Page 61 of Smoke & Ashes
“We need you here,” replied Tara. “They might attack while I’m away.”
Or you might not come back. Nobody wanted to say it, and nobody needed to.
The dowager rose to her feet. Slowly, but not stiffly. “Then I’ll come. And”—Tara was about to open her mouth but the old woman raised a hand to silence her which, unusually, she accepted—“before you tell me not to, you know this is how it must be. We are never at our strongest fighting alone, and for all the power thatthis one”—she eyed me suspiciously—“undoubtedly has in her veins she is not family. I would not have you risk anybody else on this fool’s errand but of us all I am by far the most expendable.”
That was—I wasn’t sure what that was. I still thought the old lady was evil, but I hadn’t been super wild about going back into faerie with little-to-no backup, and wolves did fight far more effectively in groups.
After a moment of consideration, Tara nodded. “You will come with us. And so will you.” This last comment was addressed to Flick. “Sofia might need somebody to watch out for her while we’re elsewhere, and I doubt you’d be happy leaving her in any case.”
Flick nodded vigorously.
“Then it’s decided. We leave at once—there will be no daylight in the Cold and Dark, but at least we can retreat if we become overwhelmed.”
On the one hand, it was good to know that Tara had her head firmly enough in the game that she’d thought about what we’d do if we wound up having to run the hell away. On the other hand, it wasn’t a great sign that running the hell away was so likely as an outcome. And “overwhelmed” was never a good phrase to be throwing around. It was a short step from there to “overrun” or “outclassed” and a tiny little hop from that to “just plain dead.”
Well, we did what we could with the cards we’d been dealt.
Tara arranged for a small convoy of cars—we wouldn’t quite all fit in one, and if we did manage to rescue four werewolves we wouldn’t be able to make the return trip in two either—which met us out front. From there it was an early morning drive through deceptively idyllic woodlands and picturesque country lanes. At least until we got into the outskirts of the city at which point it rapidly turned into warehouses and tower blocks.
We left the convoy, along with Flick and Sofia, in a carpark off the A502, which is exactly the kind of glamorous and sexy thing that you do when you’re a private investigator slash not-exactly-professional monster hunter slash faery princess. With a probably disproportionate sense of smugness, I also remembered to leave my phone in the car so that it wouldn’t get trashed diving into ponds. I’d had this handset a full fourteen months, and I wasn’t about to give up on it now. Then we tromped off onto the heath.
Although a lot of it is technically “ancient woodland”, Hampstead Heath isn’t exactly the depths of the Black Forest and it didn’t take us that long to hike the half mile up to the bridge with the portal to faerie. Honestly, it was almost disappointing, I mean I was fairly sure that going on a vital mission of mercy with a pair of werewolves from an ancient bloodline of mystical defenders of Albion shouldn’t have involved a short walk up a mostly paved road past a picnic area and a set of well-signposted public toilets.
We got to the pond, and I skirted the edges feeling for an entrance with whatever uncanny senses you used to feel for eerie portals to other realities. I caught it, a glimpse of deeper shadow against shadow in the arches under the red brick of the viaduct.
“There,” I pointed.
Tara and the dowager both nodded. They were probably even more used to spotting these sorts of things than I was—ancient sacred birthright and all that. Then they stripped. I’d kind have thought they might wait until we were in faerie proper to do that, what with this being a fairly popular tourist spot, but then again their clothes would be safer on this side of the gate and it’d be better for them to be able to go full wolf as soon as possible once we were through.
Fuck it. I dived in. They followed me, and the three of us swam towards the doorway. I clung to a naïve hope that nobody was filming this.
As we passed under the arch I saw nothing but brick, and with a grim sense of inevitability I realised that our path into the Cold and Dark almost certainly lay underwater. Because of course it did. Because faeries were arseholes. I held my breath and porpoised down. I couldn’t see a fucking inch. Pondwater in London was not famous for its crystal clarity. There were probably all sorts of unpleasant things in here, most of them beginning with words like “discarded” or “used”.
Navigating by instinct and what I vaguely remembered from my failed biology A-level was technically calledthermoception, I swam towards where the water was coldest. I was fast learning that my three least favourite activities were swimming in filthy, freezing water, swimming in clothes, and swimming in clothes through filthy, freezing water, with a broken arm.
I was beginning to doubt the advisability of this plan.
Walking into a faery realm is usually like plunging into an ice-cold lake, but since I’d already done that today I needed to find a new way to tell when I’d made it through to the other side. Turned out it was pretty obvious. I got this sick, rollercoaster feeling and down became up (graviception, my biology A-level informed me). My fingertips on my one good arm brushed something solid and frozen, and I saw faint bluish light filtering through what was unmistakably a thick sheet of ice between me and breathable air.
Fuck.
27
Ice & Beasts
Here lies Kate Kane. Should have seen this one coming. Beloved daughter, sorely missed.
Right. Fuck. Okay. Right. Get it together, Kate. You can deal with this. Fuck that is some thick ice. Do we turn around? We should probably turn around. Or maybe go get Sofia and see if the magic daylight thing works on foot-thick permafrost.
Shit, I was going to drown.
Yelena had come through here, which meant there must have been a way up. Except she didn’t need to breathe, which was quite a serious advantage given our present situation. Trying to keep my cool far harder than I had ever tried to keep anything, I inched along the underside of the ice feeling for any point of weakness. I was going numb in the extremities which somehow didn’t seem to be doing anything for the pain in my arm, which was only getting worse.
Although I always figured I’d die young, I thought I’d at least go out fighting something or fucking something. Not trapped in the cold and the dark and running out of breath way faster than was helpful. I doubted even my mother could get me out of this one, the ice was too thick to break through and it wasn’t like I’d be able to get a grip on it no matter how strong I was.
Tara appeared beside me, the dowager beside her. We shared quick looks of mutualhow-fucked-are-we-ness, but then she and her grandmother exchanged a few sharp glances and opaque gestures, and they moved quickly away from me, spreading out at sixty degrees from each other to cover the ice more efficiently. Hoping I’d read their strategy right, I set out in the direction neither of them had covered.
It didn’t help. I just found more ice and more water and no air or hope of escape.
