The Shattered Dark (16 page)

Aren’s tense. He moves back slightly, and I see the battle he’s fighting with himself.
He doesn’t want to keep his distance from me, but like Lord Kaeth, we need Hison to
vote Lena to the throne. I’ve met the high noble a few times before. He barely tolerates
the presence of humans in the Realm. He definitely wouldn’t approve of Aren’s relationship
with me.

I make the decision for Aren, taking a long step back. A brief wince appears on his
face before the stiffness leaves his posture, and he turns.

“Lord Hison,”
he says.
“I didn’t expect you to follow.”

Hison is focused on me. Normally, I’d avert my gaze. I don’t this time. I’m in his
world trying to end the war that has spilled so much blood these last few years. I’m
helping
him and his people. He’s going to have to accept that I’m here.

“Be careful with that,”
Hison says, his gaze still on me.
“Rumor is she seduced Taltrayn. She may try to do the same to you. Atroth should have
discarded her years ago.”

The only reason I don’t react is because he doesn’t know I understand Fae, and I want
to keep it that way.

“She is bewitching, isn’t she,”
Aren says smoothly.
“I’d caution you against touching her.”
His tone is light, but there’s an edge to it, too.

Hison stiffens.

“The
nalkin-shom
needs to be inside,”
Aren continues, before the high noble decides to take offense at his words.
“Humans are susceptible to the elements.”

Fae are susceptible to some extent, too—they can’t use
their magic to keep warm indefinitely—but I don’t complain. I’m twice as cold as I
was before Aren touched me.

“Send your man for a cloak,”
Hison says.
“She’ll survive until he returns. We’ll continue on.”

Aren’s eyes narrow just perceptibly, but Hison is already moving.

“I’ll return quickly,” Trev mutters. Then he opens a fissure and disappears.

I’m so cold, I’m numb to the pull of his shadows. I’m not numb, however, to Aren’s
next words.

“Lena shouldn’t have sent you.”

All the warm, fuzzy feelings I had when I first saw him vanish. “It’s good to see
you again, too.”

“I didn’t—”

“Was I not clear that I want you to come along?”
Hison asks, peering back down the walkway.

Aren draws in a breath. I start walking before he lets it out, partly because I’m
hoping moving will warm me up and partly because I’m just a tad bit hurt. I’ve been
worried about him. Has he been too busy to worry about me?

He’s fighting a war, I remind myself. He has more important things on his mind.

“Are you okay?” he asks, falling into step beside me. His gaze dips to my bare arms.

“I’m fine,” I say. I intend my response to be short, but it comes out harsher than
I wanted. It’s the weather’s fault. My face is going numb. I
am
going to get sick if Trev doesn’t return soon. I’m sure he’s staying in this world;
he shouldn’t have to wait too long before he fissures back.

“You know I didn’t mean it that way,” Aren says, keeping his voice so low I wonder
if Hison understands English. Two fae are with the high noble. Only the woman is a
guard, I think. She’s on Hison’s right, trailing slightly behind him. The fae on Hison’s
other side wears a name-cord in his hair. He’s carrying a sword, too—all fae carry
them—but he doesn’t seem as ready to use it as the woman does.

“I’ve missed you. I’ve been wanting to see you, too, just not like…” He stops, clenches
his jaw, then continues. “Not here. Not like this.”

He almost sounds pained. I scan him, searching for injuries. He looks okay, but he
looks different. He’s not the same Aren who held me captive. That Aren was cavalier
and sly, always ready with one of his infuriating half grins. This Aren is tense.
Stressed-out. I want to help him, but I don’t know how.

Not for the first time, I’m struck by just how little I know him. I was his prisoner
for two weeks. I’ve been his ally for two and a half.

His ally.
Is that all our relationship is? It feels like it sometimes, but I want to be so
much more than that.

“This province has been unstable since we took the palace,” Aren says, keeping his
gaze straight ahead. “Hison issued a curfew to try to keep things under control.”

A curfew. That explains why the streets are empty.

