Blurb
Civil war is about to engulf the fae. The last time it happened, in 1666, it led
to The Great Fire of London. This time, the presence of a mysterious third
party promises disaster.
After saving the British Bureau for the Arcane from its enemies, Arlo Austin and his son Tayn are back. While they recovered in New Zealand, the Bureau has undergone huge changes, thanks to its new leader, Sylvia Kent. Having eliminated corruption, the Bureau is leaner, more efficient. It also lacks the experts needed to intervene in a civil war between the fae. The only person able to prevent the conflict is Arlo. He knows all the potential combatants. Except that he’s also the problem, he could be another source of corruption. It looks like the Bureau’s famous warrior compromised its neutrality in the past – and the consequences are dire. Especially when Tayn is drawn into the fae’s political machinations, on the opposite side.
Excerpt
1998
To a Dark Elf, stealth could be betrayed by sounds, smells and even the vibrations on an uncarpeted floor. Arlo heard the rhythmic whisper of cotton first, a clue to a lack of professionalism, not an assassin then. Loose clothes, made from the wrong fabric, betrayed the wearer instantly. It suggested the killer had combat experience but little else.
Next, Arlo registered the stink of stale sweat, musky and several days old. A man.
The woman sitting opposite him frowned. She went to speak but he hushed her, a
finger on narrow lips, reinforced by assertive eyes, the colour of his dark soul. He jerked a finger at the door to indicate a warning. She nodded, tense, wide-eyed.
Arlo stood up, listened as movement drew closer. Barefooted, he could feel the same rhythmic bounce on the wooden floorboards. He placed a hand on the knife in his belt. She’d taken exception to him wearing his sword around the house. He’d acquiesced; he would tolerate the loss of his best friend for a short while.
He could confront their uninvited guest in the kitchen but he’d lose the element of
surprise. Besides, he needed her to appreciate the danger she brought to their unlikely agreement. Let her see what danger looked like, up close.
Movement next door stilled. Their visitor had grown suspicious. Arlo gestured for her
to say something.
‘I’m getting hungry, what about you? Shall I make us dinner?’ Her eyes twinkled,
despite her anxiety. She could still joke, he admired that. The only cooking Aoife did was to cook someone’s goose when they annoyed her.
The comment was all their intruder needed. A large, powerful man, dressed in black
leggings and surcoat, brandished a sword as he burst into the sitting room. Not a bad blade either, though his grip was wrong, clearly not his weapon of choice. Then again, guns made too much noise; assassins needed be silent, even unprofessional ones. His flowing white hair gave him away too: a fae warrior, youthful enough to have never seen combat.
Arlo ducked under the clumsy swing of the blade, turning his momentum into a
forward roll, to lead his opponent away from his intended victim.
The bay window exploded, discharging shards of glass in all directions. Their noisy
interloper had been a distraction. Good strategy – he approved. It meant amending his plans but that hardly mattered. Capturing the man for an evening’s interrogation morphed into a game of musical blades. His might have been smaller but he’d prove size wasn’t everything where such weapons were concerned. The thought made him smile, an uncommon expression on Arlo Austin’s lips.
Up close and personal, the man reeked of sweat. They’d likely travelled a good distance to reach Aoife, all the way from the Brecon Beacons most likely. All that way, only to die a pointless and ignominious death. The other two attackers did their best to recover quickly from their dramatic entrance but it involved careful treatment of bodies and clothes. Smashing through a window looked good but broken glass could cut, slice and embed tiny slivers in tender places. He still had time to finish off the first guy. Like dancers, Arlo stayed close to the man, as they performed their deadly tango, low enough to avoid the blade but
dodging in when the opportunity arrived. He punched the guy in the balls, forcing him to double up, making it easier to open the man’s throat. Arlo had already turned to deal with the other two idiots as his first victim fell to the ground, to gurgle his life away.
Aoife, shielding herself behind an armchair, held a cushion defensively and screamed as her two suitors advanced. They did so awkwardly, bits of glass stubbornly trapped and limiting their movements. They really were amateurs. If he’d cared about such things, he might have felt guilty.
Arlo leapt over the sofa with the grace and speed of a gazelle. The nearest man,
another white-haired fae but with deep lines on his face that spoke of age and experience, turned and raised his sword. His grip was better. The other made a beeline for Aoife.
Grabbing a cushion, Arlo swung it with his left hand. His opponent batted it away with his sword. Big mistake. It opened him up and left him vulnerable. By the time he’d corrected the swing, Arlo was already in front of him – a headbutt unbalanced him. He jabbed his knife into his opponent’s side, twisted and yanked it out to open the wound. The man howled in pain, slumped to the floor and dropped his sword. Combat on the battleground taught you to improvise, to ignore distractions, such as men with cushions. Arlo shook his head in contempt. Not at the attackers, they were following orders. No, his scorn had only one
target: the man who’d sent them and didn’t care about the futility of their deaths.
Aoife shoved the armchair back and forth to keep her attacker’s sword out of range. He growled in frustration as he made another cardinal error. By concentrating so hard on trying to reach his target, he ignored the threat behind him. Snatching up the second man’s abandoned sword, Arlo skewered the last assassin. He collapsed over the armchair with a surprised grunt and died.
The other man moaned as blood oozed from his gaping wound. Arlo ambled over,
sword still in hand. It had a good balance, shame it had been wasted on such inexperienced idiots. Things had worked out well after all, though: he still had someone to interrogate. He kicked his victim in his injured side and the howl rose a couple of octaves.
