Chapter Twenty-Seven #2
“Pussy cat didn’t tell her the deal was just for his smushy poo,” Teddai crooned. “Better hope Sparky can hold his temper.”
They laughed, lyrical and bright and pure threat. The redcap started forward, all but frolicking toward the scent of decomposing bodies. Seelie bodies. Zyr was alive. Abrhail had said he was alive. Robin had to trust them enough to keep going.
Non-descript doors with vines carved in the doorframe. Oak and holly intertwined, cast in tarnished silver.
“Tasty snacks inside.”
Robin shoved the doors open, ignoring Teddai’s laughing commentary until the sight inside drew him up short.
Tasty snacks.
Corpses. Two of them. Chests flaked with dried, black blood from matching stab wounds. The bodies were stretched out on two large, gray slabs, dull in a room full of glittering white and fresh sunflowers, ominous and vulgar.
Robin didn’t need to see the man’s face, or the whole of the woman’s, to know they were the Monarchs.
They stared at one another in death, clouded eyes locked to clouded eyes wide in desperation. Their gags were familiar, slate gray and textured.
Hollow charms. True names and Hollow charms.
Robin would care later. For now, he tore his gaze away from the spectacle to search for what really mattered.
Zyr paced in the far corner of the room, tall and silver horned and alive. Pissed. Breathing. Relief slammed through Robin, filled his senses with spiced chocolate and sharp lightning, a thunderstorm over restless seas.
“Beithir!”
Robin left the murdertwins to the corpses and Dinam to the doorframe. He crossed the room in quick, sure steps. A shimmering, slick sheen surrounded Zyr, keeping him from throwing himself at the man.
Zyr met him at the ward, anxious gaze roving over Robin, checking him over as he had when Robin was kidnapped. The beithir placed his hands against the ward. When Robin reached back, it felt like a cool, unyielding fabric. No warmth of Zyr’s palm to his, spindly fingers splayed to try and touch.
Old books. A library of them, fluttering wildly in the winds of a hurricane. Storm winds and a crack of lightning, but rich chocolate on his tongue instead of metal.
“Robin.” Zyr’s voice was level, for all the thunder behind it. “I allowed myself to be tricked. Captured. I apologize.”
“You don’t apologize for what someone else did,” Robin replied. Like this was a normal conversation. Like they had the time. “Tell me what’s happening, beithir.”
“Kesk and Veroni intend as we feared. They sacrificed the Monarchs. Protocol is simple, in that. Faerie is theirs.” Zyr glanced toward the stone altars, expression wooden. “They’ll have power enough with their ascension to channel the death of a Gate.”
“Which Gate?” Robin poked at the ward with his free hand. It hummed under his touch, but remained solid. Fucking hell.
“Their own, I think. If they’ve not yet given him their oath, they can kill him without ill effect.” Zyr bared his teeth, pressing his hands more firmly against the ward. “Faerie is not safe for you.”
“Faerie’s not safe for anyone right now.” Robin hated being right sometimes. “And I’m not leaving this place without you. It’s both or neither.”
A wet, fleshy crack, from behind him. Ribs, from the sound of it. Various internal bits being moved. Robin steadfastly did not turn around to witness.
“That’s not a body you made,” Dinam said.
“Puttin’ your paw up to take its place, cat?”
“Murdertwins,” Robin called out, eyes still on Zyr. His beithir. “Corpses are yours, but we need someone to find the Gate and make sure he’s not tied down somewhere first.”
The sucking sound of something meaty being pulled. Bile burned Robin’s throat. He didn’t look.
“Think he’s tryin’ to woo us, Abrhail. Talking ropes and corpses and hunts. Lovey names even. Be still, my beating heart.” A cackle. “Snack for the road?”
Abrhail’s soft murmur was too low for Robin to hear, but it elicited a giggle from Teddai.
“I cannot break this ward. Not from within.” Zyr’s gaze flicked up, briefly, then back to Robin. “Your companions shouldn’t trust the cat. His bond betrayed us all.”
“My bond—” Dinam shut up at Robin’s look. He bristled instead, glaring at Zyr over Robin’s shoulder like the little coward he was.
“Taibe’s how we were able to get here, and is about to show the murdertwins where to find Lysander. I wouldn’t have been able to get to you fast enough if Dinam hadn’t found me. I promised no retaliation.”
Robin heard another murmur from the murdertwins, then metal being drawn, and feet pitter-pattering quickly from the room. The creepy little weirdos were on the move. Robin thought maybe they were his new favorite people. Just so long as he didn’t have to look.
This was fine. They were fine. Zyr couldn’t break the ward from within, and as soothing as their clipped back and forth was, it wouldn’t help.
“Wards created from the outside must be taken down from the outside, and vice versa.” Dinam said cautiously. “It would require immense brute strength to break. Maybe the Gate…?”
