Rune Thief: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Isabella Hush Series Book 1)

by Thea Atkinson

  "Kassie."

  He wouldn't answer.

  "Well?"

  I winced as a cracking sound rent the air. Then everything went silent. It felt wrong somehow. Like those moments in that wet ditch when all sound got soaked up by the dark. My feet stung, remembering the pain of the cold.

  I saw Maddox wince at the sound.

  "That's not good," he said. He swung his gaze to mine and I noted the corners were tight with anxiety. If the silence was bad, those eyes said it was worse than I could imagine.

  And Kassie was out there with it. In her own ditch, probably just as terrified.

  "We need to get you the hell out of here. Now," he said.

  "But Kassie—"

  "She's fine."

  Fine. A young girl out there next to Kelly's boot, lobs of deadly light all around her. Creatures of every sort engaging in ways that left them dead all around her. What might that do to a tender psyche? And what was Kelly's reasoning for bringing her here in the first place? Leverage, obviously. Kelly knew I had that tile. She knew I cared about that girl.

  It was my fault she was here. I couldn't just leave her there.

  I tried to crawl over him, not sure what I could do, but knowing I couldn't let that girl suffer because of me.

  "Stop it," he said. He gripped me by both shoulders with those broad hands of his and I could swear his fingers met across the span of my back. He forced me to meet his eye.

  "Listen to me. She doesn't need you," he said. "It's the rune we need to worry about."

  I met his gaze but I didn't like the steeliness of it. He was as heartless as I'd thought. Cold. I wasn't sure why I expected better.

  "She's just a kid," I said. "What kind of man are you, anyway?"

  "I'm not a man, remember?"

  No. he wasn't. Whatever he was, whatever all of these creatures were, they might fight the fae, but they'd not win. I knew that because they were dying all around me. Maddox said he'd give a healthy respect to the most notorious fae assassin the rogue lords had. He wanted to run with me, get the rune safe.

  None of these creatures could do anything. I knew that. There was only one thing that could help. And I had it.

  I shook Maddox off and managed to stagger forward. My legs hurt. My head hurt.

  I shouted Kelly's name and her head swiveled in my direction. She smiled.

  "What are you doing?" he hissed.

  "Stopping this," I said.

  I could hear Maddox's whisper from behind me.

  "You can't," he said.

  "The hell I can't," I said.

  CHAPTER 30

  THE VELVET BOX FELT like a thousand pound weight in my hand.

  Kelly canted her head to the side, took several steps toward me. Kassie stumbled along beside her and could barely keep her feet from dragging as the assassin strolled closer. I heard the first vampire from earlier suck in a breath and mutter that I was insane.

  Maybe. But I'd let one girl down today. Since I was as good as dead anyway, I could at least save someone else.

  I held the box high above my head. Strange how it seemed to feel lighter the higher it went. Just doing so seem to flip a switch. Everything in the market stopped as though I had frozen play on a DVD.

  Heads swiveled in my direction. I fancied I saw Kassie moving. Her foot scraped against the ground.

  "I have it," I said, bolstered. "The Odin rune. It's what you want, right?"

  A shocked gasp went up from the courtyard. I gathered it had nothing to do with the fact that I was offering it to her, but rather the fact that they didn't know it existed in the first place.

  And that made me question what it was they were fighting for. Not the safety of the bazaar, not their booths or the fact that they'd been attacked. Certainly not even for the rune. They were fighting for something else.

  It was on the fringes of my mind. A puzzle worthy of solving and I might have had it except Kelly's gaze swiveled to mine. She dropped her hands to her sides and although she didn't take her eyes attention from me, she nudged Kassie with the side of her boot. The girl shifted, scrambling away from her several inches before butting up against a dead body. The wolf man, I thought.

  Without taking her eyes from mine, Kelly leaned sideways, and grabbed hold of Kassie's hair.

  "I knew it was here," she said and her voice was lilting. Musical. A stark contrast to the tough look of her. "But I didn't think a human was stupid enough to hold it."

