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CHAPTER 2
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A fter some of the events I’ve witnessed, the Incy/cabbie/magick/neck night should seem like a party. I’ve raced away in the night, clinging to a horse’s mane, with nothing but the clothes on my back, while a city behind me burned to the ground. I’ve seen bodies covered with the oozing sores of the bubonic plague, piled high in city streets like logs because there weren’t enough people alive to bury them. I was in Paris on July 14, 1789. You never forget the sight of a human head on a pike.
But we weren’t at war now. We were living an ordinary life, or as ordinary a life as an immortal can have. I mean,there’s always a bit of a surreal quality. If you live long enough, through enough wars and invasions and attacks by northern raiders, you end up defending yourself, sometimes to an extreme point. If someone’s coming at you with a sword, and you have a dagger tucked in the back of your skirt, well…
But that was different. It didn’t matter that your attacker probably wouldn’t kill you—how often does someone actually cut your head clean off?—it still felt like a life-or-death situation, and you reacted as if it were. But last night had been… just a regular night. No war, no berserkers, no life or death. Just a pissed-off cabbie.
Where had Incy gotten that spell? Yes, we’re immortal, we have magick running through our veins, but one has to learn on purpose how to use it. Over the years, I’d known some people who were all about studying magick, learning spells, learning whatever they needed to learn to wield it. But I’d figured out a long time ago that I didn’t want to. I’d seen the death and destruction that magick could cause, I’d seen what people were willing to do to pursue it, and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. I wanted to pretend it didn’t exist. And I’d found some like-minded aefrelyffen (an old word for immortals), and we hung out.
Okay, maybe I’d use magick to get a cab when it’s raining and there’s none to be found. To make the person in front of me not want that last pain au chocolat . That kind of thing. But to snap someone’s spine, for fun?
I’d seen Incy use people, break girls’ and boys’ hearts, steal, be callous—and it was just part of his charm. He was reckless and selfish and a user—but not to me. To me he was sweet and generous and funny and fun, willing to go anywhere, do anything. He was the one who would call me to go to Morocco at a moment’s notice. The one I’d call to get me out of a jam. If some guy wouldn’t take no for an answer, Incy was there, smiling his wolfish smile. If some woman made a snide remark, Incy’s wit would skewer her in front of everyone. He helped me pick out what to wear, brought me fabulous stuff from wherever he went, never criticized me, never made me feel bad.
And I’d done the same for him—once breaking a bottle over a woman’s head after she went after Incy with a long metal nail file. I’d paid off doormen, lied to bobbies and gendarmes, and pretended to be his wife or his sister or his enraged lover, whatever the situation demanded. We would howl about it afterward, falling together, laughing until tears came out of our eyes. The fact that we’d never been lovers, never had that awkwardness between us, only made it more perfect.
He was my best friend—the best friend I’d ever had. We’d been tight for almost a century, so it was amazing that he’d managed to shock me last night. And amazing that our other friends hadn’t been shocked. And amazing that I’d managed to reach a new low, even for me. The low of indifference. The low of cowardice. And, to top it all off, Incy had seen my neck. Better and better.
When I got
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CHAPTER 2
Â
A fter some of the events I’ve witnessed, the Incy/cabbie/magick/neck night should seem like a party. I’ve raced away in the night, clinging to a horse’s mane, with nothing but the clothes on my back, while a city behind me burned to the ground. I’ve seen bodies covered with the oozing sores of the bubonic plague, piled high in city streets like logs because there weren’t enough people alive to bury them. I was in Paris on July 14, 1789. You never forget the sight of a human head on a pike.
But we weren’t at war now. We were living an ordinary life, or as ordinary a life as an immortal can have. I mean,there’s always a bit of a surreal quality. If you live long enough, through enough wars and invasions and attacks by northern raiders, you end up defending yourself, sometimes to an extreme point. If someone’s coming at you with a sword, and you have a dagger tucked in the back of your skirt, well…
But that was different. It didn’t matter that your attacker probably wouldn’t kill you—how often does someone actually cut your head clean off?—it still felt like a life-or-death situation, and you reacted as if it were. But last night had been… just a regular night. No war, no berserkers, no life or death. Just a pissed-off cabbie.
Where had Incy gotten that spell? Yes, we’re immortal, we have magick running through our veins, but one has to learn on purpose how to use it. Over the years, I’d known some people who were all about studying magick, learning spells, learning whatever they needed to learn to wield it. But I’d figured out a long time ago that I didn’t want to. I’d seen the death and destruction that magick could cause, I’d seen what people were willing to do to pursue it, and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it. I wanted to pretend it didn’t exist. And I’d found some like-minded aefrelyffen (an old word for immortals), and we hung out.
Okay, maybe I’d use magick to get a cab when it’s raining and there’s none to be found. To make the person in front of me not want that last pain au chocolat . That kind of thing. But to snap someone’s spine, for fun?
I’d seen Incy use people, break girls’ and boys’ hearts, steal, be callous—and it was just part of his charm. He was reckless and selfish and a user—but not to me. To me he was sweet and generous and funny and fun, willing to go anywhere, do anything. He was the one who would call me to go to Morocco at a moment’s notice. The one I’d call to get me out of a jam. If some guy wouldn’t take no for an answer, Incy was there, smiling his wolfish smile. If some woman made a snide remark, Incy’s wit would skewer her in front of everyone. He helped me pick out what to wear, brought me fabulous stuff from wherever he went, never criticized me, never made me feel bad.
And I’d done the same for him—once breaking a bottle over a woman’s head after she went after Incy with a long metal nail file. I’d paid off doormen, lied to bobbies and gendarmes, and pretended to be his wife or his sister or his enraged lover, whatever the situation demanded. We would howl about it afterward, falling together, laughing until tears came out of our eyes. The fact that we’d never been lovers, never had that awkwardness between us, only made it more perfect.
He was my best friend—the best friend I’d ever had. We’d been tight for almost a century, so it was amazing that he’d managed to shock me last night. And amazing that our other friends hadn’t been shocked. And amazing that I’d managed to reach a new low, even for me. The low of indifference. The low of cowardice. And, to top it all off, Incy had seen my neck. Better and better.
When I got
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