Iced Read online

  He slaps me again. “Stop looking at me like that. Get mad at me. Hate me for what I would do to you. I’ll kill you if you keep looking at me like that! I’ll fuck you until you die!” he hisses.

  Suddenly the Unseelie prince who was across the dock from me is standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him. They begin to argue in Unseelie and I can’t understand a word they’re saying but I get the tone. The other prince is pissed.

  A third prince sifts in. Or a second, if you’re counting Christian as an almost-prince. They look so much alike, I wonder if maybe he’s already gone through the final change in the short time since I saw him last. Yesterday, being so close to him didn’t mess me up this badly. Did something happen to him overnight? Is it because there’s more than one prince here and they amp each other up? Did he really just say something weird about waiting for me? My brain is a mess. None of my circuits are working.

  I can’t stand up to the princes. For all my superhero powers, here I’m nothing. I’m as weak and helpless and doomed as any other person. I’m a willing victim, ready, waiting, eager to be destroyed. I know with one part of my mind how horrifying that is, but with another part of my mind—a much larger one—I don’t care. Being a victim to eternal pleasure sounds like the most perfect state of existence I could ever imagine.

  I stare at them. My cheeks are wet. I want to look away but I can’t. I wipe my face and my hands come away bloody from my tears. I try to back up but there’s superglue on the bottom of my boots. The spell Christian had begun to shatter is weaving itself around me again and I can’t do anything to stop it. I’m standing ten feet away from three death-by-sex Fae and I don’t see any way to get out of this one. Could Christian actually protect me from them if I don’t want him to? Because if they move even one inch closer, I’m not going to want him to.

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  “Get behind me, kid,” Lor growls from somewhere behind me. It seems mere thoughts of Ryodan conjured his men. If I could move, I’d go limp with relief. I can’t. I stand there.

  Lor grabs me and shoves me behind him. He’s got half a dozen of his dudes flanking him and they circle in around me.

  They face off with the princes, and just when all hell is about to break loose between them, one of Jayne’s men barks a sharp command because they spotted us, and the Guardians swing their guns our way.

  Then the Unseelie trapped in the cages must see their princes standing outside because they start roaring and howling at the top of their lungs, I guess trying to get them to set them free.

  That’s when the first of Dancer’s bombs goes off.

  TWENTY-THREE

  “My pretty pretty thing. Do you want to freeze? … The Iceman cometh”

  Dancer planted the bombs up on the top floors because we try not to destroy whole buildings unless they’re nests and need to be demolished.

  When the charges start going off, the roofs blow sky high, one after the next, and rubble rains down on us.

  Glass and bricks and chunks of drywall spray the street. The air is so full of dust that I can’t see for a couple seconds.

  We all start scrambling and ducking, covering our heads, even the Unseelie princes. I guess being immortal doesn’t make you like getting slammed by a slab of concrete any more than the next guy. So we all start looking for cover, except Jayne and his men, who are already standing inside the warehouse and don’t need it.

  The bombs detonating didn’t work as I’d planned. The Guardians were supposed to look outside when they went off, and see no one because I’d be hiding. Then they were supposed to go hunting for whoever was setting the bombs in the surrounding buildings, and I was going to take on Jayne and whoever was left.

  Instead, they look out and see all of us because we’re dodging falling debris and we’re all doing it in slow-mo because you can’t fast-mo through an unpredictable, unmappable rain of bomb shrapnel.

  The Guardians start trying to line us up in their sights and bark orders for us to freeze and drop our weapons, which is ridiculous, like anybody’s actually going to listen, but I guess old habits die hard. Nobody freezes or drops anything. And I wonder, doesn’t Jayne get that me and the Unseelie princes want what’s in his hand and we’ll kill for it? Dude, if I was him, I’d drop it and run.

  Once I’m pretty sure the biggest chunks of roof have hit the ground, I freeze-frame past Lor to take back my sword from Jayne. Only I slam into Lor on the way there because the fecker’s faster than me.

