Shadowfever

Barrons has never been able to. It never ended. For either of them.

The child, whose death destroyed him, has destroyed him every single day since. By living.

Dying, Barrons said, is easy. The man who dies escapes, plain and simple.

I’m suddenly glad Alina is dead. If the light comes for anyone, it came for her. She rests somewhere.

But not his son. And not this man.

I press my cheek to his chest, to listen to his heart beating.

And for the first time since I met him, I realize it isn’t. Have I never heard his blood rush before? His heart pound? How could I not have noticed?

I look up at him to find him staring down his chest at me, an unfathomable expression in his eyes. “I haven’t eaten lately.”

“And your heart stops beating?”

“It becomes painful. Eventually I would change.”

“What do you eat?” I say carefully.

“None of your fucking business,” he says gently.

I nod. I can live with that.

*   *   *

He moves differently down here. He doesn’t try to conceal anything. Here, he is himself and moves in that way that seems one with the universe, smooth as silk, flowing noiselessly from room to room. If I forget to pay attention to where he is, I misplace him. I discover he’s leaning against a column—when I’d thought he was the column—arms folded, watching me.

I explore his underground lair. I don’t how long he’s lived, but it’s clear he has always lived well. He was a mercenary once, in another time, another place, who knows how long ago. He liked fine things then, and his taste hasn’t changed.

I find his kitchen. It’s a gourmet chef’s dream—stainless-steel top-of-the-line everything. Lots of marble and beautiful cabinets. Sub-Zero fridge and freezer well stocked. Wine cellar to die for. As I devour a plate of bread and cheese, I imagine him here all those nights when I trudged up to my fourth- or fifth-floor bedroom and slept alone. Did he pace these floors, cook himself dinner, or maybe eat it raw, practice dark arts, tattoo himself, go for a drive in one of his many cars? He was so close all that time. Down here, naked on silk sheets. It would have driven me crazy if I’d known then what I know now.

He peels a mango while I wonder how he managed to get his hands on fruit in post-wall Dublin. It’s so ripe it drips down his fingers, his arms. I lick the juice from his hands. I push him back and eat the pulp off his stomach, lower, then end up with my bare ass on the cool marble of the island and him inside me again, my legs locked around his hips. He stares down at me, as if he’s memorizing my face, watches me like he can’t quite believe I’m here.

I sit on the island while he makes me an omelet. I’m ravenous, body and soul. Burning off more calories than I can eat.

He cooks naked. I admire his back and shoulders, his legs. “I found the second prophecy,” I tell him.

He laughs. “Why does it always take you so long to tell me the important things?”

“You should talk,” I say drily.

He slides the plate in front of me and hands me a fork. “Eat.”

When I finish, I say, “You have the amulet, don’t you?”

He catches his tongue in his teeth briefly and gives me a full-on smile. It says: I’m the biggest baddest fuck and I have all the toys.

We go back to his bedroom and I get the page from Mad Morry’s notebook and the tarot card from my pocket.

He looks at the card. “Where did you say you got this?”

“Chester’s. The dreamy-eyed guy gave it to me.”

“Who?”

“The good-looking college-age guy that bartends.”

His head moves funny, like a snake drawing back to strike. “How good-looking?”

I look at him. His gaze is cool. If you want that kind of life, get the fuck out of my house now, his eyes say.

“Nothing like you, Barrons.”

He relaxes. “So, who is he? Have I ever seen him?”

I tell him when and where and describe him, and he looks puzzled. “I’ve never seen the kid. I saw an elderly man with a heavy Irish accent pouring drinks a few times when I came to get you, but no one like you’re describing.”

I shrug. “Point is, it’s too late for the first prophecy to work.” I hand him the page. “Darroc was convinced he was the one who could use the amulet. But I read his translation and it sounds like it could be you or Dageus. Or any number of men.”

Barrons takes the parchment from me and scans it. “Why would he think it was him?”

“Because it says he who is not what he was. And he used to be Fae.”

He turns it over, looks at Darroc’s translation, then flips back to Mad Morry’s prophecy.

“Darroc didn’t speak Old Irish when I trained him and, if he picked it up since then, he didn’t learn it very well. His translation is wrong. It’s a rare dialect and gender neutral. It says the one that is possessed … or inhabited.”

“That’s what the first prophecy said.”

He looks at me and raises a brow. It takes me a moment to interpret his expression.

“You think it’s me.” Somehow that doesn’t surprise me. As if some part of me always knew it was going to come down to this in the end: me against the Sinsar Dubh, winner take all. It smacks of fate. I hate fate. I don’t believe in her. Unfortunately, I think the bitch believes in me.

He moves to a vault behind the painting I’d been watching candlelight flicker over earlier and removes the amulet. It’s dark in his hands. The moment he approaches me, it pulses faintly.

I reach for it. It blazes when I touch it. It feels right in my hands. I’ve wanted it since the moment I first saw it.

“You’re the wild card, Mac. I’ve thought that since the beginning. This thing thinks you’re epic. So do I.”

Quite a compliment. I cup the amulet in my hands. I know this piece. I turn inward, hunting, searching. I’ve learned so much tonight, about him, about myself. In this place, I feel fearless. Nothing can touch me, nothing can do too much damage to me. I feel calmer than I’ve felt in a long time. If I can use this, I can find the spell to unmake his son. I can end their suffering.

Show me what is true, I say, and shake off my blinders. I quit trying to force myself on the truth to reshape it, and I let the truth force itself on me. What have I been hiding from? What monsters have been stalking me, waiting patiently for me to look at them?