Silver Skin (A Cold Iron Novel) Read online

  Elada’s voice came quietly from the front seat. “This unknown Fae can still summon her,” he said. “And there can be no doubt he is planning something. Something to do with the solstice gate.”

  “She is safe so long as she is with one of us or in my house,” said Miach. “Where she belongs.”

  She probably should have made some objection to that, but the sorcerer’s hands were warm, stroking her cheek. The whiskey and her ordeal had exhausted her, and sleep beckoned.

  Just before she lost consciousness she heard Elada say, this time even more quietly, “It isn’t one of the Fianna. They were all there tonight.”

  “I know,” replied Miach tightly. The tension in his voice echoed through his body. “Say what you are thinking, old friend.”

  Elada didn’t respond all at once. Then he said, “It cannot be one of the Fianna, but it could still be one of us.”

  It made no sense to Helene at first, but on the edge of sleep, when the mind can make leaps of association it could not bridge during the day, the answer came to her: there was only one member of Miach’s family that Elada could mean, only one half-blood son of Miach MacCecht who would dare to touch the woman his father had marked for himself.

  The same man who had kidnapped Helene and Beth, who had given them to the tender mercies of the Prince Consort: Miach’s own son, Brian.

  Chapter 11

  Helene woke up in a strange room. She was not at Deirdre’s. The proportions of the chamber were too grand, the domed ceiling too high, the windows too large for that classical Beacon Hill dwelling. The walls were round like a turret, papered in a pink and green stripe with garlands of flowers at the top, and her bed had a tester with a green silk canopy. The hangings, the color scheme, and the shape of the room made her feel like a princess in a castle with a view of the sea.

  Which meant she was at Miach’s, in the tower above the library. The whole room, including a frilly dressing table, was decorated in shades of white, pink, and green, so she was fairly certain that it was not his chamber, which made her feel both relieved and disappointed at the same time.

  When she stretched her body beneath the cool cotton sheets, she decided that she was more relieved than disappointed. Someone had bandaged her thigh and put her to bed in her T-shirt and panties, but her mouth felt like sandpaper, and her hair was even more of a tangled mess than usual. Not sexy.

  Her wound, when she peeled the bandage away, looked better than she expected, but she was definitely going to have a scar. It would be easily explained, a bicycle accident or hiking injury, just another one of the dents and scratches on her body to add to those left from her tomboy youth. She refused to be upset by this one, ugly as it was. It was a battle fought and won. Her memories were safe, and the next time that Fae bastard summoned her, there would be no forgetting him.

  Fortunately the room had its own bath, also pink and green, and a basket of delicious smelling soaps and shampoos and lotions. And a razor. The bag Nieve had brought her at Deirdre’s turned up in the wardrobe, along with an assortment of silk and cotton robes and lounging pajamas, the kind Helene had always promised herself she would buy as soon as she had an apartment with more than one room and could reasonably be expected to lounge.

  By the time the knock came at the door, she was showered, shampooed, shaved, and dressed in a pair of Indian block printed pants and a matching quilted jacket that fell to around her knees.

  Helene opened the door to find a very relieved Beth on the threshold. Beth threw her arms around Helene and hugged her. And the petite archaeologist cum Druid was not herself the hugging type.

  “You slept a day and a night. Miach said you were fine but I couldn’t help worrying,” said Beth. “How bad was it?” she asked. “The geis I mean.”

  Helene rolled up her trouser leg. “Ta-da! No more memory eating snake that can turn into fireworks and also, I think, an actual snake.” Unless that had been the pain and the whiskey playing tricks on her . . . but she didn’t think it had been.

  “It’s going to scar,” said Beth, shaking her head. “Miach explained that the geis had a physical manifestation. More like an eel, he said, than a snake.”

  Helene thought about the thing that had slithered across the floor after Miach pulled the geis out. She shuddered. “I’m not sure I like eel any better than snake.”

