Blade Dance (A Cold Iron Novel Book 4) Read online

  He liked her house. He liked the idea of making love to her in her own place, but it would have to wait. Hopefully not too long. He could see the nervous tension in her, the need to work out her lingering fury. A berserker with control of her powers would be a formidable ally. She’d already taken the first steps to train herself. She knew how to suppress her power, but not how to wield it. He wanted to be the one to teach her.

  “Here,” she said, tapping her smartphone. “I can text you the photos so you can show them to Garrett.”

  “I have a better idea,” he said. “Come with me.”

  “And sit outside like Nancy McTeer?” she asked. “You said the Fianna were gathering, and I’m not a member of your band.”

  “You could be.”

  “I’m not Fae.”

  “But you share in the same magic. And there have been berserkers among us in the past.”

  “Two thousand years ago, the way you tell it.”

  “True, but the Fae have long memories.”

  “Sean won’t like it.”

  “Sean is no longer a member of our company. He is part of the search for his son because that is his right as a father, but he will not be welcome in my house after Davin is rescued.”

  “You believe we’ll find him?” she asked, biting her lower lip. It made him realize how brave she had been this week. He’d known she was made of rare stuff the day they’d met. She was a bloody schoolteacher, for Dana’s sake, and she’d marched straight up to the door of the most fearsome criminal in Charlestown—his door—and brazened her way past the gauntlet of tattooed ruffians who skulked outside, all for the sake of a little truant boy. She’d bearded the lion in his den, gone toe to toe with Finn in his own parlor, and Finn still wasn’t sure who had come out ahead in that confrontation.

  Even after the stress of passing, she’d gotten up, dusted herself off, and promised that she would be back. Tonight she’d been kidnapped and experienced her first conscious berserk, and the thing she was worried about wasn’t herself, but the fate of a little boy who wasn’t even her own flesh and blood.

  “We are going to find Davin,” said Finn. “The Druid took him for a reason.” He was not going to remind her that the Druids delighted in “experimentation” on living victims. “If he intended simple murder, he would not have taken the boy. And you are more than worthy of a place in my company”—at my side—“once you learn to harness your power and acquire some fighting skills.”

  “I’ve always been afraid to take a self-defense class, in case I hurt someone unintentionally.”

  “You can’t hurt me,” he said. But even as the words left his mouth, he knew that was wrong. Caring about someone was the easiest way of all to get hurt. Brigid had caused him the greatest hurt in his life by dying, not to mention the daily pain Garrett’s defection caused him. “We’ll start tomorrow.”

  “I have school tomorrow.”

  “You’re on sabbatical,” he said.

  “Since when?”

  “Since tomorrow morning, once I’ve called the school.”

  “The principal will object.”

  “No, she won’t,” said Finn. “She knows who rules in Charlestown.”

  “I have students who need me.”

  “Not as badly as Davin does.” Or as badly as I do. “You may be the best chance we have of finding him. You photographed his tattoos. You were there for him when the people he should have been able to turn to, his mother and his father, failed him. It’s possible he confided something in you that will help.”

  “Do you really believe that? Do you really believe I can help?”

  “I do.”

  “All right,” she said. “We’ll call it a sabbatical, but it’s only until we have Davin back.”

  Ann knew he was offering her something special, admission to the select company of Fae that he fought with. A part of her wanted to explore her power, learn how to use her gifts, but the greater part of her was scared and wanted to retreat to the familiar. She wanted to sleep in her own bed tonight, to cling to this place and the life and identity she had carved out for herself.

  But Finn MacUmhaill knew how to push her buttons. And to save Davin, she would follow him, for now.

  It was past midnight by the time they got to Finn’s. He slipped his car into a narrow drive beside the house that she hadn’t even noticed on her previous visit, but not before she saw the Fae outside, flanking the entrance like a guard of honor. Suddenly she felt nervous. She’d marched past the Fianna the day his house had exploded, but she hadn’t known what they were then, hadn’t needed or desired their acceptance.

