What Man Defies

by Clara Coulson

  “Nice try,” I spat, and unleashed a new spell with a faint whisper. A hundred ice blades formed in the air around me, a spinning minefield. I’d modified this spell since my fight with the svartálfar a few weeks back. Now, when someone cracked one of the blades, they would burst into shrapnel sharp enough and fast enough to penetrate bone. “Now it’s my turn.”

  The woman’s smirk curled at the corner. “Ah, but the knife was the distraction, bréagadóir. Not the arm.” She shouted an incoherent word, and all the energy in her metal arm suddenly drained from the appendage into her body. But she couldn’t add foreign energy to her own like that—it poisoned the well, so to speak—so she must’ve been bolstering her strength, or her speed, or her…

  The woman opened her mouth and screamed.

  I clapped my hands over my ears, but it didn’t matter. The scream was so loud that it shattered every piece of glass in a two-block radius—and every piece of ice. My eardrums ruptured, and my hearing fizzled out into the high-pitched whine of tinnitus as my ear canals filled with blood. The vibrations were so violent they rattled my bones, and I felt as if I would shake apart.

  My vision blurred. My heart rate quickened. I tasted the tang of bitter metal spreading across my tongue. My rapid pulse pounded hard against my veins, threatening a full-body hemorrhage. And my brain, overtaxed, began to short out, all its circuits overloading.

  Dizziness overtook me, and I collapsed into the snow.

  My thoughts swam in a violent sea, and I struggled to steer myself to a needed conclusion. But I managed to grasp it and hold firm, the answers slowly sinking in: The woman with the metal arm was what you’d call a bean sídhe. A banshee. Unlike the name suggested, banshees were not a type of sídhe, but rather among the higher orders of the lesser fae. The misnomer was a human mistake that had been perpetuated through the ages. A mistake that never ceased to rankle the actual sídhe. They didn’t like being conflated with fae as physically and magically weak as banshees.

  Problem was, “weak” to the full-blooded sídhe was often a match for me.

  If nothing else, this banshee had a great deal of ingenuity. She’d funneled the collected energy of her conduit into her vocal cords so that she could produce a shriek a dozen times more powerful than the normal banshee fare, loud enough to rock the earth and leave destruction in her wake. The shriek had caught me off guard because I hadn’t known what type of fae she was, and she’d deliberately misled me into believing she favored more straightforward physical attacks, first with the brutal punch from her conduit arm and then with the charmed knife. It was, in essence, a sleight of hand. An element of trickery. A fundamental trait of the lesser fae.

  I’d played into her hand like a complete moron.

  And Christie could be the one who paid the ultimate price.

  Christie, I’m sorry I can’t save you now, I vainly thought as my consciousness waned. But I’m going to find you. I promise. If it’s the last thing I do, I’m going to…

  The present slipped out of focus, and in its place slipped in the memory I’d been fruitlessly hunting for a few minutes prior. I found myself in another place and time. A world of muted color, blurred at the edges. Sensation was fleeting, and details were sparse. Only two things were clear: the heavy book of history in my lap, and the voice of the woman who was teaching me that history.

  “Nuada Airgetlám was the first king of the Tuatha Dé Danann,” she said. “They called him ‘Airgetlám,’ meaning ‘Silver Hand,’ because he lost his arm in combat to the Fir Bolg champion Sreng and had to get a replacement. Do you remember who the Fir Bolg were, Vincent?”

  “Yes,” my younger self replied, all of six years old. “They were the fourth settlers of Tír na nÓg. They were similar to humans, except they had more magic, and they lived a lot longer. They fought the Tuatha for a long, long time, before they lost on the battlefield of Maige Tuired. Then they went away to live on Earth, with no magic and no long lives. The Tuatha took all that away, and made the Fir Bolg live like normal humans until they finally died.”

