.

“That’s what slavery means,” I called out, moving carefully around the space.

The more time I spent here, the more I concluded that the gloom wasn’t due to lack of windows. Glancing upwards, I could see the faint hints of windows that should have cast the room in the glow of daylight. Clearly, the darkness was just another one of the witch’s little spells.

If this was the best she could do, then she wasn’t particularly powerful… And certainly not like the Shadow Sorceress I’d run into in King City.

“Come on, MacNa, you know the drill. I take you in, you use your charm to worm your way back out of trouble, and before you know it you’re back to running your sleazy bar and I can go back to working a paying job.”

Silence greeted me, and I swore quietly. There was no way he’d given me the slip. I was good at my job, good at tracking people…

Anger slammed through me, and I clenched my fingers into fists. I could feel my power flooding through my veins as I threw back my head and screamed, the sound reverberating around the warehouse. The windows above me shattered, causing glass to cascade to the floor in a glittering spray of sharp shards that reflected the light and momentarily cut through the gloom.

She was sitting in the corner, her back to me as her hands moved through the air, the colour of her magic sparking along her fingers.

I screamed again, this time directing it at her and the magic she was weaving. Her hands froze mid-air, and I saw the moment the harrowing sound of my cry had pierced the veil of her power.

She scrabbled to her knees, her hands clawing at her ears and eyes. The darkness threatened to sweep inward, so I crossed the space quickly, grabbing her arms as I dragged her roughly to her feet.

Blood dripped from her nose and dark, almond-shaped eyes, and I knew instinctively that it would also be dripping from her ears. The harbinger’s cry was only for those whose death was near. For everyone else, it was a painful reminder of life’s fragility, a reminder that it could be snuffed out without so much as a moment’s notice.

“Cut the crap,” I said, shaking her until her teeth chattered in her head. A fine sheen of sweat had broken out across her olive skin.

“He hired me to keep him hidden. I don’t even know how you found him…” Her voice was high-pitched, just another nasty side effect of my power. The ringing in her ears would take days to dissipate, and as for her eardrums? Well, six weeks should see them both healed.

“It’s my job to find assholes like him,” I said. “But I’m willing to bet that you want to help make my day easier by just telling me where he went?”

She shook her head and then moaned. I could see the pain clouding her vision, and I fought the desire to smile. I liked pain. I enjoyed inflicting it on those who deserved it, and sometimes I even enjoyed inflicting it on those who didn’t deserve it. The price of being Unseelie.

But that didn’t mean I wanted to enjoy it. I’d spent more than a lifetime fighting against my own nature, but it never seemed to get any easier.

“I can’t,” she said. “He’ll kill me.”

“You’re worried about him killing you? Sweetie, shouldn’t you worry about what I’ll do to you?”

Her pain-filled eyes cleared a little, and she stared up at me with the fear I deserved. Well, fear I might once have deserved. Now, I was only good enough to drag wayward strays like MacNa back to Faerie and seek out cheating husbands for their spoiled wives.

“MacNa won’t kill you,” I said. “He doesn’t have the stones. Never did.”

The witch shook her head, and I slowly released her. “You don’t know him as he is now,” she said. “Fear will make people do things they might not have been capable of doing before.”

My eyes fell on the bruising that ran down one side of her face and on the faint rope marks around her neck.

“He didn’t hire you, did he?” I asked, keeping my voice very quiet.

“He did, I…” She trailed off, and her gaze hit the floor.

“MacNa’s not here anymore, so you can tell me.”

“There are places where those of my kind are kept like animals, chained and used for the gifts we possess. We’re outlawed, so even if we wanted to, it’s not as though we could go to the cops and complain. If the humans knew of our existence, they would wipe us out without a second thought.”

“I’ve seen what the humans can do. I know it’s not pretty, but I didn’t know about the rest of it.” Pity churned in my stomach.

“We are sold to those who can afford us, and we do their magical bidding,” she said, her gaze still firmly trained on the floor.

I had a horrible, sinking feeling that they had to do far more than just their “owners’” magical bidding, but I wasn’t going to push it. She’d clearly been through enough, and while I was Unseelie, I wasn’t a monster like many of my kind. I knew what it was like to be a slave, and I didn’t like it any more than the woman standing in front of me did.

“But he’s gone now,” I said. “You don’t need to be afraid of him.”

Reaching up with hands that shook, she tugged down the edge of her jacket to reveal the silver collar fastened around her neck. What looked like a suspiciously large diamond was set into the centre.

“He has the key. If he doesn’t release me, they will come to claim me back and I will be sold again.”

My stomach churned again, but this time it had nothing to do with pity and everything to do with the urge to rip off the heads of those who would do such a thing. I knew what it meant to be an outcast, but even though the Fae weren’t exactly fond of banshees, they hadn’t resorted to this. Or at least I was pretty certain they hadn’t.

“No one is claiming anyone back, that I promise you…” I trailed off. I didn’t even know her name, and here I was pledging her my protection.

“Samira,” she said hesitantly. I couldn’t blame her. I’d barged in here, tried to arrest the man who’d bought her, and then threatened her life if she didn’t help me. If I were her, I’d have been hesitant to share anything.

“Right. Samira, how about we get out of here and you can fill me in on what you know about MacNa and the people who sold you.”

She started to shake her head, and I shot her a stern look. “Look, I can keep you safe, but I’m going to need some information to go on. The ones who sold you cannot get away with this. I won’t let them, but in order to stop them I’m going to need your help.” I tried to keep my voice as friendly as possible, but friendly wasn’t exactly something we banshees were good at.

“You will not let them take me back?” Her voice was so low that if I didn’t have preternatural hearing I might not have picked up on her words.

“I promise…”

Swallowing hard, she nodded once and then flung herself into my arms. I staggered back, shock washing over me as her sudden movement almost knocked me off balance.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she whispered over and over as the front of my T-shirt grew damp with her tears.

I held her for a moment and then placed a firm grip on her shoulders, pushing her gently away. “Rule number one: you don’t thank me for doing the right thing. You need to understand that not everyone in this world is bad. And rule number two: I don’t like to be cried on. Brings back a lot of memories I’d rather forget.”

Samira stared at me with wide eyes that were still bright with fresh tears, and I felt my resolve weaken. Whatever they had done to her had very nearly broken her. I could see it in her face, feel it rolling off her in waves. She’d been on the verge of giving up hope, and it made me wonder just how long she’d been forced to pray that one day help would come.

Staring down into her face certainly didn’t make me like MacNa more. In fact, it made me loathe him more than I thought possible—enough that if I got my hands on him again, I wasn’t sure I would be able to control myself and bring him in for the slap on the wrist he deserved. The Faerie Court wouldn’t care that he had been holding a witch hostage, or that he had bought her… Most of the Fae viewed the humans as little more than an amusement—fragile, helpless creatures who could help pass a little time before they broke.

“Come on, I’ll bring you back to my place and you can get cleaned up. I might have something that can help with that collar,” I said, eyeing it carefully.

Samira nodded and followed me from the warehouse, gasping as she caught sight of the motorcycle.

“We can get a taxi if you’d be more comfortable,” I said, catching sight of the fear in her wide eyes.

“Yes, please, I…” She trailed off, and I smiled at her.

“You don’t need to tell me. Taxi it is.”

“But what about your motorcycle? Will it not…” Her words died in her throat as the bike disappeared.

It would already be at home, safely tucked away in the parking garage I paid quite a hefty sum every month to rent. It was my one and only luxury, and for good reason. I could never let my bike fall into the wrong hands. Along with the Bone Blade, it was one powerful artefact, and in the wrong hands it would be more than a little dangerous.

I hailed the first taxi that approached us, and quickly shepherded Samira inside. My sensitive nose wrinkled in disgust at the smell of stale tobacco and urine. I didn’t hate the humans, but they often had disgusting habits. Urinating in the back of taxis seemed to be one of those uncomfortably common occurrences.

“Wesson Street, please,” I said, directing the driver toward my apartment.

He didn’t answer me as the car glided forward, taking us away from MacNa’s hideout.

Staring out the window, I scanned the empty streets. He was out here somewhere, and I would find him. When I did, I would make him pay. Make him pay for everything.

Chapter Five

The sound of the running shower echoed through the apartment and I tried not to pace around anxiously. The second Samira’s eyes had fallen on the shower, her face had lit up like a Christmas tree. I couldn’t turn her down, especially when she turned her big brown eyes on me.

The running water cut off, and I paused next to the window and stared down into the street below. Ever since I’d taken her from the warehouse, I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching me, following us. I couldn’t prove it, but that didn’t prevent me from feeling nervous. I wanted to take the battle to them, not have them follow me home and set up some sort of ambush.

“The clothes are a little big,” Samira said, her voice drawing me back from my dark thoughts.

As I turned to face her, I couldn’t stop the laughter that burst from my lips. She was being generous when she said the clothes were a little big. They were a lot big, and my T-shirt and sweatpants swamped her petite frame. She looked like a little girl playing dress-up in her older sister’s clothes.

“We’ll get you some new clothes, but for now at least they’re clean,” I offered, trying to smother my laughter behind my hand.

The clothes she’d worn beneath her black coat had consisted of some sort of yellowed and aged dress that must have begun life as some sort of sack. It was torn and soiled, and the sight of it brought my anger crashing to the surface.

If I could have burned the offending article, then I would have done it—but living in an apartment in the middle of a city didn’t exactly lend itself to ceremonial fires. So I’d had to make do with tossing it down the garbage chute in the hall.

“You hungry? There’s not much in the fridge, but I might have something worthwhile… Failing that, we can always order take out?” Samira shook her head, and I chewed my lip.

I wasn’t used to having guests, and I was even less used to having people to protect. The whole protection gig wasn’t really part of a banshee’s repertoire, so even attempting it was pushing me way outside my normal comfort zone.

Samira crossed the floor and flopped down onto my well-worn grey couch. I hadn’t found it in a dumpster—unlike most of everything else I owned—but it hadn’t come from a store and I hadn’t paid a dime for it. Even though its springs were sagging and it tried to eat me every time I sat on it, I didn’t care. It was mine and it was grey… Call it a banshee thing, but I adored the colour grey.

“The man who bought me, he is not a good man…” Samira said quietly as she tucked her legs beneath herself. She was someone able to perch on the edge of the couch without sinking into it.

Watching her perform such an amazing feat almost made me want to ask her if she was doing a balance spell, but I bit my tongue.

“No, he’s not,” I said, shame washing through my cheeks in a blaze of heat.

I’d been young when MacNa had befriended me—young and impressionable, and I’d let him convince me that embracing my Unseelie nature could be a good thing. No, young and impressionable was a cop out, and I knew it. I’d been an idiot, and certainly old enough to know better. But he was charming and tough, and I’d been sucked in by his desire to thwart authority at every turn. By the time I realised the path MacNa was leading me down, it had already been too late and the monster had sunk his claws into me…

MacNa had betrayed me, but that was nothing in comparison to the scars I still bore after he delivered me to the monster.

“He’s afraid,” Samira said, her words snapping me out of my own head and back to the moment at hand.

“Afraid?” I asked in confusion. What MacNa had to be afraid of was beyond me. The one he’d been in service to was gone, and he’d gotten away with his side of it scot-free.

“Something is after him—something he fears—and that was why he bought me,” Samira said.

Someone being after him wasn’t impossible, he generally seemed to rub everyone he met the wrong way and he had ducked out of a challenge. What if he was supposed to face the same one who was after him? But that still didn’t make any sense… He’d been involved in plenty of challenges in the past and had always managed to worm his way out unhurt. Why would this time have been any different?

None of it was making any sense, and thinking about it was beginning to give me a headache.

“So how did he find out about you? You know, so he could buy you,” I asked. There was no way to sensitively address the subject, and the more waffling I did the more I was going to hurt Samira. My policy had always been to rip off the Band-Aid and face the resulting pain head on. This was no different.

“You are not like him,” she said suddenly, and I felt my spine stiffen.

I definitely wasn’t, but to hear it pointed out to me as though there might have been even the slightest hint of a tint that I might be like MacNa bugged me.

“You mean I’m not a rat-bastard?” I volunteered, and Samira grinned.

“I like that. He is both of those things, but I never considered putting them together.”

“Yeah, well, when you spend your days hanging around people like him, you learn to get creative with the insult-slinging.”

She sighed and dropped her head once more to her knees, a slight shudder running through her frame.

“It is much colder here,” she said.

“Where’s home?” I asked.

“Home used to be Izmir, but it has been a very long time since I was there… I don’t even truly remember it anymore.”

“That’s in Turkey, right?” I asked, trying to get a better picture of how she’d come to be in captivity.

“Yes. Much like here, they do not approve of my kind. My mother hoped that by sending me to America, I would lead a better life… She did not know who she was entrusting my care to.”

I’d heard of it happening. In the human news, it was an all too common occurrence to hear of young women taken from their families and sold into sexual slavery. It was probably naive of me to believe that it wouldn’t also be happening in the magical world. It certainly made perfect sense.

“How long ago was that?” I asked.

“Thirty years.”

I stared at her. She looked to be no more than late teens, twenty tops. Not that it wasn’t possible to both look young and be immortal. That’s what I was, after all, but the kind of power it took to achieve that, well that was something you could feel deep in your bones. Samira felt like any young woman, and her magic hadn’t felt all that powerful in the warehouse. So how was it possible?

“I don’t understand,” I said.

“We do not age the way the other humans do. I am vulnerable in much the same way, but my power keeps me young.”

“Will you ever age?”

Samira smiled and nodded. “Eventually, and faster if I ever find the man I’m supposed to fall in love with and marry. I will give up what I am for love.”

Again, I found myself staring at her. The thought of giving up what I was for a man just felt wrong. If he couldn’t accept me for who I was—well, more importantly, for what I was—then why the hell would I ever want to fall in love with him?

“You do not approve?” she asked, her voice meek.

“Hey, who am I to question it? It’s your life, Samira, and once we get that collar off, you can live it however you see fit.”

Moving across the room, I headed for my bedroom.

“Where are you going?” Samira’s voice sounded more than a little frightened, and I poked my head back out into the living room.

“I’m going to see if we can’t do something about that collar.”

Heading into the bedroom, I gingerly picked my way through the piles of clothes on the floor. I hated being dirty, but that obsession definitely didn’t extend to my housekeeping abilities. There was a wardrobe leaning against the back wall of the bedroom with half-open doors that displayed the pathetic lack of clothes actually inside it.

That might make me a slob, but I was pretty much okay with that label.

Tugging open the doors, I pressed my fingers against the back wall of the wardrobe and popped out the false panel. It was a pretty shitty hiding place, but I also didn’t really need to hide the blade that well. There wasn’t a hope of it ever going anywhere… at least not while I was alive.

The Bone Blade lay against the closet wall, its sharp edge glinting in the dull light. The second I lifted it free, I felt its power coursing in my veins, strong enough that I sucked in a deep breath and closed my eyes.

This was my heritage, who I was. Losing most of my powers meant nothing as long as I had the blade in my hands. With it by my side, there was nothing I couldn’t do, no soul I couldn’t sway… Nobody was immune from my call. I was not death; I was his harbinger. The mourner at the graveside. I wept for those who had no one.

I swallowed down the power and opened my eyes, knowing that they shone with the light of what I was. Of course, heading out into the living room while the power was riding me wasn’t a good idea. Samira was already spooked enough, and frightening the crap out of her just didn’t sit right with me, no matter how much the Unseelie side of me wanted to indulge in such cruelty.

It was harder than normal to hide what I was. It had been too long since I had allowed my true nature to emerge, and if I wasn’t careful it was going to start bleeding out at the most inopportune times.

After getting a tight rein on myself, I stalked out into the living room. Samira scooted away from me.

“What are you doing?” Terror lit her eyes with the magic she carried within.

“Relax, I’m not going to hurt you. I want to see if the blade can pop the lock on your collar.” I carefully studied the collar.

I avoided her gaze, keeping it focused on the diamond. She was so afraid that I knew if I lifted my eyes to meet hers, I wouldn’t be able to contain what I truly was. Something about extreme emotions sent my glamour off course. The pain I’d endured to crush down my nature would have all been for nothing. And there wasn’t a chance she had enough strength to withstand my cries for a second time in one day.

“It can’t, only the key will work,” she said, her knuckles and fingers whitening with tension against the edge of the couch.

“We haven’t tried this,” I said with a smile.

“What is it?”

“Something really old.” I suddenly felt uncomfortable telling her the truth. Telling others of the power possessed by a Bone Blade was asking for trouble. They didn’t need to know it was one of the few items truly capable of killing a Fae, of killing a banshee… And they definitely didn’t need to know that it trapped within it the souls of those whose lives it took, absorbing their power and making it its own.

Spilling secrets had led to the little incident in King City, which had very nearly been a catastrophe.

“It looks as though it’s carved of bone,” she said, releasing her hold on the couch and moving closer for a better look.

“It is…” I said, biting down on my tongue.

“The bone of what?”

“It’s a little complicated.” It wasn’t a lie. Explaining how the Bone Blade was carved from my bones, and from the bones of my ancestors, wasn’t a concept most people could wrap their heads around.

Samira lifted her hands to the collar around her neck. “This, too, is complicated, far more than I think you realise. There are only two ways to remove it.”

“Yeah, I know about the key, so what’s the other way?”

Samira’s eyes widened, and I understood without the words leaving her mouth. The only other way to remove the collar would be for someone to cut it off… Specifically, cut off her head and lift it free.

“Christ, who are these assholes?” I said, more to the air than to Samira.

“Men of power,” she answered simply.

“Why doesn’t that surprise me,” I said in a dry voice, and when Samira cocked her head in question, I added, “that they’re men. For some reason, men have this urge to control and condemn the women around them. Those who don’t get on board with their little power trips tend to find themselves at the wrong side of their wrath.”

Samira nodded and smiled. “It has always been that way. I don’t believe there is any changing it.”

I sucked in a deep breath in surprise and felt my shoulders tighten with tension. “There is always a way to change something, but we need to stop accepting the status quo. I’ve watched the humans, and they have a tendency to blame each other, and those who have been wronged, instead of the guilty…”

“There are many who would blame me for what has happened. The ones who held me said it was my fault, that if I wasn’t an abomination they wouldn’t have touched me.”

“They would have found another reason, Samira—that’s the problem with those who are truly evil. They always have a reason, an excuse as to why they’re not to blame. Why their way is righteous… There was a time when it wasn’t so, but it was before even I existed.” I stared down at the blade in my hands.

I might not have existed, but the blade certainly had, and it remembered.

Gripping the blade more firmly, I dropped down beside her on the couch. “We need to at least try it. If it doesn’t work, then we’ll find the key.”

Samira’s eyes darted between my face and the sharp edge of the blade. Fear rolled off her in waves, and I could only imagine what she had already endured to feel such terror.

“All right,” she said, turning her back to me and lifting her damp hair away from her neck.

As I ran my fingers along the edge of the collar, I could feel the first prickle of power, but it was faint. The lock looked just like any other lock, and I didn’t think anything of it as I lifted the tip of the blade to the clasp.

The second the Bone Blade touched the clasp, power flared bright enough to send tiny star bursts of light behind my eyes. Samira screamed, and I jerked away from both her and the collar.

Dropping the Bone Blade onto the table, I stared over at Samira’s tiny frame curled into a ball on the couch. Her thin shoulders shook with sobs, and my nose picked up the faint traces of burnt flesh.

“What happened?” I asked, moving closer.

When she continued to sob without answering, panic clawed at me. My intention had not been to hurt her. Crossing to her side, I crouched down next to the couch and carefully rolled back her shoulders so I could take a better look at the collar.

Her skin beneath the metal was reddened and blistered, areas of it blackened as though they’d been lit on fire. Samira whimpered as I moved the collar, lifting it away from where it was stuck to the skin on her neck.

“Goddess help us,” I said, staring down at the scorched ring of flesh. Whoever had designed the collar had done a good job of making it impossible to remove. Samira’s words rang in my head. There were really only two ways to get it off… I’d never come across anything that could withstand the Bone Blade and the power it wielded.

“Samira, I’m sorry… I didn’t mean…” I trailed off, because there was no point in saying the words. They were just a pathetic attempt on my behalf to absolve myself of my wrongdoings, which I didn’t deserve.

Pushing up from her place on the couch, she scrubbed her hands across her eyes and cringed as the collar brushed against her damaged skin.

“Hold it here,” I said, urging her to take the collar. The second my hands were free, I hopped to my feet and darted for the tiny bathroom.

Being an enforcer for the Faerie Court meant I got my fair share of bumps and bruises, some worse than others, so I had learned to heal almost anything. But it also helped to have a well-stocked first-aid kit.

I carried it back to the living room and plopped down next to her, then popped the lid on the box. Grabbing a handful of gauze, I ripped open the sachets of sterile water and soaked the gauze in it before gently applying it to the wounds. Samira flinched each time my hands touched her, but gradually subsided as I moved quickly and deftly.

“Thank you for trying,” she said quietly, her eyes focused somewhere on the other side of the room.

“Don’t thank me for hurting you,” I said.

“You’re the first to hurt me and not mean it,” she whispered, and her words froze the blood in my veins. It took all of my willpower not to crush my hands into fists.

“We will get them,” I said. Samira smiled, but didn’t answer.

As I worked on her wounds, I couldn’t help but wonder if I had said those words to convince her, or if I’d said them to convince myself. Either way, it was a promise. I would find them, and I would make them pay.

I knew what it was like to be a victim, to have others hurt me for their own amusement, and I had done all I could to banish my demons back to Hell where they belonged. If I could help Samira do the same to hers, then I would be happy.

Chapter Six

Waiting until she’d fallen asleep seemed a little mean, but I still had to work and she was afraid to be alone. I couldn’t blame her, but at least I was sure she’d be safe in my apartment. The place was warded, and if anyone who wasn’t welcome so much as tried to poke their nose beyond the doorway, then they were going to get a rude awakening. Faerie magic still had more benefits over human technology, but the little app on my cell phone that would alert me to any trouble at the apartment? Well, that was something not even Faerie magic could do without involving gaudy, glowing jewellery or more useless crystals than I cared to carry with me.

Moving silently across the street, I paused outside the apartment belonging to Mr Archer’s mistress. Martina Ricer lived in a small but extremely expensive apartment on the upper side of the city, the place where all the rich gits hung out. I wondered how she’d managed to pay for a place like that on a secretary’s salary. I was clearly in the wrong line of work, but if sleeping with your boss was part of the job description then I definitely wasn’t cut out for the corporate world.

Moving around the side of the building, I stared up at a window without curtains. The fire escape was only accessible by the residents. I tested my fingers against the brick wall of the building, then dug my boots into it and dragged myself upward. I climbed quickly, not wasting any time.

Reaching the level of the fire escape, I jumped, my body twisting as easily as a cat as I locked my hands around the iron railings. Pain lanced through me as my stomach slammed into the iron, and I fought to keep my grip. Pulling myself over the top, I dropped to the grid platform and stared down at the long, ragged burn across my abdomen. The edges of my bulldog T-shirt were still smoking where the iron had burned through my clothes.

The T-shirt had been inappropriate for meeting clients, but that didn’t mean I disliked it.

With a sigh, I crept forward and peered through the darkened window. The room beyond was in darkness, but the vague outlines of the furniture told me it was the living room.

I tugged up on the window and swore under my breath at the sound of the lock popping. I’d been hoping it was already unlocked, but clearly luck was not on my side today.

I ducked inside the apartment and paused. The air was drenched in the stench of death. I’d have known that smell anywhere, and it sent my senses into overdrive.

Creeping forward, I followed the worst of the smell. It wouldn’t have been as strong to a human nose but death was kind of my thing. The smell led me straight to the bedroom, and I paused outside the door.

I’d seen enough dead bodies to know that whatever lay beyond the door would be bad. The prickle of energy in the air skittered across my skin, and I could taste a mixture of lust, terror, and sweat on the air. It was stale, almost overpowered by the stench of death, but it was there nonetheless.

I pushed open the cream double doors leading into the bedroom and did a double-take. The room was decorated in muted tones of creams, silvers, and deep purple. But the blood spattered around the room definitely wasn’t part of the decor.

Martina Ricer lay across the bed, her body a mottled mess of bruises and cuts. If I didn’t know better, I’d have said she’d been attacked by a troll or something equally nasty—the only problem with that theory was that trolls ate their victims, and from what I could tell Martina was still intact.

Moving into the room, I glanced into the darkened corner. Henry Archer sat naked with his back against the wall, his knees drawn up to his chest as he rocked back and forth, his breathing so quiet I’d almost missed it.

“Mr Archer, what happened?” I asked, my voice dropping oddly into the room.

He lifted his gaze to my face and stared at me as though it wasn’t the first time he’d seen me.

“You killed her,” he said, his voice breaking across the words.

“Excuse me?” I repeated. I must have misheard him, because there was no way he’d just said what I thought he’d said.

“You crazy albino bitch, you killed her!” He hopped to his feet and launched himself at me.

“Whoa,” I said, catching his arms and twisting him away from my body as he tried to crash into me.

His arms were slippery with blood, which didn’t make any sense. Any blood from her wounds should have long since dried. I’d searched for her essence hours ago and she had already been dead…

Henry stumbled to the bed and turned to face me once more, the look in his eyes crazed as he threw himself back in my direction. I caught him again, but he latched on to my arm and sank his teeth into my skin. I screamed and raised my fist, smashing it into his eye socket in an attempt to loosen his grip on me.

He went down, his hold falling away as he slumped to the floor with a whimper.

The bite wasn’t serious, but he’d still pissed me off.

“What happened? And before you accuse me of killing her again, get your facts straight. I didn’t kill her… but from the looks of things in here, I’d say you did.”

“I loved her. We were together and now she’s gone…” His voice was gurgling with unshed tears as he dragged himself across the floor to the bed.

“Truly, I’m sorry,” I said, but he cut me off with a sharp look.

“No, you’re not,” he said. “I watched you slaughter her. You’re nothing but a monster! The things you did to her, it wasn’t human…” His voice broke over his words.

Sighing, I clenched my hands into fists. My ability to keep my temper in check was rapidly fading with his constant accusations. I’d be the first to admit if I’d murdered someone, but this time I knew for certain I was innocent…

“You saw someone who looked like me,” I said.

A noise from the living room caught my ear, and I turned my head in time to see Mrs Archer striding into the centre of the apartment.

“Henry! Where are you?”

I didn’t move, holding my breath. This was going to look really bad…

“He’s in here,” I said finally, letting my breath out in a long whoosh. There was no point in pretending we weren’t there; she was in the apartment and would find us sooner rather than later.

She crossed to the doorway and stepped inside, her eyes widening as she took in the scene surrounding us.

“I asked you to find him,” she said, her voice strained.

“And I did, but what you see here is what I walked in on.”

“Nancy, she killed her,” Henry said from his place on the bed.

When had he crawled up next to the body? Didn’t he realise he was ruining evidence?

With a shake of my head, I turned back to face Mrs Archer and found myself staring down the barrel of the gun she had pointed in my direction.

The room fell silent. I didn’t move. I didn’t even breathe as my body took on the stillness of a predator right before it strikes down its prey.

“It took you long enough to get here,” Nancy said, tossing her handbag to one side.

“You asked me to find your husband.”

“Yes, but I’d hoped you’d get here sooner… I’ve been waiting all day for this gruesome business to be over with.”

The urge to close my eyes was almost overwhelming. I was missing something, that was for certain, and the only way I would figure it out was if I had the chance to really catch my bearings. Nancy Archer was no mastermind, and there wasn’t a hope in hell she had the smarts to pull off something this complicated.

Of course, I had one good thing on my side. She had no idea what I was…

As I moved toward her faster than any human eyes could follow, I felt it the second she pulled the trigger. My world slowed to a crawl, and the scent of iron hit my nose moments before the bullet reached me, giving me just enough time to turn. The bullet lodged in my shoulder, and pain ripped through me hard enough to cause me to stumble.

I’d been wrong. She knew what I was, and I was screwed if I hung around much longer.

Darting for the window, I flung myself out through the glass as the sound of sirens split the air. My landing was not as graceful as I might have liked, and the impact of my boots on the ground sent a shockwave up through my body that tore into my arm once more.

I could feel the iron in my arm burning and eating its way through my flesh. If the bullet didn’t come out soon, I was going to have some major issues when my powers kicked in and tried to heal over the wound.

I raced for the street, narrowly avoiding the first cop car as it careened to a halt outside the apartment building. Gritting my teeth, I tried to appear as nonchalant as possible as I strode down the street and out of sight.

This was bad. Like, really bad. No one had ever tried framing me for a murder. While it had been a novelty for all of five seconds, that feeling had worn off the moment Nancy Archer shot me with an iron bullet. Lead, I could handle; copper jackets, not a problem. But cold iron… She knew what I was, and that was really bad.

If the Faerie Court got wind of the mess I’d managed to walk right into, they were going to be furious. The thought of facing them certainly wasn’t high on my agenda, especially after the last time…

If I was lucky, they wouldn’t find out.

Of course, luck belonged to the leprechauns. It really wasn’t my thing…

Chapter Seven

The office seemed like the best place to hide out and fish as much iron from my shoulder as I could. It didn’t have the comforts of home, but at least I wouldn’t spook Samira.

Slipping into the office, I flicked on the lights and then quickly changed my mind. Drawing attention to myself after everything that had happened was the worst possible idea. I moved stealthily through the office until I made it to the stairs leading down to the basement and then flicked on the lights. At least this way no one would even know I was here.

By the time I reached the bottom of the stairs, my breathing was strained. My body was already beginning to heal, and the pain of the ruined muscle trying to knit back over the bullet, only to be ripped apart once more by the iron, was excruciating.

I grabbed the first-aid kit and made it to the desk before exhaustion washed over me hard enough that I stumbled. Being weak wasn’t a new concept to me. I’d lost the bulk of my powers a long time ago, which tended to leave me vulnerable to the other Fae. Naturally, that loss of power had forced me to up my ability to fight, and I could more than hold my own against nearly any type of Fae. Well, there was just the one exception… and he tended to come in the most delightful of packages.

Because Lunn was once worshiped as a god, he had become more powerful. He was also the best fighter I’d ever set eyes on. Most of the Fae relied on their magic to get through any fight, but not Lunn—he was both a skilled fighter and more powerful than many of the Fae could hope to be, and it made him twice as deadly.

The thought of Lunn coming to kick my ass was enough to cause me to break out in a fine sheen of sweaty fear even at the best of times. In my weakened state, with the iron still coursing in my veins, I dreaded to think what he could do to me…

Grabbing the surgical scissors from the first-aid kit, I widened the wound. My watering eyes blurred my vision enough that I was at a real risk of stabbing myself in places other than the half-healed bullet wound.

“Need some help?” Lunn’s voice cut through the silence, and I jerked around with the scissors still gripped in my hands.

Not exactly my weapon of choice, but it would have to do.

“What do you want?” I hated myself for the panic in my voice.

“Not quite the answer I was expecting,” he said, crossing the floor toward me.

I had an overwhelming urge to throw myself behind the desk and hide from him. He raised an eyebrow in my direction, as though he’d managed to read the panic that was flooding my system with adrenaline.

“Let me help,” he said softly, his hands closing over my fingers, where I held the scissors in a death grip.

My hand fell away as I stared up into his face. He wouldn’t need to use any of his fancy martial arts-style fighting techniques on me. Not with the bullet still embedded in my body, which was causing my mind to melt down. All he really needed to do was stare down at me like I was the only Fae in the world…

He worked quickly, but there was no glamouring away the pain. I bit down on my lip in an attempt to keep my pathetic whimpering to a minimum as he dug around in search of the bullet.

“Darcey, you need to tell me what happened,” he said.

“Stupidly got shot, what more is there to know?” I gritted my teeth as he dug past the bullet. “What are doing? You’ve gone past it.”

“It’s not an ordinary bullet. You must realise that?”

I glanced up at him as he spoke, and he chose that moment to do a particularly painful manoeuvre that left me clinging to him like a damp dish rag.

He fished deeper and tugged a small piece free, dumping it onto the desk before returning to the task. If I didn’t know better, I might have wondered if perhaps he was enjoying inflicting pain on me. But who was I kidding? Of course he was enjoying it. Once upon a time, Lunn had been all for war and bloodshed; in fact, he’d encouraged it whenever possible. This was right up his alley.

He dropped another small piece onto the desk. I stared down at the smoking shard.

