With a Golden Sword (DFZ Changeling Book 2), page 14
The fairies both nodded as if this were a very good plan indeed, but Lola couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“Why are you all acting like this is okay? Valente’s planning to die for something that might not even matter anymore!”
“It matters very much,” the queen objected, flashing a dazzling smile at Simon. “Just because your brilliant mage has found a way to sabotage the Hero’s Army is no guarantee that Victor himself will perish. Throwing Orlando at him is the perfect solution. Even with our unfortunate new bane for blood magic, Alberich’s Red Knight is a killing machine who feels no pain. He’ll rip Victor apart before the old fool’s magic can shatter his gossamer.”
“But at what cost?” Lola demanded. “Your plan was to use Victor to weaken Alberich, but there’s no way he’s sending the Rider into that fight without his head. That’s why we have to steal it before he faces Orlando. If we don’t, the Black Rider’s done for!”
She’d thought that much was obvious, but the rest of the room was looking away from her, leaving Lola with a sinking feeling.
“You don’t care,” she said, stepping back. “You don’t care if he dies!”
“It’s not that we don’t care,” Morgan said. “It’s just that this way is better.”
“How is him dying better?”
“Because he’s already doomed,” the queen snapped. “Knights are tied to their monarchs unto death. Even if you did manage to save his head, there’s no future for him without Victor. He’ll just diminish like Tristan did without me, only much faster since he was never a true fairy to begin with. Putting him out of his misery is the kindest option, and this way he gets the satisfaction of taking Victor down with him.”
“It really is for the best,” Tristan told her gently. “The Rider’s story has always been a tragedy. Giving his life to defeat a tyrant is a far better ending than any of us thought he’d get. It was his idea to do this, wasn’t it?”
Lola nodded glumly, and Tristan nodded back as if that settled things. “Then let him have his victory. Let him die a hero so he won’t have to die a—”
“No!” Lola shouted, stabbing her finger at Simon. “If he’s got a kill switch on the Hero’s Army, then there’s no reason for the Rider to fight. I wasn’t going to let him die even if it would kill Victor. I’m definitely not letting him do it for nothing.”
“It’s not for nothing,” the queen insisted. “The Rider’s sacrifice is a critical move that will ensure—”
“He’s not a chess piece for you to move around!” Lola yelled. “He’s a person!”
“Who is doomed,” Tristan reminded her, but Lola wasn’t having it.
“You think I don’t know what that feels like?” she cried. “I was Victor’s monster too. I know exactly how hopeless it is to think you’ve got no future without him. That your only choices are to die alone or be his slave forever. But the Rider didn’t abandon me when I was turning into Fenrir, and I’m not going to abandon him now. I don’t care if it’s his decision. You can’t make real choices under Victor because with him it’s always ‘serve or die,’ but I found a way out. I have to believe the Rider can, too, because apparently no one else here is willing to give him a chance.”
Tristan sighed. “Lola-cat—”
“Don’t ‘Lola-cat’ me,” she snapped. “You act like you’re some all-knowing God of Knighthood, but even you were impressed when I told you how the Rider dodged his oaths to avoid killing me. You know he’s not a bad person, so don’t stand there and act like the Rider killing himself is some kind of noble victory because that’s what’s convenient for your queen.”
The fairy looked horribly affronted, but Lola didn’t care. She didn’t even care if Victor lived or died at this point. Her only concern was getting her people out of his blast radius. Simon sounded like he was already covered, and while Lola didn’t know how she was going to save the Rider yet, she was determined to keep trying even if she had to do it alone. Valente had done no less for her.
With that, Lola took matters into her own hands, turning her back on the others as she marched back into the guest room and slammed the door.
~~~
“Don’t follow her.”
Simon hadn’t even started to move yet when the queen spoke, but that didn’t mean he did as he was ordered.
“I owe it to her,” he said as he walked toward the door Lola had just slammed. “I’m the one who got her hopes up and then brought the wrong head.”