  “Very good.” The woman patted my head. “Back to Nuada. After he lost his arm, the Tuatha’s healer, Dian Cécht, and the goldsmith, Credne, made Nuada a new arm. A very pretty arm that glinted like silver and could absorb all the different energies of the world. Nuada used this arm for many years, until Dian Cécht’s son, Miach, made him yet another arm of flesh and bone. Nuada then discarded his metal arm, leaving it for others to seek like a treasure.”

  I looked over my shoulder at the woman—at my mother—but her face was an indistinct blotch of color. “Where’s the silver arm now, Momma?” I asked urgently. “Can we go find it? Before somebody else does? What if a bad person gets it and takes all the energy?”

  She laughed. “You don’t need to worry about that, Vincent. The arm is history, along with the rest of the Tuatha Dé Danann. And if it ever does surface again, in this realm or any other, it will herald far more important events than a treasure hunt.”

  Chapter Five

  I woke up in a jail cell.

  That was odd, so I didn’t immediately get up. I drank in the details around me: the cracked and stained concrete walls, the buzzing magic lights bolted to the ceiling where a bar of fluorescents had once been, the tiny slit of a barred window, clouded with years of grime on one side and a layer of ice on the other. A metal toilet. A barebones cot chained in place. And behind me, I knew without looking, a door of thick steel bars that slid to the right and only locked from one side.

  The precinct. My precinct. I was in the lockup.

  Muted voices swam in and out of earshot, and I realized two people in the hall outside my cell were arguing. But my eardrums were only catching snippets of sound, still healing from the banshee’s vocal attack. And my ear canals were gummed up with blood, a few globs still dripping out as half-congealed sludge. If you were significantly injured, the cops were supposed to take you to a hospital for medical care before tossing you into lockup. The fact that I hadn’t been given such a courtesy immediately identified one of the mystery people in the hall.

  I tested my hands—cuffed. And not with normal cuffs either. In the past couple years, the cops had switched over to magic-suppressing cuffs produced by a company made up of local practitioners. The cuffs were more like manacles, in that the bands around the wrists were wide enough to accommodate the spellwork symbols and shapes carved into the metal. They were also less like classic cuffs in that they were padded so the metal didn’t make direct contact with the skin. Suppression charms powerful enough to have any long-term impact tended to burn on contact. I could feel the warmth seeping through the padding as the spell fought my magic.

  Thankfully, the cuffs weren’t made of iron—the fae leadership would never stand for that—and the suppression spell wasn’t strong enough to subdue my magic should I put up a real fight. It worked great against human practitioners and the lesser half-fae, which constituted the bulk of the city’s paranormal population, but sídhe magic was a great deal more potent, not to mention wilier. Only problem was, if I broke the cuffs, I’d give myself away as half sídhe to a bunch of cops I didn’t like.

  That wasn’t going to fly. I needed a better option.

  I had a pretty good idea of why I’d ended up in this cell, and how to talk my way out of it, so I finally rolled over to face the door and get a glimpse of the contenders in the shouting match taking place in the hall. As I’d suspected, I found Nolan Kennedy on the left. He was still the same short man with a short fuse I’d met three weeks back, when he hassled me during the raid at Mo’s place. I’d embarrassed him more than necessary, I’d admit, and he’d clearly held a grudge and let it simmer. He was red in the face, spittle flying, as he shouted at Saoirse, who stood a few feet across from him, her hands on her hips.

  Saoirse looked absolutely pissed. There was fire in her eyes, brown irises like molten pools. I’d only seen her wear a scowl that deep and cutting a handful of times, mostly when we were interroga
ting child killers or family annihilators. Kennedy had already been rankling her feathers because she’d taken my side at the raid, and now he was messing with me directly. Me, the half-fae guy with a partially healed iron wound, who’d just had his ass handed to him by a banshee and obviously needed medical attention. Saoirse did not take kindly to mistreating suspects. She was big on things like “civil rights” and “basic human decency.”

  Nobody had noticed me turn over, so I peeled my eyes and read their lips to get the gist of the conversation I could hardly hear.

  Kennedy said, “He’s under arrest for assault and battery, not to mention about a hundred counts of vandalism.” He stomped on the floor. “You should’ve seen the street. There was glass everywhere. At least ten people had to go to the hospital with serious lacerations.”

