“Michaela. Fancy meeting you here. And in such…interesting company.” Raven swept her a bow and took hold of her free hand. “Would you like to accompany me to an artist’s panel?”
Michaela bit her lip. The chance to sit in on one of those was intriguing. She glanced at Moira to get her reaction. After all, she’d promised to spend the day with her.
Moira looked ready to pass out. She was so pale Michaela was ready to check her blood pressure. “What about A Midsummer Night’s Dream?”
“What about it?” Raven shot Moira a glare before turning a charming smile on Michaela. “I could draw whatever character you wish for you.”
She grinned. She knew just what character she’d love to hang on her apartment walls. “Can you draw Robin Goodfellow?”
Robin threw his head back and laughed. “Yes, MacSweeney, why don’t you run off and draw Robin Goodfellow. In the meantime, I will escort Michaela and Moira to the talk on A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
“Do you want me to show her the true face of the Hob?” Raven’s voice was so full of soft menace Michaela was stunned. “Do you think she will still want you after the truth is revealed?”
What the hell were they talking about? The true face of the Hob? Who on earth was the Hob? The man beside her, calling himself Robin Goodfellow? And why was that supposed to frighten her off?
Something hinky was going on.
Robin’s glare should have worried Michaela. The way his eyes went from brilliant blue to a startling green was even scarier, but she wasn’t afraid the way she should have been.
Robin, like Ringo, would never harm her.
Robin tugged Michaela close and placed his arm around her shoulders. The warm scent of his skin filled her senses. God, he even smells the same. “Michaela is already mine.”
“Then say you are mine.”
The words her dream Robin had spoken came back to her. He’d used that same tone of voice then as well. He’d had no doubt what her answer would be, and had demanded it as his due.
Michaela blinked. She was acting as if everything in that dream had been real, but that was impossible. Right? She stared up at Robin, her heart pounding.
He looked exactly like her Robin. Right down to the teeny tiny beauty mark on his chin.
Right?
Moira grimaced, her gaze darting between the three of them. “Um. Aren’t we meeting Ringo for lunch right after the next workshop?”
Ringo. Aw, crap. What the hell was she thinking? None of it was possible. Her Robin was just a dream. He couldn’t be real.
Could he?
Michaela tried to tug herself free of Robin’s grasp, but his grip firmed. He leaned down and whispered in her ear, sending more delightful shivers down her spine. “It will be all right, Michaela. Ringo will not object to you being with me.”
She nearly choked on her own drool at a sudden vision of how she wanted to be with him. Oh boy, did she want to be with him.
“What a delightful imagination you have, my dear.” Robin’s breath tickled her ear and she shuddered. “We’ll have to explore that later.”
She was in such deep doo-doo. She looked up at Robin and smiled weakly. “I think Moira and I need to go.” She needed to get her head examined. Why was she so attracted to two men? Why couldn’t she be like normal people, and have one guy, one love?
Then she looked at Moira and wondered if maybe she was more like her newfound friend than she thought. The idea of being the meat in a Robin-Ringo sandwich was incredibly seductive. But then she thought about how high-maintenance such a relationship would be. Two guys to cook for, to clean for. To do laundry for. Two guys to argue over the remote with, to hog all the computer time, to pick up socks for.
Two guys who would make her every sexual desire come true. And hey, they could do the kitty litter, if she ever broke down and finally got a cat.
Ugh. Yup. It was time to find a nice, quiet loony bin and stare at some pretty white walls for a while.
“Then I will speak with you soon.” And before she could react Robin swooped down, cradled her in his arms, and claimed her mouth, kissing her with a raw passion that turned her insides to jelly.
He tastes just like he did in the dream. Just…maple syrupy too.
She soon forgot about the sweet taste in Robin’s mouth as the kiss stole her breath, her wits and her knees. She damn near collapsed, only held up by Robin’s strong arm around her waist.