“You do yourself a disservice,” the beautiful fairy replied, moving in a swirl of flowers to block his path. “You’re good at hiding it, but I’m the Queen of Desire. I know what you want, and I know how you get it. Victor’s Black Knight is as good as dead, which means all you have to do is be patient. The changeling will forget about him soon enough, and then it will be your turn.”
“I’m not doing this to get my turn,” Simon told her in a disgusted voice. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to Lola before she does something crazy without my help.”
The queen rolled her eyes, but Tristan looked impressed, which made her roll them even harder.
“Have it your way,” Morgan said as she carried the sheep’s head out of the room. “I must see to Lamb. Don’t let him do anything that might endanger our plans, knight.”
“Yes, my queen,” Tristan said, wrapping an arm around Simon’s shoulders. But instead of marching him back into the strange hallway full of doors, the fairy waited until his queen was out of sight before steering Simon straight toward Lola’s door.
“What are you doing?”
“What I want,” Tristan replied with a dazzling smile. “Contrary to what Victor may have led you to believe, a knight is not a slave. I respect my queen and obey her orders, but that doesn’t mean I have to agree with everything that comes out of her mouth.”
Simon arched an eyebrow. “But didn’t she just specifically tell you not to do this?”
“She ordered me not to let you endanger our plans,” the knight said. “And I don’t intend to, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t touched by your noble act.”
“My noble act?”
“How you rushed to Lola’s aid despite the fact that it would mean helping your rival,” the fairy explained, pulling Simon closer as he lowered his voice. “My queen is very powerful, but she’s only interested in desire. True love, the sort where you place another’s happiness above your own, is too bitter for her palate.”
“But not for yours?”
“I find it the most delicious thing in the world,” Tristan purred, leaning in until his lips were a hair’s breadth from Simon’s ear. “I didn’t become a knight because I enjoy taking orders. A fairy’s life is too long to live without purpose, and I decided centuries ago that my purpose was to be a champion. Normally, that means serving my queen. Right now, though, I’m championing you.”
Simon pushed him away with a huff. “I don’t need a champion.”
The fairy gave him a knowing smile. “Don’t you? The changeling’s heart is not easily won. Believe me, I’ve tried. But you seem a good sort of man for a blood mage, and she obviously cares for you very much, so I think you’ll do nicely.”
Simon was about to point out this wasn’t something Tristan got a say in when the knight slapped him on the shoulder.
“Go to her!” he commanded. “Be her knight! Help her feel she did all she could, and maybe when this is over, I’ll no longer have to taste sadness in her dreams.”
“You shouldn’t be eating her dreams at all,” Simon said. “But… thank you. You know, for not kicking me out.”
“What are co-conspirators for?” the fairy replied with a wink. Then his face grew serious. “Just make sure you don’t shake things up too badly. If the blood mage ends up surviving this because I distracted you with a girl, the queen will have my head.”
“Don’t worry,” Simon told him darkly. “Victor’s not going to survive.”
“Then we have nothing to worry about,” Tristan said, giving him one last slap on the back. “Good luck!”
The words were still hanging in the air when the fairy vanished like sea spray, leaving Simon standing alone in front of Lola’s door.
Chapter 10
Lola burst into her room like a misfiring bomb. The door slam startled Buster so badly that he fell off the bed. He ran behind the chair next, meowing angrily at Lola as she began violently pacing the room.
A plan. She needed a plan. A fast one, because she’d wasted too much time already. Alberich’s Hunt could arrive any time now, but what was she going to do? Her best idea to sneak out of the barrow had already tanked, and she didn’t think the Rider’s loophole extended to looking the other way while she ransacked all of Hero’s Tower, assuming Valente’s head was even there. She was sure Victor would keep it close, but that could still mean any number of—
Her whirling thoughts were interrupted by the click of the doorknob, and Lola’s hands balled into fists. “Go away, Tristan.”
