chapter twenty-three
I didn’t make a whole lot of progress on my escape plan before falling asleep, stress and the exhaustion of my workout with Keane having stolen most of my energy and brainpower. I woke up in the morning not having moved past step one.
Still in my sleep-addled, pre-coffee daze, I sat up and swung my legs out of bed. That’s when my body reminded me that it wasn’t used to the kind of exercise it had endured yesterday, nor was it used to being repeatedly bashed against a shield spell and thrown to the mats. I groaned in misery and almost got back into bed.
I spent way more time in the shower than was strictly good for me, but the hot water pounding down against my sore muscles felt heavenly. I was still stiff and sore when I got out, but at least I was able to move.
Silly me, I’d expected that after yesterday’s intense training session, I’d get a day off. But when I made my way downstairs in search of coffee, I found Finn and Keane sitting at the dining room table.
They didn’t see me at first, and I hesitated in the stairway, surprised at the sight that met my eyes. Keane was smiling. Not a nasty smile, or a condescending smile, but a real smile. He and Finn were each nursing a cup of tea, and though their voices were too quiet for me to make out words, they seemed to be having an easy, bantering conversation. Was this the same Keane I’d met yesterday?
Then Keane caught sight of me, and the smile vanished. Didn’t that just make me feel welcome? Obviously, he had some kind of a problem with me, but hell if I knew what it was.
“Don’t let me interrupt,” I said as I breezed past them into the kitchen for a cup of Dad’s awful instant coffee. I was going to have to remember to buy a coffeepot and some real coffee if I was going to stay here much longer—which I was, if I couldn’t figure out how to get out of Avalon. The kettle was empty, so I took it to the sink to fill it, but when I turned around, Keane was standing way too close behind me.
I hadn’t heard him approach, so he was lucky I didn’t drop the full, heavy kettle on his foot in my surprise.
“You might want to wait until after working out to put anything in your stomach,” he said, smirking at the pleasure of having startled me.
“Getting between me and my coffee is dangerous,” I warned him. “And there’s no way I’m in any shape for another lesson today.”
I tried to push past him but, surprise, surprise, he didn’t let me. I wondered if his shield spell was up yet or if a strategically placed knee or elbow would actually hurt him.
“Don’t even think about it,” he said, and I felt the heat creep into my cheeks. Apparently, I’d been pretty transparent.
“Think about what?” I asked, but he just looked down his nose at me. “You know, I’m not in the army, and you’re not my commanding officer. I don’t have to have a lesson if I don’t want to.”
He cocked his head to one side, his face a mask of exaggerated curiosity as he stroked his chin. I saw he’d painted his nails black today—just in case I hadn’t noticed he was wicked Fae Goth boy, I suppose. “Is it that you think you’ve already learned everything you need to know, or that you think you’re out of danger today?”
“I can see why you opted out of Knight training,” I countered. “They’d have ‘accidentally’ killed you before you made it to adulthood.”
His expression and his body language didn’t change all that much, but it was enough to tell me I’d drawn blood. His eyes hardened, and a muscle ticked in his jaw. I should have been thrilled at my victory, but I’m just not that mean-spirited.
“Sorry,” I muttered. “Just because you’re an a*shole doesn’t mean I have to be a bitch.” Perhaps not the most wholehearted of apologies, but his expression thawed.
“I expect you to fight back with any available weapon,” he told me, and I saw something strangely like approval in his eyes. “If I attack you with words, then it’s only fair you counter with words.”
He smiled at me crookedly, and something inside me warmed. I’m pretty sure I was blushing as I turned away from him and put the kettle on the stove.
I should have known better than to turn my back on him. As I was reaching to turn the stove on—I didn’t care what he said, he was not keeping me from my coffee—he suddenly grabbed me from behind. I tried to counter with my elbows, just as he’d taught me, but he’d caught me by surprise, and I was too slow.
Keane whirled me around and bent down, grabbing me around the thighs and hoisting me easily over his shoulder. He clamped his arm over my calves, pinning my legs to his body so I couldn’t kick. From this position, there wasn’t much I could reach that was terribly vulnerable—not with any leverage, that is. I might have been able to reach his privates if I really stretched, but no way I was grabbing him there, no matter how effective it might be.
I reached up and tried to dig my fingers into his throat, but the position was too awkward, and he grabbed my hand with his free hand, pinning me even more securely as he carried me out of the kitchen. I raised my head and cast an appealing glance at Finn as we went by.
