by Sarra Cannon
When he didn’t answer, my mind filled the blanks in horrific detail and my foot stomped on the accelerator.
“Why black birds?” I demanded.
“Crows and ravens are—” His sentence ended in snarled liquid syllables when his head bounced off the window after we skidded left.
“Death omens,” I finished the thought for him.
“They are also evidence as incriminating as a fingerprint.” His voice lowered. “Someone doesn’t want you to trust me.”
“Well, mission accomplished.” I wish I had free hands to slow clap. “I don’t trust you or anyone else with a Faerie agenda.”
Raven grimaced. “When was the last time you saw your mother?”
I tallied the flipped-shifts I’d worked since then in my head. “Two days ago.”
He didn’t have anything to add.
I clenched my teeth. “If anything has happened to her…”
“I will accept responsibility.”
“That’s not good enough.”
One more hard right made Raven flinch, and then we were there. Mom’s house.
He yanked his fingers from their indents in the dash, leaned back and shut his eyes.
A whimper brought our attention to the backseat. The stink of ammonia lit up my nose. Great. Bad Luck Bunny had wet his furry britches. I almost felt sorry for him. Almost.
Raven’s lip curled. “What about the púca?”
“Leave him.” Sean was no longer a priority.
After throwing open the car door, I climbed out and ran up to the house. The front door stood ajar. The knob cracked against the wall when I shoved it out of my way and barreled inside. The TV was off, both the living room and the kitchen light dark.
“Do you see a car in the garage? The big room next door to the house?” I called to Raven, who stood on the welcome mat. He vanished, and I worked my way from room to room. “Mom?” I gulped down my panic. “Are you home?”
“I looked through the slats.” Raven’s voice rose behind me. “An orange car is in the large room.”
“Mom gets carsick if she isn’t driving. There’s no way she left with anyone in theirs. That means she took her afternoon walk early or…” I swallowed hard, “…something has happened.”
Shoving past Raven, I hit the hallway leading to her bedroom, flipping on lights as I went, popping my head into the rooms I hadn’t checked yet. Empty. Dark. Empty. Dark. Her room was my last hope. I rested my hand on the knob, inhaled and pushed open the door. The glow from her plug-in air freshener cast a halo over her throw pillows. Resting atop one lilac-colored sham curled a single black feather.
Lifting my feet took more effort the nearer I got to her bed.
I pinched that feather between my fingers and turned to Raven. “What does this mean?”
He took it from me, his eyes narrowing. “Your mother has been taken.”
“First the birds on her lawn and now this,” I snarled. “Black birds and black feathers, Raven.”
“I know how this looks,” he said softly.
“It looks a hell of a lot like you’re behind this.” I shoved him against the wall and braced my forearm against his throat. “Tell me you didn’t do this. Give me your word, as the Morrigan’s son, or I’m dragging your ass in front of the magistrates right now.”
His breathing remained calm. “I vow, as the Morrigan’s son, I did not take your mother.”
My arm went limp, and I backed away as it fell. “How do you know she was taken?”
“There are carvings in the shaft of the feather.” He held it out to me. “They’re runes. The same ones used to operate the tether between realms. They were leaving you a means of following them.”
I snatched the feather and studied the foreign symbols. “They took her to Faerie.”
I had screwed up. I should have gone to the magistrates immediately. I had been too slow making up my mind about Raven’s offer, and now some asshat from Faerie had made it up for me.
I stormed through the house headed for my car. I tugged my cellphone from my pocket and sent Shaw a text to meet me at the office ASAP.
“Wait.” Raven grabbed my arm and took the feather. “Where are you going?”
“To the magistrates.” I shrugged him off me. “They’re the only ones who can get her back.”
He pocketed the blackened quill. “You overestimate the conclave’s influence in Faerie.”
“The magistrates are nobles.” One Seelie and one Unseelie, as every conclave outpost required. “Are you saying Faerie won’t listen to its own nobility?”
