“Nope,” I mutter, then voice something I can’t quite wrap my brain around. “Why are you and Ryodan willing to help rescue Christian?”

“Beats looking for a bloody spell all the time,” he says dryly.

“Aha, I knew I forgot to tell you something! I saw the Dreamy-Eyed Guy in Chester’s and again on the street. We don’t need to keep looking. The king is hanging around Dublin again.”

“You continue to cling to the absurd hope he’ll free you from your burden, no harm, no foul. Doesn’t look like much of a burden at the moment, Ms. Lane. Rather seems you’re enjoying it.”

Criminy, that woman is flashing him her boobs! Slanting him a come-hither look, gyrating seductively to the music, pulling up her shirt (no, there’s not a damn thing but skin and perky nipples underneath), gaze moving hungrily from his face to his crotch as she prowls closer.

I veer to the right and jostle her before she gets to him, knocking her off balance. She has no idea what hits her. She stumbles into a chair then crashes into a table, drinks go flying, and she lands in a tangled heap on the floor. A bottle of beer mysteriously tips itself over and pours all over her head.

Now she looks like a drowned rat. “It does have perks,” I agree.

“Little testy tonight?”

“That woman’s boobs do not belong in your face.”

“It’s not as if I can see yours at the moment.”

“Well, you’re damn well going to feel them. Soon.”

“One hopes,” he murmurs.

“So, why is Ryodan willing to get involved in all this again?” I circle back to my earlier question. “I thought he couldn’t stand Christian.”

“Jada will go after the Highlander herself if she discovers where he is. Ryodan won’t let that happen.”

“He cares about her. A great deal.”

Barrons says nothing, but I didn’t expect him to.

When we step into Ryodan’s office, Barrons removes the princes’ heads from a duffel bag and tosses them onto the desk next to R’jan’s.

I never knew I could be happy to see three gruesome, severed heads. More princes will no doubt be made, transformed from whatever raw material the Fae realm likes to pick up and use. But at the moment the only two princes that remain are Christian and Cruce.

“Risky as fuck,” Ryodan says, staring down at the heads.

“What?” I ask.

“Killing them now,” Barrons replies. “Their continued use as linchpins was debatable. Their absence problematic.”

“Well, at least now we can get the women out of their mansion, help the ones they turned Pri-ya,” I say.

Ryodan says, “More princes will be made.”

“Yeah, but they’ll have to do something like eat Unseelie flesh. And participate in a botched ritual.”

“Any here that haven’t eaten Unseelie flesh, raise your hand,” Barrons says dryly. He glances down through the glass floor. “Ask the same question down there.”

“Humans are eternally performing botched rituals,” Ryodan says. “Every fucking time they use a Ouija board. Among other things.”

“Really, a Ouija board?” I knew it! The macabre board game played with unseen participants always made me uneasy. Someone tells you, Here, I’m giving you a door to death, and you play with it? Not me. No clue what’s on the other side but I’d bet it sure as hell isn’t going to be my dead sister. No matter how much I’d like to think so.

By such criteria, half this city could start turning Fae. “Barrons could become Rath. I could become Kiall,” Ryodan says.

I protest instantly, “You two are immune—”

“Not to the princess’s magic. Not to K’Vruck,” Barrons points out. “When the Fae royal court is reduced, someone or something will always be altered to complete it. Who’s to say we’re immune to being transformed?”

I refuse to entertain the possibility. “Speaking of the princess,” I ask Ryodan, changing the subject, “how are you controlling her?”

“How are you controlling the Sinsar Dubh,” Ryodan mocks.

“Day by day,” I say coolly. “And I’m doing just fine.”

Ryodan smiles faintly. “Welcome to war games, Mac, where the terrain never stops changing and he who adapts fastest wins.”

None of us adapt fast enough in the next moment. But then we have absolutely no warning.

The Unseelie Princess sifts in, snatches the princes’ heads, and sifts out before my brain manages to process what my eyes just saw.