“Please call off your dog,” I said, but Finn held up his hands in a gesture of helplessness.
“I had to agree not to interfere or he’d have refused to come.”
“And that would have been a bad thing?” I asked, but we had already reached the spiral staircase, and I wasn’t sure Finn could hear me.
Keane carried me to the horse stall, the floor of which was covered with mats. He then slung me off his shoulder.
I’d expected him to put me down, not throw me down. Even with the mats, the impact with the floor knocked the breath out of me. I lay there, dazed, for a moment while Keane towered over me.
“Next time, put your arms out like this.” He demonstrated, holding his arms out to the side with his palms facing back. “Then slap your hands down when you hit to dissipate some of the force. If I’d been a bad guy, you’d be in deep shit right now.”
I sucked in a breath of air. “I’m really beginning to hate you,” I said.
“Glad to hear it,” he replied with a cocky smile. “Now why didn’t you go for my balls when I slung you over my shoulder? I let you hang low enough to have a shot.”
I pushed myself up to a sitting position, ducking my head to hide the blush I was sure colored my cheeks. “Only in your wildest dreams am I touching you there,” I grumbled.
He laughed and offered me a hand up. I decided to ignore it, figuring it was a trick of some sort. My muscles groaned in protest as I hauled myself to my feet. They hadn’t felt too good before Keane had slammed me into the mats.
“If a bad guy grabs you, are you going to be too prudish to touch him there if that’s your best chance to get away?” he asked.
My cheeks burning brightly, I managed to meet his stunning green eyes. “Touching a stranger is one thing. Touching someone I’m going to have to look in the eye afterward is another.” I jutted my chin out and gave him my most stubborn look. He’d pushed me into doing things I wasn’t comfortable doing, but he wasn’t going to push me into that.
Keane thought about it for a minute, looking displeased. Then he nodded. “All right. I suppose I can see your point. Now, let’s work on how to escape various holds, using the tools I taught you yesterday.”
It was a weird morning. Since Keane was teaching me how to escape holds, it meant he was constantly grabbing me, holding me against his body. He was an a*shole, but he was one hell of a sexy a*shole, and I couldn’t help being aware of it when his hands were on me. He moved with lethal grace, and the intensity in his eyes said he loved what he was doing—whether because he loved teaching, or because he loved fighting, or because he just liked beating me up I wasn’t sure.
I was pleasantly surprised to find myself a fast learner. Keane could still overpower me with frightening ease, but I was making him work harder at it than he had yesterday. Hard enough for a fine sheen of sweat to coat his brow. He should have smelled of nasty, stinky guy, but instead I caught the mingled scents of leather and something unfamiliar, yet faintly herbal.
One time when we were rolling around on the mat, I ended up on my back with my hands pinned beside my head. I was eye to eye with him, the entire front of his body pressed against mine. I felt his breath against my cheek, and I smelled the leather-and-herb scent that was beginning to be familiar—and delicious. His hair hung over one of his eyes, hiding it behind an inky black fringe, but I still felt trapped more by his stare than by his hold. His pupils dilated, and I saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed hard.
He did not look amused. He did not look annoyed. None of his usual expressions. Instead, I’d say he looked … surprised. He lay there on top of me, looking into my eyes, failing to snark at me for not trying to fight my way free.
“Can we just pretend I head-butted you?” I asked breathlessly. “My head aches enough already.” It wasn’t a lie, either. I didn’t know how many times I’d crashed my skull into him this morning, but it was a lot.
His grip on my wrists loosened, and a faint smile lifted his lips. “Fair enough,” he said, then rolled off of me, lying on his back beside me just out of touching distance.
I immediately missed the warmth of his body. Of course, it had to be just a rebound thing. There was no way I was interested in this arrogant, obnoxious jerk. No matter how hot he might be.
Still, he hadn’t looked arrogant and obnoxious just now. “Can I ask you something?” I said, staring up at the ceiling so I didn’t have to be tempted by his hotness.
“Sure,” he responded, and he sounded much friendlier than he had since I’d first met him.
“Is all this attitude stuff just part of the lesson, or do you really have something against me?”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. He sat up and wrapped his arms around his knees, not looking at me, the expression on his face thoughtful. I stayed where I was, somehow fearing any movement I made would turn him back into his usual self.
“It’s not you, exactly,” he finally said. “I just don’t like being told what to do.” He smiled sardonically. “One of the reasons Knight training didn’t work out for me.”
I frowned up at him. “I thought you chose not to enter Knight training.”
