Burned (26 page)

Although it’s two hours till dawn, in Ireland, for heaven’s sake, I’m sweating and my hair is sticking damply to my face. It’s hotter here than it was in Dublin. The fountain isn’t the only new addition to the grounds. Golden trellises draped with black roses offer shelter above marble benches, and I suspect the scent of the blossoms would be drugging to anyone foolish enough to pause in the alcove beneath.

“They’ve stones now,” Drustan says, eyeing a cluster rising from the mist, great bleached-bone fingers reaching for the sky.

“I care naught for the looks of them,” Cian rumbles.

Dageus agrees, “Nor do I.”

Cian grunts and points, a darker-haired version of Lor, at two enormous black megaliths. I think they might like each other. Grunts and all.

“A dolmen awaiting the cover stone,” Ryodan murmurs.

Barrons says, “We bring jackhammers next time. I want those stones destroyed.”

I agree. I watched Darroc usher an Unseelie horde into our city through a dolmen at 1247 LaRuhe, in the heart of the Dark Zone adjacent to BB&B. I later asked V’lane/Cruce to crush it. I want this one crushed, too, before it’s completed and who knows what arrives on our planet next.

As we skirt the fountain, I say, “You do realize we’re walking into a trap, right? Do we have a plan? Is someone going to tell me what it is?”

Seven male heads swivel my way.

“Would you shut her up,” Ryodan says to Barrons.

Barrons slants him a cold look that shuts
Ryodan
up. I’d sacrifice my eyeteeth to perfect that look. Then again maybe that’s precisely what’s required: long, inhumanly sharp ones like theirs to pull it off.

“I doona ken why you permitted the woman to come. We doona risk ours in battle.” Cian’s brogue is so thick it’s hard to follow.

“Tell that to Colleen,” Christopher says grimly. “She’s inside.”

Drustan gives him an incredulous look. “You let her come tonight? And she’s already inside? How?”

“We need all the information we can get if we hope to rescue Christian from the Hag. These women know the Seelie nearly as well as we do, the Unseelie even better. Colleen joined
up with the new
sidhe
-seers a week ago, to infiltrate the abbey and search their archives.”

“The new group? How?” I demand. “She’s not a
sidhe
-seer.”

“And you allowed this?” Cian explodes.

“Keep it down. They’re going to hear us,” I warn.

“Honey, they opened the front gate,” Fade says. “They know we’re here. Trap. Remember.”

Christian’s father snorts. “Try stopping her.”

“Is she?” I press.

“What?” he snaps.

“A
sidhe
-seer.”

“She has other … skills.”

“Why the bloody hell are those Unseelie following you, lass?” Drustan demands. “At first I thought they were drawn to all of us for some reason, but the moment Barrons moves away from you, they’re on you like midges. Is there something about you we should know?”

Seven male heads turn my way again.

“She said they’re ghosts of the Unseelie she’s killed,” Dageus says.

“Not a ghost of truth in that one,” Ryodan says dryly.

“Oh, just shut up, all of you,” I say, exasperated, moving closer to Barrons again, reclaiming a little personal space.

We continue walking in silence toward the abbey.

“So, do we have a plan?” I say again after a few moments.

“Walk up to the front door and go inside,” Barrons replies.

“That’s not a plan. That’s a suicide mission.”

“We’re a little hard to kill,” Fade says.

“Some more than others,” I say pointedly. “I’m not so sure the Keltar get back up quite as easily as—” I bite that one off myself when all four Keltar shoot me looks of death.

Clearly, I impugned their virility, when all I was trying to do is remind my team that the other team doesn’t have the same Get Out of Death Free card.

“Why did you bring her again?” Dageus says.

“Because once she gets with the plan, she’s as useful as the rest of us,” Barrons says.

“It’d help if I knew what the bloody plan was,” I grumble.

“Besides, we can use her Unseelie as body shields,” he adds.

Well darn, that was one I hadn’t thought of.

The front door, which was once slats of wood reinforced by steel, now looms black as polished obsidian, covered with ancient runes I’ve seen before.

Below the abbey, in the chamber that houses Cruce.

It swings silently open.

I move forward and pause on the threshold, looking in to get the lay of the land before I inadvertently plant a foot on a mine.

Seven men march past me, boots echoing on the stone floor.

