The Shifting Price of Prey [4]

by Suzanne McLeod

  ‘What the hell does that mean?’

  ‘If you had truly considered the satyr yours, bean sidhe, I would have been able to protect him, and it is possible the animus spirit embodied in the gold cat would not have been able to take him as a mate. The magic listens, you know that.’

  I stared at her, aghast. Finn’s fate was my fault? Because I’d rejected him when I’d chosen Malik? Fuck. Whether it was or not, Finn wasn’t going to suffer for something I’d done. And neither was anyone else.

  Viviane was a loose cannon. One I needed to get under control. Not to mention she was in league with Bastien . . . Of course, there was always Ascalon. But the sword was an empty threat, and she knew it. If I killed her, I’d never get the last tarot card. Without that card, I’d lose any chance of finding how to release the fae’s fertility from the pendant. But she did want something. And wanted it badly enough to show herself to me.

  ‘Right, Viv, this is the way we’re going to play it. I’m claiming Finn as mine from here on in—’ We both jumped as a small chime split the air. I shot her a satisfied smile. ‘See, even the magic agrees. And next time someone’s in trouble because of me and your cards, you assume that person is “mine” and allow no harm to come to them either.’ I paused, but this time the magic was quiet; probably the ‘ask’ was too vague. Well, I still had something Viv wanted. I fixed her with a stern look. ‘Plus, if you want me to get your tarot cards then you’re going to have to help me properly; no more iffy warnings, no more cryptic stuff’– I jabbed her in the chest – ‘and no more plotting with Bastien.’

  She sighed and gave me a resigned look. ‘As I told you, bean sidhe, I will assist as I can, where my assistance does not negate another bargain I have already made.’

  It wasn’t quite a confession, but it would do. ‘Fine. But only if you’re going to play it straight with me?’ She nodded.

  ‘Good,’ I said. ‘So, is there anything, that you can tell, that’s going to cause us problems in the next short while?’

  She frowned at the distant swampies for a long moment, then pursed her lips. ‘Not as far as I can see.’

  ‘Okay.’ I held out my hand. ‘Now jump on board or whatever it is you do and get us out of here.’

  ‘At your service, bean sidhe,’ she said, placing her lavender-gloved hand in mine then vanishing, leaving a faint trail of jasmine-scented magic behind which the sulphurous reek of swampies quickly obliterated. This time instead of hiding I felt her lodge under my diaphragm as if I’d eaten a heavy meal. Looked like she planned on giving me indigestion. Perfect.

  I closed my eyes for a moment and concentrated. After a bit of huffing and puffing on her part, and a minor struggle of wills, we came to a compromise and I got her settled. An image formed in my mind of Viviane sitting on a grassy bank next to a canal. The hot yellow sun in the bright blue sky overhead reflected a golden ball on the canal’s glassy surface, and a few feet from Viviane a willow tree trailed its long curtain of sword-like green leaves into the water.

  It is rather naïve, bean sidhe, Viviane grumbled, her voice sounding tinny in my head. And I do not mean that in a good way. You could always soften the edges a touch, adopt a more impressionistic approach and add so much more depth and interest into the colours. It is a tad bright as it is. She sighed. Monet did it so much better. I knew him, you know.

  ‘Yeah, I do. You’ve just told me for the umpteenth time, and this is the first time I’ve done this,’ I muttered. ‘But if you don’t like it you can always lurk in the dark like you did before.’

  She sniffed, opened her parasol and positioned it to block out the sun’s glare.

  ‘Right,’ I said, pointing at the entrance tangled with weeds and brambles. ‘C’mon, Viv, do your stuff. And remember to get the date and time right; we’re aiming for the afternoon of the Summer Solstice.’

  I will try to get us as close as possible, she sniped, then dipped her hand into the canal and pulled out a sparkling glyph; it glistened against her fingers for a second, then my own fingers tingled as the glyph appeared and launched itself at the exit. The brambles parted like the legendary Red Sea, and I walked out of Between and into the humans’ world.

  To find Gold Cat waiting for us.

  Gold Cat looked like it had been pulled through a hedge backwards too. Or a war. Its funky metallic coat was dull and stuck up in dried-tinsel clumps. One ear was ripped, one eye swollen closed. Its ribs showed. And a long bloody gash scored its left flank.

  ‘What the hell do you want?’ I muttered.

  Need help. The words were a low growl in my head.

