Fascinated (36 page)

The Fae King smiled, and the blade of that smile drew its edge across Carstairs’s soul.

“Ned?” called Nick from the darkness of the ruined cellar. “Is that you? Are you all right?”

“No,” Carstairs breathed to the king. “It is not possible. Not even for you.”

Oberon shrugged. “Death is but another country, or so your sages say. I’ve walked many countries, Edward Carstairs, and I have brought back far stranger travelers than your brother.”

“Ned?” Carstairs could see a ripple in the darkness. He knew if he stared, it would resolve itself into a wiry silhouette. “Christ, it’s dark. Ned? Where are you? Answer me!”

“Answer your brother, Carstairs,” said Oberon. “He’s worried for you, can’t you tell?”

“That’s not my brother!” Carstairs roared.

But it was. The shadows stirred and peeled away and there was Nick: his fair hair tousled, his evening clothes smudged with soot and dirt from their last fight. His square jaw was drawn tight from pain and determination. The moonlight even threw
his faint shadow across the trash strewn ground. But Nick’s eyes—which Carstairs could see plainly in the moonlight—shifted left and right. His brother was listening, not seeing. If the Fae King stood in a mystical daylight, Nick crouched in a personal darkness. The darkness that had fallen over him when Carstairs had failed him and let him die.

“Ned!” Urgency raised into Nick’s voice. “Answer me!”

Carstairs couldn’t stand it. “I’m here, Nick. I’m right here.”

“Thank God!” cried his brother. His brother, whole and well. Tired, yes, and a thorough mess, but Nick was alive, and right in front of him. If he moved three steps forward, Carstairs could have clasped Nick’s hand. “Why didn’t you answer before, you young idiot?” his brother asked. “I thought I was going to have to explain to Father how I’d got you killed. You’re all right? She didn’t hurt you?”

“No.” Carstairs’s voice broke on the word. “No. I’m fine.”

“Good.” Nick turned his head this way and that. “Now we’ve just got to find our way out of this. Come here, so I can make us a light.” Nick held out his hand.

“Well…Ned?” drawled the Fae King. “Will you go to your brother? So he can make a light and find his way home?”

No. This could not be happening. It was not real. It was a trick. He had to turn away from this…this thing, this illusion that wore Nick’s face and spoke in Nick’s voice.

“What’s the matter, Ned?” Nick frowned and gestured impatiently. “Come on. Follow my voice, can’t you?”

Carstairs stumbled backward. Whatever strength and intention he’d brought with him into this place, that was gone. He’d been wrong, terribly wrong, yet again. Wrong about how he could help
Nick, or help Alicia, or help his captain and his country. He could do nothing. Nothing at all.

“You’re going to leave him there? Again?” The surprise and sorrow in Oberon’s voice wrapped tight around Carstairs’s heart. “Carstairs, you disappoint me. I had thought you were more of a man than this.”

Nick was carefully standing up, stretching his hands out to the dark, hoping to brush up against his brother. “Ned! Come on, Ned, you’re frightening me.”

“Stop it,” Carstairs heard himself say. “Please. Let him go.”

“Then pledge yourself to me,” said Oberon simply. “When I have your oath, he is free.”

Carstairs couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t feel his hands anymore. He was turning to dust. Memory, need, loss, shattered hope…all swirled together inside him.

“Here is something you can do at last,” whispered the king. “A promise to me, and you will accomplish all you have failed at until now. Your lady is safe from me forever, and your brother is alive and well. Come, Carstairs, what holds you back?”

Carstairs looked at Nick, standing blind and alone. His soul told him the truth. The Fae King was no liar. He had really brought Nick here.

And Nick was a Sorcerer.

“Get down, Nick!” shouted Carstairs. “There’s another one!”

Carstairs dove headfirst across the cellar. He slammed his brother to the ground, and Nick rolled under him, cursing. Now Carstairs had his brother’s hand and it was strong and real. Real.