I hurry to catch up. Well, I mostly hurry. I linger a moment, absorbing the raw fearlessness of their stride, the determination to never quit that squares their shoulders, and it fortifies my resolve. I will match the bar these men set so high. They all have their inner demons. And they manage them.

I will, too.

The entry hall is large and rectangular, with a ceiling that soars to open roof rafters. On three walls, fireplaces that could serve as small bedrooms blast more heat into the already warm room.

The sofas are faded and worn, dotted with handmade pillows and crocheted throws, the floors warmed by century-old rugs, the walls hung with antique tapestries. Chairs perch near
tables that hold open books and perspiring glasses of iced drinks.

The room is empty.

“Where the bloody hell is everyone?” Dageus growls.

“Quiet. Someone’s coming,” Barrons says.

Several seconds pass before I hear the sound of people approaching. I envy his preternatural senses, rue that my monster has no such benefits.

I offer benefits with which you could retire from this paltry planet and rule galaxies. You refuse them. Embrace your destiny and we will destroy the prince before we leave this world. It will be our parting gift
.

Right. As if either
Sinsar Dubh
would leave my planet intact. Criminy, I can’t even think about it without it stirring. I mutter Poe beneath my breath and watch as four women enter the room. I’m relieved to see they’re ours. I sat at a table with these women not so long ago.

Leading the group is Josie, a skinny dark-eyed girl with platinum hair and goth makeup, followed by Shauna, a petite brunette with hazel eyes and a quick smile, and the twins, Clare and Sorcha MacSweeney. They are the women Kat brought to our clandestine meeting in a pub, after Rowena instructed a group of them to ambush me and try to take my spear. They failed. I accidentally killed a
sidhe
-seer in the process. Moira. I never forget the names of humans I’ve slain. I catch myself reaching protectively for my spear but stop, unwilling to invite more of the Book’s unwanted commentary so near another copy of itself plus so many vulnerable humans.

“Why have you brought Unseelie inside our walls, Mac?” Shauna says grimly.

I sigh. “I didn’t. They, I—” Shit, how do I explain this one?
I blurt, “I was trying to do a spell and it backfired and they’ve been stuck to me like glue ever since.” I practically roll my own eyes. It’s the weakest lie I’ve ever heard myself tell.

Dageus gives me a look.

Ryodan laughs.

“They’re harmless,” I add. “They don’t even kill anything. They just stalk me.”

“The Unseelie doesn’t exist that doesn’t kill,” Josie says coolly.

Sorcha moves past me, inspecting them from a cautious distance. Then she surprises me by saying, “I’m not certain they’re Unseelie, Mac.”

I frown. “What else could they be?”

“I don’t know but they’re … different.”

That would explain why I can’t Null them, but not why my
sidhe
-seer senses seem to pick up on them as Unseelie. Or do they? Is that yet one more preconception I accepted without bothering to consider simply because they
looked
like Unseelie, and what else would they be? I realize I’ve never listened past their incessant chittering for their caste’s dark melody. But I will, in the near future. At the moment I want no distractions.

Barrons says impatiently, “Who the fuck cares. They follow her. Where is the one that holds you hostage?”

Josie laughs, a brittle sound. “That’s what you think? We’re being held hostage? The woman saved us!”

“Saved?” I echo.

“Aye, saved. And we’ve no need of your army, Mac. We’re just fine. The lot of you can be leaving now.
With
your Unseelie.”

“I’m telling you,” Sorcha says, “they’re not Unseelie.”

“We’d be finer if we knew Kat was all right,” Clare says.

“And Dani,” Shauna adds. “Two of our best have gone missing.”

“Dani isn’t one of our best,” Josie says sharply. “She’s a liability, a hotheaded child. And Kat, well … you see where
her
plans got us.”

Josie doesn’t look much older than Dani herself. And Kat’s plans kept them alive this long.

Clare disagrees, “How can you say that when it was Dani and Ryodan that saved us from the Hoar Frost King?”

“They didn’t save us from Cruce,” Josie says hotly. “Jada did.”

I narrow my eyes. “Who’s Jada?” Was this the name of the supposedly mystical fighter that was leading them now? “And what do you mean you’re ‘fine’? This place is a mess. It’s obviously been taken over by—”

“No, it hasn’t. Not anymore,” Josie cuts me off. “Not since
she
came.”

