“Where is Ascanio?” Hugh asked.

“Exploring the castle.”

“You let him run around unsupervised?”

“Sam is with him,” she answered.

Hugh sighed. “By now he likely knows the complete layout of our defenses. No matter. I’ll handle it.”

He got up and picked up his plate.

“Don’t bother,” she told him. “I’ll clear it.”

Hugh set his plate on the floor. Cedric nearly lost his mind with joy. Hugh set the plate on the table after Cedric was done and tilted his head to catch her gaze.

His voice was quiet. “The next time you interfere in one of my fights, I’ll serve you with divorce papers. Are we clear?”

Right. The asshole was back. “The next time I have a chance to save your life, I’ll give it a thought.”

He walked out, his hound at his heels.

She wanted to pick up his plate and shatter it against the floor. But he would hear, and she refused to give him the satisfaction.

13

Hugh leaned on the parapet walk of the keep. Below, the concrete stretch of the moat rolled out, waiting for the water. Six pump rigs waited, ready to dump water from the lake into the moat through large pipes. The magic had flooded thirty minutes ago, setting them back, and now three teams chanted, moving from pump to pump, coaxing the water engines to life.

Every Iron Dog not on duty lined up along the shore of the moat. Most of the village was here as well, mingling. Kids ran back and forth, laughing. A pirogi seller showed up and was doing brisk business, carrying trays of pirogi through the crowd.

Like some damn festival.

Elara was down there too. If he concentrated, he could pick her out of the crowd. He chose to stare at the concrete and the pumps instead.

Stoyan leaned on the parapet next to him. “Do you want to go down there?”

“No.”

The team at the furthest pump on the left waved a rag.

“Pull the trigger,” Hugh said.

Stoyan raised a horn to his mouth and blew a loud angry note.

A spark of magic dashed through the pumps, dancing on the machinery like yellow lightning. The pumps roared.

Nothing happened.

The crowd mulled about, the noise of voices rising.

A minute passed. Another…

Another…

Water gushed out of the right-most pipe. The crowd cheered. The other pipes added their own stream one by one and a foaming current poured into the moat.

Finally.

He looked along the flow of the water and saw Elara in a white dress. Her face was tilted up. She was looking straight at him.

Hugh pushed from the parapet and turned to Stoyan. “Have them check the water level every thirty minutes once it’s filled. We need twenty-four hours of stable water level.”

“The engineers are on it,” Stoyan said. “What do you want to do about the money?”

“How far overbudget are we?”

“Thirteen thousand.”

“Anything left to salvage?”

“The scouts found ruins to the south, about thirty minutes into the woods. Looks like it was a serious distillery operation at some point. Stainless steel storage tanks, copper percolators, heating coils. We got quite a bit we can pull out of there…”

A high-pitched scream rang out below. Hugh spun to the parapet. On the grass by the moat a woman and two men convulsed in the grass. Elara’s people formed a ring around them. He swore and took off at a run.

It took him three minutes to get down to the moat. Hugh shouldered his way into the ring. Elara knelt by the older of the men, holding his head in her lap, while two other cradled the younger man and the woman.

“Let it come,” Elara intoned. “Almost there. Almost.”

There was a rhythm to the convulsions. He studied the bodies, the timing. The tremors pulsed in a distinct pattern, closer and closer to becoming synchronized.

“Here it is,” Elara murmured.

The three people jerked upright in unison, like vampires snapping out of coffins in some old movie. They stared into space, identical blank expressions on their faces, and spoke in a chorus.

“Tonight Aberdine will fall.”

Well, fan-fucking-tastic.

He left the circle. Stoyan followed.

“Double the patrols,” Hugh told him. “Keep the pumps going. I want to see everyone in my quarters in fifteen.”

Elara climbed the staircase. Hugh’d taken one look at the seers and run away to his rooms. That was fine. There was no escape. She would track him down.

She reached the hallway. His door was open. His back was to her. He was looking at something on his desk. He wore his Iron Dog uniform, and from this angle, silhouetted against the light of the window, he looked like pure darkness, cut out in the shape of a man.

Memory conjured up his hands on her shoulders and the phantom touch of his lips on her skin. She shoved the thoughts aside. Not now.

She walked into his room. He didn’t even turn. He had to have heard her.

“Hugh.”

“Busy,” he said.

Ugh. “A moment of your time.”

He turned to her and leaned against the desk, his arms crossed. “Anything for my wife.”

She almost snapped back but bit the words off before they had a chance to escape. She had to make him understand.

“Aberdine will fall tonight. The Heltons are never wrong when all three of them are synchronized.”

He didn’t say anything.

“It has to be a reference to the warriors and the mrogs. They will attack Aberdine tonight.”

“Quite possibly.”

“We have to help them.”

He gave her a long look. “Let me get this straight. You want me to take my soldiers and ride out there to defend people who threw rocks at us because three creepy assholes foamed at the mouth, swooned, and had a vision?”

Ugh. Ugh! “They are not assholes. They are very nice people. They can’t help it.”

“I’m sure they are lovely when they are not announcing imminent doom.”

“How is it that Raphael made more holes in you than in swiss cheese, but your assholeness survived?”

“Raphael doesn’t have a knife big enough to kill my assholeness.”

“There are children in Aberdine. Children didn’t throw rocks at us. Almost twenty-five hundred people live in that settlement and they’re about to be slaughtered. How can you just do nothing?”

“Very easily,” he said.

She stared at him.

“If they are truly trying to take Aberdine, they will come in large numbers,” Hugh said with methodical calm. “You want me to leave a fortified position and ride out against what will likely be a much larger force. There will be casualties. I’ll have to watch my people die.”

“Our people, Hugh. They are our people, and I’ll be sending people from the village as well. You will have support. And if they die, it will be on my head.”

His stare made her want to back away from him.

“No.”

“We can’t just do nothing.”

“Yes, we can. Every Dog who dies on that field is one less soldier to protect this castle.”

“Babies, Hugh. They will murder babies.”

“There are babies here. Do you really want to orphan them for the sake of Aberdine?”

This was a pointless conversation. “I’ll go myself.”

“And do what? Lob herbs at them until allergies bring them down?”

She wanted to punch him in the face. “I want you to be the hero, Hugh. I want you to gather our people, and ride with me to Aberdine to save innocent people. What do I have to do to make this happen?”

He pushed from the desk and took the six steps separating them. Menace rolled off him in waves, so thick, it was almost choking her.

“Are we bargaining now?”

An electric shiver of alarm dashed down her spine. Elara raised her head. “If that’s what it takes.”

He reached out and caught a strand of her hair. “What will you give me if I save Aberdine?”

“What do you want, Hugh?”

“What I want you won’t give me.”

“Try me.”

He leaned toward her, his lips only inches from hers. She felt too hot, as if her clothes had somehow grown too tight on her. Her instincts wailed in alarm.