Boreal and John Grey Season 2

by Thoma, Chrystalla

  Neglect. She’d been so caught up in trying to figure out a way to make his magic stronger she’d stopped thinking about primary needs. She knew part of it was her own exhaustion, but hell, that wasn’t a good enough excuse.

  Finn tugged on the hem of the worn green tee he wore and a hole ripped in the side, growing larger. He didn’t seem to notice.

  “I need to go buy food,” she whispered. “And clothes for Finn.”

  “Good to hear. I’ll help you. But first...” Mike tapped her shoulder, wearing an exaggerated frown. “You asked me to look into Jeff Somesby, remember?”

  She nodded and put the fork down on her plate, uneasy. “Did you find anything?”

  “Not much. Military background. He’s a veteran. Joined the Paranormal Investigations Bureau in Chicago nine years ago, requested a transfer here six years ago for personal reasons. Mainly because he has family in the area and with his disability he needs the support.”

  Ella frowned, remembering the way Jeff had fought the Ettin, no trace of hesitation or discomfort evident in his movements.

  Then again, Finn fought that way, too, adrenaline making him forget the pain in his leg. And besides, her own memories were skewed. Dave had said Jeff was no voyant, and if he couldn’t see Shades, then how could he have fought those creatures?

  Ah, but were they Shades? Weren’t they hitchhikers in the river of Grey, slipping through the cracks wherever it ripped? Granted, they behaved like Shades mostly, but they didn’t just flicker and return to the Veil. They exploded, which meant something else was going on there. Had the other bystanders seen the Ettin?

  Did it matter anymore?

  “Ella, pay some attention, will you?” Mike sent her a frustrated look.

  “I am.”

  “Uh-huh.” Mike clicked something on his laptop.

  “He’s clean. I’m a terrible person who suspects everyone.” Although lately everyone was turning out to be lying. “Thanks for checking him out.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. There’s one thing you should see.” He turned the laptop toward her and she squinted at the grainy image of three people on the screen.

  “Who’s that?”

  “Who do you think? Jeff Somesby with his sniper team after a mission in Iran. It’s a good fifteen years ago, so he’s much younger and—”

  “Not him.” Ella swallowed hard, because Jeff being a sniper was bad enough, but... She tapped a finger on the screen. “Him.”

  Mike scanned the names listed below. “The spotter. It’s Jeremy... Cornelli? Do you know him?”

  Finn grunted and, man, his glare could blister paint. “Isn’t that the real name of your dead partner?”

  Mike glanced from Finn to Ella, his eyes confused. “What?”

  “Yeah, that’s Simon.” Ella wanted to put her fist through the laptop screen, but knowing Mike, this was a cutting-edge gadget that cost a fortune. She clenched her hand. “This isn’t looking good at all.”

  ***

  Of course Mike’s discovery didn’t prove anything. Oh yeah, it told her Jefferson was a lying bastard, much like Simon had been. What else was new, these days? He’d known all along Simon wasn’t her partner’s real name. And he was a trained sniper.

  But that didn’t mean he was the sniper after them.

  Did it?

  She picked up her cell phone and it rang, startling her. But the number was her mother’s and she disconnected the call without taking it. Sorry, not in the mood to talk about clothes or your new boyfriend right now.

  She pressed the speed dial for Dave and he answered on the first ring.

  “Everything okay?” he barked into the phone. A background hubbub told her he was outdoors. “Where’s Finn?”

  “Finn’s fine.” He was taking a shower and she counted on the noise, not wanting him to hear the conversation. Those damn sharp elvish ears. “Though he needs a bodyguard. Everyone’s trying to either kidnap or kill him.”

  “Who’s everyone?”

  “The sniper, the Shades, the Ettin, and these newcomers, the demon giants.”

  “The Jotunn.”

  “Yeah, those. Take your pick.”

  “A bodyguard. I’ll see what I can do.” A pause. “Why the sudden requests? Any recent attacks you just forgot to report?”