  Then we both crash into two Unseelie princes that weren’t there two seconds ago and my head starts getting screwed up with sex thoughts again. Lor grabs me and we freeze-frame away. The princes take one look at Lor and vanish, too, leaving Jayne a sitting duck for me. I try to freeze-frame around Lor again, and again I slam right back up into his chest. Then we’re all scrambling for cover, because a chimney just crashed to the ground and exploded in a spray of bricks.

  “Why does everything leave you alone?” I say pissily as we crouch behind the dock. “You got some kind of Fae-repellent spray? Ever hear of sharing, dude?”

  He gives me a look. His face is gray with grime. I taste mortar dust on my tongue. Stuff is still falling but the shower of debris is slowing. Dancer makes killer awesome bombs!

  “Why don’t you just let me get my fecking sword?” I make the argument with him I should have made with Ryodan. “If the princes turn me Pri-ya they can use me against you guys. ”

  “All the more reason he should have killed you. But no, he bloody ‘hires’ you. ”

  “I didn’t ask to be hired. Fact is, I asked not to. ”

  “Then he makes me fucking babysit you. ”

  “I didn’t ask to be babysat either. ” I poke my head up over the dock. The princes are trying to get to Jayne! I try to freeze-frame around Lor again but I don’t even make it two feet. I slam into him. Dude’s a wall. No holes anywhere. This is getting old. “Get. Out. Of. My. Way. ”

  “I’ll get it for you. ”

  “Why would you do that?” I say suspiciously. More like it he’ll take it to Ryodan, who will use it as leverage to boss me around.

  “Boss says I’ve got to keep you safe. He’s had me shadowing you constantly. ”

  “Nuh-uh. I would have noticed. ”

  “You never see him when he’s shadowing you either. And he’s been doing it a lot longer than you think. ”

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  “Bull-crikey. ”

  “I’ll never get laid trying to keep you safe. You’re a train wreck on steroids. ”

  “Am not. ” Usually I’m cooler than cool. It’s been a rough couple of days. “So, like, if you get it, you’re going to give it back to me right now this very instant?”

  “Didn’t I just say so? Go hide somewhere and shut up, kid. ”

  The Mega doesn’t hide. “My ass. ”

  “Can’t possibly be worth what he thinks. ”

  I have no idea what he’s talking about but it doesn’t have anything to do with me so I dismiss it.

  I freeze-frame back toward Jayne the second he lets go of my arm. This time he’s not expecting it because he thinks I’ll just wait around like a wuss for somebody else to get my sword. Not. I snicker when I hear him cursing behind me.

  Then I slam into Christian halfway up the stairs to the warehouse, blocking my way to Jayne.

  Then Lor has me again and I kind of melt over his shoulder because the death-by-sex Fae punch Christian’s packing is doing funny things to me, but it fades as soon as we get away from him, so I bite Lor because I hate being carried around like a sack of potatoes. If he feels it, he has no reaction.

  “Stay the fuck away from the Unseelie princes. ”

  “I’m just trying to get my sword. He got in the way. ”

  “I said I’ll get it for you. ”

  “I want to get it myself!” I want to look Jayne in the eyes when I take it fr
om him. He left me to die like a dog in the street. No mercy. Not one drop.

  Lor dumps me and shoves me up against a wall. “Fade, Kasteo, get over here and keep her out of my fucking hair. ”

  Then I’ve got two of his dudes on me, one on each arm, and I freeze-frame or try to but they weigh so much I end up buzzing around in drunken circles like a bug dying on its back because I can’t get all four of their feet off the ground at the same time. One or the other keeps digging a heel in. We slam into the wall then stumble all over each other and the whole time I’m trying to watch what’s going on with Jayne and the sword. “Let go of me!”

  They don’t. In fact, they don’t even acknowledge that I’m speaking, much less breathing. They hang on my arms like deadweights and eventually I wise up enough to stop trying. Exercises in futility aren’t me. They could hold me till I run my gas tank out and there I’d be. A noodle, and somebody would no doubt fecking toss me over his shoulder again and tote me around rather than give me a candy bar.

  After a few minutes I end up standing there, pissed as all get-out, just watching.

  And that’s how I have a front row seat when the real circus begins.