“It’s not Tristan.”
She glanced up at the sound of Simon’s voice, and her face split into a beaming smile. “You stayed!”
“You didn’t think I was letting you do this alone, did you?” he asked with a smile of his own before turning to stare at the woman on the bed. “Is that your sister?”
“That’s her,” Lola said proudly. “I’ve been trying to wake her up since the Fenrir disaster, but as you can see…”
She trailed off with a shrug, and Simon’s face fell into a thoughtful scowl. “Have you tried—”
“Yes, Simon,” Lola said with a frustrated huff. “If it exists, I’ve tried it, but nothing works.” She flopped into the chair Buster was still cowering under. “Apparently, I’m garbage at rescuing people.”
“It’s never as easy as the movies make it seem,” he told her gently, taking his own seat on the foot of her sister’s bed. “They always show you the last-second save, but you never get to see what comes after, like how many people end up in traction because Superman got thrown through their building.”
“Now I remember why I stopped watching movies with you,” Lola groused, then she smiled again. “But I am very happy you’re here.”
“I’m just sorry I messed up,” Simon said guiltily. “We wouldn’t be in this situation if I’d gotten the right head.”
“You did more than I could,” Lola assured him. “But we have to keep trying. Whatever the fairies say, the Rider’s one of us. I know you don’t like him, but—”
“It was never him that I disliked,” Simon said. “I thought he was an extension of Victor, a mindless puppet. It never occurred to me that there was a person under that helmet until I saw how he acted around you.”
“He is a person,” Lola said with a warm smile. “A good one who doesn’t deserve this. Tristan always acts like the Rider’s situation is his own fault because he’s the one who swore the knighthood oaths, but we both know how Victor puts you in a corner.”
“I know,” Simon said, his eyes getting that haunted look that she’d seen inside his death. “So, what’s our plan?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Lola admitted, slumping down in her chair. “But it’s going to have to be something crazy. The Rider’s still under orders to kill me, and he can trace my gossamer anywhere I go. He also doesn’t know where his head is. It was the first thing I asked about.”
“And you believed him?”
Lola gave him a scathing look.
“I had to ask,” Simon said, putting up his hands. “Just because he’s not Victor’s mindless puppet doesn’t mean he’s free to tell us the truth. For all we know, Victor ordered the Rider to tell you about his head so you’d go looking for it and fall back into his clutches.”
Lola froze. She hadn’t even considered that possibility, which was stupid because it was exactly the sort of trap their master would lay. A few moments later, though, she decided it didn’t matter.
“Even if it was a lie, that doesn’t change anything,” she said fiercely. “Head or no head, I’m not leaving him in Victor’s clutches.”
Simon chuckled. “I knew you’d say that.” Then his face grew grim again. “I just wish I knew how we were going to do it. If we were looking for anything other than a fairy head, I could do a tracking spell, but the Rider’s almost as resistant to human magic as you are.”
“But not immune,” Lola said, thinking back to their fight with the Paladins. “I think I’ve got an idea, but we’ll have to get inside Hero’s Tower to pull it off.”
“Why the tower?”
“Because Alberich’s Hunt could arrive any time now,” she explained. “Victor knows the Rider can’t fight Orlando without his head, so I bet he’s keeping it close. You know what a coward he is with his own life.”
“Makes sense,” Simon said. “The tower’s a big place, though, and Victor had the city build it custom just for him. It’s got secret rooms all over.”
“I’m sure I can find it if I get close,” Lola said, tapping her nose. “The Rider’s magic has a very distinctive smell.”
“So long as you don’t need me to help you search,” Simon said with a sigh. “I’ve still got a thousand more pills to make before Alberich arrives.”
“All you have to do is sneak me in past Victor’s legions of followers,” Lola assured him. “Once I don’t have to worry about getting melted by some wannabe blood mage who can’t tolerate fairy illusions, I can handle the searching on my own.”