  “I can heal the punctures,” said Beth, “but there’s no good way to avoid leaving a mark. That would take an enchantment, the kind I don’t know how to cast well. And Miach says it’s always a bad idea to use magic on humans unnecessarily. He says it can have a corrupting effect. I suppose my Druid ancestors are proof of that. What will you tell people at work?”

  “Cycling accident,” said Helene. “That is, when I can go to work. Miach still hasn’t discovered who’s summoning me, I presume?”

  “He hasn’t,” said Beth. “Conn and I went to the museum yesterday, but we didn’t turn up any new clues. We’re leaving for Ireland this afternoon. The house where the Prince Consort held me was full of his followers. Other Fae who want the old Court back. Our best working theory is that your attacker is one of them. We’re hoping we can find out more about the Prince’s circle at his house.”

  “I think Miach suspects that it may be Brian, but he can’t bring himself to come out and say it,” replied Helene.

  “Conn shares the same suspicion,” admitted Beth. “If so, we may find out more in Ireland. There’s no trace of Brian in Boston these past three months. If I could only pass like Conn, we could be back in a matter of hours, but it’s a long trip, there and back. We’ll be gone two days at least. Are you going to be all right here?”

  Helene nodded. “I’m reconciled to life as a princess in a tower for a few days.”

  She let Beth channel her power into the wounds above her knee, removing the tenderness and the minor inflammation that had plagued her since waking, knitting the skin back together until all that remained were pale pink gouges in her flesh. The hated pattern was no longer discernable as a snake eating its tail, which was a relief.

  “Not so bad. And you could always cover it with a tattoo,” suggested Beth brightly as she was leaving.

  “Do I seem like the tattoo type?” asked Helene.

  “Not really. But neither did I, and I’ve acquired quite a few since meeting Conn. Most of them are magical and serve a purpose. And one of them was just for him,” she added with a secret smile.

  Helene wasn’t alone long after Beth left. Nieve appeared soon after with a tray of food that looked like it could feed a whole family. There was a pot of steaming hot chocolate, a pitcher of iced tea, a plate of buttered toast, rashers of bacon, a covered dish of scrambled eggs, and a grilled kipper decorated with a sprig of parsley.

  “The kipper is for the old man,” said Nieve. “In case he joins you for tea.”

  “This is too much food, even for two people,” said Helene, although she had to admit she was very hungry. The fact that Miach might join her at some point kindled a sense of anticipation and excitement in Helene. It made her wonder exactly when she had stopped dreading encountering him again and started to look forward to it. She’d been happy to see him at Deirdre’s, but she wondered now if her aversion had ever really been to the sorcerer, to him. She’d met Miach under terrifying circumstances and associated him with horrible events that had not been of his making. At least, not entirely of his making.

  “It’s the last hot meal you’ll get in this house until tomorrow,” Nieve was saying. “Fiona can’t cook, and I’m going to Finn’s tonight. Garrett is finally going to meet his father.”

  “I’m very happy for you, Nieve,” Helene said.

  Nieve laughed. “You may not be if you’re stuck here with the old man tonight. He’s going to be a monster. He thinks that the earth is going to swallow me up if I leave this house. And he’s used to being waited on.”

  “I can handle Miach MacCecht,” said Helene, with a confidence that she realized she had earned. S
he admitted to herself that she had been attracted to him since the night they’d met, but a rogue’s gallery of villains including Brian and the Prince Consort had kept them apart. And Helene’s loyalty to Beth had made it a betrayal to explore that attraction. Finally there had been her fear of losing herself to a Fae.

  But now the obstacles between them were gone. She understood why he had done the things he had done when they met. Knew his attraction to her was as strong as hers to him.

  Miach had shown himself capable of providing affection and comfort as well as passion. It was unlikely they would ever share the kind of connection that Beth and Conn had forged, or exchange the vows that bound Nieve and Garrett. Perhaps their affair would only last as long as it took to track down her Fae stalker. Some degree of heartbreak was almost inevitable, but that was a price Helene was willing to pay. Just now, Miach MacCecht was the man for her.

