Institute of the Shadow Fae Box Set

by C. N. Crawford

  Of course the weirdo was intimate with his hands.

  I took a step closer, waving the lantern. “Who are Burly Nan and whatever?”

  A thin shrug from Arubian. “It doesn’t matter if I tell you. You won’t be in this world much longer, you know. Baleros gets more control every day. Fear is the easiest way to control humans. You were once their protectors. Not anymore. How quickly they’re turning on you. Maybe you’re immortals, but how long do you think you’ll stay in your comfortable palace when the savage mob of millions turn on you? You’ll be forced to wander the earth, tortured outcasts. I’ll help them make the guillotines myself.”

  “Ciara, get your fire ready,” I said. “Did you know it took humans an average of forty-five minutes to burn to death on medieval pyres? Our librarian told me that. Wonder what it takes for a fae.”

  For just a second, I saw fear flash in Arubian’s eyes. So it had been good information.

  Arubian’s hand started shaking. “I see the hounds got you with their claws.” He cocked his head. “You know, I could see death whispering around you when you fought,” he said. “I’m very in tune with death.”

  Shit. I needed to shut him up.

  And that’s when Ruadan decided to reappear, solid as a brick building, right by my side. Now this conversation had his full interest.

  I furrowed my brow, doing my best “get a load of this weirdo” face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said. “Death whispering around me? Sounds like some bad poetry.”

  He shook his head, eyes burning. “No. Not poetry. I feed off death fears. You instill them. I feel positively radiant around you.”

  My pulse started racing.

  Ruadan took a step closer to him. “What are you talking about?”

  “Surely you must see it,” said Arubian. “She’s not a normal fae.”

  “Is that all you have to tell me?” Ruadan’s eyes slid to me. “She’s not a normal fae. Anyone who meets … whatever her name is … can tell that right away.”

  So that’s how it was. We’d gone from our romantic moment in the sewers to whatever her name is.

  Arubian’s smile was pure poison. “You want to know what she is, don’t you? You want to know if you can trust her. Has her pretty body been confusing you, distracting you from the truth?”

  “This is…” I sputtered, trying to block out the pain from my deep wounds so I could think clearly. “This is stupid. Honestly, are you going to listen to a man who spends his free time massacring people in his own personal roller disco? He’s weird as shit.” Every one of my muscles had tensed, my nerve endings igniting with a fight-or-flight instinct.

  This is it. This is when they learn the truth.

  Chapter 88

  Arubian’s orange eyes were on me. “You can’t be more than a few decades old, but you instill death like an ancient being. If it hadn’t been so delicious to feed from the fear you created in my hounds, I might be in a very bad mood indeed. As it is, I feel glorious. Perhaps we should spend more time together. We’re alike, you and I.”

  “Fuck off.” Why was it that the creepiest people kept telling me we were alike, like I was a long-lost sister to all the earth’s monsters? I was going to develop a complex about it. “Who are Nan and Hal? Where’s their gaff?”

  Arubian cocked his head, his interest intense. A smile cracked his pale features. “Ahhh…. Can it really be?” He tapped his fingertips together, his features delighted. “Did he have a girl? I didn’t know it was possible, and yet I see the evidence before me.”

  He knew. I had to stop him.

  “Where is the house?” I demanded, my voice rising as I lost control. I tightened my grip on the lantern, panic cutting through my chest.

  He pointed a long, bony finger at me. “Ruadan, I can tell you exactly who this one is. She’s—”

  The lantern was out of my hand before he could get another word out, the tip piercing his throat, ripping it open. Arubian fell back, his body slamming hard on the parquet floor. The pole had impaled his neck, ripping his vocal cords apart. As an ancient fae, the steel wouldn’t kill him, but I’d managed to silence him for now.

  A cold sweat rose on my skin, my heart hammering. We hadn’t finished interrogating Arubian, and I’d completely screwed up the mission. Still, it wasn’t like I’d had a choice. Arubian had nearly told the truth about me.