“How many pieces are there?” I asked. I hadn’t been paying much attention to the gun, but even if I had I probably wouldn’t have been able to identify it anyway. Guns weren’t my thing. I could shoot one, and my aim was pretty perfect, but only because I was Fae and not through any of my own talent. Guns were just too unpredictable for me, even the newer ones. The thought of having to use one or carry it near me left me cold. I liked the certainty that a blade offered me.

“A few,” he said, and tugged another piece free.

“I think that’s all I can pull out. The rest of it seems to be some sort of iron filling powder. You’re going to be seriously sick until you work that shit out of your system…” He caught me as I slumped forward.

The world swam in sickening colours, my stomach rebelling. I wanted to upchuck, but the Fae don’t really vomit so the retching was a bit more than I was prepared to deal with.

“Just kill me now,” I moaned as Lunn propped me back up against the desk.

“Don’t tempt me. Now tell me—where in all darkness did you come in contact with a bullet like that?”

“I’m working a case,” I said, cringing against the pain that washed through me.

He’d been right when he’d said that the bullet contained iron fillings. I could feel them spreading out through my bloodstream; rooting out the bullet had just caused the iron to move faster.

“Don’t give me that bull.,” he said. “The last time I saw one of these, the Fae I fished it out of was dead. So who did you piss off now?”

“Other than you? No one.” I forced as much sarcasm into my voice as possible and made my way around the desk to the swivel chair.

Lunn’s face darkened, and for a moment the air in the basement prickled with his power. As far as I was concerned, he’d always been way more attractive when he was pissed off. There was something about his anger, the thrill of his magic as it beat against my skin. It was part of the reason I got such a kick out of really winding him up.

His gold-green eyes lit with his power, and the deep bronze tone of his skin seemed to glow from within as his magic pulsed in his veins.

“Do you take me for a fool? Tell me, or so help me I’ll…” I cocked my head to one side as he trailed off.

“You’ll what, Lunn? Because last time I checked, there’s nothing you can do. The human cases I take have nothing to do with you. The Faerie Court agreed to let me get my hands dirty and deal with the humans on my own terms, remember?”

“I have not forgotten,” he said, his voice strained with the effort of keeping his power in check.

Part of me wanted to nettle him some more, just to see the fireworks that were sure to be released, but I bit my tongue. I was in no position to run, and if I pushed him too far then running would become a necessity.

“Why won’t you let me help you? It could be so much easier if you would just—”

I cut him off with a wave of my hand. “Don’t, there is nothing easy about this. Nothing that will ever make my slavery easier, so don’t insult my intelligence by pretending there is.”

Lunn stared at me and finally nodded. “You’re right. Nothing will ever make your sentence easier, except maybe the knowledge that you still have your head and your heart and that your blade was not used against you as you used it on others.”

A shiver of cold fear lanced through me at the thought of the Bone Blade ever turning against me, being used to steal my spirit and bend it to someone’s will. Well, it didn’t bear thinking about, and I was only too happy that the Faerie Court had agreed with my way of thinking.

I’d never worked out why they had decided to spare me. They certainly had plenty of enforcers. Willing enforcers, anyway.

“I know I’m a monster,” I whispered. The guilt I felt over the past, over the things I had done before I’d come back to myself, ate at me every single day.

“You’re not a monster, Darcey,” Lunn said, his voice oddly tender.

“Look, I’m not kidding. This really is just a case I’m working—” I cut myself off. Skirting too close to the edge of a lie only made that lie all the more obvious, and Lunn wouldn’t hesitate to sniff out any untruths I might dream of spilling to him.

He coughed awkwardly. “Well, whoever shot you is a threat to our kind, so I would rather you dealt with it sooner rather than later.”

“I noticed you failed to bring in MacNa,” he added. “I hope you won’t force the Court to believe their willingness to spare your life was a mistake?”

“He’s being a pain in my ass, but you’ll have him soon enough,” I said, closing my eyes and leaning back against the chair.

Lunn’s laughter wrapped around me before it cut off without warning and I was left in silence once more.

Opening my eyes, I stared at the place where he had been standing and sighed. He was a complication I really could have done without, and yet a part of me wished he would have stayed. Clearly, that was the stupid and masochistic part of myself, because only a lunatic would wish that Lunn would stay…

Perhaps it was the iron fillings in my blood? Satisfied I’d discovered the reason for my sudden stupidity, I closed my eyes, safe in the knowledge that lying to myself wouldn’t hurt me. Not really…

Chapter Eight

My cell phone buzzed and I searched my pocket for it, my eyes still closed as I tried to give my body time to expel the remnants of the iron. Lifting it free, I pressed it to my ear. The sound of MacNa’s laughter sent a shiver down my spine that had nothing to do with the temperature I was running, and everything to do with my hatred for him.

“You would leave her alone?” he taunted, and my stomach tightened.

Hopping to my feet, I ran for the stairs as the phone line went dead and my ears filled with static.

She was safe. She had to be safe. I’d warded the place; there was no way he was getting inside without the magical equivalent of a nuclear bomb, and even then he couldn’t leave without taking the kind of damage only a truly powerful Fae could withstand.

Powerful was not a word I would use to associate with MacNa.

As I crashed out through the door to my office, my shoulder stung like all the demons in Hell were poking their taloned fingers into the wound. Racing along the street, I didn’t bother slowing my pace to something humans would find more palatable, I cared too much about Samira to risk taking my time. I was after all the reason she was alone.

When I reached the street with my apartment block, my cell phone started to buzz violently. I knew without needing to look at the screen that MacNa had attempted to fetch Samira.

The apartment building buzzed with power, so much power that my ears popped as soon as I crossed the threshold. Without waiting to see what was coming next, I took the tiled steps two at a time, the lime green walls doing nothing for the headache building behind my eyes.

I burst out into the hallway of my floor and came face to face with the ugliest blind dude I’d ever set eyes on. The hood covering his bald head had fallen back to reveal the black, vine-like tattoos that snaked across his head.

I’d assumed he was blind because of the way the whites of his eyes rolled back in his head, but when he swung his blade toward me, narrowly missing slicing through my chest as I hopped out of reach, I realised my assumption had been wrong.

Samira screamed, and the hairs on my neck stood on end. Power prickled along my skin, and I tilted my head to the side as I assessed my opponent.

“So you’re one of those Saga Venatione thingies,” I sneered.

I’d met more than my fair share of them in King City. There was just something about them that didn’t sit right with me. At least the ones I’d met in the past had been some serious eye candy. But this one… Well, he was different… Wrong. If that was even possible.

“Witch,” he snarled, and leaped toward me.

Without thinking about it, I sidestepped him, slamming my weight into his outstretched arm and forcing his body into the wall. He practically hummed with power, which danced along my skin like an irritating tapping of fingers.

“Not a witch,” I said, jerking my elbow up and into his face. Blood exploded from his nose and mouth as his head connected with the wall and my elbow in a veritable sandwich of pain.

Samira screamed again, and this time I heard more than terror in her voice. It echoed with pain—pain and sadness.

Power flared inside me, and I didn’t try to fight it. I could taste death on the air, and I knew I needed to celebrate and mourn the impending end.

A ragged scream ripped from my throat, the cry echoing around the hall and bouncing from the walls until it found its target. The witch hunter next to me collapsed to his knees, his prayers drowned out by the scream that tore from me again.

I strode forward, moving steadily toward my apartment and where I knew I would find Samira.

The front door was in pieces and Samira sat on the floor, blood smeared down one side of her face. She cradled the body of another young woman in her arms as the Saga Venatione standing above them raised his bloodied axe above his head and prepared to bring it down.

Clenching my hands into fists, I gave into my urge and released the full extent of my mourning keen on the room.

The axe slipped from the witch hunter’s fingers, and he fell to his knees. But from this one, there were no prayers. The blood that gushed from every available orifice rendered him incapable of making any movement but the twitches of the dying.

Samira clung to the girl in her arms, tears streaking through the blood on her face. When she looked up at me, there was no fear—only sorrow.

Throwing back my head, I screamed again as the life of the woman Samira held slipped away like the sands of time. The light slid from her eyes, and her body grew still as her ragged breathing ceased, leaving nothing but the mournful sound of silence in its wake.

Samira stared down at the girl as though able to sense the moment she ceased to exist. Her sobs grew louder, more frantic.

I swung around once more at the sound of footsteps in the hall. The other Saga Venatione stood in the doorway, his white eyes staring past me to where Samira sat on the floor.

“What you have done here cannot be forgiven,” he said, and for a moment I thought he was talking to me.

“I don’t want your forgiveness,” Samira said, choking through her sobs. “The only one who can forgive me is dead because of you.”

“We did not deal the killing blow,” he answered, his voice growing hollow.

“Why are you here?” I interrupted their strange back and forth.

“To take back what is ours,” he said, settling his gaze on me. “I know what you are now, and there won’t be another mistake…”

With a shake of my head, I reached down and scooped up the bloodied axe from the death grip of the other witch hunter. Swinging it up so it rested against my shoulder, I smiled… but it wasn’t a friendly smile. It was the one I wore right before I tore my opponent to shreds; it was the smile of an Unseelie, the smile of a monster.

“Where you’re concerned, there won’t be another mistake …”

He tried to move, but I was faster.

I swung my arm as if I were throwing blades. Pushing as much force into the throw as possible, I released the handle and watched the wickedly sharp blade slice through the witch hunter’s chest. He stumbled into the hall, staggering backwards until his body hit the wall behind him.

Eyes wide and staring, he made an odd choking noise before sliding down toward the floor.

I felt his life ebb away, his heart crushed beneath the sharp axe head, but I did not mourn for him. I couldn’t even if I had wanted to; he was an enemy, and it wasn’t my job to keen for his sort.

“Is he dead?” Samira asked, and I turned to face her.

“Yeah, they both are,” I said, gesturing to the other one lying at my feet. “Samira, how did they get in? You should have been safe. I’ve got enough wards set up on this place that it should have been impossible.” I couldn’t keep my voice level. Part of me blamed myself. I’d promised to keep her safe, and yet she’d been attacked while under my protection, and all because I’d been too busy getting shot. But there was no denying the accusation in my voice, and Samira heard it too.

Her chin jerked up, her dark eyes flaming with an anger I hadn’t thought in her.

“You said you would be here, and yet I wake and you are nowhere to be found.”

“That’s not answering my question. How did they get in? Did you let them in?”

Her gaze darted to the dead girl in her lap, and when I saw the collar around her neck I understood.

“You wanted to protect her,” I said.

“I loved her. She and I…” Samira trailed off and kept her gaze averted. “They said it was shameful to love one another.” She lifted her tear-filled eyes to me. “How can that be?”

With a shake of my head, I dropped onto the couch. “It’s not… I’m sorry.” I scrubbed my face with my hands. “Did they threaten her? I still don’t get how they got inside.”

“Ana was a void,” Samira volunteered, and everything clicked into place. Only a void would have been capable of nullifying the wards. Once she was inside, the magic used to protect the apartment would have been rendered useless. The Saga Venatione were able to walk straight in.

“Tell me exactly what happened,” I said. “It’s important, or I won’t be able to put the wards back up.”

“There was knocking on the door, so I went to check who it was… They’d hurt her… I had to let her inside, but as soon as I did they came in too.”

I waited for her to continue, prompting her when she didn’t. “He said they hadn’t delivered the killing blow. What did he mean?”

“I killed her… They were going to take me away, kill me for spilling their secrets, and she defended me. That one,” Samira said, gesturing to the one on the floor, “he hit her, knocked her to the ground, and started kicking her when she tried to stop them.”

“You used your magic,” I finished, and Samira nodded.

“I didn’t have a choice, but my magic is no good against them. They absorb it somehow… It makes them stronger… She tried to take it from him, and it was working. I never knew a void could do that. When I went to help, the blade…” She stared down at the knife on the ground beside her.

“He used her as a shield,” I said, the events playing out in front of my eyes. The ghosts of the dead moved like puppets as they replayed their final moments. I couldn’t see Samira’s actions, but I watched the blade enter her friend and the look of glee on the Saga’s face as he watched the girl crumple forward into Samira’s lap.

“How did you know?” she asked, her eyes wide.

“I mourned her, so I can see her death play out.” I left out the part where her death would haunt me, like a horror movie on a loop. Every time I closed my eyes, I would see her face, feel her pain, her sorrow, and her fear. Her fear for Samira.

“What are you?”

“I have many names, but the most common is the banshee. People think there is only one banshee, when in reality there are many of us. Or there used to be…”

Samira nodded and returned her gaze to the dead girl still in her arms. “What do we do now?” she asked quietly.

“We call the cops… Well, my version of the cops. But first, I need to reset the wards.”

Samira’s eyes widened in fear and she shook her head. “If you call them, they will know what happened. They will know what I am.”

“There is no choice.”

Samira began to cry. “They’ll kill me, they’ll know I’m a witch and they will kill me…”

Blowing out a long sigh, I pushed to my feet.

“Fine, I might know a guy who can help, but don’t even think about opening your mouth. He doesn’t need to know anything that I don’t tell him.”

Samira nodded, and eventually her tears began drying on her cheeks.

I quickly scrolled through the list of contacts in my cell phone. There weren’t many, but everyone on the list was there for a reason. Mazik was no different.

I hit the call button and listened as the ringer echoed and then static cut in.

“Mazik, you know it’s me,” I said in exasperation. “You’ve got caller ID, so what’s the point in ignoring me?”

The static continued, and I sighed. “Fine, I’ll owe you a favour…”

The line clicked as it went dead, and a moment later I turned toward the shattered remains of my entry hall as I heard the sound of footsteps.

Mazik poked his peroxide-blond head around the edge of the splintered door frame and whistled low, his turquoise eyes meeting mine.

“What happened here?” he asked, and I smiled when I heard his London accent.

“Witch hunters,” I said, jerking my thumbs in the direction of the two dead bodies.

Mazik turned his gaze to the witch hunter slumped against the wall. He crossed the hall, crouched down next to him, and whistled again.

“How hard did you throw it? It’s gone right bloody through him!”

“Just more proof that you really shouldn’t piss me off by ignoring my calls.”

“I’m here, aren’t I? Try not to get your knickers in a twist, love.” His voice dripped sarcasm, and I fought the urge to punch him.

Every time I laid eyes on Mazik, he left me with the overwhelming urge to commit some sort of violence against him. Usually the kind that would end in him sniveling on his knees and begging for mercy.

As though he could read my mind, his eyes flickered black for just a second. Then it was gone, and the turquoise glinted brighter than ever.

“I’d like to see you bloody try it,” he said, his voice low and growling.

“I didn’t call you over here for a pissing match,” I teased. “And anyway, we both know who would win.”

“Ha, not bloody likely,” he said, but I could tell the tension had slipped from his shoulders.

Demons were unpredictable, and Mazik was no exception. I knew that given half an opportunity he would have no problem killing me, but that was also part of what made him such a good gun for hire. With him, there was no conscience, no wondering if he had the balls to kill when necessary. Mazik would kill everyone he got his hands on if he thought he could get away with it and not have an Elite on his ass.

“Well, you seem to have all of this tied up nicely. What did you call me for?”

“Clean up?” I gave him my best wide smile, and he rolled his eyes in my direction.

“When you say ‘clean up,’ are you telling me I can keep the bodies?”

“These two you can do with as you please. But this one—” I stepped aside to reveal Samira huddled on the floor with Ana’s body—“this one we give a proper send off.”

“Hell-O, lovely,” Mazik said, striding into the room and making a beeline for Samira. “I do love a woman who knows how to make blood look good.”

As soon as he drew level with me, I slammed my hand into his chest. My shoulder still ached, but I was beginning to get used to the continuous burn of the iron in my system. Plus, the adrenaline flooding my body made it easier to deal with the pain. Of course, once I crashed the pain would really kick in.

“She’s not part of the deal,” I said, tilting my head toward Samira. “Leave her alone, Mazik.”

“One of these days, Darcey, you’ll go too far.” He glanced down at my hand. “You’re just lucky I like you.”

“And you’re lucky I sometimes call you up for odd jobs.”

His laughter grated on me, and I gritted my teeth.

“Is that what we’re calling murder nowadays?”

“Just do your thing,” I said, waving my hand in the direction of the bodies.

He didn’t answer me. His eyes darkening as he gazed at the body nearest to him. Ignoring him, I crossed the floor to where Samira still sat.

“Does she have any family?” I asked.

“Not anymore. They died before she ended up like me.” Samira stared down at Ana, her face contorting into a mask of horror. “The collar… It won’t come off… Her spirit is trapped…”

“Well, one of these guys has to have the key, right? We can just unlock it and—”

Samira shook her head and held up two pieces of a key. “They broke the key. Those whose key is broken and who die wearing the collar have their spirits damned, trapped within the jewel. They are slaves for eternity.”

Her words shocked me. The situation had sounded vile enough before, but to trap someone even after death was a step too far for me.

“I mourned for her,” I said. “That should have been enough to send her on her way. Their magic shouldn’t override the rite of passage.”

“She’s still here,” Samira said quietly, and my heart stuttered in my chest. My power might have been depleted, but not to the point that I couldn’t do my one and only true purpose…

I crouched down next to them and placed my hand over the collar. I could feel Ana’s spirit within, and my heart sank.

“We need to bury her, and I think I know just the place.” I grabbed the blanket off the edge of the couch and wrapped it gently around Ana’s body. I could only think of one place that might free her. It helped that it was hidden from the human world. If she was ever found, the police would uncover evidence tying her back to me, and that was something I couldn’t allow.

As I scooped Ana up from Samira’s arms, I noticed just how little she weighed. It seemed the captors weren’t that interested in feeding their captives. Samira hopped to her feet and choked back a gag.

“Just ignore him,” I said, catching her wide-eyed stare in Mazik’s direction. “He does weird shit like that all the time.”

He ignored us and continued examining the body, which mostly consisted of him tasting the blood that had spilled from the Saga’s chest wound.

“I want it all gone before I get back, Mazik, so no stalling,” I said, carrying Ana’s body to the door.

He grunted in response, and I took that as a good sign. If he’d wanted to cause a fuss, he’d have done it already.

“Where are you taking her?” Samira asked, following me down the hall.

“Somewhere special. You’ll like it, I promise.”

I didn’t say anything else. There didn’t seem to be much point; she was going to find out soon enough.

Chapter Nine

It wasn’t hard to find a between place. They existed everywhere, and most humans didn’t pay them any attention.

After making my way down the alley next to the apartment building, I paused and waited. The air itself seemed to shiver with anticipation, and the feel of it rolling across my skin left me with goose bumps. The smell of blossoms filled the air, and I glanced at Samira over my shoulder.

“What’s happening?” she asked, staring at the dingy masonry of the apartment building on one side and the lush grass just a couple of steps away.

Sucking in a deep breath, I took a step forward and felt the earth soften beneath my feet. It wasn’t quite Faerie. Faerie was much grander, but I preferred the Between. According to stories that had been passed down through generations of banshees, the Between had once been our home.

Nothing lived there now, but we often came to bury what was left of our dead, or sit and commune with the spirits of those who had gone before.

For most Fae, the Between was simply an inconvenience. Some even had the audacity to call it a Veil, but they could no longer see it for what it was. Fae magic had started to fade from the world a long time ago, and now it was also fading from the Fae themselves.

“Keep up,” I said. “The Between is not a place where you want to get lost.”

Samira didn’t answer, but I could hear her footsteps moving closer and I took that as a sign of understanding.

The air caressed my skin, and as I drank down another lungful I felt the last remnants of my headache drifting away. For me, this place far more than Faerie was home.

I moved quickly toward the small burial ground ahead. The huge weeping hawthorn that grew in the centre of the circle arched up into the sky, its branches drooping down to brush against the ground. None of the graves were marked—they didn’t need to be. We were all linked in some way, each banshee family related to another, and as such we didn’t need to separately mark our fallen ones.

“I cannot bury her within the circle, but this is close enough that the burial will still count.” I rested Ana’s body on the ground at my feet.

“I don’t understand,” Samira said.

“Just watch,” I answered, feeling the ground tremble beneath us.

Samira gasped as the first tendril burst from the ground and wrapped around Ana’s body. It was quickly followed by others until she was completely covered in a fine lace of interwoven tendrils that hid her from view.

The place where the tendrils had come from split, and the ground swallowed the root coffin into the rich, dark earth. Power spiked, making it harder for me to breathe, and tears stung the back of my eyes as the grass rolled like the fur of a wild animal rippling beneath the touch of a hand.

Magic pulsed, and the hawthorn groaned, its branches sprouting thousands of tiny white and pink blossoms, their scent coating the air in sweetness. From the corner of my eye, I could see the look of wonder of Samira’s face as she stared up at the sight. And it was a sight to behold. Mother Earth herself had accepted Ana into her embrace.

A shiver raced down my spine, and I felt the moment Ana was freed from her bond by the spirits of those who had come before her.

The blossoms began to fall, drifting down through the air, and for a moment it appeared as though the tree itself was weeping.

“Why are you doing this?” Samira asked, turning to me with a curious glance.

Her question surprised me, and I didn’t have an immediate answer. I hadn’t known Ana, and I barely knew Samira, and yet part of me had felt the importance of bringing Ana here. I had wanted to free her. I couldn’t save her from those who had hurt her, but I hadn’t wanted them to keep her even after death. I couldn’t take back the things I had done in my past, but I could still try and make amends for them now.

The Between had called to me, and not just because I knew Ana’s body would never be found by the humans.

It was because I’d seen the hurt and terror in Samira’s face. I’d witnessed Ana’s fear, and her passionate desire to protect Samira from those who would harm her. They were slaves, and it seemed only right to release their spirits…

“Because no one should be forced into anything against their will,” I said quietly as I stared down at my bloodied hands.

“You are,” she said.

“My situation is different. Mine is the equivalent of a prison sentence without the prison… It’s in place of the death sentence I was supposed to receive.”

“What did you do?”

“Nothing I want to talk about,” I said quickly, an image of His face flashing before my eyes.

“You know we’ve all done things we’re not proud of,” Samira said.

Lifting my face to meet her gaze once more, I smiled. “I never said I wasn’t proud of it.” I left out the part where I was utterly ashamed of the actions that had led up to the end, and about getting caught. But what I had actually done to get myself caught… that, I would never regret. It had been my only choice, and it had been worth every second of agony I’d since endured.

She looked utterly confused, and my grin widened.

“Come on, we should get back,” I said. “The wards need to be replaced.”

Instead of responding, Samira watched me with a new wariness. Whatever I had said to her had clearly frightened her, and that wasn’t any harm, those close to me tended to get hurt. Perhaps she would be better off afraid of me.

With a shrug, I headed toward the way out of the Between, happy in the knowledge that, at least for now, she was still following me.

Chapter Ten

The bloodstains on the floor and the shattered door frame were the only indications of what had gone down in the apartment. Mazik had been as good as his word, and both bodies were gone when we returned. What he did with the bodies was something I hoped I would never have to find out.

“I’m sorry about the door,” Samira said as she stepped through the wood splinters.

“It’s not your fault, it’s not like you…” I stopped speaking as soon as I caught her expression. “Oh, it was you.” I smiled.

At least she wasn’t entirely helpless, and that was always a good thing.

“I wasn’t aiming for the door.”

“Well, I’m sure next time you’ll nail him,” I said with a wide grin as I bent down to pick up one particularly large carved piece of wood.

It was mostly intact, and I let out a long sigh of relief. The thought of having to get my hands on another protection symbol of this level didn’t fill me with joy. As long as Samira’s magic hadn’t rendered this one void, we would be fine.

“If that’s your ward, you’re going to need a new one,” Samira said quietly as she began to pick up the cushions that had been knocked to the floor during the fight.

“Why?” I stared down at the piece of wood in my hand.

“Ana was a void, remember? What little magic the ward used to have is now long gone.”

“Ah, crap.” I dropped the wood on the floor and kicked it hard enough to send it skittering across the floorboards.

It had cost me a hell of a lot to get my hands on that one—it had mostly cost my dignity, but that wasn’t something I ever gave up lightly.

“Any chance you know how to create another ward?” I asked, but a shake of Samira’s head dashed all my hopes.

“So what can you tell me about the guys who sold you?” I asked. “Because from what I’ve seen, none of this is adding up.”

Samira shot me a curious glance. “I do not understand.”

“The ones who were here today are known as Saga Venatione, or at least they used to be,” I said, remembering the dark, vine-like tattoos that stretched across their very bald heads.

“They still are, but they were foot soldiers.” Samira’s words caused my breath to catch in the back of my throat.

“What do you mean, ‘foot soldiers?’ I didn’t think the witch hunters had any sort of tier system.”

“There is much you do not know about witches.” A small smile lit Samira’s face, but it was still tinged with terrible sadness—the kind of sadness I knew only too well.

“They are the Saga who have given themselves over wholly and completely to what they are,” Samira continued, “They will eventually become elders, and their eyes will forever remain the white colour for which the Saga are known.”

Her words sent a shiver of revulsion running down my spine. The ones I’d just faced were nothing like the two brothers I’d come across in King City. In fact, the two brothers had been practically normal, although their strength and ability in combat had been nothing to underestimate.

“This wasn’t your first time running into them?” she asked, her question drawing me from my thoughts.

I nodded. “I’ve met a few before, but nothing like those guys from tonight. They were nothing short of fanatical…”

“You have no idea.”

I couldn’t imagine what it must be like to live with those who constantly wanted you dead, but I also couldn’t figure out what the Saga were getting out of the arrangement. They’d always despised witches, or at least they’d led everyone to believe that they did. To think that they had been taking witches and keeping them captive this entire time... Well, it didn’t bear thinking about.

“The hunters have been the scourge of my kind for centuries.”

“I still don’t understand what they’re getting out of it? They always seemed like the type to stick pretty firmly to their guns, but this…” I took in the destruction in the room. “None of it makes any sense.”

She didn’t answer me, and I took her silence to mean that she didn’t understand their motives any better than I did.

As I brushed the broken pieces of wood into the middle of the room, my shoulder decided to start up its game once more and a wave of nausea washed through me. The iron had not yet left my system, although thankfully the rush of adrenaline had gone a long way toward ridding me of it.

“Are you all right?” Samira asked, as lights danced in my vision. The open doorway still needed to be secured, but judging by the way I was feeling my chances of getting it sorted were pretty slim.

Stumbling to the kitchen, I tugged open the fridge and stared into the sparse space. “Shit,” I muttered to myself as Samira paused in the doorway.

“You’re hurt?”

“Shot, actually,” I answered, and Samira’s small gasp made me smile. For someone who had spent her time as captive to a bunch of sadistic lunatics, little things really seemed to shock her.

“Sit,” she said, pushing me toward the tiny table at the far wall of the kitchen. “I will find something.”

I didn’t fight her. There was nothing to eat anyway, and the iron was really beginning to sap my energy. I at least needed sleep, but I still had to fix the door. The thought of getting off the chair and wandering around the building’s many abandoned apartments in search of a spare door just wasn’t causing me to jump up from my seat in joy.

My eyes drifted shut for what only felt like a moment before the smell of cooking food filtered through to my nose and I jerked back awake.

Samira stood over the stove, her back to me as she hummed a tune I didn’t recognise and stirred something in a pan.

Scrubbing my hands across my face, I stared a little harder. The pan was a wok. Where the hell had she gotten one of those? I was pretty sure I’d never owned a wok in my life.

“What are you doing?” I asked, stretching in the chair in an attempt to see inside the pan.

“Cooking up what I could find,” she said vaguely.

Reaching into the cupboard, she pulled out a plate and tipped the contents of the wok onto it. The strong scent of chilli and garlic washed over me, and my stomach growled in response.

When she put the plate of fresh vegetable stir-fry, chicken, and noodles in front of me, I shot her a confused glance. There was no way she’d found this in the fridge or the cupboards.

“I don’t understand, there was nothing in the house.”

“Witch, remember?” she said with a smile. “It was something I picked up from one of the other girls in captivity. It was the only way we would be able to eat anything.”

Without saying another word, I picked up the fork and stabbed a piece of broccoli. The explosion of flavour across my tongue caused my mouth to start watering.

“So you never have to shop?” I asked, trying to resist the urge to shovel the food into my mouth. “You can just conjure things from thin air?”

“It all comes from somewhere, so I try not to do it too often… It’s basically stealing.”

It made sense. The ability to conjure from nothing at all was extremely complicated and took more magic than Samira possessed. Transplanting items, on the other hand, was way easier. Even some of the humans who worked as Las Vegas magicians had managed to work out how to perform a simple transference.

“Do you want me to have a look at the wound?” Samira asked.

“No, it’s fine, the bullet is out… It’s just a little iron.”

“Who shot you?”

I scooped up another forkful of food and rammed it into my mouth, giving myself a moment to contemplate what I should say to her. I couldn’t really share the details of the Archer case, but then again something more than a little weird was happening. Mrs Archer shouldn’t have known what I was.

Humans knew of the Fae’s existence. Or they sort of did—the Elite certainly knew—but most of the human populace were so enamoured with vampires and shifters that they didn’t really pay much attention to the Fae. It helped that the Fae preferred to stay in Faerie, rarely wandering beyond the Between and generally avoiding any contact with humans.

Then there were those Fae like me who lived among humans, but I’d tried to behave as human as possible. And those who knew I was more than human assumed I was some sort of shifter or daylight vampire. Not that those creatures existed.

“I was working another case, and it became a little more complicated than I’d first anticipated,” I said, trying to keep the details to the bare minimum.

“So why would they shoot you if you were working the case for them?”

I shrugged, and the movement alone was enough to send a ricochet of pain through me. “I have no idea.” I gritted my teeth against the pain winding its way down my arm.

I’d been wondering that myself, but I was still no closer to figuring out the answer. I only knew for certain that Mrs Archer had known what I was, because the bullets she used were too unusual to be a coincidence. But why, exactly, was she targeting me? Although there were groups intent on wiping out the preternaturals, as far as I was aware the Archers had no connections to such extremists. But, then again, despite having a passing knowledge of the Archers, I hadn’t really known anything about them until Nancy had approached me.

“Look, it’s late,” I said. “You should go and get some rest. I’ll take the couch and make sure no one attempts to come through that door.” I couldn’t hide the exhaustion from my voice.

Samira nodded and headed for the bedroom, pausing in the doorway but not turning to face me. “Thank you, for Ana…” she said, and then stepped into the bedroom, closing the door softly behind her.

Dragging my sorry ass off the kitchen chair, I made my way into the living room and dropped onto the couch. Dried blood stained the floor and the cracks between the floorboards. It would be a bitch to clean, but I wasn’t going to worry about that until morning.

I dropped back against the couch cushions and closed my eyes. I could keep watch and rest… All I needed to do was make sure I didn’t fall asleep.

Chapter Eleven

Sunlight streamed in through the exposed windows and I cringed as the strong smell of coffee tickled my nose. For a second, I felt utterly lost. I threw my hand over my eyes as the sound of purring jerked me fully awake, and I pushed off the blanket covering me. I hadn’t remembered using a blanket, but now I was someone tangled up in one as a small, frizzy, marmalade ball crawled across the couch toward me.

I had an overwhelming urge to hiss at the kitten, but I bit my tongue as it bumped its tiny face against my hand and then proceeded to lick my fingers.

Samira’s laugh drew my attention to the kitchen doorway, and I picked up the tiny ball of orange fluff and sat it on the far end of the couch.

“What is that thing doing in here?” I asked, doing my best to keep my disgust to a minimum. I didn’t have anything against cats, but the life I led didn’t mix well with caring for something so dependent.

“She was sitting on your chest when I got up this morning,” Samira said.

Glancing down at my T-shirt, I noticed tiny, marmalade-coloured hairs covering the front of the bulldog’s face. The irony was not lost on me.

The kitten let out a small, pitiful mewl that tore at my heart. It crossed the couch toward me once more, its small steps awkward and uncoordinated as its intelligent green eyes met mine.

“I thought maybe she was yours,” Samira said, and I hopped to my feet before the kitten could climb onto my lap.

“Well, she’s not. I’ve never set eyes on it before.”

The kitten found the edge of the blanket and decided now would be a good time to begin playing. I watched for a few seconds as it toyed and clawed at the tassels before a misjudged pounce sent it tumbling off the edge of the couch.

I caught it before its tiny, fragile body hit the floor, and it mewled at me as though the fall had been my fault. Its green eyes judged me as I set it safely back down on the floor.

