by Maria Lima
“Nor is it,” Gigi agreed. “You must do what you think best, Adam. Though, your plane can’t get to your estate until well past morning.”
“Understood,” Adam said. “I’d planned for them to make a stop in Dallas. They can be there by dawn. I have someone there who can house everyone safely until nightfall.”
“If I remember correctly, your plane seats only a dozen or so.”
“True. However, my hired pilot has a larger plane we can use.”
“Pish-tosh.” I could imagine Gigi’s well-coiffed head shaking. “There is no need to involve others. I’ve a plane that will suit. It can transport everyone in safety directly from the ranch airstrip.” For a moment, I wondered how she knew our airstrip could support a larger plane, then I remembered. She was the one who had the bloody thing built. No doubt it could handle the entire Kelly fleet—including, evidently, a vampire-ready jet.
“The plane has blackout windows?” I asked.
“Yes, and will be freshly stocked with blood. Seats up to eighty-five. The plane will be there in three hours. Have them ready.”
“Thank you, Minerva,” Adam said. “This will be extremely helpful.”
“Gather your vampires. Have Ianto, Rhys, and Liz go with them.”
“But—” I began to protest, but Gigi cut me off.
“No, child, I know they’ve blood-bonded to you, but you need to be lean and agile now. They will best serve you guarding the rest of your people. The four of you will have more than enough to worry about. Let them help where they’re needed most.”
I couldn’t argue, even though I wanted them here. They were mine, damn it. But she was right. As much as I could use the support, tying Rhys, Ianto, and Liz here would accomplish what exactly? Waiting and pondering in some lakeside condo somewhere? They’d be just as reachable via phone if they were in the UK. Hell, for that matter, we could set up several computers with Skype and do video conferencing if we needed to. “Gigi, what else can you tell us about the Challenge? What do we need to do?”
Dead silence for a moment stretched into more, then finally, “I wish I knew, Keira,” she said. I heard something in her voice that I’d never heard before—defeat. She’d no more been able to interpret the rest of the Challenge than we had. “You already know much of the basic information. The Challenge seems to suggest that you need to tie the land to you. There are many ways to do this in lore. You’ve already established residence. You’ve given blood and sweat and tears. You’ve consummated your joining and have pledged to care for your people. They’ve pledged fealty to you in return. This, however, this puzzles me. The only thing left is true sacrifice. At least, in my own interpretation of such things.”
I did not like the way this was going. Though my knowledge of Faery lore was less than expert, I still knew many of the basic tales and too damned many of them required sacrifice—of an actual person. Yes, oftentimes in modern days, that sacrifice had evolved to something more symbolic, but I’d read that parchment and the language was about as modern as Atlantis—the actual city, not any movie or TV show. “I’m not letting anyone here—”
“Of course not,” Gigi interrupted. “That’s insanity. Gideon may be a fox, but he’s not a lunatic. He knows you’d not go that far. He’s counting on it, more than likely. Though, that said, I doubt he’d be willing to stick his own neck out quite that far. In most Challenges, what is required of one party is required of the other.”
“Then no, you’re right. He’s probably counting on us reneging.” I’d finally clicked into the overall picture. Yeah, well, I was a little slow, mostly because I wasn’t sure why. If Gideon gained the Wild Moon, gained permanent access to our door to Faery, I had absolutely no doubt that his first act would be to banish us. But with him being riven from the Kelly clan and disinherited from the Unseelie, effectively unblooded, I wasn’t sure what him gaining the land would mean. Gods and goddesses, I hated Sidhe politics. It was always like this, hidden, mysterious, double-edged, and triple-tongued. Nothing was straightforward—oh yeah, kind of like my own fucking family. I had accepted my role as Kelly heir, if not gladly, with practicality. I mean, what else could I do?
After we’d learned that Gideon, too, had Changed, had become heir, something that was supposedly impossible, Minerva had granted me, with Adam as my consort, the rule/oversight of the lands in Texas and the Southwest. A trial, of sorts, and a learning experience. She had no plans to abdicate anytime in the near future, which for her, could mean centuries. In the meantime, Adam and I could set up camp, set up our own small fiefdom and learn how to rule without being my great-great-granny. Gideon, spawn of fucking Satan (if that particular construct really existed outside of fiction and bad films) had been relegated to his blood father, Adam’s father, high king of the Unseelie Court. We now knew how well that worked out… as in not at all.
