Fire Touched (29 page)

I felt a slow, rolling anxiety. Beauclaire had once, not long ago, told me that he could create hurricanes and tidal waves. That he could drown cities. The Columbia was a mile wide and sixty feet
deep.

We followed Uncle Mike and Goreu through the double doors marked
EMPLOYEES
ONLY
. I'd expected a kitchen, but there was only a stairway that led up or down. We took the up. Uncle Mike's shouldn't have had an up. From the outside, it was clearly a single-story building. Apparently, that was an illusion or this was a different kind of stairway. We climbed more than one floor. I started counting on the third-floor landing, and I counted seven more. I don't know that there is a ten-story building in the Tri-Cities—maybe the new hospital building in Richland.

Goreu said, opening the door at the top of the stairs, “We wanted you to have a good view.”

It was windy, but warm enough, as we stepped out onto a flat roof, the kind of roof I'd have expected Uncle Mike's to have, with battered machines happily humming away, keeping the tavern a steady temperature, and a knee-high barricade to keep people from walking off the edge. Just the right height for a tripping hazard, I
thought. Someone stood on the edge of the roof, looking out over the river.

I'd once caught a glimpse of Beauclaire without the glamour that made him appear human. It hadn't prepared me for the whole deal. He was, unlike a lot of fae, almost entirely human-shaped, and his height was somewhere between tall and average, an inch or so taller than Adam and of a similar build.

He turned to greet us, and I could see the hints of the Beauclaire I knew, parts that he'd pulled into his glamour—but he didn't look like a human. His cheekbones were high and flat beneath eyes like expensive emeralds, clear and deep. Other than his eyes, his coloring came from the sun: his skin would have been the envy of a California bikini enthusiast; his hair, which reached past his shoulders in a thick, straight fall, held all the colors of gold with hints of red. Was he beautiful? I couldn't tell. He was extraordinary.

“You are just in time,” he said. “I have pushed the last of the humans off the bridge—so I am ready for our little demonstration.”

Goreu huffed a laugh, then turned to us. “He didn't mean that like it sounded. He
encouraged
the people who have been working on the bridge to find something else to do. We don't need to kill people for this demonstration.”

“One of our Council members was convinced we should flood one of the towns—Burbank or Richland,” Uncle Mike said. “It took a while to persuade her that killing that many people would ensure that we'd never get a treaty of any kind with you, and it would play right into the hands of our foes on the Council.”

I shivered, though it wasn't cold, and walked as close to the edge as I dared. We had a spectacular view, not as scary as the one from on top of the crane the other day, but spectacular. The Lampson crane was to our left, but it was the view of the Columbia and
the Cable Bridge that was breathtaking in a different way than it had been from on top of the crane. From the crane, it had looked distant and small. From our current vantage point, it felt like we were standing right on top of it—and it was huge.

Beauclaire raised his hand and said something. It might have been a word, but it sounded bigger than that. It resonated in my chest and in my throat. Below us, under the center of the bridge, the water of the Columbia started to swirl.

Magic, thick and rich and warm as the noonday sun in August, pressed down on me, and I went to my knees. Adam put his hand under my elbow, but he had to wrap his arms around me before I could stand. I breathed like a racehorse, and my face grew hot, then very cold, and still the power moved.

The swirling water started small, but grew until the whole river circled beneath the bridge like traffic negotiating the stupid roundabouts that had been showing up where the four-way stop signs used to be. Gradually, the water moved faster, climbing the banks on the outside edge as the center dropped.

The pressure of the water made the bridge groan, I could hear it from where we stood. Overhead, a helicopter flew in and hovered.

Adam said something that I, consumed by the force of Beauclaire's magic, missed, his voice just another rumble in my ears and chest.

I heard Goreu's reply, though it didn't make much sense to me at the time. “Our helicopter. We called the news agencies about ten minutes ago, but we wanted to make sure this was recorded for the media. We'll give the footage to the local stations and let them disseminate it. That worked well enough for your killing of the troll.” He looked at me. “She is sensitive to magic.”

Adam grunted rather than answering, and Goreu smiled at him.
For a moment, he looked less human to me, too, and I had the feeling that the real Goreu was a lot bigger than his glamour would suggest. But the bridge groaned again, and all my attention returned to the sight before us.

The water on the outside of the whirlpool was level with the bridge deck, much higher than the banks of the river, though Beauclaire's magic kept all the water where he wanted it. Beyond the whirlpool, the Columbia's waves grew choppy and white-edged, but the level of the river didn't appear to be affected.

The whirlpool quit growing, but it continued to speed up and drain the middle to feed the edge until I could see bare ground beneath the bridge. The circle grew until the entire section between the two towers was empty of water. The bridge was shaking under the force of the water that now hit the railed edge before rushing over or under the bridge with twisting force.

Beauclaire spoke another word—and for a moment my eyes wouldn't focus. When I could see again, there was no more dirt beneath the bridge. There was just . . . nothing, a hole, so deep that, from our perspective, I could not see the bottom.

The fae cannot lie. Beauclaire had told me he could drown cities, but until this moment, I hadn't really understood what that meant. And this was nowhere near the limits of his power. He might have been able to fake his relaxed stance, but I could feel the magic he channeled to the river and the earth, and there was no end to it.

It took maybe three more minutes, and the bridge gave in to the twisting water, breaking free of its supports and foundations. The noise was tremendous, Uncle Mike's shook, and I could hear someone's car alarm go off. For a moment, just after it was ripped from the bank, the bridge held its structure. Then it collapsed, torn apart by the water and by gravity. Some of the bridge dropped into the hole
immediately, some of it was carried by the water to bang back into the supports that had held it up. Battered by water and by debris, the supports for the towers slid into the black hole beneath. The water swirled and spat bits of cement, metal, blacktop, and long, snapping cables into the hole until the water ran clean and nothing more fell out.