“I made coffee,” Samira said, holding a steaming mug in my direction.

“Oh, thank Goddess.” I crossed the floor, narrowly avoiding stepping on the tiny kitten as it weaved in and out between my legs.

“I think she’s hungry.” Samira disappeared back into the kitchen, leaving me to face the tiny, four-legged terrorist that had decided the best way to get my attention was by climbing the side of my jeans.

Needle-like claws sank into my skin, and I sucked in a breath through my teeth before picking up the kitten and staring into its face.

“You don’t belong here,” I said.

The kitten mewled at me, the sound grating on my ears.

“You’re not going to win. Being cute is vastly overrated.”

It swatted its paw in the direction of my face, and I cocked an eyebrow at it.

“I’ve got some chicken left over from last night…” Samira emerged from the kitchen with a tiny plate covered in shredded chicken pieces.

“Can it eat solid food?” I asked, staring at it.

“Only one way to find out. And, anyway, we don’t have any kitten milk.”

“Kitten milk? Can’t it just drink normal milk like the rest of us?”

“It will make her sick,” she said, holding out a tiny piece of chicken to the kitten, who sniffed at it and squirmed in my hand like a worm.

I placed the kitten on the floor. Samira put down the plate, and the kitten threw itself on the chicken, using its body to shield the pieces from the rest of us.

Dropping down onto the floor beside it, I reached out and ran my fingers down over its head, smiling as I heard the kitten’s growls. It was a savage, wolfing down the food as if it had never eaten anything. For all I knew, it hadn’t.

“I think she likes you,” Samira said with a grin as she sat down next to the kitten. It snapped at her fingers as she lifted a piece of chicken toward its mouth.

“Likes me? Doubtful. It’s too young to know better.”

Samira didn’t answer me, and I swallowed the last of my coffee.

“I need to go out for a while, get another ward for the apartment and check in at the office.”

Samira stiffened and shot me a panicked look. “What if they come back?”

“It’s all right, I wasn’t planning on leaving you alone. I’ve got someone who can come over and keep an eye out for any trouble.” I dragged out my cell phone and typed a quick message to Clary.

I knew her from Faerie. Clary was a wood Fae who had come to the human realm as soon as she was old enough. She wasn’t a fan of trouble, but I knew I could always rely on her in a pinch. This was definitely one of those times. Plus, Clary wasn’t someone to be messed with; I would much rather have her fighting with me than against me.

The cell phone beeped her response. I didn’t bother reading it, because I already knew her answer.

“I could come with you,” Samira said in a hopeful voice, and I shook my head.

“I’ve got a lot of ground to cover today, and I can’t risk having you out there with MacNa and the witch hunters searching for you. Clary will keep you safe, and if she feels the need to she can always open a door to Faerie and hide you there.”

Samira’s eyes widened, and I couldn’t help but smile.

“She’s like you, this Clary?”

“Nope, she’s a wood Fae, which makes her way more dangerous than me. But, ultimately, they’re peacemakers.”

“Don’t you think maybe a peacemaker is not the way to go with the witch hunters involved?”

“Trust me, if anyone turns up here and Clary doesn’t like them, she’ll make short shrift of them.” I remembered all the times Clary had saved my ass in a tight spot. “I need a shower,” I said. “When she gets here…” I paused. How was I supposed to prepare Samira for Clary’s appearance?

Samira gave me a pointed stare, and the kitten climbed off the chicken plate and made a beeline for my lap. Pushing the kitten away, I sighed as it ignored me and climbed back on anyway.

“Look, Clary is a little different, and staring tends to offend her…”

“Different how?” Samira asked, and I picked up the kitten and plopped it into her hands.

“You’ll see.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but the kitten’s high-pitched mewl was enough to distract her, giving me the opportunity to escape for a shower. Needing to escape for a shower in my own apartment sounded ridiculous, but it seemed every time I turned around I had a new resident.

I’d never seen any cats in the building before, and it seemed unlikely that the kitten had wandered in through the door all on its own. Someone had clearly left it there, but I couldn’t think of one person who would consider leaving a living, breathing creature in my care to be a good idea.

Stepping into the shower, I let the hot water run over my head, washing away the aches from the previous day’s fight. The iron wasn’t completely gone from my system, but I could tell it was well on its way. As long as I didn’t get shot again, everything would be just dandy.

Well, if you could call someone trying to frame me for murder dandy…

Chapter Twelve

My hair was only a little damp by the time I was fully dressed. Sitting on the edge of the bed, I tugged on my black, army-issue boots and laced them up the front. Straightening up, I ran my fingers through my locks and wrapped the strands around one another in a makeshift French braid.

The sound of raised voices coming from the living room caught my attention, and I hopped to my feet and strode from the bedroom. Clary stood in the centre of the living room, her arms folded across her chest as she narrowed her violet eyes in Samira’s direction. Her rich, oak-coloured skin shimmered beneath the sunlight that fell in through the window. Each time she moved, the jewel undertones of her skin sparkled a deep emerald colour that gave her an otherworldly presence.

Green hair so dark it reminded me of the colour of rich moss fell down her back in curls. It was dotted with delicate, twig-like branches that shivered softly with each angry breath she took.

Samira stood near the door, the marmalade kitten in her arms. From the wide-eyed stare she was giving Clary, I could tell I’d missed something important.

“I see you’ve both met,” I said, cocking an eyebrow.

“Since when did you get involved with witches, Darcey?” Clary asked, managing to make the word ‘witches’ sound much worse than it was.

“Since the Faerie Court ordered me to be one of its enforcers. I go wherever they want me.”

I’d forgotten that Clary had issues with witches. Well, it wasn’t so much that I’d forgotten as I’d hoped she’d gotten over them.

“What are you?” Samira asked. Her question was innocent enough, but it merely fuelled Clary’s rage. I watched the wood Fae roll back her shoulders, the twigs in her green hair beginning to stand to attention like the hairs on the back of a cat.

“Excuse me? What am I? I could ask you the same thing!”

“Ladies, come on, we’re all grownups here. No need to get personal with one another. Clary, I really don’t think Samira meant any harm by asking you what you are. I don’t think she’s had a whole lot of contact with our kind before… and her introduction to the Fae was MacNa.”

Clary shot me a surprised look. “You mean he’s still around? I thought that old slimeball would have disappeared a long time ago.”

“Nope, he’s still very much around. He’s the reason I met Samira. The Court wants me to bring him in, and he bought Samira so he could use her gifts to keep himself hidden.”

Clary’s expression darkened, her violet eyes practically disappearing beneath the black of her pupil.

“Bought?”

“Yup,” I answered, and Samira nodded in agreement.

“I didn’t mean to offend you, it’s just…” Samira paused, and my breath caught in the back of my throat. Whatever words were about to leave her mouth would either be wonderful or the worst possible thing she could say. Clary was as changeable as the seasons, and her ability to take offence at the little things had always baffled me. “You’re so beautiful,” she continued. “I have never seen anyone like you.” I bit my lip as I waited for Clary’s reaction.

The wood Fae seemed to consider Samira’s words, and finally grunted in response.

“There aren’t many of my kind left.” I could hear the sadness in Clary’s voice.

Her kind were dying out as humans destroyed the natural forests, devastating the habitats of more than just the animals that inhabited the trees.

Her words broke my heart. She was the last of the oaks, and I dreaded to think what would become of the trees in her care if anything happened to her.

“I am sorry,” Samira said.

Clary shrugged. “Unless you spend your free time chopping up forests, you don’t have anything to be sorry about.” She looked at me. “Wait, you said that MacNa is on the run?”

“Yeah, he was challenged and ducked out on it. The Court wants me to bring him in so he can be reminded of where he comes from.”

Clary nodded. “I might know someone who can help you track him down.”

“Really?”

“Have you heard of the bar called The Dearg Hand?”

It sounded somewhat familiar, but I hadn’t ever set foot in it.

“Over at the Spires?” Clary added, and I nodded. “Well, MacNa was a regular there, and one of his long-time friends named Daster works there.”

A wide grin spread across my face. MacNa was nothing if not a creature of habit, and if his friend worked in the bar then he wouldn’t be too far away.

“So, will you two be all right here?” I asked, taking in their wary stances, the tension in Clary’s shoulders more than a little worrisome.

“Look, we’ll figure it out,” Clary said, shooting Samira her best smile. If she was making an effort, that meant there was hope, which was more than I could hope for. “Although, if that cat decides to use me as a scratching post we’re going to have all sorts of issues.”

“Oh, it’s not mine,” Samira added quickly, and Clary shot me an inquisitive glance.

“No idea, it just turned up,” I said with a shrug, grabbing my leather jacket and sliding an iron blade into the sheath at my back.

I didn’t wait for her to answer, instead picking my way through the door and sighing at the sight of the last remaining pieces of wood that hung from the doorframe. The next time someone decided to invade my apartment and destroy everything, I was going to send them the bill even if they were already dead…

Although, if a Faerie Court case caused the destruction, I could always send them the bill. I could already imagine the Queen’s expression when she received it. That alone would be worth the damage.

“Don’t kill each other,” I called back to the two women. “And don’t let that cat in my bedroom.” I shuddered as I imagined the damage that little fuzz ball could do.

Somehow, I couldn’t see myself striking fear into the hearts of my enemies whilst covered in tiny, marmalade-coloured fur. There was no doubt about it—in my line of business, cute was definitely overrated.

Chapter Thirteen

The hairs on the back of my neck stood to attention as I rounded the corner onto the street where my office sat. Something was definitely wrong, but for the life of me I couldn’t put my finger on it.

The people making their way up and down the street didn’t pay any attention to the loon creeping along the sidewalk. After all, this was Falcon—people did weird shit here all the time.

The front of my office looked much as it had the previous night, but I could taste the difference on the air, a sweetness that sickened me to my stomach. Something had obviously changed.

I crossed the street, made it to the front door, and pushed it open. It was entirely possible that I’d forgotten to lock up as I was rushing out the previous night. Stupid, but possible.

Stepping inside, I sucked in a deep breath and listened. The quiet sound of another’s heartbeat echoed within. Scratch that, there were multiple heartbeats.

I took another step inside the building, and they seemed to draw a collective breath before pouring from their hiding places, their guns trained on me.

“Freeze!”

I contemplated ignoring them, but after last night’s fiasco getting myself shot again didn’t seem like the best idea. Raising my hands slowly above my head, I trained my eyes on the cop who seemed to be in charge.

He pushed past the others, his wide shoulders indicating that he worked out during every spare second. Grabbing my arm roughly, he spun me around and slammed me down over the desk. His hands did a cursory sweep over my body, and he paused when he found my sheath.

“What’s this?” he asked, drawing it out and setting it down next to my face.

“Looks like a knife,” I said, regretting my smart answer when his grip on my arms tightened, causing the healing gunshot wound to throb in protest.

I felt the snap of the handcuffs; the metal caused my skin to itch, but thankfully they weren’t made of iron. The cop jerked me up, but I kept my balance despite his attempts to make me stumble.

“What’s this about?” I asked, keeping my voice neutral.

“Darcey Thorne, we are arresting you for the murder of Martina Ricer and the attempted murder of Henry Archer,” tough cop said, turning me to face him once more.

His eyes swept over my face, taking in my hair before he dropped his gaze to my body. I could feel his appreciation, and it made my skin crawl. I’d never understood human behaviour. The Fae dealt with creeps swiftly.

“Are you human?” His question took me by surprise and momentarily stole the words from my tongue.

If I answered, I would have to tell the truth. And if they didn’t know I was a Fae, I’d only have to deal with the human cops. As long as I could keep the Elite off my ass, I stood a chance of getting out of this mess without getting shot again, or worse.

“Lawyer,” I said, and smiled sweetly.

His expression hardened, and I knew I’d irritated him. He wouldn’t be nice to me, but he’d already forgotten to probe a little deeper into what I was. I pushed a little more effort into my glamour and felt his interest in me waning. The longer I could keep up the ruse, the faster I would be able to escape.

I stumbled a little as he tugged me from the room, which added to my human persona. My ego could take a little battering, and I felt tough cop’s smug attitude ratchet up several notches.

“You know, it was hard to track you down,” he blathered as we reached the unmarked cop car. He tugged open the back door and shoved me inside.

“Was it?” I kept my face and voice as bland as I could.

“No last known address, except for this place. We found it off your P.I records, but we didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to come back here.”

I didn’t answer him, instead biting back all the acerbic comebacks that were tripping over themselves to launch out of my mouth. Murder seemed like enough of a situation to get out of without adding a charge of obstructing the course of justice to my plate.

“I don’t know why you private investigators think you can do a real cop’s job,” he said, leaning against the back door.

The urge to blurt out my true thoughts was almost enough to drive me crazy, but still I held my silence. Another cop crossed the street and nodded to me in the back seat.

“Prisoner secure?” he asked, tossing the keys to the first cop, who’d started to straighten up. My hands were already free from the cuffs; it would have been painfully easy to snatch the keys from mid-air and show them who was boss, but I’d only run the risk of getting shot again. If I had Lunn’s ability to appear and disappear, I could have pulled it off…but I wasn’t, and so I was stuck in the back seat pretending to be just another sad sack caught for my crime.

“Yeah, she’s not the talker I thought she would be,” the first cop said, sounding somewhat disappointed.

“You’re clearly saying the wrong things.” The second cop slid into the passenger seat and threw me a cursory glance before returning his attention to the one sliding into the driver’s seat. “Captain wants this wrapped up ASAP. Something about it messing up his dinner plans with the Archers if we don’t.”

I flopped back against the faux leather seat and closed my eyes. I was still listening; the more they believed I was disinterested in everything they had to say, the better my chances at gleaning as much information from them as possible. Information was always handy to have, particularly when accused of a murder you definitely didn’t commit.

This was the first time I’d been accused of murder. Except, of course, the last time I’d been escorted to Court by Lunn and the other enforcers, the iron shackles slowly rubbing the skin on my wrists raw. The Queen and her Court were a lot scarier than any human court could ever hope to be.

“Did you see the crime scene?” new cop asked, dropping his voice to a whisper, and I could practically feel the look he gave me. It contained a healthy dose of fear and, if I wasn’t mistaken, awe. The second emotion raised my alarm bells.

“Yeah, it was a mess,” tough cop answered.

“Archer is in a bad way, too, babbling mostly…” the new cop said.

Silence fell over the car, and I could feel the first cop’s sudden discomfort at the conversation’s shift in direction. He might have been an asshole, but from everything I’d gathered he was one of the good assholes—if such a thing existed. He undoubtedly treated the other female cops differently, his chauvinistic tendencies causing others to dislike him, but he was just as turned off by his partner’s sudden interest in the crime scene as I was. Had he picked up on the tone in the new cop’s voice? He seemed to be in awe over the state of the Martina’s body.

The car sped through the streets, and I recognized the second we pulled into the police station because the tense atmosphere in the car eased up a little as the new cop hopped out. Sliding my hands back into the handcuffs, I waited until the door to my left swung open before opening my eyes.

New cop’s hands wrapped around my arm, half-dragging, half-helping me from the car. He had an air of excitement about him that turned my stomach, and I almost expected him to start asking me questions about the crime scene.

He didn’t, instead keeping his too-tight grip on my arm as he started to perp-walk me across the asphalt of the underground parking lot. He pressed a button on the wall and a rumbling elevator door opened to reveal a cage with the walls and floor made of iron grid. I didn’t want to step inside; if I so much as brushed against the walls, I would give away what I was. How would I explain away the smoking of burning flesh when there wasn’t a fire, or even a spark, in the vicinity?

We moved inside, and tough cop quickly joined us. I hunched in on myself, trying to make my body as small and inconspicuous as possible.

The elevator dinged and the door rumbled open, revealing a wide, open reception area. But instead of a friendly receptionist, several sour-faced police officers sat behind the desk, overworked and underpaid—it was written all over their faces.

An older cop stepped up to the desk, his face the only one not wearing the same sour expression as his co-workers. His ruddy complexion, salt-and-pepper hair, and barely concealed smile gave him the appearance of a man who should have been at home enjoying his retirement, or else dressing up as Santa at Christmastime and visiting sick kids in the hospital.

“Mikey picked up Darcey Thorne at her office,” new cop said. “She’s a suspect in the Archer case.”

The Santa Claus cop looked me over and shook his head sadly, his blue eyes meeting mine for a moment before he looked down at the book in front of him.

“Why get yourself tangled up in something like that?” he asked.

“I didn’t,” I answered honestly, and his eyes jerked up to meet mine once more. He searched my face, and I knew he was looking for an indication that I was lying. But he wouldn’t find it.

“Mikey, come on, get on with it,” new cop said, and I fought the urge to jab my elbow into his ribs hard enough to hear the satisfactory snap of bone. “If we believed every perp who walked through these doors the city wouldn’t be safe.”

I bit down on the answer hovering on my tongue; it just wasn’t worth the hassle of setting him straight.

New cop removed my cuffs, guided my hands to the front of my body, and snapped them on again. Mikey had laid out a fingerprint kit, and new cop wasted no time thrusting my hands into the ink and crushing my fingers to the card. It wasn’t exactly the best way to start my day, but at least I didn’t have to worry about my prints turning up in any database. Glamour allowed me to keep my secrets, and I could change everything about my fingerprints in an instant.

“Can I get something to clean this off?” I asked, staring down at the inky mess covering my fingers and most of my hands.

Mikey gestured to a sink behind the counter. “You can wash up there if you want to.” I smiled gratefully at him.

New cop had other ideas. He jerked me back, towing me down a long hall. “Andy, you should let her get cleaned up, it’s only fair!” Mikey called out after us, as new cop—who I now knew as Andy—continued dragging me down the corridor.

“He’s far too soft, it’s going to get him in trouble one of these days,” Andy said beneath his breath.

I jerked my head around and stared up at him. His words held all the hallmarks of a threat, but they sounded wrong coming from the mouth of Mikey’s comrade. Weren’t they all supposed to stick together?

Andy winked at me and pushed open the door to an interview room. After shoving me down into one of the chairs, he wasted no time fastening my hands to the middle of the bar on the table.

The second he turned his back, I tested the strength of the bar. It flexed gently beneath the pressure I exerted. Freeing myself would be easy, but it seemed pretty pointless. I’d come this far, and now I needed to know what information they had on me. At least then I would know what I was up against.

Dropping back against the chair, I closed my eyes and waited. The fun and games would soon begin, and once they did… Well, things would get a little more interesting.

Chapter Fourteen

I didn’t have to wait long. Minutes ticked by, and the silence was broken by the sound of the door opening and shuffling footsteps entering the room. Opening my eyes, I stared up at the detective—and he was definitely a detective. He looked just like the type you see on television, and for a second I held my breath and waited for everyone to start laughing at the great joke they’d pulled off on me.

When that didn’t happen, I rolled the tension from my shoulders and sat up a little straighter. The detective sat in the chair opposite me and dropped a rather hefty file onto the table.

There was no way they had a file on me. I’d been flying below the radar for a long time. I’d been careful…

“Miss Thorne,” the detective said, “my name is Gabriel Martinez. I’m a detective here with the FPB and I’ve been assigned to this case.”

I remained silent, studying the red sauce stain on his tie and the slightly off-white colour of his shirt that pointed to a man who lived alone in the world. Add to that the particular echo in his voice that only develops in those who have loved and lost, and it painted a picture of a man who had lost the one he cherished.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” I said, unable to keep quiet any longer. The second the words left my mouth, his pain flooded the room and I sucked in a deep breath, the air hot enough to scald me all the way down into my lungs.

“How do you know?” he asked, his voice gruff and tight with emotion.

“I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have said anything.”

Being a Fae certainly had its benefits, but being a banshee was often just one shitty misstep after another. And this was just another one of those marvellous moments.

“I’ll ask you again, Miss Thorne: how did you know?” His voice was beginning to lose the tightness that came with the shock of grief, and he was rapidly descending into full-on pissed-off mode.

“I can see it in your eyes, hear it in your voice… I really didn’t mean to upset you.” I was as honest as I could be without blurting out the truth of what I was.

He watched me for a moment, and finally seemed satisfied enough by my answer to brush over it.

“You know why you’re here?” he asked, and I was impressed by how quickly he could rein in his emotions.

“I’ve been accused of murder.”

“We have two witnesses who place you at the crime scene, and one of those witnesses saw the entire attack.”

“Mr and Mrs Archer,” I confirmed. “She hired me to find her husband. She said they had an open relationship, and that she knew he was off with his mistress but was worried because he hadn’t come back for some sort of important meeting…”

“So you admit to being there?” he asked.

“I was there doing what she wanted me to do. The victim was already dead when I arrived.”

“And how do you know she was already dead?”

I hesitated. How the hell was I supposed to explain to him that I knew she was dead because I could smell the scent of death when I walked into the apartment? That, to a banshee, death had a particular pungent odour, one I would recognise anywhere? That I could smell the scent of his own wife’s grave dirt rising off his jacket in waves?

“Is it not obvious?” I said, remembering the sight of her body and my initial reaction to it. “She was lying across the bed, not moving, not breathing, and she looked like she’d been hit by a ten-ton truck.”

Detective Martinez flipped open the file and shoved a pile of high-resolution photographs toward me. I peered down at them, my stomach clenching uncomfortably as I caught sight of Martina Ricer’s eyes covered in the grey film of death. The dimming of the light in her eyes did nothing to hide the fact that she’d obviously suffered before dying.

“Does this make you uncomfortable?” he asked, and I shot him a dirty look before returning my attention to the pictures.

A nagging feeling in my gut told me there I was missing something that I would see if I just looked hard enough. But with no clue as to what that might be, I was lost.

“Are you looking for something?” he asked me.

“Clues,” I replied curtly before reaching over and sliding out one of the bottom pictures.

“Some would think that you were enjoying the pictures, that you’re reliving the joy of the kill,” he said, and I let out a sigh as I dropped back against the chair.

“I did not kill Martina Ricer. This is all far too gratuitous. Whoever did kill her took their time, enjoyed it, and showed no mercy.” I allowed the small details I had gleaned from the photographs to soak into my mind.

I didn’t need to have those sick images in my head, but Martina deserved to have her killer brought to justice. Her real killer, that is, and there was no way I would take the fall for it, no matter how convenient that might be.

“And you would have shown her mercy?” His voice was quiet, soft even, and I knew he was looking for any chance to trip me up and use my words against me. But I couldn’t lie to him. Mercy was kind of my thing. I didn’t enjoy death. Just because I was a banshee, a harbinger, didn’t mean that I took pleasure in the cruel indignity of death itself.

“If by mercy you mean I wouldn’t have killed her, then you would be correct,” I said.

“So it was an accident?”

Anger zipped through my veins and I experienced the sudden urge to rip the handcuffs from my wrists and toss the table through the two-way mirror. Mirrors had no effect on the Fae; I could see the two cops gathered on the other side of the glass, watching everything with an intensity borne of desperation. It was almost overwhelming.

“I didn’t kill her,” I repeated flatly. “I believe I asked for a lawyer on the way over here, and I don’t need to answer any more of your questions.”

Martinez had the good grace to look surprised. Clearly, the cops who had brought me in hadn’t passed on that little piece of pertinent information. Did that mean there was dissension in the ranks? To allow the detective to question me while ignoring my rights was a pretty major misstep. Someone was going to find himself in hot water.

The door banged open and Lunn strode in. Except he didn’t look the way he usually did. He’d toned down his otherworldly appearance, and now more closely resembled a runway model than an enforcer of Fae law. The suit he wore moulded to his body, the blue bringing out the gold and green colour in his eyes. He entered the room as though he owned the joint, and I did my best to stifle the smile that crossed my lips when Martinez rammed his chair back from the table with enough force to send it crashing into the wall.

“You can’t come in here, this is a private interview,” Martinez said, hiding his nervousness behind his authority.

That same authority crumbled the moment Lunn spoke.

“I’m here to represent Ms Thorne,” Lunn said, his voice carrying just enough power to lend authority to his words. Martinez visibly wilted.

“We were in the middle of the interview,” Martinez said, but he sounded more like a frightened child than a detective.

“An interview that is now over. If you’ll excuse us, I need to speak to my client alone.” Lunn’s voice was clipped, and when he directed his attention on me it was my turn to wilt beneath his furious, green-eyed gaze.

I was in the doghouse.

Although it was beyond me what he expected me to do when humans were falsely accusing me of murder. So far, telling them I was innocent hadn’t worked.

Martinez picked up the file and stalked out of the room, gathering his shredded dignity around him like a cloak. For an uptight and overworked detective, he definitely wasn’t the worst I had encountered. Perhaps, under different circumstances, I could have warmed to the man. He certainly believed in the work he did, and he genuinely wanted to make a difference. Or there had been a time when he’d wanted to make a difference. I had a feeling that his wife’s death had changed a lot more than just the state of his wardrobe.

The second the door slammed shut after Martinez left, Lunn turned on me with all the ferocity of which only he was capable.

“What are you doing here? If the Court finds out you murdered a human, they will kill you for certain.” His voice was whipcord-sharp as it lashed at me.

“You really think I murdered that woman? After everything, Lunn, you think I’ve gone mad and I’m killing humans willy-nilly?”

The accusation hurt. It hurt far more than I actually wanted to admit. I expected the Court to believe I was guilty, but for Lunn to believe it too? That cut me to the bone. Not that I could admit that to him, of course.

He hesitated, and his eyes were conflicted as they locked onto mine. “You wouldn’t tell me what was going on, Darcey, so what do you expect me to believe? I’m not the one keeping secrets.”

With a shake of my head, I dropped back against the seat. I didn’t need him here if he was only going to tell me that he didn’t believe me. That he didn’t believe in me.

“Why are you here?” I asked, rolling my shoulders back and straining against the cuffs.

“To get the truth. I’ve got to bring you in, and you know it.”

“I thought the Court didn’t know.” I snapped upright as panic hollowed out the centre of my gut.

“They don’t. Not yet, anyway, but we both know it’s only a matter of time before they do. If you come willingly and give your side of the events, they’re more likely to look on you favourably.”

“You must be out of your mind, Lunn, if you think I’m going anywhere with you.”

“You don’t have a choice, Darcey,” he said, reaching into his fitted suit jacket and pulling free a set of iron cuffs.

I remembered them from the first time I’d been forced to wear them, and I’d made a promise to myself then that it would never happen again. If he thought I was going to come quietly, willingly even, then he was in for a rude awakening.

“You’re not putting those cuffs on me, Lunn.” I lowered my voice in warning.

“Don’t make this harder,” he said, reaching toward me. There was something in his eyes, an emotion, telling me he didn’t really want to do. Perhaps he believed in me after all, and he just had to do his job. It wasn’t impossible idea, but it was still pretty unlikely.

Jerking my arms upwards, I snapped the metal cuffs already around my wrists, ripping the metal rod from the centre of the table with a resounding crack. Without hesitating, I threw myself backwards, rolling out over the top of my chair. I came to a crouched halt on the opposite side of the room.

“Darcey, please,” he said in a pained voice. “Don’t make me do this. Don’t make me hurt you.”

“Please, Lunn,” I said, my voice harsh with anger. “Don’t make this my fault. You’re the one who doesn’t need to do this. You’ve got a choice, and you know I don’t. If I don’t walk out of here a free woman, we both know I’ll never get the chance again. This time, the Court will kill me.”

He didn’t deny my words, but he also didn’t make a move toward me. I took that as a sign of agreement.

“If we fight, you will lose,” he said.

“Then don’t fight me.”

I straightened up and took a step forward, Lunn’s eyes locked onto mine as I advanced another step. I made it to the door before he opened his mouth to speak.

“How are you going to get past the cops without them knowing who you are?”

“By going unnoticed, which is easier than glamour for someone like me.” I tugged open the door that led to the rest of the police station.

My heart hammered in my chest as I stepped out into the corridor. I half expected one of the police officers to yell after me, sending the full wrath of the Falcon PD down on my head, but when nothing happened I picked up my pace.

It was one of my gifts as a banshee. There had been a time when I could have made myself entirely invisible, but that time was gone, my magic used up. But I still had this gift, and it was enough to make the humans look the other way as I hurried toward the exit.

It would only take one superstitious cop to see me for the magic to unravel.

After reaching the door, I stepped out into the sunshine and sucked in a deep breath. I could still feel Lunn’s eyes on me, but he was nowhere to be seen. He must have decided to give me the benefit of the doubt, but that would only last as long as the Court was unaware of my alleged actions.

Would he be punished?

Although the question caught me by surprise, it was the answer that really stole my breath. I didn’t want him to get hurt. I didn’t want him to suffer, and especially not because of me. Lunn might have been the type to place his unwavering faith in the Court of Faerie, but that didn’t make him bad, just a little blind to the damage that could be caused by so much power.

If he actually believed in me, that showed him to have a willingness of spirit I hadn’t thought possible.

Not that there was anything I could do to save Lunn. I couldn’t even fix my own mess. And that mess wasn’t going to get any smaller if I kept hanging around on the steps in front of the police station, just waiting for one observant human to notice I wasn’t where I was supposed to be.

Chapter Fifteen

I ducked down a side alley across the street, picking up my pace as soon as I was out of the main thoroughfare. All of my belongings were back in the police station, and I had no way of contacting Clary… Even worse, Clary had no way of contacting me if anything went wrong.

Racing out of the alley, I weaved through the mid-morning traffic, finally making it to Noree’s restaurant on the opposite side of the street.

The bell over the door jangled as I pushed inside and grabbed a booth nearest the counter without waiting for an invitation. Catching the eye of the dark-haired waitress, I waited for her to finish serving the customers at the desk before I waved her over.

“Shall I read you today’s specials?” she asked, her piercing blue eyes roaming over my face.

“Just bring me whatever today’s special is,” I said, “and tell Noree that Darcey needs to speak to her.”

The waitress paused, and I could practically see the cogs in her mind mulling over my request. Finally, she nodded and grabbed the menus from the middle of the table before hurrying toward the back kitchen.

The rich smell of food wafted back to me, and my stomach grumbled as I twisted the edge of the cream tablecloth around my fingers.

The waitress reappeared a few moments later and set down a large bowl in front of me. The blue eyes floating in the clear soup stared back at me. They were covered in grey film, and the light they’d once sparkled with had grown dim.

The waitress stood next to me, and I knew she expected me to protest, to push the bowl away in disgust, or vomit, or maybe do both at the same time. Clearly, she was new here and hadn’t yet learned all of Noree’s ways.

I fished out the nearest eyeball with a spoon and stared down at it.

“Katia, are you going to stand there all day or are you going to serve our other guests?” Noree’s voice rang out through the restaurant, jerking the waitress out of her fascination.

She scurried off as Noree dropped into the booth across from me. Her black glasses did nothing to hide the scarring on her face, and I knew the horror that lurked beneath the tinted shades.

“You have a lot of nerve turning up here, banshee,” Noree said, leaning across the table toward me.

“You already knew I was coming.” I gestured to the bowl of floating eyeballs.

It was Noree’s way of punishing me. The first time I’d ever seen her work—and the first time I’d ever seen her without her glasses—I’d been rude, staring at the gaping and still-bloodied sockets where her eyeballs should have been. I’d come close to getting sick when I’d realised the muscles and nerve endings in the sockets were moving as though her eyes were still attached.

“You wouldn’t be here if I wasn’t that good,” she said smartly, reaching into the bowl and drawing out one of the eyeballs.

“I need a new ward for my door,” I said. I’d brought the broken one with me today, but it was still back in the police station with the rest of my personal belongings.

“What happened to the one I gave you?” she asked, tilting her head to the side as she rolled the eyeball around in her fingers.

“It broke.” Noree remained silent, and I sighed. “A void broke it,” I admitted, leaning back against the aged red leather seat and crossing my arms over my chest.

“And you think I just pull these wards out of thin air, do you?”

“No, but I am willing to pay.”

Noree nodded and lifted her hand, making what looked like a rude gesture at the waitress standing on the other side of the room. The girl dropped the notebook she’d been using to take the diners’ orders and made a beeline for the back of the restaurant.

“I sense that’s not all you’re here for?” Noree returned her attention to me.

“I need to know if…” I trailed off. Years had passed since I’d last asked if the cage still stood, but the current events had raised my suspicions. Asking Noree to check to make sure that everything was as it should be wouldn’t be the worst idea in the world.