“It’s not working,” he continues. “The gate isn’t being monitored. Merchants are fighting
over who gets to use it first, and while their backs are turned, fae are stealing
their goods. They’re breaking into their stores, too. Hison should be able to take
care of it, but the gate guards were paid by Atroth. Even if they’re willing to work
for Lena, we don’t have the
tinril
to pay them. The high nobles won’t send the gate taxes to us because they haven’t
voted Lena to the throne.”

I frown. I think I do, at least. My face is so numb I can’t tell for sure. “Sethan
was against taxing the gates.”

Aren looks at me. “No.” His gaze drops to my bare arms again. He seems agitated. “We
wanted fair tolls. Atroth’s were designed to keep him in power. He let merchants from
the provinces he dissolved fissure for free so they wouldn’t protest. The gates need
to be taxed, but we don’t have enough fae to spare to monitor them and…And I can’t
watch you freeze like this.”

His arms are around me before I process his last sentence. I look at Hison. He’s still
walking, but he could turn around any second.

“Screw him,” Aren says.

I’m too cold to step away. Instead, I meet Aren’s eyes. “Did you pick that phrase
up from Naito?”

The corner of his mouth tilts up. “From you, actually.”

The nervous feeling in my stomach disappears. It’s replaced with a warm, tingling
sensation.

His smile widens. “I really have missed you,
nalkin-shom
.”

That smile disappears when he takes my hands in his. “
Sidhe
, your fingers are ice.”

“Yeah.” I look back the way we came. We’re still in line of sight of where Trev and
I fissured in. I’m assuming that’s where he’ll reappear, but there’s still no sign
of him. How long does it take to get a freaking cloak?

I turn back to Aren. Past his shoulder, I see Hison staring at us.

“We need to keep walking,” I say.

Aren scowls, but we turn and follow the high noble. Aren doesn’t stop touching me.
He runs his hands up and down my arms, then alternates cupping first my right, then
my left hand between his. The contact helps. The lightning distracts me—
he
distracts me—and somehow, I’m as hot as I am cold. My body isn’t numb anymore. I’m
all too aware of just how much I want him.

“You didn’t say what we’re doing here.”

Aren’s thumb massages my palm. “Hison captured a fae who’s been encouraging the disorder.
He’s outspoken against Lena, the corruption of the palace, the war. We think he’s
close to the remnants’ leadership. We’re going to let him escape. We need to know
where he goes.”

Hison leaves the street, taking a narrow path between two tall stucco buildings. The
shadow-reading should be simple. This is the type of assignment I was given almost
all the time when I worked for the Court. It’s safe. The target never even knows I’m
there unless something goes wrong.

Like something went wrong back in Spier.

“You trust Hison?” I ask.

“Not at all,” he replies. Then, “Here’s Trev.”

Trev must have either known where we’re going or seen us turn down this path. He jogs
toward us, carrying a white cloak. Maybe that’s what took him so long. Most of the
fae’s
cloaks are dark colors—deep blues and various shades of gray and black. This one will
help me blend in with the snow.

Aren takes it from him. He runs his hands over it twice before he opens its folds
and places it around my shoulders.

I very nearly moan. It’s like being tucked inside a blanket taken directly from the
dryer.

“God, I love you…you’re magic.” Shit. That was a bad stumble. Humans throw those words
around so casually, but I don’t know if he knows that, and I’m not ready to tell him
I love him, not while we’re fighting a war and not while our relationship is so new
and unstable.

He pulls my hood over my head. Keeping a grip on the front edges, he pulls me close.

“Careful,
nalkin-shom
,” he whispers conspiratorially. “I might think you’re starting to like me.”

I’m grateful he’s making light of my slip. My shoulders are defrosted enough that
I manage a shrug. “I might not hate you quite as much as I used to.”

He smiles, then lets go of my hood to run his hands over the cloak again. A new wave
of warmth envelops me. Seriously, fae magic is pretty awesome sometimes. I could melt
inside this cloak. It’s heavy enough to block the wind and it has huge, wide pockets
on the inside that I can slip my arms into.

Aren’s palm glides down my back…and stops just above my waistband. That’s where the
dagger he gave me should be. It seems like forever has passed since I left the Vegas
suite, but that’s where the dagger is, uselessly parked on my dresser. Unless the
maid called the authorities.

“It’s Sosch’s fault,” I mutter.

