“Give us the boy,” Ghastek said, his tone reasonable.
“I don’t think so,” Curran said. “If you want to examine him later, you’re welcome to visit the Keep.”
Around us the People tensed. In the corner two vampires leaned forward.
I unsheathed Slayer. I had a lot of practice and I did it fast. The lawyer woman jerked back. The opaque blade smoked, sensing the undead. Come on, Ghastek. Make our night.
Ghastek sighed. “Fine. I’ll make the necessary arrangements later.”
Curran headed out through the door. I waited a second and followed, walking backward for the first two steps to make sure that no undead would come leaping out of the darkness at Curran’s back.
The door of the restaurant swung shut behind us. Ghastek’s voice called out, “Alright, people, back to work. Let’s process the scene tonight.”
“What’s your name?” Curran asked.
The boy swallowed. “Roderick.”
“Don’t be afraid,” Curran told him, his voice still laced with snarls. “I’ll keep you safe. If anything threatens you, I’ll kill it.”
The boy gulped.
A giant scary man with glowing eyes and an inhuman voice just took you from your parents, but don’t be afraid, because he’ll kill anything that moves. Kick-ass calming strategy, Your Majesty.
“He might be less scared if you stopped snarling and turned off the headlights,” I murmured.
The fire in Curran’s eyes died.
“It will be okay,” I told Roderick. “We just want to take off that necklace, and then you can go back to your parents. It’ll be alright, I promise.”
If the necklace snapped his neck, there wasn’t a damn thing I or Curran or anybody else could do about it. We had to get him to the Keep’s infirmary right away. We drove there in silence.
CHAPTER 3
Doolittle bent over the boy, studying the necklace with a magnifying glass. Dark-skinned, his hair salted with gray, the Pack medic looked to be in his early fifties. Doolittle was the best medmage I had ever met. He had brought me back from the edge of death so many times, we’d stopped joking about it.
There was something so soothing about Doolittle. Whether it was his manner, his kind eyes, or the soft Southern accent, tinted with notes of coastal Georgia, I didn’t know. The moment he walked into the room, Roderick relaxed. In thirty seconds they had struck a bargain: if Roderick stayed on his best behavior, he would get ice cream.
Not that Roderick had to be bribed. It took us almost an hour to get to the Keep and the entire ride over, he did not say a single word. He didn’t move, didn’t fidget, or do any of the normal things a seven-year-old kid would do in the car. He just sat there, quiet, his brown eyes opened wide, like he was a baby owl.
Doolittle pressed his thumb and index finger just above the necklace, stretching the boy’s skin. A vein stood out, burrowing from the gold band under his skin into the muscle of his neck like a thin root.
“Does it hurt when I press here?” he asked.
“No,” Roderick said. His voice was barely above a whisper.
Doolittle probed a different spot. “And now?”
“No.”
The medmage let go and patted Roderick’s shoulder. “I do believe we’re done for tonight.”
“Ice cream now?” Roderick asked, his voice quiet.
“Ice cream now,” Doolittle confirmed. “Lena!”
A female shapeshifter stuck her red head into the room.
“This young gentleman is in need of ice cream,” Doolittle said. “He’s earned it.”
“Oh boy!” Lena made big eyes and held out her hand. “I better pay up, then. Come on.”
Roderick hopped off the chair and took her hand very carefully.
“What kind of ice cream would you like?” Lena asked, leading him through the doorway.
“Chocolate,” the boy said quietly, with a slight hesitation in his voice.
“I’ve got loads of chocolate…”
The door swung shut behind them.
Doolittle looked at the door and sighed. “The necklace is rooted in the sternomastoid. If I try to remove it surgically, he’ll bleed out. You said his mother put this atrocity on him?”
“Yes,” Curran said.
“The collar glowed when the husband came near,” I said. “He was reaching out for it and she yanked it away from him and snapped it on the boy.”
“So it was probably intended for her husband,” Doolittle said.
“That, or it’s an equal opportunity offender,” I said. “Any neck will do and the boy was the closest.”“And it killed the girl instantly?” Doolittle asked.
“Pretty much,” Curran said.
“Strange. It doesn’t seem to be actively harming the boy at the moment beyond rooting in.”
“Does it hurt him?” I asked.