  I gave it a narrowed look. ‘It speaks?’

  She, corrected Viviane.

  ‘She?’

  Your ùmaidh, your gender, Viv said cheerfully. How else would she mate with the satyr?

  Fury boiled through me and Ascalon appeared in my hand with a burst of green dragonfire. ‘Once she’s dead, that’ll put an end to her mating with Finn.’

  Gold Cat opened her mouth and dropped a gold coin. It was one of the Emperor’s. Need me. Save mate.

  She means you can’t kill her because she’s got the gold coin the Emperor’s werewolves gave her for the satyr, Viviane said. It’s her invitation into the Forum Mirabilis to barter for him.

  I scooped the coin up. ‘I don’t need the cat. Only the coin.’

  Viviane twirled her parasol. The coin only works as an invitation into the Forum for the one it was given to, or their nominated proxy. I doubt she will give you her proxy, if you intend to kill her.

  Frustration had me briefly closing my eyes. I took a calming breath and let Ascalon slide back into my ring. ‘If the coin only works for her, or her proxy, what’s she doing here? Why isn’t she off to the Forum?’

  Gold Cat’s ears flattened. Need you speak.

  She wanted me as her mouthpiece. Figured. Except she still didn’t need me. Or she hadn’t when she’d decided to make Finn her mate. ‘Why isn’t she just jumping in and doing her possession bit like she did before?’

  Her whiskers quivered in disgust. Not strong.

  I took a closer look at Gold Cat. Beneath her ‘been in the wars’ look, her body was faded, almost transparent. She was my ùmaidh. A temporary changeling. They usually had a couple of weeks, sometimes even a month. But Gold Cat didn’t look so lucky. My guess was she had a couple of days at most.

  She means she’s too weak because she is dying—

  ‘I managed to work it out for myself, thanks, Viv,’ I said flatly, despite the anxious pounding of my heart. Carlson had been dying too because his mate had died, so he said. So if Gold Cat was dying and she was mated to Finn— I squatted next to Gold Cat, grabbed her by the scruff, demanded, ‘If you die what happens to Finn?’

  Mated you too.

  I blinked. ‘Thought you said he wasn’t mine, Viv?’

  Was not, Gold Cat said sourly. Is now.

  She means the mate bond jumped to you too, Viviane supplied with a touch of smugness, when you reclaimed the satyr just now.

  Relief streamed through me. So Finn wasn’t going to die when Gold Cat did. That was the good news. And of course the magic would take its pound of flesh for that little bargain. Still, it could’ve been worse. But that didn’t mean I was just going to accept being mated to Finn; not when it wasn’t what I’d chosen. And for all Finn saying he wanted us to be together he hadn’t chosen to be mated either. If it wasn’t what he truly desired, then sooner or later he’d feel trapped, never mind whatever magic the mate bond was supposed to do to make us like each other. I gave Gold Cat a shake. ‘Can you undo the mating without killing either of us?’

  Not possible. Her copper-coloured eyes slowly blinked and my heart sank. For me.

  Tentative hope flared in me. Specific questions, Gen. ‘Is there someone that can undo the mating without killing either Finn or me?’

  Her pink tongue swiped her muzzle thoughtfully. Yes.

  ‘Who?’

  Shrewdness flickered over h
er furry face. Save mate first.

  I sighed, not even surprised. Standard negotiation tactics. Next she’d be asking me to find a way to keep her alive before she’d tell me who could break the mate bond. After all, she wanted to survive. But saving Finn was more important right now. In that we were of one mind, so we might as well be of one body. I tightened my hold on Gold Cat’s neck and lifted her. For something that looked the size of a chunky tiger, she was as limp and light as a kitten, but then the physical part of her was virtually non-existent.

  ‘Say hello to your fellow passenger, Viv,’ I said, as I absorbed Gold Cat in a brush of tickling fur. She landed on the grassy bank next to Viviane in a tumble of tail and paws. Viviane sniffed and brushed a couple of loose cat hairs off her dress. Gold Cat staggered to her feet, shook herself then curled up on the grass, tucked her nose under her paws and went to sleep as if she hadn’t a care in the world.

  Nice for some. I rolled my shoulders, feeling the muscle ache of swordplay setting in. At least with Gold Cat and her coin on board I could waltz right into the Forum; a way better plan than the original one of letting Mad Max walk me into his ‘trap’. But I still needed backup. And I needed to know what else had happened while I’d been stuck in Between.

