Bloodline (23 page)

“What about your stepbrother and stepsister?” Inigo asked. “Are they on your side? They’re older than you. Do they feel they have a right to the throne?”

“They told me they have no wish for it, and I believe them. They have…their own reasons for wanting a quiet life.”

“Because they’re not actually brother and sister,” Inigo said.

Kit nodded. “Exactly.”

“We know the names they were born with,” Pixie said. “We know the place they were taken from. Your father gave the Kewen in exchange for them. They have relatives here.” She winced. “Oh, maybe it’s April who owns Jago and Ellie’s place. She could throw them out. She—”

“Enough,” Micah said.

“Sorry.” She didn’t look it.

“Will April and Flint help you take the throne?” Micah asked.

“If they thought the plan could succeed, I believe they would.”

“Do you know where they are?” Inigo asked.

“Yes.”

Micah smiled. He didn’t blame Kit for not saying where. “So we need West Land fae on this side to cross to Faerieland and unite with opponents of Oberon. We have to arrange a time and place and be certain Oberon will turn up.” Micah dragged his fingers through his hair. “Lucia will have to speak out along with you and April and Flint.”

“I won’t risk their safety,” Kit said. “There are others in the court who support me, but I can’t put them in danger.”

“But you risk the safety of the kingdom while Oberon is on the throne,” Inigo said quietly. “You risk the lives of decent faeries.”

Kit sucked in his cheeks. “They could have rebelled. They chose to accept him.”

“They had no choice, and with no king on the throne they’re vulnerable to the other lands,” Micah said. “This could work. But we need a safe portal open for faeries to cross and a way to keep the hunters on this side.”

Hall bent to sniff Pixie’s neck, and she elbowed him in the stomach.

“You make it sound simple,” Kit said. “This isn’t a plan. It’s a collection of hopes and desires. I won’t cross over until I can ensure the safety of Lucia, nor will I tell you the whereabouts of April and Flint until you have more to offer than this.”

“I need to speak to some people,” Micah said, “see what I can arrange, but in the meantime you have to be careful. The hunters are out there looking for your stepbrother and stepsister, and maybe you too. Do you have a mobile phone?”

“Pixie gave me one.”

Micah held out his hand. “I’ll put my number in, and you call me if there are any problems.”

He tapped in the number and called his own phone before he handed Kit’s back.

“My heart,” Hall whispered. “It’s beating.”

“What?” Pixie gaped at him.

“It is. I can feel it.” Hall looked around at each of them. “I look better, don’t I? Not like death warmed up anymore.”

Pixie put her hand on Hall’s chest and gulped. “Oh God. It
is
beating. How could that happen?”

“He gave me something.” Hall nodded toward Inigo.

Inigo took the small flask from his pocket. “It’s what I had to add to the ink to make Oberon’s tattoo stick, though it didn’t work. Unicorn blood.” He shook the container and looked at Kit. “I could give you the coronation tattoo. It won’t have stayed on Oberon’s back. It will on yours.”

“That’s a great idea,” Pixie said. “A big tiger face and some dolphins.”

Micah rolled his eyes. “No, Pix.”

“Isn’t anyone listening? I’m alive…” Hall let out a choked cry.

Pixie put her arm around him and hugged him. “That’s great.”

He beamed at her, and then his face fell. “It won’t wear off, will it?”

“I don’t know.” Inigo glanced at Micah. “Don’t waste your time worrying about what might happen. Enjoy what you have.”

“It can’t wear off,” Hall mumbled. “Oh God, please don’t let it.”

“Stay here with Pixie and Kit,” Micah said. “If they need anything,
you
go out to get it. Don’t talk to anyone, and look out for anyone watching you. Inigo, I’ll take you to buy tattoo equipment; then you come back here while I go and speak to my boss. Above all, everyone be careful. Take no risks. Pixie, do you have an exit strategy?”

She glared at him. “We have the same father, don’t we? I wouldn’t dare
not
have one.”

Micah sighed. “Going out of the back door is not an exit strategy.”

Her shoulders slumped.

“The hunters are good. I don’t know what facility they have to trace fae on this side, but we have to assume it will happen sooner or later.”

“I have a motorbike in the yard,” Kit said.

Micah nodded. “That’s good. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Be vigilant.”

