by S A Archer
Donovan’s deep voice rumbled softly, but London still caught what he said. “We’ll talk tomorrow. When you’re ready, Dawn will escort you to your room for the night.”
Lugh apparently made some word or gesture of agreement, because Donovan turned away from him. He cut his dark gaze over London, letting the weight of it linger as if to make sure she felt it, before heading down the back hall toward his office. She watched him go, all dark and smoldering. The muscles defined? by his shirt, from his broad shoulders tapering down to that narrow waist, was downright mouthwatering. And he filled out the butt of those jeans something wicked.
Was it wrong that she thought he was hot in a scary way? Oh, yeah. Most definitely wrong. And potentially fatal.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Lugh hadn’t seen exhaustion shadow Donovan’s features so intensely since they’d battled back the third wave of berserker goblins that flooded through the defenses at Tír na nÓg during the Sidhe-goblin war. In that conflict, they’d been allies. Now… much less so. The fact Donovan had dismissively instructed Dawn to give Lugh the tour and show him to his chambers, only further proved his belief. There was much to be done, and many who relied upon him. It spread thin the energy of the Unseelie’s ‘dark chieftain,’ as was the meaning of the name Donovan.
It would make it that much easier when Manannan appeared to wrest control from the Unseelie’s grasp.
That very thought brought a gentle smile to Lugh’s lips. The feeling within him welled up once more. The reassurances. Manannan had put him completely at his ease. All was within Manannan’s power. He was the savior of them all. Even if the Unseelie didn’t yet suspect this. As Lugh breathed in deeply, the cool power seemed to surge within him once more, echoing confidence. Yes, all was well in Manannan’s keeping, and Lugh would serve his king with all the skills at his command.
“You’ve seen the club.” Dawn gestured with an encompassing sweep of her hand. “Let me show you the lower level. Donovan has constructed an elaborate training facility.”
He smiled down at her, granting her the entirety of his attention. They no longer shared the Touch, but the lingering effects gave her expression a glow of trust. “Yes. Do show me everything. I am quite impressed.” Not by the elaborateness of the Glamour Club, but by the diversity and the cohesiveness of the fey within. Donovan certainly had cultivated the loyalty of many races in an impressively brief span of time. Lugh would not have thought the former assassin with no political ambitions capable of such a feat.
As promised, Dawn guided him to the lower level. Her hand hooked beneath his bent arm, accepting the escort. Once inside the training facility, Lugh could only assume that the room not only encompassed the area beneath the Glamour Club itself, but stretched out beneath the adjacent buildings as well. The height of the ceiling was greater than most modern facilities by more than twice. For all the space, weaponry upon the walls, and equipment strewn about, it seemed strange to find only one fey taking advantage of it all.
With Dawn by his side, Lugh observed the fire Sidhe from behind as he inflamed a throwing knife and flung it at the target dummy. When the lad turned about to collect another from his pile, he spotted Lugh and hesitated. They both recalled the other from the encounter in the museum mere days ago. The way the boy stilled, eyes wide and unblinking, he expected an attack.
Dawn attempted to put the young man at ease. “Bryce, you remember that Lugh will be our guest for a while?”
Crossing his arms, much like a cat tucking under its paws, Lugh showed he meant no aggression. He nodded encouragement to the lad. “Go on then. But this time, use only your flame to pummel the target.”
The fire Sidhe frowned, but then his lips firmed up into a determined line. Turning his back to Lugh, Bryce squared off with the target. He gathered a mass of flames between his hands and then pitched it like a cricket ball. It smashed against the target and burst apart in cinders to rain about harmlessly. The target, barely singed, hardly rocked, even though the mechanism of the stand was set to drop down with impact.
The aggravated mumble and disappointed stance revealed the young Unseelie’s heart. With a frustrated swipe of his palm against the sweat glistening on his forehead and hair, he kept his back to them.
Lugh placed a steadying hand to the boy’s shoulder and steered him to the side. “Let me show you.” He summoned a globe of boiling plasma no larger than a peach, and then whipped it out with a side-arm throw that rammed into the target, busting the thing in half, sending the head toppling to the back of the room, and bashing the body down so hard the supports for the stand broke away from the floor.
Lugh glanced over at the boy, whose mouth was agape and eyes wide with shock and not a little fear. He gave the lad a smirk and a wink, before turning as if he meant to leave.
Instead, getting the response he’d been hoping for.
“How’d you do that?!” Bryce’s curiosity and disbelief overrode any of his previous reticence.
Lugh didn’t resist the smile that slipped across his face, but modulated it into something more friendly before angling back toward the young Sidhe. Lifting his hand, relaxed and open, he offered it palm up.
In that stance he paused, watching the youth puzzle the meaning of it. Then he blinked with realization before lifting his questioning gaze to Lugh’s face. “You… want to Touch me?” From the blush, he knew the boy misconstrued the offer.
Lugh remained still, nonthreatening in all ways, save for the proffered hand. His attention fixed on Bryce as if he could compel him by the weight of it alone. “I want to show you.”
Debating, Bryce scrunched his face.