“I would not go so far as to presume that taking your land, your rule, is his only intent.” My clan leader’s voice clanged like a warning bell, emphasizing my own fears. Yeah, I was no idiot. I may have once thought myself in love with Gideon, but events then and events now had proven my instincts right. He was trouble with a capital fuck-me-for-being-so-stupid.
“Well, I did figure he’s got something more in mind than just living on a ranch in the middle of nowhere Texas,” I said. “Ruling here, ousting us sounds like it could be an end result, but not the only one. I wouldn’t put anything past him.”
Tucker stifled a sound that sounded suspiciously like a “duh” snort. I put my hand on my hip and shot him a “shut up” look. I was damned tired of all the stupid spanners getting tossed into the gears of my life. I truly was bloody well near to saying Gideon can just have the damned ranch and damn the consequences. We could all leave along with the vampires. I’d not ever seen Adam’s estate in England. I’m sure I’d love it. After all, I didn’t really care where we lived. But reality and a nagging sense of guilt kept bopping me on the head. What would happen to the human residents of Rio Seco if I absconded? I couldn’t trust to Gideon’s good intentions. He’d never had any.
Adam shifted his stance, something I’d never once seen him do. Was he nervous? Was he interpreting her words differently, catching a nuance I couldn’t? Had he come to a different conclusion, perhaps? I jerked my head, trying to signify that he should speak to Gigi. He shook his head and mouthed “later.”
“Keira, all of you, take care. I’m going to do a little follow-up of my own here,” Gigi said. “I have a few ideas.”
“Any help would be greatly appreciated, Minerva,” Adam said. “We’ll phone you if we come up with anything at this end. I’ll text you where we’ll be staying and will keep this phone with me at all times.”
“You do that.”
With that, my great-great-granny, clan chief, matriarch of the Kelly clan, and Machiavelli’s clone, severed the phone connection.
Adam placed the phone on the desk, avoiding my glance.
“You mind telling me what’s going on?” By this time, I had both hands on my hips. I was sure I looked like some sort of harridan, hair going all over the place, dressed in finery fit only for a formal traditional supernatural Reception, eyes flashing and face flushed. I did not want to look into a mirror and frighten myself. “Is that the Batphone or something?”
“More or less.” Adam crossed his arms. Niko and Tucker just stood in their now-accustomed bodyguard places and grinned. “Minerva gave this to me before we left Vancouver. It’s got one number programmed into it and she will always be available if I use this phone to call.”
“More like a lifeline than a Batphone, I’d say,” Tucker piped up.
“Shut it,” I growled. “Were you planning on telling me?”
Adam gave me a small smile. “Honestly, I’d utterly forgotten about it,” he said. “You came back and well…”
“We dropped right into the middle of a series of hate crimes. Yeah, yeah, all right.” I had to concede the point. “So we’re to go to this inn, th
en.”
“It seems so.”
“She’d damned well better be right about the boundary thing,” I muttered. “Last thing we need is for Sidhe magick to disrupt us while we’re trying to figure out what to do.”
“Point. Now, let me get to work and coordinate with Lance and Jessica. We’ll need to get our residents notified and packed up so they can get on the plane when it arrives.”
Thank goodness for our vampire assistants. They’d be sure to corral everyone and everything that was needed. “I think I’ll go back to the house and pack, unless you think there’s anything else I need to do?”
“No, that’s fine,” Adam said. “Pack for the both of us if you don’t mind? Niko and I will need to go to the inn as soon as possible since our hours are limited. We’ll take one of the ranch vans. You and Tucker can come along first thing in the morning. I’d like you to make sure John and his family get off all right.”
Tucker nodded. “We’ll do that. Where are they going to?”
“I’d like him to make sure the Wild Moon is closed up behind us. Then he and his family can drive to Austin and catch a commercial flight to London tomorrow,” Adam replied.
