Apart from the bed, the room was sparsely furnished with a small reading chair and a dresser. Something glittered on the top of the dresser—Kester’s reaping pen. Ursula stuffed it in her pocket before turning to pull the covers off Zee, who still wore her bloodstained opera gown. Ursula slid her hands under the fae girl’s petite shoulders, lifting her from the bed. She was lighter than Ursula expected, and she carried Zee back into the the main room, cautiously eyeing the soldier. He was just where she’d left him, pinned to the floor like an enormous entomologist’s specimen. “What do you want with that whore?” he spat.

“She’s a friend of mine.”

“You know she’s tainted? King Oberon never lets a fae leave his troop unless they’re unclean.”

“King Oberon is unclean,” she shot back. She didn’t know what that meant exactly, but clearly the old fae king was a filthy bugger. She hoisted Zee over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and gripped Honjo’s hilt. “I’m going to free you now, but only because I want my sword back.”

She ripped the blade from the fae’s shoulder. He screamed, hands gripping the wound.

She trained the point of the dripping blade at him, backing away. “If you get up, I’ll stab you through the other shoulder.”

She stopped when she reached Emerazel’s sigil. Holding Zee tight, she whispered in Angelic. At the last words, she and Zee disintegrated in a burst of flame.

* * *

Ursula was gasping for breath by the time she reached the gothic bedroom in the Plaza apartment. It wasn’t every day that she carried a limp body up a flight of stairs.

She dropped Zee on the black canopy bed, ignoring the animal skulls that lined the walls. She tucked Zee under the blankets and slipped out the door, her body aching.

A tear slid down her cheek, and she wiped it on the back of her hand. She’d retrieved Zee’s body, only to learn that Kester had died in the fall—died trying to clean up her mess, in fact. She’d only just been getting to know him, still hadn’t gotten the chance to learn his secrets. Who had Oriel been, and what had she meant to him?

No use wondering about it now. She still needed to figure out exactly how to hunt down an incubus lair. Kester would have known what to do. The man had been an experienced hellhound with an encyclopedic knowledge of spells and arcane magic.

Of course, she did have a literal encyclopedia of arcane magic in the library below. A lick of hope ignited, and she rose.

Chapter 35