  Yeah, well, maybe? “Dave, listen. Jeff used to know Simon. I mean Jeremy. You know, my ex partner.” Whom she’d dated, and been friends with for years, and seen dead in the morgue and then found out he was a lying cheat.

  “They were friends,” Dave said, sounding impatient.

  “They knew each other since their days in the army. Jeff was a sniper, Jeremy the spotter. Does this ring any bells or am I being paranoid yet again?”

  “Damn.” Dave was rumbling like a broken exhaust pipe. Should she be worried? How did you ask a machine if they were about to break down?

  Ella cleared her throat. “So you agree this is suspicious?”

  “Damn right I do. I’ll get to the bottom of this.” A siren wailed somewhere near Dave. “We talk later.”

  “Wait.” She tiptoed to the corridor, glanced at the bathroom door. Still closed. Still splashing water noises coming from inside. She returned to the kitchen. “One more thing.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “What can you tell me about my powers?”

  There was a silence from the other end. Then Dave said, “What the hell happened?”

  Ella rubbed her face. “I can do stuff. By touching threads. Not Finn’s, apparently, that hurts him. But there are other threads, darker, and when I touch them...”

  “You can?”

  “I’m telling you I can, are you even listening? And then the room shakes and... What do these threads do, Dave?”

  “The warp,” Dave muttered. “You’re John Grey’s complement.”

  “Yeah, it all sounds amazing when you say it like that, real melodramatic, but what can I do with them?” She was ready to start banging her head against the wall.

  “Finn and you were destined to be together.”

  “Oh god, Dave. Cut the cheesy crap.” Because she didn’t want what she had with Finn to be a twist of fate.

  “Not like that. You were destined to work together. Loving him was your choice.”

  Well, damn. Now she was having a conversation about love with a robot. That had to be a new low. “Okay, look. I really need to understand the thing with the threads.”

  “Magic destabilizes the world. It distorts the laws of physics; distorts reality. You keep reality from fraying. You allow his magic to operate and affect it at the same time. With me so far?”

  Yeah, because it all sounded so simple. “How?”

  “I can’t tell you how to use your magic. That’s something beyond my understanding. I know your threads are interlaced tighter than any other’s. You must work together.”

  Ella shook her head. Was he being dense on purpose? “We are working together.”

  “Find the tangle. The snare. Untangle it. Make him remember. Make him strong.”

  “I’m trying. Dave—”

  “Look, I’ve got to go. Talk to you when you come in.”

  “Wait!”

  The pause that followed thrummed. “Say what you want to say, Ella.”

  She felt her face heat. She blurted, “What about pleasure?”

  “What about it?” Bland and uninterested.

  Dammit. “Does it help?”

  “Help with what?”

  “Finn. Does it help Finn get stronger?”

  “I thought we’d established that changing the aelfr’s memories into better ones is a step in the right direction. His power is awakened by pain and sorrow. You’re here to balance that.”

  He was driving her up the fucking wall with his evasive answers. “Was that a yes?”

  “Affirmative, agent Benson. Pleasure is good. Are you thinking of spicing up your sex life with the aelfr? Do you need recommendations?”

  She pulled the cell away, s
tared at it. Yeah, he’d actually said that. She put the phone back to her ear. “No, thank you.”

  “As you say.”

  He was definitely laughing at her. “I’m serious about this, Dave. He has scars on his back, connected to his nightmares, and when I touched them—”

  “Energy points.” Dave muttered something she couldn’t catch. “Along his spine. He’s scarred there?”

  “Yes. Energy points? Why didn’t I know this?”

  “You didn’t think the only difference between aelfar and humans were the ears, did you?”

  Ella bowed her head, irritated. “And you didn’t think there was a difference between aelfar and Duergar when you planted the gadgets in Finn’s flesh? That if the magic of the Veil makes you ache, it cripples him so much he can hardly fight anymore?” Her jaw clenched. “You said we should stop lying to each other. So I have to tell you that we removed the transmitter from his shoulder.”

  “I didn’t put any transmitter in his shoulder,” Dave grated out, sounding distracted, and she heard voices shouting in the background. “I only inserted the tracker in his leg.”