“There!” Carstairs wrenched his brother’s hand around. “There, Nick!”

Carstairs opened his mind wide, and drew up the magic. Instantly Nick grabbed the power, slammed it into shape and threw it out in front of him, a bright golden blade to fly straight toward Oberon. The blow caught the king before he was ready and he staggered back. A savage joy ripped through Carstairs as Oberon roared in outrage. The light blazed around him Carstairs shouted from and almost lost his hold on his power. But he gripped Nick’s hand tighter. Nick shaped another bolt and hurled it forward, and another. The shield of light enveloping the Fae King shivered.

“Felt that, did you?” crowed Nick. “Have another!”

But before he could hurl the next bolt, the king’s power surged forward. It toppled over them like a mountain of blinding light and burning cold. Nick’s scream cut off abruptly and Carstairs’s chest caved tight against his lungs. He was frozen, clamped down by pure cold and pain. He couldn’t breathe; he couldn’t hold. He was dying. Nick was dying again…

EDWARD!

Alicia!
The pain vanished, and darkness blinded him. But he could move. Nick was spitting and cursing and Carstairs felt him snatch at the shred of power left between them to raise a flicker of light from his fingertips.

The Fae King had turned to face the rim of the cellar hole. There here stood Alicia, one hand outstretched as if in accusation. The other was held by an old woman.

Eugenia Hartwell. Alicia had not crumbled in despair, had not fled and deserted him. She had gone to fetch the one experienced Catalyst she knew and come after him. She might even have brought her hat pin, he thought in a kind of dazed awe.

“Who dares!” cried Oberon.

“I do!” Alicia drew herself up straight and strong. The summer
wind grabbed hold of her hair and whipped it out behind her. She looked like a goddess of old silhouetted by the moonlight, standing unafraid before the creature who had blighted her life and her family. Carstairs’s heart swelled.

“My God, Ned,” whispered Nick. “You’ve brought your own avenging angel. Nice work, man.”

“Well, well.” The Fae King laughed harshly. “It seems I’ve underestimated you both.”

“Let them go!” shouted Alicia. “You will let us all go and you will leave here!”

Oberon’s response to this shrill command was to applaud, slowly at first and then faster. His contempt curdled the darkness. “Very affecting.” Icy tendrils drifted from the words, coiling out toward Alicia. “Unfortunately, you have quite spoiled my plans, Miss Hartwell. I cannot let this pass unanswered.”

“Don’t think we should give him the chance, do you?” murmured Nick.

The Fae King pointed one long finger toward Alicia. He would strike her down. It took everything Carstairs had to keep himself in check, but this once he must. He could not make a mistake; he could not move too soon. “Hold, hold, hold…” he muttered.

The king’s power lashed out, a flood of power greater than any human could raise. But Eugenia dodged in front of Alicia. The Fae King’s bolt struck her over her heart. Eugenia blazed like a torch in the darkness as and screamed in pain and ecstasy as the magic flooded her being.

“Now!” Carstairs cried aloud to Nick. At the same time he cried out with all his heart.
Alicia! Do as we do!

Carstairs launched his inner senses straight into the current of magic the Fae King flung toward Eugenia Hartwell. It was
diving into a river in full flood. The magic overwhelmed awareness and breath and thought. But somehow Carstairs held, he held, and opened himself wide to Nick. Nick caught up the great wave of magic and stretched out his other hand, and shot the bolt back to the Fae King.

Oberon snarled, and then he screamed. For Alicia had heard Carstairs. She had staggered to her feet and grasped her aunt’s hand. She snatched up another share of the power leveled against them, and turned it back against the Fae King.

