Tooth and Nail (38 page)

I tried to communicate with my face, widening my eyes, furrowing my brow.
How?

He mouthed something, and I squinted to see. He mouthed it again, exaggerating the words:
Just intend. Just fly.

I intended, and swooped backward and up like I was on a swing set. My arms and legs flailed, and the whooshing air burned through my wounded and swollen ankle. Just before I hit the ceiling, I intended to hover, and I did.

I’d expected the skin on my back to pull, that I’d have a feeling of my body weight hanging by a thread, but it was as though I was standing still—ground unnecessary. I didn’t have to think about moving my wings any more than I thought about moving my arms and legs. They were my body, and they did what I needed them to do. My hovering was shaky, like a car that could stall at any moment, but I was doing it.

Clayton kicked the office door off its hinges and shoved the desk against Avery, pinning him to the wall.

I swooped crookedly down to the pile of jump ropes near the ring, grasping the wooden handles. Clayton didn’t see me. His full concentration was Avery, who was squirming and angry, but not frightened. I knew he wouldn’t be, and that was my only comfort in the nanosecond it took me to get up on Clayton from behind and wrap the jump rope around his neck.

He clutched at the rope—literally his last rope—gasping and trying to breathe, trying to cough.

I pulled tighter.

I had a life in my hands, and remembered what I said to Svein.
When you fae finally do bring back the Olde Way, I am going to be worthy of it.

The Olde Way needed me to fight its battles, but I couldn’t win its war. The problem was that the morning fae assumed they needed violence to win the war. And maybe—maybe they didn’t.

“Svein!”

He ran to my side as I loosened the rope and, still floating just above his twitching wings, instead wrapped my arm around Clayton’s neck. He took the reprieve to cough, tears of pain streaming down his face. “My pocket,” I said. “A little bag.”

Svein reached into my front pocket, the warmth of his hand sliding down flat against my inner thigh, grasping a handful of trinkets. He threw my keys on the floor and opened the pink pouch. I held out my free hand, and he dropped the tooth into my palm. I closed my fingers around it.

The sticky, sweet scent ran up my nostrils and into my brain, coating my mind like molasses. White light radiated from the crown of my head and dissolved into a rainbow that slid down the length of my body, branching out into my fingers and toes, pulsing warmth into my injured ankle. The chorus of otherworldly voices faded in and wrapped itself around me like a lace blanket, humming in and out of the surface of my skin.
We all came from here, this place of purity. The light moves in and out of all of us. It’s eternity. It’s not gone …

“You can’t even kill me,” Clayton managed in a hoarse whisper. “The legendary warrior can’t finish the fight.”

As at peace as I would have been had I just been tucked into bed, I stretched my legs out behind me and put my mouth close to his ear. “The Olde Way,” I whispered, “is that we all exist in each other. If I kill you, I kill us, and then I fail.” I squeezed my elbow tighter, and he scratched at my forearm. “You opened my eyes,” I said. “Because I understand now that to win, we don’t need violence. We only need what we already have. We only need to share the memory with those who can’t remember. Or won’t remember.”

Still weak from his near-strangling, he struggled, pushing back at me, but I held fast. “In the end,” I said, “you poisoned yourself with your toothpaste. And to beat you, I need to save you. Innocence is stronger than me, and it’s much stronger than you.”

With the hand wrapped around him, I reached up and pinched his nose shut, and he opened his mouth, his gulps for oxygen hissing over his tongue and through the gap where I’d smashed away his perfect grin. Blood slid from the corner of his mouth.

Fae blood. Our shared blood.

“For the record, I wish I didn’t have to do this, because I don’t forgive you,” I said. “But this is my destiny. Now, smile wide.”

I jammed the tooth, shimmering and scented with innocence, into the empty hole in his gum.

He howled long and hard and convulsed, tugging at his own face and lips, but still I held him until he abruptly silenced and closed his eyes. He softened completely, and when I slipped my arm away and backed up, he nearly tumbled backwards, so I eased him to the ground before my underused wings gave out and I fell against the wall next to him. He curled up, trembling, and hugged his arms around himself. Then he smiled.

It wasn’t the killer smile of Dr. Clayton. It was the smile of Riley, a child skipping downstairs to find a pile of colorful gifts under a Christmas tree.

