Benedict growled, “I don’t much care for travel.”
Rule’s breath sucked in. Benedict was awake—and not screaming or howling at the severance of his mate bond. No, he was looking out through the bars. Rule spoke carefully. “I imagine your sweetheart would miss you.”
“Yeah.” Benedict sat up and smiled faintly at Rule. “We’re very close.”
Arjenie was alive—and close? Rule couldn’t see her, couldn’t see anything that suggested she was there. His view of the cavern wasn’t impeded. He didn’t have any sense he was being urged to look away from some spot. “You met Benedict’s sweetheart earlier today,” he told Lucas, who looked puzzled. “She’s shy.”
“A real wallflower around strangers,” Benedict said. “Hates drawing attention to herself.”
She was near the wall, Rule concluded.
“Of course,” Lucas murmured. “I remember her.”
“Brian,” Rule said, “do you have an idea of how long we were out?”
“Not so good at guessing time lately. Maybe an hour?”
Arjenie was here now. In about an hour, Lily would be coming … and wasn’t that a fine bit of irony? He’d wanted to spare her the worst of the danger, but she would walk right into the trap just as he had. If any of them were to get out of this, she had to be warned about Rethna—and those damned spiders. “Perhaps,” he said softly to Benedict, “your sweetheart and my nadia will console each other.”
Benedict nodded. “The sooner the better, I think.”
The rest were waking—stirring, looking around. José rolled up on one arm and looked at Rule. “Not what we had in mind.”
“No. Explanations—”
“Shh,” Brian said urgently. “He’s coming.”
Yes, Rule had noticed a new scent. He looked at Brian. “That smell—a bit like human, but not as meaty, a hint of cardamom. That’s how elves smell?”
“Shh.” Brian’s eyes were wide.
A tall elf sauntered into view a few feet back from the bars. His hair was the blue black of a raven’s wing, so shiny it was almost iridescent. It hung to his waist in back, but was arranged in elaborate braids on the sides. He wore a similar outfit to the others—red tunic, black trousers. He’d added a knee-length vest in gauzy black silk. His belt was black, too, as was the hilt of the knife protruding from the sheath on that belt. His boots were dark red. He liked jewelry. Rule saw two rubies in one ear, a diamond in the other, plus armbands and two pendants: a short one with a silver disc and a longer one with a large black stone.
He stood there with his head tipped to one side, studying them. “Which of you is the leader?” He spoke news-anchor English.
“I am,” Rule said.
“Has Brian told you who I am?”
“If you are Rethna, a lord of the sidhe, he has.”
The elf nodded. “I will speak only with you. The others are to remain silent at all times in my presence. If they do not, I will hurt you. You will speak only when I ask you a question. You will answer fully and truthfully. If you do not, I will hurt one of yours. Like this.” He pointed at Rule and clicked his tongue.
Every nerve in Rule’s body fired with agony. He convulsed, mouth agape, too stunned by pain even to scream. Pain ate his skin, his eyeballs, his genitals, and burned from inside as if he’d breathed it in.
It passed. Between one moment and the next, it passed. His chest shuddered in relief.
“Rule.” Benedict’s voice. Benedict’s hand on his shoulder. “Rule, can you talk?”
It wasn’t until he opened his eyes that he realized he’d closed them. He was shaky, weak, flat on the ground again … and unharmed, aside from his ribs. They disapproved of convulsions. Benedict hovered over him, worried. He managed to nod—then realized that Benedict had spoken, which that bastard had threatened to punish them for.
Rule pushed himself up on one elbow. The bastard was gone. He’d introduced himself, told them his damned rules, given Rule more pain than he’d ever felt outside of the Change … and left. “I’m okay. But something tells me Rethna and I are not going to get along.”
FORTY-FIVE
“GIN,” Cynna said, spreading her cards.
“Again?” Lily tossed her cards down, disgusted. She didn’t mind losing. She hated being useless, especially when she thought something had gone wrong.
She couldn’t call Rule and he couldn’t call her, not when he was a few hundred feet below ground. But nothing blocked the mate bond. She knew roughly where he was right now … and that he hadn’t moved for the last hour. He could be hurt or trapped … or, she admitted, he could be simply waiting for the right moment to make his move.
They were in Friar’s kitchen, where oceans of granite and islands of stainless steel floated on solid oak flooring. Cynna and Lily sat at the table; Cullen was sitting tailor-style in front of the open broom closet, staring at the floor.
Cynna had Found the secret door pretty fast. The house was lousy with doors, of course, but she could eliminate those on the upper floor, and one by one she’d removed those on the lower floor from the pattern she used to search, leaving only the one they wanted.
The broom closet held a mop, broom, and carpet sweeper suspended off the floor by grippers fixed to the wall. The opposite wall had shelves for cleaning supplies. The floor held a trapdoor.
It was snugly fitted, almost invisible, but close examination revealed a hairline crack outlining a tidy square in the polished oak flooring. As for how to open it—there were two switches on the plate just outside the closet. One turned on the light. The other activated the trapdoor … or so they thought. They couldn’t check because the damn thing was warded to hell and gone. Open it and they notified Friar they were on their way.
Unless it fried them instead. Cullen said it was a nasty piece of work, not like any ward he’d ever seen. He could neutralize it, sure, but doing that without tipping off its caster was a slow, tedious business.
Funny how Cullen always claimed to be impatient. He’d been sitting there for an hour studying the damn thing. Now and then he muttered something or sketched in the air with his finger. Then he went back to staring.
Cynna collected the cards and began shuffling. “You want to switch to poker?”
“I want—” Lily’s phone rang. It wasn’t Rule’s ring tone, but she lunged for her purse anyway. It might be Nettie with word about the Challenge, or maybe Rule had sent someone aboveground for some …
The caller ID had her frowning, puzzled. “Lily Yu here.”
“As if I wouldn’t know your sweet voice,” Cody Beck said. “Hope you don’t mind me calling so late. It’s important, verging on oh-my-God.”
Lily’s focus tightened instantly. “What’s up?”
He told her. When she disconnected, Cynna was frowning at her. “I didn’t catch all of that, but I gather you want me to Find something.”
“Yeah. Cody discovered a very odd purchase made by Friar’s hazardous waste disposal company. Two days ago, they bought fifteen pounds of RN40.”
“I don’t speak acronym.”
“It’s a high-grade plastic explosive, new to the market. Fifteen pounds is a lot. A single pound of the stuff, applied right, can take down an office building.”
Cynna’s eyes widened. “Isn’t stuff like that regulated? How could they get hold of that much?”
“It sure as hell isn’t something a hazardous waste company ought to be able to buy. I don’t know how they got it or how Cody found out—he didn’t give me details. You said you can Find something if you have a piece of it, right? Well, they’ve got a piece from the same block of RN40 that Friar bought. Cody’s bringing it here.”
“I can use that, sure,”