Shoot the Messenger

by Pippa Dacosta

  “You would be surprised. Not everyone appreciated Mab’s peacemaking techniques. Some are likely relieved you removed the queen and her treaty with her.”

  “Some like Oberon?” I watched him for any reaction to his brother’s name, but his human expressions were too well schooled.

  He leaned back in the chair and peered through his screens at me. “You have to admit, you killing Mab saved Oberon the trouble.” Eledan’s mask briefly slipped, and the full weight of his fae-glare rested on me—searching for what? “Frustrating, don’t you think,” he added, “for the first-born son, the next in line to the throne, to be in waiting forever?”

  I returned his stare with a level one of my own. “Oberon has waited a few thousand years. What is another few hundred to a fae like him?”

  He took the words, considered them and returned to his work. “A great many.”

  Eledan would know a great deal about waiting. A thousand years among his enemy. Did he even remember who he really was? What did that kind of stress do to a fae mind? “How many human lifetimes have you pretended to live?” I asked, keeping my voice quiet, easing it around his illusionary armor.

  His hands stilled. He looked at me side-on.

  “Larsen is just the latest. You’ve been here a long time…” I wasn’t supposed to know how long.

  His face softened as his thoughts wandered to the past.

  “Did you come to know families?” I asked, sensing a weakness. “Were you ever invited to become part of one?”

  Something new flared in his eyes. I wasn’t sure what, especially with the biotek lenses dulling his faeness. But a thousand years? How many human lives had he touched?

  “There were… times,” he admitted.

  Had he come to love them like he used to make them love him? Had he ever fallen into his own trap? A thousand years was a long time to be alone.

  What if I was looking at this all wrong? What if he hadn’t let the fae into Halow because he knew his kind would ravage what they found? What if he was protecting Halow? He had said he should have opened the door, but he hadn’t. He’d held back, living his Larsen life among tek. A thousand years among the enemy would test even the most devout hater.

  An alert chimed on one of the screens, drawing his attention away from me. “The marshal will be here in a few minutes,” he said. “Make sure he leaves appeased or his subsequent death will stain your hands with more blood, Wraithmaker.”

  I curled my fingers into my palms, digging my nails in.

  An empty threat? Eledan had killed Crater, but I didn’t yet know why. Dammit. Kellee had better be good at pretending, because he was about to stand toe to toe with a professional illusionist.

  Chapter 19

  Marshal Kellee held out his hand. “Mister Larsen.” He smiled the neutral lawman smile that said, I’m your friend until I’m not.

  Eledan smiled back, his smile equally false. “Marshal Kellee.” They shook, both of them lying with their body language, if not their words.

  Kellee turned to me. “And you are…?”

  “Kesh Lasota.” I forgot to offer my hand, distracted by Eledan’s simmering presence. The fae settled against his desk, gripping the edges on either side of him, knuckles briefly paling. A line of tension ran down his back, and a muscle twitched in his cheek. His strain was obvious, but the marshal didn’t notice because the idiot was looking at me.

  Something was wrong. Larsen should have been relaxed. He had been relaxed before Kellee arrived. He was in his territory, wrapped up in his comforting lies. This was supposed to be easy—answer the marshal’s questions and send him on his way—but Larsen was looking at him without blinking, in the way all fae did when they were about to attack.

  Kellee continued to stare at me.

  “What?” I snapped.

  The marshal’s pretty face darkened. “I asked if you were well, Miss?”

  “Me? Yes. I’m fine.” I laughed like a lunatic. “We’re all fine, Marshal.”

  “I feel like… we’ve met,” Kellee mused, backing up to get a better look at me. “You seem familiar,” he added, grabbing a chair. “Do you mind?” he asked Larsen. Before the fae had a chance to reply, Kellee sat down and leaned back, utterly at ease.

  What was he doing? We weren’t supposed to give Larsen any reason to suspect us, and the second thing he said was that he thought we’d met before? Had he lost his mind?

  “No,” I denied. “I don’t think we’ve met.” The heat of Larsen’s gaze fell on me. I fought not to meet his glare. “I’d remember a marshal.”

  Kellee’s shiny metal star winked.