He tugged Inigo out of the door. When they stepped from the house, Micah was alert for signs of hunters but saw nothing suspicious. He glanced at Inigo.

“Nothing,” Inigo said.

“Where do you want to go to get your tattoo stuff?”

“Canning Town. There’s a shop just off the A13.”

The car still stank of zombie when they got in it, and Micah opened all the windows.

“That blood is special,” Micah said. “Try not to use all of it on the tattoo. And no saving any more zombies. I’m worried—”

“I know.” Inigo put his hand on Micah’s knee, and his cock pressed against his zipper.
Oh fuck
. “And you can forget me not going back to Faerieland with you.”

Micah shot him a quick glance.
How the fuck did he know I was thinking that?
“This isn’t your fight.”

“You’re in it, so it is.”

* * * *

By the time Micah had gone through everything with Roman, his boss’s fingers were tapping furiously on the desk.

“We can’t interfere to that extent with affairs on the other side of the Divide,” Roman said.

“We’re not. All I want to do is convince and enable exiled and stranded faeries to return to West Land. If the hunters are detained on this side, it will make it easier to confront Oberon. He’s not the rightful king.”

“Some would argue that he is. The eldest—only child of the former king.”

“Who was not the birth child his father claimed.”

“It’s shaky ground, Micah.”

“My family remains under threat while he is on the throne. Once the story of the Kewen is revealed and the bill of sale produced, he’s done.”

“Hmm,” Roman muttered. “What do you want from me?”

“Stop looking for April and Flint. Kit knows where they are. Put out a call to all West Land faeries on this side. We need a safe portal open. One close to the castle but not in it. I need hunters detained long enough for my plan to work.”

“What makes you think I can do any of that?”

“Because you’re more powerful than you’d have us believe. Because the hunters crossed without permission, so you have the right to detain them. Because if you don’t help me, another faerie kingdom might invade West Land and there’ll be war.”

Roman smiled. “The first time you’ve shown such faith in me. I can call all West Land faeries and detain the hunters once they’ve been located, but I can’t open a portal. It requires powerful faerie magic. Magic done by a powerful faerie.”

He’s telling me something. Kit? Is he powerful enough?

* * * *

When Inigo returned with the tattoo equipment, Hall, Pixie, and Kit were deep in discussion. Micah wasn’t back.

“Where do you want me?” Kit asked.

“You can sit backward on a chair or lie on a bed. Sure you want me to do this?”

Kit gave him a curious look. “You were the one who suggested it.”

“I know, but if Oberon catches you, that tattoo is a death warrant.”

Kit laughed. “He’ll kill me whether I have the tattoo or not.” He headed for the stairs, followed by Pixie, but when Hall tried to follow, she pushed him back.

“Stay downstairs,” she snapped.

Inigo had inked the design so many times he was able to work quickly. Kit lay motionless, which helped. Pixie kept up a continual line of chatter, which didn’t. Though when she talked about what Micah had been like as a boy, Inigo took it all in.

Hall came up after an hour and poked his head around the door. “How’s it going?”

“Great,” Pixie said. “I want a tattoo as well.”

“I’m just going to nip out and buy some stuff for dinner.” He laughed. “I’m actually peckish.”

“See you later.” Pixie turned back to Kit, and Inigo didn’t miss the look of disappointment on Hall’s face.

“Anything in particular you want?” Hall asked.

“Nope,” she said without turning round.

Inigo winced when the door slammed downstairs.

They managed three minutes of silence before Pixie started again. “What tattoo do you think I ought to get?”

“I’m not tattooing you.”

She glared at him. “Why not?”

“Because there are better uses for the unicorn blood.”

“He’s right,” Kit said. “And why spoil your lovely skin?”

“You think my skin is lovely?” she whispered.

“Very.”

Pixie smiled. “Well, your back is beautiful. It looks as though the dragon-bird thing could rise up and fly away.”

“That would defeat the objective,” Kit said.

Inigo did
not
want to have to do this design again. He felt tired, but he was determined to finish it. Funnily enough, Pixie’s ceaseless chattering
did
keep him going at a pace. The sooner he finished, the sooner he could walk away from her.

“Do you have any coffee?” he asked.

Kit’s eyes widened. “You drink coffee?”

“Not usually but these are unusual times.”