“Okay, but how am I sneaking you in?” he asked. “I’ve got clearance, but even if he’s found a way not to kill you on sight, I doubt the Rider will be able to ignore you waltzing into Victor’s penthouse.”
“That’s exactly what I’m counting on,” Lola said, her face splitting into a grin as she told him the plan.
~~~
Thirty minutes later, Simon walked into Hero’s Tower carrying Buster’s cat crate. Victor had already informed his faithful that Simon was his apprentice, so none of the red-coated mages said a word as he marched through the elegant lobby and took the special elevator that went straight to the casting workshop.
It had been Victor’s personal workshop until just a few days ago, and it still had the look. Not only was it only one floor down from the Hero’s penthouse, everything inside the huge room still reeked of his blood despite the sterile laboratory aesthetic. Even the gleaming stainless-steel casting circles couldn’t hide the dirty, deathly feeling the place exuded like a smell, and the drains placed at discreet intervals in the cement floor definitely weren’t helping.
Having already worked here around the clock for the past three days, Simon walked through the horror-movie setting without a second look, placing the plastic cat carrier on the large steel table that served as his desk. Since this had been Victor’s private casting room, there were no security cameras inside, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t being watched. Case in point, Jamie stormed in barely half a minute later, her lovely face blotchy with terrified fury.
“Where have you been?” she demanded. “I’ve been looking for you for an hour! Why did you turn off the tracking on your phone, and what is that?”
“A cat,” Simon replied as he moved the plastic carrier away from Jamie’s accusing finger.
“I can see that,” she snapped, leaning down to glare at the plump animal cowering at the back of the cage. “But why do you have it? I thought you were allergic.”
“I am,” Simon said, pulling up his computer’s augmented reality field to look over the day’s assignments. “But it seems that, before she died, Lola paid for her cat’s boarding using my account. The vet wouldn’t stop calling me, so I took some personal time to pick him up.”
The blond didn’t look convinced, but Jamie had always put her own problems above everything else, and right now, she was clearly too freaked out to care.
“Whatever,” she said, pulling out her phone. “I need another batch of pills. The Hero’s speech brought in a bunch of new idiots last night, and I need to give them all a test dose to make sure the sudden surge of blood magic doesn’t pop their brains before Victor wakes up.”
Without looking away from his work, Simon reached into the sleek white cabinet behind him and pulled out a glass jar full of bright-red pills.
“That’s my entire supply,” he warned as Jamie grabbed it. “I won’t have any more finished for another hour.”
“You might want to work faster,” Jamie advised, tapping her manicured nails against the glass pill jar like a machine gun. “Our sources report the Wild Hunt left France late last night. I don’t know how long it takes nightmare horses to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, but—”
She cut off as the door behind them slammed open, and the Black Rider marched into the room. Jamie nearly dropped her pills at the sight. She snatched them back against her chest at once, scuttling out of the workshop without another word. The Rider waited until she was gone to approach the desk, slamming his gloved hands down right next to where the cat carrier was sitting.
“Can I help you?” Simon asked.
The Rider’s body tensed as he pulled his writing pad out of his jacket pocket. He grabbed one of Simon’s pens off the desk next, his gloved hands moving in angry jerks as he scribbled a note and shoved it in Simon’s face.
Why did you bring her here?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Simon said, leaning back in his chair.
Don’t lie to me, the Rider wrote furiously. I know Tristan already picked up Buster. The writing grew messy as his gloved hands began to shake. You know what he’s ordered me to do. Why would you bring her here to die?
Simon leaned forward with a smile, beckoning the Rider closer so he could whisper into his reflective helmet.
“A better question would be, ‘Why do you think that’s what I did?’”
The Rider jerked as Simon grabbed his notepad and tore off the incriminating page, crumpling it in his fist as he pushed off the desk to roll his chair out of the way. That was the only warning the Rider got before a grand piano made of lead fell out of thin air above his head, crushing him instantly.