“Those bastards raised him. No bet. You take it down.”
Silence, for once, from the cat. Robin twisted around with a snarl. Dinam pressed his ears flat against his hair, tail flicking unhappily.
“I’ve little enough in the way of personal magic,” the cat-sith muttered, looking between Zyr and Robin. “I’m a weaver. The manticore and redcap are known for their physical prowess, not the depth of their magic.”
“So what the fuck can you do?”
Dinam hesitated, looking past Robin to the ward, gaze sweeping upward. “I’m adept with reading knitted works. If you give me a moment, I can see what stipulations are set on who may pass; this stinks of Veroni’s magic, and I’ve seen her wards before. Perhaps it will help.”
Robin tapped his fingers against his thigh, looking back to Zyr. Gears moving moving moving, otherwise they would stop, and he would freak the hell out. There was no time for that. This was just a situation, and Robin could handled situations. It was what he did.
Humans didn’t have personal magic. Fae did. But Bo—
Bo had Everil.
Impulsive. Reckless.
Robin had done worse for less.
“You said it would be safer for me if we bonded, beithir. I’d get magic. You’d be able to sense me. Tell me if the offer’s still open.”
“The offer is always open.” Zyr’s lips quirked into an ironic smile. “As long as I live, at least. Unfortunately, forging a bond requires physical contact.”
Of course it fucking did. Why wouldn’t it. Nothing said convenient like hand-holding that would bond you, except when stuck behind a magical fucking playpen.
Not the time.
Not for any of it. Wouldn’t think about how he and Zyr were still getting to know each other. About it meaning four hundred years of his own shit. The possibility of drowning Zyr in his emotions, the too much of Robin’s mind.
No.
First: How to get the dragon out of the bubble when no one had the magic to do it.
They had a weaver more in touch with Faerie than magic, a magic-less human who talked to Faerie, and a very powerful unseelie dragon stuck in a ward with his head bowed so that Robin might have reached for his horn and pulled, if it had been possible.
Robin loved him so much it made his teeth ache.
He tipped his forehead against the ward in turn, fingers tapping a quick, gentle rhythm as he tried to think beyond fuck fuck fuck and not the fucking time.
Veroni was arrogant. The palace they stood in, now, was hers in part. The ground wouldn’t move for them, unless they had Aultyr or Judah maybe. But she was cocky as anything, so…
So.
“Cat,” Robin called out, finally managing to dull the ragged, threatening edge in his voice. “Try to weave something that can worm its way under this marble. I want to know if this ward is a bubble or just a dome.”
“It’s a bubble.”
“You haven’t even tried.” There that edge was again. Fucking cat.
“I’m a weaver,” Dinam retorted. “Understanding the shape of things is what I do. It’s a bubble, with a flat bottom, maybe an inch under the flooring.”
Robin dragged in a long, slow breath. “Right. Okay. Faerie? Will you please open up the ward so I can reach in a tiny bit? I would love that.” Nothing. “I’ll cut my hand or something and smear it wherever you want?”
Nothing.
At least it wasn’t opening up a gaping hole under Zyr’s feet or something.
Fine. Fuck. Fine.
“Dinam?”
“It’s not a lockbox. I’m looking.”
Fucking. Cat.
Fine.
“Beithir. Eyes closed. You ever get your hands on any of Aisling’s books about bonds? Something about unusual bond creations, preferably.”
Zyr closed his eyes and let out a long, shuddering breath.
“Through magic, rarely,” he said. “Not skin-to-skin but power-to-power. Through a dryad’s tree.” His fingertips sparked against the ward uselessly. “Not through a ward.”
“Okay,” Robin said, turning the information over furiously for a different angle. “Okay. That’s something. What–”
“We need a seelie,” Dinam said, successfully silencing Robin. The cat-sith actually sounded impressed. “A seelie tied to their House.”
Robin breathed. Slow. In. Out. And turned away from Zyr to stare at the cat, whose dark tail twitched. “Explain.”
Dinam shrugged, holding his hands palm-up. “The she-fox is a vicious, coldhearted, suspicious beast. She weaves her wards with impressive specificity. Only a seelie, of her House or sworn to the Monarchs, can breach the magic without destruction. And she knotted the fabric tight.”
In. Out. One, two, three. Screaming would only hurt the cause.
It would not help.
Robin needed to start using contractions again, or he would spiral.
It wouldn’t help.
Better.
Ancient books. Ancient rituals. The monarchy changed hands, and the world had shivered, that’s what Dinam had said.
(Robin needed to stop tapping his fingers against his leg but didn’t.) The heirs had done something by killing the Monarchs.
The old magics still meant something. Bo and Ever showed it, and so did the bodies on the stones Robin still hadn’t looked at.