Page 71 of Crown of the Fae King

“First, not enough room in the car. Maybe…hey, maybe you should leave two of your friends with us, so you can fit them in.”

He turned and looked his friends over, then shook his head. “Or maybe I’ll just put two in the boot.”

“Naw.” I shook my head. “Not possible now.”

“Aye? And why not?”

“You said you had a gun.”

He raised his hand to look at the fat stick in his hand. Confused, he danced around, searching the ground, while his friends scrambled back into the car and closed the doors, having noticed the danger closing in…

I learned a lot about Highland men that day, both contemporary and the 18thcentury kind. First and foremost, they liked to fight.

No. Maybe “like” was too mild.

These menenjoyedfighting like most women enjoyed trying on clothes. They smiled when they landed a blow. They smiled even bigger when someone hit back. It was like watching killer whales play with seals before they devoured them. But unlike those videos, I didn’t have to look away. When I thought about what those men had planned to do with whatever set of twins they got a hold of--and what fate I suspected they’d be in for--I figured the Orange Car Gang deserved every ounce of pain the team dished out.

And if they planned to go hunting twins again, they would be physically incapable for a long, long time.

29

Luck And Profiteroles

The next morning, looking around the breakfast table, I got a good inventory of the injuries sustained by the home team. There’d been no need to bring in Dr. McAvoy, but Wickham had a black eye, Kitchens worried at a loose tooth with his tongue, and Urban held an ice pack on his jaw when he wasn’t chewing. All their big fists were beaten and scratched. Alwyn and Irish twins had gotten in some blows themselves, but other than a few red knuckles, they showed no signs of wear and tear.

No one asked for one-on-one time with Hank.

Wickham could barely sit still while he shoveled food into his mouth like a starving man. It turned out he was just anxious to get to the war room where we could discuss business.

“Obviously, what happened last evening is dire news,” he said, once we were assembled before the maps. “O’Ryan is relying on more than just his dogs to find witches. But I’m encouraged by the fact we’re dealing with the dregs of society—mortals willing to sell other human beings. And though it isn’t a new concept by any means, they are easily thwarted.”

I waved a hand. “How?”

“By not going out in public in pairs. From this moment on, none of our twins are to be out of the house at the same time.” Before I could argue, he leaned toward me and held up his hand. “And I’ll find a way to alert as many witches—and other twins—as I can. There is an entire village of them on the Black Isle, and they’ll need to be separated. A small army, you might say, half of which would be free to go from city to city to warn others.”

Brian smiled. “Ye’re goin’ to play the Grandfather card, then.”

Wickham nodded. “I am going to play the Grandfather card.”

April in a collegetown was nothing new to me, though Oxford and Laramie had little in common. The perfume of spring hormones mixed with the fear of failing exams wasn’t just an imaginary thing, and I wondered if that was why God forced the bulb flowers to bloom in April—to cover up the smell.

Though…maybe the smell was stronger that year because some of it was coming from me.

When I thought of Griffon, I was heartbroken, worried I would never see him again. Since my luck had run out, I tempted my own bad luck. I stopped wearing makeup, hoping that might be enough to bring him back into my path. I’d imagined all kinds of reasons why he might have left Oxford completely and prayed he hadn’t gone home…to visit the wife and kids.

In the Bod, we found nothing at all about Moire with an e. Plenty of stuff on the Moira, the Greek version of her, and the later Greek version of the plural, Moirai. Usually, those referred to Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos, the chicks who measure out your life like a piece of thread, decide when it ends, then cut it. But those three also morphed into the Nine Fates.

We were only interested in the original, single individual. If we could locate the fairy version of Moire, who had named every living thing, maybe we could learn more about O’Ryan and his dogs.

The key phrase wasliving, and if she knew the fate of everylivingthing, that included fairies, whereas the Greek version seemed to suggest Moirai only knew the fates of humans, or mortals, and none of the immortals. Of course, that depended upon which book you referenced.

We’d been searching the libraries for well over a month and I was feeling entitled to my own degree in fairy studies, but that wasn’t offered, even at Oxford.

I stood in the stacks one morning, thumbing along the spines of Greek histories when someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned, but no one was there. “Persi?”

“Guess again.”

I spun around to face the deep voice and found Griffon smiling down at me. A blush flooded my face with heat.

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