Into the Fire (The Unseelie Court Book 4) Read online

  “What’s it like there?” It takes me a minute to realize she’s talking about the farm, not the land beyond the Veil.

  “This time of year, it’s very quiet.” I close my eyes as I picture the icicles hanging from the roof of the house, the snow layered over the ground like a thick blanket. The icy north wind whipping a blast of chilly air between the barn and the other outbuildings, making the powdery snow dance.

  Astrid studies me. “Are there any animals?”

  “Not that we own. But Addy has a veterinary clinic where she takes care of dogs and cats. I help out there sometimes after school.” Or I had until my destiny had blindsided me.

  “It sounds nice.”

  “It is my favorite place in all the worlds. My home.” It’s true. My memories from my life as Nicneven had shown me wonders beyond human imagining. I’d seen the in-between—the space behind the Veil that separates Midgard from Underhill. I’d grown wings and flown, bathed in a bioluminescent pool and dressed from a magical wardrobe in a sea glass and sandcastle by the sea.

  But Dorothy had it right—there’s no place like home.

  I wonder if I’ll ever see it again.

  “Someone’s coming,” Astrid says a moment before I hear the footsteps.

  “Stay behind me.” I put myself between her and this new threat.

  A hiss as the airlock door opens. Two guards stride through the door, both armed, both wearing the required cleanroom suits. “Get up.”

  I am slow to comply. I don’t threaten them but neither do I try to pull off poor, pregnant teenager. These people have no mercy, so playing the sympathy card is a waste of time.

  “Step forward.”

  I do but when Astrid moves to follow the other levels his sidearm at her. “Not you.”

  “It’ll be all right,” I tell her.

  She doesn’t answer.

  The guards lead me out into a hallway. As we walk, I make an effort to mentally map the twists and turns. Note the cameras perched in the corners of every intersection. Is there anything here that can aid me in an escape?

  Astrid might know.

  And then we come to the room that has become a familiar part of my day, interrogation 101 with professor Hanson. Time to sit and stare blankly at the wall behind her. Pretend I hadn’t cried, hadn’t begged for her to stop relating the tragic lives of my victim’s families. I hate her for that more than all the rest.

  But Hanson isn’t inside the room. The guards don’t bother to tether my shackles to the chair. I scowl and look down but before I can decide if it’s an oversight or an order, they exit the room, the hermetically sealed door hissing behind them.

  I sit and wait. Is this some sort of test? Best not to respond at all. There is no camera in here, no two-way mirror, only a thin vent in the ceiling. In the quiet I can hear the fan thrumming as air circulates through the ductwork.

  I count to thirty. Then one hundred. Nothing happens. I’m used to waiting, it’s in my nature, but I’d be lying if I said that, under these circumstances, it isn’t unnerving.

  The door opens and a woman steps through. She is tall and statuesque with blood-red hair wound up in an elegant chignon.

  The Hag of the Ironwood. My heart leaps when I recognize her. But is she here as a friend or a foe?

  “Don’t say anything,” Angrboda sets her briefcase down on the table. “We don’t have much time.”

  “How did you get in here?”

  “I had to wait until Hanson was off the premises to ensorcell the other mortals so they’d let me in.”

  I stare at her, the woman my mother forcibly evicted from Underhill. The mother of monsters and the giantess who Aiden held responsible for ruining his life.

  “I’m your lawyer, hired by your aunt, as far as they’re concerned.”

  Chloe. “Is she all right?”

  The giantess nods once. “Worried about you though. We have a plan to get you out of here. Soon.”

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t want to reveal too much. Just know that I’m going to slip an order into their heads on the way out to move you from this facility to a more secure location. When they transport you, we will be at the ready.”

  I pick at a hangnail. “There’s a girl here, her name is Astrid. Do you know anything about her?”

  The giantess shakes her head. “No. Is she fey?”

  Unwilling to say the words out loud I murmur, “I want to help her, too.”

  She studies me. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Do you know where Aiden is?” It’s the sort of question any normal girl would ask.