  And he disconnected.

  Chapter Five

  Poison

  Evening had fallen outside, the lights inside the surrounding buildings switching on, one by one, brightening their windows. Patches of snow glimmered on the sidewalks.

  Ella twitched the curtain shut and returned to her perch on the armchair and the ethnography book she’d been reading.

  Finn was stretched out on the sofa, his breathing even. In the soft glow of the lamp, his hair fanned like silver filigree on the dark cushions. She watched his broad chest rise and fall as he slept.

  With an effort, she forced her attention back to the treatise. She’d only managed a few chapters before the whole mess with the dragon, the recurring nightmares with the cave and everything else had filled her life to bursting, and she’d let it lie for a while.

  She wasn’t even sure she’d find anything of interest in the leather-bound little book. Sarah had been a better source of information. Unfortunately, she was still in the hospital.

  Ella sighed. Maybe she’d misjudged Sarah. Suspected her unfairly. Okay, sure, she’d tried to kill Finn when she’d found out he was John Grey. But hell, just about anyone knowing what John Grey was would freak at this point. And she’d done her best to help afterward.

  Perhaps it was time to pay her a visit, see how she was holding up and when she’d be released.

  She glanced again at Finn. He’d shifted, turning on his side, his hair falling into his face. His high cheekbones gleamed, and his mouth...

  Crap. Finn was far more distracting than the book — maybe because the book was telling her things she knew, about the Ettin and the Jotunn, about the elves and the Nine Worlds. There was a semi-interesting bit about the alignment of the worlds, though it didn’t say that the Weaver could affect their placement as Dave had claimed, and how the distance between the worlds played a role in the ease with which Gates opened between them.

  Knowing more than the book had to offer really wasn’t motivating.

  There was one thing she hadn’t known, though: apart from the Nine Worlds, there were also Nine Heavens — whatever that meant. The Aelfar had set up observatories, searching for them, because legend had it they were wondrous places of warmth and beauty. To a people trying to survive in a frozen world, it made sense that promises of a warm universe would be attractive. Did they think their gods live there? What gods did the Aelfar believe in? Nobody seemed to know.

  She was getting sleepy and curling against Finn on the sofa sounded like a damn good idea, when her eye caught the word Duergar in the text.

  Duergar, the Guardians, like Dave, who protected the Gates between the worlds. There was mention of an old uprising against their masters and creators, the Dark Elves. The robots had revolted.

  Rogue machines.

  Ella shivered, put down the book and went to lie down next to Finn. Breathing in his scent and holding him in her arms, she could forget about the strange happenings of the world and pretend everything was perfect.

  ***

  Finn hung from the cave ceiling, his body wracked with shivers. Pain. It came and went like a rolling wave, making him catch his breath, then let it out in a hiss, time and again.

  And she could only watch and feel it with him, huddled by the stone table where his blood dripped.

  The Aesir approached, his white muzzle twitching. Then he reached up and adjusted something on Finn’s back. Curious, Ella stood and went around to have a look. Looking was all she could do.

  Oh god. Bile rose in her throat. Blades were stuck in Finn’s back, forming two glinting ridges. From each blade, a shimmering line snaked up to a contraption hanging from the ceiling, a sort of machine with lights flashing and symbols appearing and disappearing down its sides.

  As she watched, the Aesir reached up, stretching to his full impressive height, and pressed two fingers on the machine.

  A symbol seemed to detach itself from the metal surface, bulging out, a lopsided heart shape that flashed green and white.

  White liquid ran down the lines to the blades in Finn’s back.

  He screamed, arching his head until she thought his neck might break. He was shouting something she couldn’t make out.

  “Stop hurting him!” She pushed against the hulking Aesir, trying to shove him away from Finn, but he didn’t even look down. “Stop!”

  Finn had slumped again, his head hanging forward, and didn’t appear to be conscious.