  “You know damn well Vince wasn’t responsible for that,” Saoirse countered.

  “I know you have a soft spot for this half-breed failure of a cop,” Kennedy sneered. “You wouldn’t let me book him when we caught him with that drug dealer, but I beat you to the punch this time, Daly. And he’s going to get what he deserves for fucking with this city.”

  “Don’t you mean fucking with you?” Saoirse’s fists clenched. “You don’t give a shit about this city, Kennedy. All you care about is your pride. Vince hurt your poor little feelings, and now you want to get back at him.” She took a single step forward. “But I’m not going to stand for such a gross abuse of authority. You had absolutely no right to throw him in lockup without medical attention. A decision that, I assure you, will result in your suspension.”

  Kennedy threw his head back and laughed. “And who’s going to suspend me? You? Get real. You don’t have the power, and the captain doesn’t have the balls. I’m not going anywhere, and neither is he.” He glanced my way, another string of insults on his tongue—all of which died when he found me staring back, wearing my best “I’m going to murder you in your sleep” expression. His bravado deflated like a popped balloon animal, complete with a startled whine in his throat. And despite his best attempt to throw up a mask and keep the arrogance flowing, I didn’t miss the fearful shudder that tumbled down his spine.

  Kennedy was a loose cannon, and stupid to boot, but even he knew to steer clear of an angry half-fae. The lesser half-fae weren’t as powerful as me, but they could still pack a punch, and more than a few Kinsale cops had fallen victim to their fury over the past seven years. Kennedy would have heard those stories by now, whispered in the corners of the office, in hushed conversations behind locker doors. He knew the kinds of things I could do if I really wanted to hurt him. Knocking him into a dirty fountain had been a kindness, not a cruelty.

  Yet he’d still had the audacity to arrest me while I was unconscious.

  What an asswipe.

  Saoirse finally noticed Kennedy was no longer contributing to the screaming match and looked my way. “Vince!” She shuffled up to the bars. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m deaf,” I said, probably louder than necessary.

  She cringed. “Will your ears heal?”

  “Eventually.” I shook my head, and blood dribbled out of both ears. “Would help if I could get my ear canals cleaned out though.”

  “One doctor’s visit, coming right up.” Saoirse gestured to someone at the end of the hall, standing out of view. “You, get over here and unlock this cell. Now.”

  “Don’t listen to her,” Kennedy snapped. “I have the authority here.”

  “Since when?” I said. “Did your parents score you a flimsy promotion by shoving a big wad of cash up the commissioner’s ass?”

  “Watch yourself, Whelan.” He batted his fear further back and smirked. “You’re looking at the head of the new Paranormal Crimes Division of the Kinsale PD.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. “Your parents forced the commissioner to make a new division just for you so you could feed your fragile ego? Wow, and I thought I’d heard it all.”

  “Actually, the PCD has been in the works for a long time.” He sniffed in that snooty way rich people favored. “I’ve been generously given the position of the first lieutenant of the division, with six detectives working under me. That puts me on equal standing with Daly here, and because you’re a paranormal and not a human being, that means I have jurisdiction over you. Daly, on the other hand, is barred from investigating major crimes with a paranormal aspect, from this day on. So she isn’t allowed to give you another get-out-of-jail-free card.”

  Saoirse had amazing restraint. She only shot him a glare. I would’ve totally decked the guy.

  “Got to say, pal”—I stretched my neck, left and right, causing more blood to leak out—“you’re off to a bad start with your new position. Not only did you arrest an injured half-fae without cause, then refuse him medical attention before tossing him into a cell, all for the sake of your burned pride. But in so doing, you also lost the trail of a serial abductor—and possibly killer—who’s been snatching innocent people off the street for the past month and a half.”

  “What?” Kennedy’s face was turning that delightful shade of tomato red again.

