Heir of the Dog Black Dog (2 page)

I hated this part, the severing of a soul from its host, the trimming away of the fat of life and the cauterizing of immortality. Fae were built to weather eternity. Few grasped true death in any context.

But we were all tangles of muscle and bone, flesh and blood, heads and hearts, weren’t we?

We could all die if the time was right. Sometimes we did even if it wasn’t.

I held O’Shea’s terrified gaze while the top layers of his skin peeled away from muscle like ripping off an old bandage. I owed him that. I was ending a man’s life and could damn well look him in the eye while I did it. The vicious teeth of my magic savaged his soul, rent the tatters of his self and devoured it whole.

Pleasant warmth suffused my limbs, sating the darker part of me who stared at carnage a little too long, watched each death a too closely and enjoyed a soul-induced high just enough to shove me spinning down a shame spiral only one person could stop.

I wish Shaw was here.

No. No, I didn’t. Sure he might pull me out of my guilt tailspin, but that meant talking to him, and if he got me on the phone, I knew what he would want to talk about.
Us
. Except there was no
us
. Not anymore.

The troll’s pupils had faded to milky white. He was an empty shell suspended by an intricate web of misery. Magic knifed under his flesh, jolting his corpse, seeping out his pores until his skin released with a wet kiss of sound and puddled at his ankles where the pinky-white folds withered into a dried husk.

What remained was a meat and bone sculpture of troll musculature ready for disposal. Time to ring the dinner bell.

Before gloving my hand, I tugged a quarter-size silver medallion from my shirt by its chain and palmed the cool metal. Rubbing a rune-covered thumb across the triskele stamped into its center, I summoned the Morrigan.

A breeze smelling of wood smoke and embers ruffled my hair. A pulse of black magic beat in the air before me. The ball of swirling mist drifted on the breeze. That...wasn’t right.

A carrion crow swarm that blotted out the sky then swooped to encircle an offering in a cawing black feather tornado complete with glowing ruby eyes? That was more her style.

This was something else—
someone
else. But who had the balls to claim her feast in their name?

I lowered my hand to my side where its luminescent threat remained visible.

“You summoned the Morrigan.” A thickly accented voice throbbed across my skin.

“I did, and you aren’t her.” The cadence of those words shivered through me. “Who are you?”

“Whoever you want,
a stór
.” His chuckle was worse, all buttery rich and inviting. Dangerous.

“I’m not your darling.” I raised my left hand. “By whose authority have you answered my call?”

A moment of silence passed. “I am the Morrigan’s son.”

“The Raven,” I breathed.

Her son and heir, Raven, an Unseelie prince. A prickle of unease quivered along my nape. A prince in the mortal realm. What on earth had lured him here? And did the conclave know? They had to, right? The prince must have used a tether to get here, and for visiting dignitaries, that required permission from the Faerie High Court on his side and the Earthen Conclave on this one.

Straightening my shoulders, I gestured toward the body. “Then you are welcome to your feast.”

“Who do I owe for this offering?” Amusement throbbed in that nebulous swirl of magic.

“Thierry Thackeray.” Not my Name, but a name nonetheless.

“Tee-air-ree.” He dragged out each syllable as if savoring the sound on his...well, he had no lips in this form.

“Let me grab this...” I knelt and rolled up the troll’s skin, “...and I’ll leave you to it.” Tucking the proof of death under my arm, I saluted the magic blob. “Enjoy your feast.”

Eager to put Raven behind me, I turned on my heel and strode toward the mouth of the alley, tugging my glove back in place. His mother tended to rip off limbs and gnaw on them like chicken wings instead of, oh, I don’t know, someone’s
arm
. I shuddered and kept on walking. However her son chose to dine, he was doing it alone.

“I will savor every bite.” His voice dogged my heels.
“Go bhfeicfidh mé arís thú.”

Until we meet again.

A shiver danced down my spine as I raised a hand in a half wave and kept walking. The conclave awaited my resolution, and thanks to O’Shea’s refusal to stand trial, I had a good three or four hours’ worth of paperwork ahead of me.

Chapter Three

On the dusty outskirts of Wink, a ramshackle farmhouse slouched on three hundred acres of dried weeds. Or so its glamour led you to believe. Those who knew the Word and braved the gap-toothed front porch were rewarded with entrance into the modern brick office building run by Mable, who was receptionist, secretary and den mother to us all.

