By then, Patrick knew it would be too late.
Which was why he and his pack were standing on a corner outside a smoke shop in the hazy border between the 13th and 14th arrondissements, waiting for their contact to arrive.
During dinner last night, Gaspard and Mireille had promised to send them someone who could get them underground. The Paris god pack had refused to help beyond that, putting the safety of their packs over everything else. Patrick had thought that was shortsighted seeing as how the entire city was in danger, but he knew better than to argue.
When they’d received the call that morning for an early evening meeting, Patrick had wanted to argue forsooner. Time was running out like grains of sand in an hourglass, but their contact had been adamant about when and where she would meet them, and they’d been forced to agree to it. Considering the access they were after was illegal, Patrick could understand why their guide would want to meet at a later hour than midday, but it wasn’t easy to wait when he knew a threat was coming.
Patrick had spent most of Wednesday in one long meeting after another, understanding only some of what was said and relying on Nadine to act as his translator. When they’d finally left, no closer to convincing the Ministry of Magical Affairs to act now with little evidence, he and Nadine had split their duties for the mission.
Lucien had grudgingly followed them to Paris, his promise to Ashanti about keeping Patrick alive the only reason he’d gone. Nadine and Spencer were meeting with Lucien tonight after sunset at his Paris home to see if the master vampire could get any information out of the Night Courts in Paris. They all had a long night ahead, and the tightness in Patrick’s shoulders wasn’t close to easing.
A slim woman crossed the street on the next red light, heading in their direction. She was dressed all in black, wore sturdy work boots, and carried a backpack. Her light brown hair was tied back in a sleek ponytail, and her makeup was minimal. The only accessory she wore was a pendant hanging around her throat carved from moonstone in the shape of a snake twisted into the infinity symbol.
“Jonothon?” she asked cautiously in a thick French accent. “Patrick?”
“That’s us,” Patrick said.
She beamed at them, looking impossibly young. “Bonsoir. I am Lisette. I was told by theloup-garouyou needed access to the network?”
Patrick cupped his hand against his thigh, conjuring up a tiny mageglobe. He filled it with a silence ward, creating a bubble of quiet around them on the street. Lisette startled at the sudden absence of sound, hands rising to her ears.
“It’s a silence ward,” Patrick said.
“Ah. Good. We can speak freely then,oui?” At Patrick’s nod, her expression lost some of its cheerfulness. “The network is not safe. Were you not warned?”
“We understand it’s not safe, but we still need to go down there,” Jono said.
Lisette bit her bottom lip. “I can only take one of you.”
“We all go,” Sage said.
Lisette shook her head. “You are new to the network, and I can’t promise you safety. One, only. That is what I told theloup-garou.”
“Whatever lives in the Catacombs right now is a threat no matter how many people you bring down there,” Patrick said.
“I know the way. You do not.” Lisette made an agitated cutting motion with her hand. “One person, or we do not go.”
Patrick sighed and looked at Jono. “I’ll go.”
Jono blew out a breath. “You don’t know what’s down there.”
“Exactly. Which means I’m the one most capable of dealing with it. Space will be tight in the mines. Shifting might not be an option.”
Zombies or drekavacs or Peklabog himself—no matter the monster or god, Patrick’s magic and dagger were far more versatile to handle such a threat. His pack could only shift, and that had the threatening possibility of producing a cave-in, bringing city blocks down around their ears. Patrick could shield, but he couldn’t shield against something like that and hold it for hours on end. He wasn’t Nadine.
Jono stared at him, jaw working, eyes hidden behind his sunglasses despite the late hour. The sun was low in the sky, but not low enough for the sky to go dark in the east. This close to summer solstice and Patrick knew the sky would take its sweet time to show the stars.
Patrick stepped closer, putting his hand over Jono’s heart. His skin, burned from Srecha’s blessing, scraped against the soft fabric. He looked up at Jono, searching his face. “I’m going below. I need you to stay up here. I need you to follow me. You know how.”
Like he had last summer when Patrick had traded himself for a werecreature’s life, a plaything between gods before a trickster dragged him through the veil, high on shine and one breath away from death’s touch. Jono had found him when Patrick couldn’t even find his thoughts at the time.
Patrick trusted Jono to find him through anything except the veil. That was a barrier that made it almost impossible to track each other, but Patrick wouldn’t be going through the veil below.
He hoped.
Jono reached up and flattened his hand over Patrick’s. “I don’t like it.”
Patrick shrugged, saying nothing to that. Jono’s dislike wasn’t going to stop him from doing his job—it couldn’t. Too much was at stake for them to wait and do nothing. They’d chased the Morrígan’s staff across two continents already. They needed to find it, and soon, before Ethan bargained with Ilya or murdered the necromancer outright to get his hands on it.