“No, I chose not to stay in Knight training.” He smiled wryly. “It was something of a mutual decision. I didn’t want to blindly follow orders, they didn’t want to deal with a troublemaker.”
“And what does this have to do with me?”
He blew out a breath. “Nothing, exactly.” He turned to face me, crossing his legs.
I was tired of looking up at him, so I pushed myself up into a sitting position. “I don’t get it.”
He met my gaze steadily. “Why do you think they chose an eighteen-year-old Knight reject to be your teacher?” he asked.
“Huh?” I asked intelligently.
“There are Fae out there who have centuries of experience with fighting and with teaching. I’m good, but I’m not that good. So why would your father, who could afford anyone he wanted to hire, choose me?”
“Because you’re Finn’s son?” I suggested.
“That made a convenient excuse. I bet my father was even the one to suggest it. But there’s more to it than that.”
“Go on. Spell it out for me.” There was a hard lump in my gut, and I clenched my teeth tightly.
He looked away. “Your father had a private word with me before he left for work yesterday. He didn’t come out and say it—he’s far too subtle for that—but he suggested I might want to ‘befriend’ you.” He made air quotes. “He said you’d made a couple of Unseelie friends, and he wanted to offer you a Seelie alternative.”
I lowered my head into my hands, fighting a sudden urge to hunt my dad down and personally show him all the neat tricks Keane had taught me.
“I didn’t much appreciate the suggestion,” Keane continued in a massive understatement. He sighed. “But it wasn’t fair of me to take it out on you. Sorry.” He managed another smile. “Don’t get me wrong—my teaching methods are never warm and fuzzy, and if you don’t feel like smashing my face in when we’re sparring, then I’ll feel like I’ve done something wrong.”
I gave a little snort of laughter. “Thanks for telling me. And I’m sorry my dad’”
“You don’t have to apologize for your father.” He pushed to his feet, and I could see the drill-sergeant mask drop back into place. “Now, enough resting. Let’s get back to work.”
I was sore, tired, and pissed off at my dad for his behind-the-scenes matchmaking, or whatever it was he’d thought he was doing. But despite everything, I couldn’t say I was completely unhappy to spend more time in Keane’s arms, even if it was just to fight.
———
I spent much of the afternoon debating whether I should confront my dad about pushing Keane at me. Based on the brutal honesty he’d already shown me, I knew he’d tell me the truth about what he’d done, and maybe even about why. The question was, did I want the truth?
When Dad came home that night, however, I decided his little manipulative tricks were the least of my worries. Because, you see, he’d had another meeting with Grace and Alistair, and the Big Three had come to an agreement as to where I would live, the “safe house” that would supposedly keep the bad guys from finding me.
I had a sneaking suspicion that Mom’s threats to take me out of Avalon without Dad’s approval had inspired the Big Three to come to an agreement faster than they might have otherwise. I also suspected that I’d have a much harder time escaping from the safe house than from my dad’s place. Dad told me they planned to have the place ready as soon as tomorrow, so whatever I was going to do, I’d have to do it fast.
I had two major problems to solve if I hoped to go home with Mom. First, I had to get out of the house. Second, I had to get out of Avalon. The first should be manageable, as long as I waited until Dad was asleep at night. I wasn’t getting by Finn no matter what, but Dad could hardly expect me to try to sneak out alone in the middle of the night. Naturally, he would assume I wasn’t that stupid. I tried not to think about the terrible things that could happen to me if the bad guys found me wandering the streets of Avalon alone at night.
The second problem was tougher to figure out. How could I get out of Avalon without a passport? Hell, even if I miraculously made it through the border and into England without my passport, I wouldn’t be able to get back into the United States without one. I was sure I could arrange to get a new one in London, but that would take time, and Mom and I had to get well and truly gone as fast as possible.
The inevitable conclusion was that I needed my passport. But if I asked my dad about it, that would put him on his guard, particularly when he knew Mom planned to “rescue” me from him.
I was completely stymied. Yeah, I could try searching the house for the passport, but I couldn’t guarantee it was here, and my chances of getting caught and putting Dad on high alert were too great. I supposed it was a good thing that passports are hard to forge, but I was finding it rather inconvenient at the moment.
And then I reminded myself where I was: Avalon. The Wild City, the Magic City. If I couldn’t forge a passport with technology, might magic do the trick? I remembered the dismal little room in the tunnels that Ethan had taken me to, the one no one would ever know was there because of the illusion spell Ethan had cast. If he could create a wall that wasn’t there, could he create a passport?
