2 Witch and Famous (16 page)

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she said. “I mean, they don’t really like visitors down there.”

“They’ll just have to learn to be more hospitable.”

“We’ll be lucky if they don’t kill us,” Siobhan said. “And what about Dougie? If I take you there, and they see you, then what will they do to him?”

I shook my head. It was a fair question. “The truth is, I don’t know, Siobhan. I do know that if we don’t go in there, Niall is probably in a lot of danger. Honestly, I don’t think they’ll exactly hold back once they don’t need Dougie anymore, either. I
could
be wrong. I
could
be putting him in danger.”

I paused before going on. “I think we need to get them both out of there. I think that they’ll be in more danger if we don’t go, but I’m not going to make you do this. It’s your choice.”

Siobhan was silent for several seconds, and I knew she was weighing the options. Trying to weigh the chances of getting Dougie killed against the ones of getting him back. Weighing what she owed me against the danger of getting caught. I could have pushed her then. I could have made her do what I needed her to do in order to save Niall, but I was serious about it being her choice. She’d already been manipulated too much by one enchantress, from the sounds of it.  

Eventually, she nodded. “All right.”

“You’re sure Niall is even down there?” Marie asked.

I shrugged. “He wouldn’t just leave, and he isn’t here. He’s got to be Underneath.”

“Can you even hope to sneak into the goblins’ home?” Fergie asked.

I sighed and nodded at Siobhan. “Siobhan will find me a way in. As for any goblin who tries to stop me…”

“There are a
lot
of goblins down there,” Fergie said.

I shrugged, tossed the handfasting ribbon back in the box, and shoved it in my handbag. Something told me that I would need it soon enough.

“I’m coming, too,” Fergie said. “You need help.”

“Help, maybe,” I said. “Legal advice, not so much.”

“That’s low.”

I smiled. “It’s true though. Fergie, you’re a good guy. That’s kind of the problem. I might need to do things down there that won’t be good, if I want us to survive.”

Fergie started to speak again, but I held up a hand to cut him off.

“Don’t get me wrong. You’ve helped a lot. The thing with the coven was pretty impressive, but it still doesn’t make you some kind of werewolf super-warrior. Fights are about instincts as much as anything, and if it comes to one, let’s face it, your first instinct is to sue.”

“I can fight,” Fergie insisted.

“And I can fight better. Stay here with Marie and protect her.
That’s
your job right now.”

“While it’s your job to go down into darkness?”

I smiled. Why not? After all, I’d been heading that way for a while now.

The tunnels of the goblins’ underground world
weren’t
actually that dark after the first couple of hundred yards. Certainly, for the first part, they were so dark that Siobhan had to take my hand, guiding me by touch so that I didn’t trip and fall. That was just something to keep out the curious, though.

Beyond that first section, the tunnels of the extinct volcano beneath the city had lights set into the walls in a complicated mishmash of electric lights, torches, and simply stones that glowed, apparently set according to whatever the goblins had to hand at the time. For all they’d learned to fear the sun, many of them still craved light. Maybe that was partly because, away in the dark, I was sure I could hear things moving.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” I asked Siobhan. “It feels like we’ve been down here a while now.”

At least an hour, according to my watch. It was hard to tell if that meant we were close to our destination, or still barely setting out. I’d known about the goblins living beneath the city most of my life, but that didn’t mean I’d had an opportunity to wander around their home. Goblins might not fit the stereotypes in most respects, but the rumors of what they did to unwanted guests were still there.

Siobhan nodded. “I know where I’m going. We’re just having to take a roundabout route to avoid trouble. Are you still sure you want to do this?”

“Yes, I’m sure.” What other answer was there? Niall was down here. I was going to find him. That was all there was.

“I mean, are you strong enough to do this?” In the confined space of the tunnel, it was hard to avoid the slow trickle of her fear. Siobhan had gone along with me because it was her best chance of getting Dougie back, and because she owed me for lying to me, but that didn’t mean she had to like this situation.

“I’ll have to be strong enough.” I tried to sound like I meant it. I was still pretty weak from not having fed. Marie had pricked her finger before I left, allowing me a thin trickle of energy through that break in her body’s defenses, but that wasn’t much.

I hadn’t dared to take much—I couldn’t take power from Fergie because he was a werewolf, and Siobhan needed all of her strength to guide me. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to try feeding from Siobhan anyway. From what I’d seen, Victoria had already messed her up badly enough with her “explanations” and her threats. Siobhan needed someone in her life she could trust.

Siobhan led me down through twisting tunnels and open caverns, many of which seemed to turn back on themselves, so that we were either descending in a spiral beneath the city, or the presence of so many fey meant that the tunnels didn’t bother about little things like the laws of physics. There were times when the tunnels reminded me of the Escher artworks Niall enjoyed, with stairs going in impossible directions.

