“Girl, do you know how long I’ve been on the other side waiting to be called through? Others like this oaf were smarter. They made the opening too small to get through when they called to me and made their offerings. Seems like time has done nothing to improve the wisdom of your people.”
Siobhan, who had opened the gate without knowing the monster had already been called to it, looked abashed. She’d told Shane she just wanted something to scare the druids. Neither of them could have known that what they would unleash would be so much worse.
“I—” She began to speak, but the monster lashed out, backhanding her with shocking speed. Siobhan flew across the circle and smacked into a tree, making a loud crack sound. Her bow clattered to the ground, and she tumbled after it, flopping limply into the duff.
“I will not be bound,”
screamed the fae.
It didn’t wait for anyone to chat with it again. Charging in the direction Shane and Siobhan had entered from, the monster vanished into the darkness. Eion stood, mouth agape, watching the empty space where the creature had last been. Shane didn’t waste time staring at the woods. He skirted the stone table and skidded to a stop beside Siobhan.
“Red. Hey, Red.” He tapped her face with a light slap.
No response.
He lifted her head, and his fingers felt warm and tacky with blood. “Hey, sweetheart, you wanna wake up for me?” he asked hopefully.
She groaned, giving his heart a leap. “What happened?”
“You saved the girl.”
Siobhan gave a weak smile, her eyes fluttering open. Her gaze swept the area behind him, and a frown settled over her lips. “Where did…?” She glanced at her father’s transfixed figure. “Did he banish it?” she asked.
“Um…”
“Did he banish it?” she demanded, sitting bolt upright before wobbling slightly from her head wound.
“Not so much.”
“Then where is it?”
Eion turned around, looking at his daughter cradled in Shane’s arms. “We’ve made a terrible mistake,” he mumbled.
Siobhan gazed at Shane wide-eyed. “What does that mean?”
When Eion didn’t speak, Shane ventured a response. “You know how it’s bad when a troll gets through the gate and out into the streets?”
Her skin went whiter than usual, taking on a green-gray pallor. “Yes.”
“This is about a thousand times worse.”
Chapter Fourteen
They couldn’t leave the girl, but Siobhan didn’t want to trust her father. Considering he’d kidnapped the girl so he could kill her, Siobhan figured the distrust had been earned.
Outside the Bath & Body Works, Shane set the unconscious girl on the sidewalk and pulled out his cellphone. They’d dressed the girl the best they could given how torn up her clothing had been once her kidnappers had taken them off her. One of the dead druids had a robe that wasn’t too shredded, and they’d wrapped it around her damaged clothes to keep her protected from the elements. She was still out cold.
The second they’d hit the street, Eion had taken off. Siobhan wished, ruefully, that her people had a death-before-dishonor policy and her father was running off to skewer himself on his own ceremonial knife. She knew better, but it didn’t stop her from wanting him to suffer.
Shane was pacing the empty street in front of the darkened store, gesturing wildly while he hollered into the phone. “What do you mean you don’t know where she is?” He paused, listening to the response. “Jesus Christ, Nolan, I don’t know. No, I don’t think she just fucking vanished, she has responsibilities.” Shane sighed. “No, I don’t think you should call them. Look, I need help. Can you meet me on the corner of Ninety-seventh and First?” Another long pause and Siobhan marveled at how stormy his countenance became as he argued with whoever Nolan was. “Okay, thank you.”
He came and sat next to her on the curb, and she let herself lean into him. Her head still felt like it had been pumped full of helium. The unconscious girl was flopped against Siobhan’s opposite side. They looked like a heap of drunks.
“Who’s Nolan?”
“My partner.”
“Who can’t he find?”