  The two original Unseelie princes keep sifting in, trying to get close to Jayne. Each time they do, Lor or one of his men is there, blocking their way.

  Christian keeps trying to get to Jayne, too, and I realize he can’t sift yet. He’s moving at just under full sift mode. Still, he’s faster than me. Fecker. Lately, seems everybody is.

  Jayne is spinning in a circle with my sword out in front of him, trying to keep everyone from taking it.

  The Guardians are spinning in circles, pointing their guns, trying to get a fix on something. Good luck with that. They can’t even see anything that’s happening, just feel the wind of everyone freeze-framing past them.

  The hundreds of caged Unseelie are grunting and howling, stomping and rattling bars and making a deafening noise, and there’s some kind of Unseelie in there that starts making a sound I’ve never heard before. It’s enormous and dissonant and it sets my teeth on edge, crawls under my skin and makes me want to crawl right out of it. I’m not the only one it bothers.

  “What the hell is making that noise?” Fade snarls.

  “I know, right?” I want to cover my ears but they’ve got my arms so I clench my teeth and begin to hum real loud instead.

  An Unseelie prince materializes in the middle of the whole shebang, Lor pops in directly in front of him, they smash into each other and careen off, then go slamming into a half-dozen Guardians who slam into Jayne, and all the sudden everyone is stumbling off the edge of the dock.

  When Jayne falls, my sword goes flying straight up in the air, end over end, an alabaster column of light. I close my fingers like I’m catching it.

  It’s there, right there for the taking! I can almost feel the perfect weight of it slapping into my palm.

  “Let go of me!” I nearly yank my arms out of my sockets but they don’t let go. I’m forced to stand there and watch as the princes, Lor, a dozen Guardians, and the latest intended Unseelie victim all try to position themselves to catch my sword when it comes down. One of the princes tries to spread his wings but the quarters are too close and he can’t lift off. The other sifts into the air, and Lor lunges in a totally inhuman way and they collide in midair with my sword still going up.

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  Like I said, a total circus.

  And that’s when the freak show part of it begins.

  I’m standing, wrists manacled by Kasteo and Fade, not going anywhere without somebody losing an arm, and since I don’t have anything to cut theirs off with, I’m stuck like a fly in superglue, when all the sudden the air in front of the dock starts to shimmer, and I get this feeling I’ve never had before in my life. I’ve been worried on occasion. A time or two, like when the Gray Woman got me, I was actually a smidge scared. She was sucking the life out of me and I could feel it. Nothing wrong with admitting when you know you’re in a scary place, so long as you don’t let it mess with your head. I stayed cool, even tried to talk Mac out of not making any deals with the fecker, because most of the time deals made under duress come back and bite you in the butt with saber-toothed tiger teeth.

  But this is different. I’m feeling panic with a capital P. Crazy, dumb, blind panic. All the sudden, for no reason I can figure, I’m ducking like a rabbit in the middle of a huge, open field with no cover for miles and the sky just went dark with hawks, flying wingtip to wingtip. Death seems that certain. One swoop, a rustle of wings, and I’m gone. All because of some weird spot in the air. What the feck? I’m panicking because of a shimmer in the air? Dude, what’s it going to do to me? Give me a Twilight moment, make me all shimmery, too?

  I’m torn between fighting to run and staying put so I can see what’s happening because I can’t conceive of anything that could panic me so bad and I need to see it! I’m tired of these eyeballs missing all the exciting stuff lately!

  I realize I’m not the only one freaking out. Everybody that was trying to get my sword is suddenly scrambling away from the dock like they’re running for their lives, which I take it to mean we’re all in agreement about not liking unexplained shimmery spots in the air. I see my blade is still flying up, but it’s moving slow like it’s about to come back down. If I could just get Fade and Kasteo off my fecking arms, I’d rush in and catch it … well, maybe I would. I’m not real sure about that because my feet aren’t obeying a thing I’m telling them about moving forward. Much to my annoyance, they’re inching me backward.

  The princes vanish.

  Jayne and the Guardians are rushing straight for us.

  Christian, Lor, and his men freeze-frame out, then Lor’s replaced the other two dudes and has my arm, and he’s dragging me away from the dock.

