Old Dog, New Tricks (7 page)

The troll holding on to me bellowed in agony. No stopping it. No saving him. He was toast.

Magic slid underneath his skin, scalpel-sharp, cleaving flesh from muscle. Sliding deeper, into his chest, through his heart, a fist of magic grabbed the organ and squeezed it to pulp. Reaching wider, the fingers of power stabbed into the nugget of soul and ripped it free, devouring his essence before I gained control of myself. His body crumpled, landing in a heap beside my head. His skin landed in a fragile sheet half on top of me. When I breathed in, I inhaled flakes of skin and burnt hair.

“What did it do?” one of the corner trolls yelled. “
What did it do?
”

“It killed him,” the other barked. “It killed him with a touch of its hand. I saw it.”

“I’ll kill it with my hand.” The first troll made a fist. “See how it likes that.”

“It’s going to die,” the second troll sneered.

Pushing upright, I twisted into lotus position. That was as far as I made it before they charged.

The second troll palmed my entire head. I clamped a hand on to his thick wrist and used the fresh energy coursing through me to rip his soul through his chest with magic fingers. More in control this time, I reeled my power in like a lasso and flung it at the third troll as he landed a kick to my side. Gripping his ankle, I shoved more energy into him. His essence leaked from his heel to puddle underneath me like black sludge.

When I released him, his body, balanced on one foot, teetered, hitting the floor and bouncing. The second troll loomed over me, dead fingers spearing my hair, until impact jostled him and he toppled, landing on top of the third one with a thud. Both were hard as the stone they became in daylight.

Jaws stretched in primal screams. Eyes peeled open wide and blank. Their last breaths reeked of terror.

Left hand raised high like a beacon, spilling light into the room, I scanned for more trolls.

“Mai,” I called. She bounded to me, fur standing on end, thick tail swishing. “Where is Mac?”

She pointed her nose toward the ceiling.

“He’s still in the magistrates’ office? Are they hurt or—?”

The fox leapt from my lap, hunkered down on the floor and covered her ears with her paws.

“They’re hiding?”

A growl.

I took that as a negative. “They can’t hear us?”

A yip.

As I stood, it hit me. “They activated a privacy spell so they wouldn’t be disturbed.”

Mai nodded, the gesture looking too human on a fox.

Leaving her where she sat, I crossed to Shaw and fell to my knees at his side. “Oh, Jackson.”

He groaned at the sound of his name and turned his head toward me. His face was ruined. Blood covered him from scalp to collarbone, and when he parted his lips, I counted missing teeth. Potent anger ignited in my gut. All that remained of my glove was a charred scrap of fabric that I tore away.

Clasping hands with him, I trusted Mai to watch my back while I gently pushed a portion of the energy I had consumed into him. Healing worked best with several slow transfusions of magic. That was a luxury we didn’t have, but I couldn’t pump him full of juice. Not when he had been eating light for days. Instead I fed him a trickle until some of the swelling left his cheeks and the skin crept over exposed bone, reknitting the split halves of his face together. Lids regenerated over his eyes, which cracked open a fraction to stare up at me.

“I need to get my father,” I said softly. “I’m going to leave Mai here with you.”

Slight pressure on my fingers told me he heard and understood.

Shoving to my feet, I whirled on Mai. “Bark if anything moves. I’ll be back as fast as I can.”

I took the stairs three at a time, reached the door of the magistrates’ office and pounded on the gleaming silver wood panels with my fists. “Hey,” I called. “Open up. There’s a situation out here.”

No one answered. No one flung open the doors. No one ran to my rescue.

A sick, sick feeling curdled my stomach.

How long had I been out? What else had strolled through the portal? Where was my father? Had the magistrates been captured? Killed?
Mable
. Oh, God. What if she had been hurt? What if Mom...

No. Shut down the fear. Twenty questions had to wait. This wasn’t a drill. This was real.

Faerie had brought the war here. And I had helped.

Exhaling slowly between my lips, I shoved the memory of Shaw’s battered face out of my mind and grasped the fraying sense of calm Mac had struggled to teach me. From there I summoned magic into my runes and flattened my palm against the door. Through that link, I sensed a heavy enchantment as thick as cotton batting shrouding the room. I couldn’t hear a peep through it, and I bet they couldn’t either. Great. On the upside, this meant the threshold remained unbroken. That was a good sign.