He tilted his head back, and I knew he was hearing the song. His breathing slowed, and I knew he was breathing in the freshness and purity. His eyes rolled back and forth under his lids, and I knew he was seeing the rainbow light. The Olde Way pulsed through his blood again, surrounded him with love.

Then he opened his eyes, bright and wet. “I saw it.” he murmured. “I saw it. I saw it.”

Svein, lingering in the doorway, and Avery, silent and restrained, watched. Then Svein went to Avery, removed the towel from his mouth, and began working through the ropes.

I tried to limp, but had to drop to a painful crawl on my forearms, dragging my battered foot, to get to Greg Mahoney.

For a moment, I thought I was too late. Then his eyelids fluttered strangely and opened into slits. “Mahoney, you bastard,” I said. “Don’t die.”

“I think,” he rasped, “I already did.”

My wings opened and closed behind me. “No, it’s me,” I said. “I’m what you’ve been searching for.”

“You’re real,” he whispered. “I knew. I
knew
I saw her. I was a kid.” He swallowed with tremendous effort. “No one believed me.”

“Well, hotshot,” I said, and my words caught in my throat, thick with emotion. “I hope you’re finally satisfied.”

“Biggest story of my career,” he said without moving his lips, and closed his eyes. His breath rattled funny, and I shook his shoulders. He didn’t move. “Greg,” I pleaded, laying my head on his chest. Then I yelled. “Svein! 9-1-1,
now
!”

Phone in hand, he was at my side in an instant, his face sober. I looked up at him, hot tears falling fast down my face. “Hurry up!”

“Gemma,” Svein said quietly. “It’s too late.”

I stared, numbed. Svein knelt beside Greg’s body.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. I didn’t turn around, just bowed my head. “Bricks,” I heard in my ear. “I’m glad you’re okay.” I turned to see Not-Rocky cradling his broken arm with the other. He leaned into me for an improvised hug. “Shirley’s all right. He’s lying down. He didn’t see nothing. And me—well, I didn’t see nothing either. Understand?”

I nodded my gratitude. He nudged my arm with affection, warily eyed my wings, and moved away.

Svein took my hand, but I lifted my head, and Avery was in front of me.

There was nothing I could say. As it turned out, I didn’t have to.

I let go of Svein.

Avery knelt and opened his arms, and I crawled to him. He wrapped one arm around my shoulders and one around my waist as I sobbed. As I pressed my chest to his, I felt him sobbing too. I cupped the back of his neck and drew him down. His kiss was as strong and forgiving as mine. My wings shivered and folded into my back.

CHAPTER 23

O
ne week later, I was still in bed. Sorrow, exhaustion, relief, and my broken ankle were four good reasons not to get up. Avery, as often as he could, was the fifth.

Staying in bed also meant staying out of the news, for the most part. As far as the public was concerned, my story wasn’t the compelling one, anyway—I was just a bit player that night. This is what the world understood: the dentist whose career was ruined had killed the journalist who’d broken the story and tried to kill the politician who had it in for him, as well as the politician’s girlfriend and a couple of local fighters who’d tried to help us. A rambling confession by Clayton made the paperwork a whole lot easier. Avery was comfortable in the spotlight, so he spoke for both of us.

There were a few things he didn’t need to say, however, because no one knew to ask.

That night, while Clayton rocked and babbled in the corner and I cried in Avery’s arms, Svein had called in several people from The Root, a team wearing jackets emblazoned on the back with a large purple butterfly. They arrived swiftly and closed themselves in the office with Clayton to bind his fae abilities, effectively turning him into a masqueraded human. After they left, the police arrived. As the cuffs were slapped on him, the little baby tooth fell out of his mouth, and his nonsensical chattering immediately ceased. When they led him out to the squad car, he passed by me, and I tore the blood drop chain off my neck and dropped it in his pocket. A token of respectful acknowledgment of his sad story.

He looked over his shoulder at me, and although I’d never know what he felt in that moment, I understood that it wasn’t hate.

Before we’d all parted ways that night, I’d asked Svein one last question. Would Riley Clayton tell the police, tell the world, about the fae? “No,” he’d said. “Because now that you’ve shown him the Olde Way, he knows that he risks losing it too. He’s become one of us.”

