I just couldn’t show it. Not unless I was willing to hand myself over to Ryder and agree to his leash.
“Robbie, go get us some food and have Bryan charge it to my account.” I jerked my head toward the door. “Give the grown-ups a couple of hours to work this out.”
“Fine,” he grumbled, getting up off the mattress. “But if the two of you do it, not on the bed, okay? Because I’m going to have to crash in a bit, and I am
not
sleeping on the floor.”
“HOW DID
you find out about Dempsey?” I’d waited until Malone was out of the room before I perched in the spot he’d abandoned. “Who told you? ’Cause it sure as hell wasn’t him.”
“Actually it was.” Ryder smiled at my disbelieving snort. “We were at the hospital. I saw him in the corridor after I left Jonas’s marriage. He wearing one of those gowns they had put on you, so I knew he wasn’t merely visiting. A hello then led to a question, and he told me—let me see if I can remember his warm words—to fuck off, you cat-bastard and go crawl back into the tree I’d come from.
“After that eloquent conversation, which reminded me so much of the loving discussions you and I have, I headed to Billing to settle Jonas’s account and struck up a very interesting conversation with the department head there.” He sat down next to me, the mattress giving enough for me to put my hand down so I didn’t lean into him. “It was then a simple matter of asking to pay Dempsey’s account. People get very talkative when you are willing to pay off someone else’s debts.”
“I can fucking take care of him. I don’t need you to—” Anger tightened my gums, squeezing at my teeth, and my jaw hurt from my clenching down. “Dempsey is my responsibility. You had no damned right—”
“I have every right, Kai. You are….” Ryder exhaled. “He is your family. For all intents and purposes, your father. I’ve made my intentions to you known, I’ve pulled you into the Court—into my protection—as much as I can, and still you fight me on every little thing. I ask nothing from you but to let me help, and you argue, bite, and spit like an
ainle
caught in a hunter’s trap. The billing person told me you’d paid off some of his outstanding bill, but he—Dempsey—was a risk. He’d let the bill go on too long. They don’t have faith in him, and you—”
“I’m a damned elfin,” I hissed. “They don’t see him as anything to me but another human, and I have no reason to pay off his treatment.”
“Which is… ludicrous.” Ryder chuckled. “As if anyone meeting that man would think someone would help him out of anything but affection.”
“He’s going to need more tests,” I choked out. “I can’t—they don’t know if they can heal what he’s got.”
“They can. With enough money. Sadly, that is what is driving his treatment, not any concern for his longevity, but that is an easy piece to take off of the board. He will get better. I promise you this, Kai.” Ryder sounded confident, but I wasn’t reassured. “I’ve asked Medical to charge his treatments to the Court. He is your family, your clan. Dempsey is as much my responsibility as Alexa or the twins because of what he means to you.”
“You shouldn’t have done that. I can pay for his shit, Ryder. You don’t have the right….” Biting into my anger, I reeled at its bitterness and swallowed. “I can take care of him. I’ll work more jobs. Take down more black dogs. He’s mine to worry about.”
“What is your problem with my help, Kai?” His hand brushed the hair from my temple, and I jerked back, not trusting myself if he touched me for too long. Ryder’s expression dipped into a bit of sorrow, and then amusement lightened his green eyes. “You worry about me having too great of a hold of your life?”
“My life? How about over me? You pay for this thing with Dempsey and then the next time something comes up, it’ll be you stepping in again, and then again, until I get too used to turning to you.” I growled, rubbing my hands on my thighs to work off my nerves. “Every credit you spent is another thread—another rope—around my neck. I won’t—can’t—let you own me, Ryder. I just fricking can’t.”
“So you would let your pride and fears condemn Dempsey to a painful, lingering death?” Ryder cocked his head and stabbed me with his soft words. “When I have the means to help Medical cure him?”
I’d eaten more crow than I could handle that day, but apparently I’d left a little piece behind on my dish. Shaking my head, I whispered, “No, but… shit. You can’t just shove into my life and do things. Not without asking. You can’t just push in and expect me not to be pissed off about it. When you do that, you’re no better than Sebac.”
He flinched, but I needed him to understand a man’s pride—my pride—and Ryder nodded slowly, then said, “
That
I understand. But would you have asked me for help? Would you have reached out to me?”