  I dug my phone out – surprisingly, it was working! – and called Hugh.

  ‘Genny, thank the peaks. Are you all right?’ His frantic rumble calmed as I told him I was okay and where I was: Primrose Hill.

  ‘I’ll send a van to pick you up. What happened.’

  I gave him the highlights: we’d been kidnapped by the gnome and the cat-shifters. They’d disappeared, and Finn had been taken by the Emperor’s werewolves.

  ‘Finn’s safe, Genny,’ Hugh said. ‘Half the herd were searching for you two in Between. They ran across him with the werewolves.’

  My legs gave way with relief and I sat abruptly on the rough ground. ‘Is he okay?’

  ‘He’s been injured. There was quite a battle between the satyrs and the werewolves from what I understand, but he’s in a healing trance and should be fine.’

  A bubble of joy expanded inside me and I felt a grin spread across my face. ‘That’s wonderful, Hugh.’ I jumped up, punching my arm into the air. Finn was safe. Everything else, like the mate problem and my lost memory, could be sorted out. I told Hugh I had another coin. ‘So now we’ve got three invitations to the Forum auction, which should up the odds of saving the kidnap victims.’

  ‘Sorry, Genny, but Finn’s coin isn’t going to help,’ Hugh said, then filled me in.

  The police had already tried to gain entrance to the Forum auction using the coins. Mary (as the police’s main undercover girl due to her ability to mind-speak with her mother over any distance and so relay info back) had gone along with the Bangladeshi ambassador (who’d refused to let anyone else use his coin). But as soon as the pair had crossed into the Carnival Fantastique (the ambassador had been told the Forum Mirabilis was at its ‘heart’, wherever that was), the ambassador had vanished, as had Mad Max’s coin, leaving Mary and the police backup team with nothing.

  ‘So we think the coins contain some sort of dormant Translocation spell,’ Hugh finished, ‘but it only activates if the corresponding lot they’d been given in payment for is actually in the Forum. So now you’re back I’d like to put your cousin Maxim’s plan into action. If you think you’re okay to?’

  ‘Just try and stop me!’

  Ten minutes later I reached the park entrance. The gnome’s house opposite was sporting crime-scene tape. I jumped into the police van waiting for me and Constable Taegrin told me that the cambion had confessed to buying (unlicensed) dried garden fairy and various other illegal aphrodisiacs from the horrid little gnome. The cambion was under arrest but, annoyingly, the gnome had slipped the police net, obviously by disappearing into Between.

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘if there’s any justice a swampie or one of the other nasties in there will eat him.’

  ‘A fitting end, Genny,’ Taegrin agreed with a grin, giving me a glimpse of shiny gold teeth, ‘but the boss would rather we had him in custody. He was going nuts with you missing. We were all worried, so glad you’re okay.’

  ‘So am I,’ I said. ‘So we’re back to the zoo again?’

  ‘Yes. Back to see the tigers.’

  I gave a quiet huff. Gold Cat was gonna love them.

  I was right. Gold Cat’s hackles went up the minute I’d entered the covered corridor of the tiger exhibit, and she’d circled restlessly around Viviane until Viv poked Gold Cat with her parasol. Gold Cat then slunk off behind the curtain of willows on the canal bank and I hadn’t seen her since. Not that her disappearing had made the zoo’s tigers happy. Through the corridor’s U-shaped viewing windows I could still see them crouched low to the ground, ears flat, their own hackles raised, eyeing me like I was an interloper in their territory and they weren’t sure whether to attack or run away.

  Much like the two males before me.

  I narrowed my gaze at Mad Max. His long platinum ponytail was tied at his nape with black ribbon, and his diamond dog-tags glinted in the V of his unbuttoned-to-the-waist black silk shirt, which was tucked into black satin dress trousers. He looked like a naff Legolas crossed with an eighties Medallion Man. ‘Look, Maxim,’ I said, tapping my boot on the blue plastic of my portable circle which I’d laid out in the centre of the corridor. ‘Stop being a wimp and get in the circle.’

  Mad Max shot me a fang-filled grin and drawled, ‘Sorry, love, no can do. Not till the old kelpie here says you’re not going to chew my face off.’

  ‘I’ve told you I won’t,’ I snapped. ‘I gave you my word.’