“Why are you all acting like this is okay? Valente’s planning to die for something that might not even matter anymore!”
“It matters very much,” the queen objected, flashing a dazzling smile at Simon. “Just because your brilliant mage has found a way to sabotage the Hero’s Army is no guarantee that Victor himself will perish. Throwing Orlando at him is the perfect solution. Even with our unfortunate new bane for blood magic, Alberich’s Red Knight is a killing machine who feels no pain. He’ll rip Victor apart before the old fool’s magic can shatter his gossamer.”
“But at what cost?” Lola demanded. “Your plan was to use Victor to weaken Alberich, but there’s no way he’s sending the Rider into that fight without his head. That’s why we have to steal it before he faces Orlando. If we don’t, the Black Rider’s done for!”
She’d thought that much was obvious, but the rest of the room was looking away from her, leaving Lola with a sinking feeling.
“You don’t care,” she said, stepping back. “You don’t care if he dies!”
“It’s not that we don’t care,” Morgan said. “It’s just that this way is better.”
“How is him dying better?”
“Because he’s already doomed,” the queen snapped. “Knights are tied to their monarchs unto death. Even if you did manage to save his head, there’s no future for him without Victor. He’ll just diminish like Tristan did without me, only much faster since he was never a true fairy to begin with. Putting him out of his misery is the kindest option, and this way he gets the satisfaction of taking Victor down with him.”
“It really is for the best,” Tristan told her gently. “The Rider’s story has always been a tragedy. Giving his life to defeat a tyrant is a far better ending than any of us thought he’d get. It was his idea to do this, wasn’t it?”
Lola nodded glumly, and Tristan nodded back as if that settled things. “Then let him have his victory. Let him die a hero so he won’t have to die a—”
“No!” Lola shouted, stabbing her finger at Simon. “If he’s got a kill switch on the Hero’s Army, then there’s no reason for the Rider to fight. I wasn’t going to let him die even if it would kill Victor. I’m definitely not letting him do it for nothing.”
“It’s not for nothing,” the queen insisted. “The Rider’s sacrifice is a critical move that will ensure—”
“He’s not a chess piece for you to move around!” Lola yelled. “He’s a person!”
“Who is doomed,” Tristan reminded her, but Lola wasn’t having it.
“You think I don’t know what that feels like?” she cried. “I was Victor’s monster too. I know exactly how hopeless it is to think you’ve got no future without him. That your only choices are to die alone or be his slave forever. But the Rider didn’t abandon me when I was turning into Fenrir, and I’m not going to abandon him now. I don’t care if it’s his decision. You can’t make real choices under Victor because with him it’s always ‘serve or die,’ but I found a way out. I have to believe the Rider can, too, because apparently no one else here is willing to give him a chance.”
Tristan sighed. “Lola-cat—”
“Don’t ‘Lola-cat’ me,” she snapped. “You act like you’re some all-knowing God of Knighthood, but even you were impressed when I told you how the Rider dodged his oaths to avoid killing me. You know he’s not a bad person, so don’t stand there and act like the Rider killing himself is some kind of noble victory because that’s what’s convenient for your queen.”
The fairy looked horribly affronted, but Lola didn’t care. She didn’t even care if Victor lived or died at this point. Her only concern was getting her people out of his blast radius. Simon sounded like he was already covered, and while Lola didn’t know how she was going to save the Rider yet, she was determined to keep trying even if she had to do it alone. Valente had done no less for her.
With that, Lola took matters into her own hands, turning her back on the others as she marched back into the guest room and slammed the door.
~~~
“Don’t follow her.”
Simon hadn’t even started to move yet when the queen spoke, but that didn’t mean he did as he was ordered.
“I owe it to her,” he said as he walked toward the door Lola had just slammed. “I’m the one who got her hopes up and then brought the wrong head.”