She hissed, dropping the eyeball with a wet plop onto the table as she fell back against her seat, her hands rapidly moving over her face and chest in a blessing. No sound came from her moving lips, but I still knew she was praying. Several heartbeats passed as I waited for her to calm down.

“You come here and ask that of me? When you yourself are capable of sensing?”

“Not anymore. It took everything I had just to bind it… I can’t tell one way or the other if it’s still doing what it’s supposed to be doing.” I buried my face in my hands.

“You got away lucky. I did not!” She tore the glasses from her face to the reveal her gaping wounds.

I could still remember her screams as he’d gouged her eyeballs from her head and eaten them.

“He took my sight, the very thing that makes me Rom,” she said, and I could feel the ache in her words.

“If I knew, I would have stopped him,” I answered.

Her injuries were my fault. I might not have inflicted them, but I may as well have— and I would have to live with that knowledge for the rest of my life. She had punished me because of my failure.

“Please, Noree, I’m worried.” I didn’t need to say anything else. I watched as the emotion on her face changed and she straightened up in her seat.

“You really think?”

I shrugged, despite knowing that she couldn’t actually see what I was doing.

“I really don’t know, but I also don’t want to take any chances. There’s some seriously weird shit going on, and I don’t know what’s at the root of it. If it’s him, then we need to know sooner rather than later.”

Noree grabbed my hand and dragged it across the table toward her. Her magic trickled beneath my skin like water, and I fought the urge to scratch until my nails pierced the skin.

“It’s secure,” she said, and I let out a sigh.

Part of me always feared that the day might come when he would find a way past the cage. And with how things were going at the moment, a small, nagging voice in the back of my head kept telling me everything was connected. Hearing that he was still trapped made it a little easier for me to breathe.

The waitress returned to the table and laid an object wrapped in black velvet in front of Noree.

“You said you could pay?” Noree stroked her fingers almost absentmindedly across the velvet.

I couldn’t see what was underneath, but I could feel its power—it was a hell of a lot stronger than the last ward I’d purchased from her.

“How much?” I asked.

“I could say something silly like your first born, but we both know that won’t hold water. So how about something simple, like the tears of true heartbreak.”

I stared at her, unable to stop the laugh that bubbled up from the back of my throat.

Noree’s head tilted to the side, and I knew I’d offended her.

“What good will that do you?” I asked. “I’ve got money… not much, but I can pay you in cash.”

She cut me off with a wave of her hand. “If you’re not going to take this seriously, then I’m not certain we can continue having this conversation.”

“I am taking it seriously. I fail to see what you will get out of it?”

I couldn’t remember anything from the lore mentioning tears from a true heartbreak. From where I stood, I was getting all of the ward’s benefit while Noree was getting nothing in return but some salty drops.

That, in itself, was enough to make me nervous. Noree was not the type to be messed with, and her actions all had motives. If she wanted my tears, there was a bloody good reason why. And that probably wouldn’t mean good things for everyone else.

“That is my business. Do we have a deal, or are you going to waste more of my time?”

It seemed so simple… too simple. I knew for a fact that nothing to do with Noree was ever simple, and yet… I stared down at the ward on the table and sighed before reaching out my hand.

There didn’t seem to be any logical reason not to give her my tears. Noree took my hand in hers, her grip firm and even, and for a moment nothing happened.

I jumped when her magic sparked across my skin, and a wide smile slid across Noree’s face.

“Don’t be so nervous… Perhaps I won’t ever get your tears.” Something in her tone told me she wasn’t being truthful.

That was the problem with those who weren’t Fae. They could lie and cheat, and yet I was bound by the laws that said all Fae must speak the truth or else face the Wild Hunt.

I’d seen what the Wild Hunt could do, and the thought of ever going up against it sickened me.

Noree released my hand and shoved the ward across the table. Scooping it up, I pushed up onto my feet and had just started to turn away from her when the sound of her clearing her throat made me pause.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” she asked sweetly. Too sweetly. She tilted her head, aiming her non-existent eyes in the direction of the bowl of floating eyeballs.

“Are you kidding me?” I asked.

“I don’t kid, Darcey. Only the goats do that.” She grinned up at me, and I grabbed a wad of dollars from my pocket and dropped it beside the bowl.

“You really need to work on your food,” I said in an acidic tone before stalking to the door.

“And you, child, need to work on your manners,” she called after me, but I could hear the smile in her voice.

Chapter Sixteen

Making my way back to the apartment, I contemplated Noree’s deal. Was she losing her touch? It seemed unlikely, but then she was older than I was so nothing was truly impossible.

Being without a cell phone made me anxious, so I picked up my pace, jogging through the streets toward the apartment. I could have called my motorbike, but it seemed like a waste of energy when Noree’s restaurant was only a few blocks away.

When I reached the edge of the pavement across from my apartment, magic prickled down the back of my neck. I peered up at the building, but couldn’t see anything wrong. That didn’t mean that everything was fine.

Sliding the ward beneath my jacket, I crossed the street and stepped into the building. Magic shimmered on the walls, making the air hard to breathe.

Had the witch hunters returned?

I took the stairs two at a time and was relieved to find the hall leading to the apartment much as I had left it. The sound of voices spilling out through the open doorway also told me my panic had been unfounded. However, it didn’t explain the spill of magic that filled the air.

Pausing in the doorway, I caught sight of Mazik standing with his back to me. Samira’s eyes met mine over his shoulder just as he ducked to the side to avoid one of Clary’s roots that burst up through the floorboards.

Considering we were on the eighth floor, her ability to call tree roots from the earth all the way up here was damn impressive.

“I swear I’m friends with Darcey,” Mazik said, his voice a little strained as he dodged another of Clary’s blows.

“Darcey doesn’t make friends with demons,” Clary shot back, the strain in her own voice palpable as she thrust her hand upwards and another root burst through the floor.

“You know you’re paying for that,” I said to no one in particular as I stepped into the apartment.

Clary turned her flashing violet eyes on me; the colour had completely swamped her eyes, swallowing her pupils until there was nothing but a shimmering mass of violet stars.

“I hope you’re not talking to me,” she said, her anger bubbling dangerously close to the surface.

“Nope,” I said, turning to face Mazik and raising my eyebrow. He swallowed his demon halfway with just the barest hint of a ripple across his skin, and his black eyes returned to normal between one breath and the next.

“I really don’t know why I bother,” he said irritably.

“Look, I’ve told you before what can happen if you come here uninvited,” I said with a smile. “Most of my friends are not exactly tolerant of your kind.”

“And you are?” Clary was incredulous. “Darcey, it’s a demon. You should know better.”

“I do, and we help each other out from time to time.” I could feel Clary’s disgust as it rumbled through the room like displaced thunder, the tension causing the air to crackle with enough electricity to power one of the neighbouring blocks.

“If he’s such a friend, then why not ask him to babysit?” she spat.

I was willing to bet she wasn’t this wound up just because of Mazik’s sudden appearance, but I didn’t have time to mollycoddle her feelings. Whatever was going on with her was still her business, and there was nothing I could do unless she was willing to share it with me.

“Why are you here, Mazik?” I asked, pinning him down with my stare.

“I came by to tell you there’s an arrest warrant out for you. Whoever or whatever you pissed off is determined to see you off the playing field.”

“I already know that. I just came from the cop shop. They don’t have anything on me.” I could sense something else in the room, unspoken words on the air, and I wanted to hold my breath.

“I don’t mean the human police,” he said warily, studying my face. “Both the Elite and the demons have a warrant on you. Someone sent in an anonymous tip.”

“Did guilt send you here, Mazik? Did you tell them about me?”

He shook his head, his eyes widening in his best attempt at pure innocence, but demons weren’t bound by the same laws as the Fae—he could lie if he wanted to. Hell, he was a demon, so lying was basically his stock and trade. Finding a demon who didn’t constantly lie was no mean feat, and if I was being honest, I didn’t really know enough about Mazik to be able to tell if every second word from his lips was or wasn’t a lie.

“I have no business with the Elite,” he said, “and I don’t exactly see eye to eye with my own kind.”

He sounded truthful, but I couldn’t be certain. The tension in the room was making the situation harder to read.

He cocked his head to the side and gave me an almost sad smile. “You still think I told them.”

I shrugged, and it was my turn to smile back at him. “You’d think I was a fool if I simply believed you.”

He contemplated my words for a moment and then nodded. “I just thought you should know. What you chose to believe and do with that information is up to you.” He turned for the door. “And next time your attack dog decides to try and make me a tree ornament, I won’t be so nice.”

He disappeared into the hall, whistling cheerfully to himself. If I were naive, I might have said his parting shot came from being hurt. He didn’t want to be seen as the bad guy, which didn’t fit with his image as a demon.

“Really, a demon?” Clary said as I turned back to the room.

“Do I tell you who you can be friends with?” I fought to keep my voice neutral.

Clary was my friend, and I knew she would have my back, but she was also incredibly powerful. Given the opportunity, she would without a doubt crush me beneath her boot. It was simply the way of the Fae—she was stronger than me, more powerful, and she outranked me. The Fae were incredibly good at taking offence at the least little thing, and Clary was no exception to the rule. It probably came from spending so many years in Faerie; many of them had forgotten how to interact with the human world, and some just didn’t care. I had always taken issue with their lack of respect for human life. As far as I was concerned, all life was important.

If she thought I was stepping outside my rank by questioning her, it just wasn’t worth the hassle.

“He helped Darcey last night,” Samira volunteered, and Clary’s expression changed but Samira had already spoken and the genie couldn’t go back in the bottle.

“You’re involved with a demon?” Clary exploded, and three more tree roots burst through the floorboards near me.

“No, I am not,” I said, carefully saying each word. I wanted to make sure Clary not only heard me, but also understood me. “I work as a private investigator, and he’s a useful informant.” I decided to keep all of his other uses to myself. Clary was beginning to act a little too much like my mother, and I was starting to get uncomfortable.

Clary shot me a sheepish glance before staring around at the mess her power had made of the apartment.

“I’m sorry, Darcey,” she said, bending low over the floor and pressing her hand to the splintered wood.

“We can pretend it’s ventilation,” I answered, pulling the ward from inside my jacket.

“I didn’t think you’d be able to get it,” Samira said, crossing the room and stepping over the broken floorboards and limp roots scattered about the place.

“I got it as soon as I left the police station,” I said, carrying the ward over to the door and pressing it to the wall above the door lintel.

The ward glowed red for an instant before the wall swallowed it whole. The moment it disappeared from sight, I felt the apartment heave a sigh of relief, as though it understood the importance of having protection against those who tried entering without consent. I let out my magic, feeling along the edges of the warding, and sucked in a deep breath. Noree had promised the ward would be powerful. I’d believed her, but the power I could feel was far beyond my wildest dreams. Nothing would come through the ward without first being invited, and I had the sneaking suspicion that even a void couldn’t derail its power.

Samira swayed on her feet, her eyes rolling back in her head, and I knew she was also feeling the ward.

“It’s so much,” she said, her voice high and breathy.

“It tastes like The Noree,” Clary said, biting down on her lips nervously.

“I didn’t know she had a particular flavour,” I said, pushing my magic back down inside where it belonged.

Clary closed her eyes for a second, and a shudder raced through her. The tree roots spilled across the floor, forcing me to jump out of the way as they snaked toward Clary. Samira was still lost in whatever sensing she was doing, and didn’t see the root snaking along the floor behind her feet.

Grabbing Samira’s hand, I jerked her out of the way. The root tore a hole in the floorboards where Samira had just been standing.

“Clary, what the hell are you doing?” I asked, as another root ripped into the floorboards, tearing through them like a shark through water.

She didn’t move, instead keeping her eyes closed as the roots twisted and spilled down to fill the gaps they’d created.

“She’s fixing the floor,” Samira said in awe as she watched Clary work.

It took only seconds for the roots to work their magic. The floor was whole again, and the spiralling patterns of the roots interlaced with one another to create an utterly unique pattern.

I took a step forward, half expected the floor to feel rough and uneven beneath my feet, but it was smooth—just another one of Clary’s tricks.

“I hope it’s all right,” Clary said, struggling to catch her breath.

“It’s perfect,” I said with a wide grin.

The building was derelict and I was its only resident, which suited me just fine—I didn’t need neighbours butting their noses into my business or getting caught up in my world when my work inevitably followed me home. It also meant situations like last night could occur without repercussions. The building hadn’t always been empty; other residents lived there when I first moved in, but humans found it hard to be around a banshee. They left one by one, repelled by what I was without ever knowing for sure why they felt so uneasy. Leaving was probably their instinct; nobody wanted to be near the very thing that could predict when they would die.

But because of that, the building was now in a state of disrepair. The paint was peeling, the floorboards were old and creaking… well, they had been old and creaking. Now the old ones were gone, replaced with something beautiful and living.

Clary smiled and flopped back against the wall, exhaustion etched into every line of her face.

“Clary, are you all right?” I stepped forward, but Samira had already beaten me to her side. She caught Clary and slid an arm around her waist before helping her across the floor to the couch.

“That shouldn’t have taken so much out of me,” Clary said, staring down at her hands. The fine tremor that ran through her fingers concerned me more than I cared to admit.

“Maybe you’re just a little rusty,” I said, choosing to ignore the obvious signs in front of me. I hadn’t noticed them before, or maybe I just didn’t want to see them. The leaves and blossoms in Clary’s hair were beginning to wilt. When I’d left the apartment earlier they’d been fine, but now…

One pink petal had fallen away from the blossoms that adorned her head and lay awash in the sea of green that was Clary’s hair.

Clary gave me a wide smile, but I could tell by the slight flinching around her eyes that she didn’t believe it either.

“What did The Noree ask for in exchange for a ward that strong?” Clary asked. I knew from her expression that she wanted to change the subject, and who was I to deny her?

“The tears of true heartbreak.” It sounded even more ridiculous when I said it aloud, and I fought back the urge to laugh.

“What does that even mean?” Clary asked, and I shook my head.

I had just about as much of an idea of what Noree wanted as Clary did. Perhaps even less of an idea, since I hadn’t spent as much time in Faerie acquainting myself with everything there was to know about the Fae and their abilities.

“Honestly, you know as much as I do, and I was sitting there with her.”

“But you can be sure it’s something powerful, or she wouldn’t want it. There’s no way she handed something like that off to you without believing she’d get paid.”

As soon as the words left Clary’s mouth, I knew she was right. Noree would never have given me something so powerful without believing she would get something equally, if not more, powerful out of the deal. And as this was all she asked for… Well, the tears of true heartbreak must really be worth something.

Clary’s colour was beginning to return, and she pushed up onto her feet, her stance far steadier than it had been just moments ago.

“I need to be getting back,” she said, and started for the door. I had a feeling her departure had much more to do with wanting to find out what her strange weakness had been about.

I opened my mouth, but the look on Clary’s face told me that asking her to stay a little longer would be utterly pointless, so I gave up. However, her leaving left me with the little issue of what I would do with Samira. I definitely couldn’t take her with me…

“She’s more capable than you give her credit for,” Clary said, still standing in the broken doorway. Considering her reaction when she’d first arrived, I was surprised to hear her praise for Samira. It seemed a leopard could change its spots…that, or Samira was really just that charming.

“You haven’t seen the guys coming after her,” I said, remembering the dead witch hunters. Their presence made Samira’s power more of a liability than anything else, and it would only take one mistake for them to get their way and kidnap her or worse. They’d come close last night—I’d felt it in my bones—and the last thing I wanted was to get that feeling again.

“Trust her,” Clary said seriously, the expression in her eyes trying to convey a message that I didn’t understand. With a shake of her head, she smiled. “By the way, sorry about the kitten fur…” She turned to leave with a giggle.

“What kitten fur?” I said, but Clary was already halfway down the corridor. The only answer I got from her was a hand above her head as she waved goodbye.

“Samira, what does she mean by ‘sorry for the kitten fur?’” I turned to catch sight of a sheepish Samira, who merely pointed toward my closed bedroom door. “You didn’t…” I said, striding forward.

“I didn’t have a choice… Clary really doesn’t like cats.” I pushed open the bedroom door to find the tiny marmalade terrorist curled up on the bed. The pile of clean clothes I’d left in the middle of the bed was now unmistakably dotted with tufts of orange fur.

The kitten stared up at me with its little emerald eyes and mewled, the cry going straight through me. I closed the door again before it could make its move toward me.

“Remind me the next time Clary is here to let the cat sharpen its nails on her legs,” I said bitterly, and Samira covered her face with her hand. I knew she was laughing, and I left her standing near the bedroom as I stomped off in disgust to find a suitable door.

Chapter Seventeen

After setting the last screw in place, I swung the door gently back and forth, satisfied with my effort. It was far from perfect, but it was a door; combined with the ward, it kept everyone from wandering in, and that was all I needed.

Closing the door, I turned to find Samira staring at me.

“You’re not going to leave me here alone again.” She folded her arms across her chest.

“You’ll stay if you know what’s good for you.”

“And we both know how well that worked out last night,” she answered with a ferocity I hadn’t been expecting.

“Look, I’ve got some people to see and it’s not exactly safe—” Samira cut me off with a shake of her head.

“I can help; I’m not entirely helpless. I hid your friend MacNa from those who came after him.”

“But I still found you,” I said with a smile.

Samira let out a small, frustrated groan and threw her hands into the air. “I appreciate that you’re trying to keep me safe, but I need to stop hiding. I need to stop always allowing them to dictate my life…” She cut off, her voice choked, and when she lifted her gaze to me I could see tears glittering in her eyes. “They killed Ana. I cannot let that go unanswered.”

I couldn’t begin to understand what she was feeling. She had lost someone, someone dear to her heart, and she was holding herself together remarkably well. That, I could admire and understand. I knew what it was like to be hanging on by your fingernails. I also knew what it was like to want revenge on those who had wronged you. I’d faced my demons, so who was I to deny her the right to do the same?

“Fine,” I said with a sigh.

She stared at me, as though expecting me to change my mind or perhaps add conditions to my acceptance, but I didn’t have any. If she believed she could hold her own against her enemies, I had no real reason to doubt her. After all, she’d survived thirty years in captivity. I wasn’t going to put any restrictions on her; the moment I did that, I became no better than the men who had held her prisoner for so long.

Her lip wobbled, and I could tell she was biting back more tears, but she nodded briskly.

“I need to go to the Archers’ house,” I said. Seeing her confused expression reminded me that I hadn’t told her about the case.

“They’re the people who shot me, the ones who framed me for murder.” I crossed the room to a small table in the corner. I tugged open a drawer and found a pair of earplugs. “You might need these,” I said, tossing the packet back across the room to her.

“What for?”

“Banshee, remember? Screaming is kind of my deal, and you’ve already had more than your fair share of exposure to that side of my power.” What I didn’t tell her was that too much exposure would cause her to slowly haemorrhage to death. Or she would suffer a brain aneurism; the pitch my voice could reach had a nasty effect on the delicate blood vessels that kept humans alive.

Her eyes widened, but she didn’t protest. People usually did. Nobody liked the sound of my scream, but for some reason they always forgot just how painful and damaging it truly was. Samira’s willingness to take my word for what was best made her one smart cookie.

“There’s something else you’re not going to like,” I said.

Samira didn’t speak. She continued watching me, clearly waiting for me to spit out the bad news.

“Little issue of transport…” I said, and Samira’s expression fell.

I felt bad, but there was nothing I could do about it. I needed the bike with me, particularly for something like this. It was the only thing I could trust to protect the Bone Blade if anything happened to me. The bike would ensure the Bone Blade couldn’t be used against me.

“I’m sorry, but—” I began, but Samira shook her head. Rolling back her shoulders, she met my gaze with her steady, brown-eyed one.

“It’s fine. If I want to go, then I need to get over my fear.”

I didn’t question her—it wouldn’t have been right, and I’d only be putting more doubts in her mind that she really didn’t need. If she was willing to swallow back her fear, then who was I to interfere?

“Good, just let me get one thing and we’re good to go.” I moved toward the bedroom.

I sighed when I stepped through the door and eyed the sleeping ball of fur on the bed. Creeping toward the wardrobe, I swung open the door and popped out the wall insert, lifting the blade free from its hiding spot. It didn’t glitter in the light, or do any of the usual crap you’d imagine with a blade of such power. It sat in my hand, solid and reliable, the colour muted by age, the heavily-carved handle slowly turning black through use.

Running my finger along the edge, I winced as it bit into my skin. The wound healed instantly, but my violet blood glistened along the razor-sharp edge before the bone drank it down, sucking it in through its pores. The energy I’d felt when I’d picked it up thrummed to life in my grip, causing me to suck a deep, hissing breath in through my teeth. The power called to me, urging me to abandon my plans and do what I was born to do. I was the harbinger, not some petty errand boy for the Faerie Court… There was nothing greater than I.

Get a grip Darcey, that’s not what you do anymore.

The voice in the back of my head held a note of desperation, and for a moment I wavered. It would be so easy to ignore it, to take the blade and my calling back into my own hands and answer only to the true Death.

The ginger ball of fluff on the bed stretched and caught my eye, its green eyes filled with surprising intelligence. It meowed at me, a plaintive cry that reminded me of everything I’d lost. That single moment of doubt was enough to break the power of the blade, and I blinked back my tears. Everything I was, everything I had been, was gone, truly gone. I would no longer honour the banshees who had gone before me.

Scrubbing the back of my hand across my eyes, I swallowed back my tears and tucked the blade into the sheath clipped onto my belt. Passing by the bed, I paused next to the kitten; its green eyes never left my face.

“Thanks,” I said grudgingly, brushing my fingers across the top of its head, the fur soft beneath my fingers.

The kitten mewled in response, and I shook my head as it curled up on the bed.

“Don’t get too comfortable,” I told it, moving toward the door. “As soon as this is over with, you’re going back to whoever sent you.”

I’d come to the conclusion that the only possible solution was that someone had sent the kitten to me. It was clearly an intelligent being, and there was something so familiar about its eyes that I should have known who sent it. But whoever that was would be taking back the kitten as soon as I cleared up the mess I had found myself in.

Chapter Eighteen

The motorcycle’s engine died as it rolled to a stop a couple of houses down from the where the Archers lived. The last thing I needed was to get busted before getting close to them, so parking at a distance from their house seemed like the best idea.

I climbed down from the bike and waited for Samira, who seemed utterly unstable on her feet, the fine tremble running through her body giving away her terror. Pushing down the kickstand, I gestured for her to follow, and we crept down the street toward the Archers’ oversized mansion.

The street was quiet, and the black iron railings that surrounded each of the houses set my teeth on edge. Climbing the fence was going to suck, but I pushed the thought aside as we neared the house.

The Archers’ house was also surrounded by black iron railings, and a shudder raced down my spine when I saw that the tops were shaped into pointed spikes. I could practically feel the damage they could do if I was caught unawares. The house was made of red brick, and it rose above the trees that lined the boundary of the property. The interior lights blazed bright enough to spill out onto the driveway and surrounding lawns giving the appearance of daylight.

The crackle of a walkie-talkie ground my progress to a halt, and I held out an arm to keep Samira from passing me. Peering in through the gateway, I quickly caught sight of the police cars and several other unmarked security vehicles.

The place was a hive of activity. Security officers in dark suits scurried back and forth with the uniformed officers.

Great. I was good—and there was a time I had been great—at getting in and out of places unseen, but that time was gone. I could practically feel their attention already trained on me. The atmosphere of nervous tension made it impossible for me to try out the same trick I’d pulled off at the police station. They were on the lookout for me, and my ability relied heavily on going unnoticed.

With a sigh, I took a step backwards and flopped against the rough bark of a nearby tree.

“What is it?” Samira whispered, attempting to peer around me.

“There are too many guards. I’ll never get past them all without getting seen, and I’d rather not start a fight with that many innocents…” It was an act; I was only concerned about getting overwhelmed by their sheer numbers and making a mistake. I didn’t feel like dying at the hands of the humans and their weapons. I also didn’t fancy dying and leaving Samira alone to fend for herself. My body wouldn’t even be cold when the bald, tattooed creeps would come a knocking for her once more.

She stared past me and then dropped back into the shadows with a nervous that caused my stomach to knot.

“If we can get a little closer, I might be able to help,” she said, chewing her lip.

“Help how? Because I’m telling you now… if it involves you being the distraction, the answer is no.”

“I wouldn’t really be the distraction; it’s more what I can conjure…” She glanced anxiously over my shoulder in the direction of the house.

“What can you conjure?” I asked. The idea made me uneasy; conjured creatures were tough to manage and tended to be unpredictable.

“My mother taught me to call the Hortlak. This was long before I ended up in the hands of the witch hunters.”

What the hell was a Hortlak? I cast my mind back over all of the monsters and creatures I’d ever come across, but I couldn’t remember ever stumbling over something with a name so unusual that I certainly would have remembered it.

“Well, what is it?” I asked, my curiosity failing to dispel the nervous energy gathering in my core.

“The Hortlak are the spirits of the dead—evil spirits of the dead, twisted, and dark.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea…it sounds like something begging to go wrong,” I said, but Samira was already shaking her head.

“It’s safe. My mother taught me how to bind it to me, and what other choice do you have? You said it yourself, Darcey: you’re not going to get past them without something drawing their attention.”

She was right, of course, and I hated it. “You’re sure you can control this thing?” She nodded, but judging from the audible sound she made as she swallowed I wasn’t entirely convinced.

“If this goes wrong, how do we put it down?” I said, imagining the creature breaking through the bond Samira would create.

“It won’t.”

“But if it does. Come on, humour me.”

“If it breaks free, it will feed until it is satisfied… and the Hortlak have an insatiable appetite.”

“Great.” I dropped my hands down by my sides. The Hortlak sounded just like every other mindless creature lurking within Faerie. Except that by the sounds of this thing, cold iron wasn’t going to do jack-shit against it.

“So it can’t be stopped?” I said. If that were true, no way was I going to let her conjure it. I was just going to have to be smarter than the humans wandering around outside the Archers’ house—and considering I’d been around a hell of a lot longer than any of them, coming up with an alternative plan shouldn’t be that difficult.

“It’s vulnerable when it feeds—that’s when it can be killed. Iron will work against it just as it does on any spirit, but only when its guard is down and it has begun the feed.”

Her words sent a nervous shiver down my spine.

“We don’t have a choice, Darcey, and I can do this, I swear.” She suddenly sounded sure of her abilities, and for a moment I could feel a flicker of the emotion that coursed in her veins. She wanted to help, wanted to be considered useful, and who was I to doubt her abilities? She was no Shadow Sorceress, but she was still a damn strong witch. She had a hell of a lot more magic than I did, so why did I feel as though I could throw my weight around and dictate to her what she could and could not do?

“Fine,” I grumbled. “But for the record, I have a really bad feeling about this.” Samira’s expression brightened, only to be quickly replaced by one filled with nervous tension.

“Right, I need to get closer,” she said, moving stealthily toward the iron railing. I watched her grab the bars and hoist her body toward the sharp points that lined the top of the fence. She balanced for a moment on the top, and I sucked in my breath as her arms wobbled. I watched her draw up her leg, and I let out the breath I was holding as she jammed her foot between the spikes, giving her enough leverage to boost her body over the top.

She landed almost soundlessly; I only heard her because my hearing was better than that of any humans. When she peered at me through the fence, I felt my stomach flip. This was going to hurt…

I loped across the pavement and scaled the fence in two bounds, flipping soundlessly over the top. My hands burned and the smell of singed flesh tingled my nose, and I cringed when I saw the blackened welts that had sprung up on my skin.

“What was that?” Samira whispered, staring down at my hands.

“Iron doesn’t mix well with the Fae,” I said, shrugging off the pain with a roll of my shoulders. “It’ll heal.” I hid my hands and gestured for Samira to move ahead of me. She opened her mouth to protest, but I shook my head. “Seriously, it’s fine. I’ve had worse, and we’ll both have worse if we get caught here.”

She glanced nervously in the direction of the guards’ noisy voices as they patrolled outside the house, then nodded before taking off through the trees. She moved like she could see through the dark, and I followed her without a sound.

I tapped her shoulder as soon as I realised we were drawing dangerously close to the side of the house. Samira nodded her understanding. After another couple of steps, she came to a halt. I could make out the red brick of the house through the trees; the floodlights cast the house in odd shadows that made me wonder if the Archers had more than just cops guarding them.

Samira dropped to the ground, digging her hands into the dirt. The second her fingers were buried in the soil, I felt her magic rising. It prickled along the edges of my skin, raising the hairs so they stood to attention.

“Shit,” I muttered, reaching out to stop Samira. If I could feel her power, so could any humans who were sensitive to magic.

The second my hand brushed her arm, I regretted it. The Hortlak was close; I could practically feel it swimming upwards through the dirt. It felt so much anger, pain, and resentment toward the living. I felt its desire to feed, to feast on those nearby whose heartbeats thundered on the air like the clamour of hooves.

The Hortlak broke through the ground, and Samira fell away from its groping hands. It clawed and fought against the dirt, its rotted flesh sloughing away from its face in chunks as the earth herself seemed to fight back, desperate to keep the Hortlak where it belonged.

Once it was chest-high out of the ground, Samira surged forward and thrust her hand against its mouth. The creature didn’t waste any time sinking its teeth into her soft flesh.

“Jesus Christ,” I said, diving forward, an iron blade sliding from my belt and into my hand.

“No!” Samira turned to face me, her agony visible in her eyes, and my stomach churned as the sound of the Hortlak feeding met my ears. “Don’t. It has to be this way. I must be worthy.” Her eyes rolled in her head as the Hortlak’s frenzied feeding intensified.

Samira returned her attention to the beast that was still halfway out of the ground. “Stop.” The creature made no move to halt its feeding, and Samira wavered on her knees.

“Dur!” she said, her voice ringing with power. “Duy beni. Duy sesimi!”

I knew from my paltry knowledge of languages that she was speaking Turkish, but I had no idea what she was saying. But the creature understood, because its frenzied feeding halted when she spoke.

It glared at her, the dark, empty sockets where the eyeballs should have been holding an intelligence that should have been impossible. But, then again, in all my time as a banshee I’d seen some pretty impossible things, and they didn’t surprise me like they once had.

“Heed my words, you will not feast upon anyone but me. No other blood shall pass your lips. You are mine until I command otherwise.” This time she spoke in English.

The Hortlak didn’t like her words, and began struggling against the ground, its anger palpable.

“Duy beni!” Samira repeated, and the Hortlak ceased its struggles. Silence flooded over us, and the ground in which it was buried flowed upwards, freeing the creature from its bonds. It wore no clothes. Each pitted hole in its skin was exposed to the air, each muscle and tendon visible to the naked eye. What little skin it had was almost gelatinous; pieces of it slipped down its body in heavy lumps. No remnants of cloth covered its rotted form, and I couldn’t help but wonder where exactly Samira had conjured it from.

The Hortlak pushed up onto its feet, mirroring Samira’s movements. She didn’t need to speak again; the creature turned away from her and moved in the direction of the guards.

“Samira, I don’t want anyone to get hurt,” I said, remembering the way it had fed on her hand.

“It won’t. It knows its only job is to create a distraction, frighten them but not hurt them.” She watched as it shambled out from between the trees.

There was something off about its movements, and part of me knew that the intelligence I had glimpsed in its dark, eyeless sockets caused it to appear weaker than it truly was.

Casting a glance back over at Samira, I noticed her wobble on her feet again. “Let me see your hand,” I said, crossing to where she stood.

“It’s fine,” she protested, but I grabbed her arm and stared down at the ragged wound the Hortlak had created whilst she was trying to bind it with her power.

“It’s not fine. If you pass out, what happens to the Hortlak?” I imagined in horror the thing rampaging through the guards.

“Good point,” she said, giving in without much of a fight. I could tell that she was way more hurt than she was willing to share, but I needed to keep her conscious and in one piece so she could put that thing down once we were done.

The air split with a scream, and I knew the Hortlak had reached its targets. The first scream was quickly joined by another, and then the sound of gunfire cut through the panicked babble of voices.

“We need to move! We’ll get something to bind that inside.” I helped Samira through the trees and out onto the gravel path that led to the back of the house.

I glanced toward the front of the house to where the Hortlak shambled after a fallen guard. The other guards were gathered behind their cars, guns out and firing at the creature, but each bullet that struck its target was merely absorbed into the Hortlak’s body.

