A Perfect Blood

Chapter Eighteen

My grip on Trent's arm had gone white knuckled by the time we got downstairs and to the elevator at the back of the bar, just off the huge great room. I hated that he knew I was hurting, but it wasn't as if I could hide it. There was a wheelchair beside the lift's doors, but I leaned on the wall when Trent pried my fingers off him and pushed the down button.

"Would you rather sit?" he asked, his beautiful voice rising and falling like music, and I ignored him, almost panting through throbbing hurt slipping around my pain charm. The doors slid open, and I hobbled in, propping myself up in a corner of the opulent lift and blowing a strand of hair from my eyes. I hated wheelchairs almost as much as I hated needles.

Trent had the decency to hold his opinion to a raised eyebrow as he trundled the chair in and silently positioned it next to me, locking the wheels in case I wanted to sit. With a soft sigh, he jingled a wad of keys from his pocket and brought to life the entire lower half of the panel. The keys were unusual. Trent liked his gadgetry card system, and I wondered if the recent break-in might have something to do with it.

The doors slid shut, but we didn't move as Trent punched buttons. "I'm glad you want to take the charm off," he said, his thoughts clearly on something else. "What complications?"

I glanced at the chair, wishing I didn't hurt so much. "You know I put a hole in the ever-after when I made that ley line. The demons' reality is shrinking, and if the ever-after goes, the source of magic goes with it. That's not even touching on how angry they are about me helping you fix the elves' genome. If I can't keep myself on this side of the ley lines, my life is going to be a living hell."

Trent turned from the panel as we started to descend. "Minor details. You won't have to worry about the shrinking ever-after for a generation. As for the other, you are not going to be taken, so don't worry about it."

I looked him up and down in disbelief, not liking his confidence when I was the one in trouble, not him. "Don't you dare belittle my fears!" I said, my eyes narrowing. Weight on my crutch, I held my arm up, showing him the bracelet. "I sat in a cage and watched them do that horrible thing to Winona. I was helpless. I don't want to be helpless anymore. I want to get this damn thing off, and it just keeps getting harder!"

Trent sighed, infuriating me. "Fine. After we look at the lab, we'll look at your options. It can't be that much of an issue. It's just a little imbalance. I won't let Al take you, Rachel. Trust me."

Right. I couldn't stand upright anymore, and I grabbed for the handle of the chair, sullen as I sat down, my entire right side aching. "I don't care what you have come up with to keep Al under control, he's going to blow through it like a pixy through tissue paper, and I will be stuck in the ever-after. Again." I looked up at his confidence. "And this time, there's nothing you can do to stop it. Thanks a hell of a lot, Trent."

His grip tightened on my crutch. "Why are you always angry with me?"

I looked up at him, aching everywhere, frustrated that I hadn't been able to stop what they'd done to Winona, embarrassed that I had to show my weakness in front of him by sitting down, angry with everything. "You want the short list or the long one?"

"I'm tired of it," he said calmly, but the rims of his ears were red and his motions to prop the crutch in a corner were too fast. "Ever since camp you've been picking at me and my ideas."

Picking at him? "You are the one doing stuff to irritate me," I said, heart pounding. "Shall I start with today and go backward? You hit me with a pain charm - "

"You got in the way. I apologized for that," he interrupted, his green eyes squinting.

"You put me in a cage. Made me fight for my life in the rat fights!"

He smacked a button on the panel, and the lift eased to a jerky halt. In the distance, a faint buzzer sounded. "Your life was never in danger, and I apologized for that, too." His eyes were virulent, and something in me liked it.

"You hunted me like an animal!" I said, his anger fueling my own.

Smelling of ozone and broken trees, Trent leaned over me, his hands on the arms of the chair and his suit coat open to show his trim waist. "You broke into my desk," he said tightly. "You stole something that could put me and my entire species in the ground. You think I'm going to ignore that? I wouldn't hunt you now."

