Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices #2)(128)

* * *

"Was this planned?" Kieran said. His expression was stony. "It cannot be a coincidence."

Mark raised his eyebrows. Cristina was sitting on the edge of one of the beds in the infirmary, her wrist bandaged; Mark's injury was hidden by the sleeve of his sweater. There was no one else in the room. Tavvy had been upset by the sight of blood on Mark and Cristina, and Dru had taken him away to calm him down. Livvy and the other two boys had left for Blackthorn Hall while Cristina was at the train station.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Mark said. "You think Cristina and I planned to spray blood all over London for fun?"

Cristina looked at him in surprise; he sounded more human than she'd ever heard him.

"Such a binding spell," said Kieran. "You must have held your wrists out for it. You would have to have remained still while you were bound."

He sounded bewildered, hurt. He looked enormously out of place in his breeches and linen shirt, now very crumpled, in the heart of the Institute. All around them were hospital-style beds, glass and copper jars of tinctures and powders, stacks of bandages and runed medical tools.

"It happened at a revel," said Mark. "We couldn't expect it-we didn't expect it. And no one would want this, no one would set it up on purpose, Kieran."

"A faerie would," Kieran said. "It is just the sort of thing one of us would do."

"I am not a faerie," said Mark.

Kieran flinched, and Cristina saw the hurt in his eyes. She felt a wave of sympathetic pain for him. It must be horrible to be so alone.

Even Mark looked stricken. "I didn't mean that," he said. "I am not only a faerie."

"And how glad you are," said Kieran, "how you brag of it at every opportunity."

"Please," said Cristina, "please, don't fight. We need to be on the same side in this."

Kieran turned puzzled eyes on her. Then he stepped close to Mark; he put his hands on Mark's shoulders. They were nearly the same height. Mark didn't avert his gaze. "There is only one way I know that you cannot lie," Kieran said, and kissed Mark on the mouth.

A pulse of pain went through Cristina's wrist. She had no idea if it was random or some reflection of the intensity of what Mark was feeling. There was no way he could reject the kiss, not without rejecting Kieran and severing the delicate chain of lies that kept the faerie prince bound here. 

If, indeed, Mark didn't want to kiss Kieran back. Cristina couldn't tell; he returned the kiss with a fierceness like the fierceness Cristina had seen in him the first time she'd glimpsed him with Kieran. But there was more anger in it now. He gripped Kieran's shoulders, his fingers digging in; the force of the kiss angled Kieran's head back. He sucked at Kieran's bottom lip and bit it, and Kieran gasped.

They broke apart. Kieran touched his mouth; there was blood on his lip, and hot triumph in his eyes. "You did not look away," he said to Cristina. "Was it that interesting?"

"It was for my benefit." Cristina felt odd and shivery and hot, but refused to show it. She sat with her hands in her lap and smiled at Kieran. "It would have seemed rude not to watch."

At that Mark, who had been looking furious, laughed. "She understands you, Kier."

"It was very well-done kissing," she said. "But we should talk practically now, about the spell."

Kieran was still staring at Cristina. He looked at most people with disgust or fury or consideration, but when he looked at Cristina, he seemed bewildered, as if he were trying to put her together like a puzzle and couldn't.

Abruptly, he spun on his heel and stalked out of the room. The door slammed behind him. Mark looked after him, shaking his head.

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone aggravate him like that," he said. "Not even me."

* * *

Diana had hoped to see Jia the moment she arrived in Idris, but the bureaucracy of the Clave was worse than she had recalled. There were forms to fill out, messages to be given and carried up the chain of command. It didn't help that Diana refused to state her business: For the delicate matter of Kieran and what was happening in Faerie, Diana didn't dare trust the information to anyone other than the Consul herself.

Her small apartment in Alicante was above the weapons shop on Flintlock Street that had been in her family for years. She'd closed it up when she went to live in Los Angeles with the Blackthorns. Impatience jittering her nerves, she went downstairs into the store and threw open the windows, letting in light, making the dust motes dance in the bright summer air. Her sore arm still ached, though it had nearly healed.

The shop was musty inside, dust on the formerly bright blades and rich leather of sheaths and ax handles. She took down a few of her favorite weapons and put them aside for the Blackthorns.