“That’ll work.”
Part of me was ecstatic that we were doing something, anything that seemed like action, like forward motion. The other part was trying to freak out that this was happening so fast. I stuffed down the gibbering part of my brain with a ruthless mental “later” command. I’d break down later. This wasn’t anything big, just a temporary relocation. I refused to think of anything else right now but getting my stuff packed. No problem. I traveled light. San Antonio is a big city. If I needed anything, I could just go to a store. Right?
Adam pecked me on the cheek. “See you later, love.”
“I’ll come with you, sis,” Tucker said. “Cariad.” He kissed Niko. “I’ll pack for us as well. You two get out of here quickly, okay? It’s three hours to San Antonio from here. You need to go within the hour to beat full sun. Everyone else will be fine. I’ll help make sure they get on the plane and get out of here.”
Niko laid a hand on Tucker’s face. “I’ll get him out of here. Why don’t we take your van? You and Keira can come in her car after.”
The four of us stood in silence for a moment, regarding each other. This was huge. Huger than huge. We were about to abandon the one place that I’d felt safe, loved, cherished since my family had left more than two years ago. The place where I’d found love. I knew that my ties here were strictly emotional, but damn it, I didn’t want Gideon to take this—and there was no way I was letting him rule in my stead. I’d been dealt this heirship hand and I was going to play it out, as long as I had Adam next to me and my blood-bonded family supporting us.
The mood broke as John, the day manager, bustled in with a clipboard and a long printout of something or another and gave us each a quick greeting. From his cheery demeanor, I couldn’t tell that he’d probably been wakened from a sound sleep and hurriedly brought up to speed on the situation.
As Tucker and I left, I could hear Adam, Niko, and John organizing and coordinating things I’d never have thought of—such as suspending deliveries, clearing out perishables in the restaurant refrigerator, hiring someone to drop by and check the water tanks for the livestock. I felt as if we were preparing for a long haul, some sort of mental and physical entrenchment for Armageddon. I hoped I was wrong.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“Time is a great healer, but a poor beautician.”
—Lucille S. Harper
“Oh, hells to the no. You expect me to stay here?” I looked at the place one more time, hoping that I was hallucinating. Nope. Still the same—a clapboard house, two stories and a porch that looked like the second cousin of the Bates Motel—the cousin that only got hand-me-downs third hand. Normally, I’d be okay with just about anything, despite my brothers’ teasing that I was only used to four-and five-star hotels, but this place? The house leaned dangerously to the right, the porch leaned the other way, every single step broken and worn in multiple places. What was left of the once-white paint on the wooden clapboards was now a dingy dirty gray, decorated with clods of dried mud, smears of I don’t know what, even smashed bits of insects. A lone shutter hung precariously by one hinge on one of the upstairs windows. None of the other windows even had shutters. The entire place looked abandoned, broken, unclean. A decrepit wooden sign hung from the edge of the porch roof, the only thing about the place that wasn’t falling apart.
A line drawing of a flower—meant to be a rose, I thought—graced the sign, just to the left of the worn words “Rose Inn.” Shabby, like the building, the sign swayed gently in the quiet breeze. A sense of decay, genteel, but decay nonetheless hovered around the building. Cracks in the paint shimmered in the heat. The requisite wooden swing hung from beams to the left of the double front doors, both open. A pair of shredded screen doors were the only thing holding back the outside from inside. A scraggly gray tomcat wandered into view from the right of the house. He stopped, fur rising, hackles drawing up. With a hiss and spit, he arched his back, tail stuck straight up at least three times bushier than at first sight. Tucker bared his teeth and let out a low growl. The cat hissed once more for good measure before disappearing back the way he’d come. Great. Feral cats plus a run-down piece of shit building. What had Adam gotten us into?
“Seriously, we’re staying here?” I repeated. He couldn’t mean it. This place was beyond a dump.
“Yes.” My brother didn’t sound as if he were joking.