Geologists said that the volcano beneath the city was dead. That it could never fire again. Yet, the temperature grew warmer as we headed down. Siobhan and I took side tunnels and kept to the shadows where we could, yet I still caught glimpses of goblins and their world as we passed openings and junctions. Here and there were gardens of molds and mosses, glowing softly in the dark. We sneaked by a sort of holding pen where one of the more misshapen goblins I had seen stood guard over things that shuffled behind wooden bars. Was that their food or just something too dangerous to be allowed free? I shuddered in spite of myself as it began to sink in just how different Siobhan’s world was from mine. We passed a cave room full of statues, each carved to impossible beauty, just sitting there with moss growing up the bases.

Somewhere down one of the endless tunnels, Siobhan froze. Her pupils glowed silver in the gloom as our eyes met. She whispered, “They’ve found us.”

Softly moving humanoid shapes stepped in front of us and behind. Goblins. I could have pushed out the same kind of not noticing power that I had back at the castle, but for now, it seemed that these goblins were content to stay on the edges of what we could see, never moving closer, simply always there as Siobhan and I kept moving down through their home.

“It looks like we have an honor guard,” I told Siobhan, trying to sound more confident than I felt. She looked at me like I was crazy.

Other goblins appeared as we passed branches and openings, not doing anything, just standing there, watching us. They came to stare at us in all shapes and sizes, from slender and beautiful–their skin made almost translucent by the dark–to tusked, and bristling with spiny hair.

“They’re funneling us somewhere,” I said.

Siobhan nodded, not saying anything. I sensed that she felt too scared to say anything. I put a hand on her shoulder. It didn’t help. All we could do was keep going, trying to find the space they were pushing us toward.

We found it soon enough, and when we stepped into it, I couldn’t help a gasp of surprise. It was beautiful. Beautiful in a way that I would never have associated with the goblins. The cavern we had stepped into was floored with white and black marble tiles, creating a checkerboard effect. There were mirrors around the walls and chandeliers burning above. A kind of long buffet stood along one wall, by the mirrors. Goblins of all shapes and sizes filled the space. Overall, the effect would have been of a 1920s’ ballroom, except for the raised dais at one end, on which sat what could only be described as a throne.

Figures clustered around that throne, young men and women. All good looking, all elegantly dressed. All wore the vacant expressions of addicts, or an enchantress’ prey. Where had they gone missing from the world above?
When
had they gone missing? I couldn’t help thinking of the missing witches and warlocks Rebecca had told me about. Even if these weren’t them, they were just one more proof that Jessica’s death had not been sloppy. That Victoria could have made her disappear without me noticing all too easily, if she’d wanted.

Victoria looked perfect, playing the part of royalty. She wore a shimmering dark dress that matched her hair and had probably cost a fortune, along with dark opera gloves that reached above her elbows and just a few pieces of ornate silver jewelry. The goblins around us parted to allow Siobhan and me to proceed forward to the foot of the dais, where I stopped, putting my hand on Siobhan’s shoulder to stop her, too.

“So, I’m here.” I paused, wanting to make it clear that I understood what was going on here. “Just the way you wanted.”

Victoria laughed, and I had to admit that it was a beautiful laugh. “Niall said that you would be clever enough to work it out. To be honest, I had a few doubts after our first meeting.”

“At Jessica Hammersmith’s house.” I nodded. “I thought I could feel your emotions, and you didn’t feel like one of us.”

“I’m old enough to have learned a thing or two about projecting what I want, and you
did
feel the sense of me in the house.”

“Because you wanted me to,” I said. I was only too aware of the goblins all around me, yet, for now, at least, it seemed that Victoria wanted to make this a nice, cozy chat. “Because you wanted to play with me. Test me.”

“Good,” Victoria said, like a teacher happy with a small child’s progress. “You understand, then?”

“Niall tried something similar,” I explained. “Only with him, it was an expensive artwork for bait, not a dead young woman. Tell me, did you ever feel anything for Jessica Hammersmith?”

“Of course,” Victoria said. “She was beautiful, she had money, and she was deliciously eager to please me. Oh, Jess would do
anything
I wanted, after just a little while.”

Clearly, we had very different ideas of what it meant to feel something for someone.

“You addicted her to you like a drug,” I said. “You met her…where? At one of those singles’ nights you so conveniently pointed me at? You took her and you made it so that she couldn’t live without you. Couldn’t think without you.”

Victoria’s expression darkened slightly. “Niall warned me that you would take a dully moral view on this. How distastefully…human. Righteousness is overrated, dear.”