Murmuring a Word, I keyed the ward locking the front door of the marshal’s office. I stepped inside Mable’s domain in time to catch her licking a dollop of honey from a teaspoon before dipping it into her glass of sweet iced tea.

The sight of Mable’s lopsided bun sliding down the back of her head always made me smile.

She was a bean-tighe, a housebound spirit. They were one of several nocturnal races of Seelie. Their personal glamours were usually of the cookie-baking, apron-wearing, booboo-kissing grandma variety, but Mable had taken her illusion one step further. She emulated the ultimate grandmother figure. She was a dead ringer for Mother Christmas, if Mrs. Claus had never met a shade of pink she didn’t love. And possibly if the North Pole was, in fact, a dude ranch staffed by ten-gallon-hat-wearing elves.

“Knock, knock.” I waited while she adjusted her alarmingly fuchsia glasses. “Did I interrupt your dinner?”

“Thierry.” Her round face split into a grin. “Always good to see you, sweetie. Come on in.”

“I brought you something.” I pulled the troll skin from under my arm. “Quinn O’Shea.”

“Oh dear.” She covered her mouth with a plump hand. “An execution.”

“I...” Old guilt tightened my throat until it trapped my excuse. “It was self-defense.”

“I don’t doubt it.” She bent down, opened the mini fridge under her desk and produced a pitcher of iced tea and a glass that matched hers. “Yours is a dangerous job.” She poured the syrupy liquid to the brim then passed the drink to me. “Out in the field, anything can happen. You do the best you can to see that justice is served, and then you do whatever it takes to get home in one piece.”

The miserable tightness making it hard to breathe eased enough that when she passed me a tray of my favorite iced lemon cookies, the smile bending my lips was as genuine as the affection behind it.

She jabbed her finger at the chair across from her desk. “Go on, sit. I’ll get the papers together.”

“First, I have a gift for you.” I reached into my messenger bag, a graduation gift from her, and pulled out a small jar. “Basswood honey.”

“Basswood, you say?” She clasped her hands together. “I haven’t tasted that variety in years.”

“I’m glad you approve.” I passed it to her. “I’ll bring avocado next time.”

Despite being employed by the conclave, tradition dictated a price be paid for the services of the bean-tighe. Mable loved her honey, the more exotic the better. Sucking up to the lady who handed out case assignments was always a stellar idea, but Mable was like family. Spoiling her with rare honey made me happy.

“You are too good to me.” She unscrewed the lid, her eyes closing as she sampled it by dipping her pinky into the jar and licking honey from her finger. “Divine.”

I dropped into the spare chair and leaned forward, propping my elbows on her desk. Two more cookies vanished while she filled out my bonus voucher and printed the necessary paperwork. Chasing O’Shea must have worked up an appetite. “What do you know about the Morrigan’s son, Raven?”

“Not much, I’m afraid. I don’t involve myself with Faerie’s politics when I can help it.” Mable capped her honey and placed it in a desk drawer. “Why do you ask?”

I licked my fingers before remembering where my hands had been
. Ick
. I gulped Mable’s lemony sweet brew, swishing it around in my mouth. Brushing my teeth with a palm full of sugar would have had the same scouring effect. “Someone claiming to be Raven showed up when I summoned the Morrigan earlier.”

I had been working cases solo for over a year now. Factor in five years of education in the fae private school system, plus sixteen weeks of marshal academy, and my summoning skills should have been topnotch. When I summoned the Morrigan, I expected the Morrigan. Not her next of kin.

“Give me a moment.” Mable cleaned her hands with a wet wipe then clacked a few keys on her computer. “I don’t see any cross-realm travel paperwork filed under his name—or hers.” She glanced up at me. “Did you get a good look at him?”

“No.” The cookie turned sour in my mouth. “He appeared as a floating glob of energy.”

“Hmm. That sounds like a scavenger to me.” She clicked a few more keys. “I’ll file a report and let the magistrates know there was a poaching incident. That’s the fourth one this week.”

“There have been more?” Poaching from the Morrigan was suicidal, so understandably rare.