Beauclaire said another word, a release of some sort, because it was easier for me to breathe again. The hole in the earth closed up, and this time I could watch it happen, the soil building up from the outside and working in until there was nothing but disturbed dirt and rocks where the hole had been.

Beauclaire said another word, and the water slowed, the whirlpool edge leveled, and the center filled with water. Eventually, the Columbia quit swirling altogether and flowed with deceptive mildness in the same path it had taken an hour ago—except that now it didn't flow past a bridge. It looked beautiful and peaceful. I could see people, some of them in uniform, on both sides of the river, and they were all staring, just like me.

Adam turned me around so he could see my face. He wiped my cheeks with his thumbs—that's when I realized there were tears running down my face. I didn't know why I'd been crying, I wasn't sad—just overwhelmed by Beauclaire's magic.

He bent down to me.
Are you all right?

His voice slid through the mating bond, caressed me, and cleared my head. I felt like I could take a clean breath for the first time since Beauclaire had called his magic.

“I'm fine,” I told him out loud, because if I spoke through our bond, he would hear too much, and I was afraid that the echoes of magic still rattling my bones might cross and hurt him. I didn't know why it was a worry, just that it was, and I had learned to trust my instincts.

He looked at Goreu, standing patiently beside Beauclaire. Sometime while Adam and I were talking, he had regained his usual, unremarkable, glamoured appearance.

“You said two things,” Adam said. “This was the first—a demonstration of what the fae can do. So that no one thinks that you were driven to treat with us because we killed your troll, and you're scared. I found your demonstration very convincing.”

“The mortals and their government will be very grateful to you for achieving a neutral territory where they can be safe,” Goreu said. “The second thing is that you need to find a reason for us to treat with you.”

“The Fire Touched would work,” Beauclaire said. “I would guarantee his safety and his well-being.”

“Since he left our care, Underhill has been more difficult,” said Goreu. “She didn't seem to mind while he was on the reservation grounds, but when he left, she was unhappy.”

Beauclaire shook his head. “She didn't care that Neuth and Órlaith tortured him,” he clarified. “She only cared when he left her influence. Had I realized that, I would have taken him under my protection in the first place. But it would have cost me political power I needed at the moment, to step in to rescue a human—no matter how altered. So—” He stopped speaking.

“Don't worry,” said Goreu. “I knew you helped the Dark Smith and his son escape with the Fire Touched. No one had to tell me—who else would have done it? Don't worry, most of them are blinded by the fact that the Dark Smith killed your father. They wouldn't forgive someone's sneezing on them, and couldn't comprehend you in a million years, my friend.”

“We won't send the boy back,” I said.

“Do you doubt me?” asked Beauclaire. He didn't sound offended,
but it scared me all the same. It didn't change my opinion, but it did scare me.

“No,” I said firmly. “But he wakes up screaming in terror on the nights he can sleep. He's afraid of you—all of you. If you'd stopped the Widow Queen and her ilk when he first escaped Underhill, if someone, if anyone had cared for him, he wouldn't have come to us. I don't think that he'll go back willingly. And I think he has suffered enough. I won't encourage him to go back. I trust you and your word, Beauclaire. But I don't think that he will survive if he's forced back to you. I won't force him, and I won't allow anyone else to, either.”

Beauclaire turned to Adam. “Does she speak for you?”

“She speaks for herself,” said Adam. “But I agree. He cannot go back.”

“You will risk the survival of the pack for the happiness of a boy who will not be harmed,” said Goreu. There was no judgment in his voice. “A boy who is not a child at all.”

I looked at Adam.

He smiled. “My wolves would not thank me for sending a scared kid to the people in his nightmares just to keep them safe. Safety is not always the key. He belongs to the pack now, and we take care of our own.”

And that right there was one of the differences between Adam and Bran. Bran kept his eye on the end game. Adam understood the end game all right, but to him, the people mattered more than the game.

The werewolves needed Bran, who could make the tough choices to make sure they survived. I needed Adam because he would never abandon someone who loved him, the way that Bran had abandoned us. Abandoned me. Twice. I swallowed and reminded myself I was a grown-up. But I was so grateful that I had Adam. “Name something else,” said Adam.

Goreu turned to Beauclaire, and said, “I told you that would not happen.” He looked at Adam. “I'm afraid, then, it is up to you.”

“You can't give us a better clue about what we could offer you?” Adam said.

“Ask Zee,” said Goreu. “Our people are hungry for magic, and Zee has been collecting the weapons he has made.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Now,
that
makes sense. We find ourselves on opposite sides in a conflict—and to stop it, we give you a powerful magical artifact, a weapon?”

Goreu grinned at my logic. “It might work.”

Uncle Mike, who'd been a silent witness to it all, shook his head. “That old man has been destroying his toys ever since his wife died. I'm not sure he has anything big enough to matter.”

I looked at him, and Uncle Mike shrugged. “He was forced to marry her, and he thought it would be easy so he allowed it. Then he fell in love for the first time in . . . for the first time, I think. When she died—he was very angry. Angry at the Gray Lords who made him make himself vulnerable. So he started to destroy any of his own work that came back to him—and most of it does, eventually. He also destroys other things when he can, too. The Gray Lords would stop him if they could.” He gave the two Gray Lords present a merry look. “But they can't. So they pretend not to notice.”