Kelly Meding: As Lie the Dead

Rest was all I wanted to do, only no one was letting me. I reached desperately for another explanation. “The goblins are rioting? Calling for my head because of Kelsa?”

I swore Amalie almost smiled. “Rumor has it they are decidedly upset at the loss of one of their Queens, but no. They are not an immediate threat.”

Not yet, right? “Okay, so what the hell are we doing here?”

“Another matter has been brought to the attention of the Fey Council, via the Assembly of Clan Elders.”

Clan Elders meant the weres. I gazed at the stranger, every instinct suddenly rising to the defensive. I sensed an ambush. The man was far too calm and self-assured for it to be anything else.

“This is about the Owlkins, isn’t it?” Wyatt asked. He stepped forward, immediately on my right. To my left, Kismet shifted, fists clenching by her sides. Her Hunters remained stiff, watchful.

“Yes,” Amalie said.

“Who are you?” I asked the stranger.

He tilted his head, regarding me briefly before answering. “My name is Michael Jenner. I speak for the Assembly of Clan Elders, as I also speak for those unable to speak for themselves. Silenced voices who demand justice.”

My eyes narrowed as my heart sped up half a beat. So much for my promise to Phineas. “If you wanted me, why not come and get me? Why drag my ass down here?”

“We don’t want you,” Jenner said.

I frowned. “Then who—?”

“They want Rufus,” Wyatt said.

My stomach twisted. Kismet made a soft, strangled sound in her throat—the only confirmation I needed. “Fuck that,” I snapped. “Why?”

Jenner stood, drawing his lean frame to six feet, all sinewed muscle and strength under that suit. “Rufus St. James led the Triad raid that resulted in the near-total annihilation of one of our Clans,” he said. He could have been ordering a cheeseburger for all the emotion in his voice.

“He was following orders,” Wyatt said, voice low. Entering danger zone. “You want to hold someone responsible, get their asses down here.”

“And risk exposing our allies among your kind?” Amalie said. “Your superiors hide their identities for a reason, Wyatt Truman. Secrecy is necessary for our continued success in controlling the dark races. You, of all people, know the importance of this. Generals will not submit when they can sacrifice a captain in their stead.”

I bristled, hands clenched so hard my wrists ached. “There’s no way in fucking hell Rufus is going down for this. No way. The Owlkins are dead because of me, and no one else.”

“Perhaps,” Jenner said. “But to the Assembly, you are insignificant.”

Wyatt caught me around the waist before I could take a swing at Jenner. I struggled against his hold, my temper flaring like a sunspot. I wanted to wrap my hands around the arrogant bastard’s neck and throttle him. Not because he’d called me insignificant—I’d been called way worse things in my life—but because of his consistent, uninvolved tone of voice. As if this were just another errand and not a man’s life at stake.

Jenner quirked a slim, perfectly shaped eyebrow at me. “Temperamental, aren’t you?”

“This is my calm side,” I said.

“I already tried arguing it,” Kismet added. Her voice, usually so commanding, was mixed with equal parts anger and resignation. “The brass won’t return my calls, and the Fey Council supports the decision of the Assembly.”

“What’s the decision?” Wyatt asked.

“The earliest the hospital will release him is Monday,” Amalie replied, standing to join Jenner. The pair of them, tall and self-assured and strong, shrank the size of the visitors’ lounge. “After that, Rufus St. James will be remanded to the Assembly for punishment.”

“What punishment?”

Kismet snorted. “They want to make an example out of him, so we never forget what happens when we Triads cross any line the Fey Council decides to draw in the sand.”

Amalie’s eyes flashed cobalt. “Do not forget your place, child. The alliance between humans and the Light Ones is the only thing allowing your kind their continued control over this world. Recent relations have been tenuous, at best. Do not let this man’s life become an impetus for the dissolution of those alliances.”

“Is that a threat?” Wyatt snarled. Fury rippled around him like a physical object.

“Merely an observation.”

“Bullshit,” I said, pulling out of Wyatt’s hold. Three days. Three fucking days. Again! Am I wearing a sign?

I didn’t advance, just stood in the center of the small room, all eyes on me. Even though Amalie’s avatar towered over me by half a foot, she didn’t intimidate me. Just kind of pissed me off more. “You lord your friendship over us in order to get the brass to agree to any sort of sacrifice, and then you threaten to take it away when we call it for what it is. So, bullshit. It was a threat.”

Jaron stood, completing the trifecta of really tall people squaring off against two Handlers and three Hunters. He (she?) didn’t speak, just glared.

“I’d watch my tone if I were you,” Jenner said, calm as ever.

“Good thing you’re not me.” I predicted a warning “Evy” from Wyatt and cut it off with another question of my own: “Who punishes him?”

“He’ll be turned over to the Assembly on Monday,” Jenner said.

“Yeah, Repetitive Guy, I got that much. Who punishes him?”

“The one who requested recompense in the first place.” Jenner looked past me, to the sound of the lounge door creaking open.

Ice settled in my stomach. Both hands twitched, and I fisted them to stop the shaking. Wyatt made a noise, but I didn’t turn around. Didn’t want to prove what instinct told me was true. The osprey above the apartment building. Only one person left who could demand such an act from the Assembly.

“I’m sorry, Evangeline.”

I winced at the sound of his voice, enough proof to shift disbelief into rage. I turned with slow, steady ease, careful not to look at Wyatt. Just at the jeans and familiar black polo. The face of a man who’d tricked me into a devil’s bargain and had done so smiling.

“You son of a bitch,” I said.

Phineas had the gall to flinch. Wyatt wasn’t fast enough to stop me this time. I hit Phin across the corner of his mouth, snapping his head to the side. He fell to his knees even as I drew back my aching fist for another blow.

“Stop this!” Jenner’s voice vibrated in my chest like a bass drum, charged by emotion for the first time. I froze, my arm still back and ready to strike. My chest hurt, and my lungs ached for a good breath. Heat blazed in both cheeks. Phin raised his head, shock settling into his sharp features. His lip was split, blood oozing from the cut.

“You lied to me,” I said.

“No, I didn’t,” he replied. “Everything I told you was true.”

“Lying by omission is still lying.” Everyone else in the room melted into the background; only the traitor at my feet mattered. “You tricked me into agreeing to help you while plotting behind my back to kill one of my friends.”

“You never would have agreed if we’d met under these circumstances.”

“No shit.”

He stood up, flexed his shoulders. “As I said, everything I told you was true, and what’s happening here does not change that. I still need your protection. They need your protection.”

“And if I refuse?”

“You won’t.”

Annoyance flared. “I won’t?”

“No, because you gave your word, and I know what that means to people like you.”

I was too angry to come up with a sarcastic response, so I settled on a terse “Oh?”

“You live by a code of honor, you and your fellow Triad teammates. Your word means everything to you.”