She closed her eyes. It had been too much to hope that the sentinels would keep quiet about their outing. What she wouldn’t give for a little privacy right now.
Don’t talk to me, she said to Dragos.
You left the Tower. His mental voice was so quiet and controlled it sent a chill down her spine. You promised you wouldn’t.
She snarled, I said don’t talk to me, you son of a bitch.
A heartbeat, and then, his calm quite stripped away, he demanded, What’s happened?
Shut up. Get out of my head.
Pia, goddammit. When she didn’t answer he roared, WHAT THE FUCK DID I DO NOW?
His telepathic shout reverberated in her skull. She clapped a hand to her forehead. Don’t yell at me like that. I can’t think! Give me a minute.
Her body felt numb, her seat belt the only thing anchoring her in place as Aryal suddenly cut across traffic. How could Dragos even ask her that? How could he not realize that she would know, now that she had made the full change to Wyr?
I’m sorry for shouting at you. He turned coaxing. Bayne and Aryal won’t say anything, just that you’re upset and they’re taking you where you need to go. Gray’s worried about you. We can talk about anything that’s wrong, can’t we? Pia, please. You’re killing me here.
Whatever else anyone might say about him, he had a wily wisdom that could slip inside a person like a stiletto. She wiped her eyes and tried to process. You don’t know . . . anything . . . about what’s going on?
I swear I don’t. His response was strong and immediate. Whatever has happened, we can fix it.
Could they? How?
Tell me where you’re going, he said. We’ll do it together.
Dragos, just give me the afternoon. She held on to a door handle as the Porsche hit an open stretch and gathered speed. I need to calm down and think, and I need to find out some things before I can talk to you.
Silence pulsed. Then, quiet and silken, he said, I could use your Name to call you back.
She sniffled as she stared out the window. She said, Threats aren’t a good idea right now, big guy.
Seconds trickled by. Then he told her, You have the afternoon. After that I’m coming to get you.
You’re giving me a whole afternoon of my own time? Gee, thanks. Big of you, said the part of her that was sarcastic with hurt. She managed to bite it back and stay silent.
Then he was silent too and she was alone.
Without him.
Rune and Graydon stood in Dragos’s office, their hands on their hips as they wore identical scowls.
“At least she’s protected,” Graydon said. “She’s got Aryal and Bayne with her.” He did not look reassured by his own words.
Rune asked, “Did she say where she needed to go or what was wrong?”
“No.” Dragos prowled the perimeters of the room. It was too small, closed in. “She just said she needed time. I told her I’d give her the afternoon.”
Rune said, “You’re really going to give her the whole afternoon?”
“Fuck, no. I lied.”
He threw open the French doors with such violence the glass shattered. The sharp May wind whipped through the room. The fresh air lessened his sense of confinement, but he still vibrated with the need for action.
“The witch isn’t answering her phone,” he said. “Find someone to put a tracking spell on this and do it fast.” He held up a fist. It was the one with her pale braided hair on his wrist.
“On it,” Gray said. He dove out the window and changed in midair.
Dragos and Rune regarded each other. Bayne and the harpy were excellent warriors. They were a couple of his finest.
But an afternoon could be a very long time in New York with the Fae King at large and intent on mischief.
An afternoon like that could be a very long time indeed.
Pia gave Aryal directions when necessary, but other than that the trip to Brooklyn remained mercifully silent. Soon they arrived at the large Brooklyn Wyr health clinic she had used for the last couple years. The clinic was housed in an unadorned square, concrete-block building in a neighborhood filled with pawn and barber shops, liquor and rent-to-own stores and businesses offering paycheck loans. A fugitive dereliction hovered around the edges of the streets, a sense of something sharp and desperate that huddled in shadowed places waiting to show its teeth after nightfall, but the clinic itself was open during the daytime, and it had a professional, caring staff and a high number of half-breed patients, so it was perennially busy.
Aryal pulled the Porsche to the curb and switched off the engine. Both she and Bayne snapped open their seat belts as they scanned the street.
Pia’s stomach clenched again. “Stay here,” she said.
“Sorry, Pia,” Bayne said. The gryphon moved fast. He was out of the car and standing guard before she could get her car door open. Aryal slid around the front of the Porsche and joined him.