Heir of the Dog Black Dog (21 page)

No wonder they kept to the shadows.

“You have killed the Unseelie prince.” He glanced to the Watcher on his right. That one nodded. “You have also slayed the Seelie prince.” Their voices layered together. “This is not the outcome we foresaw. You must accompany us to Summer, where the High Court will review our accountings.”

I lowered my head and sent magic coasting through my limbs. The skin fell away and left me with blood turning my cheeks sticky. I knelt there on the ground until I could breathe without gagging, then snagged the pelt and shoved to my feet. I should have left the skin there. I could have tossed it onto the other prince and been done with both of them, but a niggling doubt cautioned me to keep hold of it, at least until I spoke with the High Court.

My legs were rubber. I was grateful when Diode prowled over to me in a show of support. Rook put an arm around my waist and pressed a brief kiss to my temple. The knuckles of his other hand brushed over the pelt.

I flinched at his gentle touch. “I’m sorry about your brother.”

I had no choice, but Rook knew that. He wasn’t blaming me, which somehow made it worse.

“I am too,” he managed, voice thick with emotion. “If you like, I can put this somewhere safe, until you need it.”

“All right.” I handed it to him, feeling like a pallbearer passing over her charge.

Together the three of us faced the Watchers. Something told me we had a long night ahead of us.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Crossing into Summer was like stepping onto the back porch of my mother’s house in August. The sky was clear, the night clean. A fat moon hung overhead, and stars glittered as far as I could see. Frog song carried, accompanied by a bawdy cricket chorus and the bass hooting of something I felt safe assuming wasn’t an owl. Still, more than anywhere else in Faerie, this place reminded me of home.

“How much farther is it?” I wasn’t in any hurry to face down the consuls, I was just curious.

Distances seemed oddly fluid here. Almost as if by wanting to be somewhere, I got there faster. Considering how this sweat-sticky procession dragged, I began believing the opposite must also be true.

Diode butted his head against my thigh. “Not much longer now.”

I glanced at Rook, whose arm still hung around my waist and whose fingers rubbed my hip. His eyes were distant, the rest of his features arranged in such a way as to discourage conversation.

Since talking wasn’t an option, I settled for scratching Diode behind his ears. His rumbling purr thanked me. The sound was soothing. Odd, since I wasn’t a cat person.

While I mulled over the day’s events, our group strolled from a perfect summer night into a humid morning that promised midday would be a scorcher. The kind of day where, if there had been a sidewalk, you could have fried eggs on it then crisped yourself two strips of bacon.

“We have arrived,” the Watchers announced together.

I examined our surroundings. “Where are the Halls of Summer?”

They pointed toward a dark splotch in the landscape.

“What is that?” I squinted at it.

“The way in,” Rook answered.

After remaining quiet for so long, his voice startled me.

“The Halls of Summer are in a swimming hole.” I shook my head. “Of course they are.”

As our party approached the entrance, I could see it was, in fact, a natural pond. It reminded me of a case Shaw and I had worked together.

A farmer went to water his cows one day and found them standing in the middle of his field around a pond, measuring twelve feet in diameter, that hadn’t been there the night before. Sinkholes are common in Texas. Underground springs are too, so the farmer didn’t think much of it.

Word spread and local teens started sneaking onto his property to swim at Blue Hole, so named because the water was Caribbean blue and clear as the purest spring water. So clear you could have seen the bottom if there had been one, but the hole seemed to go on forever. Which became the topic of debate between the farmer, the geologists interested in studying the phenomenon, and the teens who figured the fastest way to figure out what was down there was to dive for it. And dive they did.

But they didn’t come back.

When the tally shot to five missing teens, the conclave caught wind of it and sent us to investigate. Turned out to be freshwater mermaids. They used the area’s underground river system as their own private hunting grounds and migratory system all rolled into one. Nasty things, mermaids.

Standing on the lip of this gateway into the Halls, I kept flashing back to those weeks spent at Blue Hole. How often had I swam there as bait, expecting a hand to grab my ankle and drag me to a watery grave, trusting Shaw’s reflexes were fast enough to save me if something tried?

I hoped we washed ashore after confronting what awaited us in the deep.

