Bloodfever

But they would know who he was.

I wondered if any Fae had ever been forced to drink by others of their race, to rescue them from the vast, desolate steppes of insanity. Or perhaps for more nefarious reasons.

I wondered, considering V’lane had known exactly where I was and what I’d been doing, if he’d been responsible for the massacre at the Welshman’s estate.

“Did you steal the amulet?”

He laughed. “Ah, so that was what you were after. I wondered. It amplifies the will, MacKayla.”

“Your point?”

“I have no use for it. My will needs no amplifying. My will shapes worlds. The amulet was fashioned for one like you with no will of which to speak.”

“Just because we can’t manipulate reality with our thoughts doesn’t mean we don’t have will. Maybe we do shape reality, just on a different scale, and you don’t see it.”

“Perhaps. The queen suspects such might be the case.”

“She does?”

“That is why she sent me to help you, so that you may help us, and together we may ensure the survival of both our races. Have you learned anything about the Sinsar Dubh?”

I thought about that a moment. Should I tell him? What should I tell him? Perhaps I could use it as leverage. “Yes.”

The palm trees stopped swaying, the waves froze, the birds halted mid-dive. Despite the sun, I shivered. “Would you please start the world again?” It was creepy frozen. Things moved once more.

“What have you learned?”

“Did you know my sister?”

“No.”

“How could that be? You knew about me.”

“We learned of you because we were watching Barrons. Your sister, who we’ve since become aware of, did not know Barrons. Their paths never crossed, ergo nor did ours. Now, tell me of the Sinsar Dubh.”

“Why were you watching Barrons?”

“Barrons needs watching. The book, MacKayla.”

I wasn’t done yet. The book was big information, surely worth more of an exchange. “Do you know the Lord Master?”

“Who?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No. Who is this Lord Master?”

“He’s the one bringing the Unseelie through. He’s their leader.”

V’lane looked astonished. No more so than I felt. He and Barrons both knew so much yet were missing chunks of essential information. They were so smart in some ways, and so blind in others.

“Is he Fae?” he demanded.

“No.”

He looked incredulous. “How can that be? A Fae would not follow a human.”

I hadn’t said he was human. He was something more than that. But the way V’lane had just sneered the word human—as if a life-form just couldn’t get any lower—pissed me off so I didn’t bother correcting him. “You’re the one who’s supposed to be all-knowing.”

“Omnipotent not omniscient. We are frequently blinded by how much we see.”

“That’s absurd. How can you be blinded by vision?”

“Consider being able to see the atomic structure of everything around you, MacKayla, past, present, and part of the future, and exist within that skein. Consider possessing awareness of infinite dimensions. Imagine being able to comprehend infinity—only a handful of your race has yet achieved such awareness. Consider seeing the possible ramifications of each minute action you might make, from your slightest exhalation upon the breeze, in all realities, but you cannot piece them together into a guaranteed finale because every living thing is in constant flux. Only in death is there stasis and even then, not absolute.”

I had a hard enough time functioning on my tiny little nearsighted human level. “So, what you’re saying in a nutshell,” I distilled, “is that for all your superiority and power, you’re no smarter or better off than we are. Perhaps worse.”

A heartbeat stretched into half a dozen. Then he smiled coolly. “Mock me if you will, MacKayla. I’ll sit at your deathbed and ask you then if you would rather be me. Where is this human fool that fancies himself master of anything?”

“1247 LaRuhe. Warehouse behind it. Huge dolmen. He brings them through there. Would you mind squashing it for me?”

“Your wish, my command.” He was gone.

I stared at the empty chaise. Had he really gone to destroy the dolmen through which the Unseelie were being brought? Would he kill the Lord Master, too? Would my vengeance be achieved so anticlimactically? And without me there as witness? I didn’t want that. “V’lane!” I shouted. But there was no reply. He was gone. And I was going to kill him if he killed my sister’s killer without me. The dark fever I’d caught that first night I’d set foot in Dublin had turned into a fever of a different kind: a bloodfever—as in I wanted blood, spilled for my sister. Spilled by my hand. That savage Mac inside me still hadn’t found an audible voice, still wasn’t speaking with my tongue, but we spoke the same language, she and I, and agreed on critical things.

We would kill my sister’s killer together.

“Junior?” said a soft, lilting voice. A voice I’d never expected to hear again.

I shuddered. It had come from my right. I stared out at the waves. I would not look. I was in Faery. Nothing could be trusted.

“Junior, come on, I’m over here,” my sister coaxed, and laughed.

I nearly doubled over from the pain of it. It was exactly Alina’s laugh: sweet, pure, full of endless summer and sunshine and the sure knowledge that her life was charmed.

I heard the slap of a palm on a volleyball. “Baby Mac, let’s play. It’s a perfect day. I brought the beer. Did you get the limes from the bar?”

My name is MacKayla Evelina Lane. Hers is Alina MacKenna Lane. I was Junior on two levels. Sometimes she’d called me Baby Mac. I used to pilfer limes from the condiment tray at The Brickyard on Saturdays. Cheap, I know. I never wanted to grow up.

Tears burned my eyes. I gulped deep breaths and forced air in and out of my lungs. I fisted my hands. I shook my head. I stared out at the sea. She was not there. I did not hear the thud of a ball hitting sand. I did not smell Beautiful perfume on the breeze.

“The sand’s perfect, Junior. It’s powder. Come on! Tommy’s coming today,” she teased. I’d had a crush on Tommy for years. He was dating one of my best friends so I pretended I couldn’t stand him, but Alina knew.