I was no horticulturalist, but I’d been doing some research. I was pretty sure if we reintroduced the right nutrients into the soil, in time, we’d be able to grow things again.
We had a lot to reclaim. Trees to remove and replace. Planters and flower boxes to fill. Parks to redesign. I planned to start small, haul dirt back from the abbey, grow a few daisies, buttercups, maybe some petunias and impatiens. Fill my bookstore with ferns and spider plants and begin taking back the night in my own space before spilling over onto the rooftop garden and beyond.
One day Dublin would live and breathe again. One day all these husks of what had once been people would be swept up and buried in a memorial ceremony. One day, tourists would come to see ground zero and reminisce about the Halloween when the walls fell—maybe even mention in passing a girl who cowered in a belfry before helping save the day—then head off to one of six hundred newly restored pubs to celebrate that the human race had taken back what was theirs.
Because we would. No matter who or what I was, I was determined to capture and re-inter the Book, then get to work figuring out a way to put the walls back up. Along the way, I’d find proof that I wasn’t the king, just a human woman with a lot of memories someone else had planted for reasons that would make sense when I finally knew them. I wasn’t the fulcrum of a prophecy that would either save or doom the human race. I was merely the person who’d been pre-programmed by the queen—or who knew? Maybe the king—to track the Book in case it escaped, just like the Keltar had been manipulated: one small part of the equation for sealing it away again, forever this time.
As I sauntered through the morning, I tried to slip back into the mind of the young woman who’d stepped off the plane, taken a cab through Temple Bar, and checked in to the Clarin House late last summer, bemused by the thick accent of the leprechaun-like old man behind the reservations desk. Starving. Scared and grieving. Dublin had been so huge, and I’d been so small and clueless.
I looked around, absorbing the silent shell of a city, remembering the hustle and bustle. The streets had been crammed with craic—vibrant life that took itself entirely for granted.
“Morning, Ms. Lane.” Inspector Jayne moved into step with me.
I assessed him quickly. He wore tight khaki-colored jeans with a plain white T-shirt stretched over his barrel chest and military boots laced up outside his pants. He was draped in ammo, pistols in his waistband and arm holster, Uzi over his shoulder. No place for an evil Book to hide. Months ago he’d had the start of a paunch. It was no longer there. He was rangy with muscle, long limbed, and walking like a man who had his feet planted firmly on the ground for the first time in years.
I smiled, genuinely pleased to see him, but it was all I could do not to reach for my spear. I hoped he wasn’t still after it or holding grudges.
“Fine morning, isn’t it?”
I laughed. “I was thinking the same thing. Is there something wrong with us? Dublin’s a shell, and we look ready to burst into a cheery whistle.” The Unseelie-spiked-tea-drinking inspector and I had certainly come a long way.
“No paperwork. I used to hate paperwork. Didn’t know how much of my life it was eating up.”
“New world.”
“Bloody strange one.”
“But good.”
“Aye. The streets are quiet. Book’s laying low. Haven’t seen a Hunter in days. We Irish know to make the most of the times of plenty, for sure enough they’ll be famine again. Made love to my wife last night. Children are healthy and strong. It’s a good day to be alive,” he said matter-of-factly.
I nodded in complete understanding. “Speaking of Hunters, you’ll be seeing at least one in the skies soon.” I filled him in on the outline of our plan—that I would be scouring the streets by Hunter, looking for the Sinsar Dubh. “So don’t shoot me down, okay?”
His eyes narrowed shrewdly. “How do you control it? Can you force it to take you to its lair? We could wipe out the lot of them if we could only find the den.”
“Let’s get the Book off the streets first. Then we’ll help you hunt, I promise.”
“A promise I’ll be holding you to. I don’t like using the girl, but she insists. That one’s had a hard enough life. She should be home, somebody watching out for her. Kills like she was born to it. Makes me wonder how long she’s been—”
“MacKayla,” V’lane said.
Jayne was frozen, mouth ajar, mid-step. Not iced. Just immobilized.
I stiffened and reached for my spear.