Rosemary and Rue

“What?” she demanded, half-standing. “You can’t do that!”


“I can. I owe you a question, too, you know. You can ask it now.” I smiled, trying to hide the sickening thud of my heart. She could kill me without thinking twice. It would almost have been kinder than what I was about to do. At least then I wouldn’t be a traitor—just dead. “I have to tell the truth.”

“What’s to stop me from gutting you where you stand?” she snarled, hands twisting into claws. “Answer that!”

“Simple,” I said, keeping my arms wrapped tight around the rose goblin. “If you kill me, I’ll die with you in my debt. You won’t stand for that. You said so yourself.”

She backed off a half step, glaring at me. “You’ll ask that question someday.”

“Maybe.”

“I’ll have the right to kill you when you do.”

“Maybe; maybe not. We aren’t there yet.” Besides, there was no guarantee I’d live that long.

The Luidaeg paused, and then actually, grudgingly, smiled. “You’re pretty smart, considering your mother. Maybe the brains skipped a generation.”

“I’ll take that in the spirit in which it was given.” I half bowed. The rose goblin squirmed out of my arms, perching on my shoulder.

“What are you going to do now?”

If it hadn’t been for the attack in the park, I could have gotten out of it, because what I was thinking wouldn’t have been a viable option without blood. My blood wasn’t good enough, and neither was Evening’s. I needed the blood of someone who was involved, blood that would hold at least a trace of the truth. Without the attack, I could have let it go. But the attack happened, and we had the blood—Tybalt had been covered in the stuff. It would be dry by now, but it was worth trying. There was a chance, and I had to know.

“The only thing I can do,” I said, sighing. “I’m going to ask the dead.”





TWENTY-FOUR



FINDING A TAXI NEAR the docks after dark is something I never want to do again. I would have called Danny; unfortunately, I couldn’t find a phone, and I was reduced to waving my arms whenever a likely car passed by, hoping someone would take pity and stop. Eventually, someone did.

The rose goblin had never been in a car before. It kept peering out the windows, making interested mewl ing noises until I had to fight not to laugh. The last thing I needed to do was convince the driver the woman he’d picked up in one of the worst parts of town was crazy. Besides, I was afraid the laughter would be more hysterical than anything else. I’d left the Luidaeg’s apartment in a daze, fumbling for a line of reasoning that didn’t lead back to blood. There wasn’t one. The entire case was bound in blood magic and chains of broken lives; it made sense to solve it the same way. So what if I didn’t want to? That never stopped me before.

It was past midnight when we reached my apartment. I paid the cabbie with the last of my cash, wincing as I did it. If I didn’t find a new job soon, I was going to be replacing fae problems with more mundane ones. Maybe I could learn to be a bartender. They work nights, don’t they?

The rose goblin rode my shoulder as I walked up the path to my door. The wards hadn’t been reset the last time I left, mainly because I’d been carried out by Manuel and Dare. I hesitated, contemplating what might be inside, then unlocked the door and opened it, flipping on the living room light. Waiting rarely solves the question of what’s under the couch.