I’d better pack my bikini, ’cause I’m going to hell. Michaela returned Robin’s kiss with fervor, burying her hands in his rich, fiery hair. It had a different texture from Ringo’s, throwing her off, but his kiss…
Dear God, they kiss the same. Robin’s kiss was nearly identical to Ringo’s. So what the hell did that mean? Unless…
Nah. No way was Robin Goodfellow real. Things like that just didn’t happen to a boring nurse from Philadelphia. No way, no how.
Robin broke the kiss and stroked her cheek, his expression full of the same longing she’d seen on Ringo’s face not two hours before.
But oh, how she wished they did.
Robin watched Michaela and Moira head off, Michaela’s steps wobbly and uncertain, Jaden barely visible in their wake. The vampire’s powers were growing fast if he could pull such a trick off. Perhaps that was why fate had seen fit to give him two mates. Jaden would need to feed more than other vampires if he used his powers so often.
Raven was glaring at him, but Robin did not care. He’d staked his claim before the Fear Dearc, and now there was but one more thing more to take care of. “On the roof. Now.”
Robin stepped into a doorway and disappeared, reappearing on the roof of the hotel.
The Raven Lord appeared soon after. He placed his hands on his hips, but he eyed Robin warily.
Good. The boy should fear him. He’d seen the way Raven tensed when he’d taken Michaela’s mouth in front of him, how he’d held back a growl when Michaela, stunned, her lips swollen and her cheeks flushed, had stumbled in Moira’s wake.
“Now what?”
Robin examined his nails. “Now you leave Michaela alone.”
Raven snorted, amused. “No.”
Robin glared at him through his lashes, allowing his eyes to glow so brightly they rivaled the noonday sun. “Yes.” If Raven were the threat to his truebond, he would soon be a threat no more.
Something flashed through Raven’s eyes, something startlingly familiar. He’d seen something similar recently, that flash of green that marked the children of the Hob. Raven’s eyes had looked eerily similar to Jaden’s. Robin tilted his head, studying Raven.
Now that he allowed himself to look at him, Raven had Robin’s look about him. He, too, was slender, as was the Hob. His blue eyes were a close match to his, as well. His black nails tapped impatiently against his black leather belt, but his hair blew around him against the breeze.
The boy had sylph blood in him, then. That would explain his connection to ravens. Robin himself had a way with the creatures of the earth. Earth sprites were by turns drawn to him and terrified of him, something that had served him well. Even Moira, who cared for him, was wary of him.
Raven attacked first, as Robin had known he would. He disappeared in a swirl of dark smoke, only to reappear behind Robin. He took a swipe at Robin with his claws, but Robin was no longer there, disappearing in a similar swirl of dark mist.
The wind changed, and Robin scented it again, that elusive scent tantalizing him, taunting him with might-have-beens and deliberately forgotten dreams.
That earthy, feral aroma could not be Robin’s. There was no way one of the worst of Titannia’s lackeys was his child.
“I will protect her, even from you.” Raven disappeared again, but this time stayed gone. Robin stilled, stretching out with his senses, waiting for Raven to try again. He hated to admit it, but the boy had guts. Hobart had barely fought, choosing instead to beg for his life and that of his lover, Constance.
Robin had destroyed Hobart, l
eaving nothing behind but the thick, black sludge that ran through his veins, the same sludge that had poisoned and nearly killed Shane Dunne.
Robin wished things could have turned out differently. Hobart Klaussner, the man who’d tortured Shane and somehow brought the Child of Dunne prophecy to pass, had been his child, but had been nothing like the Raven Lord. He’d operated under the radar, born of a mother who’d once been a pooka but was changed into a vampire halfway through her pregnancy by Titannia. That was the only way the bitch queen could have laid her hands on one of his progeny, of that Robin had been certain.
He’d been a fluke, nothing more. He had to have been. If not…
Robin could not have lost another unknown child to that black-hearted bitch.
Raven popped into the air above him, nearly getting the drop on him. Robin dodged, impressed, and lashed out. He took a chunk of Raven’s coat with him.
The boy might be his, but he certainly didn’t have Robin’s fashion sense. He dressed completely in black, like the raven he took his name from. Robin had yet to see him in any color.