The chair shook as he pushed himself up and away again, standing with a fist on his hip and his stance tight.

Fine. I could write that one off. But it was easy to come up with things about Trent that irritated me. "You kill people," I said, coming out with what really bothered me. "All the time. I hate it."

"And you can't." His voice was mocking, pissing me off as he turned to face me. "Someday you'll thank me for that particular skill. I'm not proud of that ability, but I'm glad I have it. And you're alive because of it. I'm not asking for gratitude, but stop rubbing my nose in the ugly things I do to help you that you are afraid to do yourself."

Oh. My. God. He thought the ability to kill people was a skill? "You murder your own associates!" I shouted, my stomach clenching as I leaned forward in the chair and gestured wildly. "Jonathan practically raised you! And you ran him down under a pack of dogs like a common thief! Ivy and Jenks kill people, too, but never those who trust them!"

"Jonathan isn't dead."

As if that ended the conversation, Trent smacked the button to make the elevator move. Shocked, I lurched out of the chair and hit the stop button again. The car swayed and settled as Trent backed away from me, his stance stiff. My heart pounded. "He-he isn't?" I stammered, remembering the awful cry at sunset, the horse under me prancing at the chilling sound. The horse had known what it was. I had, too.

Trent's eyes flicked to me. "I told you he wasn't dead. I've never lied to you. Well, once, maybe. Do I have to apologize for that, too?"

Stunned, I reached for the chair and slipped back into it. "Where is he? Vacation?"

Trent seemed to relax, the tension in his shoulders easing as I carefully lifted my leg, painfully putting my foot on the rest. "He's in the doghouse. Literally."

I looked askance at him, and Trent shrugged, a faint smile playing about his lips as he fastened my crutch to the back of the chair. "I asked Quen to turn him into a hound at the last possible moment. He got bitten in the confusion, but he survived - as I wanted. I would've done it myself, but you were squeamish, and making you understand your position was more important than making Jonathan understand his."

"Is that what you were going to do to me? Turn me into a dog? Put me in your kennel until I learned to sit and heel at your command?" I said, warming as I remembered the dogs singing for my blood as I ran, then later, those same dogs jumping at the fence to get at me even as I stood before them and watched them slaver.

Trent unlocked the chair and shifted it slightly. "He tried to kill you using my magic," he said, not answering me. "I could not let that go. I'll turn him back when his disposition improves. I like him better as a dog, though. He's one of my best trackers."

Stunned, I sat in the chair and tried to make sense of it. Jonathan was alive? I don't know why that was important to me, but it was. Trent was still a murdering bastard, but somehow it felt different. "I don't know if I'm impressed as all hell, or disgusted."

"Like I said," Trent said as he pushed the button to get the elevator moving again. "Always angry with me."

I was silent, feeling him standing behind me, remembering the dangerous determination in his voice when he thought Winona was trying to hurt me. He'd looked for me. Found me when others couldn't. That was important, too.

"I wish you'd stop it," Trent said, his tone distant, as if he was talking to himself. "I like working with you. And Jenks. Even if my judgment needs some fine tuning, apparently. Everyone else I work with is so damn . . . polite."

This was a long way from the cocky businessman who offered me a job I couldn't refuse but had two years ago. I didn't know what to think anymore. The scent of wine and cinnamon was drifting over my shoulder, becoming stronger, reminding me of our three days in a car, the passionate kiss we had shared, his arms around me not twenty-four hours ago. The doors started to open, and I felt a moment of panic. Beyond the elevator was a white hallway, Quen and Jenks turning to see us. Beyond the elevator also waited Trent's mask. He was putting it on already. I could feel his posture stiffening, his hands on the chair becoming relaxed, the strong emotion that I'd seen in him moments ago already hidden.

Heart pounding, I reached out and hit the button to close the door. Jenks rose from Quen's shoulder in a clatter of angry wings, and then the doors shut and we were alone. I was shaking, and I laboriously shifted the chair so I could face him.