  He opened the car door for her.

  “Can we go in the back?” she asked. “I’m betting a lot of those Fae are Sean’s friends and won’t feel kindly toward me.”

  “Better if we walk in the front door. I want the Fianna to know that you’re on equal footing with them.”

  “But I’m not. They’re experienced. I’m just . . . what I am.”

  “What you are is gifted and brave. And every member of this band had to start somewhere.”

  He took her hand. That was unexpected. The Fae flanking the door and the ones loitering on the street outside noted it. Ann saw surprise and curiosity on their faces, but no hostility. His band might be thinning, but the Fianna who remained were obviously loyal and Finn’s favor meant something to them.

  Then they were inside and exhaustion finally hit her. Finn had insisted that she pack a bag. “You’ll be too tired to go home. The photos will help, but Iobáth and Garrett will want to ask you questions. Possibly the boy said something or did something at school that might help us find him.”

  He’d been right. She was too tired to go home. She almost nodded off retelling her encounters with Davin to Garrett and Iobáth. The overstuffed leather sofas in the parlor weren’t helping either. Garrett had eagerly taken her phone from her and uploaded the photos to Miach’s computer, and now he and Iobáth stood in front of the flat-screen television murmuring and pointing out details in the inky vines. Their voices were soft and low, soothing even, and Ann could barely keep her eyes open.

  “There’s more than a simple geis here,” Garrett was saying. She could hear beers being opened in the kitchen, the metallic squeal of baking sheets Mrs. Friary pulled out of the oven. The house had the feel of a large family gathering at a holiday, although not quite as festive. Maybe more like a respectful wake. She felt like a child who had had too much dessert, falling asleep on the sofa while the adults stayed up talking and drinking. “He’s cut scars into the boy as well,” Garrett continued. “They’re barely visible beneath the ink, and I’m not familiar with the pattern, but they’re there.”

  “I recognize the scars,” said Iobáth. “They are Druid control marks. He could order the boy to do anything with those.”

  “To come with him, even against his will,” said Garrett grimly. “Miach should have a look at these. This is magic from before the fall.”

  “How would some modern Druid know such things?”

  “I have no idea,” said Garrett, “but I know it’s not good.”

  Finn’s hand on her shoulder startled her. She’d been drifting into an uneasy sleep, imagining the tattoo needle jabbing her over and over, as it had Davin, and a silvery blade scoring her flesh.

  “You were fast asleep,” said Finn.

  “I’m awake,” she slurred. She could barely open her eyes.

  “You’ve done all you can for today. It’s time for bed.”

  She tried to get up but before she could get to her feet, he lifted her into his arms and carried her from the room. She was too tired to protest. The front stairs were wide and ornately carved. At the landing they turned toward the back of the house and Finn angled their bodies through a half-closed door and deposited her on a bed. It was too dark to see much of the room, bu
t the sheets were smooth against her cheek and the mattress was topped with a fluffy down pad.

  Finn covered her with a quilt from the bottom of the bed and stopped for a moment to stand beside her pillow.

  “Is this your room?” she asked. She wouldn’t be sorry if he said yes.

  “No. This is a guest room.”

  “It’s comfy,” she said. “I like it.”

  He smiled. “Don’t get too used to it. I promise you, my lovely little berserker, after tonight, you sleep in my bed.”

  He bent to kiss her then, full on the mouth, his warm lips a sensuous contrast to the cool cotton sheets, and she wanted to pull him down to the bed with her. But even with that thought in her head, she was already drifting to sleep.

  When she woke, daylight was streaming in through the windows. She was lying in a pencil-post bed of figured tiger maple dressed with pristine white sheets. There was a fireplace at the foot of the bed and off to one side a small table where her overnight bag rested. The room itself was finely paneled and had been painstakingly restored, a Georgian gem in the heart of the city.