Raven snarled at him. “Stay away from Michaela. She is mine.”
Robin laughed, evading the swipe Raven aimed at him with ease. “What care I for your words? Michaela has a mind of her own. She will decide which of us she wants, and there is not a damn thing you can do about it.”
The Fear Dearc leapt into the air, his movements so swift Robin could barely follow them, avoiding Robin’s return blow. He landed on the edge of the building and perched there in a pose that was so familiar Robin’s heart broke. “You are no Sidhe, to Claim her against her will.”
“Neither are you, it would seem.” Robin straightened from his crouch. Hell and damnation. There was no longer any doubt in his mind.
This boy, this Black Court parasite, was one of Robin’s get.
The arrogant smile on Raven’s face turned bitter. Luminescent green fire danced in his eyes. “Finally figured it out, did you, Father?” He tilted his head, the gesture birdlike.
“How?” How had two of Robin’s children wound up in Titannia’s hands?
“The Dark Queen pays your women handsomely for your seed.”
What? Robin froze in place, his attention fixed solely on the Fear Dearc, the Raven Lord. Baddest of the Black Court fae, save for Bres and the Black Queen herself.
But for all his reputation, Robin saw something in Raven’s face, something quickly hidden, that made his heart stutter in his chest.
Longing. The same longing Robin felt each time he saw Michaela, or watched the Dunnes and their mates together. The same longing that had been in Aileen Dunne’s eyes when her son had been missing, stolen by the Malmaynes in an attempt to get Leo Dunne’s attention.
The boy wanted his father the way Robin wanted his children, but was too terrified to do anything about it.
“Indeed. She even allowed my mother the privilege of living. Be grateful to her. If she hadn’t, I’d have been an even bigger bastard. She was the only gentleness I knew.” Raven’s smile softened, lost its bitter edge. “Michaela reminds me of her.”
Raven was lying. He had to be. There could not be more of them out there, lost in the Black.
“Father?”
The mocking edge to Raven’s voice was impossible to miss. The building beneath his feet trembled, nearly sending Raven over the edge. Without thought, Robin moved to save the boy.
His boy.
He grabbed Raven’s arm, ignoring the claws that were suddenly embedded in his side, and pulled Raven off the edge. Dark poison pumped uselessly into his veins. No one had bothered to inform Raven that Robin was immune to it, an advantage Robin had been forced to use in his fight with Hobart. The vampiric pooka had been resistant to dying. Robin had been forced to make an example out of him. He’d prayed for the lost child he’d never known, his soul crying out for what had needlessly been lost forever.
If Titannia had, indeed, been taking his children, raising them in her image…
Raven stumbled against him, and that elusive scent, the one that had bothered Robin from the start, filled his senses. Under the stink of Titannia and sylph lay Robin’s own feral tang. He could deny all he wished, but there was no longer any doubt.
Titannia had taken another one of his children from him.
Robin screeched in rage, the sound shattering the metal door behind them and cracking the tar and concrete of the roof.
Raven, his deep blue–green eyes filled with fear, tried to back away, but Robin would not allow it.
“How?”
Raven stilled, as a human would when facing a hungry tiger. “How what? That’s a rather broad question.”
“The Black Queen. How did she get to your mother?” Robin barely remembered the night he’d spent with the sylph, but her scent was all over their son, dark and swarming with fae magic. Combined with Titannia’s, it had nearly obliterated Robin’s. Only the tantalizing whiffs of Robin in his blood had saved Raven from death.
“You didn’t know.”
Robin frowned. That wasn’t the answer he’d been expecting, nor was the strange wonder in Raven’s voice.
The green fire in Raven’s eyes died. He eyed Robin warily now, but his claws and fangs were sheathed. “Titannia always told us that you’d sold us.”
Robin took a deep breath. Mandates of the gods or not, Titannia needed to die a slow, agonizing death. Robin knew just the Hob to deliver it to her. “No. I would never sell my children.” He’d longed for a true family for centuries, and now his son stood before him, willing to hear him out.
