Carl studied me thoughtfully. “What else?” he asked.
I met his eyes, refusing to flinch from them. “We need to kidnap someone close to Alucard as well.” I turned to Yahn. “The Reds. Unless you think you could kidnap Tory.”
Yahn shook his head numbly. “I’m as useful as a puppet against a Beast Master.”
Carl considered it. “Not if you want her in one piece,” he finally said. “But two pieces, on the other claw…” he suggested, trailing off to gauge my reaction.
I shook my head adamantly. “No. One piece, Carl.” I waited until he nodded.
“What about Gunnar?” Yahn asked. “I really hope you’re not planning on—”
“Let me worry about Gunnar,” I said, interrupting him. That part of my plan had a few additional steps they didn’t need to know about. “You’re going to leave a note behind where the Horsemen can immediately find it. The timing is crucial. They need to instantly know they’ve been hit.” Yahn gulped, his face paling. “Now, here’s what your note needs to say. Not in my handwriting, and not in yours. They might recognize it.”
Kára leaned closer. “I can write them.”
“Good,” I said. Yahn handed her a tiny Moleskine notepad and a pen from his pocket—a total manager move. I chose my words carefully. “Tell a single soul and they die. Meet me at noon on Chateau Falco’s front lawn if you want to see them alive again. —Peter.”
Kára chuckled, scribbling on the pad. “A setup,” she mused.
“How are we going to get them without hurting them?” Yahn asked. “They’re all fighters.”
I smiled, pointing at Roofie Ruxpin.
Yahn flinched. “I don’t think you realize how dangerous he is. Touch him for too long and the nightmares might not ever leave,” he said warningly. “We designed it for the toughest of foes, to override all sense of self-preservation or loyalty they have, and force them to spill their secrets.”
“They only need to hold it long enough to get taken.”
He sighed, nodding in resignation. “And where is that? Where are we going to house a group of hostages who want to kill us? Preferably, somewhere Horsemen-proof.”
I smiled. “Buddy Hatchet.”
Kára glanced at me sharply. “My bar?” she blurted.
I shrugged. “I’ve seen the security measures, but we won’t need them. It’s just a temporary spot. I need you guys to trust me on this.” She sighed, finally nodding. Yahn and Carl looked equally doubtful, but they did nod. Good enough. “You have a phone?” I asked her. She nodded. “Give Yahn your number so we can stay in touch.” She scribbled a number down on his notepad and handed it back to him. Along with his pen.
“Zeus will know you’re behind this,” Yahn said, reading the number and pocketing it.
I nodded, smiling. “And what could he do about it? The trap he set for me is so intricate that it will trip him up just as well as it does me. He can’t very well tell the Horsemen the truth.”
I watched them play it out in their heads, smiling as they realized my point. My plan was also the only way I could think to get Alice back safely. I swallowed my anxiety, briefly imagining her cold and alone, locked in my old prison cell or worse. I gritted my teeth. I’m coming, Alice.
I pointed at Yahn’s eyepatch. “Use that to hide your identity.” I turned to Carl. “Let them get a good look at Alaric Slate. I hereby promote you both to pirates.”
“Aye aye, Cap’n!” Kára hooted. Yahn and Carl echoed her cheer.
But my heart had skipped a beat to hear Indie’s familiar phrase come from Kára’s lips. They were too excited to notice my momentary surprise. I managed a smile.
A very nervous one.
Yahn bent down to scoop up my satchel. He handed it to me, dipping his chin. “The Sensates and the duct tape are inside if you want to tape up your manacles like Carl,” he said, glancing at my necklace.
“Thanks. I hope it works.”
He nodded, gesturing at the pile of junk I’d stolen from Grimm Tech. “Kára told you it was all worthless, right? Nothing worth even keeping locked up, to be blunt. You must have the worst luck ever.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Thank you.”
He smiled. “I have a few Tiny Balls on me, but none of them go to Kansas City. Luckily, I know I have one that does at my apartment.” He lifted a golden marble with a smirk. “And I always carry one to my apartment.”