  I ignored the insult. "Release her," I said. "And you can have this thing."

  Kelly laughed. "Have it?" she said. "The way I see it, all I have to do is take it from your dead hand."

  Despite the threat, I inched forward. Held my hands out, supplicating.

  "You just have to let her go," I said.

  I knew the risks. I'd be giving over the rune, and even if I lived, I wouldn't see many sunrises afterward. Once my time ran out, Finn would kill me as surely as Kelly would. The least I could do was save Kassie in the process.

  "It doesn't belong to you, does it? I said. "You're stealing it."

  "Not stealing," she said. "Liberating."

  I chuckled. "I've used that term myself many times."

  I stepped closer. I had already gained several yards and the assassin so far seemed content to wait me out.

  Just a few more. I watched as Kassie climbed up to her hands and knees. She lifted her face to mine and I smiled encouragingly. I wanted to tell her with my eyes that everything would be okay. Instead of the relief I hoped to see, there was panic. She shook her head back and forth.

  One of the creatures ran in from the sidelines, aiming his track toward Kassie. Without so much as turning sideways, Kelly lifted her hand out and blasted him with a jagged bolt of lightning. He crumpled a hand span away from the girl.

  I canted my head sideways, confused. I expected everything to stop now that I had produced the rune. And yet they were still trying to get to Kassie.

  Maybe there was hope for this world after all.

  From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw Maddox creeping forward, the mace in his hand.

  "You want this thing?" I said, and snapped open the lid. I tilted it so she could see it clearly.

  She took an involuntary step forward. Progress, I thought.

  "All you have to do is relinquish the girl," I said. I winced at the memory of Maddox using the same phrase of me back in the bar with Fayed.

  "Deal," Kelly clipped. She stepped forward again. Put out her hand.

  She was close enough now I could see her face. The irises were purple. Several scratch marks ran down her cheeks to her neck. I chuckled to myself, recognizing the look of those scratches. I knew them well.

  If she had the type of affinity for light that Maddox said she did, she hadn't missed me back in the alleyway at all; she had been aiming for the bag. Obviously thought the Odin rune was inside of it.

  I could just imagine her fury when she opened the bag and my cat jumped out at her.

  "My cat," I said hastily. "I want my cat too. And don't tell me she's dead because I won't believe you."

  Her brow furrowed. "Cat? That mangy thing I found in your suitcase?"

  "Bug out bag," I corrected her. "My way out. You stole that too and I need it."

  "And you know this because?"

  "Because it disappeared. It didn't burn or fizzle like everything else you've attacked. So you weren't trying to destroy it. Just acquire it. It's still whole and unharmed somewhere. At least it better be."

  She laughed at that. "You can have that hellish thing."

  I was almost close enough. Almost.

  "Then give it to me now," I said inching forward more. "All of them. The bag. The cat. Kassie." I jerked my chin in the girl's direction.

  My timer sounded in my pocket. One minute left? Couldn't be. Was everything accelerating? From the side of my eye I could see Kelly take a step sideways. She was giving me a wide berth. I inched the other direction toward Kassie. I wasn't sure what I
would do once I got there. I only had a few seconds left before Finn found me. Didn't matter. I planned to press the mark long before that. I just had to get Kassie in my arms, and get that bag.

  I crouched down next to the girl and gathered her in my arms.

  "Can you walk?" I asked her.

  She nodded. I looked up at Kelly. "The bag."

  "Not without the exchange," she said. "And be aware, I can strike both of you in a second if you don't."

  "Just put the bag somewhere I can reach it," I said. I eyed the distance between myself and the door. I didn't know how I was going to get through those creatures. Their stinging tails and barbed tails made me shudder. But I had to do it.

  "The bag." I said again.

  A sizzle like the sound of meat landing on a hot griddle sounded and the bag popped into view a foot away from me. The belly of it was moving. I told myself it was the cat inside.

  Kelly's boot came into view and I glanced up. She towered over me. Her hand extended.

