Claimed By Shadow (28 page)

I scrambled out from under the table and tackled Billy Joe, who had torn his shirt off and was clawing at his bare chest, leaving red welts behind. “Billy!” I grabbed for his wrist, intending to drag him under the table with me, but he was too fast. He ran to the back of the room, to the small door beside the cot that I had never seen opened. I didn’t see it now. I had the feeling that it was solely ornamental, but Billy didn’t get that. He beat on it and tore at the doorknob, which he finally managed to rip completely off.

I stared at him in confusion. I’d never seen him like this and wasn’t sure there was anything I could say that would calm him down. Then there was the fact that, in human form, Billy stood almost six feet tall. No way could I subdue him without a weapon, and the only ones I had—my gun and bracelet—would likely kill him in his new form.

There was a lot of keening, swearing and some explosions from the front of the shop, then there was a rushing wind and a sound like a hundred helicopters starting up. I looked up to see the dragon lift itself into the air on black leathery wings, screeching and clawing at its face. Half its snout was missing, lost in a smoking hole, and there were gashes in the great wings that beat the air with the force of a small hurricane. A second later the creature was gone, soaring high over peaceful green fields toward distant, tree-covered hills.

Billy slumped against the door, his hands on the scarred wood, his fingers a bloody mess. He was sobbing in great, wracking heaves, but at least he was no longer manic. I was about to try to talk some sense into him, when Pritkin ran through the curtain, followed by Mac and Marlowe. The vamp wasn’t, I noticed with rising anger, under any kind of restraint. And the first thing he did was head for Tomas.

“Pritkin! Stop him!” I crossed the room at a run, while the mage merely stood there, looking in disbelief at Billy’s solid form. I dove under the table from the far side and grabbed Marlowe’s wrist before he could drag Tomas into the light. “Get away from him!”

He looked surprised, as well he might. Why any human would think she could stop a master vampire from doing anything he wanted by holding his hand was laughable. I threw myself backwards, raising my wrist with the bracelet on it and hoping it would be enough to do the trick. I never found out, since nothing happened. I shook my arm and glared at the inert silver. What was wrong with it now?

“Our magic won’t work here,” Marlowe told me gently.

“I’m not going to hurt Tomas, Cassie. Believe it or not, I want to help.”

Sure, which was why he’d sat by and watched him be butchered. Marlowe had a reputation that had started in Elizabethan England, when he’d been one of the queen’s spies, and it had increased in infamy ever since. If even a fraction of the stories whispered about him were true, I didn’t want him anywhere near Tomas. “Get away,” I repeated, wondering what I would do if he said no. But instead of arguing, he slid gracefully out from under the table. I checked on Tomas’ wounds, but they didn’t seem to be any worse. His eyes were open a fraction and he even managed to raise his head.

“I can’t hear him,” he said obscurely, an expression of pure bliss passing over his face. Then his eyes closed and his head fell back, connecting sharply with the tile floor.

My heart almost stopped and I frantically felt for a pulse, which of course I didn’t find. The fact that I’d even tried said something about my mental state. It looked like he’d fainted or was in a trance, but I couldn’t be sure. Tony had once been involved in a clandestine and highly illegal feud with another master. One of our vamps lost an arm and was halfway gutted in the miniwar. When he was brought back to us I’d assumed he was dead, but Eugenie said he was in a healing trance. He’d stayed unmoving and immobile for several weeks, until one night he suddenly sat up, asking whether we’d won. I hoped Tomas was only in a trance, but there was little I could do for him either way. Vamps healed themselves or they didn’t—there weren’t a lot of medical or magical remedies that worked on their systems. The problem was to keep him safe long enough for him to have a chance to recover.

I glanced at Pritkin. “Why isn’t Marlowe tied up or something? ”

“Because we may need him,” was the grim reply.

“Do you know who he is?” I demanded.

“Better than you.” He tore his eyes away from Billy, who was now rocking back and forth, staring sightlessly at the wall, and turned the full force of his stare on me. He wasn’t angry—that, at least, I’d almost come to expect, and it wouldn’t have worried me. But this was different. He was pared down somehow, his eyes so intense that they looked like two lasers. It was the face of a predator when its own life is threatened—deadly, serious and completely focused.

