Night Rune (Prof Croft Book 8) Read online

  “So you dulled it with alcohol?”

  “Yes, and it worked. Or at least it did.” She squinted at me accusingly before wrapping her head back in her arms.

  With her succubus nature, Tabitha was sensitive to activity in the Below. And this latest report from my canary in the demonic coalmine troubled me. By defeating the Strangers in the time catch and capturing Arnaud, I believed we’d disrupted Malphas’s plans. But Tabitha’s reaction coupled with songs about possessed fae suggested Malphas might not be done, that a demon apocalypse could still be on the horizon.

  “Any idea where this dread came from?” I asked.

  “No, darling,” she moaned. “But I wish it would stop.”

  I retrieved a new vial from a bin. “I have another potion. It’ll dull your hangover and help take the edge off, but let me give it to you downstairs.”

  She waved a weary paw in concession, and I carried her back down the ladder.

  “How is she?” Bree-yark asked. He emerged from the kitchen holding a large mixing bowl of raisin bran staked with a serving spoon. Dropsy hopped along beside him.

  “I’ll survive,” Tabitha answered dramatically.

  “Hey, Everson and I are going to Faerie,” Bree-yark said. “You should come with.”

  I made a quick cutting motion across my throat, but the goblin was too busy shoveling cereal into his mouth to notice.

  “Faerie?” Tabitha moved the back of her paw from her eyes and blinked up at me. “You never mentioned going to Faerie.”

  A couple years before, she’d given me crap about refusing Caroline’s offer to hide us in her and Angelus’s kingdom during the mayor’s purge campaign. Tabitha’s interest hadn’t been for our safety but in the food—specifically rumors of a goat milk so rich it separated into layers of thick cream.

  “We’re not going to a kingdom,” I said, setting her inside her vast depression on the divan. “We’re going to the Fae Wilds, where the food is suspect at best. We’ll be packing what we eat, and it’s stuff you don’t like.”

  “Actually, there’s a border town I wouldn’t mind stopping at,” Bree-yark said around another mouthful of cereal. “They have a great market.”

  Tabitha, who had begun to lose interest, perked up again. “You don’t say?”

  “Oh, yeah. Roasted fish stuffed with goat cheese and herbs. Dripping lamb shanks on spits. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it.”

  “That does sound delectable,” Tabitha agreed.

  I glared at Bree-yark, who took a moment to get the message.

  “Well, only if that stuff’s in season,” he amended. “Otherwise, all they have is, you know … hay bread.”

  “Hay bread?” Tabitha echoed.

  “Yeah, bread made from hay.”

  Tabitha wrinkled her face. “I can’t think of anything more dreadful.”

  “Oh, it’s worse than dreadful. And that’s if they have fresh hay. If not, they have to sift it out of the ox manure.”

  “Hey, would you mind heating up some goat’s milk for Tabitha,” I said before Bree-yark could make his undersell any more ridiculous. He nodded and disappeared into the kitchen with his bowl of cereal.

  “I am not eating ox manure,” Tabitha pouted, sagging down again.

  “Well, lucky you, you don’t have to. In fact, I’d prefer it if you stayed here and kept an eye on the place.”

  Though I could have used Tabitha on demon sentry, especially if the fae were compromised, navigating the Fae Wilds was going to be challenging enough without having to drag forty pounds of attitude on a harness.

  “Oh, that reminds me,” she muttered. “You had a visitor earlier.”

  “Yeah? Who?”

  “They didn’t announce themselves.” When she saw I was waiting for more, she sighed. “I’d just helped myself to your scant liquor offerings and was settling in for a nap when a knock sounded at the door. Though really it was more of a scraping. A wretched sound, darling. Thankfully, my senses were already numbing nicely—it was such a relief to be able to relax at last—and I fell asleep. And then you showed up.”

  “So you don’t know who it was?”

  “No, darling. I already told you.”

  A sense of foreboding overcame me. “Did you smell anything?”

  “Yes, your whiskey. Too peaty for my taste, if I’m being honest.”

