Brush of Darkness (34 page)

“Why?” he muttered at Moira. “You aren’t as stupid as all that to choose an untrained child.” He paused in front of the Fae woman, her cold eyes glittering down at him. “What is
she to you?”

“Good question,” I slurred, my eyes growing heavy. “If she answers you, let me know. In the meantime, I’ve got places to go and people to do—so if you wouldn’t mind moving this along? Otherwise, I might just have to die of boredom to escape.”

“The Steward,” he snapped. “The Steward is always mortal. But to think she was grooming
you
for such a thing is laughable.”

“I get that a lot,” I retorted dryly. I knew a steward ran the day-to-day stuff for a king or queen, at least as far as medieval terminology went, but what would that have to do with me? Or Maurice, for that matter. “I don’t get it. I haven’t even been to Faery.” I paused, as it suddenly struck me. “TouchStones. The Steward is the Faery Queen’s TouchStone?” I snorted. “You don’t aim small, do you?” He stepped toward me and I hurried to change the subject.

“What about Brystion?” The words slipped out before I could stop them.

“What about him? I hadn’t realized he would prove so tenacious. But he did what he was supposed to—more or less.” He sneered at me. “You were merely a complication—and quite clearly an easy one to remedy.”

I blanched, remembering Brytion’s words to me on the dock. Hatred sparked to life in my chest.
This is a complication I don’t need, Abby.
Shamed at my idiocy, I turned away. He’d known all along . . . and yet I’d fallen for it.

“I’m sorry to interrupt, but if we don’t get this finished the paint will be wasted.” Topher slid up next to us with an apologetic simper.

“Very well.” Maurice stared down at me for a long moment and then shook his head. “I don’t think we’ll be getting anything out of this one. Let me know when it is done.” He shuffled out of the room, leaving Topher to
reclaim his seat.

“I trusted you,” I said softly, hoping I might be able to convince him to let me go. “We all did.”

Topher’s hands stilled for a moment. “I know. And I also know that it doesn’t matter what I tell you right now, but I do have my reasons for it.” He slopped another slimy trail across my cheek, chewing on his tongue as he concentrated. He bound my wrists tighter this time, draping a sheet over my prone form.

“Why? Why are you doing this?” My gaze flicked to Sonja. “You were her TouchStone. How could you do that to her?”

He studied his hands. “I can’t paint anymore,” he said finally, putting the brush down. The handle struck the edge of the table with a ring of finality. Sighing, he picked up a rag and started tying it over my face, covering my eyes. “So they don’t get damaged,” he explained.

Damaged from what? Fear swept over me.

Keep him talking, Abby . . .

Trying to keep the tremble from my voice, I turned my head toward him casually. “Brystion said you couldn’t paint,” I agreed. “Looks like he was right.” The hot stink of Topher’s breath brushed against my ear as he tightened the rag.

“Watch yourself.” The lilt in his voice became dangerous and feral. I’d touched a nerve. “But as to why I’m doing this?” A sad chuckle escaped him and in my blindfolded state it was like I could hear every rattled nuance of it, from the way it guttered in his mouth to the low vibrato in his chest. “I owe Maurice a debt.”

“Must be one hell of a debt.” I choked, hysteria threatening to bubble over. “What’d you do? Welch on a bet?”

“I had pancreatic cancer,” he said shortly. “He had the cure. A cure,” he corrected himself. There was the sound
of liquid sloshing, something grating on the floor. “And pay my debts, I have. The cost for my life was my talent.” His laughter was humorless. “I’m not sure how fair the trade was, honestly, but I am alive, so there is that. Tell me something, Ms. Sinclair—are you so ready to stare death in the face that you wouldn’t give up everything you had to jump at the chance of being able to live?”

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. The words were so close to what Brystion had said to me just a few hours ago. “Once I might have said yes,” I said slowly. “But to betray those I love to do it? I’d rather die.”

“And so you shall,” he said amiably. “Not right away, of course,” he assured me, patting my cheek. “In fact, I imagine it will take a rather long time, most likely through starvation. I doubt you’ll last as long as Sonja though.” I heard the smug pride in the words, and I fought back the urge to vomit.

“Are you going to capture Melanie now?” My lips moved numbly, trying not to babble.

“No point. Last night was a clusterfuck of rather epic proportions, due in no small part to
you
. But no matter,” he said. There was a note of doubt rippling beneath the cocky tone of his words. “Her violin was really all we needed, wasn’t it? I’m sure she won’t last too long after we destroy it.”

“But why capture any of us at all? Maurice already had Moira.”

He looked at me as though I was daft. “Control,” he answered softly. “What better way to make sure Robert behaved himself than to capture you and Charlie? Or to try to bribe his way into the Faery Court?”

In answer I lashed out with my feet, wriggling like a worm on the sidewalk, burning with the need to smash his face in.

“Now, now,” he admonished. “Are you ready? This won’t
hurt a bit. Or maybe it will, but in either case, I’m sure I don’t care. You’re the last of them and as soon as you’re finished I’m out of here and heading for a beach somewhere. Fuck the lot of you.”

“Talentless hack,” I spat.

“It’s true now, but then at least I’ll be alive. Off you go.” His fingers dug into my hip and my shoulder, heaving my body with a slight grunt.

I was falling. In a matter of seconds, I was unable to see, everything felt like it was moving in slow motion. The sweat of my fear stung the cut on my head, my eyes burned with rage and unshed tears, and a wretchedness of shame at my own stupid ignorance.