  She shakes her head. “No one has seen or heard from him for days.”

  The hangnail rips free. That’s why my eyes sting.

  “One thing at a time. We have to set you free then we can worry about the wolf.”

  “I’m pregnant,” I’m not sure why I tell her this, other than that it feels good to tell someone since everyone else has been busy telling me. It should be my news, fucked up as that is. “I’ve heard it’s a girl.”

  The giantess’s eyes go wide. “The One True Queen.”

  “What?” Where had I heard that before?

  “Nothing.” Her green eyes fix on my face. “Does Aiden know about the babe?”

  I shake my head. “I’m worried about his reaction though.”

  “Worry about yourself, Nic.” Her gaze goes to my midsection. “For you carry the key to saving all of us within you.”

  Aiden wakes to the feel of warm hands sliding across his naked back.

  “Nic,” he breathes, but the second the scent hits him, he knows it is wrong.

  Leaping out of bed, he turns his back on the goddess. “Keep your talons to yourself, goddess.”

  “Is that what you really desire?” She is wearing a sheer white gown that reveals more of her flesh than it conceals. She skims her hand along her side. “Do you not find me…irresistible?”

  He glowers at her. “Somehow, I’ll manage.”

  She falls back, her touches growing bolder. “Why must you make this so hard on yourself?”

  He catches her hands. “Don’t try me, Freya.”

  She lets out a breath. “So, this is to be our fate? You denying us any sort of pleasure? Do you not remember how good it was between us?”

  His gaze narrows. “What I remember is that you abandoned me to Midgard, you let my brother die and didn’t bother to say a word against the gods. And you’ve all but abandoned your children to Underhill.”

  She sucks in a breath. “Oh, here we go. Váli, you are centuries old. Don’t you think it’s time you learn to let things go? These grudges aren’t becoming.”

  “Tell me what I need to do, Freya.” Aiden paces the room. “Tell me what it is you really want. You know you can’t keep me here forever.”

  “Fine, you insist on leaving and dooming us all….” She rises from the bed, hips swaying as she prowls closer to him. “I want to carry your child.”

  He stares at her, uncomprehending.

  “It’s the only way your father will spare me. He’s always had a soft spot for his progeny. If I am the mother of his grandchild, he will let me live in peace instead of destroying me with all the rest.”

  “I will never have a child.” He closes in on her, wrapping his hands around her arms. Barely refraining himself from shaking her. “Do you understand me? My entire line is tainted, filthy. I will not spawn, especially not with the likes of you.”

  Her face grows mottled in her fury as he speaks and she vanishes out of his grip.

  He sinks down onto the bed. What a mess Loki made. Why couldn’t his father have been content with his mother? Why couldn’t they have spent eternity together as a family? It had been idyllic to be a child of the Trickster.

  Right up until the moment that it wasn’t.

  Angrboda had been right. He must accept his past and all it had taught him. He’d been trying. Now that madness no longer threatens, he can think clearly fo
r the first time in centuries.

  Fact one. He loves Nic. His wolf accepts her as his mate.

  Fact two, she, for whatever reason, loves him as well. The last night they’d been together was all mixed up with the pain from the past and the thin thread of hope for the future. And then they’d been separated again. The cycle repeating as it had since he had first met her.

  Why can’t they be together? In Midgard or Underhill, the Vanir lands or the deepest corner of Hel. He doesn’t care where as long as it is her and him.

  Fact three, it might be all his fault.

  Freya is an idiot if she believes having a child with him will protect her. His father had been jaded and tortured for thousands of years. And now, with the end of the world at hand, he will be even more vicious. And there is the ever-present worry that any child of his would side with Loki, Fenrir and all the rest come the last battle. The odds are already stacked against the world. Aiden refuses to do anything else to aid its downfall.