“Doesn’t appear so.” Doolittle leaned against the chair. “I poked and prodded at it a bit. It seems that the ‘roots’ shift under pressure so any attempt to cut the necklace will likely cause it to contract and strangle him. I don’t want to fool with it.”
“The woman,” Curran said, “she knew better than to touch it.”
I thought out loud. “She was unaffected by the glow, so either she’s immune or she knows how it works.”
“The boy didn’t cry when you took him from his mother?” Doolittle asked.
“No,” I said.
The medmage glanced at the door again. “The child is very passive and compliant. He doesn’t speak unless spoken to. He doesn’t take initiative. This boy is doing his best to be invisible. Sometimes this is a sign of a shy nature. Sometimes it’s a sign of emotional abuse or neglect.” Doolittle crossed his arms. “Such an accusation can’t be made lightly. This is just something to keep in mind in dealing with her. If she is emotionally distant, she may not have any attachment to him. Let me run some tests. The sooner we identify what the necklace is, the better.”
We left the infirmary and walked down the long hallway, heading toward the stairway leading up to the top of the tower, to our rooms. The Keep’s hours were skewed toward the night. For most people ten p.m. meant evening and probably bedtime—both electricity and the charged air that powered feylanterns were expensive and people tended to make the most of daylight. For shapeshifters ten p.m. was closer to four in the afternoon. The hallways were busy. Random shapeshifters ducked their heads as we passed them.
Something had occurred to me. “When the journeyman handed Amanda the necklace, did it seem paler to you?”
Curran frowned. “Yes. Almost white gold.”
“And now it’s almost orange.”
“You think it feeds on the host?”
“It would make sense. Maybe it develops hunger. The girl died instantly, because the necklace was hungry. Now it’s satiated, so it’s biding its time.”
“We’ll need to talk to the journeyman,” Curran said. “And the boy’s mother.”
“Yes, the woman. The supernaturally beautiful woman with long flowing hair…Can’t forget her.”
Curran turned his head to look at me.
“What?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.”
I shrugged. “I’ll speak to the journeyman tomorrow.”
“I’ll come with you.”
And why would he want to do that? I pictured trying to conduct an interview in the presence of the Beast Lord. The journeyman would take one look at him and run for the hills screaming.
“No.”
“You always say that word,” he said. “Is it supposed to mean something?”
“It means I don’t want you to come with me. The moment you muscle your way into the room, he’ll clam up out of sheer self-preservation. Let me handle this.”
We started up the stairway. Our quarters were at the very top and I really could’ve used an elevator right about now.
Curran kept his voice even. “Somehow I have managed to deal with the People just fine for almost fifteen years without your help.”
“As I recall, you almost had yourself a war. And I won’t be dealing with the People. I’ll be dealing with one specific journeyman, facing sanctions and scared out of his mind.”
“If you think you’ll be able to get anywhere near Ghastek without me, you’re crazy,” Curran said.
I stopped and looked at him. “I will take my boudas and personal guard, dress them in black, put them on horses, and ride up to the Casino. Then I will pick the scariest-looking shapeshifter in the bunch and send him in to announce that the Consort seeks an audience. Do you really think the People will keep me waiting for long?”
It’s good that we didn’t have any kindling or paper around or the sparks flying from our butting heads would set the Keep on fire. We were both tired and pissed off.
Above us Jim rounded the corner on the landing and came to a dead stop, obviously wondering if he could get away with turning on his foot and going back the way he’d come without our noticing. Curran turned to face him.
That’s right, you’re busted.
Jim sighed and headed toward us at a brisk pace.
Tall, his skin the color of rich coffee, and dressed all in black, Jim looked like he was carved from a block of solid muscle. Logic said that at some point he must’ve been a baby and then a child, but looking at him one was almost convinced that some deity had touched the ground with its scepter and proclaimed, “There shall be a badass,” and Jim had sprung into existence, fully formed, complete with clothes, and ready for action. He was the alpha of Clan Cat, the Pack’s chief of security, and Curran’s best friend.
He braked near us.
“Have you vetted the Wolves of the Isle yet?” Curran asked.
“No.”
“Who are the Wolves of the Isle?” I asked.
“It’s a small pack from the Florida Keys,” Curran said. “Eight people. They’re petitioning to join us and for some odd reason our security chief is dragging his feet on the background checks.”