I blew out a frustrated breath.
The only time I’d ever felt like I could take care of myself, since I’d come to Dublin, was the night Mallucé had nearly killed me, and I’d eaten Unseelie to survive. Revolting as it was, Fae flesh bestowed a degree of Fae power upon the person eating it; made them superstrong, healed mortal wounds, even supposedly granted power in the black arts.
I’d felt like I finally had an edge that night and hadn’t needed anyone else to protect me. I’d been able to kick ass like all the other big bad men around me. I’d been Mallucé’s equal. I’d been nearly as deadly as Barrons himself, perhaps as deadly, just not as well trained. I’d finally felt like a force to be reckoned with, someone capable of demanding answers, of throwing my weight around, without the constant fear of getting hurt or killed.
It had been exhilarating. It had been freeing. But I couldn’t eat Unseelie every day. It had too many downsides. Not only did it temporarily cancel out all my sidhe-seer powers, and make me vulnerable to my own spear (the Hallow killed anything Fae, even if you’d only eaten it; I’d learned that from watching Mallucé rot) but I’d realized over the past week that eating Unseelie was addictive, and a single meal was enough to birth that addiction. Mallucé hadn’t been weak. The lure of Fae power was strong. I’d been dreaming about it at night. Carving off chunks of live Rhino-boy . . . chewing . . . swallowing . . . feeling their incredible dark half-life entering my body . . . electrifying my blood . . . changing me . . . making me invincible again . . .
I snapped out of my reverie to find a dainty sandwich perched at my mouth. A bit of flour from the bakery bread was on my lip.
I thrust the sandwich back on the tray, carried the snacks to the table, and arranged the spread invitingly, near flowered paper plates and napkins I’d picked up on my way back from the pastry shop.
Genteel southern Mac was shamed by my lack of china and silver.
Spear-toting Mac cared only that there might be leftovers and food should never be wasted. People were starving in third-world countries.
I glanced at my watch. If Jayne was a punctual man, he’d be here in three minutes, and I would put my plan into action. It was risky but necessary.
Last night—between nightmares in which I was chasing the Book and each time I got close to it, it morphed into, not the Beast, but Barrons—I’d lay awake, sorting through and discarding ideas until I’d struck upon one that had impressed even me with its cleverness.
The key to finding the Sinsar Dubh was tracking the most heinous crimes. Where chaos and brutality reigned, It would be found. At first, I’d decided to try to get my hands on a police radio, but the logistics of stealing one, and monitoring it 24/7, had defeated me.
What I needed, I’d realized, I already had.
Inspector Jayne.
Mom always told me not to put all my eggs in one basket, and that was exactly what I’d been doing with Barrons. Who had I cultivated as my backup plan? No one. I needed to diversify.
If I could persuade one of the Garda to call whenever they received a report of the type of crime that fit my parameters, I’d get an instant lead, without being tied to a radio. I could rush to the crime scene, hoping the Book was still close enough that I could sense it, and use my sidhe-seer senses to track it. Most of the tips would probably prove fruitless, but eventually, I was bound to get lucky, at least once.
Jayne was going to be my informant. One might wonder how I planned to achieve such a monumental twist on the usual police/civilian relationship. That was the brilliant part of my simple plan.
Of course, I had no idea what to do if I managed to actually locate the Sinsar Dubh. I couldn’t even get close to it, and if I managed to somehow, I’d seen what happened to people who touched it. Still, I had to hunt it. It was one of those things programmed into my genes along with my innate fear of Hunters, knee-jerk reactions to Hallows, and constant urge to run around warning people about the Fae, even though I knew I’d never be believed.
Today, I needed to be believed. Jayne wanted to know what was going on.
Today, I would show him.
The voice of my conscience protested thinly. I quashed it. Conscience wasn’t going to keep me alive.
I eyed the tray. My mouth watered. Those were no simple egg, tuna, or chicken salad sandwiches, those scrumptious little confections I’d worked so hard to make, and was now dying to eat. Dreaming of eating. Hungering for in a way I’d never hungered for human food.
Those wriggling little delicacies were Unseelie salad sandwiches.
And Jayne was about to get one great, big, eye-opening look at his city.
It went about as well as train wrecks do.
The inspector ate only two of my tiny sandwiches: the first because he hadn’t expected it to taste so awful; the second, I think, because he’d thought surely the first must have been a mistake.
By the time he’d swallowed the second one, he could see that the sandwiches were moving on his plate, and there’d been no chance of getting a third one into him. I wasn’t sure how long the effects of such a small amount of Unseelie would last, but I figured he had a day or two of it. I hadn’t told him about the superstrength, regenerative powers or skill in the black arts that resulted from eating Unseelie. Only I knew he was currently strong enough to crush me with a single blow.
My hands had trembled when I’d forced myself to flush the rest of the uneaten delicacies down the toilet before we’d left. I’d set two aside, in case of emergency. Halfway out the door I’d called my own bluff and gone back to flush those, too. I’d caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, white-faced with the strain of denying myself what I so badly wanted, the bliss of strength, safety from my countless enemies roaming the streets of Dublin, not to mention being able to hold my own with Barrons. I’d clung to the edge of the toilet, watching the chunks of meat swirl around in the porcelain-cradled whirlpool, until they’d disappeared.
We stood on the outskirts of the Temple Bar District, and I was exhausted.
I’d been with Jayne for seven long hours, and I didn’t like him any better now than before I’d fed him Unseelie, and forced him to see what was going on in his world.
He didn’t like me any better, either. In fact, I was pretty sure he was going to hate me for the rest of his life for what I’d made him confront tonight.
I’d drugged him, he’d insisted, shortly after I’d commenced our little monster-tour. Given him hallucinogens. He was going to have me arrested for trafficking in narcotics. He was going to have me kicked out of Ireland and sent home to prison.