  This was insane. Larsen was not happy, and Kellee either wasn’t picking up on the crackling tension or he didn’t care. He had told me to trust him. He had said everything would be okay. This was not okay.

  “So,” Kellee began, “you know why I’m here, Mister Larsen.”

  “I do. The unfortunate report of an assault at the anniversary gathering. Who reported it?”

  Don’t tell him. Whoever it was might not wake up again.

  Kellee opened his hands. “I’m not at liberty to say. But you understand I have to follow up on reports, even regarding esteemed individuals like yourself.” Kellee looked around him, likely reading all the modern elements of Larsen’s surroundings. “Nice office. Not like mine. The department gives us cubicles. I much prefer being in the field.”

  “Of course, a man like you would naturally prefer not to be cornered.” Larsen’s smile was sharp enough to cut glass.

  At least the marshal didn’t have his sharp teeth on show. Yet.

  “Did you have questions?” I asked before Kellee dug himself into a deeper hole.

  “Yes.” Kellee regarded me, his expression softening. “You were the victim of this assault?”

  “No.”

  “No? The report said—”

  “I’m not a victim of anything. What happened was a misunderstanding. We er… Mister Larsen and I were just… We had too much cyn. You know how it is.”

  “Not really. Please explain what happened, in your own words.”

  I glared at Kellee, wishing he could read my mind so he’d get out of Larsen’s office now. “We argued, sure. But we made up.”

  Kellee’s dark eyebrow arched and his green eyes sharpened. “What’s your relationship to Mister Larsen?”

  “Sister,” Eledan answered for me.

  “Sister?” Kellee’s tone might as well have said, karushit. “Huh.” He breathed in and leaned back. “Mister Larsen, I assume you won’t mind if Miss Lasota and I talk alone?”

  “Why would you need to talk alone?” Eledan asked.

  “Because I’m a marshal, you’re accused of assault, and Miss Lasota is the victim.”

  Dammit Kellee, just let it go already.

  Eledan straightened and stepped toward Kellee, putting himself slightly in front of me. I gave Kellee a quick shake of my head. The marshal’s determined glare narrowed. The fool wouldn’t back down. Did he want Eledan to attack? If he kept pushing, the fae surely would.

  I stood and reached for Eledan’s arm. The undercurrent of illusionary magic prickled my fingers. “Istvan, it’s all right.”

  But Eledan ignored me. He folded his arms and tilted his head, blatantly scrutinizing the marshal. Kellee peered up at the young CEO.

  A citrusy bite tingled on my tongue.

  “Vakaru.” The word dripped from Eledan’s lips like a curse or a threat. I had never heard it before, but Kellee had.

  The marshal’s upper lip pulled back, revealing lengthening canine teeth in a smile crafted of pure malice.

  Fae magic flared, and Eledan lunged. Kellee—a blur—kicked off the floor, knocking his chair backward with inhuman speed. Eledan’s hand clawed at the air where Kellee had been sitting, and the marshal landed a punch to Eledan’s cheek, nearly dropping the fae to the floor.

  I stepped in. “Kellee!”

  But he flung out a hand—“Stay back, Messenger!”—
and sunk his hand into Eledan’s hair, twisting him off the floor. The fae’s illusion collapsed, revealing the warfae in all his black-haired, leather-wrapped alien glory. A growl bubbled up from Eledan as he turned his head to fix the full weight of his glare on the marshal. His eyes burned, crackling with the full force of his magic. Kellee wasn’t leaving this room alive.

  “Vakaru el nislet,” Eledan growled.

  “Fuck you, fae.” Kellee locked his hand around the warfae’s throat and drove him backward, slamming Eledan into the desk.

  Eledan wasn’t fighting. Why wasn’t he fighting? He smiled at the marshal, and that smile was a terrible portent. He was toying with Kellee.

  I had to do something. But with no weapon and my magic contained, the pair of them grossly outmatched me.

  Five black knives appeared in Kellee’s hand and punched into Eledan’s chin. The fae jerked his head back, yanking free.

  Not knives. Claws.

