Dark Horse

by E. A. Copen

  “Your sacrifice,” Noelle announced, beaming.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The fae in chains looked up at me and Remy, his eyes narrowing. Rather than stay down, he fought his way to his feet and said, “They said you were pretty. Bastards need their heads examined. You’re gorgeous.” Whatever Noelle had done to him, she hadn’t beaten the stubbornness out of him, not completely.

  Foxglove drew his sword. “Show some respect.”

  “Why?” the prisoner countered and rattled his chains at Foxglove. “I’m a dead man walking. Might as well use my last few breaths to say what I’m thinking, though all things considered, I could do worse for a view.”

  I stepped away from the throne. “You’re not Summer’s prisoner. You’re mine. And that’s my little girl you’re talking about.”

  “You?” Some of the blood and mud—at least I hoped it was mud—smeared on his face cracked as his eyebrows shot up. “Just my fucking luck I’d die without a nice pair of tits in sight.”

  I looked around the court. “Anybody got a gag?”

  “Gladly.” Foxglove took his hands off his sword and stepped forward, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket.

  “Who is he?” I directed my question at Noelle who stood smugly behind the man she’d brought in.

  “Is it really important? I was told you needed a fae soul and preferred someone who would not be missed. I’ve brought you exactly that.” She gestured to the prisoner.

  “I asked for a volunteer. He doesn’t seem very willing.”

  Noelle made a choking sound. “You want someone to die willingly? You are a wishful thinker, aren’t you?” She sighed and rolled her eyes when she realized I wasn’t going to back down without an answer. “His name is Finn and he’s a member of the Shadow Court. Or was. He ran like the rest of them when their land was overrun. Unlike most decent fae, he decided to break into my treasury and rob me.”

  I frowned. “That doesn’t seem like it should be a capital crime.”

  “It is when he also assaults one of my handmaidens in her own bedchambers.”

  “What do you have to say for yourself, Finn?” I crossed my arms, trying to look threatening.

  Foxglove had just finished tightening the gag in Finn’s mouth, so all that came out was a muffled, “Hrmumph.”

  I sighed and gestured for Foxglove to tug down the gag so he could make his statement.

  Finn spat in the dirt in front of him. “I said I didn’t assault her. I seduced her. There’s a difference. Said handmaiden enjoyed my company. Ask her and she’ll tell you the same.”

  Noelle mirrored my posture, even crossing her arms. She probably pulled it off better though. That icy demeanor gave me chills. “Either execute him or don’t, but don’t waste my time, Horseman. Whatever you do will be kinder to him than the punishment he’s already endured.”

  Something about the story didn’t add up. Noelle was cruel and iron-fisted, but executing someone for stealing seemed a little extreme, even for her. Of course, Finn was irritating. Even in the short time he’d been in front of me, he’d made me want to wring his neck. Maybe he’d talked his way into an execution. Either way, he wasn’t willing.

  Yet if I refused, I could be giving up my only chance at securing a fae soul for the spell. Not only that, but Noelle would take him back to Winter and just continue the torture.

  I sighed and gestured to Foxglove. My knight picked up the gag and shoved it back into Finn’s mouth while Finn protested.

  “I’m grateful for your assistance, Queen Noelle.” I was careful not to thank her, as I didn’t want to be put into any further debt.

  She smiled a sweet smile, one shockingly at odds with her awful personality. “We both benefit from this trade. I get rid of him, and you get the soul you want. I do so love an even trade.” She turned to Remy and inclined her head. “If there’s nothing else, Queen Remy, I shall take my leave.”

  Remy nodded. “By all means, do so. I look forward to hosting Winter again in the future. May our alliance last a thousand years.”

  “And then some,” Noelle responded. She spun around dramatically and, with the sounding of trumpets, exited from the court.

  As soon as she was gone, Remy made an exasperated sound. “What an awful person. I liked the former Winter Queen much better. Noelle is duplicitous.”

  I bit my tongue to keep from pointing out that most, if not all fae, were. It was ingrained into their very being. Noelle was just better at it than most. “Do you think she was telling the truth?” I asked, stepping off the dais. I realized I’d misspoken and corrected it by adding, “The whole truth.”

