“Silver charm?” Brigid came alert. “In the shape of a knot?”
“Yes? You’ve seen it?”
“It’s mine. He took it from me. It was my mother’s—has been in my family for generations.”
“Oh.” Kenzie deflated. “Might not be the key to the gate, then.”
“No, it is simply an ornament. He liked it, because it is heavy silver, but it is common. In my home, that is.” Brigid let out a sigh. “It is strange, is it not? We are enemies, you and I. I should feel great distaste that you stand here unclothed, so barbaric, but I do not. If I am to escape, I will need your help. But that is not all of my feeling. I am grateful for your presence. I had grown lonely.”
She looked wistful, this lovely woman with her certainty that Fae were the greatest creatures in the universe.
“Don’t write us off yet,” Kenzie said. “I’m getting out of here and back to my wee one. I say that when Turner comes back in for you, we jump him, take whatever magical device he’s using to get in and out, and go.”
“It may not be so simple,” Brigid said, sounding skeptical. “He uses some kind of spell that freezes me into place, keeps me from overpowering him and fleeing. He is not a warrior, and I have trained to be, so I should be able to best him. But I cannot get near him.”
“Great.” Of course it couldn’t be that easy, could it? “Will this spell freeze me too?”
“I do not know. You are not Fae, and he might not know you are here.”
Kenzie drew a breath. “Well, we’ll have to take our chances. If I can pin him fast enough and tear out his throat, that will probably cancel any spell he has on you.”
“I am willing to try,” Brigid said, giving her a solemn nod.
“Then we’ll get the hell out of here. Sound like a plan?”
Brigid’s brows drew together. “Why would that not sound like a plan? It is a plan.”
Kenzie grinned. “It’s our way of saying Is it a good plan?”
“Better than rotting here.” Brigid wrinkled her nose. “This world stinks.”
“I’ll drink to that.”
Brigid looked wistful again. “Aye, a good flagon of mead would go down well. We shall overcome this man and raise a glass.”
“Kick his ass and go out for pizza.” Kenzie laughed at Brigid’s bewildered expression. “Means the same thing.”
“Then that is what we shall do.” Brigid settled herself on a damp, fallen log. “Now we wait.”
“Yeah,” Kenzie said, letting out a breath. “We wait.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Gil led Bowman to the mountain trail where Kenzie had disappeared. “There,” he said, pointing down the hill. “But it doesn’t mean you can get to her.”
Bowman didn’t bother arguing. He signaled to his trackers to start searching.
A few hours later, Bowman’s hope was dying. Kenzie was nowhere, and the mists were dispersing with the coming morning.
He’d walked into every pocket of mist he could find, until his human hair or wolf’s fur was dripping wet, and he still found himself in the familiar wilderness of western North Carolina.
“Where the hell is she?” he snarled at Gil.
“The pockets move,” Gil said, shaking his head. He’d gone to a cabin he owned nearby to change out of his nineteenth-century clothes, and now wore jeans and a UNC sweatshirt. He’d been heading to this cabin, he said, to hide from Kenzie when she’d chased him from the hotel. “I tried to go in after her, but most of the gates are locked to me.”
“Why are they?” Bowman demanded. “What does that mean?”
“It means I was kicked out of Faerie a thousand years ago, and anything that smacks of Fae magic is barred to me. The Fae made gates to lots of worlds back in the day, though most of them have vanished, disused. The pockets are what’s left. I can’t traverse them.”
“A thousand years ago?” Bowman stared at him.
“Yeah,” Gil said. “I’m older than I look.”
“Don’t be a smart-ass. Why the hell didn’t you tell me all this before? About the gates? About you being from Faerie? You don’t look Fae.”
“Because I’m not. And I had no idea there were pocket gates in this part of the world, or that your professor was breeding monsters. He shouldn’t be able to.”
“I shouldn’t be able to turn into a wolf, but I do.” Bowman slung him away, tired of arguing. “Where else can we find these gates?”
“Everywhere. Anywhere. They come and go. A Fae talisman can make them easier to find and use, instead of hit or miss, but working talismans are few and far between. I’m sorry it’s not what you want to hear, but there it is.”
Shit. Bowman swung from Gil and walked away, deeper into the woods, where all was silence. The trackers didn’t follow him, knowing he needed to be alone for the moment.
Bowman stopped and let out a long, steaming breath. Kenzie, where are you?
He wouldn’t accept that she could be gone forever. Magic happened, yes; but magic could be undone. If Kenzie had gone into a gate, she could come back out of it. Logical.
Bowman didn’t want to admit that magic could be more complicated than that. People vanished all the time, never to be found again. Magic had created the beast that had attacked them in the roadhouse—a beast like that shouldn’t have been able to exist.