  Citrus spritzed the air, so pungent it burned the back of my throat, and Kellee launched away from Eledan, coat whirling. Air shimmered, Eledan’s illusions coming to life and surrounding Kellee. The lawman roared and turned away, shoulders heaving.

  Shudders racked him.

  Eledan straightened. He brushed a hand down his jacket, straightening it, and wiped his chin, smearing blood across his cheek.

  “Interesting,” he said, eyeing his spilled blood and then the shivering marshal. “Do you know what he is?” Eledan asked, addressing me.

  A fucking idiot. “No.”

  “No, you shouldn’t. We wiped his kind out long before the saru were conceived.”

  I wet my lips and swallowed, finding my throat dry. Kellee stood rigid, his back to me, his long coat rippling, amplifying his trembling. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “Besides the obvious, I showed him something from his past. Something he didn’t want to see,” Eledan said, blasé. He retrieved a towel from inside his desk drawer and wiped the blood from his chin and neck. Not a mark remained. “I believed they were all dead.”

  “We are,” Kellee said, grinding the words out from between his teeth.

  Eledan rolled his eyes in a very human expression of dismissal. “The Vakaru were bred as soldiers and designed to feed off violence, making them crave the kill. They were Oberon’s pet project, and they served us well, until one of their kind started harboring rebellious ideas. They have a pack mentality. Once one turns, they all turn. It sealed their fate.”

  After wiping his hand clean and dumping the bloody towel on the desktop, Eledan crossed the room to stand dangerously close in front of Kellee. But the marshal didn’t lash out. He lifted his head, I assumed to look into Eledan’s eyes, though I couldn’t see Kellee’s face.

  Standing so close, it was clear which of them was designed for combat. Kellee’s presence was broader, even draped in his marshal’s coat. Eledan’s taller, slimmer frame was meant for stamina, for weeks spent on the hunt, for illusion and trickery. Kellee was designed to deliver a punch to the face, which he had done spectacularly to Eledan, for all the good it had done him.

  The fae rubbed his jaw. “What shall I do with him?”

  He was asking me? Let him go! I approached, giving them both wide berth, and stopped in front of Kellee. With his lips parted, Kellee’s sharp teeth were obvious and lethal—but his slack expression revealed Eledan’s hold on his mind. The fae was likely surrounding Kellee with illusions. Painful ones, from the haunted look crossing the marshal’s face.

  I sighed. If only the fool had listened to me and stayed away. “Let him go.”

  Eledan laughed. “I thought you might say that.”

  A blade dropped from Eledan’s right bracer into his hand. I caught the shimmer of metal too late to stop him from slashing open Kellee’s neck.

  “No!”

  The marshal staggered, reflexes holding him up. His hand went to his throat, fingers sinking into the gush of blood. Blood soaked his shirt and poured down the front of his coat, obscuring his marshal’s badge. Panic stuttered my thoughts. I grabbed Kellee’s arm. He caught the back of the chair, but his grip slipped and his knees buckled. We dropped together.

  “Oh, Kellee, no…” I knelt beside him, reaching for the gaping wound pumping out too much blood. His eyes rolled back. I was losing him.

  His wet fingers touched my face. “Messenger,” he mouthed, his voice drowning in blood.

  No! He was the last of his kind. A good man. He had saved me from Eledan’s assassins. He was only trying to do the right thing. He didn’t deserve to die this way.

  I shot to my feet and slammed my palms into Eledan’s chest, splattering blood across his fine leathers and shoving the fae backward. “Remove this collar. NOW!”

  “So you can use Mab’s magic to heal a vakaru?” Eledan scoffed. “No. I’m putting him out of his misery. Life as a vakaru, alone and hungry, is no life at all.”

  “That’s not your choice to make!”

  “Yes, it is. His life belongs to the fae.”

  Rage and fear overrode all reason. I snatched Eledan’s blade from his hand and pressed it to my neck, feeling the sting of the blade cut. “Heal him or lose your only chance at being fixed.”

  Eledan reached for the blade. I jerked back, nicking my skin. “If he dies, I will never help you. Do you understand? You’ll have that metal heart in your chest forever.”