  “She is fae,” Remy pointed out.

  That was her way of saying it had to be true, but it was unlikely the whole story. I couldn’t see Noelle handing over a prisoner just because they were being annoying. She liked to hurt people too much and would’ve enjoyed torturing Finn just for the heck of it. No, she wanted him dead and it couldn’t just be because he’d seduced someone at court. There was more to this story, and I would get to the bottom of it. But not in Faerie with all of Summer watching me.

  Foxglove and Emma joined me as I approached Finn. I halted once I got close and had to cover my mouth and nose because of how bad he smelled. Maybe it wasn’t mud he was covered in.

  “Father,” Remy said from behind me.

  I turned my back to Finn, and to the eye-stinging smell of him. “For the last time, it’s—”

  Remy sprouted a smile and came forward to meet me. “Dad. I know. I’ll never get used to it.” She put her arms around me as if to hug me, but used the opportunity to whisper, “Remember your promise, and don’t take too long. We can’t hold it back forever.”

  I nodded and she stepped back. “Sir Foxglove, secure the prisoner. Remy, I have one more thing I’d like to ask you. Do you know of any Spellweavers?”

  “Erher,” shouted Finn.

  I gave Foxglove a warning look.

  He sighed. “Fine. We’re going. This way, oh smelly one.” He tugged on Finn’s chains with a gloved hand, moving them further away from the throne and toward the exit.

  I turned my attention back to Remy. “So how about it? Know of anyone?”

  She shook her head. “That’s a specialty of the Shadow Court mages. There used to be Spellweavers in every court, but not for hundreds of years. They’ve nearly died out, as there’s hardly been a need for them.”

  “Why? I mean, what did they do for the courts that isn’t useful now?”

  Remy folded her hands in front of her, a gesture that made her seem older somehow. “Well, the stories say they were great heroes, but not in the same way a knight would be. They were roguish characters who used their powers to undo small spells and cause mischief. In reality, they did little more than remove unwanted magic, a task that now falls to our healers. Redundancy makes things obsolete, even here.”

  She smiled when she said it, but something about how she delivered the last line sent a chill up my spine. Still, I returned her smile, took her hand and kissed it like I was supposed to, and backed away, not giving her my back until I was already halfway out of the clearing.

  BACK ON EARTH, I STUMBLED out of the greenhouse and into sweltering heat, choking humidity, and bright light. It was late afternoon in New Orleans, which meant we’d lost the majority of a day. Not too bad, all things considered. Faerie was being kind.

  Foxglove had gone to get his car and left Emma holding Finn’s chains. I ushered her out of view of the street, took the chains away and backed Finn up against a wall.

  “I can’t march you around town in chains,” I told him. “So, I’m going to take these off of you. I still wouldn’t run if I were you. You think you’ve got nothing to lose? Try the idea of spending your entire afterlife as my prisoner. Stay here. Follow directions, and I’ll hear what you have to say. Got it?”

  “Hrrm,” Finn said and nodded his head.

  I lowered my head to examine the lock on the chains. Noelle had c
onveniently forgotten to leave me the key.

  Iron doesn’t hold magic well. That was one of the reasons the fae reacted so strongly to it. They were magical beings, and the touch of iron interrupted something in their bodies, causing pain and damage. There were some kinds of supernatural creatures who could enchant iron, but they were few and far between. Usually when magic hit iron, it fizzled into nothingness, or at least the spell produced a weakened effect. Depended a lot on the wizard in question and the iron content. I could’ve tried a spell to get the chains off Finn, but I didn’t know what would happen if I did.

  Lucky for me, I knew how to pick locks. I didn’t have my kit on me at the moment, so I had to improvise using a piece of wire I found and a lot of luck. The lock popped open and Finn shook off the chains. I half-expected him to run, despite giving me his word he wouldn’t. Finn didn’t exactly come off as a stand-up guy.

  He rubbed his blistered wrists. “If you expect me to just stand here and let you kill me, you’ve got another thing coming.”