I nodded in relief. I was so used to being able to go anywhere I wanted at the snap of a finger that I rarely considered other means of locomotion. I reached into my satchel and fumbled around in my velvet sack of Tiny Balls, reading and discarding. I finally pulled out the one I had for Kansas City and handed it to him. “Here you go. Kansas City.” He smiled in relief, studying it as if he didn’t trust me—his boss. “Just curious, but where do your other Tiny Balls go?” I asked with a curious frown. He’d claimed to have a few on him.
He grinned. “Where my Tiny Balls belong. The Reds’ house. AKA Alucard’s house.”
I laughed, shaking my head at his innuendo. “Luck.” He shook my hand firmly, then turned to join Carl. I pointed at the Elder. “Do not reach out to Alucard.”
He saluted at me. “Aye, aye, Cap’n!” I cringed.
Kára stepped up beside me. “Go to Hell?” she asked with a smirk.
“We have one other quick errand to run before we go to Hell. I meant to ask you sooner, but can you take more than one person with you?”
She frowned suspiciously. “Why?”
I told her.
38
I stood at the end of the long passageway, squinting at the purple flames on the walls, waiting for the alarms to go off in the event my theory was wrong. Kára stood patiently beside me. “Are the flames dangerous?” she finally asked.
I shook my head, not breaking my study of the passageway. “The whole place is dangerous.”
She nodded, accepting my warning, even though nothing even remotely dangerous had happened. Thanks to Aphrodite taking me to the Sanctorum earlier for our nightcap, I’d learned that I could enter Chateau Falco without raising an instant alarm. I’d had an old, dusty Tiny Ball in my satchel that would take me here, but I hadn’t wanted to risk setting off Falco’s alarms, or having my friends learn of my sudden appearance.
“It’s really me, Falco,” I whispered. “I swear. I hope you and Ruin have been—”
The rafters groaned faintly. Not enough to alarm anyone else in the mansion, but enough to at least let me know she’d heard me.
“There you are, old girl,” I said, patting the wall with a big goofy smile. Other than Carl, she was the only one to have recognized the real me, and it made my heart swell with love. I hugged the wall, leaning forward to rest my cheek against the cold stone. It instantly warmed.
Kára snorted incredulously. “Really? A hug?”
I pulled away from the wall and pointed at the spot I’d been touching with my cheek. She frowned suspiciously and then touched it. She gasped. “It’s hot,” she whispered, yanking her hand away. Then she touched the rest of the wall and frowned. “The rest is cold.”
I smiled, nodding along. “That’s my lady Beast, Falco. My one true love. She’s never gonna give me up. Never gonna let me down.”
Kára’s smile faded and she nodded awkwardly. She had her trident strapped to her back, but I knew she had a handful of discreet blades camouflaged in her scuffed, but still elegant, armor. In fact, I was certain her armor had been designed to conceal the hilts. “Does that mean we can proceed? We still have to worry about the residents, and I don’t think you have an escape plan, do you? No more safe destinations for your Tiny Balls?” I narrowed my eyes at her smirk and she chuckled, lifting a hand in defeat. “I had to. Who names such an incredible invention Tiny Balls? It’s a blatant middle finger to everyone you know who will use it in the future, forcing them to say something ridiculous just to make you laugh.”
I grunted. “Well, maybe someone more responsible should have gott
en off their ass and imagined them. And Falco loves my Tiny Balls, because she’s loyal. Right, old girl?”
I slapped the wall with my palm and the stone around us for ten feet suddenly glowed in the dark. My eyes shot wide open, momentarily panicking. That was a new reaction. At least I knew we were in a secluded, locked down area of the mansion—I was fairly certain we were on an extended plane of reality, in fact—and that no one would be patrolling here. I was one of the very, very few who had a Tiny Ball leading here. The only other way to the Sanctorum was walking in through the front door of the mansion—attracting the attention of everyone on the property—and approaching the magical door that only I could open. I glanced over my shoulder with a frown. Or through the waterfall behind us that led to Fae. Now that I thought about it, I really should have set up stronger wards for that back door. Always watch your six.
I made my way down the hall, speaking low to Falco. “Keep an eye out for me. We need to make it to the Armory without anyone seeing us.”