  I stared at his body. Shock held me still for a moment as I tried to process what had just happened. The jagged wounds all around my torso ached, and I gripped my bleeding side. My heart was pumping hard, and blood poured from my neck, my sides—the claw and teeth marks all over my body. The damned shifters had shredded me to ribbons. With the pain and the shock roiling in my mind, it took me a moment to realize that Aengus was yelling at me.

  “What the hells was that?” he was shouting. “We still don’t know where Baleros is. You killed our only source of information before we’d got any real answers—all so you could hide the truth from us.”

  Nausea curdled my gut. The silence that fell was cold and damp as wet soil. I racked my mind to think of an explanation.

  This did not look good for me. It was clear, now, that I had a secret I’d be willing to do almost anything to keep, and that didn’t exactly mark me as trustworthy. Ruadan’s eyes had shifted to black, and he was looking at me like I was his enemy.

  Blocking out the pain from my wounds, I folded my arms, my gaze darting between the two Knights of the Shadow Fae. “Arubian was wasting our time. He told us where to find Baleros. Nan and Burly Hal’s place. We need to go now. Can you please open the portal?”

  Aengus took a step closer, fury etched in his features. “Who the fuck are Nan and Burly Hal? Do you happen to know?”

  “I thought you’d know.” It sounded lame, even to me. I shot Ciara a pointed look, one that I hoped conveyed help me here.

  “Yeah. Nan and Burly Hal,” she added. “I’ve heard of them. Hackney, maybe? Or Islington by the tube station, near that kebab place?” She was terrible at bluffing.

  Aengus growled, canines flashing. “This was all for nothing. All we’ve learned is that we’re working with someone we can’t trust at all. No—scratch that. We already knew that, considering you stabbed our Grand Master and left him to bleed. All you’ve done is confirm that you can’t be trusted. Can we get rid of her now?”

  My chest clenched. Our fragile alliance was falling apart fast.

  Ruadan had gone so still, so quiet, it sent a cold thread of fear wending through my body. I could hardly see him, now, his body blending into the night. When I’d first met him, he’d seemed so ephemeral—a fleeting night wind, whispering over my skin. Then, I’d come to know him well enough that his violet eyes stood out like a neon sign to me, even when he was in his Wraith mode. But right now, he seemed to be slipping away from me, shadows blending into darkness. I couldn’t see him anymore, couldn’t grasp him. It seemed like there was something intentional about it.

  The thought of losing him so fast opened a hollow pit in my chest.

  I didn’t even see Ruadan as he moved for me, had no idea where he was until I felt his finger on my arm, his touch feather-light. He leaned down to whisper in my ear so that only I could hear him. “This looks bad. And I don’t know why, but I trust you implicitly and completely.”

  His words warmed me from the inside out. I wanted to throw my arms around him, but I knew it would look bad in front of Aengus. In fact, if Aengus saw us embracing, he’d assume Ruadan’s mind was clouded by lust.

  Was it?

  Guilt twisted through me. I was hiding something important from Ruadan, and it should be obvious to him, now. I’d ruined the mission just to keep my secret.

  “Of course you can trust me.” The words tasted bitter in my mouth.

  “What the hells is going on? Is she working with Baleros?” barked Aengus.

  “Gods below, Aengus,” I protested. “You have to know that I want him dead. I want him dead, and I want us to s
tay alive. That’s what matters, isn’t it?” This, at least, was the truth.

  “She’s telling the truth.” Ruadan’s tone brooked no argument. “I know she is.”

  At that moment, mist began pooling around us, and a shiver rippled up my spine. It whirled in unnatural eddies.

  “Looks like Arubian’s mist soldiers are finally arriving. We’re out of time here.”

  Without another word, Ruadan turned and walked away. A sharp tendril of pain wound through me as he did. He trusted me for now, but he’d learn the truth at some point. And when he did, the trust would dissolve. We’d be enemies.

  As he started speaking in Angelic, the parquet floor began rumbling.

  All around us, the mist army materialized, fog twisting around their weapons. Then, from the shadows, the jackdaws began moving, running for us.