Raven relaxed even further in Robin’s grasp. “If that’s so, then she’s lied to us all.”
Us all. Robin’s worst fears were becoming realized. “How many of you are there?” Robin held on to his anger by a thin, easily broken thread. Too much more and he’d lose it, and the building would collapse beneath his feet.
He had to maintain his control. Michaela was in the building. There was nothing Robin would not do to ensure her safety.
“More than you’d hope, less than you fear.”
He closed his eyes and prayed. “A number, if you please.”
“Six—no, five, now that the highly annoying Hobart is dead. And not all of them are displeased to be there.”
Robin’s eyes popped open. “Were you?”
One of Raven’s dark brows quirked upward. “Need you ask?”
Indeed. If Raven had been happy under Titannia he would now be sitting in the delegate’s chair below, not confronting his lost father. “Then why did you not seek me out?”
Raven laughed, the sound bitter beyond words. “Seek out Robin Goodfellow, the Hobgoblin himself? Boogeymen frighten their children with tales of you.”
Well. He had to admit, Raven had a point.
“It was drummed into us that even entertaining the thought of running to the Gray Court and begging for sanctuary would bring your wrath down upon our heads and the heads of what loved ones we dared to have. No. Coming to you was not an option any of us dared contemplate.”
“I would have protected you. All of you.” From Oberon himself, if need be.
“Even Hobart?” Raven grimaced. “There are those of us who enjoy the attentions of the Dark Queen.”
That did not sound good. “What do you mean, attentions?”
Raven shuddered. “Each of us is forced to lie with her, to give her our seed so that she might bear a child with your power and her dark heart.”
Robin, for the first time in centuries, felt nauseous. “She’s leannan Sidhe, a vampire. She cannot bear children.” Vampires were infertile, even the original. Titannia must have been desperate indeed to please her demon lord, if she tried to bear fruit in an empty womb.
“Her Majesty is not the most stable leg on the table.” Raven grinned, the expression a pale imitation of his usual arrogant look. “Why aren’t you still trying to kill me? Because I share your blood? Don’t think that will stop me from claiming Michaela.”
Robin growled. “Make no mistake. Michaela is mine.” He shook his head, staring at the boy who looked nothing like him, but was more his son than any he’d faced before. “But so are you.”
Raven, obviously stunned, laughed. “We’ll see about that.”
He moved to leap off the edge of the building, but Robin held out his hand, stopping him. “Wait. Your brothers and sisters. Is there a way to contact them?”
Raven scowled. “I am the youngest, and the least under Titannia’s thumb. I would trust none of the others, were I you.” He sighed, perhaps reading Robin’s determination to save as many as he could. “Fine. I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, Father—” Raven’s form blurred, “—prepare to fight for her.”
Robin watched as his son launched himself from the rooftop with a raucous, mocking cry. “So be it.”
Chapter Fifteen
Oberon swirled into being and stared at the strange humans in front of him. He could not believe some of the lengths they would go to in order to imitate the fae.
He shook his head and straightened his pearl-gray suit. His hair was bound in a tail at the nape of his neck by a titanium clasp with the symbol of his Court etched into it, the dark gray metal a foil for the symbol. A triple spiral triskelion, the bottom two spirals were white and black enamel, to represent the White and Black Courts. But the upper spiral, the one above them both, was done in pure, shining silver, the arms of the spiral reaching down to touch the white and the black, blending into them. It doubled as his crown when he was away from Court, and declared that the High King was present on official business. Silver glasses with gray lenses hid his eyes.
Some of the true fae attending the con saw him and quickly averted their eyes, aware that if the High King were present something must be wrong.
It was, and Oberon was uncertain how to deal with it. Shane had told him his presence was necessary in Philadelphia, but had refused to tell him why. Even pressing him with his power had not elicited a response, a fact that still stunned him. Shane had given in when pressed about Robin’s truebond, but would not do so when asked why Oberon was needed in Philadelphia. All he’d done was wish him the same as the Seer.
The Hob (The Gray Court 4) Page 13