The house rumbled and a sharp crack drew me up short as I held out my hands for Kára to stop. She gripped two daggers in her hands, staring over my shoulder warily. Then she gasped, drawing the blades and raising them towards the wall in a defensive stance.
I followed her attention to see what looked like a new door set into the stone. “Falco?” I whispered giddily. “Have you been holding out on me? A secret fucking passage?” I hissed. “You know how much I love secret fucking passages!” Kára smiled at my boyish reaction, lowering her blades.
I gripped Kára by the arm and tugged her after me, shouldering the stone block open. It grated loudly as it moved, but there was nothing for it but to press onward. The purple torches of the hallway puffed out behind us as I pushed the door closed behind me.
Our new tunnel was pitch black, and Kára was gripping my hand tightly, refusing to let go. I couldn’t see her face, so I was happy that she couldn’t see mine. I stood like that for a few seconds longer than absolutely necessary, taking in the sensation of her warm flesh against mine, and thinking back on Aphrodite’s sybaritic syllabus of love.
It also felt nice that someone as tough as Kára reflexively trusted me to protect her.
With a sigh, I shouldered my satchel out of the way and rested my free hand on the wall of our secret passageway. The stone began to glow, stretching ahead of us with a cool blue light to help guide us. Kára’s eyes reflected the gleam in two different ways, making them even more mesmerizing. She was staring at me with open interest, momentarily forgetting to mask her emotions. She abruptly lowered her eyes, turning to face the path ahead. “Sorry. It took a few seconds for my eyes to adjust.”
I waited a moment. “You could have taken a few more,” I said carefully, watching her reaction. Her shoulders tightened, but she didn’t look my way.
“I did not know you were a cruel man, Nate Temple,” she said softly.
I flinched as if she’d slapped me, my cheeks reddening. “Right. That wasn’t appropriate. I’m sorry, Kára.” I let out a frustrated breath.
She nodded stiffly. “I’ve made my feelings clear. I expect your response to be as equally…heartfelt and genuine. Not mocking.”
I hung my head, seriously considering her words. Right now was not the time. Then another fact wormed its way into my thoughts. She saw Peter when she looked at me, not Nate. She’d been checking out Peter. My mood instantly soured. “This whole thing pisses me off. Knowing that people see someone else when they look at me is surprisingly disheartening, and it hits me about five seconds after the fact, catching me off guard. When they hear my voice, they’re hearing a different voice. When they hold my hand, they’re holding someone else’s hand. When they hug me, they’re hugging someone else.” I met her eyes. “A man I hate.”
She had flinched at each example, knowing full well they applied directly to her. She turned to look at me, meeting my eyes. “And do you think it’s not equally infuriating for everyone else? For me?” she said in a low warning tone. “I’m forced to look at this douchebag,” she spat, waving a hand at me from head-to-toe, “and I have to try to imagine the man I admire beneath. Perhaps when I hear your nauseating voice, I am twisting it in my mind so that your real voice parrots it. Perhaps when I smile at this disgrace of a creature, I am trying to encourage the real you to persist and not give up. Perhaps when I reach out to hold your hand, it is the act of a fellow warrior supporting you on the field of battle, ignoring the fact that you’re now missing a goddamned leg! That I’m trying to be fucking brave for you, looking past all that you are suffering!” she shouted, her voice cracking through the passageway. Kára abruptly turned her back on me, visibly trembling with anger.
I tried to mentally sink into the stone floor, but Falco wouldn’t let me. In fact, she seemed entirely too pleased about my comeuppance, shifting her glowing walls closer to Kára. So much for loyalty.
“There is a difference, Nate Temple,” she said, still facing away from me, but speaking in a gentler tone. “I know a thing or two about suffering a new body. It takes a while to break in. At least yours is only temporary, and those who matter know who you truly are.”
My heart split at the pain in her words, but I knew she didn’t want me to call her out on them. Just like I didn’t really want people reminding me that I looked like Peter every two minutes. But her admission also told me something I had only assumed. Kára was wearing a new body.
So…what had she looked like before? And why this body, specifically?
“I’m sorry for snapping at you, and I’m sorry for poking fun at you. If you like eyeballing douchebags in the dark, have at it,” I said, holding my arms out wide to put myself on display.
