The Cold Kiss of Death

killed by the suckers, and everyone thought that was it.’ His voice was flat, almost detached. ‘But as time’s gone on we’ve all realised there’s more to the droch guidhe. Since it was cast, no full-blood child has been born to any of London’s lesser fae, only faelings, so not only do we have to watch our children die because they live only a mortal lifespan, but if our magic doesn’t procreate, it will start to fade. Once the magic fades it won’t be long before we all follow it.’

Fuck. Grianne hadn’t told me about that nasty bit of the curse, but—‘So what exactly has this got to do with me?’ I asked quietly.

‘There’ve been a lot of things tried to break the droch guidhe,’ he went on, his voice not sounding quite as detached, ‘but so far none have worked. The one thing no one has tried yet, because the queen has refused to allow it ... is for one of London’s fae to have a full-blood child with a sidhe,’ he finished quietly.

I blinked as my mind caught up with what he meant.

Grianne had told me the facts of sidhe life when I was fifteen, in more detail than I’d ever wanted to know. Outside of a fertility rite, I’d only ever get pregnant if I wanted to—no morning-after-the-night-before worries for me as Grace had enviously said when I’d told her once—and if I did nothing to influence the pregnancy, then any child I had would inherit only their father’s genes.

It’s a magical anomaly that always seems ‘difficult’ for humans to understand. But they’d proved it themselves—back in the eighties, when the witches’ right to be called human was challenged. Every DNA test known to man was done, and no matter that their fathers were sidhe, the tests showed nothing other than human genes in a witch’s make-up. All a witch’s sidhe father contributes—other than life, of course—is an ability with magic. It’s why a witch’s daughter—born of a witch mother and a non-magical human father—doesn’t inherit their mother’s power. It’s not there to be passed on.

And it was why the sidhe queen’s son had been human.

And by the sounds of it, it was why I’d landed on the dryads’ and the naiads’ Most Wanted list.

‘Whoa, wait a minute!’ I whispered in shocked disbelief. ‘Are you telling me they think they can get me to start popping out babies for them or something? Because it’s so not going to happen. Even if they kidnap me, they need my freely given consent for that, otherwise the magic doesn’t work.’

‘Unless the magic has already taken the decision for you, Gen,’ he said, an odd edginess to his voice, ‘which they think it has. Then your consent isn’t needed. It’s not even classed as rape under fae tradition.’

‘Listen, anyone who tries to have sex with me without my say-so, regardless of magic, or anything else, is in for a whole load of pain,’ I muttered furiously, casting furtive glances at the commuters around me. ‘And where the fuck do they get such a stupid idea from anyway?’

‘The fertility rite ritual.’ He sighed. ‘Hell’s thorns, Gen, I know it sounds stupid, but it’s not, not when you think about it from their side. As far as they know, you’re not in a relationship, you don’t date, not even humans, and you haven’t made any arrangements with any other fae. Usually the only reason a fae, particularly a sidhe, abstains from sex is when they’re preparing to bear a child, so when they hear about what’s going on, their first thought is that you’ve abstained for too long and the magic is making you react to any sexual advance you get, even without a proper fertility rite. They believe their way offers a solution to their reproduction problem, and your own.’

‘What,’ I snorted, ‘so kidnapping me to take part in a fertility rite and get me pregnant is just their way of being practical?’

‘Something like that,’ he muttered.

‘Damn! And I thought it was only humans that got all wound up about the sidhe sex myth thing!’

‘Yeah, well, the humans only think about the sex part, and not the reasons behind it. But for them, having children is kind of like falling off a log. For us it’s much more difficult, even without a droch guidhe to contend with.’ The words sounded bitter. ‘Anyway, Tavish has gone to talk to them and sort things out, but it might take a while for him to convince them, so you need to be careful. I’m not going to be able to get away from here until after midnight. If you can think of somewhere safe, then I’ll meet you there.’

‘I don’t know ...’ I glanced round and caught sight of a large poster for the HOPE clinic. ‘I’ll go to HOPE; they’re used to dealing with magic and stuff, so if anything happens it’s not going to faze them.’