  His gaze takes in the room around him. Freya’s white motif abounds but on a shelf in the corner sits a ruby red dragon’s egg in a small glass case. It had been there the first time she’d brought him here. He recalls the first time he’d been in this room after he’d seen his father and Angrboda together. Freya had found him in her garden. He hadn’t been paying attention to where he was, his mind trying to reconcile what he’d seen.

  “Why was he with her?” Aiden shook his head.

  “They were making love.” The goddess handed him a drink.

  “That wasn’t love.” It couldn’t be, not with a woman who wasn’t his mother. “She must have bespelled him.”

  “Sweet boy, love comes as it comes.” Freya’s cat eyes had glittered. “Let me show you.”

  Aiden squeezes his eyes shut.

  Deep in his chest, his wolf stirs. He’s oddly relieved to know the beast is with him.

  He rubs his thighs as though they itch. The creature within him detests being caged almost as much as he detests being separated from his mate. So how to escape?

  Harmony. The seer is his way out. So what if she foresaw his death? The future isn’t set. He must convince her that the world will best be served if he gets out of this place as soon as possible.

  With that thought in mind, he follows his nose, tracking the seer’s wisteria scent. Her room is down a long open-air gravel path. Moonlight illuminates the white cobbled walkway. A fountain burbles merrily. Everything perfectly austere. Not a pebble out of place. Perfect and cold, like the bitch who lives here.

  He knocks softly, not wanting to wake the seer if she is resting.

  Harmony opens the door. She is wearing a blue silk bathrobe and her jet hair is pulled up in a high ponytail.

  She smiles softly when she sees him. “How’s your head?”

  Though he had told himself he needed to make nice with her, her question enrages him. “Why the concern, Harmony? You delivered me into the hands of my enemy.”

  “We’re friends, Aiden. And she’s not your enemy. In case you missed it, we are trying to save your life. And Freya isn’t all bad. She petitioned the other gods to allow the fey to evacuate to the Vanir lands.”

  “And?”

  “They’re discussing it.” She stands aside and gestures for him to enter her space.

  He does and then frowns at the room. Fluffy white bed covered in purple and pink pillows and a white lace canopy. Stuffed animals cover a chaise lounge by a picture window that overlooks a glittering silver stream.

  It’s a child’s room.

  He studies the seer anew. “How long have you known Freya?”

  “All my life.” Her chin goes up and she crosses to the bed, seating herself on the edge of it. “She rescued me from certain death.”

  “How so?”

  “You’re not ready to hear the story.” She tilts her head to study him. “I assume you’re here to try and convince me to help you escape?”

  He doesn’t bother to fight a smile. “Am I so obvious?”

  She shrugs. “It’s what I’d do in your place.”

  He studies her a moment. “Please try to understand. I have a mate out there. You know how rare that is?”

  When she nods, he pushes, “I have no idea what’s happening to her, no idea if she’s too hot, too cold. If she’s hungry and doing without. It’s my job to protect and provide for her.”

  The seer shakes her head. “It really isn’t, Aiden. Nic has been taking care of herself since she was six-years-old. She’s a survivor.”

  “And that means what, that I shouldn’t worry?” His laugh is hollow. “Tell me, have you ever gone without protection from a goddess?”

  Her expression grows shuttered. “You know I have. Wardon kept me locked in his castle.”

  “Where you were dressed in finery and given plenty of food and a place away from the elements?”

  Her stare is unflinching. “A gilded cage is still a cage, Aiden.”

  She sounds like Nic. “There are worse things than being chained, seer. Part of me still longs for Ragnarök if it means I can forget all that I have done, all that has been done to me.”

  She shakes her head in clear denial. “You don’t mean that.”

  He didn’t, not anymore. Not if total eradication meant his mate would die. For her, he will endure, even with the cruelty and suffering that plagues him. “There’s a reason the dead of the Wild Hunt are so formidable. Nic can’t turn a corner without coming across another evil soul. They are sprouting up everywhere like weeds among both human and fey populations. The worlds are only getting worse.”

  She rises up and moves to the door. “Hungry?”

