Part I Part 104 (2/2)
Some shocks of sensation are pleasant. This one wasn't. The water was so cold that tiny chips of ice had formed in it, as though it was trying to freeze itself from the inside out. That cold went right down where I had intended it to go, and everything in my jeans tried to contract into my abdomen in sheer, hypothermic horror. I let out a little yelp, and my skin promptly crawled with gooseflesh.
The gesture had its intended effect. That overwhelming, almost feral hunger withered and vanished. I was able to take my eyes off the Winter Lady and her handmaiden, to clear my thoughts into something resembling a sane line of reason. I shook my head a bit to be sure and then looked up at Maeve. Anger surged through me, and my jaw clenched tight, but I made an effort to keep my words at least marginally polite. ”Sorry, sweetie, but I have a couple problems with that offer.”
Maeve's lips tightened. ”And those would be?”
”One. I'm not handing over a child to you. Not mine, not anyone's, not now, and not ever. If you had a brain in your head, you'd have known that.”
Maeve's already pale face blanched even more, and she sat bolt upright on her throne. ”Youdare -” -”
”Shut up,” I snarled, and it came out loud enough to ring off the walls of the ballroom. ”I'm not finished.”
Maeve jerked as though I'd slapped her. Her mouth dropped open, and she blinked at me.
”I came here under your invitation and protection. I am yourguest . But in spite of that you've thrown glamour at me anyway.” I stood up, my hands spread on the table, leaning toward her for emphasis. ”I don't have time for this c.r.a.p. You don't scare me, lady,” I said. ”I only came here for answers-but if you keep pus.h.i.+ng me, I'm going to push back. Hard.” . But in spite of that you've thrown glamour at me anyway.” I stood up, my hands spread on the table, leaning toward her for emphasis. ”I don't have time for this c.r.a.p. You don't scare me, lady,” I said. ”I only came here for answers-but if you keep pus.h.i.+ng me, I'm going to push back. Hard.”
Maeve's evident anger evaporated. She leaned back on her throne, lips pursed, her expression placid and enigmatic. ”Well, well, well. Not so easily captured, it would seem.”
A new voice, a relaxed, masculine drawl, slid into the silence. ”I told you, Maeve. You should have been polite. Anyone who declares war on the Red Court isn't going to be the sort to take kindly to pressure.” The speaker stepped into the ballroom through the double doors and walked casually to the banquet tables and toward Maeve's throne.
It was a man, maybe in his early thirties, medium build, maybe half an inch shy of six feet tall. He wore dark jeans, a white tee, and a leather jacket. Droplets of dark reddish brown stained the s.h.i.+rt and one side of his face. His scalp was bald but for a stubble of dark hair.
As he approached, I picked out more details. He had a brand on his throat. A snowflake made of white scar tissue stood out sharply against his skin. The skin on one side of his face was red and a little swollen, and he was missing half of the eyebrow and a crescent of the stubble on his scalp on that side-he'd been burned, and recently. He reached the throne and dropped to one knee before it, somehow conveying a certain relaxed insolence with the gesture, and extended the box to Maeve.
”It is done?” Maeve asked, an almost childlike eagerness in her voice. ”What took you so long?”
”It wasn't as easy as you said it would be. But I did it.”
The Winter Lady all but s.n.a.t.c.hed the carved box from his hands, avarice lighting her eyes. ”Wizard, this is my Knight, Lloyd of the family Slate.”
Slate nodded to me. ”How are you?”
”Impatient,” I responded, but I nodded back to him warily. ”You're the Winter Knight?”
”So far, yeah. I guess you're the Winter Emissary. Asking questions and investigating and so on.”
”Yep. Did you kill Ronald Reuel?”
Slate burst out laughing. ”Christ, Dresden. You don't waste time, do you?”
”I've filled my insincere courtesy quota for the day,” I said. ”Did you kill him?”
Slate shrugged and said, ”No. To be honest with you, I'm not sure Icould have killed him. He's been at this a lot longer than me.” have killed him. He's been at this a lot longer than me.”
”He was an old man,” I said.
”So are a lot of wizards,” Slate pointed out. ”I could have bench-pressed him, sure. Killing him is something else altogether.”