  “Prince Isthelfinn of the Ice Dragon House. Destitute Prince.” The Aesir took a thundering step forward and lifted a clawed hand, grabbed Finn’s chin and raised it. “You can hear me. Show me your magic.”

  Ella swallowed hard. Finn’s face was bruised and his cheeks sunken. Blood had dribbled from the corner of his mouth. His eyes were clouded over, the pupils blown to hell, making his blue eyes look like pools of black.

  The Aesir made a clicking sound. “I don’t think he’s the one.”

  “Have you tried the older memories?” a female voice asked. Another form moved behind Finn, but when Ella stepped aside she saw it was an apparition — a two-dimensional image floating on air. A woman, her eyes large and piercing, her hair falling on her shoulders like fresh snow.

  “I have,” rumbled the Aesir and his armor appeared to glow from the inside, a blinding source of light in the dimness of the cave. It illuminated Finn’s face in every detail, showing every line of pain around his mouth and eyes, before the Aesir let go and Finn’s head bowed again. “The mark hasn’t changed.”

  “Maybe we plucked him too early,” the woman said, her voice resonant, echoing in the cave, and Ella suddenly knew who she was: Queen Adramar. “Any results with the Frenzy?”

  “No success so far,” the Aesir said.

  “Then maybe it’s time to work on the next candidate, save this one for later.” She leaned forward. “We’re wasting precious time. The Weaver is ready.”

  “He needs a Stabilizer.”

  “We’ve had this discussion already. His magic should be evident, if wild, without a Stabilizer. But it matters none, since a Stabilizer is not available.”

  Finn groaned deep in his throat, and Ella turned toward him to find those grey eyes on her. Right on her.

  “Finn?” she whispered and reached up to his face. She touched his skin. It was cold as ice. “Can you see me?”

  But he didn't answer. His face tightened with pain, and the cave dissolved into darkness.

  ***

  “You said we’d take Finn shopping, right?” Mike said, his voice distorted over the cell phone in Ella’s ear. “Wanna go this afternoon? I can make some time. Hell, I can take Finn on my own, if you need a rest. We’ll have a blast and I’ll return him to you unrecognizable.”

  “Hm.” Ella stood outside the bank, at the cash-point, staring at her latest bank statement in a kind of shock. Was that really all she had l
eft? “Shit.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Ella tore the statement into little pieces and threw them into the trash. “Nothing.”

  “Don’t you nothing me, girl. What’s going on?”

  She chewed on the inside of her cheek. No reason to worry Mike who had enough trouble between the noise from the Veil and keeping an eye on her and Finn all the time. She’d get paid by the end of the month, all she had to do was last until then. “I, um. Changed my mind. Finn’s got enough clothes and Dave’s given us loads of paperwork to fill out... Rain check?”

  “You lying to me, Ella Benson?”

  Ella stomped toward her car, the question bothering her more than it should. She had to come clean to Finn about her talk with Dave. Sooner rather than later. And damn Dave had stopped answering his phone since her last call. “Why would you say that?”

  “’Cause I know when you’re lying. Your voice goes all high-pitched and stuff.”

  Man. Ella shook her head. “I don’t have money right now, Mike. And take that comment about my voice back, or else.”

  “That’s what got your thong in a twist? The money? I’ll just grab him a few cheap things, no need to spend a fortune. You can pay me back later.”

  Or maybe much later? Ella swallowed a sigh as she crossed the street and entered her car. Finn shot her a questioning glance and she did her best to wipe the frown from her face.

  “We’ll see. Talk to you later, okay? Will you be at home?”

  “Sure.” Mike clucked his tongue. “I’ll be home. Jeez, I’m turning into a hermit in my young age. See you later.”

  Ella pulled into the traffic, heading toward the Bureau. She glanced at Finn. He was dressed in a threadbare pair of jeans that had probably belonged to Scott at some point in the past. Rusty stains decorated one side — blood. His boots were worn and scuffed — and holed? Ripped, rather. No wonder, with all the running and fighting and climbing. An old sweater of Mike’s peeked underneath his jacket.

  Prince Isthelfinn. A prince in rags.