"What did you want to tell me?" I said, my heart pounding as I searched his expression, finding a tightness to his eyes that spoke of an opportunity ill spent.

Then it was gone, and I felt alone.

He shrugged, reaching to take my chair and slowly move me to face the doors. "It doesn't matter," he said, and he reached past me to push the button to open the door, the complex scent of linen and starch a breath in me.

"It does to me," I said, but the doors were opening, and Trent took the key from the elevator panel, tucking it away in a pocket as he bumped me over the small gap and out into the hall. Damn it, what had I wasted?

Quen had moved a few steps down the hallway with Jenks. The lean, sinewy man had his back to us, but he'd turned at the noise of the doors opening again. Quen was Trent's longtime security officer, dark where Trent was light, but still looking like an elf. It was in their eyes. The older man's face had the pockmarks that some Inderlanders came away with from the Turn, and spoke of the taint of human blood. You wouldn't know it from his magic, both wickedly fast and powerful. He was wearing his usual loose-fitting uniform, but the black fabric had a tighter fit now that showed off his build, and I wondered if Ceri was the reason for the change. His expression wasn't happy. Neither was Jenks's.

"Rache, we got no time for your elevator fetish," Jenks complained as he swooped to land on the chair's arm. "David's going to be here in half an hour."

"David?" I looked up from trying to appear as if the ride down here had been uneventful, but Quen was eyeing us suspiciously. He knew Trent better than anyone, having raised him as much as, if not more than, Jonathan after both his parents had died. "I thought Ivy was going to pick me up."

"Your alpha called this morning," Trent said from behind me, his voice polished and having a professional, almost plastic sound as he pushed me forward, so different from the elevator. "And since we needed to talk . . ."

I didn't like Trent pushing me. I could feel his eyes on my tattoo. David, though, had a cooler head than Ivy, and the ride home would be easier on my nerves, so I said nothing.

"Good thing you're in a chair," Jenks said, "or it would take you that long just to walk down the hallway."

"Sure. Okay." I felt vulnerable as Trent slid out from behind the chair and Quen seamlessly took over. "Quen is the only one allowed to push me. Got it?"

"Heaven should fall if I did," Trent muttered as he fell into step beside the chair.

Jenks hummed his wings for an explanation, and I ignored him. "So . . . we're going to look at an empty room?" I asked.

"Something like that." His manner distant, Trent walked beside me, his steps almost silent. "I want you to look at the replacements and tell me if you saw them during your captivity."

"Winona could have done that," Jenks said, and Trent flicked his gaze to him.

"It's a workday. There are people down here, and Winona isn't ready to face the world."

I stiffened, wishing I hadn't yelled at him in the elevator, but a young man in a lab coat with hair as red as mine was striding down the hall toward us, his pace intent and slightly anxious.

"Sir?" he called out as if there was any question that we were his goal. "Mr. Kalamack?"

Trent sighed, and the chair stopped when the man halted before us, glancing at me in curiosity, then going bug eyed when Jenks gave him a peace sign from the arm of the chair. "Sir, if you have a moment?" the man asked, and Trent forced a neutral smile.

"Donnelley, I'd like you to meet Ms. Rachel Morgan and Jenks of Oak Staff," Trent said as he shifted to make more of a circle.

"Jenks of Oak Staff," Jenks echoed, clearly pleased as he rose to dust his hello.

"Pleasure," Donnelley said, shifting his clipboard to shake my hand. "How do you do."

"The pleasure is mine, Darby," I said, and the head lab rat started as I used his first name.

Blinking, he looked from Trent and focused on me for the first time. "Have we met?"

Trent was making a really weird noise in the back of his throat, but I kept smiling. "No," I admitted, "but I was there when Trent decided you were going to take Faris's place two years ago." Watched him kill your predecessor. Give his daughter a scholarship. Tell Jon to move you up. "You're Trent's chief geneticist, right?"