  She’d slept in her clothes. She needed a shower and a toothbrush. Both of these, fortunately, turned out to be available. There was an attached bath, painted in the same simple colonial blue and bright white as the bedroom, stocked with basic toiletries and plump towels and rich soap and even a soft cotton robe.

  When she emerged, there was a breakfast tray on the dresser. There was hot coffee in a silver pot, a beverage she enjoyed the scent of but never drank, and—more to her taste—hot tea in a chubby porcelain pot under a quilted tea cozy. She poured herself a cup and tasted it, identifying at once the smoky, expensive flavors of a Chinese Lapsang Souchong, the kind she could only afford in quarter-pound bags, doled out for special occasions. When Ann lifted a silver dome next to the teapot, buttery steam rose into the air. The scrambled eggs were flecked with parsley and seasoned with salt, and Ann ate them, alternating bites with the maple sausages, rich with sage. Finn’s cook had made popovers, and these came wrapped in a cotton napkin in a basket along with a pot of clotted cream and raspberry jam that had to be homemade. Ann sat at the little table beside the window and ate everything.

  She tried to remember the last time she’d eaten a hot meal cooked by someone other than herself, and all she could come up with was the dinner Finn’s housekeeper had brought them last night. It wasn’t that she didn’t cook. Her mother never had, so Ann had set out to master the art. But cooking for one person meant a single chicken breast. Loose leaf tea was something reserved for company. The spread in front of her, the bustle of the kitchen last night, made her long for the busy family home she’d never known. She’d grown up largely in institutions. The foster homes she’d lived in had been just her and her well-meaning foster parents, none of whom had been part of large extended clans. Her only brush with that kind of busy joy had been in college. One of her roommates had invited her home to a Christmas in cheerful suburban Beverly, to a holiday bursting with siblings, nephews, nieces, cousins, aunts, uncles, and even neighbors.

  Ann had loved every minute of it, and days later, in the stacks of the library by herself, lonelier than she had ever been, she’d wept buckets for that Christmas, wished she could feel that warmth, that fellowship all over again.

  Finn might have problems with his band, but they had gathered when he needed them, and that was a feeling Ann had never known.

  She’d packed casual clothes in her overnight bag, and it felt wonderful to be warm and clean and to pull on her soft moccasins and velour sweatpants—a favorite, because in black, with nice shoes, they looked velvet, and with casual shoes, they were fine for the supermarket. She was glad to discover that she had grabbed her most flattering turtleneck, a generous cowl in soft black cotton that hugged her curves, and a navy-blue cotton sweater in a swingy cut that almost made her feel slender. She pinned her hair on top of her head and ventured out of the room to discover the house relatively quiet.

  Relatively. Ann could hear the clank and chirp of cutlery and dishes being collected downstairs. And distantly, from somewhere above, she could hear the ring of blade meeting blade. She didn’t have to see it to know what it was. Something deep inside her heard and recognized. The sound quickened her blood and drew her along the hall and up the stairs to an unexpected space.

  The top floor of Finn’s three-story house was tucked under the gambrel roof, but it wasn’t the dark, cave-like nook she’d been expecting. Nor was it a warren of tiny Georgian rooms. Someone had opened up the space, making the whole of the third floor into one enormous studio with a vaulted ceiling. There were five dormers cut into the walls for sash windows that flooded the room with light, and the wide pine floors were polished to a mirror-like shine. The long walls were sloped inward following the mansard roofline, but the short walls at the ends of the house were straight and hung with a daunting collection of weaponry, some of which was being used by Finn and two Fae she didn’t recognize.

  He moved fast, the leader of the Fianna. He had a short blade in each hand and he was barefoot and shirtless, countering two attackers, but there wasn’t a bead of sweat on his muscled chest.

  She knew the moment he became aware of her standing at the top of the stairs. His body tensed, he threw his shoulders back and, even though he was turned away from her, he spoke as though he knew exactly where she was. “Did you sleep well?” he asked even as he parried one attack and moved to counter another.

