Page 45

Maurice

T here is no question about it. Njáll is not healing.

A broken arm won’t kill him, but it has been a long time since his body went into shock this way, I’m fairly sure, and he is not handling it well.

All the colour has seeped from his mouth, making him look even paler, his eyes bright and feverish in comparison.

“I’m… I’ll be fine.”

He’s holding his broken arm so carefully, but I need to line the bone up to be sure that when it does eventually heal, it does so correctly. I can’t break the arm again if that happens. I can’t .

“Can I—” My voice comes out panicked. I don’t dare turn my head and look at any of the fae. Reijo’s gaze bores into me already. I can feel it. “Can I see?”

Njáll blinks slowly. Sweat beads at his hairline. “Yes.”

He doesn’t move, and I do not ask him to. I adjust my crouch, running my hands gently over his good arm before I touch the broken one. He lets out a pained moan at the contact, but I don’t flinch back, even though I want to.

I can do this . Maybe I can’t kill Meilyr with my blessing gone—maybe I wouldn’t have managed it before—but I can help Njáll with this.

He groans again when I grip his arm more tightly, and it’s difficult in the cuffs, metal digging into my wrists, but that is a momentary discomfort, and I can endure it. “Hold here,” I say, gesturing, and Njáll’s movements are a little faster this time.

Another cry, when I line the bone up again, and Njáll drops his head back against the wall, breathing hard. I shake my head. We’re not done. “I need your jacket. We need to bind it until it heals.”

I’d give him mine, but I can’t get it off and I don’t think he can manage it right now, either.

Minutes pass while I urge Njáll forwards, get the jacket off one shoulder, then carefully over his broken arm, and it’s just as difficult to wrap the arm—never mind that I have nothing to use as a splint—but the pressure seems to relieve at least a little of the pain.

“You need to feed,” Reijo says. He doesn’t wilt in the face of my glare. The tip of his chin is stubborn, and his gaze quickly moves from me to Njáll.

“You’re weak,” Njáll replies. He still sounds almost breathless. I reach up and wipe sweat from his brow and his gaze meets mine.

“So are you,” Reijo says, and I’m thankful that he says it instead of me.

“Drink from me,” I say to Njáll, and he shakes his head just like he did when I said it before.

“Just need sleep,” he mutters.

I growl under my breath and move, sitting down next to him. I like having my back to the wall more than I do having it to those fae. They’re all watching us, absolutely unabashed, and I’ll do what I can to get them out of here, too, but I can’t pretend to myself that I’m close to being in charge.

I’ll be lucky if I get Njáll out of here. I don’t see that I’ll survive this.

“You came here because of me,” Njáll says a few minutes later, and I look at him in surprise. He’s not asleep?

“Yes.”

“You shouldn’t have.”

Claws seize my chest. I know how he means it, but still… “Well. I did.”

“’S that why you’re not part of the Hunt now?”

I turn my face away, glaring out into the cellar. Now the fae start to look away.

“Maurice?”

“Yes. That’s part of the reason why, I suppose.”

“What’s that mean?” His words are slurring a little, and I’m glad he’s getting through the shock because at least sleep will be a little restorative.

“I disobeyed. I should have served the Hunt, and I didn’t.”

Njáll makes a confused sound but then falls silent, and when I glance over, his eyes are closed. Reijo is still looking at me, his dark eyes big and sad.

“You should try to convince him,” he says.

“To do what?”

“To feed from me.”

I sigh. “He won’t do it if he thinks it’ll kill you.”

“It won’t.”

“Have you had a vampire feed from you before?”

Reijo stares at me for a heartbeat too long. He looks away quickly, and I can’t see any more colour on his dark skin, but I think he is embarrassed. “No.”

“Injured like this, he wouldn’t be able to control himself,” I say. “He’d drain you.”

“You think that little of him?”

I snort. He doesn’t get it, for all that he is fae and I’m certain he knows a great many things.