“It’s an illusion,” Rook said under his breath. “You have nothing to fear.”

The Watchers each stepped to one side of the hole and waited. I guess we were going first.

The soothing presence at my side had vanished. I sought out Diode. “Are you coming?”

“If I must.” He pressed against me and scowled at his reflection in the water. “Disgusting.”

“You’ll be fine.” I clutched his ruff. “If you’re not, you can take it out of Rook’s hide.”

“Pleased to be of service,” Rook said dryly.

I patted his chest. “I never doubted.”

“The consuls await,” the Watchers reminded us.

I tried meeting their eye—eyes?—and ended up crossing mine. “Can’t have that, can we?”

Rook cleared his throat. “Everything you say and do before them is seen by the consuls.”

“I figured.” I stood on the edge of the pool. “I just don’t care.”

They had kept me bent over a barrel since I arrived, hell, before I arrived, and I just wanted to go home. I had participated. That meant Mom went free. The rest wasn’t outlined, and I hadn’t signed any papers. Our verbal agreement, my obligation, was met to the letter.

Rook slid his hand into mine. I squeezed his fingers and let him guide me. We stepped onto, not into, the water. The sensation of falling tensed my knees, but he kept me standing as the water rose, never touching us, and the pit of my stomach stopped hovering overhead and dropped back into place.

Once the illusion of water receded, we stood in a cylindrical room made of what must have been glass or crystal. Beneath us, water rushed. It cascaded down the sides too. Overhead, a circular patch of blue sky illuminated the uncluttered chamber.

A low growl pumped to my left. Diode’s fur bristled, making him twice as imposing.

Poor guy, this had to be a cat’s worst nightmare.

A breeze stirred the loose hairs hanging from my braid, announcing the Watchers had joined us in the chamber. They crossed the room to where two clear benches extended from the wall, and sat. Over their heads, the rushing waters parted, and the same two likenesses as before appeared as watercolor portraits. Neither of the consuls looked pleased to see me.

“Thierry Thackeray.” Liosliath inspected me. “Your presence here is...most unexpected.”

“You agreed to take your father’s place in exchange for the return of your mother.” Daibhidh stared daggers at me. “Yet there you stand, as he has never stood.”

“Sorry, guys.” I kept my tone neutral. “This Black Dog gig didn’t come with an instruction manual.”

Air distorted to my right, and the Huntsman appeared with a snort.

“You laugh at this?” Liosliath spoke. “She murdered your hounds in cold blood.”

“Cold?” He chuckled. “No. Cold-blooded would be stealing a girl’s mother, ripping her from her life to participate in a game you savor playing every century. That this is the first time one of your houses has broken their blood oath and murdered a reigning king is the only surprise here.”

Liosliath’s reflection rippled with the force of his anger.

“This is not the first time a prince has died in pursuit of the throne, nor will it be the last. How many times have we crowned kings while their rival’s blood still stained their teeth?” The Huntsman drew himself taller. “The loss of both princes in one hunt is regrettable, but as we have offered past victors amnesty for crimes they committed in the heat of battle, so must we make allowances now.”

“Do the lives in your care mean so little?” Daibhidh asked.

“My hounds die in this tourney. Just as princes do. The beasts are made from my own blood and bone, my own soul and thought. When they die, it is
I
who pays the price,” he snarled. “Never think I don’t mourn their loss.”

The anguish in his voice resonated with me. “I’m sorry for my part in their deaths.”

“No one is truly sorry when they won and lived.” He sighed. “But I do accept the sentiment.”

“We sit here discussing
dogs
when each of the houses has lost a
prince
.” Daibhidh glared.

“The question set before us is this—” Liosliath spread his hands, “—do we forgive your trespass, allow you to atone by offering yourself as tribute for the next hunt, or do we behead you now as recompense?”

Rook stepped forward. “I propose a third alternative.”

That same taste of apprehension soured my mouth.

The Huntsman cocked his head. “What do you propose?”

“Your final words were, I believe,
‘
May the best hound win.’” Rook addressed Liosliath’s image with a tight smile then swept out his arm to indicate me. “I would argue that the best hound did.”

