My “thing” entailed making like a brisk vacuum through the church, and when I’d finished with the spartan stone chapel, sweeping over the graves, up and down burial lanes, in and around mausoleums, searching with an inner antenna I’d not known I possessed, to collect things a few weeks ago I wouldn’t have believed existed.
I saved the unmarked graves behind the church for last. I was armed to the teeth with flashlights, although I knew no Shades were here. Where Shades dwell, no night crickets chirp, not a blade of grass stirs, and tree limbs gleam bare and white as old bones.
I expected my stroll through the cemetery at night to be unnerving. I didn’t expect to find the hushed world of the human dead soothing, peaceful, but there was an undeniable synergy here. Natural death was part of life. Only unnatural death—like Alina’s—opposed the order of things and demanded retribution, a balancing of the scales on a cosmic level. I read the inscriptions as I passed. The epitaphs not worn to dust by time were heartfelt and warm. There were a surprising number of octogenarians and even centenarians interred here. Around these parts, life had once been simple, good, and unusually long, especially for the men.
Barrons waited in the car. I could see him in profile, talking on his cell phone.
Finding an object of power, or OOP, for short, is a talent not all sidhe-seers have. From what Barrons says it’s rare. Alina had the gift, too, which is why the Lord Master used her.
Don’t think I don’t see the similarities between us: my sister and the Lord Master, Barrons and me. Difference is, I don’t believe Barrons is out to destroy Mankind. I don’t think he particularly cares much for Mankind, but I don’t think he has any deep-seated desire to see us all wiped out. Another difference is he hasn’t tried to seduce me, and I’m not in love with him. I have a clear head about what I’m doing and why. And, if one day, I learn Jericho Barrons did kill O’Duffy for snooping into his life, and is one of the bad guys, well…I’ll cross that bridge if and when I come to it.
Revenge is a dish best served cold. I never used to understand that saying, but I think I finally get it. I’m hotheaded and inexperienced right now. I need to know more about the Fae, and what I am. I need to be cooler, smarter, tougher, stronger, and packing better arsenal before I go after revenge. I need more OOPs, like the spear. I need Barrons. He’s an endless source of information, and knows all the right places to look. Take this cemetery, for instance. I never would have known it existed, or what it had once been. I don’t know the first thing about my heritage and even less about Irish history. Criminally young, he charged, and I can’t argue. But I can change.
I stepped into the shadows beyond the church, swinging my flashlights left and right. This part of the graveyard was enclosed by a low, crumbling wall of stone, and had been fending for itself for years. No gardener toiled here. The grass grew tall and dense, and not one flower broke the stark pallor of many small cairns neglected beneath the heavy boughs of oak and slender limbs of yew. A broken wrought-iron gate swung from a single hinge that creaked a rusty protest when I pushed it open and stepped in.
So much for my talents—I was thigh-high in grass, and tripping over the darn thing before I sensed it.
In my defense, there wasn’t much of it left.
“What is it?” I asked Barrons, horrified.
When I’d stumbled over the monstrosity, I’d screamed loud enough to wake the dead. Barrons had come at a run.
It was a misshapen lump at our feet, motionless but for the occasional, terrible shudder.
“I do believe it’s what’s left of a Rhino-boy,” Barrons said slowly.
“What happened to it?”
“I believe, Ms. Lane that something has been…gnawing at it.”
“What in the world eats Rhino-boys? And why?”
He glanced at me and I was stunned to see that he looked stunned himself, which was an exorbitant display of emotion for Barrons. “It had to be another Fae.” He sounded appalled. “Nothing human could take down one of these things, and would certainly have no cause to eat it. As for the why, I have no idea. It goes against everything that is Sidhe. Fae do not savage one another. Even the lowest of the Unseelie would consider this an atrocity, an abomination. Packs of them would turn on the defiler.”
“Will it die?” I asked. There was so little of it left. Yet it lived, and its agony was obvious.
“Not unless you stab it with your spear, Ms. Lane.”
“Will it eventually regenerate or something?” It was missing major parts.
“No. Only the royal castes have that power. It will exist in this form forever, unless one of its own race stumbles across it and takes pity on it, which is unlikely. Or you do.” His gaze was heavy on me. “Do you? Pity it?”
I stared into his dark eyes. Sometimes they seem bottomless, not entirely human, and this was one of those times.
“Tell me, Ms. Lane, will you walk away from it? Let it suffer for eternity? Or are you an angel of mercy?”
I bit my lip.
“Which will it be? Knowing one of these things murdered your sister. Perhaps not a Rhino-boy, but certainly one of its brethren.”
“The Lord Master killed my sister.” I was sure of it.
“So you say. He’s not Fae and the marks on her body were.”
There was that. Still, if he hadn’t actually dealt the killing blow, he was the one who’d orchestrated it. I narrowed my eyes. Barrons was testing me. I had no idea what his twisted idea of a passing grade was. I only knew what I had to do. There is a synergy to life and death, and this did not fit.
I slid the spear from my boot and stabbed the Rhino-boy. Barrons smiled, but I don’t know if he was mocking me for being weak or lauding me for being compassionate. Screw him. It was my conscience I had to live with.
As we were leaving the cemetery, I made the mistake of looking back.
The black-shrouded specter stood, dark folds rustling, one ghostly hand on the rusted gate, watching me. Its darkness was as enormous as the night. And like the night, it was all around me, pressing at me, caressing me, knowing me.
I cried out and stumbled over a low gravestone. Barrons caught my arm and saved me from a nasty spill. “What is it, Ms. Lane—pangs of regret? So soon?”
I shook my head. “Look back at the gate,” I said numbly. It had never appeared to me before when someone else was around.
Barrons turned, scanned the old partitioned-off cemetery for several moments, then glanced back at me. “What? I see nothing.”
I turned and looked. He was right. It was gone. Of course. I should have known. I sighed. “I guess I’m just a little spooked, Barrons. That’s all. Let’s go home. There’s nothing here.”
“Home, Ms. Lane?” His deep voice was gently amused.
“I have to call it something,” I said morosely. “They say home is where the heart is. I think mine’s satin-lined and six feet under.”
He opened the car door for me—the driver’s side. “Shall we dispel some of that youthful angst, Ms. Lane?” He offered me the keys. “Not far from here there’s a road that goes on for miles, through positively desolate parts.” His dark eyes gleamed. “Devilish curves. No traffic. Why don’t you take us for a drive?”
My eyes widened. “Really?”
He brushed a curl from my forehead and I shivered. Barrons has strong hands with long, beautiful fingers, and I think he carries some kind of electrical charge because every time he touches me it shoots an unwelcome thrill through my body. I took the keys from his hand, being careful not to make contact with skin. If he noticed, he let it pass unremarked.
“Try not to kill us, Ms. Lane.”
I slid behind the wheel. “Viper, SR10 coupe. 6-speed, V-10, 510 horses at 5,600 rpm, 0–60 in 3.9 seconds,” I babbled happily. He laughed.
I kept us alive. Barely.