  “Not unless you don’t give me a choice,” I told him.

  He gave me a look, a deep, examining glare. With all the mud—and whatever else—caked on his face, I couldn’t read his expression well, but I thought he might be trying to judge the truth of my words. I’d seen other fae look at me like that. Maybe some sort of Faerie magic let them detect lies or something.

  After a minute, he lowered his hands. “I heard you ask the queen about Spellweavers. What do you need one for?”

  I glanced over my shoulder to where Emma stood a short distance away, grasping her spear and looking mildly threatening. “Loki did something to her. Mind control or something. I’m not sure what, but I can’t break the spell. I sort of tugged on it earlier and it felt like it wanted to unravel though. If only I could figure out how. Someone told me a Spellweaver could do it.”

  Finn leaned to the side, squinting at Emma. The wind suddenly picked up and rain started to fall, pelting the sides of our faces with fat, heavy drops. I scowled at the rain. Guess the plus side of getting caught in a rainstorm was that it would wash most of that foul gunk off of Finn.

  “It’s not mind control,” he said at length. “Whatever it is, it’s woven in there deep. Good thing you didn’t try to pull it out. You might’ve killed her.”

  I looked from Emma to Finn. “You can see the spell?”

  He nodded and gestured to Emma, tracing invisible lines through the air as he spoke. “Wrapped around her soul like barbed wire, except the barbs have dug in deep. There are lines of it running into her all over. Some of it is pulsing. Whoever’s woven this spell is actively working to bury it deeper.”

  The news that Loki was still trying to dig his claws into Emma made my chest burn with rage. Hadn’t she been through enough? I stuffed the emotion down. This wasn’t the time for an emotional reaction. I had to use my brain.

  If Finn could see the spell, that meant he had magic. Question was, what kind? I’d been able to see it too when I looked hard enough with my Sight, but not in that much detail. “What kind of magic do you have that you can see this spell?”

  “That’s just the thing. I was trying to tell you before we even left Summer. You can’t kill me. I’m a Spellweaver! You need me!”

  Chapter Twenty

  I stared at Finn as the rain pelted us. He didn’t look like much, covered in dirt and muck. He didn’t look like he belonged to a prestigious and long line of magic-sensing and -manipulating fae. Looks could be deceiving. I mean, look at me. Who would’ve thought Death would wear flannel and blue jeans? “You didn’t think to mention this before?”

  He shrugged. “How could I? You kind of put a gag in my mouth.”

  Good point. Dammit, now I couldn’t kill him, no matter how badly I needed a fae soul. He was the key to removing Loki’s spell from Emma.

  “If you’re so rare, why does the Winter Queen want you dead?”

  Finn opened his mouth, then snapped his jaw closed as if he’d reconsidered answering, replacing an actual answer with a shrug. Fae couldn’t lie, but did that extend to body language? I wasn’t sure. Either way, that wasn’t as important as what I was going to do with him. I couldn’t extract his soul, and I couldn’t let him go. I also couldn’t not use his soul, not unless I had some other way of securing a fae soul for this spell.

  I cursed and paced away from him, holding my head in my hands. “What the hell am I going to do now?”

  “It doesn’t change anything,” Emma said, shifting her hold on her spear and moving closer. “What he is doesn’t matter so long as he’s fae.”

  She hadn’t heard our conversation a moment ago about the spell attached to her soul. Otherwise, she’d be grilling me about that instead of continuing as usual. How the hell was I going to explain it to her? The moment I did, she’d probably run back to Loki where she’d be out of my reach.

  I massaged my temples. Thunder rumbled in the distance, promising even worse weather before the hurricane hit. The pressure changes were giving me a headache, or maybe it was this whole quest Loki had sent me on. I’d only been working on it for a few days and I was already sick of it. Not only that, but I had had no time alone. Beth and Emma had been up my ass since it began. I needed to get away, to have a minute to explain the situation to Finn, a minute to breathe.

  Foxglove’s car pulled up, wipers flapping like mad to push the rain away. He sat in his car for a minute, waiting for us to get in. When we didn’t, he lowered the window just enough to shout out, “What is it now?”