She coughed out a laugh, glancing over her shoulder at me. “Okay,” she said. She sighed, turning to face me. She assessed me up and down like a side of beef. “Consider yourself eyeballed, douchebag.”
I rolled my eyes. “Okay—”
She stepped forward into my personal space, leaning forward to lock eyes with me from only inches away. “The reason I was staring was because sometimes I feel like I can see your eyes—not his—staring back at me,” she whispered.
I held my breath, torn between which eye to focus on—the green or the blue—and wondering if I could take her advice, peering through her eyes to see the real woman beyond.
Finally, she pulled back with a resigned sigh. “Nope. Still the douchebag.”
I let out a frustrated grunt. Kára’s words cut deeper than anything I’d suffered from Ares or Apollo. Even Aphrodite wasn’t as painful.
39
I frowned, scuffing the ground with my shoe. “Let’s go before I make a bigger ass of myself.” And then my mouth kept right on flapping of its own accord. “Just so you know, I’m terrified of the dark, so if I grab your hand, it’s definitely not because you look ridiculously amazing in that armor and that you make it difficult for me to think straight. Even though my mind is going in a million directions right now, it all comes into sharper focus when I look at you. I know it’s not fair, and I’m not trying to lead you on. When I’m with you, it feels so natural that I speak without thinking. Reflex flirting, I guess, and I’m out of practice.”
My words echoed in the passageway, leaving behind their own kind of physical silence.
She slowly turned to look at me, and her eyes were dilated despite the glowing walls. “I feel your eyes on me often, Nate,” she whispered. “If you had a mound of clay, I have no doubt that you could sculpt a perfect image of me in a dark room. I know this.” She stepped closer, her armored chest coming within inches of contact. “Yet the next minute, you deny you have hands with which to sculpt. It is beyond frustrating.”
I realized I was breathing heavily, clenching my fists. “I…see.”
“Carl explained your little bracelets,” she said, tapping them with a finger and making me jump, “in great detail. Your project with Aphrodite. How you are stuck in a fairy tale, searching for true love to escape
your prison.”
I blushed. “That rat bastard.”
She grunted. “Which was good, because when you told me I had been right about Callie…” she trailed off, licking her lips and suppressing a shudder, “I intended to restate my case to the Court of Appeals. Vehemently. Vivaciously. Scandalously. And shamelessly,” she whispered.
Each word fell on my ears like she was removing an article of clothing, dropping it to the floor between us. I was panting, unable to break eye contact. “Oh?” I squeaked.
“But that is not what I want. If I merely wanted to seduce you, I would have already claimed my prize. If you wanted to be merely seduced, you would have let me. You claim you seek true love, but you are a blind, foolish, stubborn, idiotic man,” she said, shoving my chest and forcing me to take a step back. She advanced after me, not relenting. “In our story, I am not the beggar shaking my tin cup for coins, and you are not the billionaire graciously helping the poor. I do not need—or accept—your charity. In our story, as you are now, you are the damsel in distress and I am the fucking knight in dented armor. Throw down your fucking hair already, Nate.”
I stared at her, clenching my jaws and flexing my fists. “Did…you just call me a girl?” I whispered dangerously.
She scoffed. “If the shoe fits, Cinderella.”
The glowing walls were still favoring Kára, for those at home keeping score.
Kára took a calming breath. “I did not ask for this armor, but when my time came, I accepted it. I’m a quick study, so I grew into it well. But that does not mean I don’t want to someday be the princess. The difference between us is I now know when it’s time to put on a dress and when it’s time to put on my armor. The choice in clothing does not dictate or alter who I am beneath it. Our character roles are not static or permanent, because our fairy tales are darker and everlasting—requiring us to adapt or perish. You’ve worn the armor for far too long, and I see your shoulders sagging, your steed faltering, your sword and shield dragging,” she whispered compassionately, lifting my chin with a gauntleted hand. “No matter what happens between us, take this to heart…your bartender is telling you to sit down, take off your armor for a spell, and have a drink before you get yourself killed. She has a shotgun under the counter, so she can keep you safe while you recover from your weary travels. Fucking let her, you idiot.”
Carnage: Nate Temple Series Book 14 Page 26