  “No, besides that.”

  She started to answer, then reared back onto her haunches. “What is that thing?”

  Dropsy had come around the back of the divan and was peering up at her, her glass face glowing with what seemed curiosity.

  “It’s just a fae lantern,” I said. “She’s harmless.”

  “Well, get it away from me!” Tabitha cried, batting a paw at her.

  The lantern shrank back and hopped past the hearth toward my bedroom.

  Tabitha ground her paws against her eyes. “As if I need a light in my face right now.”

  “You were about to say something about the smell?”

  She muttered as she finished rubbing her eyes and settled back down. “Right before I drifted off, I caught the foulest stink of death.”

  I leaned an arm against the stone mantel above the hearth and stared at the empty grate.

  “Why?” Tabitha asked. “Does that mean something?”

  “I picked up the same scent earlier. Something’s looking for me.”

  “Going on the smell alone, I’d say better you than me.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Well, why not set a trap?”

  I’d been considering the very idea, but I didn’t have the time or resources to spare right now. It was going to take everything I had to reach Crusspatch, and if that went well, to navigate the time catch.

  Possibly a failing time catch.

  Bree-yark reappeared from the kitchen with a steaming saucer. “One serving of goat’s milk.”

  I added the potion absently, and set the saucer where Tabitha could lap it up without having to leave her perch.

  “How soon can you be ready?” I asked Bree-yark as I stood again. I was thinking of all the time I’d already spent running around that morning while days and weeks were flipping by in the time catch.

  “Just need to change and pack a small bag,” he said. “Twenty minutes?”

  “Let’s make it fifteen.”

  9

  “It’s the only way?” Vega asked.

  “It’s not ideal, I know,” I said into the phone. “But yeah, it’s what I’m left with.”

  Bree-yark cocked an eye at me from behind the steering wheel as we motored up Eighth Avenue. I would have preferred to have had this conversation in private—I’d known Vega wasn’t going to like my plan—but with time being a factor, calling her on the way to the goblin tunnels was the best solution.

  She sighed.

  “Look, I started with my most trustworthy contact and moved down the list,” I said. “Claudius couldn’t get me there, and neither could Gretchen. The fae, well, I told you what happened. This is where we are.”

  “Crusspatch,” she said skeptically.

  “Yeah, I don’t like the name either. It sounds like a skin condition. But I’m not going alone,” I reminded her. She’d worked with Bree-yark just a few days earlier, the two fighting side-by-side in the West Nyack rock quarry to repel a host of demons.

  “And Bree-yark knows the Fae Wilds?” she asked. “He knows how to get where you’re going?”

  The goblin’s ears perked up at mention of his name, and he gave me a thumbs-up.

  “Yes,” I said. “And I have everything I need for the journey. Journeys plural, if Crusspatch can get me into the time catch.” I looked past my lumpy coat pockets to the rucksack between my feet. The only thing we were light on was food. With little time to prep, I’d packed the gingersnaps and Mae’s coffee—refreshments, basically, until we could find something more substantial.

  “When can I expect you back?”

  “With the time dif
ferentials, it shouldn’t be any later than tonight.”

  “How about an actual time, so I can know when to start worrying?”

  I consulted my watch—it was still before noon—and then did a little math. “How about seven o’clock this evening? If for some reason I don’t show up by then, call Claudius and Gretchen.”

  “The two people who couldn’t help you?”

  “Couldn’t help me into the time catch,” I stressed. “If we run into trouble in the Fae Wilds, one or both can reach me there.” I was putting out a lot more confidence than I was feeling. I had no idea if Gretchen was helping me at the moment, and Claudius didn’t even know what city he was in, much less the year.

  “But it shouldn’t come to that,” I added.

  “All right,” Vega said, her voice softening as though to suggest she was through being the concerned girlfriend. “I hate to bring this up, but have you considered what you’ll do if Crusspatch can’t help you?”