  “We need to go now,” I said.

  Cracks began to widen in the ground, sparkly water gleaming in the chasms.

  My heart skipped a beat at the sight of a jackdaw running for us at full speed. My jaw dropped at the sight of the bomb strapped to his waist.

  “Jump!” I yelled. “Now!”

  Ciara jumped in, then Aengus.

  The blast went off, searing the skin on my right side just as Ruadan was pulling me in. The icy water soothed my burnt skin. As soon as we drifted deeper, Ruadan let go of my wrist.

  I sank into the dark water. I hadn’t felt this alone since Baleros had first thrown me in an empty, underground cage.

  The mission had been a complete disaster, one that made me look as if I were working against the Institute. Why would Ruadan still trust me at this point?

  Lungs burning, body burned and ripped, I climbed out of the portal. I was surprised to find that Ruadan had opened the portal into his own bedroom.

  As I climbed out onto his flagstone floor, blood poured off my body. I flopped onto my back next to the portal, gasping for breath, wincing at my injuries. My mind whirled, the floor seeming to tilt beneath my back. I was in rough shape here.

  From the floor, I heard Ruadan issue an order—Aengus was supposed to get Ciara settled in somewhere, an upgrade from her home under a car.

  I gritted my teeth, closing my eyes. Did I even have any skin left on the right side of my body?

  Gentle hands pulled my backpack from me, slipping off the straps of my bug-out bag. A powerful pair of arms scooped me up, and I opened my eyes to look up at Ruadan.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “For lying?”

  My throat tightened. “Sorry for killing Arubian prematurely.”

  He lay me down on the bed, and I grimaced.

  “My skin hurts.”

  “Shhhh.”

  My eyes closed again, and I felt Ruadan’s magic skimming over me, his fingertips tracing lightly around the ragged neck wound before moving down toward my side. Sleep was threatening to overwhelm me, but I fought to stay awake.

  “You haven’t told me everything, either,” I said defensively. “You didn’t tell me you were fomoire.”

  “Shhhh. Rest.”

  “You haven’t told me what you feed off of.”

  His magic wrapped around me like a caress. “We only have fifteen hours,” he said. “We’ll address our precise natures after we kill Baleros.”

  He was right, of course, but I could tell that the distance between us bothered him as much as it bothered me. He wasn’t meeting my eyes as he worked. I reached up and touched his cheek, and for just a moment, his gaze slid to me. I’d never seen him look so vulnerable before. Then, the spell was broken, and he ripped his attention away, concentrating completely on the claw marks on my side and the burns.

  His magic was like a divine silk over my body. Still, I couldn’t quite relax.

  You and I are the same.

  Blood still covered my skin, and my little roller disco clothes were sticking to me. I wanted those clothes off me before I fell asleep.

  I forced my eyes open and pushed myself up onto my elbows. “I’m not going to sleep covered in blood,” I muttered.

  “You need rest.”

  I wasn’t a monster. I didn’t want to look like one. “I’ll just be a minute. Don’t go anywhere.”

  Half asleep, I stumbled to my feet and began peeling off my bloodied clothes, discarding them on Ruadan’s bare floor. I crossed into the bathroom, where his bath of hot, bubbling spring water called to me. I slipped into it, my mind racing with images: death spreading out from my body like a miasma; Ruadan as a boy, threading a wreath of wildflowers for a mum who wouldn’t wear them. After a minute, I stepped out of the tub and toweled off.

  Wearing only a towel, I crossed back into his room.

  I found the room empty, and my heart clenched. I couldn’t explain it, but closeness to him was starting to feel like some basic, primal drive, as instinctive as the need to eat or sleep. I had a brief, overwhelming urge to run naked through the halls until I could find him and drag him back here and wrap my naked body around his, to force his lips to mine.

  Tears stung my eyes. I’d let these fantasies trail on far enough. We could never be together, and there was no point obsessing over it. Morning sunlight streamed in through the window.