I had a lot of time since that night to think about everything, including the kids that Clayton had already gotten to—the sunken-cheeked, hollow-eyed kids in his waiting room, and little Brian’s foul-mouthed apathy. I wished the poison effect would wear off, that their parents would be able to get their children back, but I knew firsthand—as did Clayton himself—that once innocence is taken away, it’s gone forever.

In the last week, Mom came to visit me a few times and we mainly talked about my father. Dad came to visit me a few times, and we talked about Mom. They had yet to visit me together, but I knew they would. Soon.

In the meantime, Mom told me, she planned to attend the next fae moon gathering. She offered to bring me but I declined, remembering my difficult journey last time. I did ask her, though, how she could have stayed away for so long. I felt responsible, I said, that I was the one that kept her away.

“I did miss the company of other fae,” she’d said. “But I kept two of your baby teeth in a box. If I needed to remember, I poured the box into my hand and let my little girl take me there.”

Today, Avery was at Greg Mahoney’s funeral. Though my broken ankle was a convenient excuse, it wasn’t the reason I couldn’t go. I just—couldn’t go.

When Avery returned, it was noisily. The door opened and there was scrambling and shuffling and I thought I heard something heavy fall in the kitchen. “Avery?” I called. When he didn’t answer, I hauled myself out of bed and balanced on one foot as the clatter neared, ready to spring if I had to.

Avery threw the door open, and a bomb hit me. A furry beagle bomb. I fell back onto the bed, and the dog landed on top of me, licking my face, barking once with happiness.

“Down, boy,” I managed to say, and we wrestled some more. “Down, Canine!”

“Have you two met?” Avery asked. “I wasn’t aware.”

“We go way back,” I said, then sat up the best I could. “Is he here to stay?”

“Yeah,” Avery confirmed. “He needs a home, and you need an excuse to be out walking late at night.”

I looked at him.

“In case anyone sees you,” he clarified. “When you’re collecting.”

“Thank you,” I said, and meant it in a million ways.

>=<

A few months later, standing in front of an unfamiliar front door at night, I closed my eyes, concentrating on detecting movement on the other side. A dark shadow moved, and I realized someone was not only awake, but right behind the door. I popped my eyes open and turned to tiptoe down the walk in my bare feet, and the door opened behind me. I intended my molecules to evaporate and blink.

“I have to say, Gemma,” I heard, “you’re getting a lot better at this.”

Sighing, I dropped the blink and whirled to face Svein. “You live here? Nice one,” I said, “sending me your address on my Fae Phone for a tooth collection.” I dropped my black slingback shoes on the ground and slid my cold toes into them. “I’ll have you know I left a
party
to come here because I thought it was a legitimate call.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said, his eyes sweeping over me. Because the moment commanded it and because, frankly, he deserved it for tricking me, I spun dramatically around in my royal blue dress, showing straps that rose over my shoulders and crisscrossed in the back and a side slit that exposed several inches of my right thigh. He cleared his throat and I stood still again, satisfied.

“I wanted to see you in person,” he said, “to offer my congratulations on U.S. Representative Avery McCormack’s victory. I voted for him myself, but I guess it wasn’t all that important, considering his landslide.”

“Every vote counts,” I said automatically, and grinned. “We’re celebrating all those votes tonight. Haven’t seen you in a while, by the way.”

“Is that your fault or mine?”

I twisted my mouth. “Maybe both.”

Truth is I had been avoiding Svein. I didn’t know why.

Well, yes, I did.

“I’m sorry,” I said now. “I decided to lie low for a few months. Avery and I needed some time to heal and to understand each other the way we are now.”

Svein looked me in the eye. “Did that happen?”

I smiled, and maybe it was a little apologetic. “Yes.”

He nodded.

“We weren’t the only ones,” I added. “My parents are—well, they’re taking things slow with one another. They’re working it all out. A lot was taken from them, and they had to start from scratch. But they never fell out of love.”

“And you have a father again.”

“Turns out I always did. Anyway,” I said, “enough of all that. I’m back on the collection rotation.”

“I heard.”

I took a deep breath. “We need to talk about things.”

“Like?”

“It’s not over,” I said. “With these kids. This city. It’s not over. They’re getting older. Something got to them.” I stopped. “You read about that kid yesterday who held up the drugstore in Georgetown? Got what he wanted and he still stabbed the pharmacist. The kid’s
twelve
years old.”