  “Yes. Thanks,” she said, blushing. She knew what the two other Fae must think, that she was sharing his bed. She knew what he was doing, too: making a public claim, as he had last night by taking her hand as they walked in the house. He was telling everyone that Ann was his. No one had ever done that before, been willing to call Ann their own in public. And the thought that this strong, masculine creature with the broad back and the fast footwork might be hers filled Ann with a giddy sense of elation. She couldn’t remember feeling anything like it since she’d had her first grade-school crush.

  “Then it’s time to start your training,” he said, breaking off with his breathless opponents and turning to face Ann.

  “What about Davin?” she asked.

  “Garrett has been using the photographs to scry for the child all morning. It is a slow process and physically draining. There is nothing we can do until he succeeds, except ready ourselves”—he twirled the blade in his right hand and tossed her the one in his left—“for the fight.”

  She surprised herself by catching it. The hilt felt heavy in her hand. She had no idea what to do with it. “I don’t know if this is such a good idea. I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

  “What about the Druid who abducted Davin?”

  She would gladly hurt him, but the sword didn’t feel right. “Maybe I’m more of a bare-knuckle kind of gal,” she suggested.

  “Bare knuckles usually lose against naked blades. The sword may not turn out to be your weapon, but it is a good place to start.”

  Finn dismissed the other two Fae with a nod of his head and took up a position beside her. “Relax your knees,” he instructed. “Angle your body. You want to give your opponent as narrow a target as possible. Now, observe.”

  He lunged and thrust with his sword, the point kissing a worn spot on the wall. He stepped away and indicated that she should imitate him.

  It was harder than it looked. The point of her sword went wide of the mark and scratched an ugly line across the wall.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t be. These walls have their fair share of scars. Try to feel the blade as an extension of your arm. Aim for control and form now; worry about speed and force later.”

  He hung his sword up on the wall. “I have to check on Garrett. Practice until I get back. Switch hands if your arm becomes tired.”

  Her arm was already tired, but she didn’t say that, because Finn
stopped her lips with a parting kiss that promised future pleasures. Then he was down the stairs and away, and Ann was alone in the sunlit chamber.

  She practiced until her arm became not just tired but numb, then switched hands. When she was too fatigued to go on, she set the sword down and examined the gleaming weapons on the wall. Swords dominated, but there were also knives, sickles, and a selection of axes. All were forged from the same silver metal that gleamed too brightly to be steel. The axes, in particular, called to her, and she selected a small double-bladed model from the wall. It felt surprisingly light in her hand, unlike the sword, and the handle felt as though it had been made for her grip.

  She stepped away from the wall and swung the ax. Just a little tentative swing, but somehow it took on a life of its own, moved in a graceful arc that filled with her a sense of déjà vu. Which was nonsense because she’d never swung an ax before, or even a golf club.

  She reversed direction and swung again, letting the ax guide her, following the path it sliced through the air. Bringing her face-to-face with the singular Fae who stood at the top of the stairs.

  She was so surprised by his sudden, silent, appearance there that she dropped her ax. It clattered to the floor, the blade ringing dully through the space like a giant bell.

  “You must be the meddling teacher that I’ve been hearing so much about,” said the stranger.

  He was tall, quite possibly taller than Finn, and slightly leaner. His hair was longer than Iobáth’s. It was inky black, woven with tiny silver leaves, and the ends kissed the floorboards. His eyes were the frostiest blue she had ever seen. He had the same passion for expensive indigo denim as the other Fae she had encountered, but the rest of his clothes were far more opulent. He wore a heavily embroidered peasant shirt in cream linen and gray stitchwork beneath a frock coat of black silk decorated with silver wire roses. On his feet were bargello court shoes in shades of red, ochre, and black. In short, he was dressed nothing like the other Fianna, who blended into the streets of Charlestown in their faded T-shirts and jeans.