  She left her door open after Nieve departed, and raised the curved turret windows to let in the salt sea air. It smelled a lot like the kipper. She settled in to read one of the books Beth had left her, a tome about the Druids and the Celts. She found reading it to be a little like a game of telephone. History held echoes of the Fae, but their true story, their war with the Druids, the real function of the “burial” mounds, the rules that governed their gaesa, were lost in the mists of time and legend.

  She read for most of the afternoon, nibbling on the cakes Nieve had left and dozing when she was tired. It was late afternoon when she looked up to find Miach standing in the doorway, quietly watching her. He looked fully restored, his black hair freshly cut, his blue button-down open over a steel gray T-shirt, narrow chinos flattering his long muscular legs.

  The iron torc was still wrapped around her ankle, had been since the hour before they set out for Finn’s. She still felt an instant rush of attraction on seeing Miach that had nothing to do with Fae glamour or compulsion. If she really looked at him now with the clear sight that was the gift of the cold iron, she acknowledged that the Fae’s beauty held the terror of the sublime in it, a cruelty and a subtle wrongness. They hid it from mortals with good reason. No matter how alluring Miach’s face and form might be, it triggered some human survival instinct that told her she should run.

  But the chase, she had already decided, ended here.

  • • •

  Miach MacCecht was anxious. This was not an emotion that the Fae experienced often. He tried to remember the last time he had felt apprehensive about anything. He had been terrified when Nieve was sick, but that was different. He had walked into Finn’s last night knowing he might die, but he had not feared death. If he searched his memory for a similar event, he had to go back three thousand years.

  There had been a feast in his father’s hall that night. The Wild Hunt was making its progress through the countryside, and the Queen had called upon Dian Cecht’s household and demanded his hospitality. Demanded, because she was angry with Dian for withdrawing from the court, for raising his son at home, away from the politics and intrigue of the Queen’s circle.

  Miach had not fully understood the tensions bubbling just beneath the surface of that meal, but had been able to sense the currents of hostility, lust, envy, and power that crisscrossed that long table. His father had warned him out of the hearing of the Court to be on his guard, to be ready. Miach had not known for what.

  It was his first encounter with the Queen, the first time he’d looked upon her chill beauty, terrible in its perfection and almost incandescent. Like a cold flame.

  And it was the first time he had heard the dulcet sounds of her voice. It was hard, even for a boy with a natural gift of sorcery being trained up in the magical arts, to discern the words in it. A weaker Fae would be entirely caught in the music, understanding nothing yet dancing willy-nilly to her tune.

  He was summoned to the head of the table at the end of the meal and asked to perform a conjuring. A simple spell for a MacCecht. He took a flower from the bowl on the table, a single thorny rose, and channeled his power into it until it grew, in the space of a second, roots and branches and three blood-red blooms. They asked him for a display of lights next, and he cast constellations on the ceiling such that the hammered beams seemed to disappear and the night sky to take its place over their heads. He enchanted a bell to ring with the sound of a babbling brook.

  The Queen thanked him and dismissed him. His father nodded reassuringly. And he thought they were done with him. He’d felt relief. The Queen was capricious. The court was cruel. If he had failed to amuse her, if he had done worse, and somehow insulted her, his father, his whole family, would suffer for it.

  He had not understood that the performance at the end of the meal was only a prelude. The Wild Hunt had surged out into the night, replete with wine and food, to slake other appetites. His father had already sent warnings to their tenants to lock their doors and remain inside, but the Wild Hunt had long since abandoned its own rules. They kicked down doors and ravaged where they chose.

  The house was quiet and Miach was sleeping when the Queen summoned him. He had not been anxious standing by her chair at the head of the table, but he was anxious—nervous—there in her bedchamber. Because he understood the consequences of disappointing her.

  Miach had pleased the Queen. Repeatedly. And he had never felt anxious with a woman again until now.