“You do yourself a disservice,” the beautiful fairy replied, moving in a swirl of flowers to block his path. “You’re good at hiding it, but I’m the Queen of Desire. I know what you want, and I know how you get it. Victor’s Black Knight is as good as dead, which means all you have to do is be patient. The changeling will forget about him soon enough, and then it will be your turn.”
“I’m not doing this to get my turn,” Simon told her in a disgusted voice. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to Lola before she does something crazy without my help.”
The queen rolled her eyes, but Tristan looked impressed, which made her roll them even harder.
“Have it your way,” Morgan said as she carried the sheep’s head out of the room. “I must see to Lamb. Don’t let him do anything that might endanger our plans, knight.”
“Yes, my queen,” Tristan said, wrapping an arm around Simon’s shoulders. But instead of marching him back into the strange hallway full of doors, the fairy waited until his queen was out of sight before steering Simon straight toward Lola’s door.
“What are you doing?”
“What I want,” Tristan replied with a dazzling smile. “Contrary to what Victor may have led you to believe, a knight is not a slave. I respect my queen and obey her orders, but that doesn’t mean I have to agree with everything that comes out of her mouth.”
Simon arched an eyebrow. “But didn’t she just specifically tell you not to do this?”
“She ordered me not to let you endanger our plans,” the knight said. “And I don’t intend to, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t touched by your noble act.”
“My noble act?”
“How you rushed to Lola’s aid despite the fact that it would mean helping your rival,” the fairy explained, pulling Simon closer as he lowered his voice. “My queen is very powerful, but she’s only interested in desire. True love, the sort where you place another’s happiness above your own, is too bitter for her palate.”
“But not for yours?”
“I find it the most delicious thing in the world,” Tristan purred, leaning in until his lips were a hair’s breadth from Simon’s ear. “I didn’t become a knight because I enjoy taking orders. A fairy’s life is too long to live without purpose, and I decided centuries ago that my purpose was to be a champion. Normally, that means serving my queen. Right now, though, I’m championing you.”
Simon pushed him away with a huff. “I don’t need a champion.”
The fairy gave him a knowing smile. “Don’t you? The changeling’s heart is not easily won. Believe me, I’ve tried. But you seem a good sort of man for a blood mage, and she obviously cares for you very much, so I think you’ll do nicely.”
Simon was about to point out this wasn’t something Tristan got a say in when the knight slapped him on the shoulder.
“Go to her!” he commanded. “Be her knight! Help her feel she did all she could, and maybe when this is over, I’ll no longer have to taste sadness in her dreams.”
“You shouldn’t be eating her dreams at all,” Simon said. “But… thank you. You know, for not kicking me out.”
“What are co-conspirators for?” the fairy replied with a wink. Then his face grew serious. “Just make sure you don’t shake things up too badly. If the blood mage ends up surviving this because I distracted you with a girl, the queen will have my head.”
“Don’t worry,” Simon told him darkly. “Victor’s not going to survive.”
“Then we have nothing to worry about,” Tristan said, giving him one last slap on the back. “Good luck!”
The words were still hanging in the air when the fairy vanished like sea spray, leaving Simon standing alone in front of Lola’s door.
Chapter 10
Lola burst into her room like a misfiring bomb. The door slam startled Buster so badly that he fell off the bed. He ran behind the chair next, meowing angrily at Lola as she began violently pacing the room.
A plan. She needed a plan. A fast one, because she’d wasted too much time already. Alberich’s Hunt could arrive any time now, but what was she going to do? Her best idea to sneak out of the barrow had already tanked, and she didn’t think the Rider’s loophole extended to looking the other way while she ransacked all of Hero’s Tower, assuming Valente’s head was even there. She was sure Victor would keep it close, but that could still mean any number of—
Her whirling thoughts were interrupted by the click of the doorknob, and Lola’s hands balled into fists. “Go away, Tristan.”
“It’s not Tristan.”
