Tiddly Jinx (17 page)

I had been there many times after Selene became a changeling while I was dating Alanna. It had been my haven as well during that short time, an escape from my pain and troubled thoughts. Alanna’s imprisonment was in part my fault. I hurt her, and she never fully recovered. She’d fallen in love with me when my heart always belonged to another. That thought made me think of Selene and Corbin. Alanna’s love turned her into my enemy. What would Corbin’s love turn into when he couldn’t have Selene?

I headed to the palace. Though it looked different every time I came, it was always in the same location. Fairies could be fickle. No one knew what the real palace looked like, but the illusion was always breathtaking. This time it appeared to be made from clouds and evening sky. The clouds passed over the walls, giving hints of the starry sky behind it, and the light of the moon glowed through all the windows despite the fact that the sun was high in the sky overhead outside.

“The Erlking to see the Fairy Queen,” I told the door.

After several minutes, the enchanted door opened and a sprite led me to the new queen. She had hair the color of spun silver that pooled on the floor at her feet, giving the impression that she stood on a pool of liquid metal. Her deep purple eyes regarded me coolly. “Are you the one I have to thank for my promotion?” she asked in a quivery voice.

“Alanna has been imprisoned, but she has not been sentenced yet.”

“She is not likely to be freed, though.”

“No.” There was no point in lying or withholding information. If I had it my way, Alanna would never see the light of day for her infraction.

“But you cannot guarantee it if you are not Erlking. Your successor could free her.”

I nodded. I hadn’t considered that. Honestly, I hadn’t considered Alanna at all since that night.

“But you have reason to assure she never knows freedom again.” She looked me up and down. “I would not like to lose my position, and I think you should not like to have a powerful enemy such as her. If you promise to end her reign however you see fit, I will promise you the support of the fairies.”

I shook her hand. I hadn’t planned on killing Alanna, but if she were free she would never stop coming after Selene and me. If I left office, she would need to be taken care of. The list of people who needed to die to make the life I wanted possible kept growing, and each one weighed heavily on me.

She waited to see the understanding of what she wanted in my eyes before she smiled. “I think we can work together, Erlking.”

“Call me Cheney.”

She fluttered silvery eyelashes at me. “Auromina.”

I stopped by my office on my way to find Selene. A small card decorated with tasteful flourishes lay in the center of my desk. I picked it up. Selene’s father and the heads of “concerned” houses were going to stop by tomorrow to meet with me. I tucked the card into my breast pocket and went to check on the progress the others had made. Katrina and Edith were at the table in the archive, deep in conversation, and Selene and Sebastian were sitting on the floor reading.

“Could the Pole raise the dead?” I asked the room, getting their attention.

“I don’t see why not if the wielder knew how to use it,” Selene said. “But we really don’t know much about its power. It could be hard to get the right souls in the right bodies.”

I went over to stand next to her. “It’ll be used in New Orleans on the next new moon. Lily heard someone talking about a cemetery where the dead will be brought back to life. It sounded like the Pole to me.”

“Which cemetery?” Sebastian asked. “We can’t keep this hidden if that happens. People will start to ask questions that are bound to get harder and harder to answer without implicating Selene.”

“She didn’t know. Lily is looking for the name of the guy who she heard talking about it.”

“I know which one,” Selene said. “The spirits wanted the Pole for a reason. What better reason than coming back to life, but why the whole cemetery? Seems like overkill.”

“Maybe they just want to show that they can,” Katrina said. “They have this all-powerful Pole thingy. Raising a few bodies up isn’t going to be enough. They are going to want the world to know what they can do. Why do people drive $100,000 cars when they can get a $20,000 car? To show that they can. It’s about status and power. Once those spirit people are back, I bet they have something else they want. Something they intend to take by force.”

“The new moon is in three days,” Sebastian said. “Ten of us cannot find an entire army of undead.”

“We’ll be ready.” Determination settled in on Selene’s face, hardening her jaw. “They aren’t going to raise anyone. If we know where the Pole will be, we don’t need the spell to find it.”

“So we don’t need Frost anymore?” Sebastian asked.

“No we still need her to close any tears the Pole creates and maybe to help stop whatever they’re going to try to do. I wish I could read that book. If someone’s wielding the Pole of Charon, I don’t know that we are strong enough to take it back, even with dark magic.”

I took her hand. “Have you talked to Corbin?”

Selene shook her head. “I will tonight.”

I wasn’t entirely sure how to bring this up, but it needed to be said. We had too many people with questionable alignment within our circle at the moment. Something was bound to go wrong. I decided to just be blunt. “He is loyal to you, but perhaps not to the rest of us. I think we need to tread lightly with his involvement. Tell him only what he needs to know.”

She sighed. “I’ve been reading up about vampires, and I have some questions for him about his bond, but I think it could work in our favor. The books did confirm that he will do what he can to save me—probably not the rest of you. I won’t tell him everything.” She rolled her neck and climbed to her feet. “Katrina and Gram are working on finding the binding spell, and Sebastian is reading about necromancers.”

“Actually, we gave up finding anything. We’re writing a new spell,” Katrina said. “That way it can be as restrictive as it needs to be and hopefully harder to break.”

“It will be ready in time,” Edith added. “I’ll make sure of it.”