Aren lifts an eyebrow as if to say, “Really?” There’s an entertained glint in his
silver eyes that makes my stomach flip again.

He unhooks a short scabbard from his belt. “Lena’s not going to be happy when she
learns you’re depleting the armory.”

He lifts the back of my shirt to slide it—

“Cold!” I squeak as soon as the scabbard touches my skin.

“Oops,” he says, sliding it into my waistband, but he’s grinning. He sobers a second
later, though. Softly, he asks, “You’re okay?”

I pull the cloak more tightly around me. “Yeah, this is warm enough. Thanks.”

“No. Are you okay with being here? In Rhigh?”

I’m not sure what he’s asking. He knows Thrain was the false-blood who pulled me into
the Realm. Does he know Thrain held me here? I don’t see how he could. This was only
one of Thrain’s bases, and I don’t think Atroth or any of his fae went around telling
others this is where they stumbled across me.

Trev—I almost forgot he was here—clears his throat, then mutters the warning, “Hison.”

“Is there a problem?”
Hison has doubled back and is standing only a few paces away.

Aren focuses on the high noble and says,
“Lena expects her humans to be taken care of. McKenzie’s well-being is my priority.
I want her out of the elements.”

“It’s not much farther,”
Hison practically spits. It was so much easier to work for the fae when I didn’t
realize just how much some of them hated me.

It takes less than a minute to reach our destination, a small, detached home near
the city’s marketplace. I can’t see it from here, but that marketplace is on the river.
That’s where the gate is, too. Kyol fissured me through it when he stole me away from
Thrain.

I’m uncomfortable being back here, but I don’t let it show. I follow Hison and Aren
through the door and into the living area. The room is dark, lit only by the moonlight
coming in from a window, but I can still make out the blue silk shimmering overhead.
It’s a common fae custom to pin thin drapes to the ceiling. They’re soft and light,
moving like waves when we walk beneath them. They’re supposed to be relaxing, but
I still feel tense, which is stupid. Thrain is dead. Dead, dead, dead.

Unless Naito is right and
banek’tan
do exist.

I don’t know why I let that thought creep into my mind.
I’m 99.9 percent certain no one can bring fae back from the dead.

“Is this close enough?”
Hison asks. He’s standing in front of a window.

“It’s close enough,”
Aren answers. He motions me forward. “The fae will come out of that door.”

That door is barely ten feet away. It’s just across the narrow street and nearly hidden
behind the snow-covered branches of a leafless bush, but it won’t be a problem to
draw the fae’s shadows; the problem will be to do it without the fae seeing me.

“This is fine,” I say, taking the pen out of the spine of the sketchbook tucked under
my robe. Now that we’re out of the weather, I’m much warmer. I don’t take my hood
off, though. If a chaos luster flashes across my face when the fae steps onto the
street, he might figure out this is a setup.

Hison orders his assistant, the one with the name-cord, to go. From what I understand,
he’s to check on the fae prisoner, then “accidentally” leave a door unlocked.

I sink down to one knee beside the window and wait.

Aren squats beside me. “Trev and I will fissure after him.”

That will leave me alone with Hison and his guard. Lovely. “How am I getting back
to Corrist?”

“I shouldn’t be gone more than a few minutes,” he says. He looks directly at me. “McKenzie—”

The door across the street swings open. I don’t have time to see the fae’s face; he
disappears into his fissure the instant he steps outside.

I flip open Naito’s sketchbook, rest it on my knee, and start sketching. I draw three
thick, wavy lines at the top of the page. It’s the Daric Ocean. I frown at the shadows,
scratch down a few bottomless triangles. It’s the same mountain range, too. The fae
didn’t fissure to the exact location Aylen did, but it’s close enough to be extremely
coincidental.

I flip to the next page, narrow down my map. He’s close to a winding street on the
west side of the city. He might even be on it, but I’m not 100 percent sure. I wait
for the shadows to shift, see a thin dark line appear in the center of my vision.
An intersection. I mark an “x” where the shadows tell me he exited, then turn to Aren.

“He’s gone to Eksan,” I say. “I just drew—”

Trev fissures out.

“Thank you.” Aren rests his hand briefly on my bent knee before he rises.

“Aren—”