Utter silence. Complete stillness.

Then the room caught its breath and the consuls exploded into shouted arguments with Rook.

“Silence,” the Huntsman bellowed. “I will have silence.”

“The fact remains.” Liosliath cleared his throat. “She is not a hound.”

“She is the daughter of Black Dog, who once led the Wild Hunt and was one of the Huntsman’s first and best hounds.” Rook snapped his fingers, and the Unseelie prince’s pelt appeared draped across my shoulders. “She claimed my brother’s skin as hers. She was a hound when she slayed the Seelie prince.”

“You are no doubt claiming this was an Unseelie victory,” Liosliath seethed.

Daibhidh’s reflection jolted as he grasped the implications.

“Perhaps we ought to hear him out,” he said thoughtfully.

“You can’t be serious,” Liosliath spluttered. “She killed our princes.”

Daibhidh waved a hand. “There are more princes where those came from.” He swept his gaze over me with renewed interest. “Now a princess...that would be unique.”

My jaw would have dropped if I hadn’t clenched it shut.

“A princess,” Liosliath echoed with a grimace.

“An
Unseelie
princess,” his counterpart confirmed.

“If we allowed her to ascend,” Liosliath argued, “she must replace the king
we
lost. She must become a Seelie princess if such a title is bestowed, and how can it be? She is neutral, if you recall.”

Again Rook cleared his throat. “What small knowledge I have gleaned from her and her father’s condition leads me to assume that she devoured Raven’s essence prior to his death and the removal of his skin. That means my brother was with Thierry, physically and spiritually, as the Seelie prince died.”

“If she becomes a crown princess,” Liosliath argued, “what of her position in her world?”

My job, my life, my income was all being decided right in front of me like I wasn’t even there.

“I don’t want a crown,” I spoke over them. “I don’t want to rule.”

I had come to love my position with the conclave. I would not be blackmailed into this.

Rook returned to my side and gathered my hands in his. His thumbs rolled across my knuckles. “You won’t have to,” he promised me in a low tone. He then projected his voice for the High Court’s benefit. “My wife is young and modern. She was raised among humans. Thierry doesn’t understand the ways and traditions of Faerie, as evidenced by the fact we are all standing here having this conversation.”

“Don’t sound so disappointed not to be rid of her,” the Huntsman rumbled.

“You can’t comprehend the depths of my gratitude that she survived the ordeal.” He touched my cheek. “A lesser woman would have fallen victim to the hounds. Mine tore the skin from those who dared hunt her and ended their lives for their trespass against her. She is worthy of any crown.”

“As I recall...” Liosliath folded his arms, “...she is not alone in her humble origins. It seems to me that you were one of the Morrigan’s follies among men. Only she chose to raise you alongside her heir after her lord husband learned of your existence and threatened to see her wings clipped permanently. Your origin is as clouded as your bride’s, Rook Morriganson.”

“I lived twelve years among men,” Rook answered. “I have lived centuries among the sidhe.”

Face lit with avarice, Daibhidh asked, “What are you proposing?”

“That I rule in her stead,” he said in a loud, clear voice so steady he must have practiced the line.

My head whipped toward him so fast I got a crick in my neck. From pauper to princess—or was it from fae queen to Rook’s pawn?—in under five minutes. That must break a Faerie dynastic record.

Beware the Rook
. I was growing warier by the minute.

Diode snarled under his breath.

“Ha.” The Huntsman tugged at his beard. “What have you done to earn the right to rule?”

“More than my brother ever did.” Rook aimed his next remarks toward the consuls. “My crime was the circumstance of my birth, over which I had no control. I have been a loyalist of House Unseelie. I have sweated and bled and toiled—” his gaze touched on mine, “—and I have lied for them.”

“Be that as it may, you can’t believe even your own people will obey you.” Liosliath frowned. “If you seek to sell us on Thierry’s merits—you have done so. She is worthy of her father’s legacy, but it does you and yours no good to thrust the girl upon a throne she does not want and will not occupy.”

“She is fatigued from her ordeal,” Daibhidh countered. “Once she has recovered, she will see this unprecedented opportunity for the gift it is. Let her head clear before she answers.”