She glanced up at the sound of Simon’s voice, and her face split into a beaming smile. “You stayed!”
“You didn’t think I was letting you do this alone, did you?” he asked with a smile of his own before turning to stare at the woman on the bed. “Is that your sister?”
“That’s her,” Lola said proudly. “I’ve been trying to wake her up since the Fenrir disaster, but as you can see…”
She trailed off with a shrug, and Simon’s face fell into a thoughtful scowl. “Have you tried—”
“Yes, Simon,” Lola said with a frustrated huff. “If it exists, I’ve tried it, but nothing works.” She flopped into the chair Buster was still cowering under. “Apparently, I’m garbage at rescuing people.”
“It’s never as easy as the movies make it seem,” he told her gently, taking his own seat on the foot of her sister’s bed. “They always show you the last-second save, but you never get to see what comes after, like how many people end up in traction because Superman got thrown through their building.”
“Now I remember why I stopped watching movies with you,” Lola groused, then she smiled again. “But I am very happy you’re here.”
“I’m just sorry I messed up,” Simon said guiltily. “We wouldn’t be in this situation if I’d gotten the right head.”
“You did more than I could,” Lola assured him. “But we have to keep trying. Whatever the fairies say, the Rider’s one of us. I know you don’t like him, but—”
“It was never him that I disliked,” Simon said. “I thought he was an extension of Victor, a mindless puppet. It never occurred to me that there was a person under that helmet until I saw how he acted around you.”
“He is a person,” Lola said with a warm smile. “A good one who doesn’t deserve this. Tristan always acts like the Rider’s situation is his own fault because he’s the one who swore the knighthood oaths, but we both know how Victor puts you in a corner.”
“I know,” Simon said, his eyes getting that haunted look that she’d seen inside his death. “So, what’s our plan?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Lola admitted, slumping down in her chair. “But it’s going to have to be something crazy. The Rider’s still under orders to kill me, and he can trace my gossamer anywhere I go. He also doesn’t know where his head is. It was the first thing I asked about.”
“And you believed him?”
Lola gave him a scathing look.
“I had to ask,” Simon said, putting up his hands. “Just because he’s not Victor’s mindless puppet doesn’t mean he’s free to tell us the truth. For all we know, Victor ordered the Rider to tell you about his head so you’d go looking for it and fall back into his clutches.”
Lola froze. She hadn’t even considered that possibility, which was stupid because it was exactly the sort of trap their master would lay. A few moments later, though, she decided it didn’t matter.
“Even if it was a lie, that doesn’t change anything,” she said fiercely. “Head or no head, I’m not leaving him in Victor’s clutches.”
Simon chuckled. “I knew you’d say that.” Then his face grew grim again. “I just wish I knew how we were going to do it. If we were looking for anything other than a fairy head, I could do a tracking spell, but the Rider’s almost as resistant to human magic as you are.”
“But not immune,” Lola said, thinking back to their fight with the Paladins. “I think I’ve got an idea, but we’ll have to get inside Hero’s Tower to pull it off.”
“Why the tower?”
“Because Alberich’s Hunt could arrive any time now,” she explained. “Victor knows the Rider can’t fight Orlando without his head, so I bet he’s keeping it close. You know what a coward he is with his own life.”
“Makes sense,” Simon said. “The tower’s a big place, though, and Victor had the city build it custom just for him. It’s got secret rooms all over.”
“I’m sure I can find it if I get close,” Lola said, tapping her nose. “The Rider’s magic has a very distinctive smell.”
“So long as you don’t need me to help you search,” Simon said with a sigh. “I’ve still got a thousand more pills to make before Alberich arrives.”
“All you have to do is sneak me in past Victor’s legions of followers,” Lola assured him. “Once I don’t have to worry about getting melted by some wannabe blood mage who can’t tolerate fairy illusions, I can handle the searching on my own.”
