“I truly wish that were the case, Jason,” Falk told him. Someone had to.

Jason turned back to Henry and Henry wasn’t certain if his expression displayed more betrayal or anger.

“The son of a bitch who murdered my father,” Jason ground out, “does not get to take his place.”

Suddenly Henry wished that they didn’t have to have this conversation. But Greine’s lawyers could be depended upon to exploit every aspect of the arcane fine print of any number of treaties. Henry could guarantee that they had already pointed out that Jason had been born a sidhe and never legally emigrated. As a sidhe he was a year short of his majority and so technically still under his biological father’s guardianship.

If his father had been some shiftless gnome, it wouldn’t have mattered. NIAD would have simply trotted out their own retinue of lawyers, filed an injunction, and delayed until Jason came of age.

But Greine commanded a vast army of goblin mercenaries and exerted immense financial influence as a highly valued trade partner. He would be appeased and Jason would be handed over to him—very quietly and very soon.

The knowledge ate into Henry like a shot of battery acid.

“The problem is that he’s got the law on his side,” Henry said.

“What are you talking about?” Jason demanded.

“Legally, you’re a sidhe minor of the Tuatha Dé Dannan clan, not an American citizen—”

“You’re saying I’m an illegal alien?” Incredulity almost tempered Jason’s outrage.

“It’s a little more complex than that, but basically, yeah,” Henry replied. “As such, it’ll fall to the Irregulars to turn you over to your guardian.”

“So that he can butcher me for some fucking mythical rock?” Jason glared at Henry. “What a great law! How about putting dingos in charge of daycares while they’re at it?”

“I never said it was right—”

“No, you said that going to Phipps and finding all of this out would help somehow.” Jason pinned him with a stare as hard and sharp as a razor. “Has it helped?”

“It’s given us warning of what we’re up against and a little time…” Henry told him.

“When you say ‘us’ do you mean you and me or you and your Irregular buddies?”

Henry could read suspicion spreading across Jason’s face as Jason belatedly realized how little he really knew of Henry or NIAD.

“It’s not the same thing, is it?” Jason asked.

“No, it’s not,” Henry admitted. Gunther had all but told him that Research and Development wanted a crack at prying the stone from Jason’s body before they had to hand him over to Greine. Phipps had been right about that.

“Phipps wasn’t just bullshitting when he said your people wanted to carve me up for the stone and turn me into a—a zombie patch job, was he?” Jason stepped back out of Henry’s reach, but he didn’t run. That showed just how little he truly understood of the danger Henry posed to him. Or perhaps it simply betrayed Jason’s desire to trust him even now.

“Phipps wasn’t wrong. Gunther sent me a note this morning. R&D wants me to turn you over.”

“But you’re not going to…” Jason took another step back but then stopped and stood, staring at Henry warily.

All morning Henry’d shied from asking himself what he’d do when the moment came to pack Jason up and hand him over to the dowdy, merciless creatures that populated the R&D laboratories in DC. He hadn’t suspected that his own conscience would kick quite so hard. The Irregulars had created, trained, and kept him for nearly a century; the institution was a great gyre that carried his wreckage, making him look alive and full of purpose.

Jason, on the other hand, was nearly a stranger. They’d had sex, but Henry wasn’t one to mistake that for anything beyond a momentary respite—more pleasurable but certainly not more meaningful than sharing a drink and a laugh. It’d been a good time but taking it for more than that wouldn’t have just been whistful but damn unwise. Yet Jason’s gaze affected Henry more than he wanted to acknowledge; the smallest spark flickered in the darkness of his dead heart.

Jason exerted no special power over him—commanded no spells, oaths, or obligations written in blood. Instead he just looked at Henry like he could see the decency in him—like he was betting his life on it. And somehow just that made Henry feel the good, gallant, and foolish man he’d once been awaken within him.

Henry held his scarred left hand out to Jason and Jason came to him.

“When I said ‘us’, I meant you and me,” Henry told him.

Jason nodded, looking relieved but also exhausted. Overhead a flock of smoky blue butterflies swirled across the sun like a passing cloud.

“So what now...Henry?” Jason said his name like it was a secret spell. Silly, really, but still touching.

 “We need to find a way to keep you out of both the research labs and Greine’s reach.” No news there. But Henry didn’t feel quite ready to explain all the details of the plan that had been growing in the back of his mind since early this morning. He didn’t trust his own commitment enough yet to test it against the hard realities that even words would evoke. “You need to disappear for at least a year.”

“Disappear to where?” Jason asked.

“As who might be more important—” Henry cut himself off as the door of the brilliant blue port-o-let swung open. A group of naked, green-haired youths burst out and immediately dispersed into a cloud of emerald butterflies. Princess padded out in their wake. She watched the nearest butterfly flutter with feline interest before trotting to Henry’s side.

Henry scooped her up, noting the pretty collar she now wore as well as the silver message cylinder hanging from it like a delicate bell. The note inside told him nothing he didn’t already know, except that Gunther had bought the collar for Princess and that Greine had been formally invited to take custody of his son first thing tomorrow morning. R&D were expecting Henry to make a delivery to them within the day.

Princess settled herself on Henry’s shoulder but watched the surrounding moths and butterflies with great attention.

“We better leg it,” Henry said. “Buttercup won’t abide a cat in her kingdom, not even an enchanted one.”

“But where are we going to go?” Jason asked.

“Back to where we started,” Henry decided.

Chapter Eight

Carerra’s strike team had left Phipps’s Curiosities and Antiques locked up, taped off, and warded with small gold spheres that looked to Jason like miniature sea mines. Jason’s own key and Falk’s knife made easy work of the first two obstacles, but after that they both spent nearly an hour dismantling all the security spells with lullabies and curses written across masking tape. At last they slipped through the backdoor.

Inside, the once-tidy shop now stood in disarray. Antique chairs and ivory-inlaid card tables lay toppled and cracked like the remnants of a fire sale. Tapestries had been ripped from the walls and the entire collection of eighteenth-century Japanese umbrellas rested in a heap, tattered with bullet holes, as if they’d been executed by a firing squad.

Most of the valuables were missing. The display cases that had housed Persian and Chinese gold jewelry were nothing more than battered frames haloed by shards of shattered glass.

Falk snorted derisively.

“I knew they’d snatch up the fool’s gold and leave the silver goblin’s scimitar lying in a pile of tarnished trash.” He carefully lifted the sheathed blade from a heap of broken glass and bent bookends. When he drew the blade a few inches Jason noticed red symbols glowing along it.

Princess circled Falk’s feet but then bounded away to bite the wings of a stuffed owl that had fallen behind the empty, open cash register.

“Of course they also left a lot of actual garbage,” Falk commented. He sheathed the scimitar.