If the fighting downstairs hadn’t punctured the spell, how was I going to manage the job?

My bag of supplies was in my office, probably, unless the trolls had taken it. But this was out of my league. I didn’t have Shaw’s experience or knack for cracking enchantments. Dragging him here for this wasn’t an option. Not unless I spent more time healing him first. By then it might be too late.

Sizzling noises drew my gaze to where red liquid popped and bubbled on the floor.

A thin cut severed my palm, and blood dripped from my hand. Weird. Had I been bleeding all this time? I flexed my fingers, waiting for the wound to knit closed, but it didn’t. It kept weeping in a slow but steady drip. Kneeling by the hissing blood splotches, I wiped my finger through them, and a pulse of magic raced up my arm. Again I called magic into my hand, hotter and faster this time. I let it build, pressed my runes and the sore against the door simultaneously, and a
pop
unblocked my ears.

I smacked the wood with my open hands. “Can anyone hear me?
Hello?
”

Inside, I heard the legs of a chair scooting backward. Footsteps. A
click
as the knob turned.

I don’t know what Evander saw in me right then, but he shouted quick orders in his native tongue, and the others leapt to their feet. Even Kerwin, the Unseelie magistrate, and not my biggest fan showed concern. Each dipped a hand into the air and withdrew their weapons from the pockets of ether where they stored them, and as one they all turned their eyes toward Mac.

Emerald light burst in his hand, darkening until a viscous black magic swirled around his feet.

He lifted his head, and his nostrils flared. “Trolls.”

“I killed three of them,” I said, voice trembling, “but Shaw’s hurt.”

Mac’s gaze swept over me and left me cold and miserable. “Take us to him.”

I sprinted down to my office, Mac hot on my heels, squinting against the strobing light painting the hallway red. The portal was growing. I swept inside my office and pulled up short.

Shaw was gone.

No body. No blood. No tracks. No scent.

Vanished without a trace.

“He was right there.” The sharp edge of panic cut into my voice. “Mai?”

Small as she was in fox form, she might have hidden. She might have...

I jumped when a hand buzzing with power landed on my shoulder. Heart pounding, I jerked away from the touch, gulping hard at Mac’s grim expression. The icy coldness in his green-black aura clung to my chilled skin. He stalked toward me and snarled in my face. “What happened?”

I eased back a step. “Shaw—”

He dug his fingers into my upper arms. “This is bigger than Shaw.”

“He’s hurt.” Panic narrowed my focus to a fine point. “He was right there.
Where is he?
”

Green eyes blazing, Mac homed in on the pendant I hadn’t tucked back into my shirt, and his lip curled. “Why do you still wear that?” He uttered a feral growl. “Remove it and give it to me.”

My hand closed over the skin-warmed pendant. I meant to lift it over my head, I did, but my elbow locked. I stood there clutching the Morrigan’s coin, frantic for Shaw and desperate to find Mai, my pulse sprinting like my life depended on this moment, frozen in the face of Macsen’s anger.

A strange expression settled over his features, and his fury dissolved. “It’s a compulsion.”

“No, it’s not.” I tossed my head until my brain rattled. “I would know if it was.”

“Give me the necklace,” he demanded.

Fingers cinched, I extended the hand holding the pendant toward him, but I couldn’t loosen them, couldn’t take off the necklace, couldn’t remember if it tied or clasped or what. The idea of removing it was insane. What would I do without its comforting weight around my neck? Where would I keep my skins?
My skins
. My gaze broke from Mac and skittered to the closet and its whirling red vortex.

All my skins.

Lost.

The puca. The hound. The selkie.

All gone.

Confused tears welled in my eyes.

“It will be all right,” Mac said gently.

Faster than my eyes could track, he fisted the chain and jerked. It snapped at my nape with a bite of pain. His arm completed its downward arc, yanking me forward when my hand refused to unclasp and let him take the coin from me. His hand clamped over mine, and he pried loose my fingers one by one.

Once he alone held the coin, a flare of magic burst from his palm and engulfed his clothing. Red magic lashed him like a tongue of unquenchable flames while a piercing cry made the room tremble.

Throat burning, I understood the scream came from me. I curled onto my side on the floor and rocked back and forth, stomach roiling, skin too tight, feeling wrong, like a T-shirt turned inside out.

Face lined with concentration, Mac rubbed his hands together until ash rained from his fingertips.