It was a crazy idea. Even if Ethan really could pull it off, I had to be out of my mind to even think about asking him. He was the enemy, after all. Well, maybe not the enemy exactly, but he was definitely a lying jerk who had his own—and his father’s—best interests at heart.
Then again, he had taken quite a risk approaching me at Starbucks the other day to tell me the truth about the Spriggan attack. Finn had been on a hair trigger, and he could easily have flattened Ethan. And Ethan could have just had his father warn my father. The fact that he’d talked to me personally instead told me he probably really did feel bad about what he’d done.
Bad enough to help me escape Avalon?
I gnawed my lip. Even if he wanted to help me, he might think the same way my dad did, that I was safer in Avalon than in the mortal world. I let the idea ping around in my brain the rest of the evening. Dad couldn’t help but notice my less-than-lovely mood, but though he tried to talk to me a few times, he didn’t push.
I watched TV with him for a bit, my arms crossed over my chest, my shoulders hunched. I hoped I wasn’t laying it on too thick. Probably not, because Dad looked relieved when I finally announced I wasn’t in the mood for TV and wanted to spend some time surfing the Net.
When I got upstairs, I closed my bedroom door, then booted up my computer. I’d bookmarked the Avalon phone directory when I’d been looking for my dad, so I had no trouble finding it again. I then held my breath as I entered Ethan’s name into the search field. I sighed in relief when his number popped up. Then I kind of laughed at myself, because it was way too early to feel anything even resembling relief. I didn’t know what the chances were that Ethan could help me, or that he would help me. But I was about to find out.
I surfed to an Internet radio station and turned the volume up on my computer. If Dad was spying on me and wanted to listen in on my call, all he had to do was pick up another receiver, but at least with the music blasting he wouldn’t be able to overhear me accidentally if he for some reason came to check on me.
I then went through a few repetitions of picking up the phone, starting to dial, then chickening out and hanging up, before I finally punched in Ethan’s number. I don’t know if I’d have had the courage to try again if Ethan hadn’t been home, but luckily he picked up before I chickened out yet again.
“Hello?” he said.
My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth, and I sat there like an idiot not saying anything. How could I possibly be asking help from a guy who (1) could have gotten me killed by arranging for me to be attacked, and (2) had used magic to try to seduce me for political reasons?
“Hello?” he repeated. “Anyone there?”
Then again, it wasn’t like I was just overflowing with options. I cleared my throat, and that loosened it up enough for me to talk. “Yeah. It’s me. Dana.” I rolled my eyes at myself. I’m sure he recognized my voice without me having to tell him my name.
There was a half-second hesitation before he answered. “Well, this is a surprise,” he said in a low mumble I’m not sure I was supposed to hear. “Is everything all right?”
“Um, yeah. Sort of. Umm…” Oh, please! Could I sound any more pathetic? “Well, not exactly.”
“Sorry. That was a stupid question. You wouldn’t be calling me if everything were all right. Are you somewhere safe? Do you need me to come get you?”
“I’m fine,” I said, feeling more confident. “I’m at my dad’s house.”
“Oh.”
“Look, you know what a mess I’m in. Your father has filled you in, hasn’t he?” Because I couldn’t believe Alistair wouldn’t have told Ethan about the Queens being after me, not when the two of them had already been coconspirators.
“Yeah, he told me. But I was coming to that conclusion myself. The more I thought about those Spriggans…” His voice trailed off, probably because he realized talking to me about the Spriggans wasn’t his wisest move.
“My dad says I have to stay in Avalon for my own safety. I bet your dad and Aunt Grace agree.”
“But you don’t.”
“I assume Kimber told you about what happened to Finn the other day?”
“Yeah.” I could almost hear the wince in his voice.
“If I stay here, I’ll have both Queens after me, and they’ll have a lot more weapons they can use against me. If I leave, the Seelie Queen will be satisfied, and the only people the Unseelie Queen can send after me are humans.”
“But you won’t have any sort of magical protection at all,” he reminded me.
“I won’t need it if I don’t have Fae attacking me.” I think I was trying to convince myself as much as him. I reminded myself that if we escaped Avalon, Mom had promised to go into rehab, and that was worth whatever crazy risks I was about to take.
He changed gears. “All right; let’s say I buy your reasoning. I know I’m not your favorite person right now, so I’m guessing I have a part to play in this great escape?”