“Those who are sent to monitor this realm are outcast from their families.” Raven corralled me against the car. “In the eyes of the High Court, this is all they are fit to do. The consuls in Faerie could care less what magistrates here have to say. They are lesser nobles. Not benevolent ambassadors as you seem to believe.”
“I’ll have to take my chances.” I shoved him stumbling back and slid into the driver’s seat.
He caught the door before I slammed it. “I’m sorry, Thierry.”
I glared up at him. “Sorry doesn’t cut it.”
“The conclave can’t know I’m here.” He squatted to put us at eye level. “No one can.”
“I filed a report after you poached from the Morrigan.” I stretched that statement into a lie. “They know you’re responsible.”
“That is unfortunate.” He clamped a hand over my wrist. “That means your time is up.”
“What are you talking about?” Tugging against him got me exactly nowhere.
“If the magistrates know I’m here, they will be watching the tethers.” Urgency spiked his tone. “I can’t risk being trapped in this realm.”
He placed my hands on the wheel. Magic wound over my wrists and stuck my hands in place. He shut the door, circled the car and climbed onto the seat beside me.
I struggled against the invisible restraints. “What are you doing?”
“What I should have done in the first place.” He grimaced. “I’m taking you home to Faerie.”
— —
Compelled by Raven’s magic, I drove straight to the conclave, which suited me just fine. We sat in the parked car, him peering through his window and me praying Shaw was racing up the drive behind us. Raven pursed his lips and squinted his eyes. Call me crazy, but I got the impression the glamours applied to this place slid right off before his eyes. No Word required.
All I saw and all I would see until I deactivated the wards was the glamour depicting a dilapidated farmhouse and the adjacent field.
“You can’t sneak past the guards.” I grunted while tugging on my hands. “You’re going to get caught.”
“I don’t think so.” He studied a point in the distance. “I’ve already done this once, remember?”
“You separated your consciousness and crossed the ward in pieces.” I looked him up and down. “You’re fully formed now.”
“It will require more finesse,” he agreed. “For one thing, there are two of us.”
I ground my teeth. “I’m not going to Faerie until I speak with the magistrates.”
“You’re trembling.” He shifted toward me. “Are you frightened?”
“My mother was kidnapped, and according to you, she’s being held hostage until I agree to be a temp for my father at court,” I spat. “Of course I’m afraid.”
“It’s more than that.” His intense gaze stripped me raw. “You’re scared of the other side. Afraid of finding out how Faerie looks, what it’s like there. Your mother poisoned you with her doubts. You fear cloaking yourself fully in the mantle of the Black Dog.” His voice softened. “You have no idea what you truly are.”
“Leave my mother out of this. She raised me. Macsen Sullivan was a sperm donor, not a parent.”
Raven brushed a stray hair from my cheek. “This is the best chance you have to save your mother.”
I snapped at his hand. “It just happens to also be the best chance you have of gettin
g what you want.”
He exited the car.
Think, Thierry. Escape seemed unlikely. Rescue was my best hope, but my knight in shining pickup truck was nowhere in sight.
Raven opened my door and bent inside. He passed his hands over mine, setting me free, and I leaned forward and bit his ear as hard as I could. Blood filled my mouth, and his curses spilled from the car. I shoved him backward and scrambled outside, hissing my Word and yanking off my glove. I took a step toward the marshal’s office, but Raven tackled me.
Magic boiled in my fingertips when I clamped them around his wrist, but the power fizzled and dripped unspent to the ground. I pushed every ounce of energy I had into the hot runes where my bare palm touched his skin. Nada.
He clamped a hand over my mouth in anticipation of a scream I was too stunned to utter.
“We are both death portents,” he panted. “We are immune to one another’s magic.”
I recovered enough to bite his palm until more of his blood coated my tongue.
Raven hissed an incantation, and my lips smashed together as if an invisible hand had stitched my mouth shut.