  The survival instinct in me told me what I needed now more than anything else: sleep.

  I crawled into Ruadan’s bed and pulled the covers up around me, slipping fast into a dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 89

  I awoke to the tawny evening sun.

  I had the strangest feeling that a boom had sounded, but I couldn’t tell if it had been in my dream or real life. In fact, considering I’d been healed and rested, I felt oddly delirious. I blinked, trying to clear my mind, but the edges of everything around me seemed hazy.

  “Ruadan,” I whispered.

  It took me a moment to realize the bed was empty. Where had Ruadan gone? And why was the world tilting back and forth like I was on a boat?

  My mouth felt like cotton, and I licked my lips, trying to get up to speed mentally.

  Let’s see … roller disco, hounds…. Oh, and we had a time limit before Baleros unleashed the Black Death and told everyone I was Adonis’s daughter. And I’d just spent many hours sleeping. Why hadn’t anyone woken me? And what the hells was wrong with my head?

  I rolled to my side. Plaster and stone dust covered the sheets. What the hells?

  BOOM. The walls shook, and more dust rained down on top of me, the bed trembling.

  What in the world was going on?

  I sat bolt upright. When the sheets fell off me, I realized I was still naked. My clothes from yesterday still lay on the floor—shredded, wet, and blood-soaked. Every other time I’d woken in the Institute, I’d found fresh clothes left by someone or other, and the room tidied.

  Dizzy, I rose and crossed to Ruadan’s dresser. Off-balance, I stumbled, then rested for a moment on the wood. I pulled on my underwear and boots, but the rest of my clothes had been shredded the night before.

  I pulled a drawer open, then picked out one of Ruadan’s shirts—a black one with buttons. I pulled it on, and the hem reached halfway down my thighs.

  What time was it? Surely, we only had a few hours left. I should never have slept so long. What was I doing? Confusion clouded my mind.

  BOOM!

  My heart shuddered. Were we under attack? Off-balance, I crossed to the windows. I touched the glass, staring outside. From here, I had a view of the courtyard and the inner ring of connected towers. Somewhere beyond the outer wall, dark smoke curled into the air. I sniffed—gasoline and a strong chemical scent floated on the wind, along with burning wood and stone. Jackdaws bombing us again?

  My limbs were too heavy. I looked down at my wrists. For just a moment, I caught the faint shimmer of magic pulsing through my veins. Something was happening to me.

  Frantically, I snatched my bug-out bag off the floor. It had almost dried after the last trip through the portal. As I stumbled, I shoved my hand into the bag, picking out a soggy G
alaxy chocolate bar. My stomach rumbled, and I tore it open as I walked, gnawing into it.

  I pushed through the door into the courtyard, squinting at the blazing afternoon light. The sun dazzled me, and I shielded my eyes with my arm.

  BOOM.

  Instinctively, I ducked, covering my head as the earth shook. From inside the fortress walls, I still couldn’t see a damn thing—just the smoke rising above the towers.

  Then, I forced myself up, holding out my arms to steady myself. I broke into a jog, rushing into the Cailleach Tower.

  As I moved, voices whispered around me. The colors seemed too bright today—garish, almost.

  In the Tower, I gripped the banister hard to get myself up the stairs.

  At last, I reached the throne room.

  Melusine was on the floor, hunched over a book, with a tall stack of volumes by her side. Aengus sat slumped against one of the columns. He looked dazed, his jaw slack. His mouth opened and closed mutely. What was he doing just sitting there?

  “What’s happening?” I swayed on my feet. “I don’t feel right. And you don’t look right.”

  Aengus stared at the ground. “Poi—poi … porcu-pie.”

  “Poison,” said Melusine. “We think. I’m amazed you’re up at all. Aengus isn’t doing so well.”

  “Poison from what?” Was it connected to the bombs blowing up our Tower?

  “I’ve been working on it for hours,” said Melusine from the floor. “Aengus and Ruadan have both been delirious all day, though Aengus took a sharp turn for the worse about an hour ago.”