Trent cleared his throat, and Quen shifted the chair slightly, probably when he let go of the handles. "Uh, I am, yes," Darby said, his eyes wide. "It's good to meet you." Nervous, he shifted from foot to foot, clipboard before him like a fig leaf. "Mr. Kalamack, I hate to interrupt you, but could I talk to you for a moment? The last batch has gone somewhat awry," he said, somehow looking both confident and embarrassed, his freckles giving him a careless mien. "If you could look at the numbers before our meeting tomorrow, it would be helpful. I say more time, less stimulation. Andrea wants to toss the batch entirely, but we'll lose three months. Won't take but a moment to go over the numbers."

I'll give Trent credit - he didn't even sigh as he looked over me to Quen.

"I'll show her the instruments, Sa'han," Quen said, and Jenks rose up from the chair.

"Yeah, we know our way around," the pixy said, his hands on his hips.

Trent turned halfway from where he had started down the hall with Darby. "I'll meet you there," he said, then strode briskly away with Darby almost jogging to keep up.

Quen started us forward, our pace slower but following their path until they took a sharp right down another corridor and vanished. "I didn't know Trent did anything but fund this merry-go-round," I said.

"He doesn't do the grunt work, no," Quen said softly from behind me. "But he enjoys analyzing the data. His new interests lately have been pulling him away from it, and it shows."

New interests. His sudden zeal in practicing wild magic, maybe?

We passed the corridor that Trent and Darby had turned into, and Jenks rose up to follow them. "Jenks, if you would stay with us, please?" Quen said, and Jenks buzzed back, giving me a shrug as he landed on my knee. No one said anything, and the silence became uncomfortable as Quen slowed, then stopped before a door that looked like any other - apart from the formidable lock, that is.

"In here," Quen said as he came from behind me and unlocked it using a mundane key instead of the card reader. It looked like the reader wasn't even powered up, and again I wondered if the latest break-in had been the end of Trent's love for gadgetry.

I felt like an invalid when Quen opened the door, then backed me in like a professional, swinging me around to face the silent but clearly in-use room. It was a good size, with the expected lab benches, counter space, and machines lining the walls. There was a desk in the corner, and a table used as a makeshift second desk. Charts and graphs took up a bulletin board, and a small, locked cabinet held books, visible behind the glass. It looked very professional and up front, not at all like a place where illegal bio drugs might be researched or prepared, the tools of Trent's blackmail and rise to power on the back of his father's legacy - the same one that had kept me alive.

"What instruments did you see at the sites?" Quen asked, bringing my awareness back to why I was here.

Sighing, I stood, reaching for the crutch that Quen handed me. I fitted it under my arm, and the sudden throb retreated to a dull ache under the pain amulet. Jenks had already gone over the room in three pixy seconds flat and was now getting a drink from the dripping faucet.

"That one," I said, pointing to a machine whose purpose I couldn't begin to guess at, but it looked the same. "And they had an autoclave smaller than this one," I added, pointing to the tabletop version. "It had a lot of scratches on it. They also had a mini deep fridge, which I don't see here, a couple of battery backups, and a test-tube centrifuge almost identical to that one." I turned, seeing Quen still standing beside the door with my wheelchair. "Bunsen burners, data books, syringes, the usual lab stuff."

He nodded. "Thank you."

"Is this the room they stole them from?" Jenks asked, and Quen's mood became guarded.

"No," he admitted, and my instincts sang out at his reluctance. "That's across the hall."

Crutch swinging, I started for the door, almost pushing Quen out of my way. "Just over there, you say?" I said, and he backed up as Jenks nearly flew into his face.

"Rachel," Quen protested, but I got the door open despite the wheelchair's being in the way.

Triumphant in my small success, I hobbled out the door with Jenks, coming to a quick halt when I almost ran into Trent.