To put the young man to his ease, Lugh added in a private voice that Dawn, waiting several feet behind him, might not hear. “No sexuality. Just the knowledge you seek.” When Bryce scrubbed his palms on his jeans, apprehensively, Lugh added, “Who else knows the proclivities of fire? When will you ever get this chance again?”
That decided the lad. He thrust his hand into Lugh’s.
The Touch rose from Lugh’s palm, seeping into the young Unseelie with the warm reassurance of an older brother to a worshipful younger one. The very feelings Lugh desired to engender in the lad. And when Bryce raised his gaze, Lugh saw that emotion reflected there. The earthborns truly had no understanding of the deeper nature of the Touch, of the possibilities. Only when the feeling fully saturated the youth, did Lugh share the knowledge he promised.
Bryce’s eyebrows lifted as in his mind’s eye, he would see that the fount of his power surged from his center, his heart of magic, not from his hands. Bringing the magic from the source was so much more effective than siphoning it from the conduits of his limbs. The control of his fire didn’t end with the limits of his body. The very threads of his living magic could extend from him to shape and control the fire even after it left Bryce’s hands, feeding it with the full force of his magic through impact, rather than breaking the connection once he threw it. The method was close to magicraft, pulling the threads of magic from within and moving them outside to create manifestations.
“Could I become fire?” The question was breathed with uncertainty mixed with lust.
“You are Sidhe, not an elemental,” Lugh warned. “Flames do not damage your body because of your magic, but you need blood and bones and flesh to live.” As if to prove his point, he reached out and gripped Bryce’s shoulder in a brotherly fashion. But even that gesture moved Bryce closer to the state of acceptance towards which Lugh maneuvered him with Seelie elegance.
Bryce firmed up his expression, nodding his understanding, then he turned back to the next target in the line. When the fire Sidhe wound up his next projectile, it was no mere mass of fire, but thick with magic like lava. He threw it with all his strength, magical and physical. When it impacted the dummy, he cracked the torso and knocked the thi
ng down with enough power to bang to the floor.
The boy jumped with his astonishment and joy. “Did you see that?!” He spun to Lugh, gripping his arms with his excitement.
“Impressive,” Lugh agreed, grinning as he watched the lad turn back as if to verify the truth of what he’d just accomplished. He chuckled good-naturedly as Bryce raked his fingers through his dark red hair, and gripped his head as if the shock might make it explode.
“Do it again.” Lugh encouraged, getting rewarded with Bryce’s wide smile and with the approving pressure of Dawn’s hand squeezing his forearm.
How easily it had been to turn two of the Unseelie from enemies into friends. Each word and gesture cemented the allegiance more. The first stages of his plan were coming together with artistic perfection.
Chapter Forty
After Donovan left, the activity in the Glamour Club changed completely. London tucked herself into a booth in the corner and out of the stream of activity as it seemed that every fey that had been partying an hour before, now was disassembling the place. Boxes and crates were teleported in, packed with the contents of the bar, and then the disassembled pieces of the bar itself. The musical equipment and the stage went with equal speed, followed by the dance floor. The railing around it came down within minutes as the fey worked like a battalion of carpenter ants. Chairs were stacked and tables moved to one corner in a neat pile. And all of it was happening at once.
London reached out and caught a bright-eyed Brownie toting an armful of packing tape rolls. “What’s happening?”
“We’re moving everything to the Isle of Fey, of course. Don’t expect us to leave it all behind, do you?” The Brownie lad chuckled, and slipped away before she could ask anything else.
Digging her phone out of her pocket, London glanced around again. Already the activity had died down as areas were completely disassembled and stacked. As she dialed Willem’s number, she watched as the fey disappeared, some slipping away out of doors, and others teleporting from sight. While most of the fey ignored her, two of them by the boxes packed with musical equipment spoke with heads together and with occasional backwards glances towards her. Kieran and the blond Sidhe singer.
The soft sound of breathing replaced the ringing over the phone.
“When you answer, you should say ‘hello,’” London said.
“Hello!” Willem chimed excitedly.
“Hey, where are you? Lugh and I are at the Glamour Club.” Keeping watch on the Sidhe from the corner of her eye, she pretended to focus all her attention on the phone conversation. She saw Kieran shake his head at something the woman asked, and then he kissed her cheek before walking away. She caught a glimpse of the stairwell through the door he passed through, before losing sight of him.
“We are on the Isle of Fey now. Just arrived a bit ago.” Willem explained, as if London should understand what he meant.
“The Isle of Fey? Where’s that?” Now the blond Sidhe openly watched London, not yet approaching but clearly considering it.
“I’m not sure, really.” Willem gave a light titter of laughter. “It’s where the magic for the new realm is, though. It’s amazing. Enormous, even! I can’t imagine it will take much longer to complete.”
“Lugh will be glad to hear about that. So you’re ok? They’ve not mistreated you?”
“Not at all. Malcolm even lets me speak now, if I don’t chatter on too much.”
She blinked at that. “I guess that’s a good thing. Call me if anything changes, alright? I need to let Lugh know the artifacts have moved.”