  Until Helene Whitney. She was seated in a chair by the window, wearing gauze trousers printed in blue and gold and a matching jacket that set off her blond hair.

  She was the first woman he had courted in hundreds of years who had not known immediately what he was, had not been initially attracted to him because he was Fae. Who had not been beguiled by glamour, or dazzled by expensive gifts. She had seen the worst of his kind—in some ways, the worst of him—and she still wanted him.

  He was going to get this right.

  Which meant not rushing her to his bedroom. Which meant taking this slow.

  “I thought we could go for that walk on the beach I promised, Helene,” he said.

  She put the book down. “I’d like that. Let me change my clothes.”

  He wanted to linger and watch her, wanted to see more—all—of her tanned skin. But he was going to wait.

  “I’ll be downstairs,” he said.

  She was quicker than he expected. He’d caught Liam in the hall and thought he might as well use the time to find out how the search was going. If there was a strange Fae in town, between the Fianna and Miach’s family, they should be able to get wind of it. The Fae could pass unseen among humans fairly easily, but they were always noted by half-bloods, who could sense the power in them.

  “No sign,” Liam said. “And no word of Brian either.”

  Helene came down the stairs in a short black cotton sundress and sandals, her hair pinned on top of her head and a light wrap thrown over her shoulders. The sight of her long legs in the short dress meant that, for a moment, all he could think of was finding a secluded place on the beach and having her, up against a wall or a dock pillar.

  “I’m off,” said Liam, who knew he was to make himself scarce when Helene was around. Reconciling her to his sons, who had kidnapped her and Beth Carter against Miach’s wishes, would take some time. And today was not the day.

  • • •

  She had expected him to make love to her. She had been thinking about it all morning. Her body had flushed and grown wet when he walked in the door. She’d checked to see that the cold iron torc was still clasped around her ankle, that this was not the effect of his glamour, and felt a heady rush when she realized that the bracelet was there, and everything she felt was real.

  Now, walking along the beach, she was filled with a tremendous sense of anticipation. She couldn’t remember the last time she had felt that way about embarking on a physical relationship. She realized she had come to see sex as a road bump in the progress of dating, as an awkward make-or-break experience, not an exploration.

  Miach kicked off his shoes and r
olled his trousers, and Helene abandoned her sandals. He took her hand as they crossed the thick line of beachgoers with their blankets and umbrellas and chairs.

  They walked hand in hand along the water. “You told me once,” he said, “that you weren’t like Beth Carter. You weren’t searching for something. So how did you end up working at the museum?”

  “I love paintings. I wanted to study them. But I discovered that I didn’t like basements or spending long hours in closets cataloging art that no one ever got to see, and I got sucked into the fundraising end of things.”

  It was a normal question and a normal answer and she could, if she wished, stick to normal. Pretend he was human. Rich and criminal, but human. Like the donors she met at the museum. Only not married. But she was coming to realize that normal was overrated and that abnormal could be extraordinary, so she asked the question she was most curious about.

  “Why Boston? Why did you and Finn and Deirdre come here?”

  “We came with the Irish,” he said. “We came looking for excitement. At least Finn and I did. And Deirdre . . . she came looking for new places and people to paint, and a city where she could live quietly. She is somewhat fragile. When we rescued her from the Druids she was too weak to know what was happening. She never saw them brought low, never saw them defeated. And because of that she has never really believed, in her bones, that they are gone. She thinks they’re out there, somewhere, plotting their revenge.”

  “That’s why you have to ward her house every year,” Helene guessed.

  He nodded. “She has no enemies amongst the Fae. Most of us revere her talents too much. The Druids were not interested in our art, for the most part, and so they did not keep many of our painters or musicians aboveground. They hoped that Deirdre’s art—which has a deep magic in it—might have some value as a weapon, perhaps to create terrifying illusions. They tried to force her to produce images of immense horror, but all they succeeded in doing was driving her more than a little mad.”