Her voice softened, and he could see that she was aware of him again. Her entire demeanor changed, from distant to coaxing, enticing. “Would you accompany me, sweet man? Would you walk beyond these gardens, your hand in mine?”
There was a moment of doubt, something like cold sweat in his mind: leave? Go beyond the silvery walls and the pale-misted gardens? No. Oh, no. He could not leave. He could not leave; there was nowhere else for him to go. Leaving was... But...the frantic skittering of his thoughts halted, running against the wall of her words. She was leaving? If she left and asked him to go with her, if he were to accompany her—that would be all right, surely. He would not be punished for that, not if she commanded. But she had not commanded; she had asked. Was this a trick? A test? What was the right answer?
Fear and love were too intermingled to unbind. “I would not be parted from you.” She was cold and cruel in her love, but she had claimed him, protected him. Without her, he would be at the mercy of the others, the ones with the hard hands and fierce tools, and mercy was not a thing they knew.
“You will walk with me through the veil? Take my hand and carry me through?”
He had no understanding of what she asked, but he knew what she wanted him to say. “Yes.”
Her smile was clear and bright, the sun finally broken through the ever-present fog. “Excellent. Come.”
She was standing, without his sensing her move, but he was used to that by now. Something moved in his memory, sluggish and deep; they had done this before? No. He would have remembered that, surely. There was nothing save the cold palace, the gardens and the thorn chair. And her.
He placed his hand in hers, the cool, smooth fingers closing around his, pulling him to his feet and into—not an embrace, but an enclosure, her arms going around him, sliding into place like... He could almost remember the thing it reminded him of now, almost, but the memory was hidden behind mist and thorn-sharp pain. He had learned his lesson well: the only way out was to forget. He let the memory go.
There was only now, only her holding him, her breath cool on his neck, and then they were walking off the path, into the mist, the dampness wrapping around them.
“Lead the way,” she said to him, urging him forward, and he didn’t understand, didn’t know how he could lead rather than follow, but once commanded, his feet found the path underneath them, step by step.
“Yes.” Her voice curled around inside him, her very self carried within him, the prickling feeling in his flesh as though the thorns were within him, pushing out.
There was a shout, distant and muffled, as though someone had taken note of their leaving and objected, and then the mist thinned into nothingness, his skin burned, his lungs cramped for air, his eyes and nose dried out, and they were...
Elsewhere.
The noise took him by surprise—like a blow he’d felt before, his body cringing in reflex until it recognized it as sound. It washed around him, did not hurt him. Her hand was still in his, the skin oddly warm and wet against his skin as the screeching, shuddering noise was replaced by someone yelling at them, furious and scared.
“You morons!”
He wore pants, and a shirt, and shoes upon his feet; he did not remember changing, from that moment in the starlight garden to this moment under too-bright sunlight, but he did not have time to question it, or the feeling of familiarity the clothing gave him, as he pulled her out of the roadway, away from the traffic and onto the relative safety of the sidewalk.
The cars—yes, cars—moved past them, and other than a few odd looks from people passing by, no one paid them any heed. He knew this, but he couldn’t recognize it, once the moment of danger was past, couldn’t remember how to act.
“Walk,” she told him, and he did, some instinct setting his feet upon a certain route. Down this street, past that storefront, the display of bicycles and mannequins that were different from the last time he had seen them.
When was that time? How did he know this place? His brain turned, but nothing more fell out. This place was both familiar and alien, and he did not know what to do.
Stjerne raised her face to the sunlight, her pale features flushed as though she had a fever, and her smile sent shivers through him. As though he had drawn her attention back to himself, she tilted her face and directed that smile at him. “Take me somewhere I can get a cup of coffee.”