Sebastian cleared his throat. “As far as I can tell, necromancers can be killed as easily as any human so long as you don’t touch them. Those who have a mastery of their magical abilities are more dangerous and harder to kill, but if you cut them, they will bleed. We should be able to dispatch the necromancer without too much trouble.”

Selene frowned. “I haven’t seen Frost all day. Surely she’s awake by now.” She glanced at her watch, worry filling her eyes. “For that matter, I haven’t seen Jessica, either.”

I HAD NO IDEA where Corbin was or how to find him without resorting to using magic, but I had a theory. Corbin had been able to feel my physical pain when we were in the underworld. Could he still? I sat in the garden with a knife in front of me. I pinched my arm hard enough to leave a mark several times and then waited, focusing on my need to see him. He didn’t come.

Licking my lips, I picked up the knife, nimbly twirling it in my fingers. I didn’t really have much choice. I plunged it into the palm of my right hand and pulled it out, hissing at the pain. It burned and stung as I wrapped a towel around my hand and clutched my arm to my chest, eyes watering.

“Should have waited a tad longer, pet,” Corbin’s voice came from the darkness. He stepped into the light, flexing his right hand. “I can’t get around as fast as you. You keep this up and I will be forced to move closer to you. Let me see.” He reached for my wrapped hand.

“It’s okay. Cheney will heal me. I needed to see you.”

He took the hand anyway and applied pressure to the wound through the towel, making me grimace. “I gathered.”

“So how does this work, Corbin? Exactly what feelings of mine do you share?”

He shifted. “Mostly just physical, but if I’m paying attention when the physical sensation comes through I can pick up traces of other things. I knew you wanted to see me.”

I nodded. “I need a favor.”

He lowered himself down beside me with the grace of a wolf, never releasing my hand. “A favor you were willing to harm yourself to get.”

“I needed your attention.”

“Let me assure you that self-mutilation is unnecessary. You have my attention with or without it, love.”

“I didn’t know how else to find you.” Even sitting three feet away from him, he was unreadable. “I need you to make friends with Frost.”

He blinked. “Why?”

I struggled to my feet, taking my hand from him and pressing it against my chest. “Walk with me.” Corbin fell in step with me. “I’m asking her to use quite a bit of dark magic, and the thing is, it can change people—harm them. Even if I did trust her now, which I don’t, I can’t be sure the magic itself isn’t going to change her for the worse. She won’t talk to me and I can’t tell if the magic is affecting her. Katrina can read auras, but not to the degree to tell if a necromancer is good or evil—not that she would open up to or trust anyone in my coven. So, I need you to be her friend. Get her to confide in you and let me know if she starts to take a turn so I can be prepared.”

He smiled, more to himself than to me. “You honestly think she will be my ‘friend’ as you say?”

I nodded. “Because you’re going to betray me.” Corbin raised his eyebrow. “You’re going to tell her we’re planning to kill her after this is over.”

We walked for a bit, not speaking. “Even if I told her that, why would she believe me? She knows I helped you through purgatory.”

This would be the tricky part to explain. “Everyone knows how you feel about me…”

“That I love you. Yes. Agreed. Go on.”

“Well…we’re going to use that to our advantage. You’re betraying me because you want her help getting Cheney out of the way. The plan will be for the two of you to devise a way to turn me dark, maybe by forcing me at the very last minute to cast with her. The evil would tear Cheney and me apart, and I would willingly go to you. You can’t just kill him, because I would never go to you if I thought you’d hurt him in any way. This way, the two of you are partners. You feed her information and get closer to her so you can keep a better eye on her for me.”

“And you trust me to do this?”

I nodded. “I do.”

He shook his head. “When is all of this supposed to happen?”

“In three days. You need to move quickly and be convincing.”

“And what do I get for helping you?”

“What do you want that I can give you?”

He smiled at the qualification. His finger lightly traced my lower jaw. “That I will have to contemplate, my pet.” I frowned at the intimacy of the touch. “Where’s the necromancer?”

“I’m not sure. Katrina went to find her. She went to her room after closing the tear this morning.”

“Get her to come outside and I’ll see what I can do.”

I chewed my lip, debating on whether or not to say what was on my mind. “I read something about vampires sharing life force with the vampires they create—like your creator can’t die so long as you live.”

“Technically that’s true.”

“But yours died.”

“A vampire’s bond lasts until a new bond is formed. I never sired another vampire, so I remained bound to her.”

“But you didn’t make me into a vampire.”

He nodded slowly. “You’re not a vampire.”

I sighed. “So if you sire another vampire, our bond will break.”

“I can sire as many vampires as I want and they will all bond to me. It is up to them to break the bond. It’s possible when you marry the elf it will break our bond, but I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t know what you are. You took my essence and I took yours, just as if I had sired you, but it was done on a level I don’t understand. You still don’t feel the bond, correct?”

Though his face was blank and his voice was level I knew the answer he wanted to hear, but the fact was I didn’t feel any bond to him other than friendship. “I don’t think so.”

The left side of his mouth rose wryly. “Still in love with the elf? It’s the castle, isn’t it? I knew I should have kept my castle.”

I laughed. “Castles are drafty and come with a lot of people who like to tell you how to behave.” I cleared my throat. “I better go find Cheney and get this hand looked at, but I’ll make sure that Frost comes out here soon.” I touched his shoulder lightly. “Thank you. You know, for everything.”