“I’ll make you one,” Pixie said. “What about you, Kit?”

“Yeah, I’ll have one too.”

Pixie bounced out of the room.

“She is the most exhausting female I’ve ever met,” Inigo said. “She doesn’t keep a thought in her head but blurts them all out.”

“Cute though.”

Inigo laughed. “I suppose.”

She returned with drinks and chocolate-coated biscuits, and Inigo had eaten two before he realized what he was doing. When he looked up, Kit was staring at him.

“You know I have to have that unicorn blood back,” Kit said. “It technically belongs to the kingdom, and when it’s gone, there’s no more to be had.”

Disappointment gnawed at Inigo’s gut. “Of course.”

At least he’d had a taste of real life if things went back to normal.

He finally switched off his gun, wiped Kit’s back, then stood and stretched. “All done.”

The faerie pushed up from the bed and turned to look in the mirror. “Wow. It’s amazing. Thank you.”

“It’s brilliant,” Pixie said. “I really want one. Just a little heart on my ankle or a rose on my wrist?”

Inigo screwed the top tight onto the flask and handed it to Kit. “Best you keep what’s left.”

“Thank you.”

When they went downstairs, there was no sign of Hall, and Inigo’s senses prickled. “Shouldn’t Hall have been back by now?”

Kit met his gaze and frowned.

“Where’s the store, Pixie?” Inigo asked.

“Just on the corner. He
should
have been back.”

“I think you need to use your exit plan,” Inigo muttered. “Something’s wrong.”

“But Hall wouldn’t betray us. He loves me.”

“And do you love him?” Inigo asked.

She twisted her mouth. “No. He’s a friend. I felt sorry for him, but he was a zombie. He smelled awful.”

“Go now,” Inigo snapped and grabbed their jackets from a chair, then pushed them toward the kitchen.

“You’re overreacting.” Pixie stomped her foot.

“Now.” Inigo growled the word.

She rolled her eyes. Only when Pixie and Kit were on the bike, helmets on, heading down the alley at the back of the houses did he exhale in relief.
Exhale? Am I fucking breathing?

Back in the house, he rushed upstairs, grabbed the tattoo equipment, and put it in the trash bin in the yard under a bag of garbage. If he was wrong, he could retrieve it, though he didn’t care one way or the other. He put on his coat, slipped out through the same gate as Kit and Pixie, but turned the opposite way to head back onto the street so he could watch the front of the house.

He cursed himself for not using Kit’s phone to call Micah and warn him. He’d been so desperate to get the pair away he hadn’t thought. He took up a position in a garden across the street from the house and tried to blend into the shadows. There was a chance he was wrong, but remembering the look on Hall’s face when he’d stared at Pixie, he feared he was all too right.

Each time a car slowed down, he tensed, but when Micah pulled up right in front of him he gave an audible sigh of relief. As he climbed from the car, Inigo leaped from the bushes, planning to push him back into the vehicle. Then he spotted another vehicle slowing.
Change of plan
. He grabbed Micah around the neck and dragged him to where he’d been hiding.

“What the—”

A hand over the mouth silenced him.

“Watch,” he whispered in Micah’s ear and took his hand away.
Oh hell, fucking brilliant timing. I need to feed
. Inigo’s mouth drifted closer to Micah’s neck, and his fangs emerged.
Shit. I need to feed
now.

Four figures exited the car.

“This is the house,” said one.

Micah raised his eyebrows at Inigo.
Hall?
he mouthed. “Where are the others?”

Safe
, Inigo mouthed back, trying not to reveal his fangs.

“You won’t hurt Pixie. You promised,” Hall said. “And I get the little flask of blood, right?”

“Of course.”

The three hunters ushered Hall into the house. When they closed the door, Inigo and Micah made a break for the car, and moments later, they’d rounded the corner and were accelerating away.

“Your fangs,” Micah said.

“Need to feed,” he mumbled.
Desperately.

“You’ll have to wait. Get my phone from my pocket. Call the number stored under R.”

Inigo pried the phone free from Micah’s pants. Disappointment that he needed blood vied with his longing for it.
Fuck it
. He’d waited too long. Thought he was different.
Stupid
. The unicorn blood had thrown him out of whack. When he found himself sliding toward Micah, he dragged himself upright.