I didn’t have time to think on it. I plunged into something cold and fluid. It wasn’t quite water and it smelled a bit like the succubus blood on the paintbrush, but more elastic. Instinctively I kicked, flailed, and my mouth clenched tight. Topher gripped my head and held it beneath the surface. To breathe was death; my heart lurched painfully against my ribs. I could hear him shouting something, but it was all a fog as my senses dulled, faded. Liquid poured in through my nose and mouth.

Air!
My body was screaming for it, but there wasn’t any, and still the artist pushed me down. Then I was sinking, everything fading into black. Something battered at the edges of my consciousness, images of Brystion and his gleaming golden eyes filling my senses, and my heart shattered.

N
othing but darkness, cold and velvet black. It was quiet and comforting; my mind felt sluggish as I curled around myself like some kind of fetus, cradled in the dark womb of the ocean. My lungs stung with each shallow breath full of burning pain. It was easier to just lie here in that strange torpor. Something niggled in the back of my mind. Something I needed to do. Someone I needed to save? I closed my eyes and drifted away, rocked to sleep in the shelter of the cool waves.

Abby.

I rolled over, brushing the seaweed from my face.

Abby.

The voice was getting persistent. Who was it? I was sure I knew. My eyes fluttered open. Everything was as it should be. Cool. Blue. Softly lit. Protective and safe. I closed my eyes again, nestling into the soft scales of my tail, and gently told the voice to hush. I was a mermaid, like I’d always been. I rolled back into the welcoming shadows.

Abby.

The voice nudged me again. I stretched, ignoring the way it still hurt to breathe. I didn’t know how much time had passed in the darkness. A haziness wafted over me as I swayed back and forth, weightless and quiet.

Wake up, Abby.

The voice was softer now, pleading and desperate. What was I supposed to do? It hovered on the edge of my memory, dangling like a worm on a hook.

You seem to be doing an awful lot of sleeping considering you’re a mermaid. Maybe Topher should have painted you as a sloth,
the voice muttered dryly in my mind. It was delicate and feminine and vaguely sarcastic, but there was a brittleness to it.

Who are you?
I thought back, not pondering on the ridiculousness of having a silent conversation with myself.

There was a pause.
Sonja.

“I don’t know any Sonja,” I retorted aloud.

For someone who’s sleeping with my brother, you’re not very bright. And to be perfectly honest, I don’t care if you know me or not. But we need you, Abby, so please wake the fuck up.

“Brother? What brother?” Everything was jumbled. And then I froze. “Brystion?”

Bingo! No, wait, Abby—don’t do that!

Too late. The memories came pouring in, my blood suddenly churning, as I pushed through the membrane of the blue pearl encapsulating me, feeling its slimy walls reclosing in my wake. I glanced up, up, up . . . so far up as to see the rolling of the breakers and the shadow of a ship. Up, up, up. My tail flicked, propelling me forward, my heart longing for the surface and the man that was surely waiting for me. My love, my—

I shrieked silent bubbles as the first grazing slide of teeth sliced into my arm. Ebony red blood billowed like falling
silk from the injured limb. I gazed at it incomprehensibly, and then twisted away as another cut of pain shredded the base of my tail. Sharks—great whites, hammerheads, tigers . . .

Nightmares.

My lips formed the word as my mind screamed at me to move, swim, do
something
. I couldn’t see anything in the blackness, couldn’t find anything but the pearl down below, welcoming me, winking its blue light like on the porch back home.

Hurry, hurry, hurry . . .

I kicked my fins, graceful even through the pain. Shadows everywhere, sharp and vicious, nothing but hungry mouths and gaping maws, silver-gray dorsals cutting through the water like living blades—coming for
me
. Those hideous dark eyes were dead and lifeless and utterly without mercy. Sobbing, I pressed onward, my hands scraping at nothing, pulling myself through the weighted thickness of the pearl.

It swallowed me up. I nestled at the bottom, staring as the shadows neared, circled, and then swept by. Safe.

Idiot.

“I didn’t know,” I said, my voice marred and hollow-sounding in the water. My arms folded around my shoulders, my mouth sucking numbly at the wound on my wrist. The blood tasted salty, foul.

I
tried
to tell you.
Sonja sounded weaker, more distant, than before.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I was babbling, my mouth running, running, running, trying to match the litany of thoughts in my head. Who was I apologizing to? Brystion’s face slipped past and I paused. Where was he? Was he starving? Lost? Waiting for me? I thought of the Heart of my Dreaming, pictured him standing there, outside a dark and dusty house. I shivered as he raised his head, eyes dull and lifeless,
as the sharks swam around me.

Betrayer.

The image washed away in a flush of anger.

“Where am I?” My brow furrowed as I wrapped my hands around my bleeding tail, trying to staunch the blood with some seaweed. It burned. I hissed with the sting, eyeing another cautious shadow as it floated by. Instinctively, I crouched away from it. Everything seemed so horribly familiar about this, like I’d been here forever, a mermaid enclosed in a blue pearl at the bottom of the sea. Waiting for . . . ships . . .

“Painting,” I breathed. “I’m in the motherfucking painting.”

Memories crashed down around me, the last few days flashing by—the incubus, the unicorn, the bookstore, Moira. I glanced around the pearl, fury and anguish racking through my chest. It wasn’t safety; it was a goddamned prison. I lashed out at it, watching as my fist punched through the filmy surface. Immediately, a shadow approached, not hurrying, merely watching. Waiting.

I waggled my fingers at it, pulling them back hastily as it sped toward me. Painting or not, I had
no
desire to find out what would happen if I actually lost limbs or bled to death here. I pushed back a strand of tangled hair in impatience.