“No, probably not.” I glanced over at him and swallowed the last black feather on my plate. “But I should have. Next time I’ll think about it. If it endangers someone, then yes, I’ll…
ask
.”
“Then I promise to ask before I do something I think will help you.” He patted my thigh. “Now I need you to understand why I announced your bloodline to my sister. Since we are working on understanding one another.”
Yeah, I’d forgotten I was still pissed off at that, but he’d come halfway, so listening was the least I could do. “Shoot. Go ahead. Make it good.”
“You are… dangerous,” he started. “The sidhe in Elfhaime know of you… know of what Sebac tried to do to you. You stood up to her, Kai. Spat in her face and walked out with your head high. Not many can say they’ve done that. Everything you did up in Elfhaime laid the foundation of your house… of your clan.”
“I put a couple of guards into the dirt, and your grandmother made me cry like a baby,” I reminded him. “Not very respectable there.”
“You were attacked and put them down without drawing blood.” Ryder shook his head at my short, barking laugh. “Well, okay. Some blood. But Sebac tried to…
unmake
you, Kai. Simply because you
are
what you are… who you are, and in that, she had no right. She tried to kill you, and you pushed back, refusing to bend to her spell. She
couldn’t
kill you, Kai. As much as she tried, she
couldn’t
.”
“So what? You told everyone that?” I scoffed. “You hate her, but she’s your grandmother. You wouldn’t turn her in for that. That’s—”
“You are my… friend, Kai. More than that, but we shall use that very human word. Sebac is now pulling as many threads as she can to save herself, because the other clans have held her responsible for her attempt to murder you. The Sebac can control many things, but gossip spreads the truth in many forms, and sometimes the truth comes back with teeth and an undeniable hunger,” Ryder interrupted. “Yes, I filed a complaint against her. You are of my Court. I have acknowledged that. She might have the Clan, but I have eons of sidhe tradition behind me. I am a High Lord. She openly attacked one of mine, and for that, she will have to pay. The Courts will make her pay.”
“So you’re telling me everyone with pointed ears pretty much knew I’m some damned monster Tanic made in his workshop the moment I walked out of the Sebac’s kill room?” I hissed at Ryder’s nod. “Well, shit. What about Ciarla? Does anyone know she gave those healers my brother’s seed instead of her husband’s?”
“Some do, but it’s not… discussed openly,” he answered softly. “Not because I am ashamed of their—your—bloodline but because I do not want them to be targets. The Clan heads and High Lords know of their bloodline, and some are in favor of giving them to the Dusk Court, but I do not want them to go to the unsidhe. I don’t want to lose them to their father—your brother, Valin—because I know he will do to them what was done to you.”
“They’ve pulled sidhe. They
are
sidhe. With the exception of yours truly, the elfin can only be
one
Court,” I reminded him. “As much as Valin cuid Anbhas wanted to mess with my mind about stealing them to raise, there’s no mistaking that Ciarla’s daughters are sidhe.”
“The Dawn Courts haven’t decided if the twins are sidhe yet. But by declaring them a part of your bloodline, I’ve protected them regardless of how the Courts decide.” Ryder gave me a slim smile. “I’ve acknowledged your Clan, counted you in my Court, so it doesn’t matter if the Courts decide they are unsidhe. They are still a part of my Court because you are their uncle.”
“What? You think that the Dawn Court’s going to just hand them over to the Dusk because they don’t like the way the kids were cooked up?” It was stupid, but knowing what I did of the hard-shelled, tradition-bound sidhe, I wouldn’t put it past them. The girls I’d helped break from their eggs were considered as unnatural as I was, merely because they’d been created in a petri dish then carried by a human surrogate. “You’d think they’d be happy about it. You’re the one always going on about how you guys don’t make enough babies. Sure, it’s weird, but… apparently it’s all you’ve got going for you.”
“The Dawn trusts magic more than science. Which is why I need to get to that abandoned Court. If here is a record or a spell there to help with fertility, I need to find it. The Court looked old, probably vacated well before the Merge for one reason or another. It might hold answers we’ve lost to history and arrogance. We are—as a people—very arrogant,” he said ruefully. “I will admit to being glad I made Alexa stay at Southern Rise. Ciarla is a complication.”