“No, I think…” I look at Njáll’s sleeping face and something seizes in my chest again.

It’s not the claws from before. This is sweeter, softer, the kind of feeling that makes the pain of losing my magic ease, if only for a second.

“I think he’s the best of us. But he’s still a vampire.

An injured, powerful vampire, who would be weak to magic-infused blood even if he were at his strongest.”

“Oh,” Reijo says. He chances another look at Njáll too, then at the fae around the room before he looks at me again. “You’re in love with him.”

“I—”

“I thought you just wanted to keep him,” Reijo says, steamrolling right over me. In love? Am I? There’s a chance it happened when I was not paying attention, I suppose, but it’s the kind of feeling…

It should hit me hard, shouldn’t it? It shouldn’t be something I realise in a damp cellar, knowing we have days left at most.

“That too,” I mutter, and Reijo huffs in amusement before he falls silent.

I lean back against the wall next to Njáll and don’t even bother listening for noise from above. No doubt they’ll come for me when they feel enough time has passed.

And when they do, Meilyr and I both know what I will do.

I’ll give up all of the Hunt’s secrets, just so long as Njáll gets out of here alive.

Njáll doesn’t even stir when the door to the cellar opens again hours later, and that, more than anything, has fear skittering down my spine.

I have never been outnumbered like this. Even when I was turned, I do not believe there was such a sense of unavoidable dread. Perhaps I thought I could get away, back then.

I cannot now. But I cannot lose all sense of hope, either. If I give up, then we all die.

So I get unsteadily to my feet, and with a few cautious steps forward, I am standing between the foot of the stairs and Njáll.

When it is not a fae who descends, only Augustine, some of that dread recedes. He does not have the look of a vampire who has ingested fae blood, and so I am sure that, even bound as I am, I can kill him should I need to.

He scoffs when he sees me standing, casting a look at the fae, who shy back from him the same way they have done with everyone down here so far. When his gaze moves past me, taking in Njáll, I growl.

“Wake him,” Augustine says.

“You think I’m taking orders from you ?”

His face goes ruddy—with anger or humiliation, I do not know. He is easy to provoke, and that has me wondering why Meilyr would keep him so close at all.

A vampire is the easiest way into the clan, I suppose, what with how they’ve closed ranks this year. Still. Meilyr does not need the help. He already has their crai, and he didn’t need Augustine for that at all.

“What do you want, Augustine?” Njáll says from behind me. His voice is rough from sleep, but I can’t hear any pain in it. He’s hiding it well.

“I thought you might like to know what is happening out there,” Augustine says. He is still standing at the foot of the stairs, and he does not take a step closer. Instead, he leans back against the banister as though he is entirely at ease.

Njáll gets unsteadily to his feet, and I step aside so he can stand next to me. Augustine’s muscles tense when I move and I grin at him, showing my fangs. He can pretend all he likes. We both know who’s in danger here.

“What have you done?” Njáll asks. His face is still ashen, arm held tightly against his body, but his eyes are bright and not with fever.

With anger.

“The alpha gave in,” Augustine crows. “I will fight the little wolf later tonight.”

“You’ll kill him,” Njáll says.

“And why should I not? As though his life is worth half as much as—” He snarls, cutting himself off, and does push off from the banister now, though he comes to a quick stop when I take my own lurching step forward.

“He is nothing . Besides, from what you all have said over and over again, I will be doing him a favour, putting him out of his misery this way.”

A sound builds deep inside my chest, but I swallow it down when Njáll speaks again.

“You didn’t listen to me at all. A young wolf is not to be trifled with, especially one from that pack. There is a good chance you will not survive this, Augustine. He might kill you, and if he does not, and you go through with this, then I can guarantee you that his alpha will.”

Augustine shakes his head. “I never wanted to survive this,” he says, and there is a deep well of grief in his voice that I have not heard since the first day he walked into Njáll’s office.

I feel empathy for him, but it is… distant. Second to the anger that trembles through me.