Maeve let out a sudden hiss of anger, the sound eerily loud. She lifted her foot and kicked Slate in the shoulder. Something popped when she did, and the force of the kick drove the Winter Knight down a tier, into the table and the Sidhe seated there. The table toppled, and Sidhe, chairs, and Knight went sprawling.
Maeve rose to her feet, sending the green-toothed Jen scooting away from her. She drew what looked like a military-issue combat knife from the carved box. It was crusted with some kind of black gelatinous substance, like burned barbecue sauce. ”You stupid animal,” she snarled. ”Useless. This is useless to me.”
She hurled the knife at Slate. The handle hit him in the biceps of his left arm just as he sat up again. His face twisted in sudden fury. He took up the knife, rose to his feet, and stalked toward Maeve with murder in his eye.
Maeve drew herself up, her face s.h.i.+ning with a sudden terrible beauty. She lifted her right hand, ring finger and thumb both bent, and murmured something in a liquid, alien tongue. Sudden blue light gathered around her fingers, and the temperature in the room dropped by about forty degrees. She spoke again, and flicked her wrist, sending glowing motes of azure flickering toward Slate.
The snowflake brand flared into sudden light, and Slate's advance halted, his body going rigid. The skin around the brand turned blue, then purple, then black, spreading like a stop-motion enhanced film of gangrene. A quiet snarl slipped from Slate's lips, and I could see his body trembling with the effort to continue toward Maeve. He shuddered and took another step forward.
Maeve lifted her other hand, her index finger extended while the others curled, and a sudden wind whipped past me, cold enough that it stole the breath from my lungs. The wind whipped madly around Slate, making his leather coat flap. Bits of white frost started forming on his eyelashes and eyebrows. His expression, now anguished as well as full of rage, faltered, and his advance halted again.
”Calm him,” Maeve murmured.
Jen slipped behind Slate, wrapping her arms around his neck, leaning her mouth down close to his ear. Slate's eyes flickered with hot, violent hate for a moment, and then began to grow heavier. Jen ran her hand slowly down the sleeve of his jacket, fingers caressing his wrist. His arm lowered as I watched. A moment later, Jen slid the jacket from his shoulders. The tee was sleeveless, and Slate's arms were hard with muscle-and tracked with needle marks. Jen held out a hand, and another darting pixie handed her a hypodermic needle. Jen slipped it into the bend of his arm, still whispering to him, sliding the plunger slowly down.
Slate's eyes rolled back in his head, and he sank to his knees. Jen went down with him, wrapped around him like kelp on a swimmer, her mouth next to his ear.
Maeve lowered her hands, and the wind and the cold died away. She lifted a shaking hand to her face and stepped back to the throne, settling stiffly onto it, narrowed eyes locked on Slate's increasingly malleable form. Her cheekbones stood out more sharply than before, her eyes looked more sunken. She gripped the arms of the throne, her fingers twitching.
”What the h.e.l.l was that?” Billy whispered.
”Probably what pa.s.ses for a polite disagreement,” I muttered. ”Get up. We're leaving.”
I stood up. Maeve's eyes darted to me. Her voice came out dry, harsh. ”Our bargain is not complete, wizard.”
”This talk is.”
”But I have not answered your question.”
”Keep your answer. I don't need it anymore.”
”You don't?” Maeve asked.
”We don't?” Billy said.
I nodded toward Slate and Jen. ”You had to push yourself to make him stand still. Look at you. You're just about out of gas right now from going up against your own Knight.” I started down the tiers, Billy coming with me. ”Besides that, you're sloppy, sweetheart. Reckless. A clean killing like Reuel's takes a plan, and that isn't you.”
I could feel her eyes pressing against my back like frozen thorns. I ignored her.
”I did not give you leave to go, wizard,” she said, her voice chilly.
”I didn't ask.”
”I won't forget this insolence.”
”I probably will,” I said. ”It's nothing special. Come on, Billy.”
I walked to the double doors and out. As soon as we were both outside, the doors swung shut with a huge, hollow boom that made me jump. Darkness fell, sudden and complete, and I fumbled for my amulet as my heart lurched in panic.
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