“Shit,” I muttered to myself, and turned away from the unfolding scene. I could taste the terror on the air, and the Unseelie side of me desperately wanted to join the fight. We reached a set of double doors that opened out onto the small patio where we stood, and my stomach churned uncomfortably. My Unseelie side might have wanted to join in the fun, but the essence of what I was, the harbinger, could feel death in the air like a familiar embrace. I couldn’t figure out if I was just feeling the Hortlak’s presence, the Hortlak, or if before the night was over death would come again.

Chapter Nineteen

The glass doors opened easily to a dark, silent room cast in the orange glow of the floodlights that lit the garden. Samira’s pained breaths cut through the stillness, and I moved ahead to where the door opened onto a dark corridor.

The house was eerily silent, but when I closed my eyes and opened my senses I could feel the terrified heartbeats of those who occupied it. I’d met the Archers, which made them easier to pick out among the cacophony of tiny human sounds.

I found the kitchen and grabbed a dry cloth from a hook near the counter. I tossed it to Samira and waited for her to wrap her hand in it before directing her to follow me toward the sweeping staircase in the hall.

The staircase creaked, and the heartbeats of those in the house ratcheted up. That was the strange thing about humans—they had a sixth sense for impending doom, and yet none of them ever seemed to act on it. I was driven by my instincts, and that innate instinct to survive overrode all my other thoughts. The noises were louder on the second floor, and I heard the sound of a gun’s safety being switched off long before I came face to face with the first guard.

Pressing back into the shadows, I waited for him to step out of the bedroom where everyone seemed to be hiding. His hands shook as he held the gun, and for a split second I almost felt sorry for him. Everyone knew that monsters existed, but all the monsters I knew did their level best to police their own kind, thus reducing their interactions with humans as much as possible. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to stare out the window at something that should never have existed, and knowing that the worst possible outcome meant that I would have to face it.

I wrapped my arms around his neck as he passed me in the shadows, applying just enough pressure to cut off his air supply. He never made a sound as his body went limp in my grip. He wasn’t dead, and when Samira glanced over at me with a wide-eyed look I shook my head.

“Stay here,” I whispered, my voice so low that it took a moment for her to understand.

She nodded, and I moved toward the bedroom door. The guard I’d just knocked out didn’t have iron bullets—the smell wasn’t something I could miss, especially in such close proximity to him—but that didn’t mean Mrs Archer wasn’t still packing Fae-killing bullets.

Reaching the door, I didn’t hesitate, and my booted foot drove the wood into the soft plaster of the wall with a loud crack. I dived into the room, and the remaining two guards lay at my feet in a matter of seconds. The Archers were now the only ones left, and Nancy held the same gun she’d used on me the previous night.

“If you come any closer, I will shoot,” she said.

“You’ll be dead before you ever get the chance,” I answered, my skin crawling as I remembered the iron bullet’s damage.

Her hands shook, and the gun rattled in her grip. “Mrs Archer, put the gun down, I just want to talk,” I said, this time with a placating tone. I needed to be careful or else she might accidentally pull the trigger, and I really didn’t feel like digging another one of those bullets out of my body.

“You killed them,” she said, her eyes flicking to the two motionless guards.

That one slip of her attention was all I needed, and I darted toward her, my hand closing around the gun before she had the chance to tighten her finger and pull the trigger. A small scream escaped her lips as she fell away from me, leaving me with the gun in my hands.

“I don’t want to die,” she said.

“I’m not here to kill you. I just want to know who told you about me. Who told you I was Fae?”

She shook her head, her face ashen, and darted a glance at the bed. Henry Archer lay beneath the covers, his face as pale as hers, the deep purple circles beneath his closed eyes standing out in stark relief against the rest of his face. His breaths were deep and even, but something about his appearance set all the alarm bells in my head ringing.

“He was fine last night. What happened?”

“She came back…” Nancy’s voice broke across the words.

“Who came back?”

“I didn’t know what you were, I swear I didn’t. I didn’t even know what she was, and she promised me a way to get rid of Martina… and that’s all I wanted, not this. I wanted my husband back, I wanted a fresh start for us…” She babbled on, the snippets I could make sense of causing the hairs to stand on the back of my neck.

“Who is she?” I asked again, keeping the question simple, as though I were talking to a child.

“She’s like you… Or at least she looks a little like you… her hair… and when she screamed, Henry just collapsed…”

My stomach dropped and my heartbeat thundered in my chest. It couldn’t be. It wasn’t possible. Well, it was, but it didn’t make any sense. I crossed the floor and leaned over the bed.

“Leave him alone, you’ve done enough!” Her voice was bordering on hysteria.

Lifting one bruised eyelid, I stared down into what had once been Henry Archer’s blue eyes. There was no white left in them; trauma had caused the blood vessels in his eyes to burst. A small, bloody tear trickled down the side of his cheek. The iris was ruined, the blue split by the capillaries and turning what had probably been a very attractive set of eyes into little more than a ruined mess. Turning his head gently to the side, I caught sight of the dried blood encrusted on the inner rim of his ear.

Whoever she was had done just enough to cause permanent brain damage.

Nancy Archer might have wanted a fresh start for her marriage, but I was pretty sure this wasn’t what she’d had in mind.

She slammed into me, her fists crashing against my back It didn’t hurt; there was no strength behind it. Turning toward her, I caught her hands and pushed her firmly backwards.

“This wasn’t me,” I said calmly, but she shook her head and continued to sob. “This isn’t my fault. You asked me to find your husband, and I took that job in good faith. You set me up, so everything that happened after that is on you.” My words were harsh, but true. I hadn’t caused any of this to happen, so why the hell couldn’t I shake the feeling of guilt that was trying to claw its way up the back of my throat?

“Will he recover?” she asked, scrubbing the back of her hand across her eyes like a small child. Except a small child wouldn’t have worn so much eye makeup that was now smeared across her cheeks.

I shook my head. What had happened to Henry Archer was beyond cruel. There would be no recovery…and if the legends were true, then as he lay there, silent as the grave, he could still hear the terrifying wail that had reduced him to this husk.

“Is he suffering?” Her words caught me off guard, as though she’d managed to pluck the thoughts straight from my head.

“If the stories are true, then yes…” She covered her mouth with her hand, muffling the sounds of her sobs. “But I cannot say with any real certainty.”

Crossing the room to his side, she dropped onto the bed next to him, her hand tracing down the side of his cheek. “I’m so sorry…” she sobbed.

“Who told you to contact me?” I asked. “Who gave you the gun?”

“She didn’t give me her name,” Nancy said, continuing to stroke her husband’s face.

A frustrated sigh escaped me, and I balled my hands into fists. At the rate I was going, I would find no answers, and whoever tried to have me killed would be free to try again.

“But she asked me to meet with a man, and he was the one who supplied me with the gun…” She trailed off, and I fought the urge to shake the answer from her. “She called him Mac-something… I can’t really remember…”

My heart sank. “It wasn’t MacNa, was it?”

“Yes, I met him down on Castle Street.”

Castle Street wasn’t anywhere near where I’d confronted him, but it wasn’t far from the bar Clary had told me to check out. Just what the hell was MacNa doing working with another banshee? And not just any banshee, but one who apparently wanted me dead?

“Is there anything you can do? Can’t you reverse what she did to him?”

I shook my head and focused in on a second bloody tear trailing down Henry’s cheek. The more I focused on him, the more I could feel his torment. He was locked within his own head, trapped with the wail of the banshee until his body finally gave up. If his heart was strong, it would be some time before he was granted that kind of reprieve.

“Why didn’t she just kill him?” she asked, turning to face me.

“I don’t know, I guess she wanted you both to suffer.” I didn’t have the answers, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t do what I was meant to.

“I can ease his passage.” The words fell from my lips before I had the chance to stop them.

“Kill him?” Her eyes widened.

“I wouldn’t kill him. I would invite death to take him… It works on those who are close to the end, whose suffering is too great to endure. I intercede on their behalf.”

She hesitated, contemplating my words before finally shaking her head. “No, it feels too much like giving up.”

An agonised scream split the air, and I turned to find Samira standing in the doorway, her expression strained.

“I don’t know how it broke free, Darcey, it shouldn’t have happened…” I knew what she meant without asking her to elaborate.

“Shit,” I yelled, racing for the door. I pushed past Samira and took the stairs two at a time. The screaming hadn’t stopped, but it had changed—it sounded wetter, more frantic, and I knew without having to lay eyes on the scene what was happening. Ripping open the front door, I stared out at the driveway. The cop cars’ lights cast an odd glow on the driveway, which only served to brighten and highlight the spill of fresh blood across the gravel.

I followed the trail of smeared blood until I found what I was looking for. The creature it lifted its dark, soulless gaze to me, the lower half of its rotted face covered in the bright blush of crimson blood. And for one painful second, I could have sworn it smiled at me.

Samira squeezed through the doorway, and the creature’s weighty gaze fell on her. What remained of its lips peeled back from its mouth as it snarled before snatching the still-struggling form of the man it had been feeding on and dragging him away into the trees surrounding the property.

Chapter Twenty

“I said this was a bad idea.” I wasn’t really addressing Samira, more voicing my thoughts aloud, but from the way she stiffened next to me I knew she’d taken my words personally.

“It shouldn’t have been able to break free. I don’t know what happened…”

“Creatures like that are unpredictable. You were hurt and—” She cut me off with a wave of her hand.

“Don’t make excuses for me. This is my fault.”

Biting my tongue, I turned to stare out at the injured cops and guards that surrounded us.

“I think we’ve got bigger problems,” I said as I heard a bullet being loaded into the chamber of a nearby gun. Lifting my hands slowly, I tried to look as unthreatening as possible.

“We can help. I can catch that thing if you’ll just let me.” I allowed my voice to carry over the sudden silence.

“We’re supposed to arrest you on sight,” a voice called from the crowd of hostile officers. “You’re the banshee that escaped from custody this morning.”

“Yup. And none of that matters one little bit right now. That thing that just dragged your friend off into the night? It’s not going to stop with just him. It’ll come back for the rest of you, and then it will start on civilians. I’m telling you now—I can catch it. I can stop it.”

I sounded way more confident than I actually felt. Samira said the Hortlak could only be stopped with an iron blade while feeding, and from the look of glee I had just seen on its face I wasn’t going to count on it holding still long enough for me to send it back to Hell where it belonged.

“There was another who looked like you,” the voice from the crowd said. “She said something to it, and it went nuts and started ripping into anyone it could reach. How do we know you won’t make it worse?”

My stomach churned. I was really getting sick of my doppelganger showing up and screwing with my life. Being framed for murder was certainly bad enough, but being suspected of setting a Hortlak loose on a group of unsuspecting cops was something else entirely.

“That wasn’t me. I have no interest in letting it hurt you or anyone else.” I left out the part where Samira and I had been the ones to raise it.

A rumble of dissension ran through the men and women surrounding us before one of the cops stepped forward. He moved with a limp, and as he came closer I could see why. The creature hadn’t just decided to chow down on one of the officers; I could tell from the torn leg of his pants and the ragged bites on his calf that it had tasted him before moving on.

“Go, stop it,” he said. “Stop it before there’s nothing left of Benny to bring back to his wife and kids.”

He didn’t need to ask me twice, and I spun on my heel and started after the creature. Samira wasn’t far behind me, and the sound of footsteps indicated she wasn’t the only one following me into the darkness.

Pausing next to the tree line, I turned to face Samira and the handful of cops who were able to follow me. It was a ragtag bunch who didn’t look capable of taking down a shoplifter, never mind a hungry Hortlak.

“It’s too dangerous,” I said to Samira. “You need to stay here.”

She shook her head, drawing a frustrated sigh from me.

“This is my fault. I need to set it right.”

“I don’t want to have to worry about that thing hurting you,” I said. “I can heal. You’re still human, and I can move faster alone. Time is of the essence here.”

She started to shake her head again, but I silenced her with a glance. “I need you out here to protect the others. If this thing gets away from me and circles back, you can trap it.” It was a stretch. I had no idea if she could actually trap it, but considering she’d conjured and bound it to herself in the first place, I was hedging my bets.

Her expression was unhappy, but I didn’t care. I’d much rather be unhappy than dead any day of the week, and if she followed me into the darkness with that thing on the loose, dead was all she would be.

“Fine,” she said.

“Keep the rest of them here too,” I said, before turning and disappearing into the trees.

Angry shouts followed me, but they were quickly swallowed up by the dense trees.

The wet, gurgling screams of the Hortlak’s victim had stopped, leaving me with no clear sense of direction.

“Need some help?” Lunn’s voice came out of the darkness, and I sprang sideways like a startled cat.

“I could have stabbed you,” I said, readjusting my grip on the Bone Blade that had just magically materialised in my hand.

“I trust you not to try something so foolish.” The humour in Lunn’s voice was unmistakable. His green and gold eyes glittered in the darkness and were the only part of him I could make out. Staring at him a little harder, I could just make out the shimmering edges of the glamour he was using to bend what little light there was around his body to conceal himself from human eyes.

“I don’t need help, especially not from someone who only a few hours ago was going to hand me over to the Faerie Court for something I didn’t even do.”

Lunn laughed, the sound wrapping around me and sending a shiver of warmth sliding deep into my core.

“You’re not particularly forgiving, are you?”

“Nope.”

“Well I’m here now, so I may as well help.”

“Suit yourself,” I said, creeping forward.

“You’re going the wrong way. Can’t you smell the blood?”

I halted and sighed. “I wasn’t once worshiped as a god of war and destruction, so I can’t say I’ve really honed my bloodhound tendencies.”

He didn’t answer. His shoulders grew tense as he turned and moved through the trees in the opposite direction. Clearly, he wasn’t the type who could take it as good as he could dish it.

Catching up and then moving past him, I stretched my legs as my pace picked up. I focused my attention on the only thing that mattered. A loud crack filled the air, sending a shiver of revulsion racing down my spine. I’d have known the sound of bones breaking anywhere; I still had nightmares about the sounds of my own dry bones snapping beneath the ministrations of the Faerie Court punishers.

Lunn’s hand caught me beneath my elbow, and he drew me backwards. “There’s no point in racing in there. The human is already dead.” He drew in a deep breath that sent the gold in his eyes spiralling down until his pupils were nothing more than two tiny pinpricks of black light.

“True, but the Hortlak has to die.” I reluctantly attempted to shake off his grip.

“Do you have an iron blade on you?” he asked.

“I always do.” I drew the blade from the protective leather sheath I’d had made especially for it. The last thing I needed was for the sheath to split and the iron to burn through my skin. Singed flesh had a particular aroma, and when you were out chasing down rogue Fae, staying inconspicuous was always an asset.

Lunn’s eyes widened as he stared down at the sharpened blade that was almost as long as his forearm. The handle was wrapped in soft leather and sealed with one of Noree’s enchantments, which allowed me to hold it without having to worry about getting hurt. Of course, if I found myself on the wrong side of the blade, like any of the Fae I hunted, it would kill me just as it would any of the iron-cursed.

Pulling free of Lunn’s grip, I broke through the cover of the trees and into the small clearing where the Hortlak had chosen to finish its meal. My stomach rolled as I caught sight of it gnawing on one end of what had once been a leg, but I buried my thoughts and took a step toward the creature.

The Hortlak tossed the limb aside and darted toward me, its upper body contorting and twisting around at the waist. It scuttled forward on all fours like some sort of possessed crab. I drew up the blade, but the Hortlak leaped, catching one of the trees before launching itself past my shoulder.

Before I could turn to face it once more, the Hortlak landed on my back, driving me face-first into the dirt. I felt its loose, rotten teeth sink into my shoulder and drive against my collar bone, causing a ragged scream to tear from my lips.

The Hortlak scrambled away from me, and the bite stung my shoulder as I forced myself to my hands and knees.

Lunn dropped from the trees, crashing down on top of the Hortlak with enough force to crush even the strongest of Fae. But the Hortlak wasn’t a Fae—it didn’t need its lungs to draw breath, and its skeleton wasn’t being held together by the rotted tendons and muscles hanging loose. Until Samira’s magic link was severed and it was sent back to the ground, the Hortlak would continue to have the upper hand.

Lunn’s voice bellowed out through the trees, scattering the birds. The Hortlak’s bony fingers tore at his leg, behaving more like talons than true fingers as the lack of flesh made it easier to get a grip.

“How do we kill it?” he asked, his teeth gritted as he grabbed the Hortlak’s head and twisted it hard enough to sever the spine.

Before I could answer, the Hortlak’s legs flipped up and wrapped around Lunn’s waist. He crashed to the ground, and the Hortlak scuttled up after him with quick, jerky movements that reminded me of an insect. Lunn roared again, and I crossed the small space, lifting my iron blade and jamming it down through the Hortlak’s chest cavity.

The creature reared back, unclamping its rotted mouth from around Lunn’s arm. Its body scrabbled and tore at the blade, but the more it struggled the further the blade sank. The Hortlak’s struggles slowed, and Lunn pushed up onto his feet as I forced the creature down onto the ground, twisting the blade with as much force as I could muster through the place where I imagined its heart might have sat.

It screamed again, its dark, empty eye sockets rolling up to gaze into my face. Its hatred for me was palpable, and it sent icy fingers dancing down my spine. Before long, it stopped moving and the spark of intelligence in its eyes died.

“Do you think it’s really dead?” Lunn asked from his place on the ground.

The dirt boiled upwards, and I tugged the iron blade free of the creature as the earth swallowed it whole once more.

“I’m pretty sure it’s dead,” I said, pulling Lunn to his feet as the last of the corpse disappeared from view.

“Who summoned it?” he asked, and there was a warning in his tone that instantly put me on guard.

“Who’s asking?” I countered.

Lunn smirked at me. “I am,”

The tension slowly melted from my shoulders. He couldn’t outright lie to me, and if he wanted to be evasive then he could dance around my questions. Lunn choosing to give me a straightforward answer told me that my fears were unfounded, at least in this situation.

“A young witch. I sort of took her under my wing when I was hunting MacNa.”

“A witch?” Lunn sounded incredulous, and from the way he wrinkled his nose in disgust I could tell he wasn’t impressed with my new choice of friends. “Why haven’t you brought her in for questioning?”

The sudden turn in the conversation set my teeth on edge, and I flexed my fingers around the leather hilt of the blade.

“Because I’m capable of conducting my own interviews. Besides, you know my methods for bringing in Fae are none of your business. I pick them up and hand them over—it’s as simple as that. You don’t get to ask questions. That was our deal, remember?”

He nodded. “Aye, I remember. But you need to remember protocol, and I’m still waiting for you to bring in MacNa. I know you two used to run in the same circles, but considering what’s at stake for you I thought you wouldn’t have a problem apprehending him.”

The urge to jab the blade’s hilt into Lunn’s ribs was almost overwhelming, but a move like that would be certain suicide. Didn’t mean I couldn’t daydream about it, though.

“You’d tell me if you were in over your head, wouldn’t you, Darcey?” The sudden softness in his voice almost made me forget just who I was dealing with.

Lunn was one of the good guys… Well, if you could ever call an Unseelie one of the good guys. He had a sense of honour that I’d never come across in anyone else. But he’d been working for the Court for a very long time, and that same honour made him loyal to them. There was nothing good about the Court; they were about as corrupt as you could get, not that I would ever dream of actually speaking my mind.

“I’ll bring in MacNa, I promise. It’s just taking longer than I anticipated.” I was getting pretty good at skipping around the truth without ever actually lying.

Anyway, how could I tell him something I didn’t fully understand myself? All I had to go on was the word of a human woman who had already lied to me once. That, and the terrified cops I’d left with Samira.

Samira…

I’d been so focused on hunting down the Hortlak that I completely forgot I’d left her to wrangle the uneasy cops. One false move would reveal the truth of who she was.

“Lunn, I’ve got to go.” I turned and sprinted back through the trees in the direction of the house.

By the time I broke through the cover and out onto the driveway, most of the cops had left. The few who were left milling around wore dazed expressions. The scent of magic hung heavy on the air, burning down the back of my throat and making it difficult to breathe.

“Thank you for your assistance.” The voice that spoke was gravelly, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood to attention.

The voice in the back of my mind screamed at me to run, but I ignored it and turned in the direction of the speaker. Time slowed to a crawl, and though I brought up my iron blade, the Saga Venatione’s hand was already raised. The white powder he blew into my face clung to my skin. Instinct kicked in, and when I opened my mouth to scream the white powder flooded my nose and throat, coating every inch of soft tissue it touched.

The iron blade bit into the skin of my arm as the world tilted violently before going dark.

Chapter Twenty-One

This wasn’t happening.

Blinking away the darkness, I swam back to the surface of my mind and came to on my knees in the gravel. The iron blade lay next to me, and my arm stung with pain; the cut wasn’t serious, but it seemed to be enough to counteract whatever magic he’d tried to use on me.

My throat burned as though I’d inhaled a nest of ants, and my watering eyes blurred my vision as I fought to focus on the Saga Venatione who’d attempted to knock me out.

I didn’t have my full power, but his arrogant belief that he could take me down like any other human certainly didn’t sit well with me.

Pushing up onto my feet, I lunged forward, wrapping myself around the witch hunter and sending us both tumbling to the ground in a tangle of limbs and the weird-ass robe he wore.

Satisfaction welled in my heart as I flipped him onto his back and watched his eyes widen in surprise.

“Where is she?” I asked, sliding the Bone Blade from its sheath.

I could have used the iron blade on him, but that would have made his death too easy—a gentle slipping from this world to the next—and he didn’t deserve that.

But the Bone Blade wouldn’t have such an effect.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he hissed up at me, struggling beneath my weight as I pressed him into the small, sharp stones on the ground.

“Please, are we really going to play this stupid game? I thought we were past all that.”

He shook his head, and I pressed the tip of the Bone Blade beneath his chin. His body went as still as the grave.

“You know what this is, don’t you?” I asked, leaning over him, drinking down the bitter taste of his fear.

“You cannot use that on me—it is forbidden.” His voice was barely a whisper.

“Forbidden, is it? And who is going to stop me?” I pushed the blade a little harder against his skin.

“She tried to run, but we’re taking her back home where she belongs. The one who bought her couldn’t be trusted to keep her.”

“What are you going to do to her?” I demanded.

“Death is the only fitting punishment.”

A scream split the air. Considering I was a connoisseur of screams, I determined this to be a good one—good enough to set the hairs on my neck standing to attention.

“They’ve found her,” the witch hunter said, a smile curling his lips.

I scrambled to my feet and ran in the direction of the scream; the sound gave power to my legs, driving me on. I wouldn’t let her down. I’d failed so many others in my life, which was the reason I found it so much easier to be alone. No matter how hard I tried, I could never fail loneliness.

By the time I rounded the corner, it was all over.

Lunn stood in the middle of the road, looming over the broken bodies of the Saga Venatione that littered the ground.

Scanning the scene, my gaze fell on Samira. A sigh of relief flowed out of me, and my shoulders drooped as the tension that had held me upright suddenly deserted me. Her wide eyes met mine before I let my gaze drop to the bloodied blade she held in her hand and the lone, crumpled body of one of the witch hunters curled near her feet.

“What happened?” I asked, but Lunn lifted his hand, effectively silencing me. I folded my arms grumpily over my chest and gave him my best withering look, but he merely shrugged it off.

“She’s a liability, Darcey—a distraction.” I hadn’t been expecting his words, and my stomach clenched in panic.

“She has a name,” Samira said, narrowing her eyes in his direction, but Lunn didn’t even acknowledge her presence.

“Don’t do this, Lunn,” I whispered, my voice hoarse even to my own ears. “Don’t make me fight you.”

“You have a job to do. She’s getting in the way, and it would be better if—”

“Bullshit!” I cut him off. “If you so much as harm a hair on her head, so help me I’ll”

Lunn’s expression grew hurt, as though it was beyond the realm of belief to even hear me suggest that he planned to harm Samira.

“You think I would hurt her? I am not the Court, Darcey, no matter how much you might want to believe I am.” He slid his obsidian blade back into the sheath that lay hidden down his spine.

“What do you expect me to think?” I said. “Every time you show up, it’s to threaten me with some new torture and remind me that I’m indebted to the Court. A debt that, if not sufficiently met, will end in my demise.”

His gold-green eyes were filled with a sadness I hadn’t expected Lunn to ever be capable of, but when he blinked again it was gone.

“I hope someday you will understand why I do the things I do,” he said, moving faster than my eyes could follow. The sudden press of his hand against my cheek caused my heart to skip a beat. I stared up into his eyes, my body instinctively swaying toward him. “One day, I hope you will trust me,” he whispered. His face dipped toward mine, and my eyes fluttered shut in anticipation of the brush of his lips.

It never came. When I opened my eyes, Lunn was gone, leaving me alone in the middle of the street with the scattered bodies of the dead witch hunters. My eyes darted to Samira, who shrugged at me before cleaning the edge of her blade against her jeans.

Lunn was beyond infuriating, but as much as I was loathe to admit it, he was right about one thing: Samira was a distraction. It had been a terrible mistake to allow her to follow me out into the open like this. The witch hunters had easily tracked her to the Archers’ house. It didn’t matter whether they found her because of her magic or the collar she still wore around her neck—either way, she was vulnerable.

“We need someplace where you can lay low so I can end this,” I said, more to myself than to Samira. She didn’t argue with me, instead simply nodding and stepping across the body at her feet.

“I do not have anybody in this city,” she said softly. “You are my first friend.”

“Well, I’ve got somebody in mind, but she’s not going to like it when I show up with you.” I grinned, imagining her reaction when I turned up on her doorstep in the middle of the night.

“Who is it?” Samira asked, but I shook my head.

“Just wait and see. Now, come on before that white powder stuff wears off of the cops and they come investigating.” I emitted a low whistle.

The low rumble of the motorcycle rounding the street corner soothed the knots in my stomach as I tried to ignore the bodies on the ground. The Elite would have a field day with this mess; no doubt it would end up being mentioned in the news as some sort of magical gang warfare.

That wouldn’t really be wrong, just a little misguided. The sheer number of witch hunters with the same bald heads and strange, vine-like tattoos didn’t sit well with me. Why were they so intent on recapturing Samira? Her magic wasn’t particularly powerful, so why put so much effort into regaining control of her?

Something wasn’t adding up, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on what didn’t sit right with me.

Swinging my leg up and over the bike, I tossed Samira’s helmet in her direction. She caught it before hopping on behind me.

“I won’t ever go back to them,” she said quietly.

I didn’t answer her, because her words didn’t require one. She spoke one of those truths that everyone already knew. If she said anything else, I didn’t hear her over the sound of the motorbike’s sudden roar as we jumped forward, drowning out everything but the very loudest of my own thoughts.

Once Samira was safe, then, and only then, would I be able to hunt down MacNa and hopefully get my hands on the so-called banshee bitch who had framed me for murder. She might have been playing with me, but being the pawn in someone else’s game wasn’t one of my strong suits.

Chapter Twenty-Two

The restaurant was dark by the time we pulled up outside of it, but I knew Noree didn’t sleep and would be up and waiting. Of course, actually getting her to answer the door was another issue altogether.

I lifted my arm to knock, but my fist hadn’t even touched the wood before the door swung inwards to reveal the same young girl who had served me the eyeball soup. Her name was Katia, or at least that’s what Noree had called her.

“It took you long enough.” The young girl’s voice rasped over the words as her eyes rolled in her head. She stumbled slightly and I reached out to steady her, catching her arm before her knees buckled.

“Does she do that often?” I asked. She nodded, nervously biting her lip as she tugged her arm free of my grip.

“Grandma is very powerful,” she said, her voice hesitant. “I am the only one with enough of the gift that she can ride.”

I hadn’t known that Noree had any children—never mind ones old enough to have kids of their own—but it made sense. Her type of magic was passed from one generation to the next.

“What happened to those who weren’t strong enough?” I asked, taking a small step forward.

“They’re dead!” Noree’s voice came from somewhere above us, and her words sent a cold shiver dancing down my spine. “Katia, get them in here. Now!”

Katia’s earlier hesitation was replaced with a blank expression, and the undercurrent of fear in the air tasted bitter against my tongue. She gestured for me to climb a set of stairs inside the restaurant, and I did so cautiously.

Noree might have done favours for me—favours I paid handsomely for—but that didn’t mean she liked me. And it certainly didn’t mean that I could trust her not to lay some traps for me to stumble into if I wasn’t being careful.

The hall at the top of the stairs was bare, and the black floorboards were so heavily worn that the wood actually gleamed. Carefully making my way down the hall, I paused outside the only door with light peeking out from beneath it. I glanced over my shoulder at Samira and Katia, waiting for some kind of confirmation that I should enter. Katia merely watched me with a bored expression, but the undercurrent of her fear was still present and buried beneath Noree’s power.

When no confirmation came, I moved down the hall toward the next door. No light peeked out from this one to suggest anyone might be inside, but I could see Katia’s fear peeking beneath Noree’s magic. I shoved open the door with enough force to crack the plaster on the wall.

Noree sat on a chair near the window, staring out into the darkness—although, considering she had no eyes, staring might be the wrong word. But I was in no doubt that she could still see, just now the way the rest of us could.

She hopped up from her chair and whirled around to face me. She wasn’t wearing her glasses, so now there was nothing to hide her ruined eye sockets. The muscles and nerves moved as though she still had eyes and a gaze that could roam over us.

“If I’d chosen wrong, what would have happened?” I said.

“You’d have found yourself back out on the street, of course. You know I do not like having my time wasted.”

That, I did know. For someone who had lived so long, Noree had a real bee in her bonnet about time-wasters. And if you arrived late to a pre-arranged appointment, she was a nightmare to contend with.

“Now, why are you here in the middle of the night?” she asked, her voice curt.

“I wanted to ask for your protection for Samira…” Anxiety knotted in my guts; I could predict her answer before she even spoke the words.

“No.”

The word hung between us, and I slowly curled and uncurled my fists. I couldn’t make her help Samira; she might be blind, but I couldn’t even begin to fathom her power. Noree wasn’t a Fae, and she wasn’t a witch. She was something so much more than either of those, and no matter how fast I might be, or how strong, Noree could snap my spine and crush my heart before I could so much as take a step toward her. It was why I needed her to protect Samira: of all those I knew and called friends, Noree was the only one powerful enough to protect Samira on this plain. I couldn’t ask Clary for another favour, she’d already done enough by agreeing to guard Samira in my apartment. And anyway, I couldn’t run the risk of Samira ending up in Faerie and being brought before the Court for questioning.

No, only Noree could help me.

“What do you want in return?” I tried to keep my voice as steady as possible. If she knew I was desperate... hell, who was I kidding? She knew I was desperate, but if she heard it in my voice then all was lost.

“Nothing. You can give me nothing, because I will not do as you ask.” The faint smile playing around Noree’s lips had me on the verge of screaming.

“Darcey, it’s fine. I can wait in the apartment.” Samira moved next to me, her hand touching my sleeve.

The moment she spoke, I felt Noree’s attitude change. Her face jerked in Samira’s direction, and her empty sockets scanned down over her.

“Come here, child,” Noree said, her voice as soft as silk but far more deadly.

Samira took a step forward, but I clamped my hand down over her arm to halt her progress.

“Darcey, what is it?” Samira asked.

“Do not do as she asks. I’ve witnessed what Noree does to those she considers weak.” The memory threatened to resurface, and I did my best to crush it down inside. Some fragments of it slipped through anyway, and the smell was something I would never forget. That, and Noree’s laughter as she rubbed the blood over her arms and smeared it down her face.

“I see you remember,” Noree said softly.

“You don’t see at all.” I was unable to keep my petty words to myself.

Noree’s body stiffened, and I inwardly cursed my own stupidity. Noree was a temperamental cow at the best of times, and insulting her really wasn’t going to win her over to my way of thinking.

I waited for her anger to lash out at me, but when nothing happened I released the breath I hadn’t realised I’d been holding.

“You weren’t this stupid back when I was free to do as I pleased,” she said, a wistful expression falling over her face.

“We’ve all changed,” I said. “That was a long time ago.”

“That it was,” Noree answered. “I will offer the young witch my protection, but there is a condition.”

“I will give what I can,” I said, not promising anything until I at least heard what she wanted.

“I have an errand I need of you. Will you do it?”

“What sort of errand?” I asked.

“I need you to retrieve something for me. And if you agree to it, then I will look after your fragile little friend here.”

“Darcey, the apartment is fine,” Samira said. Her obvious unease was making it almost impossible for me to figure out Noree’s true intentions. I couldn’t exactly trust Noree, but even she wouldn’t back out of a deal. Samira would be safe.