"Oh! Hi!" I said cheerfully as Jenks dropped in altitude, thinking we'd never get a look now. I knew better. Trent wouldn't have asked me down here to simply identify machines. I could have done that from a photograph. He wanted me to look at something more, and I was willing to bet it was the crime scene. "Does this tour include the crime scene?" I asked, and Trent glanced behind me at Quen.

"It does." Trent took my elbow, surprising me. "I was hoping you would, if it's not too much trouble."

His manner was his usual businessman facade, but that touch changed everything, and I squinted at him, wondering at the slant to his eyes, the hint of humor at his lips. Or was it just my imagination, and he simply didn't want me to fall down and sue him?

"Sir," Quen said, pained by the sound of it, and Jenks laughed.

"Lookie there, Rache!" the pixy said as he landed on my shoulder. "Someone's going to let you in before the vacuum guys."

"Actually, we've been through it thoroughly already," Trent said as he let go of me and sifted through his own wad of keys. "But I do want Rachel's opinion. She finds what others miss: sticky silk, class-book photos, curse-hidden graves, HAPA hate knots." He held up a key. "Or so I've heard. Ah. Here it is."

"Wayde found the knot," I admitted, still feeling the warmth on my elbow where he'd gripped me. "Thanks, Trent," I said as he got the door open and leaned over to push it wide for me.

"After you," he said, his smile holding real warmth, but it was Jenks who buzzed in first, my ever-vigilant vanguard.

Hobbling in, I first noticed the stuffiness, as if the vents had been sealed off. Other than that, it looked like a normal lab, almost a mirror image of the one across the hall, with the exception of a few conspicuous blanks. I step-hopped to the empty lab bench, leaning against it while Jenks flitted over everything. Quen was watching him closely, and I spun in a slow circle, trying to get a feel for the room.

"There were no prints, no sign of forced entry," Trent said, and I stared at the ceiling, not knowing why. "We think they used a card, which is why we've gone to a physical key for the time being. Everything is as we found it except for some of the books. They're across the hall."

"Along with the desks?" I asked, and his eyebrows went up. "There aren't any here," I added, and he nodded in understanding.

Jenks finished his circuit and landed on the sink's spigot. "You sure you don't have a mole? It's the easiest answer."

Quen shifted his feet, a move that wasn't missed by Trent. "That's always a possibility," Quen said, sounding insulted.

"We're not actively pursuing that avenue of entry," Trent added.

I frowned and turned away. Though easy, a mole seemed unlikely to me, too. Trent paid everyone far too much to be easily bribed, but ignoring any prospect seemed risky. "I saw one of these over there, too," I said, pointing at a titrator, and I shivered. It was scary knowing that HAPA had been an elevator ride away from the girls. Eloy had been here, taken what he'd wanted, and left. Illegal machines used for illegal genetic research.

I shifted down the counter, moving slowly so my motions wouldn't break my amulet-to-skin contact. Everything here had probably been used to save me from the Rosewood syndrome. It was weird that I'd once tried so diligently to bring Trent down. He hadn't changed. I had.

Had I sold out? I wondered. Or just gotten smarter? My dad had worked with Trent's dad. But my dad was not the honest, upright man that I'd thought he was. Sighing, I ran a hand along a mundane dishwasher. Maybe I was wrong . . .

"Who am I dealing with?" Trent asked, the cold tone in his voice pulling my head up.

"Besides HAPA?" Jenks asked.

I hesitated, silent but not ignoring him while feeling my way down the counter as if trying to sense the people who had been here before me. Quen was wincing at my hands-on approach, but Trent wanted me to touch or he wouldn't have let me in. I really needed to start cutting the guy some slack. He understood how I worked, and he let me get the job done.

"Two human women," I said as I lifted the door to the freezer chest and a wave of stale, room-temp air rose up. "Chris is the driving force behind the science. She can tap a line, so she's got some elf in her somewhere. I think HAPA is going to ignore that until they don't have to, and then she's dead. In the meantime, she runs the science behind the plan," I said idly as I closed the fridge. "She's not much of a team player, more of a team yeller. Thinks she's in charge, but she's not. Did they take anything from the fridge?"