I bit my lip. I’d probably told him enough already to get me in trouble if he blabbed to his dad, but even so, it was hard to make that final leap of faith and tell him what I had in mind.
“Did you ever actually like me, or was the whole thing an act?” I found myself asking, without having had any intention of bringing the subject up.
“Of course I liked you. Like you. How could I not? I wish I had half your courage.”
That startled me. “What are you talking about? I’ve been a mess since day one!”
He snorted. “You saved Jason’s life when those Spriggans attacked. If you hadn’t slowed the Spriggan down, I’d have been too late to save him. Not to mention that you had the courage to come all the way to Avalon by yourself.”
“That wasn’t courage. That was stupidity.”
He laughed, but it sounded bitter. “I know you had to defy your mother to come here, and you’re planning to defy your father to leave. I have never once successfully defied my father. So that’s courage in my book.”
“If you say so.”
“I do. Now tell me why you’re calling. What do you want me to do?”
I considered the ramifications of what he’d just said, and my heart sank a bit. “I was basically going to ask you to defy your father and help me get out of Avalon.”
“Tell me what you need, and I’ll help as best I can. Defying him behind his back might be slightly easier than doing it to his face.” Again, I heard a hint of bitterness in his voice. I hoped that meant his conscience was bothering him over what he’d done to me.
“So you don’t think I’m completely crazy for wanting to leave?”
“It’s a risk. But then, so is staying in Avalon. As you’ve already seen.”
I believed him. Of course, I’d believed him before and been wrong, so my judgment might be questionable. But he was the only hope I had, so I pushed forward.
“Right now, I can’t get out of Avalon because either Grace or my father has my passport. I don’t see myself getting it back, no matter who has it. So somehow, I need a fake one that will do the trick. Is that something your magic can do?”
For a long, tense moment, he didn’t say anything. I could practically hear him thinking. Now, if only I knew what he was thinking!
“I suppose you know this,” he said, “but that’s a hell of a lot more complicated than creating an illusionary wall.”
“Yeah, I figured. But is it possible?”
Another long pause for thought. “It’s certainly possible. I’m just not sure I can do it. I’m good, but that’s a tall order. There are a lot of pages in a passport, and they’re detailed. Plus, I’d need an American passport to model it on, because I wouldn’t know what one looks like off the top of my head.”
“I can get you an American passport,” I told him. “My mom came to Avalon looking for me, so we can borrow hers. The question is, can you make the counterfeit one?”
“I don’t know.”
“But’”
“The only way I’ll know is if I try. I can guarantee I’ll try my hardest, but I can’t guarantee it will work. When can you get me the model passport?”
That was going to be a bit tricky. (Yeah, like everything else was going to be so simple.) The easiest way to get Ethan my mom’s passport would be to send him to her hotel. But would my mom actually hand her passport over to some Fae she didn’t know? I sincerely doubted it.
Maybe if I called her and told her he was coming?
A chill snaked down my spine. I was currently trapped here in Avalon because Grace had absconded with my passport. I was willing to take the risk that Ethan might betray me, but could I also risk my mom like that? Could I have her hand over her passport to a guy I wasn’t sure I could trust?
The answer was no. I was going to have to get the passport myself, and I wasn’t going to let it out of my sight while Ethan tried to replicate it.
“I’m going to have to sneak out of the house somehow to get it,” I said.
“Not a good idea, Dana.”
I bit back a snappish response and went for dry sarcasm instead. “You expect me to get out of Avalon without leaving my dad’s house?”
He sighed. “Right. Good point. But I’m not letting you wander around the streets of Avalon undefended. Tell me when you intend to perform your great escape. I’ll come meet you. I’m not as powerful as Finn, but I’m better than nothing.”
More lip-gnawing was in order. If I was wrong about this, if Ethan backstabbed me, then I was delivering myself straight into Alistair’s arms. I wondered if he would change his mind about whatever agreement he now had with Grace and my dad if I were in his custody.
But despite my doubts, I had already made my decision before I’d even picked up the phone.
“I’m going to wait until late, when I’m sure my dad is asleep. Maybe one a.m.?”
“That’s good. There will be fewer people in the streets then. Less chance of being seen. I’ll be waiting for you. Call if there’s any change of plans, okay?”
“Yeah. Sure.” Oh my God, I was really going to do this. Was I nuts? “I’ll see you then.”
“Okay. Hang in there. If things go well, we’ll have you out of Avalon before the sun rises tomorrow.”
I clung to that hopeful idea as I hung up the phone and tried not to think about just how many things could go horribly wrong.