Blood Spells

yourself to your leader, not fuck him over.”

She opened her mouth to answer, but nothing came out. What could she say? “I’m sorry” was far too weak, but it was all she could come up with.

“Maybe what the cards mean is that we need to reveal the shadows to each other.” To her surprise, the suggestion came from Brandt. To her further surprise, he stood and moved to her side, so they faced Strike together. “Whatever made the gods turn away from me, it can’t be good. That’s my shadow. Patience betrayed you, and in doing so, she violated the writs. That’s her shadow, and it’s partly mine too, because I alibied her.”

Strike’s expression sharpened over the ragged dismay. “That day in the hallway. You said you were looking for us, but Patience was coming the other way, from the suite. You were covering for her.”

Brandt nodded. “I haven’t always been there for her, but that time I managed it.”

“Strange time to come through,” Strike said flatly, “given that she’d just committed treason.”

Treason. The word slapped at Patience, carrying, as it did, a death sentence under the old laws.

But Brandt snorted. “You’ve played fast and loose with the rules from day one, and we’re living with the consequences. Don’t even try to pretend that Patience going through your sock drawer is on the same plane as you breaking the thirteenth prophecy.”

And there it was. She sucked in a breath at Brandt’s having the balls to throw down something that had previously gone unsaid, lurking among them as an undercurrent.

In taking Leah as his mate, Strike had broken the final prophecy leading to the end-time countdown.

And ever since then, the Nightkeepers’ luck had flat-out sucked. They had lost the skyroad and the three- question nahwal, and for every step they fought forward, it seemed that they lost the same amount somewhere else.

In a world ruled by destiny and the cycle of fate, the magi would’ve had to have been idiots not to think their bad luck was connected to Strike’s defying the last of the First Father’s prophecies. They weren’t idiots . . . but none of them had openly voiced the theory. Until now.

Strike bared his teeth. “Do you really want to go there?”

Brandt shook his head. “No. I want to use your fucking shrine so I can get my memory back and figure out how to fix whatever’s broken between me and the gods. We’ve got less than two days until the solstice, so we’re going to have to table some of the other stuff until after that.”

Patience had a feeling that was at least partly aimed at her, but she couldn’t argue the point.

Especially not when Brandt had stood up for her and redirected the brunt of Strike’s wrath onto himself.

And the king was furious. She didn’t think she’d ever seen him this angry before, not even after Rabbit accidentally torched a good chunk of the French Quarter. He was so furious that when Leah touched his arm, he actually snarled down at her, his eyes firing. “Not now, damn it.”

She glared back. “Yes, now, damn it. I know you’re pissed. You’re also worried about Jox, and feeling guilty about playing that one wrong. But like it or not, Brandt is right. We’re running out of time.” She nodded to Patience. “The shrine is yours. Do whatever you need to do.”

“Damn it, Leah!” Strike surged against her gentle hold, then subsided. “That room belongs to the jaguars,” he grated. “It’s ours.”

“It still will be when they’re done with it,” Leah said, but she didn’t sound like she totally believed what she was saying.

Patience swallowed a surge of misgivings. “The cards led me to the etznab spell,” she said softly.

“Let them give us the Triad mage we need.” Her heart cracked and bled a little, though, at the knowledge that this would be it—the last of the visions, and potentially the last thing Brandt would need from her in order to fulfill his destiny.

And after that? She didn’t know, damn it.

Strike nodded shortly, a muscle pulsing at the edge of his jawline beard. “Fine. Use the room. And you’d better hope this works.”

“Trust me, I do.” Because if it didn’t, they were screwed.

Without another word, she headed for the archway that led to the royal suite. Brandt stayed a half step behind her, as though covering her retreat. As they passed through the archway into the royal hall, with its plaster-and-beam mission-style decor, heavily carved sideboard, and ornate wooden doors, she tried not to think of how she’d crept along that hallway six months earlier. Stealing information from her king had been the lowest point for her; after that, she had fought her way out of depression. But that didn’t change the fact that she had betrayed two people she respected, teammates she needed to trust and have trust her in return.

Yeah. Like that was happening after this.

“Hold up,” Strike said from behind them.

Patience’s heart thudded sickly against her ribs as she stopped and turned. It helped that Brandt was right there, and that he was on her side in this matter, at least. But for all that Strike was a good guy, he was their king. And he had a temper.

He stood alone, framed in the archway with his arms crossed and a serious, intense look on his face.

She lifted her chin. “Yes?”

“I did what I thought was best. I still think it was—and is—best to have your sons away from all this, so they’re safe and you two can focus on your own magic.” He paused. “But at the same time . . .

I’m sorry I broke up your family.” His tone suggested that he wasn’t just talking about the boys and the winikin . He was talking about her and Brandt too.

Her throat closed, locking on a choked-back sob. Having the king talk about their family like it was over and done with made the possibility far too real.

Worse, Brandt didn’t say anything. He just stood there beside her, there for her, but not there for her, just as he had been for so long.

Swallowing hard, she said, “I’m sorry I broke into your suite. If it helps any, that was what made me turn things around, realizing that I had become a sneak, a liar, and a thief. I’ve been working on it since then. And you were right. . . . The boys are safer where they are. I’m sorry it took me so long to believe that.”

He didn’t say anything else. He just nodded and turned away.

Taking a deep breath, telling herself to stay focused, she turned back and reached for the doorknob of the normal-sized door inset into the larger, carved panels that opened into the royal suite. She glanced at Brandt. “You ready?”

He met her eyes. “Does it matter?”

“No,” she said softly. “I guess it doesn’t.” Ready or not, they needed to connect him to the Triad magic.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Brandt followed Patience inside the royal shrine, which was the size of a large closet, and had gas-

powered incense-burning torches at the corners and a large chac-mool altar taking up the wall opposite the door. Above the altar hung a highly polished obsidian disk that reflected their images from the minute they entered the room and shut the door. A woven footprint mat took up the small floor space, and a laptop was tucked in the corner.

She followed his eyes to the computer, and grimaced. “Yeah. Looks like the same one.” She waited for a three count, as if to say “I’ll tell you if you ask.” He didn’t, though, and on the count of four she exhaled and nodded. Palming her knife, she faced the altar. “Okay. Let’s do this.”

He stared at the laptop a moment longer, wanting to know whether she had found out anything about where Woody and the boys were hiding, yet unable to ask, just as he couldn’t reach out to her the way he wanted to, or be the man he’d been before, the one he’d rediscovered in El Rey.

He knew he was hurting her. And he couldn’t fucking stop doing it.