“Oh.”Shite.“Well, thanks. You’re giving up your immortality for me. That’s big.”
“Don’t get all emotional about it,” Isadora waved a hand. “It’s a matter of politeness, is all. Besides, you know what they say – live well, die immortal, leave a beautiful corpse.”
“I’ve never heard that said,” I grinned.
“Shut up,” Isadora snapped. “It’s your fault I’m here at all. Every word from your lips should be deference to my sacrifice.”
“Sexy lady with pretty ink, like a picture book with a beginning, middle, and end,” Robert sang, bending down to inspect Isadora’s tattoo. She slapped him away.
“I love what they’ve done with the place,” I said, gazing around the dark hallway, searching for Liah in the dark corners. I remembered the commentary on the interior design shows I’d watched on the telly. “Bold colour scheme, excellent use of lighting, decor a mix of minimalism and abject terror. I haveone question, though. Shouldn’t this place be swarming with demons?”
“It will take some time for them to make their way back here after they were hit with that belief bomb,” Aline said. “For now, we’ve got the place to ourselves.”
“Not just you,” a voice said from behind us.
I whirled around. In the middle of the hall, holding a bow over her shoulder, was Liah.
The urge to embrace her itched in my arms. Being with Maeve was turning me soft. Fae didn’t embrace. I walked over to her and fixed her with a nonchalant look. “So you weren’t a mirage.”
“I was not.”
Fuck it. I wasn’t fae anymore. I was a human, and seeing her gladdened my heart. I threw myself at her, wrapping my arms around her neck.
“I’m glad you’re not a megalomaniac villain,” I whispered in her ear.
“Get off me.” Liah pushed me away, but there was a hint of softness in her cold eyes. “The humans have made you all sentimental. We don’t have time for this. If you want to stop Daigh once and for all, you’d better come with me.”
We stood at the mouth of hell – a gaping maw of darkness so dark it made the void seem like the Blackpool Illuminations. Surrounding the arch was a decorative border formed from skulls and femurs. The decor reminded me a little of theUnseelie court, except we never had doorways made of darkness so solid and oppressive it threw you away from it.
Liah took a vial from a pouch on her hip and tipped a black sludge onto her stump. A rank smell rose through the hallway. Liah rubbed her hand into the sludge, smearing her skin with the black slime. Aline shrieked as Liah rubbed the foul grease into her skin.
“Stop squirming,” she commanded. “This is the blood of the demon that held me at Daigh’s behest. He deserved his death. It may spoil your complexion, but it will get you through that door.”
She did the same to Smithers, then approached me, her hands raised. I kept my face impassive as she slid her hand over my skin. This was no worse than some of the things Daigh had forced me to do. And if it led us to Maeve and Corbin, it was worth it.
I sniffed, and the foul shite caught in my throat and made my stomach gag and retch. Liah thumped me on the back while I struggled to breathe normally.
It hadbetterbe worth it.
With the demon’s blood smearing my face, the black doorway no longer appeared as oppressive. I could make out the faint glow of a light in the depths. I sprinted forward and passed through the darkness with ease. Nothing bit nor snared me.
I emerged into a cavernous space, shaped like the interior of a sidhe but on an impossibly grand scale. In the centre of the room stood a high throne built from a pile of bones, presiding over an enormous fire from which sulphurous flames leapt and licked. A long bridge stretched from where I stood across to the throne.
Atop the throne sat Daigh, an enormous crown with a blue aura sat atop his head. Across from him at the foot of the throne stood a figure, her stance wide and defiant.
Maeve!
She had her hands on her hips and her head cocked to one side as she spoke. From the expression on her face, it looked like… it was impossible, but…
I stifled a laugh.
Maeve Moore was giving Daigh ascience lecture.
Her voice reverberated from the cavernous space as she enunciated on some vital point. I caught the words ‘DNA’ and ‘epigenetics’, but the rest of it was like a foreign language. On the throne, Daigh’s mouth hung open. He tried to interject, but Maeve kept talking.
“For a High Priestess, she’s useless,” Liah said. “She had him at her mercy, but she let him go. Now she just keeps trying to talk to him aboutscience.”
“That sounds exactly like Maeve.”