“Let me explain the situation,” he said, and even his words were faster and more clipped than before, as if every second counted. “We have arrived in Faerie, but not in the unobtrusive way I had planned. Most of our magic will not work, and we have a finite amount of nonmagical weapons. One of our company is gravely ill and two others are mentally suspect. To make matters worse, that dragon was the guardian of the portal, and having failed to defeat us itself, it has gone after reinforcements. If the Fey do not already know we’re here, they soon will. And we cannot go back though the portal for obvious reasons.”

“Will the Senate come after us?” I asked, uncertain that I wanted an answer.

Pritkin gave a short bark of a laugh. It didn’t sound amused. “Oh, no, at least not until they can appeal for passes. To cross into Faerie without them is to risk a death sentence. As we have done.”

“He means that we’re all in this together,” Marlowe added. “I, too, am without a pass, and the Fey are famous for not listening to excuses. If I’m caught, I could be killed.” He smiled at me. “So I won’t be caught, and shall endeavor to see you are not, either.”

Mac snorted. “The fact is, we’re all safer together. Nobody would last a day in Faerie alone right now.”

Marlowe shrugged. “That, too. And, as my first comradely gesture, may I suggest that we leave this area as soon as may be? We have very little time to lose.”

Pritkin had pulled Billy up by the wrists and now he slapped him, hard. “He’s right. If the Fey find us, they will either kill us on sight or ransom us back to the Circle or Senate. ” After the second slap, Billy tried to hit him back, but Pritkin blocked his arm, then twisted it cruelly behind his back before pushing him at me. “Gain control of your servant, ” he said briefly. “I will deal with mine. Then we move.”

I spent the next few minutes getting my ward checked out by Mac while I tried to reassure a very freaked-out Billy Joe. “Why are you so upset?” I asked, when he had calmed down enough to listen. “You have a body,” I pinched him lightly on the arm and he flinched, the big baby. “Isn’t that what you always wanted?” He certainly seemed to have a good time whenever he was borrowing mine.

Billy still looked stunned, although some color had started to return to his cheeks. Without warning, he leaned over and kissed me hard on the lips. I jerked away and slapped him, and shock made it harder than I’d intended, but he just laughed. His hazel eyes were bright with unshed tears as he gingerly felt his stinging cheek, but his expression was euphoric. “It’s true; it’s really true,” he said in awe; then his eyes grew wide and he abruptly started rooting through Mac’s backpack. He came out with one of the beers, clutching it like he’d found a treasure made of pure gold. It was unopened, and he scrabbled at it, trying to get the bottle cap off with his bare hands.

“You don’t get it, Cass,” he said, his eyes almost feverish. “Sure, I babysit your body from time to time, but nothing’s really real, you know? Like there’s a film over everything, and I only ever touch that, taste that.” He gave a yell of frustration and tried to smash the bottle on the table, but it was padded and the glass bounced off.

Obviously, he was not going to be coherent until he’d had a drink. “Give that to me,” I said impatiently, and he handed it over, but his eyes never left the dark brown bottle. I opened it on the metal underside of the cot and he snatched it out of my hand, gulping half the contents at one time.

“Oh, my God,” he said reverently, falling to his knees. “Oh Jaysus.”

I was about to tell him to stop the melodrama when Mac interrupted with a report. “There’s nothing wrong with your ward, so it must be the
geis
. They tend to complicate things, with the more powerful spells causing the most interference. And the
dúthracht
is about the strongest there is.”

“But my ward worked before, and the spell was cast when I was eleven,” I protested.

“That could have been why you got away with it, because you were too young for the
geis
to be active. This particular ward is designed to fit over your aura like a glove does a hand, but it needs a stable field to keep a proper grip. An active
geis
is interpreted as a serious threat, and your natural defenses go into constant turmoil, trying to reject the invader. But, by doing so, they make it impossible for your artificial protection to do its job.”

Light dawned. “That’s why Pritkin was freaking out at Miranda. He knew if she didn’t remove the
geis
, he couldn’t get that tattoo.”