For an instant, he wanted only to run, to flee: she was a beast, baring too-sharp teeth and intending him harm. The instinct passed; she trusted him to lead, to keep her from harm. He focused on that and let the odd sense of having been here before fade into background noise in his head, just enough of a hum to lead him and not enough to interfere. Her hand on his arm was the only thing that was real, even as other people moved past and around them, cars and bicycles passing them on the street, the smells in the air harder, stronger than the misted air he had been breathing....
“Here.”
A small café with tables outside, people sitting with dogs that looked up and studied them warily as they walked by, through the door with a gently tingling bell overhead, and then they were surrounded by the thick smell of coffee and pastries.
Something at the base of his spine twitched, a deep, instinctive longing for something lost. Her hand moved, as though she sensed it, to cover that spot.
The longing stilled, filled by her presence, and she led him to a table at the front of the café, where a couple was just getting up.
“Wait here,” she said, drawing out a chair for him.
He sat, obedient, and waited.
* * *
If first dates were hell, blown dates were purgatory. The café was bustling, people waiting for tables. Jan sat in the wrought-iron chairs that were prettier than they were comfortable, and tried not to fidget. She hated waiting even on good days, and now, with the time ticking off constantly in the back of her head, a monotone of “Tyler’s in danger, Tyler’s in danger,” she begrudged every minute wasted.
He’d been missing for fifteen days. She’d asked Elsa once if time ran the same for preters, in their sphere or whatever, as it did for humans. Elsa’s discomfort with the question had made her not ask again.
Maybe, maybe, time was slower there, like legends said. If so, maybe Tyler thought he’d only been gone for fifteen hours.
This was her third “bait-date” in two days, and she suspected that this one was going to blow her off. Had she sounded too needy? Had she rushed too hard, trying to follow AJ’s instructions? Whatever the reason, the guy was twenty minutes late and hadn’t called or texted.
“This isn’t going to work.” The couple at the table next to her gave her a pitying look, her coffee cup untouched, the chair opposite her unused. It seemed as though the café was filled with couples, old and young, and she was the only one seated alone. Waiting. Unwanted.
Tick. Tick. Tyler’s in danger. Tyler’s in danger. And she sat here, and waited for her quarry to come to her.
“Damn it, AJ, I told you this wasn’t going to work.” But when challenged, she hadn’t been able to come up with anything better: short of sending the supers out into the streets to find another preter, and that, she had been told, was not possible. They had only so many volunteers, and more than half of them were not the sort you let out in the general human public. And once they got too close, they’d spook them off, anyway.
No, it had to be her. Even when a woman responded, they sent Jan in, to check her out.
“If you can’t convince more of your own people to help, why not bring in more humans?” she had asked, at her wit’s end. “I’m only one person—you could cover three or four times as much ground, just by bringing in more people. And a guy would be able to go right up to them, be proper bait.”
AJ had stared at her, then stalked off; she could almost see the sway of a tail, stiff with annoyance, as he walked away. Martin, who had been sitting beside her as she worked on the laptop, only shook his head.
“You’re right. Of course
you’re right. And how are we to convince them? If you were to approach even your closest friend and say ‘we need to rescue my leman from these creatures who have taken him captive...’ How would she respond?”
He was right, of course. Most would have her tanked to the eyelids ten minutes after she’d finished her story, convinced that she had lost her mind. And yet, Jan had almost called Glory, anyway; Glory of all her friends might be hardheaded and clear-eyed enough to see that Jan was not crazy, had not had a nervous breakdown or psychotic episode. Or she might play the concerned friend, and have Jan committed, saying she had always known that Tyler would be bad news, in the end.
She couldn’t risk it, couldn’t take the chance. Not with the clock ticking and Tyler still in preter hands.
All she had to do was hook one preter, and he would tell them how to find Tyler. And she could bring him home again. That was how it would go. Jan frowned, her forehead creasing. Yes. AJ had said that only someone who cared, who really loved, could defeat a preter. The way Martin didn’t care about anyone, not really...she had to be part of the rescue effort. All she had to do was nab them a preter.