  I heard Mae’s voice: Talk to that woman about this demon of yours. You need to work it out together. But having already passed Penn Station blocks ago, that conversation wasn’t going to fit into the few minutes between here and Central Park. Of course, the goal was never needing to have that conversation in the first place.

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” I said. “Any updates on Arnaud?”

  “I’m looking at him right now.” I pictured her staring at the monitor for his holding cell, the grainy light reflecting from her troubled eyes. “He’s just sitting there, legs crossed like he’s expecting a visitor.”

  Yeah, me, I thought sickly.

  “And he’s got this stupid smile on his face. Are you sure he’s getting weaker?”

  “He is. He just hides it well.”

  “He does look thinner,” she allowed.

  “Have the Sup Squad keep an eye on him.”

  “Oh, that’s not changing until he’s dead and gone.”

  “You have your coin pendant on, right?” I asked, partly to change the subject.

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “Well, when I left your office earlier today, I had the feeling I was being watched. It happened again on the Upper East Side, and Tabitha said someone came to my door earlier.”

  “Any idea who?”

  “No, but there could be magic involved.” I left out the part about the death smell—I still didn’t know what it meant—but I pictured Mae Johnson frowning her disapproval. “Is Tony at the apartment?”

  “Yeah, with Camilla.”

  “Good, have them stay there. It could be nothing, but the wards will keep them safe. I just want to be extra careful until I know what’s going on.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  At Columbus Circle, Bree-yark turned right and pressed the hand accelerator.

  “We’re almost there,” I told Vega. “I’ll see you tonight, if not sooner.”

  “Try to make it sooner.”

  “Are you going to be all right?”

  “Do I have a choice?” She sighed. “I’ll be better when I know you’re safe.”

  “I have three very good reasons to stay that way,” I said, referring to her, Tony, and our pea-sized girl.

  I shouted as Bree-yark swerved off road to avoid a line of cement traffic barriers. The Hummer caught air and landed in a series of violent jounces before joining up with a drive that led into the park. A set of wooden barricades greeted us. The Hummer’s steel bumper smashed through them, sending planks clattering over the rooftop.

  “What’s that racket?” Vega asked.

  “Um, nothing the city can’t replace.”

  “All right,” she said thinly. “I love you.”

  “Love you too. Give your tummy a pat for me.”

  She snorted a laugh. “Will do.”

  I nearly put the phone back in my coat, but the device couldn’t make the journey to Faerie. As I placed it in the glove compartment along with my watch, the idea of not having an immediate line to Vega punched my heart. Something told me these types of trips away were going to get harder, not easier.

  Bree-yark looked over at me. “That seemed to go pretty well. I never would’ve been able to have that kind of talk with Gretchen. No, siree.” He said it as though still trying to convince himself that leaving her had been the right move.

  “Good thing to remember if you’re ever tempted to backslide.”

  “So what do you think Gretchen’s doing right now?” he mused, as if my words had gone in one notched ear and out the other.

  “No telling,” I muttered.

  Bree-yark rounded a horseshoe-shaped pond and pulled up beside the old skating rink, now a burnt ruins. As he killed the engine, I eyed a familiar pile of boulders. A couple months earlier, I’d picked my way through them and dropped into the goblin tunnels to stop Damien from reconstituting his five-member cult of devotees. Damien had turned out to be Arnaud, doing Malphas’s bidding.

  Could we stop Malphas again?

  “This is it,” Bree-yark said, breaking up the question.

  “I thought the mayor said he’d filled in the tunnels.”

  He grunted a laugh. “Might’ve believed he did, but goblins are like termites. We dig everywhere.”

  Dropsy, who had been hopping from one side of the backseat to the other, jumped onto the console and looked between me and Bree-yark. With no time to leave her at Gretchen’s—and her staying with Tabitha out of the question—we’d taken her along. I trusted she’d be all right in the Hummer.

  “C’mon, Dropsy,” Bree-yark said.

  “Wait, she’s coming with us?”

  “What did you think we were gonna do? Leave her in the car?”