“I can’t take the risk with the apartment,” I said to Samira. “If the hunters turn up again when I’m not there, you’ll be vulnerable. They’ll just find another way to hurt you, to draw you out. And she—” I pointed across the room to Noree—“can’t hurt you if the deal is struck.”

“If you are sure,” Samira answered. I waited until she nodded and rolled back her shoulders. She looked like someone who was about to face a firing squad rather than spend a few hours with Noree. I was pretty sure some would argue that the firing squad would be easier to cope with.

“Deal,” I said, turning back to face Noree with an outstretched hand.

Noree crossed the room, moving through the pieces of furniture like she could see exactly where everything was—and perhaps she could. Pausing in front of me, she wrapped her hand around mine. The sudden sharpness of her nails caught me unawares, and I gasped and fought to jerk back my hand. But Noree held on.

Blood trickled from between my fingers and dripped to the floor as Noree forced our joined hands up toward her face. I cringed as her tongue flickered out to lick the blood from my fingers.

“Your turn,” she said, pushing our joined hands toward my face.

I didn’t want to do it, but I had a vague recollection of Noree making similar blood oaths in the past. The oath would bind me to her, but it also meant she couldn’t go back on her word about keeping Samira safe.

I licked the blood as fast as I could, and the metallic taste coated my tongue like old pennies that tingled and popped with magic.

Noree broke free, releasing me as quickly as she’d grabbed me. She wrapped her arm around Samira’s shoulders and drew her over to the light filtering in through the uncovered window. “Come, child, let me take a good look at you.”

Noree studied her for what felt like an eternity; the blood in my veins slowed to a crawl as I waited to see what she was planning to do. The moment she lifted one wizened hand toward Samira, my body tensed and I prepared to throw myself between them. But Noree merely shot me a withering look before carefully lifting the collar away from Samira’s skin.

“There is powerful magic at work here,” she said, her voice sounding breathy and excited.

“It doesn’t come off,” I said.

“Oh, it comes off all right,” Noree answered. “Just not in any way that is useful to me at the moment.”

“I do not wish to die,” Samira said quietly. She didn’t sound as afraid as I had expected her to be. Noree could be overwhelming, and yet Samira stood before her as though she wasn’t a crazy person capable of killing with the flick of her wrist.

“Killing you would be a pointless waste,” Noree said. “The power of the collar relies on you remaining alive. To cut off your head would ensure that whatever magic flows through it would be destroyed forever.” She sounded almost disappointed, and I curled my lip in distaste.

“Relax, Darcey. I gave my word that I will not harm her, but I will not lie to make you feel better. You have known me for a very long time. You know my desire for power, and to one day right the wrong done to me.”

I nodded; there was no point in denying it. Noree had been as bloodthirsty as anyone I’d met, but her constant striving for more power had eventually led her to the Beast… and her downfall.

If I was being honest, my own search for power had led me to the same fate. But, then again, we were both still free, capable of feeling summer’s warmth touch upon our skin and winter’s cruel embrace. The Beast would never have that again. Not if I could help it.

“We have a deal, Noree,” I said. “You know the price for breaking a blood bond.” The expression Noree gave me was anything but friendly. There was a time when I might have shrunk away from it, but not anymore.

“Go, Darcey, I’ll be fine.” Samira met my gaze with her steady one, and I felt myself stagger almost imperceptibly with what I saw lurking in her eyes.

She trusted me. I was a stranger—someone she barely knew—and yet her faith in me was plain for all to see. The last person to trust me like that had been betrayed.

I spun away from her and stumbled toward the door, Noree’s laughter echoing in my ears.

Samira might not understand what exactly had transpired all those years ago, but Noree did. She had been a witness, which, in a weird way, was a type of ironic justice. MacNa had led me to Samira, and now I would hunt him down. He, too, had witnessed first-hand the extent of my betrayal—it was one of the reasons neither he nor the Noree would ever trust me again. To betray a friend was bad enough, but to betray your soul mate… Well, that was something only the darkest of Fae would ever contemplate. And yet it was exactly what I had done.

Chapter Twenty-Three

I’d made it as far as the street in front of Noree’s restaurant before I regretted my decision. She really wasn’t someone to be trusted, and yet here I was getting ready to walk away and leave Samira behind. But she had agreed to a blood pact, and even Noree wasn’t stupid enough to try and break something like that.

I’d never been so uncertain of something in my entire life.

I jumped as my phone vibrated in my pocket, and I slipped it free of my jacket.

“Yeah,” I answered it, chewing my lip nervously and casting a quick glance over my shoulder at Noree’s darkened apartment.

“Darcey, you remember that bar I told you to check out?” Clary was whispering, which instantly captured my attention. I turned my focus to the conversation.

“The Dearg Hand, yeah. I haven’t had a chance to swing by there yet.”

“Well, get your butt over here. You’re not going to believe what’s here!” Her excitement was almost contagious.

“MacNa,” I said, knowing he was the only reason she would get so worked up. She’d always hated him, and I could imagine Clary being only too happy to see him locked away in Faerie.

“Nope, better.”

Her words prickled along my spine, causing my skin to erupt in goosebumps.

“Don’t keep me in suspense, Clary. Out with it!”

“Another banshee,” she said. “I don’t recognise what clan she comes from, but she’s having a lovely chat with Daster.”

I knew the name instantly. He’d been one of MacNa’s closest friends, and I couldn’t imagine that changing despite the years that had passed since I’d last seen him.

“You’re sure it’s a banshee?” I asked. I was practically certain that Clary wouldn’t be wrong, but it seemed too coincidental for a third banshee to be running around the city without my knowledge. I needed to hear her say it.

“Darcey Thorne, I didn’t sprout last season. I know a banshee when I see it.” I smiled at her irritation over being questioned.

“I’ll be right there,” I said, hanging up the phone and sliding it back into my pocket. Throwing my leg across the motorcycle, I gunned the engine and gave one last glance to the apartment above me.

I could feel Noree’s eyes on me, and her eagerness to see me gone, and that alone was enough to send my unease into overdrive. But what other choice did I have? I couldn’t risk Samira’s life by keeping her out in the open; if the Saga got their hands on her again, she wouldn’t live long enough to see the sunrise.

Of course, there was always the chance that I wouldn’t live to see the sunrise, especially if the strange woman Clary saw in the bar was a full-blooded banshee who decided to come after me. On the other hand, if I didn’t figure out the connection between her and MacNa, the Faerie Court would come for me.

Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. But I was Unseelie—those were odds I could get behind.

* * *

Parking the motorcycle outside The Dearg Hand was the easy part. Arguing with the security guard at the door to let me inside was the hard bit.

“Your kind ain’t wanted here,” he said for what felt like the millionth time in his gruff Irish accent. Trolls were notoriously difficult to reason with at the best of times. At least the nursery rhymes about them had accurately depicted their obsessive need to guard things. Everything else, though, was way off base.

True, they were tall and butt-ugly, and this one was no exception to the rule. However, they appeared human, and if you could get past the stench of rotted meat on their breath, they weren’t the worst.

“I realise that, but I still need to get inside. I’m on official Faerie Court business, and I’m pretty sure you don’t want to fall on the wrong side of the Court.”

“Yer not going inside,” he said again, blasting me with fetid breath as he planted his hand on the centre of my chest and pushed with his full weight. I stumbled back several steps, barely managing to stay on my feet as I gritted my teeth and fought the urge to rub my chest in the spot where he’d pushed hard enough to break human ribs.

Did I mention that trolls tend to be as dumb as rocks? Apparently, this fine specimen was no exception. Anyone with an ounce of grey matter between their ears didn’t want to fall on the wrong side of the Court, and his answer proved that the only thing floating between his ears was cotton wool.

Pulling one of my iron blades free of the protective shield at my hip, I adjusted the grip. The metal immediately began burning my hands, but the welts I’d received from training helped me to ignore most of the pain. The troll eyed me warily and shifted his weight from one foot to the other as I started forward at an easy jog.

“Do you ever do anything inconspicuously?” Clary’s voice cut through my concentration. I halted, glancing over my shoulder to where she stood half-concealed in the shadows next to the door. I’d been so busy arguing with the troll I hadn’t even noticed her sneaking up on me.

“I’m a banshee, Clary. The Fae don’t like my kind—we give them the willies.” I shot a pointed glance in the troll’s direction.

She sighed and stepped from the shadows. Without a word, she thrust her hand into the air and the ground beneath our feet began rumbling and roaring as tree roots as thick as my arms burst forth toward the sky, throwing dirt in every direction.

Her face was a mask of concentration as she pushed her hand toward the troll. The roots instantly followed her movements, winding their way around his legs and arms, lifting him from the ground, and pinning him to the wall.

“Get me down, ye silly bitch.” His accent grew stronger as panic filled his face.

“What did you call me?” Clary asked, and from the corner of my eye I caught sight of one root sliding across the ground toward the trussed troll.

“Enough, Clary, he’s not going anywhere,” I said, gently touching her arm.

The look she gave me caused me to swallow back my fear. She was my friend, and I knew she wouldn’t hurt me, but the expression in her eyes said otherwise.

I’d heard of tree Fae going mad before the end, but I’d never seen it. Practically a millennia had passed since the last tree Fae had died, and while the history books were a little sketchy on what to expect, there was no denying the tumultuous power that spiralled in Clary’s gaze.

“Did I ask your opinion, Darcey? Perhaps you deserve to be pinned up there like him.” Her voice was hollow and distinctly unlike my friend.

“Clary, please, I know you can hear me.” I closed the distance between us and wrapped my arms around her. At the same time, a root found my ankle and slowly climbed the calf of my leg.

She blinked rapidly, but the power still spiralled in her eyes. The root’s grip on my leg tightened. The iron in my hand burned, and without thinking I pressed it to Clary’s back.

She screamed and writhed in my grip, the iron searing through the flimsy fabric of her dress to reach her iron-sensitive skin. The root wrapped around my leg tugged on me violently, but I held on to Clary, keeping the metal firm against her body.

The moment the root fell away from my leg, I lifted the iron from her and pulled back enough to stare into her eyes, which had returned to normal. She glared at me and jerked free of my hold.

“What the hell was that for?” she said, a low hiss escaping her as she rolled her shoulders back.

“Can’t have you going all supernova on me, now can I?” I smiled in an attempt to soften my words, but Clary’s expression shifted. She took in the scene around us, and my gut twisted as I watched comprehension dawn in her eyes. She swallowed hard and gave me a jerky nod.

“What do we do with him?” she asked, her voice surprisingly steady despite the haunted look in her eyes.

“Leave him. It might teach him not to get involved in Faerie Court business from now on.” I glared up at the troll, who was fighting and writhing against the grip of the roots still pinning him to the wall of The Dearg Hand.

I headed for the pub, stepping past the mess the roots had made of the road and footpath. As I pushed open the front door, warmth and noise spilled over me. The smell of magic and hops filled the air, giving it an intoxicating atmosphere that had been created to keep the Fae docile and encourage them to spend money. Clary joined me, her nose wrinkling in disgust as she sucked in a deep breath of the same spicy scent.

“I hate places like this,” she said. “It’s always so bloody stifling.”

“Which part?”

“Mostly the magic. Every time I take a breath, I’m forced to filter it out through the root network, pushing clean air back out into the atmosphere. The polluted air of Falcon is hard enough to deal with, but this takes the biscuit altogether.” She drew in another deep breath, and I could see the magic in the air settling around her nose and mouth, thousands of tiny, sparkling lights that dotted her skin like glitter.

“Jesus,” I said, unable to help myself. In all the years I’d been friends with Clary, I’d never seen magic behave in that way around her. I knew she could filter it from the air, but I didn’t know she could make it manifest.

“What is it?” she asked.

“It looks like glitter.” I gestured to her face.

She hastily scrubbed the back of her hand against her face, and the magic drifted toward the floor in tiny, brightly-coloured swirls.

“Shit.” She stared down at the streaks across her hand.

“Clary, what’s happening?” I asked. I had my suspicions, and I had heard the stories, but the true answer could only come from Clary.

“It doesn’t matter. We don’t have time to—”

“Like hell it doesn’t matter! Clary, I know the stories. Is it true?”

She lifted her face, and one fat, glittering tear rolled down her cheek.

“They’re true, but”—She scrubbed away the tear—“I know you won’t let me go supernova like the others did.” She gave me a watery smile.

“Clary, I—” She cut me off with a wave of her hand, the expression in her eyes hardening.

“We don’t have time to discuss it. Nobody lives forever, Darcey. You, above all else, know this.”

Her words struck a chord with me. I did know it, but being forced to watch someone you care about wither away and die was more than most were fit to handle. I’d witnessed my fair share of human grief. Death had a way of ripping lives apart, and its finality was beyond cruel. But a human life was fleeting. Humans expected death, and yet still had the capacity to be surprised when their time came.

The Fae were supposed to be immortal…

We could be killed, but only if we were foolish enough to wander into the way of a stray iron blade.

Just another of the great lies, really. It had helped many of us forget that death would eventually catch up to us. Even I, surrounded by death, had forgotten. And now, as I stared into Clary’s eyes, I felt my heart ache for the friend I would lose to the great abyss.

“There she is.” Clary jabbed me in the ribs hard enough to snap my attention back to the situation at hand.

Casting my gaze over the busy pub, I searched for the one Clary believed to be a banshee. It didn’t take much effort to find her. It was almost as though I was drawn to her—and perhaps I was.

She stood near the bar with her back to the crowd surrounding her. Her hair was shorter than mine and cut around her shoulders in a style that vaguely looked as though she had taken the scissors to it herself. That would almost certainly have been the case for me, but everything else about her screamed money, and so the precision of the choppy layers had probably cost her a small fortune.

She’d also obviously discovered the same issue as I had with the colour of her hair. No human had hair like a banshee’s—all white and silver streaks, with strands of blue and pink pearl giving it highlights that no hairdresser could ever hope to achieve. It looked natural, which the humans always noticed. Perhaps it was in their genes; we were, after all, predators. I added bright blue streaks to mine, giving it the illusion of an expensive dye job, and so the humans skimmed straight over it. The woman at the bar had opted for hot pink ombre, and the bright colour clashed with her natural ghostly pallor, making her complexion look almost pasty.

She started to turn around, and Clary caught my hand and dragged me toward the corner of the pub, where we were obscured by the raucous patrons. Straining to see through the crowd, I could still make out the woman.

“That’s Daster,” Clary said, nodding in the barman’s direction.

“I know.” I eyed him carefully.

Not that I could forget the leprechaun—I was pretty sure there wasn’t a female Fae alive who could forget Daster. He had bright green eyes, and his broad shoulders and muscled chest were barely concealed beneath the tight muscle shirts he liked to wear. And then, there was his height. Daster towered above the others working behind the bar, so that when the banshee beckoned him over, he was forced to lean across the bar. He planted his thick arms on the mahogany counter as he folded his upper body across it so she could whisper in his ear.

True leprechauns definitely weren’t what humans imagined, but that made it the perfect disguise. Their muscled bodies, strength, height, and good looks made them the perfect candidates for blending in with human athletes. No one questioned them, everybody worshiped them, and that, above all else, was what the leprechauns wanted.

Most of them were lovely and talkative, especially the Irish ones, and they enjoyed playing practical jokes. The ultimate coup for them had been making the humans believe they were greedy little men intent only on their pot o’ gold. But not every leprechaun was a kind-hearted, chatty chap, and Daster definitely wasn’t.

“So do we wait for her to leave and then go and have a word, or…?”

“Or,” I said, straining to make out what the banshee had taken from Daster’s outstretched hand. “We’re going to follow her. The sneaky cow had me framed for murder, and I’d much rather get the humans off my back and keep the Faerie Court happy than have them haul me in for breaking the peace.”

Clary didn’t say anything, but I could practically feel the cogs turning in her brain.

“Why are you so eager for me to chat to Daster?” I asked. “Do you two have history or something?”

“Or something,” she said sullenly. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Who hog-tied the troll!” a voice in the crowd hollered, and the revellers roared in response. The sound was deafening in the confined space of the pub.

“Blondie’s on the move,” Clary shouted over the din.

An ear-popping roar erupted from the doorway of the pub as the troll chose that moment to burst through the small entryway. He pushed bodies out of his way with wide, sweeping blows of his arms and locked his gaze on me as a second yowl tore from his throat.

“I knew we should have killed him when we had the chance,” Clary grumbled.

I grabbed her hand and we pushed and shoved our way through the crowd toward where the banshee had gone. Pushing out past the last person, we found ourselves standing in a back hall that led to an open exit door.

The troll’s cries of frustration dissipated as we pushed out onto the street.

“Where’d she go?” Clary asked.

I pointed toward the end of the street. “That way. I can still sense her.”

“If you can sense her, can she sense you?” Clary tugged my arm, forcing me to a halt.

“Nope, she doesn’t know we’re following her. Sensing has to be done consciously.” I picked up my pace, following the banshee’s essence down the street. Her trail was already beginning to fade, but that was the problem with harbingers: we were difficult to track.

Reaching the end of the street, I paused and watched as the banshee crossed to the other side, making a beeline for another alleyway. Following her down there would put us at risk of being discovered, but what other choice did I have? If I didn’t go after her and figure out where she was lying low, then I would never know what she was up to and the Faerie Court would have my guts for garters.

Rock: meet hard place. Or, in my world, it’s called another day at the office.

I crossed the street, and Clary followed. One way or another, there would be an end to what was happening. With Clary on my side, my chances of survival shot up exponentially… and those were odds I could live with.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I shrank back against the shadows of the alley we’d exited just seconds ago and watched the banshee climb the steps to one of the maintained townhouses. The neighbourhood stank of money, but how she could afford something so luxurious was beyond me. Clearly, when she wasn’t busy framing me for murder she was killing it on the job market.

“Now what?” Clary asked, her voice barely audible. As I turned to glance at her, I admired how she managed to disappear almost entirely into the darkness. No human would be able to pick her out, and even the Fae would have trouble seeing her against the red brick wall.

“How do you do that?” I asked.

“Glamour. I can teach you if you’d like?”

I shook my head. “I’ve got just enough to make the humans think I’m one of them. Anything more than that, and I’m pretty sure I’d short my magic out.” A wry smile twisted my lips.

Clary returned my smile, but hers was tainted around the edges with sadness. I’d never seen her show any kind of emotion about my predicament. A banshee without her power was a pretty pitiful state of affairs, but Clary knew why I’d given it up. I knew, deep down, she approved. I just never imagined she would be sad about it.

“Doesn’t mean you can’t kick ass,” she answered, and I widened my smile until it was more of a grin.

The sound of a front door slamming drew my attention back to the townhouse, and I watched the banshee hurry back down the steps, sliding her door keys into the pocket of her grey satin bomber jacket.

“Where do you think she’s off to?” Clary asked.

“No idea, but I guess we’ll find out.” I stepped out of the shadows.

“I’ve got a better idea,” Clary said, and let her glamour drop. She moved from the dark alleyway and headed toward the banshee’s house at a brisk jog.

“Clary!” I whisper-shouted after her, but she ignored me, taking the steps in front of the townhouse two at a time.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered under my breath as I raced after her. “What the hell are you doing?” I said, watching her press her hand against the front door of the house.

The front door swung open in response to reveal a dark hallway.

“I’m going to find out what she’s been up to,” Clary said, “and then I’m going to call the Elite down here to arrest her.”

“The Elite?”

“Yeah. They’re gunning for your ass, so I’m going to give them the real culprit.” She slipped inside.

“Shit,” I said again, this time meaning it.

The human cops were one thing, but the Elite were a different kettle of fish. I didn’t fancy tangling with them over something that wasn’t even my fault.

“You coming?” Clary asked, poking her head back out the door.

“Yeah,” I said, moving cautiously up the steps. I glanced up and down the street, but no one could see me as I stepped into the hall.

Despite the entrance hall’s gloom, the darkness didn’t affect my eyes and I navigated through it easily. The walls were split in half by an ornate rail of cream timber; the upper portion was painted dove grey, and the bottom half of the walls were dominated by striped wallpaper in varying shades of greys, creams, and blacks. A small shudder raced down my spine. Not all banshees were alike, but this particular banshee had my taste down to a fine art. Of course, it could be nothing more than a weird coincidence…but I’d been among the Fae long enough to know that such a thing didn’t really exist.

The slate tiles on the floor gave way to thick cream carpet as I moved stealthily through to the living room.

“Clary, where are you?” I called out, my voice low and cautious. Despite watching the banshee leave, I worried she might still be here, waiting to pop out on top of us at any moment.

Something tapped my shoulder, and I whirled around to find Clary standing behind me with a wide grin on her face.

“This is so much fun! I wish you’d taken me out sleuthing like this before.”

“Sleuthing? That’s what you think this is? Personally, I call it breaking and entering, and I’m pretty sure the law would agree. What are we doing in here, anyway?” I gestured to my surroundings. “From everything I can see, there’s nothing much to tell me who she is or what she wants.”

“There has to be something,” she said. “Maybe if we look upstairs.”

I opened my mouth to protest and then stopped. What was the point? We’d already broken in, so delving a little deeper at this point wasn’t going to do more harm.

“Fine, but we’ll make it quick and then we’ll call the Elite.”

Clary nodded in agreement and practically skipped toward the stairs. I’d never seen her enjoy something so much, especially not something that involved breaking any kind of law. Clary had always been the type to toe the line without ever stepping out of bounds. Perhaps it was all part of the process she was going through.

What a stupid way to think of it. She’d been my friend for a very long time, and when she needed me most I was burying my head in the sand by pretending that she wasn’t really approaching the end of her life cycle.

I followed her up the stairs, pausing once I made it to the landing to stare at the door sitting ajar at the very end of the hall. My stomach twisted nervously, and I contemplated turning away and never looking back. The gnawing feeling in my guts was hard to explain, and I wasn’t sure why I felt so suddenly out of step. But I’d been a banshee long enough to know that ignoring my instincts only led to disaster.

Clary moved ahead of me down the hall, pausing at each door to push it open and give the room a cursory glance. I held my breath until she made it to the final door at the end of the hall and gently pushed it open with the toe of her boot. The light from the hall didn’t penetrate the thick gloom beyond the door jamb.

Clary disappeared inside the room, and a moment later a yellow light flickered to life.

“Darcey, I think you should see this,” she called out to me, but I was already moving toward her. I gasped as I crossed the threshold and saw the icy tendrils of the strange banshee’s magic clinging to my skin like thousands of tiny strands of cobwebs.

“Shit,” I muttered, brushing my hands across my face and arms in an attempt to scrub away her magic. It was a personal alarm system of sorts, created to ward against others from trespassing into claimed territory. Now, she would know I was here.

“What’s wrong?” Clary asked.

“We need to get out of here. The room is warded; she knows I’m here.” I ran my fingers through my hair in an attempt to shake free of the strands of her power.

“I see that,” Clary said, nodding in the direction of my hair.

“What?”

“The blue is fading from your hair.” She was watching me in abject fascination.

“Shit, shit, shit,” I said again. The colour fading from my hair had nothing to do with the warding she’d created on the room, but everything to do with her proximity. I was on her turf; the closer she was to home, the more my fake dye job would fade and reveal me for what I truly was. Of course, the same would be true of her.

“She’s been after you for a very long time,” Clary said, turning away from me. Her movement drew my attention, and when I glanced up at the walls of the room my heart came to a shuddering halt.

My image was plastered all over the walls. There were photographs of me coming and going from my office, the Between, and even the nursing home. Among them were also pictures of Clary, MacNa, Noree, and Lunn. But what really set my teeth on edge and caused tendrils of fear to crawl across my skin were the drawings.

I would have recognised his handiwork anywhere. From the moment we’d met, he’d been fascinated with drawing me. In the beginning, I’d been flattered. I’d honestly believed it proved just how much he loved me, how much we were meant to be together.

Crossing the room, I paused in front of one particularly large drawing. He had used the pencil to bring my image to life in such a way that I might have been persuaded to believe that he’d actually been in my room as I slept…

“This isn’t possible,” I said, my hand hovering above the drawing.

“He always was very good at capturing your likeness.” Clary’s voice was heavy with scorn.

“No, Clary, you don’t understand. This was done recently. This is my apartment. I lived somewhere else when I knew Manann, before I trapped him in the cage… He’s never seen my bedroom.”

She stared at me for a few seconds, unable to comprehend my words. I could see her confusion as she chewed her lip and stared down at the picture before finally giving up the silence.

“How could he know any of this?” she said. “It’s not possible. I thought the cage was unbreakable.”

“You’re not the only one. I had Noree check it out, and she was pretty convinced that the cage is still secure, that Manann is still locked away.”

Grabbing the edge of the picture, I ripped it from the wall and balled it in my fist. If he was free, then we had much bigger things to worry about beyond finding MacNa and setting the human cops on the right killer. If he was free, then we were all as good as dead.

Power prickled down the back of my neck, giving me a split second to slam my hands over my ears before the strange banshee’s scream sent me reeling backwards. Pressure welled in my head, and it took all of my strength not to rip my hair from my own head.

I should have been immune from her scream, but locking Manann away in his cage had come with some particularly nasty side effects. I shook my head, a poor attempt at breaking free of the magic she was weaving, but it was utterly useless. I could only shut her up by using physical force. Sliding an iron blade from the sheath at my waist, I rolled forward and into the woman standing in the doorway.

Shock momentarily cut off her scream, and I used the split-second reprieve to my advantage, crashing into her and sending her sprawling onto the carpeted hallway. Her fist collided with the side of my head before I could arc the blade up and into her exposed abdomen. Pain bloomed in my face and my ears rang, but I pushed through it to bring the blade down. She rolled to the side, and as the iron embedded itself in her shoulder the sound of metal on bone filled me with grim satisfaction.

A howl of anguish and pain ripped the air, but there was no power behind it. She fought against my hold, but I twisted the blade deeper.

“Tell me how you have it,” I said, gesturing to the photographs and drawings plastering the walls.

Despite the very obvious pain she was suffering, a bitter laugh burst from her lips. I cut it off with another twist of the iron blade.

“Why would I tell you anything?” she asked.

“Because you and I both know that the iron from the blade stuck in your shoulder is slowly leeching into your bloodstream. If I don’t remove it soon, you’re going to die.” I ground the knife down.

She hissed, closing her eyes and writhing beneath me to try and escape my hold on her, but the blade and my body weight pinned her in place.

“Don’t bet on it,” she said.

She let out a long sigh and her body went limp, but her eyes fluttered open and stared up at me. Only then did I notice the almost imperceptible violet bloom of colour that surrounded her pupil.

“Half-breed,” I said, unable to keep the disgust from my voice. I hadn’t thought of it before, but now everything made perfect sense. Part banshee, part whatever other type of Fae her banshee mother had decided to hop into bed with. The Fae community had long considered them abominations.

Why hadn’t I thought of it before?

Banshees were a dying breed, and it had seemed unusual for one to wander into my territory without my knowledge. My power had diminished, but not enough that I could no longer sense another one of my own. It also made perfect sense that she had been able to so callously kill Martina Ricer, breaking her body apart as though she was nothing more than a plaything. Half-breeds were stronger, more vicious, and far more bloodthirsty than just any ordinary Fae.

She rolled her eyes at me, but I could see something else now lurking in her hate-filled gaze. If I wasn’t very much mistaken, I might even have called it envy. Of course, it was entirely possible that I was wrong and no actually face to face with a jealous half-breed. If anyone had the right to be jealous, it was me; after all, she was the one with all of the power and none of the hang-ups.

“That’s so last century of you,” she said. “My kind are now far superior to yours. We always have been, but now everyone else knows it too.”

“How do you know Manann?” I said, not wanting to waste any more time on idle chit-chat. My earlier threat regarding the iron wouldn’t hold water against a half-breed. It would slow her down, and it would hurt like hell, but ultimately it wouldn’t kill her.

“He misses you,” she said, and I ground the knife further into her flesh. She screamed, her violet and grey eyes sparking with power.

“I might not be able to kill you, but the iron will still keep your power in check. Let enough of it soak into your bloodstream and you’ll be nothing more than a human. So tell me how you know him.”

“He’s bored of the cage and I wanted to help him out,” she said, and the sudden movement of her hand caught my eye.

“Darcey, the Elite are coming,” Clary said from somewhere over my left shoulder.

“Don’t move,” I commanded, but the momentary distraction from Clary gave the creature pinned beneath me enough time to make her move.

She whipped up her hand, and the edge of the Bone Blade caught the inside of my arm as I tried to hop back out of her reach. The half-breed moved with lightning-quick reflexes, jerking her arm up so the iron blade dropped to the floor next to her. Before I could move, she was on top of me and lifting the Bone Blade in a high arc.

And then she was gone. Clary’s green hair blurred in the corner of my eye as she tackled the half-breed to the ground.

Sirens split the air, and the whole world came to a shuddering halt as the half-breed pushed Clary’s limp body onto the floor, the Bone Blade buried to the hilt in her stomach. Scrabbling across the floor, I reached Clary’s side as the half-banshee drew the Bone Blade from Clary’s gut and ran for the room containing the photographs.

“No, no, no.” The words spilled from my lips as I pressed my hands against the wound. It wasn’t bleeding, but the Bone Blade didn’t behave like any ordinary knife.

Clary stared up at me, the light already beginning to fade from her bright eyes.

“I couldn’t let her win,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper that was barely audible over the sound of the sirens screeching to a halt outside the house.

“You’re going to be fine. We just need to get you out of here and stop it from spreading.” I knew I was lying through my teeth as I watched the Bone Blade’s power spread. It started at the tips of her fingers, at the greying of her beautiful skin as the Bone Blade’s power stole her essence.

Clary laughed and then grimaced as the greying spread to her forearms.

“We both know there’s no way to stop what has started,” she said. Her expression darkened and pain bowed her spine as the greying continued spreading. “My necklace,” she said suddenly, trying and failing to lift her dead arms.

I lifted the tiny glass vial away from her chest, and Clary ducked out from beneath the twisted bark chain that had kept the vial close to her heart.

“I did my best, but it was all I could give.” Her words made no sense to me as I stared down at the vial of green fluid.

“What is it?”

“New life, I think…” she said. “I thought I had more time. It has been so many years since the last of my kind died that I don’t fully remember if I did it right. But bury it in the Between…” She coughed as the greying spread up to her chest, making her breathing laboured.

“Clary, I’ll find a way. We don’t need—”

She cut me off with a dark look. “Leave. By the time I die, they will be here. The Elite will not look kindly on my dying wish for you to escape and plant the essence in the Between.”

Tears blurred my vision as I shook my head. “No, you deserve someone with you until the end.” I was glad that my voice didn’t let me down by wobbling with the emotion coursing in my veins.

“Not at the expense of everything else, Darcey…” She paused and swallowed as the greying crept over her body.

I heard the front door shattering, followed by the sound of heavy footsteps pounding across the floor.

“Go!” Clary urged. “I’ll give you as much time as I can.” She closed her eyes.

The ground trembled, and for a moment my brain refused to catch up to what was actually happening. The tremble became a rumble, and the rumble grew to a roar, and soon the house cracked down the middle as thick, snake-like roots burst through the carpeted floors.

Leaning down, I pressed a small kiss to Clary’s forehead before pushing up onto my feet. Her smile remained fixed in place as the greying spread up her neck toward her face. Still the roots whipped around, building a solid wall between us and the few Elite officers who had made it up the stairs. I’d never seen any Fae capable of using their magic after being cut by a Bone Blade, but Clary was somehow managing it.

I darted down the hall toward the room with the photographs. The window was wide open, and I climbed onto the ledge without a backward glance.

From somewhere downstairs, I heard a scream. It sounded like a man, but the pitch was high enough to belong to a female. Terror had a tendency to do that to humans. The window where I was perched overlooked the neighbouring yard, and I jumped as the house groaned again, tucking my body so that I rolled forward as soon as I hit the ground.

Taking cover beneath the trees grouped at the end of the garden, I stared back at the house and watched as it sagged in the middle before collapsing in on itself.

The tree nearest to me suddenly cracked down the centre, its leaves turning brown and drifting toward the earth as sap poured from its split core. Crouching down, I scooped up one of the crisp, brown leaves, the distinctive pattern and shape of the oak leaf as familiar to me as Clary’s face.

She was gone. Really, honest-to-Goddess gone, and I knew without a doubt that her sudden death had ripped the core out of the oaks. Hers would not be the only death.