“Okay, but how am I sneaking you in?” he asked. “I’ve got clearance, but even if he’s found a way not to kill you on sight, I doubt the Rider will be able to ignore you waltzing into Victor’s penthouse.”
“That’s exactly what I’m counting on,” Lola said, her face splitting into a grin as she told him the plan.
~~~
Thirty minutes later, Simon walked into Hero’s Tower carrying Buster’s cat crate. Victor had already informed his faithful that Simon was his apprentice, so none of the red-coated mages said a word as he marched through the elegant lobby and took the special elevator that went straight to the casting workshop.
It had been Victor’s personal workshop until just a few days ago, and it still had the look. Not only was it only one floor down from the Hero’s penthouse, everything inside the huge room still reeked of his blood despite the sterile laboratory aesthetic. Even the gleaming stainless-steel casting circles couldn’t hide the dirty, deathly feeling the place exuded like a smell, and the drains placed at discreet intervals in the cement floor definitely weren’t helping.
Having already worked here around the clock for the past three days, Simon walked through the horror-movie setting without a second look, placing the plastic cat carrier on the large steel table that served as his desk. Since this had been Victor’s private casting room, there were no security cameras inside, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t being watched. Case in point, Jamie stormed in barely half a minute later, her lovely face blotchy with terrified fury.
“Where have you been?” she demanded. “I’ve been looking for you for an hour! Why did you turn off the tracking on your phone, and what is that?”
“A cat,” Simon replied as he moved the plastic carrier away from Jamie’s accusing finger.
“I can see that,” she snapped, leaning down to glare at the plump animal cowering at the back of the cage. “But why do you have it? I thought you were allergic.”
“I am,” Simon said, pulling up his computer’s augmented reality field to look over the day’s assignments. “But it seems that, before she died, Lola paid for her cat’s boarding using my account. The vet wouldn’t stop calling me, so I took some personal time to pick him up.”
The blond didn’t look convinced, but Jamie had always put her own problems above everything else, and right now, she was clearly too freaked out to care.
“Whatever,” she said, pulling out her phone. “I need another batch of pills. The Hero’s speech brought in a bunch of new idiots last night, and I need to give them all a test dose to make sure the sudden surge of blood magic doesn’t pop their brains before Victor wakes up.”
Without looking away from his work, Simon reached into the sleek white cabinet behind him and pulled out a glass jar full of bright-red pills.
“That’s my entire supply,” he warned as Jamie grabbed it. “I won’t have any more finished for another hour.”
“You might want to work faster,” Jamie advised, tapping her manicured nails against the glass pill jar like a machine gun. “Our sources report the Wild Hunt left France late last night. I don’t know how long it takes nightmare horses to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, but—”
She cut off as the door behind them slammed open, and the Black Rider marched into the room. Jamie nearly dropped her pills at the sight. She snatched them back against her chest at once, scuttling out of the workshop without another word. The Rider waited until she was gone to approach the desk, slamming his gloved hands down right next to where the cat carrier was sitting.
“Can I help you?” Simon asked.
The Rider’s body tensed as he pulled his writing pad out of his jacket pocket. He grabbed one of Simon’s pens off the desk next, his gloved hands moving in angry jerks as he scribbled a note and shoved it in Simon’s face.
Why did you bring her here?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Simon said, leaning back in his chair.
Don’t lie to me, the Rider wrote furiously. I know Tristan already picked up Buster. The writing grew messy as his gloved hands began to shake. You know what he’s ordered me to do. Why would you bring her here to die?
Simon leaned forward with a smile, beckoning the Rider closer so he could whisper into his reflective helmet.
“A better question would be, ‘Why do you think that’s what I did?’”
The Rider jerked as Simon grabbed his notepad and tore off the incriminating page, crumpling it in his fist as he pushed off the desk to roll his chair out of the way. That was the only warning the Rider got before a grand piano made of lead fell out of thin air above his head, crushing him instantly.