  Dropsy faced me with an inquisitive look. Only an hour with the lantern, and I could already read her combos of posture and lighting.

  “Well, yeah,” I said in a lowered voice.

  “By herself and for who knows how long?”

  “Can’t we just, I don’t know, turn her off?”

  “She doesn’t have a switch, Everson. She’s enchanted.”

  “Look, I’ve got nothing against enchanted lanterns,” I said. “I’m just worried about her slowing us down.”

  “Naw, I’ll carry her.”

  “Or giving us away. The plan is to travel incognito.”

  “She can do her own glamours,” he said. “Plus, she listens to me. Right, Dropsy?”

  Her light swelled before dimming suddenly. And then she was simply gone, wrapped in an enchantment that blended her into her surroundings. She reappeared a moment later and looked back at me expectantly.

  “All right,” I sighed, hoping I wasn’t making a big mistake.

  Dropsy bounced as Bree-yark grasped her by the brass ring. I checked all my coat pockets, then slung my pack over a shoulder.

  Bree-yark had changed into a fur and leather outfit more befitting of Faerie, complete with a pouch that hung from a strap across his torso. He’d dispensed with shoes, baring his splayed goblin feet. For weapons he was carrying a sheathed blade along with a bow and quiver. Though he owned modern firearms, they were barred from Faerie, thanks to a powerful enchantment that surrounded the realm.

  “I still think you should’ve ditched the trench coat,” he said as he closed up the Hummer.

  “It’s part of my system.” I patted a loaded pocket. “Anyway, I don’t plan on being visible in Faerie.”

  He gave me a final dubious up and down before we set out toward the boulders, Dropsy swinging from his free hand.

  When we arrived, Bree-yark nosed around, still convinced the goblins had dug more tunnels than the city could fill. I went in search of the hole I’d entered by the last time only to find it plugged with cement. When I backtracked, Bree-yark was standing triumphantly over a slab of stone.

  “Find something?” I asked.

  He stamped the slab with his foot. “An escape hatch. When we build tunnel complexes, we always have a plan for in case the complex is overrun. A hidden
passage that shoots straight to the surface.”

  “So, what, we lift the slab?”

  “Can’t. It’s anchored from the inside.”

  I was readying my cane for a force invocation, but Bree-yark shook his head.

  “Behold goblin engineering,” he announced.

  He stepped from the slab and onto a round stone embedded in the ground. It must have been the top of a column, because the stone sunk until I heard something clunk. An instant later, the slab cannoned open to reveal a deep hole.

  The sight made the skin over my chest tighten.

  Bree-yark frowned. “You all right, Everson?”

  “Yeah, I just have this longstanding phobia of being underground. It’ll pass.”

  “Dropsy and I can lead. That way if you faint or something, you’ll land on me.”

  “That’s reassuring.”

  Bree-yark helped the lantern nestle into the top of his pouch until she was secure. He then started down handholds chiseled into stone. I waited until he’d descended about ten feet, Dropsy’s golden light swelling around him, before following. The movement would help, I told myself.

  “You clear?” Bree-yark’s barking voice echoed toward me.

  I checked to make sure my head was below ground before answering, “Yeah.”

  There was some kind of catch where he was, because the slab slammed closed, sending my heart into my throat. Dirt and grit showered over me, some ending up in my mouth. I spat and gathered myself before continuing down, Dropsy’s light guiding my holds. In the cooling air, I picked up a faint odor of rot.

  “I should warn you,” I panted. “The last time I was down here, I encountered some goblin bodies.” According to Bree-yark, the goblins who’d occupied Central Park had belonged to a warmongering tribe. If he’d been related to them, it was distantly, but I still wanted to spare him the shock.

  “They knew the risks,” he grunted.

  A few minutes later, I heard him land with a thud. I was soon standing beside him in a short corridor that appeared to dead-end. Bree-yark pawed along the wall until he encountered a small hole. He inserted a hand and struggled with something, the thick cords of his forearm bulging while breath steamed from his gritted teeth. At last, some mechanism yielded and the dead end slid away.