  Then we’re all retreating and I grin when I realize we’re backing together, shoulder-to-shoulder, in tight formation. Jayne’s next to Kasteo, who’s next to Christian, who’s next to a Guardian, and way down at the end are the full-blood princes, which totally freaks me because I can’t figure anything they’d back away from. There are more balls in twenty feet of street here than there are in all of Dublin, and I’m proud to be swaying in the nut sack. We might fight each other, but in times of danger, we’ll fight together. Dude!

  A dark slit appears in the center of the shimmering spot. My panic increases exponentially. I’d turn and run but I’m anchored by two dudes that could hold the Titanic during a tsunami.

  The slit widens and belches thick fog. I shiver. Frozen fog becomes hard rime. Hard rime coated every person that got iced and died.

  The caged Unseelie howl like banshees, and the one making that horrible screeling noise finally nails its hellish crescendo. The windows that didn’t shatter when Dancer’s bombs went off blow out now—not in slivers and chunks—they’re literally pulverized, spraying the streets with glass dust.

  The slit widens. More fog puffs out, milky and cold. The temperature plummets.

  “Hold!” Jayne shouts, and we stop.

  Fade says, “What the—”

  Sound ceases.

  The world goes silent.

  Utterly.

  Still.

  Did I lose my hearing? Did the Unseelie’s crescendo deafen me? I can’t even hear my own breath in my ears like when I’m swimming underwater. I look at Lor. He’s looking at me and pointing to his ears. I point to my own and nod. Everybody is doing the same thing. Least if I lost my hearing, we all did.

  I look back at the widening slit and the oppressive silence grows.

  It’s worse than a vacuum.

  It’s. Awful. It’s. Messing with my. Head. It’s …

  Void.

  Disconnect.

  Feels like being dead.

  But there’s something …

  I slide into my sidhe-seer center and extend curious tentacles �
��

  I get a mishmash of impressions but I can’t find words for them because what I’m feeling is beyond my ability to comprehend. Like I’m three-dimensional and what I’m feeling is six or seven dimensions. It’s …

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  Complicated.

  Ancient.

  Sentient.

  I try to get a read on its … well, mind for lack of a better word, and all I get is a weird flash of … calculation?

  Something missing. Something being searched for.

  I look at Lor and see an expression on his face I’ve never seen before and never thought I’d see.

  Fear.

  It worries me. A lot.

  He looks at Fade and Kasteo and they nod. He tightens his grip on my arm.

  The slit widens and it comes.

  Holy fecking crikey, it comes!

  TWENTY-FOUR

  “And the beat goes on”

  Cruce came tonight as he always does, stealing my sleep, parting my lips and thighs, leaving me near dawn in tangled bed linens, soaking with sweat from sex and shame.

  In the few moments of rest I snatch before rising, I have a terrifying dream.

  I walk to the hidden entry of the catacombs with the shuffling, mindless gait of a woman dead and risen from the grave.

  Margery blocks the door of stones that looks like any other wall unless you are privy to its secret. She is voluptuously nude, hair and eyes wild, smelling of him—a scent I know too well. A banshee, she shows sharp teeth in a cackle and tells me he is gone. I am too late.

  With violence of which I did not believe myself capable, I shove her aside, and when she slams into the wall, she slumps down it and is still. Blood blossoms behind her head, staining red daisy petals on the wall.

  Bemused by the hostility in my heart, I pass through the door and shuffle on.

  The tunnels are pitch, forcing me to feel sightless passage along damp stone walls. This is not the Underneath I know: dry and well lit, with everything in its place. In this dark, moist maze, moss grows thickly on walls and bones crunch beneath my feet. The odor of decay couples with some fecund scent on the breeze. There is nothing down here to generate wind unless a thing stirs that cannot possibly be stirring.

  I pull my wrapper closer and thrust myself forward on hobbled feet with stunted, stumbling steps, blind in eye but not purpose. I pray, and with the whimsy of dreams the gold cross I wear upon my neck begins to glow. I do not deserve such comfort in this dark night of my soul!