“Tucker, really? Why not the Menger or Emily Morgan? Nice, clean hotels. Or if you insist on low budget—not that I have any idea why—we can always find a Days Inn or something. I mean, for goodness sake, this place looks like the bastard child of the Psycho house crossed with the Liberty Bar.”
“And how do you plan on housing our two vampires in a Days Inn?” Tucker asked. “It’s not as if we have many choices in sunny San Antonio. This place has all the amenities we need. Adam and Niko will be safe here.”
“This is a choice?” I muttered.
“They know us, remember?” Tucker replied. “The proprietors are used to the unusual. Besides, Adam and Niko are already here. It’s this, or move out even farther. It’s vampire friendly,” Tucker explained. “Plus there’s a hell of a lot more to it than at first glance.”
“Damn well better be,” I muttered. “Bad enough I had to leave my home because my bloody cousin can’t keep his dick in his trousers.”
“It wasn’t his penis that dictated his ridiculous actions,” Tucker said. “I blame your mother.”
I shook my head as I scooped my backpack from the floor of the Rover. “Not me, as much as I’d like to. This has the stamp of Gideon all over it. Branwen may be deep into this, hell, she probably encouraged it, but I’ve no doubt Gideon instigated every bit of this charade. I still don’t know what he promised her, nor how he figured doing this, but it was him.”
“You’ve got a point, but I doubt Gideon knows any more about Sidhe Challenges than we did. If the High King of the Unseelie hadn’t seen one in his long lifetime, then I don’t know how Gideon got this stupid idea.”
“Is Angharad older than Drystan?” I asked. “She could well be the instigator, or at least the enabler.”
Tucker shrugged. “I don’t know for sure, but Adam might. Though I do think she may be about the same age as Adam’s father. We can hope that Drystan gets through to her.”
“Yeah, because we both know that him trying to persuade Gideon to give this up is about as likely as an above-freezing day in Antarctica.”
I hadn’t shared my fears with anyone yet—that we were about to become a party to a modern-day war worse than any technology could provide. Magick and power thousands of times more deadly than the worst nuclear bomb could be released. Or, we could just be fighting a battle of wits and words. We had no idea and very little guidance. Gigi had emailed back her interpretation of the text, but with a very
strong caveat lector attached. She’d been able to give us the gist, but none of the nitpicky details that still fretted me. We still had no bloody clues other than a tangled knot of words written in a mélange of languages, one of which was dead even to its own people. Most Sidhe spoke modern-day Welsh these days, at least the Sidhe I’d known.
“Soon as we get settled, Keira. I’ll try Gigi again,” Tucker said as he hauled our bags from the back of my Land Rover.
“She’s not home yet,” I said. “I called while you were getting gas. Aunt Jane told me Gigi wasn’t expected back until tomorrow or the next day at earliest.”
“She certainly took off in a hurry,” Tucker said. “I’m not giving up on her answering her messages, though. She does check her cell phone. She’s the clan chief.”
“A clan chief who pronounces she needs to handle something, isn’t specific, then takes off without so much as a ‘hey, I’ll be in touch,’” I retorted. “Granted, after finding out about the official Truce, she probably figured we’d be fine for a few weeks.” We should be, though frankly, her leaving like this was a bit odd. Her message to me delivered via text had been curt: Off for a bit. Don’t worry. Will be in touch soonest. “Do you think she’s—”
“She’s fine, Keira,” Tucker said. “I’m sure she’s gone to do her own version of research as she said. To help us out.”
“I kind of expected she’d send her minions,” I replied. “Not that she’d go haring off herself.”
“This is research that will affect her now one-and-only heir. I doubt she’d entrust this to her minions. Besides, she never goes anywhere without her Protectors.”
He was right. All I could do now was wait and work with Adam, Tucker, and Niko to help decipher the bones of the Challenge. I was sure Gigi would let us know as soon as she found something relevant.
As I stepped closer to the disgusting building, I felt a shimmer of energy sliding just below normal sensory feel. “Warded? By a Kelly?” No mistaking that energy. Someone in my family had set pretty heavy-duty protection around this miserable dump. So heavy-duty, in fact, they’d even been hidden from me until I’d actually stepped into it.
