The rhythmic motions and the sound of the bristles on the stallion’s coat were soothing, and I’d continued long after what little dirt I’d found had been brushed away. The horse seemed to enjoy the attention, not minding Bis on his back making braids in his mane. The gargoyle’s wings were out for balance, clawed feet spread wide. His long, dexterous gray fingers were almost the same color as the horse’s mane. I’d caught him once at Ivy’s computer, and the kid could type as fast as a career secretary.
A howl three streets over brought Tulpa’s head up. Ears pricked, he nickered a warning. “Easy, Tulpa,” I soothed, smiling that the big animal had already claimed the small patch of grass as his own. “Trent will get you as soon as the ban is lifted.”
As if understanding, Tulpa nosed the bowl I’d brought the brush and hoof pick out in, both purchased at a local farm and feed store along with an ungodly expensive bale of sweet-smelling hay. It was a small spot of calm after a morning of chaos and fear, and I was reluctant to leave it.
“I don’t think he approves,” I said as Bis finished his braids.
“He likes it,” Bis said, his low voice both gravelly and high. “He told me.”
“Told you, eh?” I kidded him, and Bis flushed a dark black to blend in with the night. The grass was tickling my ankles, and I ran a hand down a leg, giving Tulpa a shove to shift his weight so I could lift it. The hoof was fine, and I set it down with a pat, running my fingers up his leg along the contour of the muscles. My thoughts wound back to seeing Trent pull his shirt off as he stood at the back of Ivy’s mom’s car. I slumped, imagining what it would be like to run my fingers over the lines in his back, feel the tension under them relax at my touch. Stop it, Rachel.
Lunch at Carew Tower had been both a pleasure and a trial—pleasure because not only had I gotten to eat a specially prepared meal, but I’d also embarrassed Trent with impunity, regaling Ms. Shelly with the humorous stories I’d collected over the last three months, and a trial because Trent was his expected Teflon self for the reporter, polite and proper even as his occasional embarrassed smile pegged my meter. That Cincy was falling apart under us didn’t help, slowly turning as we ate until we saw every smoldering fire, every closed bridge, every torn-up park and blocked roadway the Free Vampires were serving up in their effort to make the world a better place.
Sighing, I dropped the hoof pick into the bowl and gave Tulpa a push to head out to the graveyard. He had a few days’ feed there, and now I wouldn’t have to mow it. Jumoke already had plans for the piles he was leaving behind.
Bis moved to a nearby tombstone, and we watched Tulpa flick his ears and huff at the pixies arrowing to him. I hadn’t liked Trent’s noncommittal answer when I’d pressed him again about elven magic being stronger than demon. Sure, humans had been summoning and containing demons for centuries, but containment was not control. Those slave rings, though . . . They had been the ugliest things I’d ever touched.
A dim spot of gold edged in blue circled Tulpa, driving the rest away so the horse could stand and watch the fire-glow from Cincinnati in peace. It evolved into Jenks as the pixy darted to us, circling once before landing on a tall Queen Anne’s lace. “You look better,” I said as the plant swung and bobbed and slowly settled, and Jenks shrugged.
“I taped my wing but it still itches like hell,” he said sourly.
Bis rustled his wings, his red eyes blinking eerily in the dark. “Well, tell her,” he prompted, making me wonder what was up.
Jenks pulled his gaze from his kids tormenting Tulpa. “Bis,” he complained, unusually whiny. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does,” the cat-size gargoyle prompted.
“But it’s not her who I need to apologize to,” he said, and my thoughts darted to Jenks caught in Ayer’s lantern.
“Bis, we all get tagged sometimes,” I said, as uncomfortable as Jenks. “It happens. We work around it. No big deal.”
“That’s not what he needs to apologize for.” Bis shot Jenks another dark look. “It’s a big deal, and you need to say the words. To her. Now.”
Jeez Louise, I thought, pushing up from the monument I’d been leaning against and heading for the church. Something had gotten Bis’s knickers in a twist. “It can’t be that bad,” I prompted, trying to make light of it, whatever it was.
“Ah . . .” Jenks hesitated as he landed on a shoulder, and I started when Bis landed on my other one and bopped Jenks with the tip of his lionlike tail. “Okay! Okay!” Jenks protested, a thin slip of silver dust falling down my front. “I’m sorry for the way that I’ve been treating Trent,” he said, almost belligerent.
Trent? Confused, I looked at Bis, his ugly, pushed-in face inches from mine. He was leaning forward to see around me, his grimace clearly saying he was waiting for Jenks to say more. “Why are you apologizing to me?” I said, thinking that Jenks and Trent had a great relationship, then thinking I never thought I’d ever think that—not in a million years.
Bis cleared his throat, and Jenks’s wings tickled my neck. “Because it involves you,” the pixy said. “I misjudged him. I thought he was all talk, no action. Just a, ah, piece of pretty elf ass. And he is! But . . .”
I stepped over the low stone wall separating the graveyard from the backyard, being careful not to dislodge either of them. Piece of pretty elf ass? “But what?”
Jenks took to the air, hands on his hips as he glared at Bis. “Why don’t you go away?”
“Soon as you say it,” he shot back, his tail wrapping across my back and under my arm.
I stopped where I was, not wanting to go into the church and involve Ivy. Jenks fidgeted in midair, a dull spot of gold in the night. “Don’t say anything until I’m done, okay? Just hear me out.” I nodded, and he added, “Ah, he’s an okay backup.”
Ah-h-h-h . . . Finally it began to make sense. Trent had said he had my back, and Jenks told him it wasn’t his job. I took a breath to protest, holding it when Bis pinched my shoulder.
Jenks’s dust grayed. “He has some inabilities that might get you killed, sure,” he said, and Bis cleared his throat in warning, “but he’s doing okay.”
“Inabilities,” I prompted, glancing at the shadows moving in the kitchen. Ivy, probably, seeing as Nina was zonked out on Brimstone to keep Felix from taking her over.