‘Okay. Look, I’ve got to go, Gen. Helen’s agreed to let me go with them to speak to the florist’s boy. We’re going there now. See you later, and be careful.’

‘Sure,’ I agreed, but I was speaking to a dead phone.

I stood staring blindly at the passing crowds, my mind reeling. Crap! Not only were the vamps inviting me to be their nightly pep-me-up and the police playing hide and seek with me, now the fae wanted to chain me to the bedposts and pass me round as their pet broodmare. And why hadn’t Grianne filled me in on all the nasty details? She had to know about them ...

Then a thought hit me like a sucker-punch. If the dryads and the naiads wanted me for a baby-machine, did that mean the satyrs did too? And if they did, what exactly was Finn’s role here? Prospective daddy? Was that why he’d gone out on a limb with the witches so I could keep my job? And why he’d kept my secret? Maybe his white knight fixation was motivated by something other than overeager protective instincts and the attraction that jumped between us. In fact—Was there any attraction at all on his side, or was his magic just to ease the way for his herd to hear the patter of tiny cloven hooves?

The questions stabbed into me like sharp knives and I hugged myself against the pain. Was that all I meant to him? I looked at the phone; part of me wanted to call him back and ask, but what if the answer was yes? Bad enough that he kept pushing me away ... Then I took a deep breath and told myself not to be stupid. Finn had been pushing me away; in fact, he’d done nothing but reject me since I’d told him about my parentage, so if he was interested in the role of ‘prospective daddy’, he was going the wrong way about it. Oddly, the thought soothed the hurt inside me, although why it should I wasn’t sure—was being rejected for something I couldn’t change better than being wanted, albeit for the wrong reasons?—I shook the confusion off for more practical concerns. At least Finn had told me the details of the curse, which was more than Grianne had ... or Tavish. But Tavish was one of the wylde fae, not the lesser fae, so where did he fit in with all this? I groaned, part disgust, and part mental overload. Now I had no idea who I could trust.

And did the curse thing have anything to do with Tomas’ murder?

But if someone could convince a sidhe to commit murder, wouldn’t they be able to convince them to have sex? Although in Tomas’ case, they had sort of convinced a sidhe to do both at the same time; any sidhe would know that having full-on faerie sex with a human would result in the human’s death.

Damn. Never mind anything else—kidnapping dryads and scheming phoukas and tricky kelpies—finding the sidhe murderer was more important. Only other than my morning meet-up with the phouka, there wasn’t anything else I could think to do just now. I stared at the HOPE poster again. Grace was at HOPE. She really was a friend, and that was what I needed right now. I trusted her.

I slid open the phone and turned it round, taking a picture of the Glamoured blonde bimbo me, then texted Grace to say I was on my way. I dashed back down the escalators and slid onto a train just as the doors were closing.

I checked the carriage carefully, then settled back, scanning new passengers at each station. At Tottenham Court Road a grey baseball cap moving slowly towards me caught my eye, but the red cross embroidered on the cap meant the poodle-perm brunette wasn’t anyone to worry about kidnapping-wise. Poodle-perm was a Souler— the Underground is one of their favourite hunting grounds for new recruits; there’s nothing like having a captive audience.

A chorus of ‘No thanks’ preceded the Souler, but her smile stayed in place despite the rebuffs and her shoulders were military-straight under her long grey tabard, which was embroidered with its own large red cross. I looked down, hoping not to catch her eye, and saw my Glamour reflected in a pair of black wraparounds. My pulse sped up. Damn.

A Gatherer goblin.

The goblin’s long ski-slope nose twitched like a curious mouse. I looked around for an escape, but it was too late, the goblin had caught the scent of my magic; the Glamour couldn’t hide it. He nodded his head, grey pigtails brushing the shoulders of his navy boilersuit, and slid a knobbly finger down his nose in greeting. My stomach tightened into an anxious knot. What if the London Underground goblin workers had been told to look out for me? Would he give me away as soon as I’d acknowledged him?