Uncurling my hand, I peered down at the vial of green liquid. I would do as Clary had asked. I could only hope it would be enough.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Making it out onto the street without being seen was no easy feat. The road that had just been quiet was now jammed with emergency vehicles and unmarked Elite cars. The Elite were easy to pick out from the gathering of mundane cops; their general arrogance and complete ease in any situation instantly set them apart. It only made me hate them all the more.

Clary had died in that house, and from the quiet conversations I could pick out they were treating her death like it was nothing more than a rogue Fae attack. They were wrong, but I couldn’t very well tell them that. Poking my nose out of the shadows would only lead to my arrest, and I didn’t have time to be bothered with them. I could only hope that their investigation would lead them to the truth sooner rather than later.

Tugging the hood of my jacket up over my head, I kept my gaze averted as I made my way through the groups of people gathered outside the barricade set up by the Elite. Hearing the neighbours’ shocked whispers as I passed made my skin crawl. Clary would have said I was being too sensitive, but what did it matter since she wasn’t here to say it to my face?

Reaching the edge of the gathered crowd, I glanced up and met Lunn’s angry gaze across the police barricade. His arms were folded across his broad chest, and a petite, dark-haired woman stood next to him. The flash of her violet eyes told me she was every inch the Fae, but it was beyond me why she and Lunn were inside the barricade.

One of the Elite officers turned and said something to Lunn. I couldn’t make out his words, but I could tell from the stiffening of Lunn’s shoulders that he didn’t take it too kindly. The female Fae put her hand on Lunn’s arm in gesture of calm, but there was also something terribly proprietary about the action. My breath caught down the back of my throat.

Fixing the hood of my jacket more firmly around my head, I turned my back on Lunn and the other Fae and jogged back toward the alley where Clary and I hid no more than an hour ago.

Once within the safe confines of the alley’s brick walls, my chest constricted and I doubled over. Bile crept up the back of my throat as salty tears stung my eyes and stole my vision.

“What the hell do you think you’re playing at, Darcey?” Lunn’s angry voice cut through my pity party, and I jerked upright hard enough to make the world momentarily spin. The half-banshee had rung my bell good and proper, and being forced to stand by Clary as she died had only made everything worse.

“I could say the same thing to you. I didn’t peg you for an Elite sympathiser.”

“This isn’t a game, Darcey. First, you keep the human witness a secret, and now one of our own has died. If you don’t come clean and tell me exactly what’s going on, I won’t be able to protect you from the Court.” The edge in Lunn’s voice surprised me, and before I could stop myself a high-pitched, hysterical laugh burst from my lips.

He grabbed my shoulders and shook me until my teeth chattered in my head and the laughter turned to sobs. I didn’t fight him as he drew me in against his chest, cradling my body to his. The steady beat of his heart beneath my ear calmed the terrible turmoil raging just beneath the surface of my skin.

“Talk to me, Darcey. I’m not the enemy. I want to help.” He spoke so quietly it was difficult to hear him above the pounding of his heart. “The Court wants you brought in for failure to turn over MacNa. They know about your history with him, and they believe you’ve turned on them.”

“As if I would ever go back to someone like MacNa. He hates me as much as I hate him. That tends to happen when you mutually destroy each other’s lives…”

Lunn sighed and pushed me away so he could stare down into my face. “Tell me what happened.”

I could have kept quiet, but I’d grown to trust Lunn. That hadn’t been easy, but something about him made me want to spill all of my dark secrets. He had just as many secrets as I did, and part of me believed we could absolve one another of our wrongdoings. Sometimes, two wrongs could make a right.

“Clary told me about the pub called The Dearg Hand. I was going to head over there to speak to Daster about MacNa, but Clary beat me to it. But when she called me up, it wasn’t to tell me that MacNa was there. It was to tell me that the half-breed banshee was speaking to Daster instead. We tracked her back here and Clary…” I cut off, remembering the glimmer of excitement I’d seen in her eyes. Had I misread it? Clary’s behaviour suggested that she knew exactly what was coming, or at the very least she recognized the possibility of it. But how?

“She’s a half-breed?” Lunn asked. “You’re sure?”

“I saw her eyes right before Clary saved me. She’s half-banshee, all right. She even has a Bone Blade—it’s what she used on Clary—but she’s definitely not a full-blooded banshee.”

Lunn nodded and opened his mouth to speak, but the sound of another woman clearing her throat cut him off.

“Do you have her, Lunn?” The strange Fae’s keen violet gaze raked over me in barely-disguised disgust.

I jerked in his grip. He instantly released me, but his kindness and the pained expression on his face were at odds with the other Fae’s words.

“I don’t think we’ve been formally introduced,” I said, taking a small step back from Lunn. It wasn’t far enough to remove me from his reach, but it was enough to make it difficult. And difficult was all I needed in order to escape.

“Generally, I don’t bother introducing myself to my prisoners. But I suppose if you insist, my name is Auriella. I am the head enforcer of the Court.”

Her name was familiar; I’d heard it spoken in whispers when I’d been held in the catacombs beneath the Unseelie Court, but I’d never met her face to face. She didn’t look like much, but then a Fae’s looks could be deceiving. The simple fact that her glamour was strong enough to hide her wings and all the other hallmarks of a true Fae told me plenty about her power.

“I see you have heard of me,” she said, the slight curl of her lips giving her Cupid’s bow pout a cruel twist.

“Everyone has heard of you.”

“No.” She smiled, and her perfectly straight teeth became jagged and needle-like. “Only those who have crossed the Court have heard of me. You do not see the end coming, Darcey. You, above all others, should know that.”

“Auriella, the Court wants you to bring her in, not kill her,” Lunn said, his words travelling like shards of ice in my veins.

“She resisted. What else was I to do?”

Lunn shook his head, and I took another step backwards as a black whip uncurled from Auriella’s wrist. The tip dropped to the ground as though it had a mind of its own. It probably did; the Fae weren’t exactly the poster children of subtlety.

“She’s not resisting, she won’t resist…” Lunn trailed off as Auriella took a step toward him.

“And you, Lunn? Will you resist?”

“I serve the Court. You know this, but I won’t let you break your oath.”

“The Mother of the Hunt cannot break her oath, because it is not given the way you believe it. I am duty and honour personified, and I say a stain like her is to be wiped from this plain of existence. It is something that should have been done a long time ago.”

“You’re the Mother of the Wild Hunt?” My heart stuttered to a halt. I’d seen what the Wild Hunt could do. I’d seen the pain it could inflict, the devastation, but I’d never for a second imagined it had a Mother.

“Yes,” she said. Her jaw seemed to be elongating, and her skin stretched across her face as her eyes grew larger and more animal-like with every passing second.

“Some mother you are,” I said. “Where were you when your children needed you? When they were being used for the gains of another? You stand there and say you are duty and honour personified, but where were those virtues when the honour and duty of your Hunt was being used for personal vengeance?”

“I am not the keeper of my children,” she said, advancing toward me. “They do what they must, and go where they are bidden. I never said they couldn’t be corrupted. If they have allowed that to happen, then it was of their choosing.”

My hand slowly closed around the second iron blade in the sheath on my waist. I’d lost the first one when the half-banshee had broken free.

“Auriella, no.” Lunn stepped between me and the other Fae. The look of glee that crossed her face the moment he moved clenched in my gut, and I touched his arm in warning. She’d planned it, hoping to catch him unawares, and he walked straight into her trap.

“Go, Darcey, run!” he said, the look in his eyes telling me he understood. He’d known it was a trap, and had knowingly stepped into it. “I can take her,” he said, his wicked smile warming me to my very core. It was true: I’d seen Lunn fight, and he was unbeatable. If anyone could stop her, he could.

The Mother of the Hunt snarled, her mouth opening to reveal the rows of jagged teeth. When she snapped her jaw shut, the sound echoed in the alley and caused the hairs to stand on the back of my neck.

“Run,” Lunn whispered again, the weight of that one simple word echoing Clary. For the second time that night, I turned tail and ran like the coward I knew myself to be.

* * *

My motorcycle came as soon as I called for it, and I sped back to my apartment. I didn’t have time to waste. Clary was gone, and I couldn’t let that stand. The Court’s bounty on me meant I would have to make capturing MacNa my priority. But before I could beard MacNa on his own turf, I would need supplies. If I was lucky, Daster would fold quickly and give me MacNa’s location. If I was really lucky, the troll guarding the door would be gone—the thought of fighting him for a second time in one night wasn’t exactly high on my agenda.

I headed into the apartment, pausing as the stench of sulfur tickled the back of my nose. I only knew of one demon capable of getting past the shiny new ward on my door.

He wasn’t in his usual spot on the couch, and I saw no sign of him in the kitchen. The subtle creak of shifting bedsprings drew me toward the bedroom, and I pushed open the door with the toe of my boot.

Mazik lay on his back, his eyes shut, his nose and mouth obscured by the marmalade ball of fluff curled across his face.

“What the hell are you doing on my bed?” I demanded, striding into the room and scooping the marmalade terrorist from its place.

It mewled in frustration and struggled in my grip. Mazik opened one turquoise eye and peered up at me before stretching lazily and propping his hands behind his head. This clearly wasn’t the first time he’d slept in my bed, and that thought made my skin crawl.

“I was waiting for you, and so was she,” he said, indicating the kitten who’d managed to turn in my grip and wriggle free. She crawled up the sleeve of my shirt, pausing only when she got to a particularly bloodied section of fabric. Then she meowed again, pitifully.

“I’ll feed you in a minute,” I said impatiently, reaching down to grab Mazik’s booted feet. He moved right before I could touch him, drawing his knees up toward his chest and propelling his body off the bed. He stood face to face with me, and the smell of sulfur mixed with the musky scent of his aftershave gave him an unusual, rather than unpleasant, scent.

“So where’s your little shadow?” he asked, peeking past my shoulder toward the living room. It took me a moment to figure out who he meant, but when it dawned on me my shoulders stiffened with tension.

“Stay away from Samira. The last thing she needs is you screwing with her head.” I turned toward the wardrobe in search of clothes that weren’t covered in kitten hair. Reaching into the inside of my shirt, I tugged the necklace containing the vial of Clary’s essence free from its hiding place. I popped open the back of the wardrobe and set it on the shelf alongside the Bone Blade. It was safe for now, and could remain there until I could return to the Between and do as she’d asked. Crouching down, I unlaced my boots.

“It’s not her head I’d be screwing,” he muttered.

I heaved my left boot in his direction, my aim accurate enough that he had to duck. It thumped harmlessly off the wall behind him.

“Get out, Mazik,” I told him wearily as I grabbed a clean navy tank top and grey jeans from the bottom of the pile in my wardrobe. I saw only the slightest spattering of ginger hair across the tank top, and the jeans appeared to have survived the ginger bomb entirely.

“Not until we have a little chat about the bodies you had me get rid of the other night,” he said. His sudden seriousness dragged me back from my own dark thoughts.

“What about them?”

“They’re gone.”

Two utterly innocuous words, and yet coming from Mazik’s mouth they were downright dangerous.

“What do you mean by gone? I asked you to get rid of them. What you did with them… well, I don’t want or need to know…”

He shook his head. “Not my kind of gone… The ‘got up and walked out’ gone that’s usually reserved for crappy human horror movies. Seriously, the things they find terrifying? I just find them funny.” He had a wide, smug grin that my palm itched to slap.

“It’s not possible, Mazik. You and I both saw them… hell, I killed them. They’re dead. They didn’t get up and walk out of there, so someone carried them out.”

“You don’t think that wasn’t my very first thought? Come on, love, I’m better than that, even got myself a mess of cameras set up around my gaff to prevent such things.”

“So you’re telling me that they got up and walked out?” I said incredulously.

“Not exactly…” He paused, and a frustrated sigh escaped me.

“Just spit it out already.” I dropped down onto the edge of the bed, tank top in hand. The ginger kitten seized its opportunity and climbed onto my lap, its plaintive meows making my headache grow at least ten sizes.

“There’s some kind of disturbance on the cameras, and when they come back on the bodies are just gone…”

“So someone knew about your cameras and switched them off? It’s really not that complicated, Mazik.”

“And I’m telling you that never happened. No one else went in or out of my place. That, I promise you. Whatever happened was enough to screw with the cameras without setting off the motion detectors. It didn’t set off my wards, either, and I don’t mean to brag but my wards are bigger than yours.” He gave me another wide grin that only made me groan.

But I couldn’t exactly dismiss what he was saying. If the Saga Venatione had truly gotten up and walked out, then there was something much bigger at play than just some religious zealots pretending to be God.

Tapping into that kind of power would be seriously bad news for everyone the Saga targeted… well, it would just be bad news regardless of who they targeted. That kind of power wasn’t something to be messed with, not by humans or the supernatural.

Many humans liked to believe that the Bible was filled with lessons, and that the fantastical stories from the Old Testament existed to teach the true path. It was a lovely theory, but I knew the truth—and I’d seen the consequences of messing with god-powers without actually being a god. That kind of power could do only one thing: corrupt. Manann had come damn close to it, and in the hands of the Saga that power would be devastating.

“Look, there’s nothing I can do about it right now,” I said. “If they’re gone, then good riddance. If they come back and I get the chance to ask them what’s going on, I will. But until then, I have a bounty to collect on. Now, if you don’t mind, I need to get changed.”

He opened his mouth as though to argue with me, but then seemed to change his mind. Without another word, he stalked into the living room. The kitten hopped from my lap and trotted after him.

“Traitor,” I whispered after her, but she just lifted her marmalade tail high in the air and disappeared around the door.

Flopping back on the bed, I stared up at the water-stained ceiling. My vision blurred as tears slid from my eyes, running down my cheeks and into my ears.

Clary was gone. Really and truly gone. The half-breed would pay. Clenching my hands into fists, I felt the blood well beneath my fingernails. By blood, she would pay for the life she had stolen. I wasn’t a full banshee anymore, but I would avenge Clary’s death… even if it was the last thing I ever achieved.

Chapter Twenty-Six

When I emerged from the bedroom, I was surprised to see Mazik standing in the kitchen doorway and watching the ginger kitten eat. I watched him, holding my breath as he leaned down and tenderly petted the kitten’s ears. The expression of affection in his eyes rendered me speechless. The ginger bombshell purred in contentment as he stroked its head.

“I think she has worms,” he said, jerking me from my silent observations.

“What?”

“Well, she just keeps eating and eating. This is the second tin of kitten food I brought over, and her appetite never seems satisfied. You’ll have to get her tagged and wormed, make sure she’s up to date on all of her shots…”

“She needs shots?” I asked, mentally calculating how much that would cost me. I didn’t have many expenses, but that was because I didn’t make a whole lot of money. The last thing I needed was the added expense of another mouth to feed.

“Well you seem to like her so much, so why don’t you have her?” I grabbed my jacket from the back of the chair.

“Nah, she’s well and truly yours. And, anyway, the demons I have dropping by my place would probably just eat her.”

My stomach churned at the thought of anything happening to the kitten, her plaintive meows for attention forever silenced.

I grabbed a newspaper from the coffee table and spread the pages around the floor haphazardly. Baby animals weren’t exactly known for their control, and the thought of coming home to an accident almost made me want to reconsider my position on the kitten’s future as a Happy Meal for demons.

“You owe me two bodies,” he said, returning to our previous conversation.

“I don’t owe you jack. If you were stupid enough to lose the two I gave you, that’s your problem.”

He didn’t answer me, simply continuing to observe the kitten.

“Well, don’t leave the door open when you leave this time,” I said, tugging on my leather jacket as I slipped the Bone Blade into the sheath on my hip.

He didn’t answer, and so I left the kitten in his capable care.

The bike was waiting for me on the curb, and I settled myself over the saddle, hitting the kick-start and sighing as the motor roared to life beneath me. At least this was one constant in my life. As I peeled away down the street, the hairs on the back of my neck prickled and I had an overwhelming urge to look back over my shoulder. But I held my attention on the road ahead and tried to ignore the feeling that I was being followed.

If Mazik was following me, he was going to be in for a nasty surprise once I reached my destination.

* * *

Parking the bike outside The Dearg Hand, I tugged my helmet free and waited for Mazik to pull up alongside me.

“You didn’t know I was behind you?” he asked, his infuriating grin making my palm itch to slap him once more.

“I knew the moment you started following me. You better have shut my door.”

“Cross my heart.”

“Are you ever serious?” I asked, climbing from the motorbike.

“Rarely.”

Pausing with my hands on my hips, I gave him my full attention. “What do you want, Mazik?”

“I told you, you owe me two bodies. I’m simply here to collect.”

“So, what, you’re going to follow me around in the hopes that I kill someone whose body needs to disappear?”

“Something like that, but I know I won’t be waiting too long. Death follows you, dogging every step you take. It’s only a matter of time before I have what I want, and I’m betting that the closer I stick to you the faster I get it.”

“You’re nuts. You know that, right?” But his words had struck a chord within me. He wasn’t wrong. Death did follow me, but I couldn’t help who I was or what I’d been born to do. Having my nose rubbed in it didn’t make it any easier.

Mazik shrugged, his grin fixed in place, but there was an almost imperceptible flinching around his eyes that told me that calling him crazy didn’t sit right with him. It was interesting, but not particularly helpful.

“Fine, any unclaimed bodies are yours. But don’t count on it, because I’m just here to get information.”

I didn’t wait for him to answer; I could already feel his scorn sliding along my back under his heated gaze. He was hungry—I could feel it—and that realisation made my skin crawl.

I’d never asked what he did with the bodies, never wanting to know the grim details, but it wasn’t a stretch to imagine him eating them. Not a stretch, but gross as all get out.

Crossing the sidewalk to the front door of the bar, I pushed against it, but the chains holding it closed on the inside rattled in protest. Chains weren’t an issue; banshees had access to wherever they needed to go, and this would be no exception.

Stepping back, I closed my eyes before laying my hands against the door. I imagined the chains dropping away, and then shoved the door with every ounce of my strength.

The door rattled in response, but the chains remained firmly in place.

“What the hell…” I muttered beneath my breath as I rammed the door more forcefully.

“Losing your touch?” Mazik asked, moving up next to me.

“It’s not possible,” I said, shoving against the door hard enough to cause the rattling chains to echo.

“Let me help.” Without waiting for an answer, he pushed past me and slammed his body into the door. Wood splintered and the sound of grinding and screeching metal bit into my ears as the door flopped open and the chains fell away. “Built special, crafted by hand…” he said, reaching down to scoop the nearest chain from the floor. “I’d say whoever lives here knew you were coming, love. This is a custom job built to keep a banshee out.”

“That’s not possible. There’s nowhere I can’t go.”

“Arrogant much? There’s plenty of places you can’t go if one has a mind to keep you out. You don’t have your full powers, remember? Easier to put a kink in the plan of a banshee who’s only working at half capacity.”

His words made sense, but I didn’t have to like them. I shouldered past him and into the bar without giving him the satisfaction of an answer. His laughter followed me inside, causing the tension in my shoulders to tighten. I was going to have one hell of a headache when this was done.

Silence crept in around me, but I let my senses wash outward. Mazik’s presence instantly spiked, his scent filling my head with its usual smell. Casting further, I found what I was searching for and strode forward, my steps faltering when Mazik’s hand closed around my upper arm.

“If you go running in there with guns blazing, it’ll be your body I’ll be taking as payment,” he said, and I halted my progress.

Again, he was right. If Daster had enough sense to get custom locks to keep me out, then he would likely be armed with something to permanently stop me in my tracks. If I didn’t slow down and really think about what I was doing, I would get myself killed. It wouldn’t help anyone if I allowed my emotions over Clary to get in the way of what I needed to do, and winding up dead in the process certainly wouldn’t avenge her death.

“What do you suggest?” I asked, sucking in a deep breath through my nose.

“They’re expecting you, but not me. That will throw them off, and gives you the element of surprise when I send them scurrying for the hills.” The smile on Mazik’s face was far from friendly; in fact, downright cruel was a much more apt description for it.

“If you screw this up—” I started to say, but he shook his head and laughed.

“Me screw it up? Love, I’ve been a demon for a lot longer than you’ve been alive. I’ve done worse than scare the crap out of a leprechaun. Screwing up isn’t really in my wheelhouse.”

He sauntered away, leaving me to stare after him.

Pulling the Bone Blade from its sheath, I crept along the edge of the wall. The silence I’d been so aware of when I first walked through the doors closed in on me again, and I waited for the sound of Mazik’s attack.

Seconds ticked by, and my skin crawled with barely-contained energy. This was the time I hated most—the breaths between the action and the end. I desperately wanted to follow Mazik and burst through the door.

The low sound of a shout and the splintering of wooden crates told me to move. Picking up my pace, I rounded the corner in time to see Daster scrambling to his feet. He lifted a gun in his shaking hands and fired several rounds in the direction of the room he’d just exited. Mazik’s cruel laughter filled the air, and Daster’s expression shifted to one of terror as he darted toward the back of the bar.

Something huge and hulking dashed from the darkness and crashed through the wall of the room I knew Mazik was inside. The troll from earlier had reverted to his true form, and he was a sight to behold.

Mazik’s laughter cut off abruptly.

“You never bloody said there’d be a troll!” he shouted with a grunt of pain.

Reaching the doorway, I paused and glanced inside as the troll plodded in Mazik’s direction.

“Hey, mountain man!” I taunted, and the troll turned the full force of its anger toward me.

Its roar reverberated around the tiny room, causing several glass bottles to crash to the floor. Mazik pulled himself from the wreckage of a wooden crate, grabbing an iron bar from the floor as he darted toward the troll.

“You got this?” I asked as I dodged the troll’s first blow. Its aim was off due to the anger rising from its body like steam.

“This body will be payment enough,” Mazik said, and I dodged another of the troll’s wild, flailing arms.

“You can’t murder him,” I said.

Mazik shot me a pitying look and slammed the iron bar into the foot of the troll. “Murder is messy,” he said, jerking the bar up as the troll roared in pain. “But if he doesn’t get his shit together, then I will kill him.”

I couldn’t argue with Mazik. Daster was in the process of escaping, but he had a point. Nobody would consider it murder if the troll kept up its attack. But I would know better, and that realisation didn’t sit right with me.

“Don’t kill him, Mazik, or you’re next,” I warned, before darting from the room in the same direction as Daster.

Of course, him actually not killing the troll was pretty hit and miss, but I had to believe he wasn’t an idiot. Everyone knew the price of killing one of the Fae, and it wasn’t one you paid willingly. Certainly not over something so stupid.

The back door to the pub stood wide open, and I slowed my pace, creeping to the edge of the frame and peering around it.

Daster’s fist glanced off the side of my jaw as I tried and failed to duck out of reach. The Bone Blade fell from my hands and skidded out into the alley. He hadn’t caught me full in the face like he’d obviously intended, but it still hurt like a son of a bitch. Bloody leprechauns and their luck.

Diving to the side, I dodged the next blow he attempted to rain down on me and brought my own fists up in a perfect double tap below his ribs. My punches stole the air from his lungs, and he fell backwards into the alley, his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.

I followed him out and scooped up the Bone Blade once more, twirling it in my grip as though it were nothing more than a baton and not a wicked, soul-sucking, life-stealing weapon.

“Whoa, Darcey, there’s no need for that.” Daster raised his hands in surrender, the Irish lilt in his voice lending him a charm that usually melted any woman he came into contact with . The glint in his eye told me he was simply awaiting his chance to grab the blade with both hands, come what may. It was one of the leprechauns’ biggest failings. They believed in luck, and that you could create a certain amount of it simply by being willing to take crazy risks. It didn’t guarantee success, though, and many a leprechaun had ended on the wrong end of a blade. But that was just the price you had to pay… at least, that’s what they believed.

“There’s every need for this,” I said. “I saw the chains on your door. I can still smell the iron from the bullets you used… the ones you fired when you thought I was walking through the door.”

“Darcey, no. I swear, I didn’t think it was you. I thought she’d come back…” He trailed off and glared down at his sneakers. “I’m not supposed to tell you anything, but you followed her out of here earlier… and, well, if you’re here and she’s not, I’m hoping that means you killed her?”

“You mean the half-breed?” I asked, the memory of her Bone Blade sinking into Clary flooding my mind before I could stop it. “She’s not dead.”

“Ah, shit.” Daster slowly climbed to his feet.

“You’re working with her and MacNa. I know you are.” I tightened my grip on the blade.

Daster swallowed hard as he watched my hands. “I swear I’m not… I’m not working with her, anyway. She came here demanding to know where MacNa was, and I didn’t tell her anything.”

I could taste the untruth on the air, a sourness that coated my tongue and made me want to cringe.

“Don’t lie, Daster. You know the penalty for a lie.”

“Bending the truth doesn’t make it a lie. We both know that.” His smug voice reminded me just how much I used to dislike him, and still did.

“What did you tell her?”

“I can’t say…”

“Then tell me where MacNa is.” I took a step toward him.

“I can’t do that.”

Flipping the blade to my other hand, I grabbed the front of Daster’s jacket and rammed him into the wall, pressing the Bone Blade tight against his throat.

“I swear, I can’t tell you. He has my oath… He’s my best friend, Darcey. You know I can’t say anything.” The panic in his voice spoke volumes. If he was telling the truth and had given MacNa his oath, then he really couldn’t share his whereabouts with me without suffering some pretty heavy consequences.

Pressing the blade a little closer to his neck, I leaned in toward him. “I know what’ll happen if you tell me, and I don’t care anymore. There’s more at stake here than your goddamn reputation, Daster. So either you tell me now, or I start carving your soul from your body…” To emphasise my position, I let the tip of the blade draw a tiny, quivering drop of his blood.

“Press it closer and I’ll pull the trigger,” Daster said, and I felt the hard edge of the gun he’d kept out of sight.

It was a stupid mistake to make. I hadn’t checked him to make sure he’d dropped the gun when Mazik chased him, and I’d allowed myself to get too close. This was the moment he’d been waiting for.

“Bloody leprechauns,” I said beneath my breath.

“Don’t shoot her, Daster.” MacNa’s voice came from somewhere behind me.

I sucked in a sharp breath and fought the urge to face him. MacNa was the one I wanted. He was the one with answers, but having him just turn up out of the blue was anything but good. Luck was for the leprechauns… so whatever he was doing here, I wasn’t going to like it.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

I heard MacNa’s footfalls as he moved forward, but I couldn’t very well turn and give him my attention while Daster’s gun was pressed firmly against my belly.

“I thought you wanted her gone,” Daster said, confusion twisting his features.

“I did, but now I don’t. Put down the gun.” MacNa’s voice brooked no argument, but I was so close to Daster that I could feel hesitation in the slight tremor of his hand as he pressed the gun into me.

“You gave Mrs Archer the gun with the special bullets,” I said, and Daster pushed the gun closer to me. The iron burned through my clothes until I could feel the barrel against my bare skin.

“No and yes,” MacNa said. There was no trace of a lie in his words, but his answer brought me no closer to the truth.

“Did you or didn’t you give her the gun, MacNa? The truth, please.” Irritation coated my voice as the iron residue from the discharged bullets bit into me.

“I gave her the gun, but it wasn’t mine to give,” he answered, and the truth wrapped around me like a comforter.

“The half-breed gave it to you,” I said.

“She knows way too much, MacNa. You said yourself that the only way out of all of this would be with her death.” There was a panic in Daster’s voice that I hadn’t noticed before and now was unable to ignore.

He seemed to believe that my death would solve all of their problems

“Drop the gun, Daster,” MacNa said again, giving the full weight of his attention to his friend. “I was wrong.”

Three words, such simple words, and yet I couldn’t mask the way my face twisted in surprise. And I wasn’t the only one. Daster’s surprise was the perfect distraction, and I took the opportunity presented to me.

Sliding to the side, I brought down my arm and knocked the gun from his sweaty hands. I caught Daster across the side of the head with the butt of my blade, and he slumped to the ground without even a whispered protest.

Spinning to face MacNa, I stared him down. “I thought you were done with Manann. I know you didn’t agree with what I did to him, but you said yourself that you wanted him to be stopped. I was the only one with the balls to go through with what needed to be done.” I couldn’t keep the bitterness from my voice. I could still remember the look in Manann’s eyes when I’d locked him in the cage. The hurt, the betrayal… Just thinking about it made my chest ache. I’d loved him. I’d loved him, and I’d betrayed his trust.

“For years, I’d accepted the censure of the Fae, MacNa. The Court believes I killed my lover, the ultimate crime against one of my own. They don’t know the truth about the things he’d planned. The things he’d done. I’ve taken my punishment because of the guilt I carry, and because we’d agreed to it. We agreed to play our parts, and now, after everything, you’ve been working on his behalf all this time?”

MacNa had the good grace to look ashamed, and dropped his gaze to the ground. “I wanted to kill you for what you did to him. I built the cage thinking you were going to use it to trap him, to kill him. I know what he was, but no one deserves to be caged like an animal for all eternity and have their humanity stripped away. Death would have been kinder.”

“I would have killed him if I had the power, but in the end…”

“You were a coward,” MacNa shouted, his words bouncing off the alley walls. “You didn’t want to kill him. I saw the look in your eyes when you sealed him in there.”

“I wasn’t strong enough, MacNa! I would have died with him. And call me selfish, but I didn’t want to die.” The truth hung on the air between us. “I didn’t see you or Noree stepping up to help. You built the cage, and she carved the runes, but neither one of you stepped up to give your essence when the time came. Neither of you wanted to be the one to finish him off. You left it to me.”

The colour drained from MacNa’s face, and he scrubbed his hands across his cheeks.

“I didn’t know…” he said finally, breaking the silence between us.

“No one knew,” I whispered. “It was my job to stop him, and I failed.”

“I’m not working with him now,” MacNa blurted out. “At least not intentionally. The half-breed approached me, said she knew what happened and the part I played in the betrayal. She was going to kill me…”

“So you thought working with Manann one last time was better than dying.” A bitter smile twisted my lips. “What does he want?”

“He wants out. He found a way to break the cage, too, and he’s really close.”

The blood in my veins turned to ice. The cage wasn’t built to be broken. That should have been impossible, and yet I could feel the truth in MacNa’s words. If he said Manann was close to escaping, then he was.

“How?”

“By killing you,” MacNa said.

It made sense. My power, my life had been poured into the iron of the cage and into the runes Noree carved.

“But it changed. Or, I don’t know, maybe it was always meant to be this way… He set me up.”

“Who set you up?”

“Manann set the Court on my tail. The duel was a fake, and the half-breed would have killed me if I’d gone through with it.”

“Wait, the duel was against the half-breed?” The world shifted and came into sharp focus as I tried to process the sudden influx of new information.

“I’m to die, Darcey. We all are, and if the Court catches up to me…”

The blood drained from MacNa’s face, his colour growing ashen as he focused on something behind me.

“You brought them here,” he said, turning to run. Two Fae enforcers dropped from the wall that had given the alley every appearance of a dead end.

“I didn’t,” I whispered as they closed in on MacNa, and my mind scrambled to come up with a plan.

“I didn’t think you’d have it in you, Darcey,” the Mother of the Hunt said from somewhere behind me.

Her voice sent a shudder racing down my spine that I struggled to suppress. The last thing I wanted was for someone like her to sense weakness in me.

“I thought you’d gone soft on us. You even had Lunn a little worried.”

Turning to face her, I searched the group of enforcers, but there was no sign of Lunn.

“Where is he?”

“On a time-out. He went against Court orders. Luckily for him, he made the right call. You did deliver MacNa to us, as he said you would, but that doesn’t change the fact that he stepped out of line.”

My heart came to a stuttering halt. She was so matter-of-fact, but I knew whatever the Court considered to be a time-out would involve immeasurable pain and suffering. And if they didn’t believe Lunn to be suitably “rehabilitated” or brainwashed, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill him.

“He did nothing wrong,” I said. “It was all on me.” She shook her head, and the cruel smile curling her lips coated my skin in a cold, clammy sweat. It was a smile that said if he died at her hands, I would be to blame.

“Bring him,” she said, jerking her head in MacNa’s direction.

The two enforcers who had cornered him at the end of the alley grabbed his arms, dragging him toward the mouth of the alley and the waiting cars parked on the street.

I’d never even heard them pull up.

“Wait!” I said, but it was already too late. MacNa spun in the grip of the enforcers, breaking their hold on him. As I started forward, he reached for the obsidian blade one enforcer wore on his belt.

“MacNa, don’t!” I said. Something slammed into me, sending me to the ground as it darted past.