Trent looked inquiringly at Quen, and the man muttered, "Several cases of tissue-growth media."

Nodding, I leaned heavily on the counter as I retraced my steps, not knowing why. My leg hurt, and Jenks watched, his dust becoming a concerned blue. "Chris has no problem treating people as a means to an end," I said, jaw clenched as the memory of Gerald forcing Winona's clothes off swam up, unwanted. "Really likes her black magic. If she was a witch, curiosity would have her dead by now. If she doesn't smarten up, I give her a month, but I think she's just clever enough to survive. They used a curse to hide one of their victims, and I'd be willing to bet she owes someone a favor."

Once again at the far end of the counter, I opened a drawer to see a plethora of plastic-wrapped instruments. I frowned, not knowing what they were for, then shut the drawer, looking up in exasperation at the large fluorescent lights. "Then there's Jennifer," I said, and Jenks laughed.

"Jennifer?" he scoffed, and I curled my fingers under so he wouldn't see them shaking. "HAPA takes in Jennifers?"

"Don't stereotype, Jenks. HAPA is an equal-opportunity hate group," I said. "She's the pretty face they use to catch their takes and procure their lab supplies. I think she's a nurse when she's not mutilating witches. She keeps the data books." Frowning, I rubbed my fingers over the counter, wondering if I could feel a faint tingle of magic in my memory. "Jennifer doesn't like the magic, but she's not as military as Eloy."

My pulse quickened, and I looked at the floor and an unusual pair of scuff marks - as if from a ladder. Again I looked at the light fixture. By the door, Quen shifted his weight, probably concerned that he'd missed something.

"Then there's Gerald," I said, shuffling to the counter against the wall to look at the scratches from a different angle. "Up until I tried to take his head off with a pipe, he didn't seem to be a bad egg - for a hypocritical, bigoted card-carrying HAPA member with a squirrel rifle under his bed. He's the muscle and security. Guns and cameras. Good old boy with a degree."

My leg hurt, and I straightened. "Last is Eloy. He's not there much, either working as a distant sentry or just making himself scarce. He's old-school HAPA. Military background. Planner. Finds and stocks their next location. He doesn't like magic. At all. I think he was the one who killed the vampires when they took me." I dropped my head and rubbed my brow, thinking I might need a new pain amulet. Everything was hurting. "He's in charge, but is letting Chris have enough latitude that she thinks she's running it, and there is clearly some question in her mind. He has the purse strings, but the real question is where HAPA is getting their funds."

"I agree," Trent said slowly, and I noticed that he hadn't moved from where he'd first come in. "What are the chances that HAPA has teamed up with another group whose aim is simply a return to old science?"

I quit rubbing my forehead. "I thought of that, too. Chris was adamant that she's HAPA."

Looking from Trent's concerned expression, my wandering eyes landed on the ceiling again. Jenks cleared his throat, his hands on his hips as he waited for me to tell him what was going on in my head. "Jenks, tell me what you think of that light," I finally said, and his wings hummed into invisibility as he rose. Quen was frowning, but something had been right under the light and in the traffic flow, and I was guessing it had been a ladder.

Sure enough, the pixy whistled. "It's clean!" he exclaimed, still out of sight between the ceiling and the top of the fixture. "Really clean. Someone wiped it. No dust at all."

Trent turned to Quen, and the man had the decency to look embarrassed. "I'll find a ladder," Quen said, looking awkward as he shifted past Trent to get to the door.

Jenks dropped from the ceiling, his dust a bright gold. "I'll come with you," he said, and after Trent's initial cringe, he nodded his agreement. Not that Trent could stop Jenks from doing whatever the hell he wanted without downing him with sticky silk.