  “The reason you found me lying unconscious surrounded by a sea of glass is because I was attacked by a banshee. She snatched my friend Christie Bridgewater right off the sidewalk and yanked her through an Otherworld portal. When I tried to pursue, the banshee emerged from that portal and provoked a fight with me by refusing to give Christie back.” I glanced down and noticed I’d been stripped of my coat. “And what astonishes me the most about your vengeful arrest fetish is that one of my coat pockets is filled with information on the missing people—many of whom have been reported missing to you, the cops—which should’ve tipped you off to what I was up to when I was attacked.”

  “Oh, I told him you were working with me on the missing persons cases,” Saoirse said with an edge to her voice. “He still didn’t care. Just wanted to get his jollies off by seeing you behind bars.”

  “Yeah?” I drilled my gaze into Kennedy’s pinched face. “Well, that puts you at the top of my shit list then. Because one of my good friends is in danger of dying, and here I am, wasting time with your dumb ass, while the banshee’s trail grows colder by the second.”

  Kennedy sputtered for a moment, then spat out, “You can’t prove you had a fight with some screaming faerie lady, Whelan. As far as I’m concerned, you’re to blame for the—”

  “Cut the crap,” I said, my words echoing off the walls. “If you’d canvassed the area, like you’re supposed to do, you would’ve found two dozen witnesses who saw exactly what happened. I was far from the only person on that street. So either you’re lying out of your ass so you can keep me here longer, or you deliberately bungled the beginning of a major investigation on your first day as the super-special lieutenant of the PCD just to fulfill a vendetta.”

  Kennedy opened and closed his mouth several times, saying nothing. Then he shut down, face like stone. “You’ll get out of that cell when you’re being escorted to your arraignment, and not a second before.”

  “No,” I said, my magic now nipping at my cuffs, “you will let me out now.”

  “I will not.”

  “You—”

  Out of nowhere, a ghost materialized to the left of my cell. It was a middle-aged man with graying hair and sunken eyes, a haunted look on his hangdog face. I recognized him from O’Shea’s list of the missing. Orson Barnum, a veteran banker who’d come out of retirement to help Kinsale rebuild its banking sector after the collapse. He was one of the highest-profile victims on the list of the missing, and according to O’Shea’s notes, the police had actually been searching for him to the best of their ability. But like with Amy Newsome, and the other man at the market, the cops simply hadn’t been fast enough, or smart enough. Barnum had died as well, and now he was back as a ghost with a chip on his shoulder, unable to rest due to his violent end.

  Saoirse and Kennedy spun around, both going for their weapons.

  �
��Don’t!” I said. “That’s a ghost. You can’t hit it. But it can hit you if you piss it off.”

  “W-Why is a ghost here?” Kennedy stammered.

  “He’s one of the Sluagh,” I answered, “the spirits of the restless dead. He’s come back from the grave because he has ‘unfinished business’ in Kinsale. It’s an involuntary trauma response that most often occurs to the souls of the murdered. And FYI, he’s the third ghost to appear in town today. All three were victims of the recent rash of disappearances, aka the kidnappings by the banshee.”

  Kennedy paled. “You’ve got to be shitting me. You expect me to believe there’s some mass murder scheme operating right under our noses?”

  “The truth is the truth whether you believe it or not,” I said, staring him down to emphasize the point. Then I caught movement in my periphery and helpfully added, “Also, you might want to duck.”

  The ghost of Orson Barnum bellowed in senseless rage and raised his arms above his head. As he did, my entire cell door ripped free from the frame and flew out toward Saoirse and Kennedy. Saoirse dove backward and rolled away to safety, while Kennedy, too slow on the draw, got a face full of steel that rebounded off his skull with a clang. He careened into the wall and bounced off, crumpling to the floor in a daze.

  His opponent down, Barnum yanked the cell door toward himself with a hand gesture and held it floating before him like a shield. He then focused his attention on the remaining cells in the lockup, and all the other doors began to shake and rattle.

  With nothing keeping me imprisoned, I calmly stood up, walked over to Kennedy, and pressed one of my feet against his chest. “Key to my cuffs. Now.”