Jan took a sip of her coffee, which had gone from lukewarm to cold, and looked down at the cell phone again. It wasn’t hers, but one that Martin’s friend had given her, along with the laptop: a prepaid phone, and no one to talk to, no one to call. She was alone, dressed up as bait and sent into the shark tank.
No, not alone. Martin and AJ had gone nose-to-nose—muzzle to snout?—about that, and AJ had been the one to blink. She was assured that there were supers all around her, watching and waiting, but staying far enough away to—hopefully—not spook any preters she might meet. The thought wasn’t comforting at all.
On impulse, she shifted the phone in her hands and started typing, the quick thumb-moves of an experienced texter.
Hey there. No time, kinda busy but wanted to give you a wave. Life crazy. Let you know the deets asap. <3.
She hit Send and watched the flicker that meant the message was en route. It was late in the U.K., but Glory would still be awake. If she was by her phone—
The phone gave a faint beep, and she looked down, surprised at how fast the response had come.
u ok?
Not Glory. Martin. After she had bitched at him about abandoning her in the first restaurant, he had become almost overly protective. He’d even told AJ to go away, that they were doing fine on their own, like they’d been told. And AJ had gone, muttering.
Given a cell phone that matched hers, Martin had also taken to texting every three minutes, it seemed, letting her know where he was (down the street), what his coffee tasted like (bad), how many times he didn’t hit on the waitress (three, and the third time she gave him her phone number. Probably a fake one, just to shut him up, Jan had thought but hadn’t texted back).
Bored, she texted back now. Think this is bust.
idiot. i’d meet you for coffee any time.
Jan almost smiled. You say that to all the girls.
true.
No matter what Toba had warned, after a week living with him, she was starting to get the hang of Martin. It helped that she’d been able to surf the Net a little while waiting for responses, do some more research. The sites she all found were fiction—she thought—but the details were pretty clear. Kelpies were water-horses, yeah. Handsome ponies who lured children onto their backs, and then drowned them without remorse.
Martin, to a T.
Their other form was human, and they were given the same theme of seduce-and-kill AJ had ascribed to the preters.
And that raised unsettling questions. Martin was set to protect her, and he had—but for how long? If a kelpie killed...how long could he hold his nature at bay? That had been what AJ had meant, when he’d said that Martin would have to decide...after.
Jan didn’t want to believe that he could kill her, but she knew one thing for sure, deep in her gut: they were all dangerous. The preters, Martin, the bansidhe, even Toba with his beak and claws, and the gnomes, with their grabbing fingers and gnawing teeth. Maybe even Elsa, who looked too slow and solid to harm anyone...she had looked Elsa up, as well. A jötunndotter was another name for troll, and troll had unsavory reputations, too.
Kelpies lured victims onto their backs, and killed them. All the stories were clear about that; if you got on, it was game over.
Jan shifted in her seat, her thoughts taking her places she didn’t want to go. Nothing of the fairy world was to be trusted, all the websites she had visited—except the seriously new-age touchy-woo-woo ones—had been clear on that. It was Martin’s nature to kill, same as it was his nature to flirt. He would, eventually, inevitably, lure her onto his back and take her into the river, and she would drown. For all that he was her ally, her partner in this, she could not trust him. Even he had admitted that.
But she had been on his back and been underwater, and not drowned. He didn’t seem particularly homicidal to her. He held her when she cried, and sent her funny texts to cheer her up, and...
AJ, on the other hand... Now him, she could easily see him taking someone’s throat out. And yet, even when he was yelling at her, she felt safer around him than she did any of the other supers, even Martin. It made no sense. Maybe because his teeth were front and center, and he made no pretense....
It didn’t matter. The supers might be more dangerous than the preters, in terms of history—after all, the only thing she could find about elves was that they took humans as pets and lovers, and didn’t always return them. No eating, no drowning... But they had taken Tyler.
