Brightly (Flicker #2) (36 page)

He slowed to a trot just before he reached her. A ball of blue fire was cupped in his palm, but he let it dissipate into the air so he could grab her by the shoulders. His fingers dug into her shoulders, as if he didn’t realize how tightly he was holding her.

“What the hell happened?” he demanded. “I heard you screaming!”

“It’s fine,” she said quickly, wrenching herself from his grasp.

His gaze flicked toward the giant, apparently for the first time. He blinked. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she muttered, reaching into her pocket. “It attacked Henry and me. I have no idea where it came from, but I think I killed it when I pulled this out of its mouth.” She showed him the scrap of paper.

Filo took the paper and frowned thoughtfully. “You found this in its mouth?”

“Yeah.”

He made a noise that sounded almost like a laugh. “You shoved your hand in a golem’s mouth. Not bad.”

“I do listen to you sometimes, you know,” she said. “Every animation spell has a center of power that stabilizes the energy and helps it flow, and it’s usually marked. If you can disrupt the center of power, you’ll muck up the flow and break the spell.”

That earned her a small smile. Then Filo paused. “Where’s Henry?”

“I left him at the…” Lee trailed off, then clapped one hand over her mouth, aghast. She grabbed Filo’s wrist, blinking against the brightness of his Sight, and started dragging him up the street. “We have to go find him!”

As they retraced Lee’s path through the Underground, she asked, “Why isn’t Matt with you?”

“That’s a better question for him,” Filo said darkly. “We were sorting through books, I turned around, and he was gone. He took the light with him. I headed outside to see where he’d gone. A few minutes later, I started to hear crashing and yelling.”

When they reached the building Lee and Henry had been searching, they found Matt and Henry sitting on the sidewalk in front of it. Henry looked a little dazed, but otherwise, he seemed to be in good condition.

“What’re you doing here?” Filo asked immediately, his eyes narrowed.

Matt blinked owlishly as he stood. “I heard a great commotion and went to investigate. I found Henry in the wreckage.”

“And where were you
before
that?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Matt said coolly. He looked to Lee. “Henry tells me you ran into one of the golems.”

“Wait,” Lee said. “You knew that thing was down here?”

“Of course. The Guild has used golems for ages. They’re great for heavy lifting.”

“But why would they need one in this place?” Henry asked, glancing at Matt. “There’s nothing heavy to lift.”

“It’s an older model,” Matt replied. “Very clunky in comparison to what they’ve got now, and much more prone to behavioral problems. There’s a reason it’s in storage. It shouldn’t even be awake.” He shot Lee and Filo a black look. “What did you do?”

“Nothing!” Lee cried, as Filo’s expression darkened. “Why the hell would the Guild keep that thing if it’s
defective
?”

Matt shrugged. “Well, they can’t just throw it out. Golems are practically indestructible. They’re built to last. Usually, the best you can do is deactivate them and put them somewhere they won’t be woken up again. Not that it always works out that way.”

“Obviously,” Lee said crisply. She hugged herself with one arm. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m about ready to get out of here for the time being.”

“We didn’t find the books.” Standing, Henry looked over his shoulder at the smashed-in doorway. “And it’s a mess in there. We’d have to start over, go through everything again.”

Matt shook his head. “I can take care of it,” he said. “Henry, if you like, I’ll find the damn things and have them sent to you—or you can pick them up. It doesn’t have to be today.”

“It kind of does,” Henry said wearily.

“Then I’ll make arrangements quickly. There are other copies in the Guild libraries that I might be able to get a hold of myself. If I’d realized we’d have…
complications
, I would’ve done that from the start.”

Henry hesitated.

“I can go back to the library tonight and see what I can do,” Matt said. “But for now, I think you’ve had enough of this place.” He spared a glance toward Lee and Filo. “I think all of you have.”

The restaurant was small and not very busy. Only a few groups of people—faeries, mostly, Lee gathered—were seated at the tables and booths, talking and laughing as they ate.

The four of them meandered toward a corner booth in the back. Henry and Matt sat on opposite sides. Instead of joining them, Filo turned to the next booth and sat there. For a second, Lee hesitated. Then she perched on the edge of the seat across from Filo. “Come on,” she whispered. “Don’t be like that.”

“Like what?” Filo asked.

“Like
that
. What, you can’t even sit near him now?”

“What’s it matter to you?”

She frowned. “Are you okay?”

“I’m
fine
,” he said, scrubbing one hand over his face. “I just need to get some air.”

“Want me to order something for you?”

Filo shook his head. “I’m not hungry.”

With that, he slid out of the booth and walked out the front door. Lee glanced at the menu lying on the table. All of a sudden, she wasn’t very hungry, either.

She got up and found the restroom. No matter how many times she visited places like this, haunts of the magical community, she was always a little surprised by how
normal
they could be. This restroom was just like most others she’d been in: florescent lights, gray stalls, paper towel dispenser.

Lee scrutinized her reflection. Her hair was a mess. She could already see the shadow of a bruise forming on her cheek. That wouldn’t be the end of her bruises, either: Her left arm and most of her torso were tender from when the golem had grabbed her. Even leaning back in the booth had made her wince.

After splashing water on her face and smoothing her hair as best she could, she returned to the booth. Filo wasn’t there. She sat down with a sigh, looked at the menu again, decided she still wasn’t hungry and set about rearranging the salt and pepper shakers to kill time until Filo came back.

