‘Oh,’ Zayanna said. She looked around at the cages and terrariums. ‘Drat. I hadn’t thought of that. I’m so glad you didn’t try it with the spiders. It would have absolutely spoiled things if you’d caught up with me that early.’
Irene wanted very badly to grab Zayanna by the shoulders and scream at her that this wasn’t some sort of game – that the Library might be destroyed, that Irene could have been killed. That things didn’t just happen in a vacuum, but that cause led on to effect. She saw that her hand was shaking, and she put the glass of jenever down before she spilled it. ‘I can see that would have cut things short,’ she agreed. Why aren’t the men here yet?
Zayanna sighed. ‘Darling, I’m not getting much of a sense of engagement from you here. You’re being very analytical about it all. Don’t you want to swear vengeance or anything? I did betray you, after all. I knew that you’d be protective if you thought I was in trouble, just like you were with that dragon you saved . . . Where is he, by the way?’
‘I sent him home,’ Irene said. She’d been expecting that question. ‘It was too risky for him to stay in this world.’
‘Probably a good thing. I’m certainly not in this to start a war with his family.’ Zayanna poured herself more jenever. ‘And he’s so incredibly possessive. Such a bore.’
‘Some people might say that was the pot calling the kettle black,’ Irene remarked drily.
Zayanna pouted. ‘Irene, you’re being unfair. I don’t want to keep you out of danger or stop you doing your Librarian thing. Totally the contrary. That’s why I don’t want . . . anyone to kill you.’
‘But if Alberich destroys the Library—’ Irene tried.
Zayanna looked blank. ‘You can find another patron, can’t you? You won’t stop being what you are.’
‘And nor will you, it seems.’ Regret fought with anger, and for a moment Irene wished she could be stupid enough to drink that glass of jenever. It might help her feel a little better about the fact that Zayanna wasn’t, and didn’t want to be, anything other than a manipulative Fae who was far more interested in playing the game than in why it was being played. Irene thought of that list of destroyed gates and dead Librarians. They were real. Compared to that, the fact that she’d once liked Zayanna and thought of her as a friend was as important as . . . well, as a dead giant Asian hornet.
‘So what now?’ Zayanna leaned forward eagerly. ‘Do tell me, darling. Are you meditating a simply devastating countermove? Will you leap across the table and attack me? Or are you going to flee into the London night?’
‘Fleeing wouldn’t work very well,’ Irene said. ‘You’d probably have the werewolves hunt me down.’
‘Oh, drat – you guessed that one. I could drop you into a pit of snakes, maybe? We always used to do that back home. And then we’d have cocktails.’ ‘You have a pit of snakes?’
‘Next door,’ Zayanna confirmed. ‘Or I can keep you in chains or something.’
‘Which you also have next door?’ Irene leaned forward, resting her hands on the drinks table, casually sliding her thumbs under its lip. ‘Don’t worry. I do understand that you don’t have a choice in the matter. Being what you are.’
Zayanna looked hurt. ‘Irene darling, that didn’t sound very kind.’
‘It wasn’t meant to be.’ Irene gave up trying to categorize her feelings, and settled for the fact that she could feel both anger and pity for Zayanna without them being mutually exclusive. ‘It really wasn’t.’
‘But we’re friends.’ Zayanna gave her the most human smile she’d given yet that evening. ‘Don’t you remember? We went swimming together in Venice, and you told me about your old school?’
‘And you got drunk and complained about how you always had to milk the serpents, and you never got to seduce any of the heroes,’ Irene agreed. This conversation had reached the point where awkward choices were going to have to be made, and she couldn’t wait for the men any longer. ‘I’m sorry that you lost your patron.’
‘Bah,’ Zayanna said dismissively. ‘I’ve had more fun in the last few months than I did for decades before that! This is what I was meant to be, darling.’
Irene nodded understandingly. And then she thrust the table upwards, bottles and all, dumping them all over Zayanna.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
The table went over in a crash of bottles and glasses. Zayanna cried out in anger, shoving it off her, but she was well doused in a spray of vodka, gin and other expensive spirits. The floor was littered with broken glass. Irene sprang to her feet and took advantage of the other woman’s confusion to grab her by the shoulders and drag her off the divan, dropping her on the floor. ‘No pressing any buttons,’ she said. ‘No releasing any snakes or scorpions, or whatever.’
‘Guards!’ Zayanna shrieked. There was an undertone of panic to her voice. ‘Guards! Get in here now!’
The far door swung open. Kai was standing there, with Vale and Singh. ‘I’m afraid they’re not available,’ he said. ‘Will we do?’
Irene was just starting to enjoy the look on Zayanna’s face when a single click sounded. She half-glanced sideways, not taking her attention off Zayanna for a second. A cage door had swung open, and a long green serpent was tentatively wriggling out of its enclosure. More clicks sounded, like a house of cards ever so slowly collapsing, as other cage doors opened.
‘It was a dead man’s switch,’ Zayanna spat. She touched her throat nervously. ‘It was supposed to activate if I took my foot off it. Do you think I’m stupid? Now let me go!’
‘No,’ Irene said firmly. ‘Not an option. You’re going to tell me the truth.’
Zayanna came to her feet in a sudden motion, but instead of charging towards Irene, she bolted away. Irene had been expecting some sort of reaction, but the other woman’s sheer speed took her by surprise. So she ended up rugby-tackling Zayanna, rather than anything more elegant. The two of them went down together, rolling across the alcohol-splattered floor. Little scratching noises of skittering insect feet sounded uncomfortably close.
Irene managed to hold Zayanna down, getting a knee in the small of her back and twisting an arm behind her. ‘You’re not getting away,’ she grunted. ‘Stop wasting time—’