  An idea popped into my head. I wiped some rain from my face and walked over to lean against Foxglove’s car. “When I say drive, lock up and drive.”

  He gave me an irritated look but said nothing as I opened the rear door and held it for Emma. “Ladies first.”

  Emma rolled her eyes, but accepted the gesture of chivalry. She wanted out of the rain as much as the rest of us.

  Rather than walk around and get in myself, or put Finn in, I patted the roof of the car, shouted, “Go,” and stepped back.

  Foxglove’s tires spun in the rain a moment. The car fishtailed, the back end swinging one way slightly and then the other before jerked forward and shot into traffic. It wouldn’t buy us much time, but it might be enough.

  “What the hell, man? This rain is cold!” Finn shouted.

  I grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him back toward the greenhouse. “Walk. She’s going to be pissed when she gets back, and if you don’t want her to stab you, you’ll keep up with me.”

  I figured Foxglove wouldn’t be able to keep Emma in the car for long, especially armed as she was. I just hoped she didn’t attack first and ask questions later.

  The greenhouse sat on a little plot of land near the river, the lot butting up against an old abandoned warehouse. We could’ve stopped in the warehouse, but the risk that Emma would come in there looking for us was too great, so I kept going, darting across the road and down a little side street. I took us up another street, zigging and zagging until even I was lost. Only then did I feel confident enough to turn Finn around and back him against a brick wall behind a dumpster.

  “I need your soul for a spell that will help me save this city,” I said. “But if I kill you, you won’t be able to undo the spell Loki put on Emma.”

  He blinked mud out of his slate blue eyes. “Does it have to be my soul?”

  “No, I suppose not.” I took my hands off his shoulders and stepped back. “But it does need to be a fae soul.”

  Finn considered me for a moment, adjusting his muck-caked clothing at the shoulders and cuffs. “Sounds like you want to cut a deal.”

  I cringed. Fae deals were almost never a good thing. The last thing I wanted was to owe him. “How about an even trade? I spare your life and in exchange you unweave that spell around Emma’s soul.”

  “And what about the fae soul you need?”

  “I’ll find another way,” I answered, though I didn’t know how I would. We were getting dow
n to the wire on time.

  “What if I know another way? An easier way. A way that doesn’t require you to kill anyone, just to take advantage of those who’re already dead?” Finn crossed his arms.

  “And what would you want for this information?”

  He shrugged. “Nothing immediate, but you would owe me. A favor is far more valuable to me than anything I could ask for now.”

  I shook my head. “No deal. I’ve got enough debt as it is.”

  “Then you’ll just have to kill me.” He spread his arms wide and lifted his head. “Go on then. Get it over with.”

  I couldn’t and he knew it. There was no way around the deal, at least not that I could see. Owing Finn a favor could turn out bad for me, depending on the favor. “Will you bargain?”

  A smug grin spread over Finn’s messy face. “That’s like asking if a drunk wants a drink. I’ll bargain with you until the sky falls.”

  “No murder,” I said, counting out my parameters for the deal on my fingers. “No hurting people either. I won’t do any dirty work for you. I won’t lie, cheat, or steal for you either and I reserve the right to refuse any favor.”

  “Wouldn’t be a good deal at all if I accepted that. Here’s my counter offer. I don’t ask you to do anything that hurts anyone else. I don’t ask you to lie, cheat, or steal for me. But I can’t let you pick and choose the favor. That’s no good to me.”

  I supposed that was about as good a deal as I could expect. “Once you’ve called in your favor, that’s it. The debt’s repaid. No stringing me along.”

  “I’m a man of my word.” Finn extended his hand. “Do we have a deal?”

  I stared at his outstretched hand, going over the words of our agreement carefully. Ideally, we would’ve written it down but there wasn’t time. The deal was as ironclad as I could make it.

  I closed my hand around Finn’s and squeezed. He had a good, firm handshake, one that reminded me of the men I’d grown up around. Pony’s friends. They weren’t all upstanding citizens, but they were good men who kept their word when it was offered. Not one of them would’ve tried to cheat me. I could only hope that Finn was the same.