Quen almost slunk out the door, clearly upset that we'd found something he'd missed, but I wasn't going to lie to save face for him. Jenks had put himself on the chagrined elf's shoulder, and just as the door shut, I heard him say, "Hey, don't sweat it. I didn't think to look up there, either. She's good like that."

The heavy door shut behind them, and the silence took hold. Trent's suit made a soft sound as he levered himself up onto a counter, looking at odds with the lab setting, more like the man I remembered from our cross-country trip, even if he was wearing dress shoes instead of stable boots.

Remembering the conversation in the elevator, I ran my hand across the top of the counter, leaning against it, the space of the room between us. My chair was across the hall, and I was too macho to ask him to get it for me. Propping my crutch up beside me, I covered my middle and met his eyes, refusing to let the silence get to me. We were alone again, and this time, I swore I wasn't going to yell at him.

"Why did you come out to find me?" I asked, and he rubbed his nose, ducking his head to avoid my gaze as he slowly slid from the counter.

"I was afraid you might try taking your charmed silver off without breaking the spell first," he said, his gaze going to it. "And kill yourself in the process." His eyes met mine. "I rescued you. Mmm. I've never done that before."

"You didn't rescue me," I said. "Winona and I got out on our own! She even stomped on the bad guy!"

"You got shot," he said, his voice suddenly bland as he looked at the ceiling. "You had no phone, no magic, no car. Your only mode of transportation was a scared woman who looked like a demon." His attention fell on me, and I felt stupid. "Still mad at me, I see . . ."

Damn it, I was doing it again. Frustrated, I forced myself to exhale slowly. "You're right," I said, swallowing hard. "You rescued me. Us. Thank you." My eyes narrowed. "You're not my Sa'han, though."

He blinked, arms falling from his middle as he stood upright. "Ah, you heard that?" he said, face crimson.

I'd never seen Trent blush, and I hesitated in my anger. "Oh yeah."

He winced. "See, there's more than one meaning to that honorific. It's not always a term of respect from a subordinate to a superior."

I nodded. "Uh-huh. You're not my Mal Sa'han, either." I'd heard him try to call Ceri that, and she wouldn't let him. I had a feeling it had a romantic overtone.

"God, no," he said, his flush making me even more sure of it. "I only meant that your safety was my responsibility." I cocked my head, and he added, "My responsibility not like a jailer or a parent, but as an equal. It was your idea."

Mine? My confusion must have shown, because he said, "The curse that emancipated me? 'I will come to your aid in a time of war'? Your idea, not mine, but an agreement is an agreement."

My head flopped to the other side of my shoulders as I eyed him from a different perspective, but he still looked like the same irritating man, his ankles crossed and his stance confident. "So you were out there perched in that tree looking for me because of some stupid Latin phrase?"

"Why do I even try?" he whispered to the ceiling. "Rachel. Listen to me for once. I helped get you into this situation with the demons, and I am standing beside you to get you out. Whatever it takes."

I thought of Ceri and the girls, what the loss of Trent would mean to them. My pulse thundered. I wanted to believe him, I wanted to be someone who wasn't afraid. His eyes were on my bracelet, and I hid it under my other hand. "Trent. I've got nothing to keep me on this side of the lines. He knows my summoning name, so even holy ground won't work this time. I don't care what you've done, what charms or spells you've made, but there is nothing on God's green earth that is going to stop that demon from taking me."

"So you made a hole in the ever-after," he said, and I threw my hand in the air - he still didn't get it. "You'll find a way to fix it. Al is broke, but only if you're dead, which you aren't. He's going to be angry you hid out from him for five months, but that was your choice - deal with it. You saved the elven species, but you also have the cure for the demons' infertility. What more do you need?"

"No, I don't," I said quickly. "I am not going to be a demon broodmare."

He touched his chin in thought. "Perhaps I should have said I have the cure for their infertility. If I can fix you, I can fix them. All they have to do is trust me."

Like that will ever happen. But my clenched jaw eased. "You'd do that? I thought you were at war with them."