“Jada?” I guess dryly.

The skinny goth folds her arms over her chest and tosses her head, looking down her thin nose at me. “Aye, she freed us from our prison. When Kat went missing, the changes to our abbey escalated. The doors and windows closed, trapping us inside. But Jada understands his runes. She was able to open them. Since her arrival the changes have stopped. Completely.”

I mock, “Gee, let’s see, your lights glow without bulbs, your fireplaces burn with no wood or visible source of fuel, and there are Fae flowers and monuments scattered all over your land. Inside a stone wall that wasn’t there three weeks ago.”

“I said she
stopped
the changes. Not undid them.
Yet
,” she adds with the fervent faith of a recent convert.

“Where’s Colleen?” Christopher demands.

Clare says, “You must be her father. She’s the look of you. She said you would be coming if she didn’t send word soon. She’s with a group of women in the Red Library, searching our oldest books. Unseelie Prince or not, your son sacrificed himself for us, and we will help you get Christian back. Jada has agreed to make it a priority.”

Her last words rub me a thousand kinds of wrong. “One of your women escaped and told us the abbey was taken hostage and three of your women killed.” They’ve accepted their conqueror, permitted her to choose their priorities. How quickly they’ve abandoned Kat.

Shauna says, “At first we didn’t know what was going on, and aye, we battled, that’s true. There were losses on both sides. But we swiftly realized the asset Jada is.”

“She’s a born leader,” Josie says proudly. “She fears nothing and I’ve never seen anyone with such unobstructed vision. She makes plans and takes action and her plans yield immediate, concrete results. Have you any idea how long we’ve been floundering out here? Hammered by one threat after the next! I’ll fall in behind her any day. You wouldn’t believe what she’s accomplished in the short time she’s been here.”

Sorcha nods agreement. “We aren’t the first group of
sidhe-
seers to join her. The ones she arrived at the abbey with told us they lost their own leader a few weeks ago. Jada found them wandering Dublin, thinking of returning home. She talked them out of it.”

“Do any of you even know where she came from?” I demand.

Josie slants me a scornful look. “Who cares? She’s the most powerful
sidhe
-seer we’ve ever seen. Not even you possess such skills. In fact,
she
should have the spear, not you. They’re training us. Teaching us to fight. Martial arts and weapons.”

I refuse to reach for it. My spear is beneath my arm and there it will remain.

Deep inside me the Book sends out a dark, cold draft of brimstone and damnation, offering all kinds of power.

I don’t need it. I am enough.

Shauna says, “Kat did a fine job keeping us together in the present. But Jada can lead us into the future.”

I glance at Barrons. He’s motionless, processing, assessing. We came here to roust a conqueror and received instead an unarmed welcome coupled with news that the abbey has embraced their conqueror.

Wants to keep her.

Likes her better than Kat.

Whoever this Jada is, I don’t trust her one bit.

“You will bring her to us now,” Barrons says.

Josie tips her head back and says down her nose to him, “We will inform Jada you’ve requested an audience.
After
Mac and her Unseelie leave our home.”

Seven men blast past her so fast her short platinum hair flies straight up in the air, and one of them must have caught her with his elbow or fist—I’d bet blood it was Barrons—because she crashes back into a couch, goes tumbling over the side, and slams into the floor.

Grimly, me and my cavalcade of whatever they are follow the men.

By the time we reach the wing that houses Rowena’s chambers—I have no doubt that’s where “Jada” has decided to squat, like the Oval Office, mere occupancy confers power—our group has dwindled to Barrons, Ryodan, and me.

The Highlanders insisted on going underground to check on Cruce’s prison after first making a detour to the Red Library to collect Colleen. Ryodan, who trusts no one, insisted Fade accompany them. Clare and Sorcha, who’d caught up with us by then, insisted we ask Jada before going beneath the abbey, and when the men stalked past them, looked impossibly torn before storming off after them. I remained silent the entire time, prepared to lie through my teeth about anything and everything if they tried to make me go down there where I might get caught in the sticky spiderweb of the powers that hold or are failing to hold Cruce.

As we approach Rowena’s chambers, the stone floor changes from pale gray to stone that glitters faintly, as if sprinkled by silver dust, to solid gold etched with elaborate symbols, inlaid near the walls with glittering gems that wink with dark fire.