She took another look at the time and sighed. Half an hour after the man on the other end of the site-connection had agreed to meet her.
he’s not going to show up, she started to text, when the door’s chime sounded, and she looked up, not even hopeful at this point.
A woman came in, slim and elegant in jeans and a bright red blouse that looked vaguely Russian, and then a dark-skinned man, wide in the shoulders, with a stubborn set to his jaw.
Jan’s breath caught, a painful hitch halfway between lungs and throat.
Tyler.
Chapter 10
“Don’t.”
Martin’s hand on her shoulder sank her back into her seat before she’d been aware that she was halfway to standing. She didn’t even wonder where he’d come from or how he’d gotten there so fast—or had she been caught in some kind of time warp, staring in disbelief?
“But that’s—that’s Tyler,” she said, her voice a harsh whisper, as though afraid to spook him, or herself, or the entire coffee shop. “It’s Tyler!”
“Look twice, Janny. He’s not alone.”
Jan felt Martin’s hand fall away—he was leaving? She felt oddly abandoned, and then his words sank in. Not alone? She slid another glance toward the so familiar, so beloved figure sitting at the table across the room. Tyler—it was Tyler—looked tired, and his hair was shorn too close, the thick black curls she had loved now a bare fuzz against his scalp, his dark skin carrying gray shadows under his eyes, visible even at this distance, under the harsh lights overhead. Never bulky, he seemed even thinner now, as though he had been ill for a month and poorly fed. Jan was amazed now that she had recognized him; but it was him. She had no doubt.
He’s not alone.
Martin had left. She could get up and go to Tyler, hug him, rage at him, ask him what the hell he had been up to, make such a scene that he’d have no choice but to tell her.
He’s not alone.
She looked again, and this time she saw the way his gaze kept going to the front counter, as though something there held all his attention. She let her own gaze follow, tracking through the crowd.
There. Jan felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach. The tall, slender woman who had come in just before him. The woman turned just then, looking over her shoulder as though scanning the room, and Jan swallowed hard, her mouth suddenly dry. The woman was golden-pale, with thick black hair around a
pointed face, cheekbones that a supermodel would kill for, and eyes too large to be natural. Even without looking into those eyes, Jan knew.
Preternatural.
How did no one else sense it? How could no one else be aware? Jan’s stomach twisted in on itself, her skin crawling, and she took a sip of her coffee to try and cover the shudder that went though her. The one in the café had not set off such a strong reaction, but she hadn’t had time to observe it carefully. Or maybe she just hadn’t been sensitized enough yet. AJ and Martin, Toba, and even Elsa, all of the things she had seen—even the turncoats and the bansidhe, they had been odd and frightening and fierce...but they had belonged here. They were part of this world.
This...creature, did not. AJ had been right. It was an abomination.
Preternatural. Outside of this world.
And it held her Tyler in its delicate hands. Jan understood that, as the preter approached the table bearing two coffees, and Tyler rose to his feet in a way he’d never done for her, his gaze never leaving her face, as though he was terrified that she might disappear, might turn out not to be real.
Jan had hated a lot of people and a lot of things in her life. But it all faded behind the rage she felt toward the preter—to all preters, right then. All the beauty in the world—in two worlds—couldn’t hide what it was, a vile thing, as hideous as its turncoat tools. She wanted to stomp on it the way you would a cockroach, erase any sign it had ever existed.
We need one alive, AJ had said after the disaster in the restaurant, leaning across the sedan’s backseat toward her, his wide-set brown eyes glimmering with a feral red light deep within. We need it bound and within our grasp, to get the truth from it.
They needed to know how the portals were being opened, and how to shut them from this side. That was their only protection. Jan had promised to follow AJ’s plan. Had promised not to confront a preter directly, but to follow it, trap it.... But this was the bitch who had taken Tyler from her. This was that bitch Stjerne, Jan was certain of it. And Martin had gone off and abandoned her....
Laura Anne Gilman Page 15
