“Not at all,” I said. “They aren’t nobles. They’re outlaws. I just outlawed them by the authority invested in me and stuff. I also hereby declare us a joint task force.”

“We’re a task force?”

“As of now,” I said.

Fix bobbed his head amiably. “If we dance fast enough, maybe we can sell that. Then what?”

“If we’re both alive, we’ll figure it out.”

We took a few more steps before Fix said, “You can’t take Maeve, wizard. Not in the shape you’re in. Not even if she was alone.”

“No,” I said. “I can’t.”

But maybe the Winter Knight could.

Ever since I’d gotten out of my bed in my quarters in Arctis Tor, I’d felt the power of the Winter mantle inside me, and held it back. I’d felt the primal drives that were its power, the need to hunt, to fight, to protect territory, to kill. Winter’s nature was beautiful violence, stark clarity, the most feral needs and animal desires and killer instinct pitted against the season of cold and death—the will and desire to fight, to live, even when there was no shelter, no warmth, no respite, no hope, and no help.

I’d fought against that drive, repressed it, held it at bay. That savagery was never meant for a world of grocery stores and electric blankets and peaceable assembly. It was meant for times like this.

So I let Winter in, and everything changed.

My weariness vanished. Not because my body was no longer weary, but because my body was no longer important—only my will. My fear vanished, too. Fear was for prey. Fear was for the things I was about to hunt.

My doubts vanished as well. Doubt was for things that did not know their purpose, and I knew mine. This was a Winter matter, a Faerie matter, a family matter, and it was precisely correct that only beings of Faerie resolve it. I knew exactly what I had to do.

There was a throat that needed ripping.

“Harry?” asked Fix. “Uh. Are you okay?”

I looked aside at him. As hunting partners went, Fix didn’t look like much, but I’d seen him in action before. He was no one to underestimate. And I needed him. Once I didn’t, things might change, because he was on my island and that wasn’t something I could let slide. But for now I could do worse than to have him at my side.

“I’m a little hungry,” I said, and smiled. “Here. Don’t need it.” I tossed the knife to him, point first.

He caught it deftly by the handle. I saw the minor shifts in shadow on his neck as his shoulders tensed up. “Remember. You’ve got iron.”

I didn’t sneer at him, because what would be the point? But I did roll the nail back and forth between my fingers, and heard it scraping on ice.

I looked down and found that ice had condensed out of the water in the air and formed over my fingertips. I put the nail between my teeth so that I could hold up my fingers. As I watched, icicles began to form, guided by raw instinct, stretching out from my fingertips. I flexed my fingers a few times, and saw the edges form, the ice hard and razor sharp. Nice.

I debated. Armor, too? Too heavy. This needed to happen fast. Besides, I wouldn’t want the armor to be in the way for what would come after. That was going to be the good part.

“Time to play,” I said around the nail. I took four steps, building up to a run, and leapt into the air toward Maeve. Fifty feet. No problem. It was glorious, the freedom, the certainty, and I could not imagine what had made me so squeamish about embracing Winter in the first place.

Bad things kept happening to me. It was high fucking time I started happening to them.

Maeve must have sensed something at the last instant, despite her focus on Demonreach. I was a fraction of a second away before she moved with the serpentine quickness of the Sidhe, throwing herself to one side. My claws missed her throat by inches. They did slice off one of her dreadlocks, and it whirled through the air as I hit the ground, legs absorbing the shock as my feet dug into the muddy ground near the lighthouse.

There was an instant of complete shock from Maeve’s coterie, and I used it to slice at the Redcap’s eyes just as Fix landed on the rawhead’s shoulders and overbore the creature, sending it toppling forward to the ground.

I felt my claws hit. The Redcap screamed and reeled away from most of the blow, darting back, brushing past one of the Sidhe from the Botanic Gardens, behind him. The Sidhe had a blank, confused look on his face as he tried to fight his way out of the concentration of supporting Maeve in her suddenly interrupted spell. No time to think. Claws of bloody ice flashed at him, and I opened his throat to the windpipe. He went down with a choked scream, and I stepped on his chest to fling myself at the two behind him, one a twisted figure inside a droopy grey cloak and hood, the other a lean, gangling thing with the head of a boar, covered in tattoos and bone beads.

I stomped a foot down onto the cloak, slammed my clawed hand into the body behind it, and ripped out something ropy and hot and slippery. The boar-headed thing tore at my body with its tusks, and I felt bright, distant pain on my ribs. I drove a foot up between its legs in a kick that lifted it six inches off the ground, and took off an ear and half its face with my claws.

I sensed Fix at my back and heard him grunt, “Down!”

I dropped to my knees and bounced back up again. In the time I was down, his sword flicked out over my head, drove into the chest of the boar thing, and whistled out again, taking heart’s blood with it.

Then there was a roar, a sound that came from something truly enormous, and someone slammed a tree trunk into my lower back. It took me off my feet and sent silver pain through my body. I landed in a roll and came up to mostly steady feet, one hand supporting some of my weight, the other up in a defensive posture.

It was the rawhead.

Rawheads are parasites, creatures that assemble bodies for themselves out of the bone and blood of freshly dead beings. They were more common when every farm and village did some slaughtering each day, back before grocery stores and fast food. As I noted before, this one was enormous, bigger than a couple of large steers, twelve feet tall and weighing at least a ton. The cloak had been torn from it, and now it looked like a bizarre sculpture of bones of various creatures, drenched in fresh blood. It had the skull of something big, maybe a hippo or a rhino, and luminous lights danced in the empty eye sockets. It drew in a huge, wheezing breath and roared again.

Fix was picking himself up off the ground, bounding up as if he hadn’t been hurt at all—but the Redcap and four other Sidhe were stalking toward him with weapons drawn. Fix faced them squarely, blade in hand, a small smile on his plain face.

“My, my, my,” Maeve said. She stepped around the leg of the rawhead into sight, giving me a frankly appraising stare. “Who would have thought you would dirty up so well, wizard? I mean, the claws, the blood, the eyes.” She shivered. “It gets to me. I’ve always had a thing for bad boys.”

I smiled around the nail. “Funny. Because I’ve got something for you, too.”

“Yeah?” she asked, and licked her lips. “You finally gonna nail me, big guy? You’ve been so coy.”

“I’m done teasing,” I said.

Maeve slipped both hands behind her back, arching her body, thrusting her chest toward me. It wasn’t a particularly impressive chest, but it was well formed, and pale, and lovely, and hidden beneath entirely too much bikini for my taste. A snarl bubbled up out of my throat.