The chain, the pendant, all of it, reduced to silver-black dust.

With a bone-weary sigh, Mac settled his attention back on me, and an emotion dangerously close to disappointment shrouded his features. Power thrummed in his voice when he ordered me, “Sleep.”

My eyes rolled back in my head.

––––––––

C
onsciousness burst through me like the first gasp of breath after spending too long under water, a shock to my system that jolted me the way a hit of espresso can and jangled my nerves in a sudden fright.

I bolted upright, magic pooling in my palm, and froze when I saw I wasn’t alone.

A man wearing a long black cloak stood with his back facing me as he studied an odd collection of archaic implements pinned onto a velvet backing on the table in front of him. A quick downward glance confirmed my worst fears. I sat on another such table, velvet crushed under my sweaty palms.

My frantic mind supplied me with the mental image of me pinned to the cloth like a butterfly, as part of this freak’s collection. Memories hammered at my sanity. I had been part of a collection once.

Balamohan laved his sticky-sharp tongue over my skin while he feasted on my death.

I had to clamp my lips shut to choke the dry heaving. “Where am I?”

“It doesn’t matter.” The black-clad figure turned. “We’re leaving.”

“Mac?” He was dressed in black leather armor similar to what I had worn during the Coronation Hunt.

“The outpost in Wink has been warded. The marshal’s office has been blood warded. By me.”

In Wink
sounded like we weren’t there anymore, but we had to be, right?

The bitter sweat from an adrenaline dump soaked through my shirt. A burst of ripe panic pushed me to my feet. Jittery as a spider on caffeine, I was all twitchy legs and a frantic heart.

“Where is Shaw?” Fear dried my tongue. “I have to finish healing him.”

Mac rapped his knuckles on the wall in front of him, and a door swung open behind me.

I turned in time to watch Mai enter wearing baggy sweatpants rolled up at the ankles, socks and a T-shirt she could have worn as a dress with the right belt. Her hair was damp and her face bruised.

My throat squeezed tight. “Mai...”

She stopped several feet away from me and asked Mac, “Is she clean?”

Clean?
I recoiled from her harsh tone, the cold phrasing.

“I examined her again before I let her wake,” my father answered just as cryptically.

I leaned against the table for support. “What’s going on?”

Cool and assessing, Mai studied me for signs of...foaming at the mouth? Dilated pupils? I don’t know what she expected to see.

“The Morrigan rolled you.” Mai cocked her hip and crossed her arms over her chest. “When she one-upped your ‘gift’, she took the liberty of coating it with one hella nasty compulsion.” Fingers tapping her upper arms, she added, “All so you wouldn’t remove the pendant, wouldn’t want it removed, and would give whoever tried to force you holy hell for the attempt. She needed to make sure it stuck to you so you wouldn’t squeal on her closet renovations until she was ready for the big reveal.” She eased closer. “You were lucky, Tee. If Mac hadn’t been there to absorb the kickback when he broke the chain, you would be dead.”

“Is that...?” I wrapped my arms around my middle. “Is that why you’re angry with me?”

“She isn’t angry,” Mac said without turning. “This is the third time I have woken you.”

“The third time?” I rubbed my forehead. “The last thing I remember was...”

“It’s okay.” Mai stepped forward again. “Some of your memory is missing.”

I spluttered before my brain got traction.
“How is that okay?”

“You lost four point three seconds,” Mac said. “You won’t miss them.”

“How did—?” I pointed at his back and asked Mai, “Did he—?” I swayed on my feet. “I think I need to sit down for a minute.” My knees buckled, and my butt hit the floor. “Was anyone hurt?” A gut-wrenching flash of Shaw’s pulped face in my mind kept me swallowing to keep my throat clear.

No Shaw. No body.
There had been no body
.

“Oh God, Shaw.” My nails scraped over the tile. “Where is he? What happened? Is he all right?”

Mac turned at last, and his color was ashen. “He was taken.”

“Taken,” I parroted.

“There was a fourth troll,” Mai said quietly. “He must have been the lookout on the opposite side of the portal. When the others didn’t return, he popped in, saw what happened and grabbed Shaw.” Her head dropped, chin bumping her chest. “I fought them. I tried—” Her voice broke. “I was too scared to shift back. I got stuck.
Stuck
. I couldn’t cry for help.” She sniffled. “I should have followed them.”