Night Rune (Prof Croft Book 8) by Brad Magnarella (best e reader for academics txt) 📕

“But how did Malphas get to him?” I lowered my voice, even though the Dutchmen were enchanted to think we were speaking Algonquin. “He’s one of the most powerful fae I’ve seen up close.”

“My husband had been acting odd, pensive. When I pressed him, he mentioned a dream he’d had about an inbound darkness, a dream that had clearly disturbed him, but he wouldn’t say more. He only grew more distant. Then one day he asked if I had been in contact with you. I hadn’t seen you in years, but I was spending more time in the city. Partly to keep my father company after he retired from City Hall. Still, I couldn’t understand why he would ask out of the blue like that. Until your letter arrived.”

She was referring to my appeal for help to access the time catch.

“It was as if my husband had been expecting you to send it,” she continued. “I noticed too that Osgood hadn’t delivered the letter directly to me.”

I took a break from paddling. “No?”

She shook her head. “But he left it where he knew I would find it. When I confronted Osgood, he admitted that Angelus had instructed him to intercept any correspondences intended for me. By this time, Osgood sensed something was off with Angelus too, and he began exploiting loopholes in his directives.”

That must have been how the fae butler was able to continue collaborating with Caroline.

“My husband was barricading himself behind loyalists,” she said, “holding meetings in secret. In your letter, you mentioned an infernal breach and demons infiltrating groups. That went a long way toward explaining Angelus’s behavior, why he was so intent on blocking contact between you and me.”

I snapped my icy fingers. “Back when Arnaud possessed me and locked me in his vault, he absorbed my thoughts—that was when you helped me at Columbus Park. Malphas would have had access to those same thoughts through his infernal bond to Arnaud. He would have known about our friendship. He clearly thought you were my one good chance to enter the time catch and disrupt his plans.”

“And when you did,” she said, “the repercussions came swiftly.”

“Placing Osgood under even stricter orders. Forcing you into hiding. Severing your lineal claims.”

“Murdering Crusspatch to keep you from returning,” she added.

But something was still gnawing at the back of my mind. “Why didn’t Angelus kill me in the Fae Wilds, then? I was helpless, trussed up, unable to cast. Malphas could have ended the threat of me going back right there.”

“Because I would have gone in your place.”

“And Angelus wanted me to lead him to you,” I said in immediate understanding. “End two threats in one fell stroke.”

Good thing I tossed the stone.

Plotting Malphas’s moves like this was helpful, but too much remained shrouded. He’d infiltrated the fae and placed Angelus under his service, but he also had a mystery demon in the time catches, not to mention some sort of works going on at the St. Martin’s site. Add to that the fact he knew we were here, but aside from a soulless mob that couldn’t shoot straight, he’d offered no real resistance. I revisited what Caroline had said about attacking us, not where we were, but where we were going to be.

“How many fae can we expect at St. Martin’s?” I asked.

“Angelus and his loyalists, certainly. So at least eight.”

Damn. “How about help from the good fae?”

“I tried,” she said wearily. “Believe me.”

“Not even Osgood?”

“He did what he could, but he’s dutybound to Angelus’s family.”

I was still curious how a fae as godlike as Osgood had become their servant, but now wasn’t the time. “Do they have any weaknesses? Anything we can exploit?”

Caroline rowed silently for several strokes, snowflakes gathering across her lashes. At last she blinked them away. “When Angelus and I wed, he closed the ceremony with a heart vow. I wasn’t expecting it—that wasn’t part of the arrangement—but he was determined to prove his commitment to me.”

“Wait, back up. What’s a ‘heart vow?’” Though I possessed a respectable understanding of the fae, many, if not most, of their customs remained veiled to outsiders.

“It’s a bond that only I can access, and it endures for life.”

“To his heart.”

“To his life force.”

Her troubled expression told me the rest. By pushing power through the bond, she could hit him where he was most vulnerable. Possibly to the point of destroying the possessing demon, but which could well destroy Angelus too.

“Does he have one to you?” I asked.

“I was given the choice, but I didn’t grant it.”

That gave her a big advantage, and a very grave decision to make.

We rowed in silence for several strokes, small waves slapping the side of the boat. Caroline had glamoured my cane into an ornamental stick, and I glanced down at it now. It held the means to banish demons, but my chances of getting the blade through a being as powerful as Angelus were next to nil.

“One more question,” I said.

Caroline looked over guardedly.

“What does the name Makkapitew really mean?”

She let out a surprised laugh. “Man with large teeth.”

“What? I don’t have—” I broke off. “Oh, no you didn’t.”

“I couldn’t think of any other names, and your glamour had to match.”

“You gave me buck teeth.”

Smirking, she dug her paddle into the water. I joined her, grateful to have drawn a smile. I couldn’t imagine her pain. Her husband turned against her by a demon. A husband who could be awaiting us at the St. Martin’s site. A husband she might have to kill. I exhaled an unsteady breath.

Right now, Seay.

31

Rowing with the current, we covered the miles quickly.

Before long, wooden palisades appeared on our left with a tower on its near corner. We were looking at New Amsterdam’s northern defenses, which would become Wall Street. The impressive defense ran along the shore—a church spire and a couple of windmills rising beyond—and ended where a large fort began on Manhattan’s southern tip. Further along, rows of gabled houses stood facing the