Swallowing Darkness - Laurell K. Hamilton [112]
“I hear a ‘but’ in your voice.”
He smiled a little more. “But there are things that can pierce the metal.”
“Remember, Merry, our people didn’t use armor once, for obvious reasons, but we ran into enemies who did. Our metalsmiths came up with a few things that would go through metal.”
“Such as?” I asked.
“There were spears forged long ago,” Doyle said. “They are locked away with the few other magical weapons left us.”
“The queen would have to give him permission to open the vault of weapons,” I said.
“She would, which makes it unlikely that he would have such a thing, but I do not like the fact that he and his followers are in the middle of the road, demanding things from us.”
Rhys said, “The queen would never permit him to appear weak or evil in front of the humans. She’s worked too long and hard to make the Unseelie Court’s reputation better to let Cel ruin it now. It’s the one thing she’s never allowed him to do, to abuse the humans, or be seen abusing anyone else in front of them.”
“And now he’s in the middle of the road, behaving badly,” I said. “Exactly,” he said.
“Where is Queen Andais?” I asked.
“Where indeed,” Doyle said, and he moved again, as if the seat wasn’t quite comfortable. It wasn’t, but it wasn’t the seat that was bothering him. Doyle could sleep on a marble floor and not flinch.
“You’re afraid for her,” I said.
“One thing she accused you of, my sweet Merry, is very true. You have stripped her of all the best and most feared of her personal guard. She retained her position, in part, because of….”
“You,” I finished for him.
“Not only me.”
I nodded. “You can say his name, Doyle. The Queen’s Darkness, and her Killing Frost.”
“It upsets you to hear his name.”
“It does, but that doesn’t mean we don’t say it.”
“It would if you were Queen Andais,” Rhys said.
“I am not her.”
“But Doyle is being too modest,” Rhys said. “Yes, Frost was feared by the queen’s enemies, but it was fear of the Queen’s Darkness that kept a lot of courtiers in line.”
“You exaggerate,” Doyle said.
I shook my head. “I’m not sure he does. I’ve heard people talk about you, Doyle. I know that the queen would say, ‘Bring me my Darkness. Where is my Darkness?’ and then someone would die. You were her greatest threat, next to the sluagh.”
“Are you saying that Captain Doyle here is as feared as the host of the sluagh?” Gregorio asked.
We all looked at her. I said, “Yes.”
“One man, against a host of nightmares,” she said, and didn’t try to keep her disbelief out of her voice.
“He can be pretty scary all on his own,” Rhys said.
Gregorio stared at Doyle, as if trying to see more of him in the dim light.
“Shouldn’t you tell Sergeant Dawson that the magic will be stopped by the trucks?” I asked.
“I’ll tell him it will probably be stopped.” She got on the radio.
Rhys said, “Some of them might be able to make illusions real enough to lure the soldiers outside the trucks.”
“What kind of illusions?” I asked.
Voices came over the radio, frantic. “Sierra four to all Sierra, we have wounded soldiers in line of travel. Stopping to render aid.”
“Those kind,” Doyle said.
“Tell them it’s not real,” I said.
“Tell them not to get out of the trucks no matter what,” Doyle said.
Gregorio tried, she really did, but one thing our soldiers are not trained to do is leave their wounded behind. It was a brilliant trap. The soldiers went to check the wounded, and once they left the trucks, the sidhe attacked, and no human magic could stop them.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
VOICES CAME IN SNATCHES OVER THE RADIO. “IT’S MORALES, but he died in Iraq! It’s Smitty…died in Afghanistan….”
“It’s Siobhan,” Rhys said. “She can bring back the shadows of the dead whom you know. Shit, I thought she’d lost that power.”
“The princess returns power to all of faerie, Rhys, not just us,” Doyle said.
The real trick to the ambush was that the soldiers didn’t realize yet that they were under attack. Gregorio twisted in the seat and turned to us. “It doesn’t sound like they’re doing anything to our people.”
“The dead are not the only mind games the