  Eledan snarled at the pale, listless marshal. “You would put the entire system—several billion lives—at risk, for one worthless vakaru?”

  I poured all my indignation at being enslaved, all my resolve, all my rage and frustration into my glare and dragged the blade across my skin, opening it up. Fiery pain fizzled. Blood dribbled over the iron collar. Kellee wasn’t worthless to me, but Eledan was right: I wouldn’t go through with this. I lied and cut myself because it was the only weapon I had left. Believe it, you fae fuck. “Heal him!”

  Eledan’s amusement turned dry. Reluctance making his movements too damn slow, he knelt beside Kellee, pushed his hand into the blood soaking the marshal’s neck and looked the marshal in the eye.

  My heart thumped too loudly. I blinked the blur of fury in my vision away.

  Eledan sighed. “It will take more than I can give.”

  No, those were not the words I wanted to hear. “Heal him, you have more fae magic here. Use it.”

  Eledan frowned over his shoulder. “The additional magic is not for a vakaru—”

  “Do it!”

  He studied the marshal’s glassy, unresponsive expression and then leaned in and heaved the marshal onto his shoulder. With a sudden flood of magic, illusion wrapped around them both and they were gone.

  I turned on the spot and, checking I was alone, lowered the blade. A sob broke free, but the others I swallowed down, adding them to the pit of rage simmering inside. I’d won that battle and Kellee would live. Eledan wouldn’t risk losing me. Not until he had the metal heart out of his chest.

  Striding to Eledan’s desk, I stabbed the blade into the desktop. It pierced the glass. Cracks scattered across its perfect surface. When I had Eledan under my knife, I’d be sure to carve out his heart. And his soul.

  I eyed the office door, realizing Eledan had left me unsupervised and unchained. I was free to roam Arcon.

  “Hey, Sindy.”

  “Oh!” The woman I’d met at the anniversary party peered through her translucent screen and blinked. Large hoop earrings framed her smiling face. “You have er…” She waggled her finger near her neck. “A little sauce or something there.”

  It was blood, but I didn’t have time to argue semantics. Eledan might be back at any moment. I scooted around her desk and tapped a few keys, bringing up a 3D image of Arcon’s layout. “There.” I pointed at the sealed-off lower sections. “How do I get down there?” Eledan had avoided those levels during our numerous tours. That had to be where he was hiding his source of magic.

  “Storage?” She frowned. “There’s nothing down there.”
>
  “Uh-huh.” That’s what Eledan wanted them to believe. “So how do I get there? None of these corridors or elevators go down that far.”

  “What?” She laughed dismissively. “Of course they do.” She pressed a few more keys that zoomed in on our view of the map. “Right there. See. That stairwell will take you right to it.” She pointed out a section of corridor that ended without any way to descend farther below Arcon.

  Illusion.

  “Your perfume is nice. What brand is it?” she asked.

  Eau de Eledan’s magic. I smiled at the woman’s innocent question and the dreamy look on her face.

  Around us, the entire floor of administration staff chatted into their ear mics while eagerly tapping away, doing Arcon’s bidding. I hadn’t paid them much attention before, but now that I didn’t have Eledan beside me, I saw them for exactly what they were. This department didn’t actually do anything. They all played the part, but the actions were automatic. They all had Sindy’s glassy look. Worker drones. Human, but utterly clueless.

  Eledan had them all under his spell. Arcon wasn’t just a business that created and maintained defense and surveillance. It was a machine and the human staff was another mask. He probably only needed a handful of people to run Arcon, but he had to keep up appearances, keep up the illusion.

  “Are you okay?” Sindy asked.

  She had no idea her working life was a lie. Did she go home at night feeling refreshed, as though she had accomplished something important during her days at Arcon, when really, all she did was follow a script Eledan had put inside her head? “Do you like working here?” I asked her, ignoring the rush of goosebumps scattering across my skin.

  “Oh, I love it. Istvan is a fabulous boss.” She laughed self-consciously. “You already know that. How’s the training going?”

  “Fine. Everything is just fine.” I placed my hand over hers and held her still. Her silly smile fractured. “You should quit. I don’t know what this place is, but it’s not what you think.”