  "Your part of the bargain, human," she said. Her head was cocked to the side, as though she were studying me.

  I reached up and passed the velvet box over. It was time. There was only one thing I had left to do.

  I looked down at Kassie and squeezed her tight.

  "It's going to be okay," I said not knowing whether or not it was true.

  I let my hand play over my wrist, the thumb pressing into the tracking mark. I held it for a long second. It burned terribly. Kelly's face went from cocky and confident to bewildered.

  My back arched with pain as the mark stripped away from my skin. It danced in the air between the assassin and me and slithered within itself as though both fire and serpent were being borne from it. It began to take solid shape, fleshing out to a black cloak.

  Kelly gasped. Then she outright laughed as she realized what had happened.

  She might have the rune but she was going to have to fight to keep it.

  In the next instant, the calm around me turned into chaos.

  I had to believe that the sorcerer had made it through although I couldn't see anything but the smoke as thunder crackled. The sounds of several battle cries rose to the air. I imagined every creature within the bizarre was either running or fighting and I had no doubt that they were enjoying it.

  I told myself that the resulting chaos had nothing to do with the rune. It didn't just allow Kelly to do what Maddox had said it would, but that the sorcerer had made it through and was fighting for possession of it.

  The smell of fire and smoke pushed us forward toward the entryway.

  "Almost there," I heard Kassie whisper. "Hold on."

  She sounded incredibly calm for someone who had just gone through what she had while I, who had done nothing but give away a precious artifact could barely speak for the terror that clumped up my throat.

  I froze at the entryway. The tails were lashing about everywhere, striking at whatever came close.

  I balked, terrified that I'd get stung or stuck or worse. I couldn't go through that thing again.

  Into the pause, a grim face loomed in front of me. Blood. There was blood on his face everywhere. I caught sight of the mace in his hand as it raised above his head.

  He was going to strike me. Vengeance. Anger. Fear. Whatever it was, he was going to make me pay for creating it.

  I gripped Kassie tight and ducked to avoid the blow. A soul-crunching sound met my ears like the thunk of a cleaver striking meat. Hot fluid sprayed my neck. A grotesque creature fell at my feet, clutching at his face where the mace had landed.

  I gaped at Maddox. The next thing I knew, he was pushing me through the portal.

  I fell through on the other side without a single sting or stick. My bug out bag lay beside me, dropped in my arrival.

  My knees skinned against the tread of the first stone steps as my cheek struck the edge of it. There'd be a nasty bruise around my eye within hours.

  I was disoriented and nauseous, but otherwise, safely through. The distance between the entryway and the steps where I lay indicated I hadn't just been pushed, but rather thrown like a sack of potatoes.

  But Kassie was gone.

  I scrabbled onto my side, searching for her. My bug out bag lay at the bottom of the steps close to the entryway, but the girl was no where to be found.

  I stumbled to my feet and considered going backwards into the portal. I lay my cheek against the door. Nothing. No sounds. No heat. It was as though it was a regular old wooden door, ages old. Nothing special except its age. I lifted the knocker and dropped it. Nothing. I wrapped several times. Still nothing.

  When I'd gone through the first time Kassie had told me it wasn't the regular way. She had spoken words that sounded like Latin. Cut me on the wrist. Obviously, it was harder to find that realm than simply knocking on the door.

  But what had I done for Kassie after all that? Nothing, it seemed. She was gone like a summer breeze and I had no idea if she even survived the journey through the Shadow Bazaar's peculiar entrance or if she simply stayed behind.

  But at least there was no sorcerer. No Fae assassin. That had to count for something, right?

  My cat meowed from inside the bag. I bent to retrieve her and unzipped the top.

  When she poked her head through, I started to cry.

  I looked above me to see that the sky was turning pink. I could make out the tops of the skyscrapers poking through orange tinged clouds. Dawn. Just seeing it exhausted me.

  How many hours had I been on my feet? How many hours with nothing to show for it. I considered going back to Fayed's bar, but I knew he wouldn't be there. If he was a vampire as I thought, he was no doubt already snug in his little coffin, waiting for nightfall again.