The edge of the pavement dug into my hands and shards of broken bottle bit into my palms, but none of that mattered. Someone grunted, and the tell-tale sound of blade grating on bone slammed into me as though my body was receiving the blow from the silver blade.

Mother of the Hunt had her back to me. MacNa slumped against her shoulder, and the look of surprise in his eyes made me believe I’d misheard the sound of blade on bone.

She jerked up and away, and this time the sound was unmistakable. A tiny splatter of blood coated MacNa’s lips as he spluttered and slumped to his knees.

Scrabbling across the ground, I reached him before he collapsed into the piles of black, bagged rubbish from The Dearg Hand. I wrapped myself around him, propping him up as he stared up at me.

“You brought them here,” he said, his voice wet and rough. “You got your wish after all…”

“I didn’t, I swear…” I said, but MacNa’s chest shuddered violently. His body grew still as his eyes stared past me into whatever came after death.

Something inside me snapped, and sound bubbled past my lips as my mournful keen tore from my throat. I was only vaguely aware of the glass in the nearby buildings shattering.

Mother of the Hunt’s hand slammed into my face. The blow drew tears to my eyes and cut off my cry as my head snapped back hard enough to have broken it if I were human.

“Shut up!” she hissed, blood trickling from her nose as she towered over me.

“This is what I do,” I said, my voice devoid of emotion. I’d never been cut off before, never been stopped from doing what I was created to do.

“You would mourn for one who would have seen you dead at his hands and enjoyed it? No wonder your kind is dying out—your stupidity knows no bounds. Get his body out of here,” she yelled, gesturing to the enforcers cowering away from her shrill words.

The two enforcers MacNa had outmanoeuvred stepped forward and grabbed him beneath the armpits. They dragged his body down the alley, and I closed my eyes to avoid seeing them toss him into the trunk of one of the black SUVs as though he was nothing more than trash.

“I’ll be waiting for your next screw up, Darcey. Who’ll mourn you when I bury my blade in your chest? Are any of your kind left to bury you in the Between?” Mother of the Hunt didn’t wait for my answer. She turned away, her black coat billowing behind her as she moved toward the idling cars. I dug my fingers into my palms as she climbed into the front of one the cars and closed the door. They drove away, leaving me alone with MacNa’s blood on my hands and a hollow ache in my core. Something important had been torn away from me. But what that was… well, I just hadn’t figured that out yet. I’d have more than enough time to worry about it when I did.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“If you try it, I’ll rip your insides out through your nose.” Mazik’s voice cut through my thoughts, and I lifted my head and spotted him in the bar’s doorway.

He stood there, staring at something right above my head. Or, to be more accurate, at something behind my head. The hairs on the back of my neck prickled, and I rolled to the side just as the lead pipe crashed onto the pavement where I’d been kneeling.

“I warned you,” Mazik said, the quiet purr of his London accent filled with the threat of violence in a way only he could manage.

He darted forward, and I pushed up onto my feet, scrubbing off the drying blood on my hands.

“Leave him be, Mazik,” I said as someone grunted nearby. I turned and watched as Mazik rammed Daster back into the wall for a second time.

“Uh, he tried to kill you…”

“So?”

“So, I warned him what would happen if he tried to and the little shit didn’t listen.” Mazik raised his hand toward Daster’s face, waggling his fingers with an expression of glee that turned my stomach.

“Let him go,” I said.

Mazik dropped Daster and turned to face me, irritation written all over his handsome features.

“You can’t just go around letting everyone off the hook every time they try to off you. It’s bad for business.”

The cold ache in my chest was slowly spreading outward, and I shook my head. Mazik wouldn’t ever understand how it felt to be this bone-weary. He had a purpose; so did I, but mine meant watching everyone I cared about being ground to dust.

“I need sleep,” I said, moving down the alley.

“He should have let me kill you,” Daster said, pain straining his voice. His words cut me to the core, because part of me believed he was right.

Shrugging, I kept my back to them and continued to walk. “You might not have wielded the blade, Darcey, but you killed him all the same,” Daster said.

I didn’t answer him; what was the point? MacNa wasn’t one of the good guys. I was pretty sure he had never been one of the good guys, but he still didn’t deserved to die at the hands of that callous bitch.

Exiting the alley, I crossed the street to where I’d left my bike and scooped my cell phone from my pocket. I dialled Noree’s number without thinking about it and waited as the ringing echoed in my ears.

The numbness was slowly spreading outward; whatever the Mother of the Hunt had done by stopping my mourning ritual affected me in ways I hadn't known possible. But, honestly, I didn't care anymore.

The phone clicked, and Noree’s breath rasped in my ear. “What is it, Darcey?” The irritation in her voice was unmistakable. Why the hell she decided to have a problem with me now was beyond me, but Noree always seemed to have a problem with someone.

“No need to take that tone with me. Tell Samira I'll swing by and pick her up.”

“What happened with MacNa?”

“He's dead,” I said. I didn't elaborate. There was no point—Noree would find out in her own way. Knowing her, she'd end up with more details than I had, even though I'd been there, watching the life drain from him. It was weird to think about MacNa being dead. He'd always just been there, turning up right when you didn't want him to, a bit like a bad penny. And, despite our problems, the past we shared and the issues we’d never dealt with, I would have given anything to see him alive. Mother of the Hunt would pay for what she had done, for the life she had taken.

Silence greeted me on the other end of the line—not that I was surprised. What surprised me more was the line going dead, leaving the sound of static as my only companion. She blamed me. She wasn't wrong.

Jamming the helmet down over my head, I straddled the bike and cracked my foot down on the kick-start. The engine roared to life, drowning out the noise in my head, and without another thought I twisted the throttle. The tires squealed across the asphalt as the bike jolted forward before finally finding purchase on the road.

* * *

I'd planned to go straight to Noree's restaurant, but the bike seemed to have other ideas. The streets grew wider as I sped away from the inner city, the close-quarter housing giving way to tree-lined avenues and houses hidden from prying eyes. I tightened my grip on the bike, not knowing where it was taking me. I didn't want to be out here; I just wanted to climb into bed, curl into a ball, and pray for the sleep I knew wouldn't come.

Instead, I was on the outskirts of the city, in a familiar area that set the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. I'd been here with Samira; I still had the scars on the palms of my hands from where the iron railing had seared into my skin while we climbed the fence. And that wasn’t all. The memory of the Hortlak still haunted me. I could remember the sound of its victims’ bones cracking beneath its jaws and the scent of fresh blood in the air.

The bike rolled to a halt, and the silence flooded in around me. It was weird— neighbourhoods weren't usually this quiet. But I didn't sense any danger, just an overwhelming sadness. The numbness that had invaded my chest seemed to spread outwards, the tendrils creeping further into my limbs until I couldn't even feel the tips of my own fingers. Whatever was happening to me was getting worse.

I crossed the street, my boots barely making a sound against the asphalt. The gate stood ajar, and I slipped through it, careful to avoid the iron bars. The last thing I needed was more holes in my clothes and burns on my body.

This time, no security guards milled around. There was no one to see me approach the front door, no one to halt me in my tracks.

The front door was shut but not locked, and it swung inwards without a sound. Moving into the hall, I was surprised to find the house practically desolate. But I knew I wasn't alone. I could feel their heartbeats, the gentle sighing of their breaths, and I knew exactly where to find them.

Making my way up the stairs, I paused to ensure no one else had followed me. But the silence I had noticed outside was the only thing to creep in after me. The plush carpet muffled any sound from my boots, and I reached the door to the Archers' bedroom without alerting them to my presence. Pushing open the door, I peered around the edge and quickly spotted Mrs Archer on the floor next to the bed she shared with her husband. Her hands were wrapped around his, just as I had left them the night before. He was still unmoving beneath the covers, but I could sense his suffering. The half-breed had been abominably cruel to leave him trapped like this. It was a fate I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

The thought of me being less cruel than the half-breed started a giggle on my lips that verged on being hysterical. I had once been that cruel. After all, I had sealed my own soul mate away in a cage formed of my own magic, my very own essence.

Mrs Archer jerked her head up in surprise at the sudden sound. “What are you doing here?” she asked, attempting to hide the salty tear tracks on her cheeks.

I couldn't very well tell her that I didn't know why I was there, or that my motorcycle had brought me to her. Humans didn't deal very well with the whole magic thing. It tended to have one of two effects on them: they either became utterly obsessed by the Fae and the magic they possessed, or it frightened them. Fear wasn't necessarily a bad thing; at the right moment, it was a useful emotion. But those who were feared usually ended up dead, and Mrs Archer had already made one attempt on my life. I didn't fancy her trying to end me again just because the ways of the Fae were beyond her comprehension.

“I came for him,” I said, gesturing to the shell of the man left in the bed.

My words brought a fresh bout of tears from Mrs Archer's eyes, and I couldn't stop the pang of guilt that tore at my heart. She had been a fool—there was no denying that—but I could understand her motivations. I couldn't imagine what it must be like to be faithful to the man you loved while knowing he didn't return your feelings. She had done a terrible thing, an unforgivable thing, but she still loved him. I knew she wanted his suffering to stop.

“Why won't you just leave him alone? Why couldn't she just leave him to me? Why did she do this to us?”

“I don't know.” It was an honest answer. From what I could see, the half-breed hadn’t been cruel for any particular reason… but just because she could.

“I don't want to lose him,” she said, the tears in her eyes sparkling in the dim light from the bedside lamp.

“But you don't want him to suffer, either. Not anymore.” I moved farther into the room. The heavy drapes were shut, deliberately blocking out the rest of the world. I had also tried to hide, but the world had found me anyway. At least the Faerie Court had, and they weren't the type to be ignored.

Mrs Archer buried her face against the duvet, clutching her husband's hand. I could tell from her white knuckles that she had a death grip on him and wouldn't let go easily.

“Let me help him. I can bring him peace.” It was the truth. He would die, anyway; nobody, not even the half-breed, could change that outcome. But his death would be agonising, slow and painful not just for him, but also for those who were forced to watch but were unable to intercede.

“Why do this?” Such a simple question, but not one I was entirely sure I had the answer to.

“Because this is what I do, it's who I am, and we don't get to choose who we are when we are born.” It was the best answer I could come up with, and the closest thing to an explanation she would get from me.

She shook her head. “Will it hurt?”

“Not like this. I'll make sure it's easy.”

Her whole body trembled as she lifted his lifeless hand from the bed and pressed it to her lips. “I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for this—”

“He can't hear you,” I said. Part of me felt guilty for telling her the truth. He couldn't hear her, but I could hear him—and it was enough to bring tears to my eyes.

“Why can't he hear me?” she asked, the sharpness to her voice suggesting she was close to tipping over the edge.

“He just can't. It's better if you don't know the truth.” I wasn't going to lie to her, but I also didn't need to say the truth out loud. Enough pain had already been caused.

“All right, just do it.”

Without waiting for further invitation, I crossed the room to the bed and laid my hands upon Henry Archer's chest. There was a fine tremor running through his entire body, and his nightshirt clung to his cold, clammy skin. He had been left like this for too long already; I was as much to blame as the half-breed.

Lifting the Bone Blade from the sheath at my hip, I pressed its tip over Henry's heart.

“What the hell are you doing?” she screamed. “You said you would bring him peace, not stab him to death.”

“This is what I have to do.” I could already feel the Bone Blade’s power singing in my veins; it had a life of its own, and now it wanted Henry's life. The blade would drink him down like a cool glass of water.

Nancy's hand closed around the top of my arm, and I jumped against the tightening grip. I fought to shrug her off, but she wouldn't budge as I lowered the blade and pressed it to Henry's skin. The air in the room became denser and more difficult to breathe as the blade did what it was born to do.

Nancy fell away from me, dropping to her knees as she clutched her throat. I was used to it, used to the discomfort, and as such didn't notice the lack of oxygen as much as she did. The tremor in Henry's body stopped and his breath left his lungs in one final rattle. The silence that followed brought a kind of bliss that was quickly broken by Nancy's heart-wrenching sobs. She crawled toward the bed, dragging herself onto it and curling her body around his.

The ice in my chest cracked, and I threw back my head without warning as a mourning keen tore from my lips. The sound echoed in the room, the glass of the window panes shattering and the power driving me to my knees. I felt the warmth of my blood as it trickled from my nose and I gasped as though something had punched a fist-sized hole through my chest.

Locking Manann away all those years ago might have depleted my power, but I still couldn't ignore my true calling. Whatever the Mother of the Hunt had done to me had come too close to destroying what little power I had left.

Turning toward the door, I left Nancy to mourn for the loss of her husband alone. The moment was far too private to intrude upon, and there was nothing left for me to do.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Exhaustion made it almost impossible for me to concentrate on the road ahead; how I managed to stay on the bike was beyond me. When I rounded the corner at the top of the street, I caught sight of Samira standing on the curb, her arms folded across her chest.

Letting the bike come to a halt, I waited for her to say something, but she dragged her helmet on in silence before climbing onto the back of the bike.

“And you're standing out here why?” I asked, glancing at her over my shoulder.

“Because that witch kicked me out after you rang up,”

Anger tightened my shoulders. I'd known Noree to be petty, but we had had a deal. Discovering she had reneged on it both surprised and angered me.

“Forget about it, Darcey. She’s not worth it, and, anyway, you're not strong enough to take her on by yourself.”

Samira was right, but that didn't piss me off any less. I let my anger pour down into the bike, and the engine roared in response. Peeling away from the curb, I let the feel of the rough road soothe my emotions. What was the point of being angry? It wouldn't solve anything, and Noree needed to understand why things had worked out the way they had. Of course, she could always decide to believe I had deliberately killed MacNa, but there was nothing I could do about that.

It didn't take long for us to reach my building. The place was bathed in darkness, and the familiarity of home brought me a sense of calm I hadn't even known I was missing. Samira hopped from the bike and carried her helmet into the dark entryway, her anger palpable. Clearly she wasn’t telling me the whole story, and I had a feeling if I pushed her I would never get the truth. She was probably experiencing reactions similar to those other trauma victims: if I was lucky, I would gain her trust, but I would likely never get beyond the wall she had built to protect herself from pain.

Stepping onto the pavement, I pulled my own helmet free and hung it from the closest handlebar before guiding the bike onto the pavement. I pushed it toward the heavy roller door that sat on the other side of my building and pressed the button, waiting as it rumbled open.

An icy shiver crawled along the back of my neck as I stepped into the liquid darkness. The small voice in the back of my head told me to run; it was the same voice that had kept me safe for all of these years, and I had learned that ignoring it usually ended badly. The bike rolled away of its own accord into the darkness; it would find the corner I had picked out for it and rest there until I needed it again. I took a step backwards, but it was already too late—something heavy slammed into my body, knocking me to the grease-covered ground.

Rolling with the blow, I tried to get the upper hand on my assailant, but a pair of legs locked around my waist and pinned me in place. The second I felt the cold iron against my throat, I ceased my struggles and lay panting on the cement floor.

“I don't know what he sees in you,” the half-breed said, her voice little more than a whispered breath against my ear.

“He loved me.” The moment the words left my mouth, I felt her stiffen against me. She pressed the iron a little harder against my skin, causing it to burn.

“How did you do it?”

“Do what?” I asked in confusion.

“How did you make him love you?” Her desperation beat against my skin like a caged bird.

How was I supposed to explain that? It wasn't something that really had an answer; it had just happened, and though I regretted it now I couldn't change the past.

“I don't know,” I said. “We just did. We fell in love. It wasn't planned, and I don't think it's the kind of thing that can be engineered.”

“You're lying,” she said, lifting the blade from my neck. Before I could react, she brought it down forcefully against my shoulder, burying it up to the tip. A scream ripped from my throat and I jerked against the force of the blow. Pain spiralled outward, spreading from my shoulder into my chest. If the blade stayed in my body for enough time, the iron would slowly leach out into my bloodstream. It might not kill me, but it would hurt like hell. And, worse than that, it would weaken me even further.

Drawing up my free arm, I balled my hand into a fist. The crunch as it connected with the half-breed's jaw brought me great satisfaction. The blow was enough to startle her, and she reared up, losing her grip on the iron blade. Jerking to the side, I used my momentum to knock her sideways before grabbing the hilt of the iron blade with my free hand. I screamed again as I ripped it free, a cathartic cry that left my throat raw.

The time it took to pull the blade free left me vulnerable, and I had only made it to my knees when the half-breed’s first blow came. Drawing my uninjured arm up to cover my head, I gripped the iron blade in my other hand and lashed out in her general direction. Her cry of pain told me I'd succeeded, and the moment’s reprieve allowed me to hop to my feet.

She came at me again, rage etched into her face. Blocking her first punch, I wrapped my hand in her hair and drew my knee up toward her face. She spun to the side, and my blow only glanced her shoulder. Her hand latched onto my wrist, twisting it violently and forcing me to release my grip on her hair or risk having my bones crushed beneath her hold.

Before I could escape, her fist connected with my jaw and sparks flew in my vision as my head snapped violently backwards. I tried to slash her with the knife once more, but she knocked it from my hand. Her foot connected with my abdomen, sending me sprawling backwards into the darkness. The force of her blow caused me to collapse to my knees and retch, but still she came for me. She fisted my braid and jerked up my head, pulling it back until the vulnerable column of my neck was exposed. I saw the dull glint of her own Bone Blade as she pressed it against my neck and prepared to slit my throat.

I felt the edge of my own Bone Blade, still in the sheath on my hip, and curled my fingers around the hilt.

“Wait,” Samira said, her voice carrying across the space and through the darkness.

The half-breed jerked in surprise, and the Bone Blade slid against my skin enough to make me wince. The movement caused my life essence to shudder to the surface, and I fought against the call of the blade to spill my life out across its dull surface.

Samira’s shout was all the distraction I needed. Gripping the hilt of my own Bone Blade a little firmer, I ripped it from its sheath and brought it up at the only angle I could manage. I sighed as it sank through skin and grated against bone as I buried it in the half-breed’s thigh as she stood behind me.

She screamed, the sound reverberating off the walls, and loosened her grip on my hair, allowing me to turn and duck from beneath the blade pressed to my throat. I ground the blade into her thigh a little harder, and she stumbled backwards and out of my reach. I watched as her bloodied hands wrapped around the hilt of the knife, and she pulled it free before dropping to her knees.

Samira muttered something to herself, and magic stirred across my skin like a whispered breath.

I raised my hand in her direction. “Don't.”

I couldn't believe what I was saying. I felt like a traitor to Clary, but I knew that if we killed the half-breed I would be just as bad as she was. I would be just as bad as the Mother of the Hunt. I wouldn't allow myself to stoop to their level, not for anything or anyone.

As much as I wanted to see her dead, I wouldn't allow my thirst for vengeance to overwhelm my sense of what was right. She needed to pay for her crimes, and I knew exactly how to make that happen. Samira glanced at me with a defiant expression that told me she was on the verge of disobeying my orders.

She was strong, but no matter what happened I couldn’t allow the half-breed to die. Not yet, anyway.

I moved across the floor and planted myself firmly in front of the half-breed, pressing my hands to my hips and meeting Samira’s gaze with a heavy one of my own.

“We can't kill her,” I said. “She will face justice, but not at our hands and not like this.”

“I don't understand you,” Samira said. Her face was a mask of confusion, and I couldn't blame her for that. Perhaps I was mad for allowing someone so dangerous to continue living? But the thought of ending her life now, like this, when she was on her knees… well, that just didn't sit right with me.

I wasn't a murderer, no matter what the Faerie Court thought or believed. I wasn't a murderer. I had never been one, despite Manann’s best efforts to the contrary.

“Samira, I don't expect you to understand. Your life has been nothing but a series of traumatic events, one after the other. The people who held you captive for all those years…what they did to you…” I stopped speaking when I saw Samira's face begin to fall.

I didn't want to upset her, or remind her of the horrors of her past. It was the very last thing she needed, and I had promised to protect her from it.

Christ, I was making a mess of this, a mess of everything, which was totally normal. The sooner I could get the half-breed to where she belonged, the better.

“I'm going to take to her to the Elite. There’s still an unsolved murder on the books that she tried to frame on me, so the least I can do in return is pass her over to those who will see her tried fairly. I won’t have somebody accuse me of something I haven’t done, especially something so heinous.”

I sighed. Samira continued to look unconvinced, but I knew deep down that I was right. I’d locked Manann away to stop him from corrupting Faerie, to prevent him from spreading his own special brand of evil assholery. I would never give up on everything I had fought for and let the darkness win.

“I can't kill her. Not here, not in cold blood. I'm not the monster Manann thought I was, or the monster he wanted me to be.” As I spoke, I glanced over at the half-breed. She lifted her face and stared at me like she wanted me dead. I knew she did, since she had just tried to end me and her expression was still filled with rage, but her eyes also held sorrow that tugged at my heart.

Had he twisted her, too? Had there been a time when she was good, when she’d wanted to help other Fae? Perhaps she had been like me. Perhaps he had gotten to her, and then…

I couldn't think like that. Allowing myself to pity her would only give her room to wriggle out of everything she’d done. She had killed Clary, and while I wasn’t into the whole “an eye for an eye” thing, I still wanted to see her get her just deserts.

“Why help me?” she asked, her voice strained with pain. The Bone Blade had sapped some of her life essence. I could practically feel the power singing to me from where it lay on the floor, but I needed to remember that she was still stronger than I was, despite her injury. If she escaped now, I really would have to kill her the next time we met.

“I’m not helping you,” I said. “I will hand you over to the Elite, and they will deal with you.”

The half-breed smiled, but it was watery. “That is helping me. They won’t hold me. When he wants me free, he will release me.”

I shrugged and shook my head. “He can’t do that when he’s also locked away.”

The half-breed’s smile widened. “Interesting. Even though it is your power, you cannot feel that it has weakened with the death of your other…”

Her words sent a shiver of fear down my spine. I hadn’t checked the cage, and I certainly hadn’t felt anything change, but she seemed so sure of herself.

“You’re lying,” I said.

The half-breed grinned back at me. “That might be true, but you won’t know until it is too late.”

“Samira, call the Elite,” I said, tightening my hands into fists. She was goading me, and I wasn’t going to give in to her.

“You know this is weakness,” Samira said.

I shook my head and smiled as I let the tension melt from my shoulders. “You know what? For the first time, I actually think this is me being strong.”

Samira shot me a look suggesting I’d lost my mind.

I scooped the Bone Blade from the floor and replaced it in the sheath on my belt. “Killing is easy,” I said. “It's facing the music that's hard.”

Chapter Thirty

I was covered in bruises from head to toe. Going up against the half-breed for a second time hadn’t been a good idea, not that it had been my choice. But none of that mattered now. The Elite had picked her up as soon as Samira called. Apparently, they’d already been looking for her, having found enough evidence in what remained of her apartment to charge her with murder. I wanted to see if they could get her name, but she refused to talk.

The cuffs they put on her bit into her skin—the Elite were obviously not in the mood for messing around—and part of me once more felt sorry for her. And while she didn’t deserve my pity, I couldn’t help but give it.

However she had managed to get tied up with Manann wasn't something I would wish on my worst enemy. But that still didn’t make it my problem.

Clutching Clary's vial of life essence in my hands, I stood at the mouth of the Between. A fine tremor ran through my body as I contemplated what I was about to do.

Questions swirled in my head, making it almost impossible for me to concentrate. What if it went wrong? What if I failed to do the very thing, the only thing, Clary had asked of me in the moments before her death? What if I failed her again? How would I live with myself?

As I stepped into the Between, I wasn't sure what to expect.

That wasn’t entirely true. Everything was exactly as I had left it. The weeping hawthorn still stretched into the sky above my head, its shiny green leaves glinting in the light of the Between. It was truly a sight to behold, and one that always took my breath away.

The vial tingled against my hands as I picked up my pace, crossing the grass to the burial spot I had chosen.

Did Clary know I would bring it here, to this exact spot? She told me to plant it in the Between, but how could she have been certain that I would? The Between was a place for the banshees, not for someone like her. Or I’d always believed that to be true. I’d never known where the tree Fae came from; I'd always thought they'd sprung up in Faerie and were crafted and created from the Mother’s hand. And yet Clary had been insistent that this was where she belonged, where what was left of her belonged.

Tears sprang to my eyes, and I scrubbed my hand across my face in an attempt to brush away my sadness.

Pausing outside the banshee ring, I dropped to my knees. The ring of graves was not the place for Clary’s essence. I dug into the soft dirt with my fingers. It parted easily, the ground crumbling as though preparing itself for what I would give it. The Between always seemed to know what you needed, what you planned, watching and waiting, understanding the truth long before you ever did—and that power never ceased to amaze me.

Lifting the vial into the light, I stared at the green, viscous liquid that glinted like emeralds as it clung to the sides of the vial.

Was I supposed to just open it and pour it into the fertile ground, or was I supposed to bury it, vial and all? I waited, but the answer never came. It wasn’t as though Clary had time to tell me before she died.

“I wish you were here with me,” I said to no one in particular. I knew she was gone, and yet part of me hoped that she could still hear me.

It was silly to think that. She had lived a long and satisfying life; in human years, she had lived many generations, which wasn’t unusual for the Fae. She had begun to wilt, an indication that her life was coming to an end long before the half-breed had intervened. She should have been given a natural end, but Clary was never the type to do things in half measures. If I was being honest, I always knew her end wouldn’t be normal.

But knowing that didn’t this any easier. Clary should have taken this trip on her own, a private ritual between her and the earth. And that knowledge frightened me.

I was meant to be there at the end of a life, not at the beginning.

As I uncorked the vial, my hands shook. I was closer to death than life, and what was left of Clary's essence needed life. She had known this, but still entrusted me with the task. She had to have known if it would fail.

“Oh, Christ, I just know I'm going to screw this up,” I said. “Please, Goddess, don’t let me mess this up.” I squeezed my eyes shut and let out a long breath before opening my eyes once more and tipping the vial on its head.

I poured the green liquid into the earth, watching it seep into the rich soil and slowly disappearing from sight until nothing was left but a faint glimmer across the surface. The soil poured back over the top without my interference, and the silence stretched around me as the minutes ticked by. Still I sat there, waiting.

Nothing happened.

I had failed.

Clary was gone, truly gone. She was lost to the ages, and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it.

Tears blurred my vision and trickled down my cheeks, dropping onto disturbed earth. The ground groaned and shifted suddenly beneath me, and I watched as a tiny shoot poked its head up through the soil, its tiny leaves glossy and bright in the light of the Between. Shock washed through me, and I stared down at the shoot as it seemed to stretch toward the sky.

She had been right: the Between was the place for her essence.

My heart skipped. Clary wasn’t truly gone. The woman I had known was dead, but part of her was still left on this earth. As long as that remained true, she lived on.

Climbing slowly to my feet, I stared down at the shoot one last time before turning to leave the Between.

I had failed Clary, she had died and I couldn’t save her, but this would be different. I would protect her offspring, no matter the cost.

“I swear, Clary, I won’t let you down again,” I said, and the air shivered in response. I had made an oath, and breaking it would end in my death. That wasn’t something I was prepared for… not yet.

Chapter Thirty-One

The apartment was eerily quiet as I stepped inside. My gaze quickly scanned the room until it came to rest on Samira, who sat on the couch with her arms folded across her body and her chin tucked down into her chest. She looked like someone who was deliberately trying to make herself smaller than she really was, as though she was fighting to take up as little room as possible. She even looked a little frightened. As soon as she heard the door slam behind me, her head jerked up.

“What's wrong?” I asked, manoeuvring haphazardly in an attempt to dodge the ball of orange fluff that was obviously finished shedding in my wardrobe in favor of wreaking destruction elsewhere. Side-stepping the kitten, I sighed as she quickly changed course and dug her tiny razor blades into my leg as she made her way up the side of my jeans.

Samira shrugged, but I could see from the look in her eyes that she wasn't telling me something, and it was something that was bothering her enough that she actually looked scared. I hadn’t seen that look on her face since I’d freed her from MacNa.

“Samira, seriously, what is it? Come on, after everything we've been through you can tell me anything.” I plucked the orange kitten from my leg and placed her on the side of the couch, then dropped into the seat opposite Samira and waited for her to speak.

“I suppose you want me gone,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper.

I stared at her. What was she talking about?

“Want you gone where? Why would I want you gone?” I couldn't hide the surprise from my voice. Did she want to leave? If she did, I wasn’t going to stop her, so why the fear?

Although, I couldn't say I blamed her after everything that had happened. I could see why she would want to escape, to run from the past that still haunted her. But there was still the small matter of the collar around her neck. Until we found a way to remove it, she would forever be on the run from the Saga Venatione. They would hunt her down like an animal, destroying any chance she might have at a future. No matter where she went, they would find her. I knew their kind, and she would have nowhere to hide, no reprieve from their cruelty.

“I don't want to leave,” she said, “but what choice do I have? MacNa is dead, and he was the only reason you were helping me. You don't need me anymore.”

Then it hit me: she thought I didn't need her. She believed that I was using her to get to MacNa, exploiting the connection she had with him. She was wrong, but how could I explain that to her?

Shaking my head, I sat forward in the chair just as the orange kitten made a wild leap from the side of the sofa straight into my arms. The second I caught her, she began to purr, rubbing her tiny head against my thumb and licking my fingers. She clearly believed she was starved of affection, and this was her way of searching for comfort. Her fur was unbelievably soft, and without much thought I began to stroke her. The purrs of contentment grew louder with each rub.

“Samira, I wasn't letting you stay here because of MacNa. I was letting you stay here because of the Saga.”

Samira's expression changed, hardening until I barely recognised her. "So you weren't using me because of MacNa. You were using me because of the witch hunters. I see.”

“No, that's not at all what I'm trying to say. I let you stay here because you needed somewhere to stay. You're welcome here for as long as you want. I'm not going to hold you prisoner. I'm not like the Faerie Court.” A shudder raced down my spine, and I struggled to suppress it as a memory popped into my mind unbidden of the things that happened in the Faerie Court. Of the torture they had put me through after Manann.

“You mean that?” she asked, her voice like that of a small child and her words snapping me out of my own twisted thoughts.

“Yes, I mean it. You can stay here for as long as you want. Nobody is using you, or forcing you to stay. If you want to go, the door is there.” Exhaustion was washing over me as the last of the adrenaline left my body. I tried to fight the urge to yawn, but it slipped out anyway.

The day had been way too long, and I was desperate just to go to sleep.

“So what will it be?” I asked, continuing to pet the contented kitten in my lap. I had a feeling I wouldn’t be able to get rid of her now, but I was beginning to find comfort just in the way she seemed to find so much joy in my presence. It had been a long time since anyone felt that way about me.

“Well, if you’re sure… I’d like to stay.” A small smile tentatively curled her lips.

“Great,” I said, climbing to my feet and taking the kitten with me. I peered down at my bloodied outfit. “I’m going to get some shut-eye, or at least a change of clothes.”

Samira nodded. “I’ll take the couch tonight, and maybe tomorrow we can look into getting me my own room.”

I nodded, not even capable of arguing with her. I should have offered to sleep on the couch, but I ached in ways I hadn’t believed possible.

“Definitely,” I said, carrying the kitten with me into the bedroom.

I closed the door gently behind me and left the kitten on the bed as I stared out the bedroom window that overlooked the city. Night-time always made the city look so much smaller than it really was, some kind of illusion with the blinking lights.

Tomorrow would be different. The last few days had taken their toll on me, but after watching the shoot spring up in the Between, I had a feeling that whatever lay ahead would be better. For the first time in a long time, I didn’t feel so alone. The darkness I carried because of Manann felt a little lighter. Hope wasn’t an emotion that banshees got to experience very often, but when we did, we clung to it. And I would cling to my hope until my dying breath.

The kitten hopped onto the windowsill next to me and nibbled on the side of my shirt in an attempt to get my attention.

“I suppose you need a name,” I said, scratching beneath her chin. “But a name is too important to screw up, so for tonight you’ll just have to remain ‘the orange terrorist.’ At least until tomorrow.” The kitten purred and rubbed her head against me.

Tomorrow would bring its own set of complications, and I still had to deal with the small matter of tracking down Lunn. But for tonight, there was just me, my bed, and the small orange terrorist.

“You better not hog the covers,” I said, climbing into bed. The only response I got was one plaintive yowl that warmed my heart.

Having someone love me no matter what was definitely a feeling I could get used to. Even if that someone was a kitten who insisted on covering every bit of my clothes in orange fur. That was a small price to pay.

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