  ‘Aye, doll, but you’re nae the one in control,’ Tavish said, the beads on his dreads flashing from black to warning amber and back again, as they had since he’d first clapped eyes on me and seen not only my own golden soul but the red glow of Viviane’s too. Damn kelpie. If he’d keep his eyes on everyone’s shells instead of their souls, this would be so much easier. So far, for whatever reason, he’d missed Gold Cat. And no way was I planning on mentioning her after his kneejerk reaction to Viviane.

  I threw my hands in the air and looked appealingly at Hugh. ‘Can’t you do something?’

  Hugh shook his head silently. He’d bowed to Tavish’s greater experience about my so-called possession, though he didn’t look too happy about it; his ruddy face was creased with concerned crevices, and anxious red dust sprinkled his straight-up black hair and the broad shoulders of his pressed white shirt. Neither did Mary, standing to attention next to Hugh, her face watchful, her police-issue stun baton extended ready at her side. Backing them up were Dessa, Constable Taegrin, Lamber and the rest of the WPCs and trolls from the Met’s Magic and Murder Squad. If sheer numbers counted in rescuing the kidnap victims, they’d be safe already. As they weren’t, we were putting Mad Max’s ‘trap’ plan into action.

  Once Mad Max had popped out of his doggy shape he’d told Hugh the details of the ‘trap’ to get me into the Forum. He was to send me through a replica of the Portal spell the Emperor’s werewolves had used to kidnap the victims from here at the zoo. Hugh was hoping that once the replica portal was open all his girls and boys in blue would follow me through but, in case that part of the plan didn’t pan out, Mary and the witches were aiming to recast the replica Portal spell once they’d seen it. The preparations had been going swimmingly right up till Tavish appeared and declared me possessed by Viviane.

  I gritted my teeth, turned back to Tavish. ‘I’m the one in control, not Viviane.’

  His lacy gills snapped shut against his throat. ‘Aye, well she’ll be letting you think that, but with Viviane in occupation, you cannae be.’

  And whose fault it that? I wanted to yell at him. Yours! You should’ve said I was only supposed to give the tarot cards my blood once instead of taking off in a kelpie hissy fit. Instead, I stuck my hands on my hips. ‘Time’s running out. Max, you need to get in the circle and, Tavish, I want tho
se cards. Now.’

  In answer Tavish crouched, called a flick-knife, sliced his finger and flung blood on to the circle marked on my blue plastic. The circle rose, sealing me in, its dome rippling turquoise like the Caribbean Sea in a stiff wind. Tavish straightened, threw his arms wide and started muttering. His eyes swirled the same turquoise colour, and power beaded like water on the green-black skin of his bare chest, trickling down to be soaked up by his black silk harem pants.

  The frown on Hugh’s face deepened. ‘What are you doing, àrd-cheann?’

  Trying to exorcise me, Viviane said cheerfully. You should tell him that only works when the spirit is in full possession. Something only a demon can truly achieve for more than a few hours.

  ‘I’m not interested in telling him anything he already knows,’ I muttered, slicing my index finger on my own knife, then jabbing my bloody finger at the watery dome. It popped, as I expected, like a kid’s balloon, thanks to the safety feature I’d built into it. And even as I glimpsed shock on Tavish’s face, I called the Stun spell from Mary’s baton and flicked it towards him. He jerked at the last minute and it glanced off his shoulder. It was still enough to take him to the floor in a flash of green lightning and a burst of burned mint.

  ‘Maxim Fyodor Zakharin,’ I shouted. ‘You are tasked to put my needs above all others, including yourself. I need you to get in this circle now.’

  Mad Max’s jaw dropped as his legs moved of their own accord and marched him into the circle. As soon as he was in, I bent and touched my blood to the circle. This time the dome rose up with a shimmer of reddish-gold. I gave Tavish a suck-on-that smile.

  Mad Max shook as if shedding water. ‘It seems it is truly you, Cousin.’ He sketched a bow. ‘As I am apparently at your command.’

  Well, that pretty much confirmed my other suspicion. The text Malik had sent telling me I was dumped, and that I should talk to Mad Max if I needed anything, hadn’t come from Malik. But psycho Bastien. Malik hadn’t dumped me, though he had still cut me out of the loop when he’d ‘sent’ me home from the boating lake island, so we still had stuff to sort out. But hell, if the psycho prick was using Malik’s phone, it meant the beautiful vamp was in trouble.