“Oh, yes.” She bobbed her head. “Territorial disputes happen to us all from time to time, and she holds the monopoly on conclave business. I can’t imagine the other death dealers are too pleased about that.”

I sat back and drummed my fingers on her desk. “So there’s no way it was Raven?”

“No.” She printed out an incident form and slid it over for me to initial. “It’s not possible.”

“Are we talking no-way, no-how possible—” a curious note entered my voice as I signed off on an official version of the event, “—or unlikely?”

Breaches rarely happened, but where there was a will, and a powerful fae, there was usually a way.

“Princes are physically bound to Faerie.” She took the paper, folded it and stashed it in an envelope. “They have other means of visiting. Astral projection. Cognitive illusions. Those sorts of things.”

“I wonder who answered my summons.” I swirled the cubes in my glass to hear them clink.

“I can send you copies of the other reports, if you’d like.” She reached for her notepad. “If a bounty is placed on him, I’ll let you know.”

Figuring the sum would be tidy, I grinned. “That would be much appreciated.”

“There is particular interest in these incidents,” she hedged.

Competition for the higher bounties was to be expected.

“Oh?” I sipped on my tea to get one last cookie down. “Who else wants it?”

“Shaw.”

Despite the drink, my tongue turned cotton-ball dry.
“Shaw?”

“Oh dear. You didn’t know.” Her brow wrinkled. “Of course you didn’t. Why would you?”

“Is he—? Shaw’s back?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Well. All right.” I set the glass down before my jittery hands dumped it in my lap. “That’s good. Great even.”

Mable cast me a doubtful look.

“I wonder if the Morrigan knows about the poacher,” I blurted to have something halfway sensible to say.

“If she did, she would have killed him by now.”

“If he can be killed.” Not all death-touched fae could be ended.

“There is that.” Mable turned pensive. “You two might consider working the case together. You’re the best suited pair for the job.”

“For old times’ sake?” I asked softly, wincing at the grit in my voice.

“Shaw has seniority,” she reminded me. “If he decides he wants the case, I have to give it to him. If you worked together, you could split the bounty.”

“I’ll think about it.” I picked at my nails and stared at her from underneath my lashes. “When are you expecting him back?”

“He ought to check in before dawn.” She glanced up then, brows drawn and lips pursed like she had sucked a whole lemon out of her tea glass. Clearly, she wasn’t hot for this idea either. “Do you want to wait for him?”

“I— No. No need for that.” Heat crept up the base of my neck. “I’ll be in my office wrapping up O’Shea’s paperwork if you need me.”

The last thing I wanted was for Shaw to find me waiting on him like a lovesick puppy.

Chapter Four

The staccato rap of knuckles on wood brought my head up in time to spot Jackson Shaw lean against the doorjamb in my office. A flannel shirt hung from his shoulders in tatters with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows, exposing vivid crimson slashes across his forearms. More gashes bisected his torso, leaving his abs peeking out at me from under his T-shirt. Dried mud caked his boots, and he smelled of...

I coughed into my fist and reached for a bottle of water. “Is that sauerkraut?”

He shrugged while shutting the door then crossed the room and perched on the edge of my desk. “Don’t ask.”

“Fine. I won’t.” I swigged tepid water to wet my parched throat. “What brings you here?”

His gaze jerked from my lips to my eyes. “Mable said you had a proposition for me.”

“Um, no.” Heat blistered my cheeks. “Well, not exactly.”

Fabric tore as he removed his flannel shirt and used it to wipe his face clean. He glanced up and caught me staring. A heartbeat later, the scent of bergamot and patchouli stung my nose, the heady fragrance sinking heavily into my lungs, tingling in my limbs with every inhale until my tender nerves sizzled.

Shaw’s voice dipped into a husky register. “It’s been a long time, Thierry.”

Twelve months.
Twelve
. Too long. Not nearly long enough.

“Don’t.” My voice sounded as small and pained as a wounded animal. “Just don’t.”

I dug through my satchel for the vial of smelling salts I kept there. I inhaled until my sinuses burned and my eyes watered. Thank God, the pungent scent still cut through his sultry lure. As to why I kept the vial on me, call me sentimental.

His jaw tightened. “The conclave—”

“—had nothing to do with you rolling out of my bed and right into someone else’s.” Bitter laughter stung my throat. “Five someone elses.”