‘Who sent you?’ He knew the answer but wanted it confirmed.
‘Fuck off!’
Kick.
‘Who sent you?’
‘Fuck off, Bureau Man.’
‘Oh, you know who I am?’
Silence. Pain was always good for loosening tongues.
Arlo knelt by the man’s side. He stank too. ‘You don’t have to die like this. Tell me. Save yourself a lot of pain.’
The man gazed up at him, blood loss making his gaze falter. ‘King Oberon.’
Arlo stood. ‘Thank you.’ He plunged the sword into the man’s heart, leaving it poking
out of his chest, like a cocktail stick in a sausage.
Aoife joined him, pale and trembling. ‘You said you wouldn’t kill him.’
‘No. I said he didn’t have to suffer a lengthy death. I made it quick.’
She sat heavily on the sofa, unable to take her eyes off the bodies. ‘They know where I am.’
Arlo nodded. Oberon had sent a handful of incompetents. A test, nothing more. To
clarify whether the Bureau was protecting Summer Court’s heir to the throne. Well, now he had his answer. Somewhere beyond the faded importance of the Summer Court’s Low Palace, the fourth member of the team would report back the bad news.
‘We need to leave.’ The woman’s voice was little more than a rasping, hesitant plea.
Princess Aoife could be a force of nature. In her courtly surroundings, many kept their distance, while others hovered nearby in the hope of winning her influence. Here, on her own and the target of assassins, she was a frightened woman all too aware of her own mortality. He’d seen a different side to her in the two weeks he’d been her protector. Before, he’d only ever known her as an icy beauty, distant and aloof. Danger had brought a keen thaw.
‘King Aodh will decide where you will be safe. It’s not my prerogative.’ Then, to remind her of the agreement negotiated with the Bureau: ‘I’m here to protect you, nothing more.’
There would be other attacks, incrementally increasing in threat until the point came
where Arlo would have to assess the risk to his own life. Oberon would sustain the pressure until things reached that point. He could wait; he didn’t care how many men would die in the process. He’d savour the moment of Arlo’s withdrawal, likely be there to witness it firsthand. He’d crow about it to his subjects; it would strengthen his arm in his negotiations to free his father from the cells in the depths of the Bailey. The additional benefit would be murdering the heir to the Summer Court, knowing they would be unlikely to respond. Aodh had no love for his daughter. In their case, blood was no longer thicker than water. She didn’t
represent enough of a reason to go to war. Oberon would use that to his advantage too. Turn Aodh into a coward.
Aoife’s scrutiny of Arlo intensified. He wondered if it was the idea of leaving her fate in the hands of her father. She wasn’t the sort of woman to allow men to dictate her life. Sure she’d gone too far down that road but he couldn’t help but admire her resilience. The fae had a word for it, czrul. It defined anyone who fought against an enemy knowing they could never win but kept fighting anyway. For a woman trapped in a court dominated by thoughtless and inconsiderate men, she’d turned into an indomitable force and that always earned his respect.
She sat upright, taking a couple of deep breaths to look like her nickname, the ice
maiden. When she spoke, her trembling voice betrayed the facade. ‘Aodh doesn’t care about me. He’ll leave me here, for Oberon to kill. Two birds with the same stone.’
Arlo’s cool appraisal angered her, eyes and nostrils flaring.
‘Don’t look at me like that. Aodh is aging and weak. I had to take the throne from him, before Oberon did the same thing. Because I failed, Oberon thinks he’s got a chance. He’s convinced the Bureau won’t interfere because it’s not their fight, not while negotiations for his father’s release are at such a critical point.’
She wasn’t wrong. He couldn’t agree with her though; such an admission wasn’t good for diplomacy. Not that Arlo Austin was a good diplomat. Far from it.
Aoife reached out, took his hand and smiled as she pulled him onto the sofa, next to
her. ‘I’m sure you have somewhere we can go. The two of us.’
He freed himself from her clutches, the grip of a preying mantis. He didn’t say
anything. There was no need. He’d made his position clear the night before, when she’d made similar overtures. It had been why Q had chosen him to be her protector: he was beyond temptation.
Her gaze hardened. ‘We’re no different, Arlo. Stop pretending.’
‘I didn’t try to murder my father.’
‘That’s my point. If you’d been in my position, you’d have seen his weakness as a
danger. You’d act. I tried to do the same but, as a woman, I lacked the support.’
Arlo didn’t answer. This was not an argument he was sure he could win.
She edged closer, never taking her eyes off him. He couldn’t help but do the same. He marvelled at the way her dress clung to her slim body, like a second skin. He hadn’t understood why she’d worn it, given the cool air outside. The broken window let in that air and now her nipples reacted, pressing against the shimmering grey silk.
‘Aoife. Enough.’ His stare was equally intense. He had an urge to throw her back against the far end of the sofa, but he realised that’s what she wanted. It had been a long time since Namid and her attempts to make him love her back in British Columbia.
This was different. This wasn’t about love. Nothing like it. She was lonely.
Eamonn, Aoife’s husband, had given her two kids and fulfilled his duty. His attention
had found youthful destinations. It was another reason why she hated him. That, and her father now wanted Eamonn to lead the Summer Court, after his death.
Arlo reached out, placed his hands on shivering shoulders. ‘I have got one place in
mind.’
She smiled, chewed her lip, placed a hand on where her heart was supposed to be. It made the top of her dress gape, as she knew it would.
‘How will I ever thank you, Arlo?’
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Book 2 of The British Bureau for the Arcane: The Carolean Code
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