Free Silver Skin (A Cold Iron Novel) by D.L. McDermott Page B

didn’t catch Garrett on the island doesn’t mean he wasn’t part of it.”
    Nieve collected little Garrett from Helene’s lap and said, “Just for that, the Grand Old Man can get up and pour his own tea. There’s cake under the dome. But let him get it himself. If you want a real meal, Helene, you can come downstairs at six. There’ll be a place set for you. Liam is taking me to your apartment to get some clothes. Is there anything you’d particularly like while the old man holds you prisoner?”
    “I can hear you rolling your eyes, Nieve,” Miach said from his chair.
    “Good,” said the woman whom Helene found difficult to believe could be Miach’s granddaughter. Difficult to believe that he was thousands of years old when he looked only a few years past thirty. Difficult to believe when he acted just like any other man when he was sick, which was to say, like a ten-year-old boy.
    “Helene’s life is in danger,” said Miach. “After today’s events, I think she’ll agree to stay here.”
    He was right. She wouldn’t feel safe in her apartment, even with Elada guarding the door. She lived on the fourth floor, and all her windows opened. . . .
    “I’ll make a list,” Helene said to Nieve.
    “And anything you want her to buy,” said Miach, “just tell her.”
    “You can’t buy people, Granddad,” Nieve said softly. There was a sadness in the girl’s voice that shocked Helene, and she realized that for all Nieve’s warmth and cheer, she was unhappy in Miach’s house. Nevertheless, she crossed the room and bent to peck Miach on the cheek, and he reached a pale hand up to stroke his granddaughter’s hair, saying in a voice Helene could just barely hear, “He almost killed you, Nieve, and I won’t forgive him that. I can’t.”
    It was none of Helene’s business, so she turned away and busied herself pouring tea, adding honey, and buttering a piece of toast, but it was impossible to deny that Miach was more human than she had thought. He’d saved her life today, plainly at grave cost to himself. And no matter what disagreement lay between him and his granddaughter, he obviously loved her and his family.
    When Nieve was gone, Helene turned to the Fae who had saved her life and, pretending she had not just witnessed such a private scene, said, “How do you take your tea?”
    “With milk and honey.”
    She poured him a cup, added a generous dollop of honey and then the warm milk, and brought him the delicate bone-china cup. When he reached out to take it, she could see the veins in his wrists. They were black. He might act like a man with a head cold—cranky and intractable—but he was more than sick. That much was obvious from his appearance. He was poisoned, and an ordinary man would probably be in the hospital, on life support.
    He sipped the tea, and she watched a little color return to his face. Beth had told her that milk and honey were the traditional offerings for the Fae, still left outside at night by superstitious villagers in some parts of the world. Helene wondered if the practice was more than superstition, if those substances gave special nourishment to the Fae.
    “Thank you for saving my life,” she said. “I guess I owe you one.”
    A smile kissed the corners of his mouth. “A Fae debt, Helene, is a dangerous thing. How will you pay me?”
    Something in the tea, evidently, was restorative, because Miach the patriarch had vanished. She was dealing with Miach the seducer once more. “You’re in no condition to receive payment of any kind.”
    “No,” he conceded. “I suppose I’m not. But I’m well enough to search for the geis . We can wait until Nieve comes back, if you’d prefer, but then we should try to find it. And at least now, iron poisoned, I’m no threat to you.” Then he looked her up and down. “Or a good deal less of one, anyway.”
    She considered her situation. From the moment she had first learned what he was, what the Fae were, she’d feared