Free Death Magic by Eileen Wilks

willing to offer some of that covert help you mentioned from time to time. But I’m not joining your ghosts.”

SIX
     

     
    I T must have rained while they were inside. The air was crisp with ozone, rich with the smell of damp earth. Wet grass glistened. But the sky was clear again and making a spectacle of itself, drifts of stars like spangled gauze swathing the darkness. As they walked to Rule’s car along a path bordered by roses and baby’s breath, Lily’s stomach jittered while her mind jumped around like a hyperactive two-year-old.
    She’d asked more questions before they left. Ruben had answered some of them. Not all.
    “You turned him down,” Rule said.
    “This may be the right thing for him to do. That doesn’t make it right for me.”
    “He didn’t stop you from refusing. You aren’t at risk because you know too much. Doesn’t that prove that your fears about the Shadow Unit are misplaced?”
    “I’ve got way too many fears at the moment for you to be sweeping them into a single pile and labeling them false. At least I’m restraining my burning urge to arrest people.”
    “For now,” he said dryly.
    “Look, let’s stipulate Ruben’s right and you’re right and so is whoever else is part of this. I don’t know. I haven’t . . . it’s going to take time for me to get my mind around everything, and we can’t even talk about it! How am I supposed to think it through if I can’t talk about it, or make notes, or . . . but even if you’re all right, that doesn’t mean I have to be part of it.”
    He was silent for several paces, then stopped just short of the car. “I hurt you with my silence. I’m sorry for that.”
    She stopped. Faced him. “It’s not what you didn’t say, it’s how you pretended. For weeks—”
    “Three weeks. Slightly less, to be specific.”
    She flung up a hand. “Okay. Fine. Be specific by all damn means. For three weeks you’ve acted like things are okay, but if you believe everything Ruben said, everything’s going to hell—or could, pretty damn fast. How could you pretend with me?”
    He looked baffled. “I haven’t.”
    “When you first learned all that stuff I can’t say out loud, it didn’t just about blow off the top of your head? And you hid that from me!”
    He answered slowly. “The timing came as a shock. She is moving much faster than I’d expected. The rest of it . . . no. We’ve known for nearly a year that she is active in our realm once more. Now we know some specifics about her plans. That’s tremendously valuable, and learning that we—the clans—have strong allies against her is a great relief.”
    She stared at him. All this time, he’d been expecting something like this. When he proposed to her, he’d known they’d face some kind of Armageddon shit. When they planned their wedding, he’d known. He hadn’t just thought there would be danger—he’d known it would be vast and powerful. World-toppling. All along, he’d known. “You’re really okay with . . . with all this. You expected it. You’re not freaked and hiding it. You’re . . . okay.”
    A small frown tugged at his eyebrows. “My wolf helps. That I live more closely with him than I used to helps a lot. Fear is . . . an immediate thing for a wolf. What hasn’t yet happened isn’t real enough to trouble him.”
    “What about the man? How does that part of you stay so damn calm, and plan a wedding, and spend time picking out a necklace for me, and set up Toby’s college fund, and—and look to the future as though things were going to be okay?”
    “Lily.” He took her arms gently. “How else could I live? It’s helpful to know what our enemy intends, and while I take Ruben’s visions very seriously, none of it is fated.” He cocked his head as if listening to something she couldn’t hear, then leaned in so close his lips brushed her ear as he whispered, “My Lady is also a patterner, and vastly more experienced than Friar.”
    “But . . .” She