“You, however, are not immune to spells.” He spun me toward him and gripped my upper arm. “I came prepared in the event you were uncooperative.” He dragged me back to the car and patted me down. He found the phone and tossed it onto the seat. “You won’t need that where we’re going.”
Another burst of magic hit the air as a second spell glued my feet to the ground.
“Don’t worry about the púca.” Raven circled the car, cracking the windows. “He has all he needs to survive until he’s found.” When Raven returned, his touch unstuck me. “I regret things had to be this way. I wanted to be your friend.”
Some of my mumbled threats must have gotten through, because he scowled.
Friend? Not likely. This nonconsensual road trip into Faerie had put him squarely into enemy territory.
His quiet sigh might have conveyed remorse, but his slender fingers seemed less sympathetic as they dug into my upper arm. I struggled against him. He didn’t bother noticing. He kept on walking.
Raven was escorting me to Faerie, even if I snarled and snapped at him every step of the way.
Chapter 16
When Raven said he came prepared, he meant it. He conjured a pan flute and rested the top edge against his bottom lip. The flute was crafted from seven cuts of a hollow reed, dried and polished to a high shine, then lashed together with brown leather. Each segment was longer than the one before it. He held it by the shortest pipe and blew.
The glamour wrapping our surroundings rustled, tearing free and flapping on the magical breeze.
I leapt back and landed on my butt when chain link appeared to thrust from the ground not a foot from the toe of my shoe. My eyes bulged while the tattered glamour ripped from its frame and the prison exploded into full view.
The shreds of concealing magic drifted through the air in our direction. I worked my jaw to ask a question, realized I could open my mouth and figured the unbinding spell he played must be loosening the spells he had cast on me. I worked my stiff lips. “Wush happening?”
He didn’t answer, but he did help me stand.
His music continued to shred the conclave’s defenses while we stood exposed to anyone glancing our way. Over our heads, those ragged scraps of glamour gained speed. The first opaque flake smacked into me and stuck like tissue paper dipped in Mod Podge.
Raven’s playing orchestrated a whirl of magical decoupage until I was covered from head to toe. A quick glance confirmed he was similarly plastered by magical debris. He lowered the pipe and, with a twist of his wrist, sent it back wherever he had conjured it from in the first place.
“Camouflage,” he answered breathlessly. “Come on. The effect doesn’t last long.”
This time when he tugged, I resisted, but the spell on my feet was stronger than the one on my mouth, and I went where he led me, cursing all the while.
Beyond the prison, he urged me into a run, and I discovered his flute hadn’t torn glamour from all of the buildings, only the ones nearest us. In the distance, I saw the field of withered corn, the skeletal stalks hunched and broken.
Our destination was a no-brainer. The old windmill. The tether to Faerie.
I figured we had arrived when Raven pulled up short in front of me, jerking me to a halt while he examined each of the structure’s spindly legs. Or I assumed that’s what he was doing based on how he started squinting into thin air and moving his lips. The area was off-limits to most personnel, including me, and I wished I could see what he was doing. Activating the tether into Faerie, yes, but how? That information would come in handy, especially since he had taken the feather with its coordinates. Say if I managed to escape, which I’ll admit was becoming less likely by the minute.
Concentration lined Raven’s face. Reaching toward nothing, he completed a complex ritual with the hand not anchoring me to the spot. His gaze drifted skyward as a gust of air blasted hairs into my eyes. What he saw up there brought a fierce grin to his face, which I immediately regretted admiring. He caught me at it, cranked his smile up several megawatts and drew me flush against him. His arms encircled my waist, his face dipped toward mine. “The first time is always the worst.”
“What a guy thing to say.” I managed to work my hands between us and shoved to give myself an inch of personal space.
“I envy you.” Wild joy animated him. “You will see Faerie through fresh eyes as I never have.”
A tiny ripple of fear collided with the doubt making my stomach churn.
“I want a guarantee,” I blurted. “Promise no matter what happens to me, you will bring Mom home safely.”
Raven’s lips parted. “You have my word. Regardless of the outcome, I swear to you I will escort your mother safely to this realm.” His gaze flicked upward. “That is the best bargain I can make.”