  He frowns. Why the abrupt change? Or is she just sick of hearing him moan and groan over things that neither of them can change?

  He can’t blame her. Sometimes he is sick of himself.

  At the notion of food, the wolf surges up. “Is there actual food here?”

  Harmony nods. “It’s been Freya’s practice to keep it around ever since I came to live here.”

  He follows her down the path once more. Instead of turning back toward his room, she takes another turn and heads in the opposite direction.

  They entered a humongous gourmet kitchen. Aiden gapes at the marble countertops, the island that is really more of a continent, the two side by side refrigerators. Though Freya could adorn her home by any magical means, she had never bothered following human custom before. Just what did Harmony mean to her that the goddess would put herself out this way?

  “You said Freya rescued you?” He follows her into the gleaming white space. “That doesn’t sound like her. She only does things to suit herself, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “Says the selfish wolf who’ll see the worlds burn so he can get to his mate. Who is perfectly fine where she is. Omelet?” She holds up a container of eggs.

  Aiden sighs. “You’re not going to try and mick me with that wolf-be-gone potion, are you?”

  She holds his gaze. “I’ll tell you flat-out with no word-twisting so you know I can’t lie. No, I will not try to slip you any drugs or altering substances.”

  He’s tempted to bring up that she’d dumped herbs in his bath so he wouldn’t detect the scent of Bifrost, but restrains himself. “Then an omelet sounds excellent.” Harmony isn’t a natural cook. More eggs land on the counter or the floor than in the bowl but finally she has enough to make an omelet.

  Aiden releases a sigh. “As for Nic, I never claimed to be farseeing, or to care about those who don’t bother with me or mine. I’m selfish and single-minded. It’s not a crime.”

  Harmony extracts mushrooms, onions, peppers, butter, bacon, cheese, and bread and lays them all out on the counter. “Did you ever stop and think that maybe the world you are so eager to let burn would be a better place if all those people could see beyond the ends of their noses?”

  He had, actually, but even with the powers of a god, Aiden possesses no ability to interfere with mortal or even fey ch
oice. Serving in an advisory role for Nic is as close as he’s ever come to political power. Harmony, maneuvering in Wardon’s court has far more experience.

  “Why do you dislike her so?”

  She plops a pat of butter in a pan and then lays cold bacon over it. “Whatever you think, I have never hated Nic. Not in her last life and not in this one. But she’s no longer a queen, Aiden. She didn’t sit on the Shadow Throne.”

  No, she didn’t. And the throne which had sat vacant for so long had accepted another. “There must be a way.”

  Harmony whacks away at the vegetables like they are fighting back. “Have you ever asked her if she wants to rule, Aiden?”

  He opens his mouth, then shuts it again.

  Harmony whips the eggs with preternatural speed and mixture slops over the side of the bowl. “Fenrir sits on the Shadow Throne because your mate didn’t claim it. She never made it a priority. Why do you think that is?”

  “It’s her destiny.” But even as he says the words, he recalls all the times Nic’s eyes had glazed over at talk of ruling. “She protects the people, the court. She rides with the Hunt.”

  “She did all that in her last life.” The bacon pops, releasing a delectable fragrance in spite of its mistreatment. “And she wasn’t a great queen or even a good one.”

  “And you think Fenrir will rule well?”

  Harmony shakes her head. “I want you to stop and think, Aiden. About something other than yourself. Nicneven was born of Underhill. She has fey in her blood. But the monarchs are tainted. The entire court system is biased. You’ve seen firsthand how those without magic struggle. Do you really think a former mortal with all the life experience of a sixteen-year-old can make things better?”

  The truth in her statement unsettles him. He remains quiet until she slides a massive omelet in front of him.

  “She’s been doing her best. The best that she knows how. The Fates didn’t tell her who she was because they wanted her to have as normal a life as possible for as long as she could.”

  She whips more eggs and adds them to the pan, before shooting him a pitying look. “Aiden, she started killing when she was six-years-old. Do you really think Nic ever had anything resembling a normal life?”