  Perhaps the best thing would be to go home. At least I knew now that the person who had been in my apartment hadn't been Scottie or his henchmen at all. It had been Finn, searching for the things I had taken from him. Of course he hadn't found it, because it went with me when I sought out Errol.

  An old incubus without powers, according to Maddox. How many other people in my world were supernatural creatures and entities?

  I didn't feel victorious at escaping. In fact, I felt rather cruddy. I wanted nothing better than to soak into a warm tub and crawl into bed. I needed to sleep for days.

  I caught the subway and sat in silence. My cat began purring as though she missed me. We both knew that couldn't be true. She was a finicky thing. Given to bouts of hissy fits rather than purring.

  I exited the subway tunnels half a block from my apartment.

  By the time I unlocked the door and crossed the threshold into my apartment, I was far too exhausted to even get in the shower. I dropped the bag onto the floor of my kitchen and the cat leapt out, tearing across the apartment into my bedroom. I could see her jump up onto the bed from the doorway.

  "Good idea," I said and followed her.

  Last thing I remember, she was curled up at the top of my head on my pillow, and I was thinking about the events of the past few hours, trying to sort through the complexity of it all, feeling like it was a puzzle I couldn't crack. Through it all Maddox's words about Kassie haunted my thoughts.

  She doesn't need you.

  Maybe she didn't. The entire market seemed ready to die for her; she probably didn't need me. I'd never know because I left the market burning behind me and the answers with it.

  I was asleep long before I figured it out and when I woke, it was the last thing on my mind because staring down at me was the business end of a pistol.

  CHAPTER 31

  I LEANED BACK INTO the seat of a familiar limousine. It smelled very much the same as the last time I'd been in it: like caramel and scotch and just a bit of blood. Scottie's henchman sat opposite me, holding his gun leveled at my chest. He wouldn't dare pull the trigger; we both knew that, but if it made him feel more in control, so be it. I'd wait him out. He was a burly man, and so I knew his muscles would fatigue easily. He might have sinew somewhere u
nder all that bulk, but I was willing to guess his huskiness was mostly fat.

  "How was your night in jail?" I said, imagining that the sour look on his face was more about sleeping on a narrow cot than any a stern effort to keep me nicely controlled.

  "A night at the fuckin' Ritz," he said. "The strip search especially."

  Under normal circumstances, I might laugh, but I was still too exhausted to feel anything.

  I looked out the window through the tint and watched as the buildings blurred by. Everything looked so sedately normal. As though the world hadn't just almost toppled in on itself. Maybe it hadn't. Maybe I had dreamed the entire thing.

  "So how far?" I said.

  "You'll see," he said.

  I flicked my gaze at the pistol. "I don't think you need to hold that on me," I said. "It's not like I can run away."

  He smirked. "You bet your ass you can't."

  I sighed. "My ass isn't worth betting on anymore."

  It was my own fault I was in this deep with a man no one should have to owe anything to. I'd chased him as a stupid teen. I'd ran from him as an adult. I was returning to him feeling very much like a chastised child. Running was stop gap measure at best.

  "So what does he have in store for me?" I said to the minion.

  "You know the boss," he said. "Thinks of all the best punishments."

  "Indeed I do," I said. "No doubt a hot bath and a few rounds of tequila."

  I fidgeted in the seat. The tequila was a certainty, laced with sedative, of course, to make me compliant. He'd wine me, perhaps, over a splendid meal complete with foie gras and hand-spitted game. He'd pretend he wasn't furious that I'd run off and I'd smile beneath a tight mouth as I tried to find a way to keep him at bay.

  If I got a bath it would be filled with bubbles and be the perfect temperature. He'd wash my back. Soap my hair. Hold me down beneath the water just long enough for my lungs to ache.

  I blinked at the minion holding the pistol.

  "What did you say?" I asked him because he was glowering at me over the barrel and I had the feeling he'd said something to me.