“Donovan should bring you. Just ask him.”
“I will.” London rung off. Before she had the phone shut down the Sidhe began to cross the room. London didn’t bother to tuck the phone away, just held it between her hands as the woman drew closer. “You want to join me?” London pointed to the other side of the booth.
“Y-yes,” the young woman admitted haltingly, as if she weren’t really all that sure about it herself. Then she slipped onto the bench opposite London. “You came here with Lugh?”
“I did. My name’s London. And you are?”
“Kaitlin,” she confessed in a whisper, as if her name alone might mean something to London. Her blue eyes darted everywhere but on London’s face, like at any moment something might happen to send her fleeing.
London tried to help the young woman to relax. “You sing beautifully.”
“Music is my aspect,” Kaitlin flipped her hand as if it were inconsequential. Finally, she leaned closer and asked, “Why is Lugh here?”
“I thought everyone knew,” London said, wondering what more she should admit, if the artifacts and the magic for the new realm wasn’t the common knowledge she assumed it was.
Kaitlin continued in a rush, her eyes wide with undisguised fear. “Did he come for me?”
London processed that. “He’s not mentioned you.” Which was the closest thing to an answer she could offer. “Why would he come for you? What are you afraid of?”
“Then Manannan didn’t send him?”
London couldn’t help the look of surprise as Kaitlin blurted out that name. That look alone freaked her out. Before she could bolt from the booth, London snatched the Sidhe’s wrist. The other fey had filtered away, leaving the two women alone. No one saw London laying hands on a Sidhe. “Please don’t run,” she implored. “Tell me what’s going on.” When Kaitlin tugged to escape, London pleaded, “Please? I need to understand.”
Kaitlin twisted her wrist out of London’s grasp, and hugged her arms to her chest. “Manannan destroyed the Mounds. He murdered my sister and the All-Mother.”
“M-” The name refused to pass her lips. London sat up straight and forced out, “Murdered Danu?” From all accounts, the fey revered the All-Mother. It had been one of the reasons Donovan wanted to choke the life out of London, once he’d discovered she’d had a hand in raiding Danu’s temple.
And Manannan had murdered her?
London ran her hands over her face, struggling to decipher the few facts she knew. What had Manannan said when he’d attacked Lugh? That if the All-Mother hadn’t been able to resist his power, how could Lugh? What exactly had he meant by that?
Lugh had changed after Manannan had drawn on him with his fingers. More than just freeing Lugh of his beast. He’d twisted something within her patron. Lugh hadn’t even flinched at the wizards in Manannan’s service. And since when did Lugh, Champion of the Sidhe, shirk his duty by becoming the unquestioning servant of one man? So much of it didn’t make sense.
“Manannan craves ultimate power and he’ll crush everyone to get it.” Kaitlin glared at London, with an undisguised mixture of fear and anger.
Mind racing, London searched for questions she could voice without betraying Lugh. Her hand closed over the token at her neck. “Could he manipulate someone? Like hypnotize them or something?”
“Manannan is a perceiver. A bloodhound. He controls magic. I don’t know all he is capable of.” Her face flushed and her eyes shined with unshed tears.
God of magic, he’d called himself. He’d reached into Lugh and stripped away the beast. But that wasn’t all he’d done. London knew that with certainty now. Her fist closed over the cold shape of Lugh’s symbol.
Suddenly, the phone vibrated with a soft buzz. She glanced down at the screen.
Isaac.
London couldn’t swallow. What was that werewolf doing calling her?
The phone buzzed again. London held up a finger to Kaitlin. “Give me just a second, will you?”
She placed the phone to her ear, but before she could say anything, Isaac’s voice murmured over the line. “Are you alone?” There was something disturbing in the way that he asked the question. A note of threat underlying the sarcastically friendly tone.
A creeping dread spread over London as Isaac purred. “Of course you’re not alone. That Sidhe of yours is always close, isn’t he?”
London moved toward the middle of the open space that had been a night club mere hours before. “Isaac, what’s going on? You don’t sound yourself.”
“I warned you.” The voice was anything but friendly. Hurt, maybe. Betrayed, even. And laced with a wolfish growl of threat.
He didn’t just call to spook her. He was close. “Isaac? Where are you?” London fought to keep a causal lilt to her voice. Turning to Kaitlin, she mouthed the word, ‘hide.’ That was all it took for Kaitlin to slip behind some packing boxes and duck down.
“Why don’t you open the door and find out?” He laughed. “Never mind. I’ll do it myself.”
The door to the alleyway where she had come inside with Lugh earlier in the evening now creaked open. Even in the subdued lighting, she recognized Isaac. He glanced around, taking in the boxes and London, alone in the middle of the room.
With nothing but her cell phone and the gloves Bain had given her for weapons, London backed away from her werewolf ex-boyfriend. How much had his sharp wolf ears heard from outside? Enough to know she was there. Enough to know she wasn’t alone? London tucked the phone away. No one to call that could help her with this. Not even dialing the emergency code 999 would help. What could cops do against a werewolf trespassing on fey property?
