House of Earth and Blood

The next morning, Hunt cooks breakfast. He’s a far better chef than Bryce is. Afterward, they take Danika’s remaining clothes to Hunt’s team member, Viktoria, to have the Fae forensic program scan for anything suspicious. Hunt then receives a call instructing him to meet immediately with Micah.

Hunt gets a lecture from Micah about the need for speed in wrapping up the investigation before the Summit. As punishment for his lack of progress, Micah sends Hunt on another assassination mission. Bryce is frantic when she can’t reach him all day. He returns late at night, looking crushed.

Bryce thinks, “It was his job, his path to freedom, what he did for the Governor, and yet … And yet Bryce had never really considered it. What it did to him. What the consequences were” (499). Numbed with horror by his own actions, Hunt can barely speak to her. Bryce helps him clean off the victim’s blood and stays to comfort the angel until he falls asleep.

The following morning, Hunt and Bryce tiptoe around their mounting sexual attraction toward one another. When Bryce arrives at work, she finds that her employer, Jesiba, has purchased a dangerous sea creature called a nøkk and installed its tank in the downstairs library. “With the tank spanning the entire length of one side of the library, there would be no escaping its presence, unless the nøkk went down to the cluster of dark rocks at the bottom” (511). Lehabah is terrified of the monster. This is another way for Jesiba to intimidate her employees from a distance.

Later in the morning, Bryce gets a call from her mother, who has gotten word of her daughter’s live-in bodyguard. Bryce agrees to a video chat between her parents, herself, and Hunt that evening.

By afternoon, the investigators learn that Danika’s clothing was saturated with trace elements of a mysterious substance. “There, on the Fae’s Mimir screening, lay the results: small bits of something synthetic. Not organic, not technological, not magic—but a combination of all three” (516).

Bryce says that Danika used to freelance for Redner Industries, the company owned by the family of her ex-boyfriend Reid. Hunt’s wraith co-worker, Viktoria, explains that the substance found on Danika’s clothing is called synth. In addition to its medicinal uses, it has become a street drug.

Bryce calls Ruhn to find out what his medwitch friend has been able to learn about synth. He says that obsidian salt is one of its ingredients, so it has the power to summon demons, among its other properties. The investigators plan to find out who is selling the drug on the streets, but first, they need to prepare for the family video call by cleaning the apartment.

The call with Bryce’s mother, Ember, and her stepfather, Randall, goes well. They know about Hunt’s reputation but seem willing to overlook it. When Hunt mentions that Bryce still hasn’t seen a healer about her kristallos leg injury from two years earlier, her mother insists that she get it treated.

After the call, Bryce tells Hunt that she will refuse to get the injury repaired. It is her way of keeping Danika and the pack alive in her memory. Hunt tries to persuade her away from that idea. To distract her, he asks about how her parents met. Bryce says that her mother was the Autumn King’s lover. She ran away from him before he realized that she was pregnant. After seeking refuge in a temple to avoid him, Ember met Randall Silago, a former sharpshooter and resistance fighter who was on the point of taking religious vows. He accompanied her to safety away from the Fae king, and the two fell in love.

Now in a more mellow frame of mind, Bryce proposes that she and Hunt spend the evening on the couch watching reality TV. Hunt thinks, “All of it felt only natural. He let himself settle into the feeling. And wasn’t that the most dangerous thing he’d ever done” (535).

The following day the two set out for the Meat Market, intending to find out who is dealing synth. While there, they receive a tip to check with the mer folk on the river. Summoning Tharion, Bryce and Hunt learn that Danika was spotted in a boat on the river with a shipment of synth. Tharion doesn’t know if she was the buyer, the seller, or simply confiscating the merchandise.

Bryce follows up with a phone call to her assassin friend, Fury, to find out if Danika ever mentioned synth to her. Fury says that Danika was concerned about keeping the drug away from Bryce. All her friends knew her tendency to indulge in party drugs, no matter how dangerous. Fury says, “It gives humans Vanir powers and strength for like an hour. And then it can seriously fuck you up. Make you addicted and worse. For the Vanir, it’s even riskier—a crazy high and superstrength, but it can easily turn bad” (545).

Bryce then calls Ruhn to see if his medwitch friend can shed more light on the mysterious drug. She has been researching an antidote to counteract its effects. Apparently, the venom from a kristallos might be a key ingredient. Redner Industries patented the drug as a medication 10 years earlier.

Bryce tells Hunt her theory that Danika must have been trying to prevent the spread of the drug. She was probably also concerned about someone repairing Luna’s Horn with it, which is why she took the artifact. They discuss the difficulty of getting any more kristallos venom to make an antidote.

The next day, Bryce is moody and uncommunicative. In the evening, Hunt finds her in the Bone Quarter, near the Black Dock, where funerals are held. She explains that this is Danika’s birthday, and everyone has forgotten about it. “It sucks […] It sucks that everyone just … moves on, and forgets. They expect me to forget. But I can’t” (555).

Bryce explains her fierce attachment to Danika. In college, the shifter immediately befriended her even though she had no magical gifts like Fury or Juniper. She was accepted for who she was. Hunt reveals a similar experience with Shahar, who saw something special in the humble soldier and chose him to lead her armies. He confesses that he would have done anything for her. Bryce observes that she and Hunt mirror one another’s loss.

Bryce has bought a box of Danika’s favorite chocolate croissants to commemorate her birthday. When she opens the box, she finds that someone has written the word “Trash” on top. Hunt is furious at the insult, knowing that the wolfpack is behind it. He goes in search of their Alpha, Amelie, and threatens to kill her if she ever harasses Bryce again.