It is one thing to hurt oneself. It is one thing to want to kill someone like Meilyr, someone like Tamesis… someone cruel and devoid of empathy themselves.

But Quinn? By all accounts, he was manipulated and is traumatised, and I understand it might be difficult for Augustine to accept he deserves to live, but Augustine is the one who has made a choice to be the worst possible version of himself.

He is clear-eyed about that choice. He rationalises that choice.

And there will be consequences. That hole in my core pulses with pain. There are always consequences.

“I’ll leave you to it, shall I?” Augustine says, a triumphant smirk on his face, and he is up the stairs and out of the cellar from one blink to the next.

Njáll looks lost once he’s gone. “I thought Deacon would not give in,” he says. I think he is talking to himself. “I thought…”

“He has to protect all his wolves, not just one.”

“I know that.”

“He cannot be seen as weak, not right now, not after—”

“I know!”

Njáll’s shout surprises me, and he looks stricken when I flinch, though I do not feel any fear. No. I want to help him, to soothe him.

This is not about Quinn, really.

“They’re looking for you,” I say. “And when they find out where you are and what happened, they won’t think you weak.”

Njáll scoffs. “No? I’ve been captured twice in little more than six months.

I am injured and hungry, and I have no idea how to get out of here, let alone get everyone else out.

And now, a vampire will kill a wolf—whether he is part of the clan or not matters very little—and I will be lucky if I make it out of here, to avoid a full-blown war. ”

“A war?”

“The treaty, Maurice,” Njáll says, and he sounds tired now.

“The treaty holds that we cannot kill each other, and sanctioned challenge or not… Quinn is young . Wolves are a community. At best, our relationships will be damaged beyond repair. It is more likely that wolves will start killing us, and I cannot pretend that a war between all of us would end in a victory for vampires.”

Is that why Meilyr wants Augustine with him? He mentioned the Guardians before, and they are of course the most immediate threat to high fae, but they are limited in their scope, as they have to stay where the veil is thinnest and ensure there are no breaches.

The Wild Hunt would be the threat after that. And then… And then every other supernatural creature, I suppose, because Meilyr does not understand nearly enough about humans to grasp the threat they could be, too.

Regardless, it is a logical next step. I shake my head.

“Meilyr wants this,” I say. “That’s why… The vampires. Samantha, she attacked that hunter, but nothing came of that, so he’s moved on. That’s why he was after you in the alley. He wants war. He wants an easy path to power.”

“He’ll have it then,” Njáll says and sighs. He sways slightly where he stands, and I reach for him without thinking. He does not object when I guide him back over to the wall and down again.

“You really think that’s what he’s trying to do?” Reijo asks. Fear pinches his expression, and when I look around the room, all the other fae look as though they feel the same.

“Yes. He can’t take the Unseelie throne, so he’ll seize power here instead.”

“Fuck.” Reijo tips his head back against the wall. He tugs at one of the cuffs holding him in place, but we both know they’re iron, seeping his magic away. Eventually, the cuffs alone could kill him, though that would take far more time than I believe any of us have.

If I get Njáll out of here… Meilyr might hesitate, but the information he wants from me is more important than Augustine starting a war tonight. It is easier for me to tell him than him to torture Njáll until I give in.

And Njáll will be able to come back. To contact Asher, at least, because Deacon will have a way of getting in touch with him, and the Hunt can come here and—

Free the fae, at least. As soon as I tell Meilyr what I know, he will kill me.

I crouch again and Njáll frowns at the look on my face. “What are you going to do?”

“Something stupid, no doubt,” I say and kiss him, quick and hard, before he can protest. “Wait here.”

“Maurice—”

I make my way up the stairs, pausing where I know the barrier sits. I run my fingers over it, then shout, “I want to see Meilyr!”

Chair legs scrape across the floor. Footsteps recede. And when I look back down, Njáll glares up at me, betrayal on his face.