Trent's toe scuffed the floor. "No one can remember why the war started," he said. "Maybe it's time to end it. It's what my father wanted. Yours too."

I looked at my bracelet, my heart hammering. The memory of being helpless rose up, not of simply being in a cage and watching Winona being tortured and knowing I might have been able to stop it if I hadn't been afraid. No, it was the feeling of helplessness I'd known all my life, of being too weak, betrayed by my own body. And then the helplessness because of a lack of skill until I learned what I could do. The helplessness brought on by my own people when they shunned me, then being afraid of what I was and of what I had done. I wasn't going to be afraid anymore. I could fix Winona. I owed her her life back.

Swallowing, I turned to Trent, but my next words died as the door opened and Quen came in, Jenks riding the ladder he was toting. My face was hot, and I knew I had a panicked look on it. Trent had something they wanted. Something they wanted so badly I might be able to bargain with Al for my continued freedom. Trent could help me, I thought. And this time I believed it. If we could hold Al off long enough for him to listen.

The clatter of the ladder being set up was harsh, and both Jenks and Quen looked up when neither Trent nor I said anything. "In the meantime," Trent said to fill the breach, "Winona is welcome to stay. We don't have a nanny, and the girls seem to like her."

Jenks's wings buzzed, and even Quen accepted that at face value, but I dropped my head, trying to lower my pulse before Jenks sensed it racing. I had to talk to Trent. I didn't want to be afraid anymore. I didn't want Winona living her life as a monster. I didn't want anyone killing for me when I could use my magic and avoid bloodshed altogether. And if someone had to die, then . . . Oh God, I didn't know if I could do that.

But I wasn't going to be afraid anymore, and it was the scariest thing I'd ever decided. With a single-minded purpose, I hobbled forward, my hand reaching for the ladder in support.

"What the Tink-blasted hell do you think you're doing?" Jenks said, and I started, shocked. How did he know?

"You're not getting on the ladder," Quen said dryly. "I can tell if the light has been disturbed."

Oh! I took my hand off the ladder, flustered. Still leaning against the counter, Trent watched me pull back as if stung. Our eyes met over the length of the room, and when he saw my frightened, lost expression, his entire demeanor shifted. His lips parted and he pushed from the counter. Eyebrows high, he smiled faintly, a new excitement making his motions sharp. He knew. I was an open book to him. It had begun, my terrifying, I'm-not-afraid world.

"Um, I have to go," I said, and Jenks's wings clattered in sudden mistrust.

"What did you say to her, Trent?" the pixy demanded as Trent came forward and took my elbow, helping me to the door. "Where are you going? We just got the ladder. Don't you want to know if this is how they got in?"

Oh shit. I was going to take the bracelet off. My heart pounded, and I felt dizzy.

Trent's grip on my elbow tightened and he slipped his mutilated hand around my waist. "Now?" Trent murmured. The scent of wine and cinnamon filled me, and I closed my eyes, trying to stand upright, but it only made me dizzier. "Let me know what you find," he said loudly, his voice calm under a lifetime of business dealings, but I don't think he was fooling Quen. "Rachel has been on her feet too long. I can get her to her chair okay. Ceri will skin me alive if she passes out. I'm going to take her upstairs. Quen, a full report of what you find, on my desk ASAP."

"I'm fine," I said breathily, but I wasn't. I couldn't meet Jenks's eyes as I shuffled out, but he was more excited about helping Quen with the light than anything else. I didn't want him around when Al showed up. At least it was daylight. I'd have a few hours to make a new scrying mirror and try to explain before it all hit the fan.

Unless he jumps me to the ever-after, that is.

"Us," Trent said as the door shut behind us and I looked up in the cool emptiness of the hall. "Unless he jumps us to the ever-after. Get it right, Rachel. I said I would help."

"H-how . . ." I stammered, but he just smiled, his grip on my elbow never changing as he helped me to my chair.