I was immediately sorry I’d said anything, since Mac demanded the whole story and seemed to find the idea of a small, female gargoyle getting the best of Pritkin hysterically funny. I finally managed to get him back on track, but he didn’t tell me anything I wanted to hear. “It’s like trying to put a glove on a small, squirming child, Cassie—which is why kids usually get mittens. It’s too damn much trouble to get them dressed otherwise.” Mac sounded like he knew, and I briefly wondered whether he had a family. Possibly there were people who would mourn him if Pritkin got him killed.

“So you can’t fix it?”

“I’m sorry, Cassie. Get rid of the
geis
, and I can have it running in no time. Otherwise—”

“I’m screwed.”

“It looks that way.”

As if in comment on the way my day was going, Billy took that moment to throw up beer all over the floor in front of my sneakers. I snatched my feet back just in time. “Billy! What is the matter with you?”

He groaned and sat up. “Stomach cramps,” he gasped. I sighed and went to get him a glass of water.

“Sip it,” I warned. “You have a brand-new stomach. Nobody gives babies beer, so I guess you don’t get any, either.” I took the bottle away, and he groaned louder.

“Have a heart, Cass!”

I held the bottle up and shook it, letting the amber liquid slosh against the sides. “Get off your backside and help me with Tomas and maybe I’ll give it to you.”

“There’s a pub in the town where we’re headed,” Marlowe said mildly.

“How do you know where we’re going?” I asked suspiciously.

“Because we aren’t spoiled for choice.” Billy was regarding the vamp as if he’d just announced that he’d won the lottery. “Beer, pretty girls—of a sort—and excellent music, as I recall.”

Billy jumped up as if propelled out of a canon. “Where’s that poor unfortunate, then? We should get the lad somewhere safe so he can rest and heal,” he added piously.

“What town?” I asked Marlowe.

“The local village and castle are populated by Dark Fey, a few of whom have done favors for my spies in the past. That has primarily taken the form of intelligence gathering—they spy on the Light Fey and my contacts among the Light spy on them. But occasionally they have helped out agents in distress—for a fee, of course.”

“You spy on the Fey?” I asked in surprise.

Marlowe smiled. “I spy on everyone. It’s my job.”

“Discuss this later,” Pritkin said, poking his head in through the curtain. The golem stood next to him calmly enough, but it flinched when the curtain brushed against its arm. “If the Dark Fey find us before we come to an understanding—”

“Point taken,” Marlowe murmured. Together, he and Billy got Tomas out from under the table and into a makeshift sling made out of the cot blanket. I didn’t believe Marlowe when he swore the Fey sun didn’t harm vampires, but Mac backed him up. Since Tomas didn’t burst into flames when the beams leaking through the ruined roof fell on him, I had to assume they were right.

Billy took one end of the sling and Marlowe picked up the other. His cooperation made me apprehensive enough to walk alongside the bearers to ensure that he didn’t harm Tomas when no one was looking. I’d have preferred another helper, but there weren’t a lot of options. I doubted I could carry even half of Tomas’ weight for any distance, especially not weighed down by fifty pounds of ammunition. Mac was bringing up the rear and his hands needed to be free for weapons. And Pritkin, at the head of our motley group, had his hands full keeping his servant from freaking out again.

The poor golem was shaking and looking about wild-eyed, jumping at every breath of wind, chirping bird or Billy singing “I’m a rover and seldom sober,” until Pritkin threatened to make him a ghost again if he didn’t stop. It was like the golem had never seen any of it before—which I guess he hadn’t, at least not through human eyes—and wasn’t sure what was benign and what was a threat. I don’t know what they rely on for senses, but based on his scream when a cloud of airborne dandelions brushed against his bare chest, I don’t think it’s the same five we humans use.

We finally made it to the tree line, but even I could follow the path of trampled grass in our wake. Anyone with tracking experience wouldn’t even break a sweat following us. I stared at the dark woods ahead and hoped someone had a plan.

The next hour was a nightmare, slogging through a forest that, while amazing, was also intensely creepy. For one thing, it made the centuries-old trees that had surrounded Tony’s farmhouse look like saplings. We passed two giant oaks going in, each of which had a trunk large enough to have driven a car through had they been hollow. Of course, that would have required building a ramp first, because the trunks started well above my head, resting on a massive root system taller than most houses. They were positioned like sentries at a castle’s gate, their mossy arms raised as if in salute—or warning.