Considering he had offered without first ensuring reciprocation from me, I nodded. “I accept.”
One hand gripped my nape and guided my head onto his shoulder. The other wound around my waist in back, mashing my soft chest into his much firmer one. He cradled me against the coming storm as much as he was able. His lips moved in a chant at my ear while the world upended.
Three heartbeats passed in silence so loud my head ached. Too bright. My eyes watered. Air sat lighter in my lungs. I gasped until I coughed. Still panicked. Suffocating. Not enough oxygen. It hurt. Breathing hurt. Looking hurt. My skin hurt. Agony like each death I had ever dealt scoured me.
“Thierry?”
Strong hands gripped my shoulders, bruising my tender skin. I screamed until they vanished and my kneecaps sank into spongy ground. I leaned forward, bracing my palms on what felt like moss or peat. After a few minutes passed and I didn’t die, I risked cracking open my eyelids. “This can’t be real.”
Color assaulted my eyes, taunting me with vibrant perfection. My brain tried matching names to shades and failed. Their sharp flavors sat on the tip of my tongue. I was tasting color? Wait… What?
The tether had dumped us into a lush meadow interrupted by gnarly trees covered in moss that sat up and blinked at us with tiny googly eyes that whirled. Mushrooms with jewel-toned caps stopped their steady procession up the side of the nearest trunk to examine us through pinprick eyes. A gorgeous turquoise butterfly fluttered past, only to be shot through the trachea by a toothpick-sized arrow fired from an equally miniature bow held by one of the mushrooms. With his hands. Because mushrooms totally had appendages. And eyes. And sharpshooter aim.
I’m losing my mind.
“None of this makes sense.” I plopped down onto my butt. “Why do I taste the rainbow?”
Raven knelt beside me. “Faerie is sensation.” He gripped my shoulder when I listed to one side. “Imagine a stamp and an ink pad. Faerie is the ink pad. Fae are the stamp. When you press the stamp into the ink, you saturate that being with magic. As you press the stamp to paper, each imprin
t, every new world or new creature, becomes more faded. Every pass holds less ink, less magic. Humans and the mortal realm are the third or fourth impression. There was little magic left by that point. For that reason, few humans have magic and their world—colors, tastes, sounds—are bland by comparison.”
Third or fourth? Was he implying there were more realms than fae and mortal?
“Is this our savior?” a mocking voice carried on a fetid breeze.
Savior? Lifting my head required absolute concentration. “Who are you?”
Raven placed his hand on my shoulder. “Forgive her, Consul.”
The voice sounded closer. “Has she been educated?”
My hackles rose. “I’ve been trained by the best marshals at the Southwestern Conclave.”
Raven’s grip on me tightened. “She is worthy to bear Macsen’s legacy.”
I raked a measuring glance over him. How long had he observed me before making contact? A while if he had claimed three of the Morrigan’s tithes to sustain him before mine. And closely, since he threw his weight behind my endorsement.
The consul’s dismissive attitude grated on me, but I held my tongue. While in this realm, I was at their mercy. With my father missing, I had no one to trust. No one other than the High Court to appeal to, and the idea of conferring with them left me quaking in my sneakers.
“Escort her to the Halls of Winter.” A soft chuckle. “My counterpart and I await you there.”
Raven gave a curt nod to thin air. He stared at the spot in the trees where the voice had originated.
What kept me from drilling him for answers, I couldn’t say. Curious as I was, instinct warned me to keep silent.
“Come with me,” he whispered near my ear. “We will be safer in Winter. There are fewer eyes there.”
The Halls, where he, as a prince, lived. Every step brought me deeper into his world.
When he rose and offered me his hand, I didn’t hesitate. I took it, hoping this wasn’t the second biggest mistake I had ever made by extending him even this much trust when he had done nothing to earn it. The first being when I fell for his sneaky ploy and rode the elevator up to investigate his apartment.