“Henry, I only wanted to talk with you,” she heard Matt say, from the booth behind her, where he was sitting with Henry. Close as she was, it was hard for Lee not to hear him, but she wasn’t sure it was a good idea to stick her head out of the booth and tell him. “About us.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“Please, Henry. I’ve been going out of my head for months.” Matt sighed. “You used to love me. You told me so.”

“One time. When I said it, you laughed at me, so I never said it again.”

“What I mean,” Matt continued, undeterred, “is that, if you loved me once, you could love me again, if you tried.”

“I don’t want to,” Henry said, so quietly that Lee almost didn’t hear him.

“I miss you.”

“No, you don’t. I’m human. You hate humans, remember?”

“But not you. Never you.” Matt’s voice was soft, beseeching. “Henry, you are so lovely and so much better than me. Patient. Forgiving. If I could love the way a human loves, I would love you for your goodness alone.”

“Was I supposed to be moved by that?”

“You misunderstand me. Faeries do nothing by half,” Matt said. “When they love, they love with their entire being. It’s the same when they hate, or mourn, or do anything else. But I’m only half-fey, so I fear I do
everything
by half.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I will spend my life half in love with you. The pity is that it’s not enough for you.”

“Give it a rest, Matt. I’m not going to play this game with you.”

“I’m hardly playing.”

“Are you sure? Because this feels really familiar. This is the part where you tell me how sorry you are, and how you’ll never do it again. Then I forgive you and we both pretend we haven’t done this a hundred times.”

“That was always my favorite part,” Matt said softly. “The part where you forgave me. You’re the only one who ever does.”

Henry sighed. “You haven’t changed at all, have you? Even the way you talked to Lee and Filo was—”

“You know, Henry, I didn’t realize you were in the market for a fixer-upper,” Matt interrupted bitterly. “I guess he’s handsome, but he seems exhausting. Moody, plus a whole lot of baggage.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t be coy. I see how you look at him. And how you
don’t
look at him. You might at least have resisted the urge to parade him around in front of me.”

By then, Lee felt uncomfortable listening. She wanted to slip out of the booth and disappear into the restroom again, or maybe find Filo—but if she left now, they might see her get up and realize she’d been sitting there whole time. She should’ve made a break for it earlier. Now she was stuck.

“I wasn’t—” Henry broke off and was silent for a long moment. “Oh, my God. You woke that golem, didn’t you?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

“Stop lying. Please.” There was a note of desperation in Henry’s voice.

“Faeries can’t lie. You know that.”

“But you’re only half fey. So how much can you lie?”

“Not as much as I’d like to,” Matt admitted. “All right. Yes. I woke the golem, much may the knowledge please you.”

“Why would you do that? What the hell is
wrong
with you?”

“It wasn’t meant for you, or even that girl.”

“She has a name,” Henry said sharply.

Matt ignored him. “The golem really was defective. I didn’t realize it at first. It got off track and it found you instead. I never meant for—”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better? Jeezus, Matt!”

“I wasn’t trying to kill him,” Matt insisted. “I don’t really know
what
I was trying to do, but I’m almost sure that wasn’t it. I almost killed you, though, and I can’t even tell you why. Funny, isn’t it?”

Henry let out a shaky-sounding breath. “I can’t be here right now.”

“Wait—I have something for you.”

Lee heard the click of a buckle unclasping, followed by two thumps, like he was setting something on the table. A moment later, she heard the unmistakable sound of pages turning.

“You had them in your bag?” Henry whispered, shell-shocked. “You
had
them? And you took us down there anyway? What, for
fun
?”

“I took the books from my father’s library,” Matt said. “It’s not like he’ll miss them. The titles I gave you in the Underground were real, but I just wrote down a random address I remembered reading in the storage records.”

“When did you plan on telling me?”

“I was going to give them to you,” Matt said quietly. “I mean that. When you walked into the shop, I was going to put them in your hands because it would make you happy. I always wanted to make you happy, Henry. I just never knew how.”

“Matt…”

“And if I could convince you to have dinner with me after, and maybe come back to my apartment, then all the better.” His voice tightened. “See? I’m being honest with you now. Isn’t that what you wanted? But then you walked in with those humans, and I saw the way you looked at him, and the way he looked at you, and I just—”

“Decided you were going to try to kill him.” Henry’s voice was so low that a chill ran up Lee’s spine.

“I already told you, I wasn’t planning to do that.”

Lee’s heart was pounding. She realized her hands with clenched into tight fists. Matt woke that golem on purpose. She was about to climb out of the booth and hit him upside the head when Henry’s voice stopped her.

“Do you like this?” Henry asked. “Seeing how far you can push people until they finally run from you as fast as they can?”

“I never—” Matt hesitated. “I never wanted you to run from me.”

“I loved you!” Henry’s voice was shaking. “I defended you to everyone. I gave you everything I had,
everything
, and you punished me for it. What did you expect me to do? I couldn’t keep it up forever. I tried.”

Matt shifted back into that beseeching voice. “Henry…”

“Don’t touch me!”

Lee slid out of the booth, no longer caring if they realized she’d heard their conversation. Not that it mattered; neither seemed to notice her until she spoke. “Henry, it’s getting kind of late, isn’t it?”

It was only mid-afternoon, but when he looked at her, she could see that he was grateful for the exit. His eyes were shiny. “Yeah, it is,” he said, getting up. “We should probably head out if we want to make it back in good time.”

“Take the books, at least,” Matt said, pushing the two dusty volumes across the table. “If you’ll take nothing else from me.”

Carefully, Henry picked up the books and tucked them under his arm. “Thank you for these,” he said quietly.