“Yeah, what about Ciarla?” Ryder’s sister excused herself from the office once the introductions were done, promising her brother she’d meet him later to discuss her plans. I personally had my own plans for her—ones involving a sharp blade or two—but Ryder wasn’t feeling the love for violence like I did. “You think she’s going to go to Balboa to take the kids?”
“No, she can’t. Not after declaring I’d been the one to use unsidhe seed on her eggs.” Ryder shook his head. “Alexa will protect the girls, but I’m curious as to why she’s here. She has no reason to be in the area. None whatsoever.”
I had a theory, something to do with Ciarla’s lying nature and her assumption the world owed her everything, but a scream cut through the night, slicing apart any idea I might have tossed at Ryder for consideration. The scream was human, male, and one I’d grown to know.
“Malone!” I was off the bed and grabbing my guns before Ryder stood up. It was a hard juggle to get the door open, but the knob eventually gave way and I was in the night air, searching the storm-rattled parking lot for the piece of naïve trouble we’d brought up with us.
I found him ten yards down the walk, standing near a sunburned palm tree and shivering in the cold rain, his hands white from clenching plastic bags of takeout food and his eyes wide with fear. I was about to ask him what he was doing in the rain when the dark around him blinked and pairs of crimson lights popped up, sparking malevolent flecks of primal evil glowing through the damp night.
The
ainmhi dubh
had found us, and from the number of eyes shining back at me, I sure as hell didn’t have enough bullets on me to save Malone’s life.
THE DOGS
were ugly, flat black shapes dappled with uneven mottles of muddy gray. They weren’t the largest I’d seen but were plenty large enough to cause damage, heavyset and squat with hulking shoulders and broad, horned, triangular heads and stubby spikes running down their slimy, sloping backs. They smelled worse than death, more like the spoiled grime of rotten skin and fat left to rot in a moist, dark crevice. Saliva dribbled from their uneven mouths, long trails of acidic spittle pocking the walk with tiny craters where the drops hit the cold cement. These dogs were nearly toad shaped; short, powerful back legs bent and tucked under them with longer limbs in front, paws bristling with uneven claws.
They were
definitely
ugly, but then all
ainmhi dubh—
the black dogs of the Wild Hunt—were ugly, foul-wrought creatures formed of blood, hate, and magic. There’s no beauty in hate, no elegance or delicacy. Even the brutish stamp of harsh planes and hard lines held an attraction in its sternness, but the
ainmhi dubh
were in a world of ugly all their own.
The magic in a black dog’s creation was at best unstable, at its worst, chaotic. It showed in their bodies, misshapen and twisted forms forged by their creator’s imagination. It took power to shape an
ainmhi dubh
and even more power to infuse it with life. Most took on canine or avian forms, their bodies changing as they aged and their unsidhe Master fed them more of his or her power throughout their lifetime.
A Wild Hunt meant status and power at a Dusk Court, shadows sent to slaughter anyone who crossed their Master. With the Merge, more and more unsidhe attempted to create their own Hunts. Very few unsidhe succeeded, and even fewer were strong enough to hold their creations in check.
And when a Master lost control of their Hunt, the
ainmhi dubh
consumed them first before going rogue and hunting whatever flesh was nearby.
I made good money bringing
ainmhi dubh
pelts in. They were a Stalker’s bread and butter. A powerful
ainmhi dubh
bitch could throw a litter within two years of her creation, but each subsequent generation grew weaker, spreading the caster’s magic thinner and thinner until it couldn’t sustain any more creatures.
There was no outcry from animal lovers to protect the
ainmhi dubh.
A black dog pack would sooner take down a toddler than feed from a tied-up goat. They fed on fear, thrived on the extinguishing of intelligent life, and preferred human or elfin for food over an animal any day.
And Robbie Crickets Malone sure as hell looked like food to the three dogs circling him in the middle of the Changa’s parking lot.
“Don’t move, Robbie.” I kept my voice low and steady, a calming strand for Malone to grab onto. His piss-soaked pants tainted the rain-dewed breeze with the smell of urine, a sharp scent woven through the rank stench of wet black dog, and Malone quivered, his arms shaking hard enough the plastic bags sounded like rattlesnakes. “Just listen to me and you’ll be okay.”