Oberon’s cry split the dark around them and shuddered through the earth. The circuit was terrible and its wild current dragged them down into the endless flood. Carstairs could feel them all as they stood and struggled; Eugenia’s cold finality, Nick’s steel sharp soldier’s triumph, and Alicia—oh, Alicia—he felt all her love and her fear and her angel’s fury. Alone, they could never have held, but together they stood strong. Each endured the pain for love of the other, giving the whole strength of heart and soul to channel the burn and the terror of the king’s own power back into him. Even Eugenia stood rock hard, supported by a desire for freedom and revenge she had so long denied. Human heart and human power, utterly focused, utterly fearless, faced the onslaught of the otherworldly magic and returned the fury of the Fae King to its source.

And it was gone. The king vanished. The magic cut out from under them. He had gone. They had driven him out. It was over. Carstairs sucked in a deep breath, and wiped his sleeve across his mouth. Over.

Then, Nick lurched sideways, and fell. With a cry, Carstairs caught his brother and gently lowered him to the ground.

“Nick,” he breathed, tears welling up in his eyes.
Oh, not again, not again.
“God, Nick…”

He was aware of frantic movement behind him, but he couldn’t turn his head. It was happening again. Nick was dying again.

“It’s all right, Ned.” Nick gripped his arm. “I remember now. He brought me back, didn’t he?”

Carstairs nodded mutely.

Nick smiled weakly. He’d turned pale. His breath was growing harsh and slow. “Bit of a mistake on his part, eh?”

The laughter bubbled up painfully from Carstairs’s throat. Alicia was beside him now, kneeling as he knelt, and wrapping her arms around his shoulders.

Nick gave a low whistle that ended in a cough. “Well, she’s a stunner, Ned.” With a grunt of effort, Nick took Alicia’s hand. “Nicholas Carstairs, ma’am. Your servant.”

“How do you do, sir?” Alicia breathed.

“Surprisingly well, I find.” But his grin faded and Nick coughed again. “Take care of him for me, won’t you?”

“I promise.”

“Good. That’s done. Now you.” Nick’s eyes drifted toward Carstairs. “Been watching you, Ned. I think, anyway. Been trying to tell you…not your fault, you young idiot. Never was.”

“Nick…”

Nick shook his head. “Got to get back now. Long life to you, brother. Long, fine life with your angel, right?”

“Right,” answered Carstairs.

Nick grinned a final time, and he closed his eyes. An expression of deep peace stole across his face. A moment later, he faded like a dream, and Carstairs’s arms were empty.

“Oh, Edward,” breathed Alicia. “I’m so sorry.”

But Carstairs covered her hand where it held his shoulder. He was shaking and he felt as weak as a kitten, but at the same time,
a bright joy surged through him. He had come here to avenge Nick and free Alicia, and it was he who was free. Free.

He stood slowly, and turned toward Alicia. She took up both his hands. She was pale and frightened and filled with love. He could feel it wrap around him. And this time, he could accept it as freely and fully as she gave it.

Alicia looked into his eyes and she saw and she understood.

“Oh, Edward!” She threw herself into his arms and he caught her, and crushed her close against him. Edward kissed her, and kissed her again. From the corner of his eye he saw Eugenia, prim, disapproving and disheveled, gazing down at them like some nightmare chaperone on the cellar rim, and he didn’t care. He kissed Alicia a third time, a long, open kiss as filled with love and need as his soul was of joy.

“Alicia,” he murmured. “My Alicia.”

She leaned in to claim yet another kiss, but he held her back, just a little. Her hair tumbled in a mass down her back, her dress was torn, she was too pale, and too magnificent to be real. But she was real and she was here, and nothing would ever come between them again, because they were both free. Finally and wholly free.

Edward?
Alicia’s hesitant thought touched him.

Let me look at you.
He cupped his hand around her cheek and lifted her eyes to his.

Always, Edward. Always.
With those words came a world of emotion, of love, need, trust and infinitely sweet desire. It was the whole of Alicia Hartwell, at ease in his mind and soul, as her body was at ease in his arms.

“Stay with me,” Carstairs said aloud. “Marry me.”

The heat of her kiss was all the answer either one of them required.

Keep reading for an excerpt from

The Surrender of Lady Jane

by Marissa Day

Now available from Heat Books