CHAPTER
EIGHT
DETECTIVE LUCY TATE was tall, dark haired, and dressed in the female version of the plainclothes detective pantsuit, black with a white dress shirt this time. It seemed only color varied for the detectives of the homicide bureau. When Lucy had first come through the door I'd thought she had a murder she wanted a fey perspective on, but she'd had a trio of small teddy bears in her hands, and I was pretty certain that made it a friendly visit, not business. I'd been half right.
"Merry, it's reasonable for the local police to be worried that Maeve Reed's estate isn't safe. The bastard kidnapped you from there."
"I can't go into a safe house with the babies," I said. The room was almost empty now. Most of the flowers had gone to other people in the hospital, as had most of the toys. We'd kept flowers and presents from actual friends, or people whose gifts it would be impolitic not to keep, and just that had filled up a second SUV, leaving room only for a driver. Lucy's bears, two pink and one blue, had been newborn safe, and were tucked into the things we were keeping.
Doyle said, "This isn't a homicide issue, Detective; why are you here?"
"She's a friend, Doyle," I said.
"She is, but they sent her because they thought a friend could persuade you where the others had failed, isn't that right, Detective Tate?" He looked at her with that black-on-black gaze; his face was unreadable, blank so that it was almost threatening in its absolute neutrality. The way a wild animal will look at you: It doesn't want to hurt you, but if you crowd it, it will defend itself. If you don't crowd it, then you can depart in peace, but the warning is there. Back off, or things will go badly.
Lucy reacted to it by taking a half step back, one foot in front of the other in a stance that let her move if she needed to. I doubted she was even fully aware of what she'd done, but the cop in her had seen the implied threat and reacted accordingly. Doyle wouldn't attack and she wouldn't do anything to push that neutrality, but it was still unsettling to watch my friend and my love face off. I didn't want unsettling, I wanted settled. I wanted to just be happy with the babies and the loves of my life, but my family was going to make sure this milestone was as traumatic as they'd made every other important event in my life. My father had protected me from them as much as he could, but once he died it had just been me trying to survive. I was tired of this shit, so tired of it.
"I'm not going into a safe house, Lucy. I appreciate the thought, but human cops would just be cannon fodder if the king attacks us. Read the police report on what his power did to Doyle, and think what that would have done to a human being."
"I've seen the reports," she said.
"That's how they persuaded you to come down," I said.
She nodded. "He can turn light into heat and project it from his hand; that's like crazy."
"He is the King of Light and Illusion; he can do many things with light, especially daylight," Doyle said.
"Like what else can he do with light?" Lucy asked.
Doyle shook his head. "I'm hoping he hasn't regained all his old abilities; if he has, then it could go badly no matter where Merry is."
"Well, aren't you just a bundle of cheer," she said.
"Instead of being able to spend time with Merry and our children, I have spent the last day and night negotiating with one high court of faerie or another. The king's courtiers have assured me that he will wait until the DNA tests come back. If they show that none of the babes are his, then he will acknowledge he has no claim on them, or Merry."
"Merry was already pregnant when he ..." She stopped as if afraid she'd said too much.
"It's okay, Lucy, but the geneticist has informed us that it may not be that simple. The king is my great-uncle, and the sidhe of both courts have been intermarrying for centuries; we could share a lot of genetics. It's probably not enough to prove paternity, but enough to confuse the issue if my uncle wishes not to give up his claim."
"He won't give up," Doyle said.
"Is it true that if he's not able to have children, then he has to relinquish the throne?" she asked.
I fought to keep my face neutral. I hadn't known that the human police knew that, or any human knew that.
"The blank face from both of you is answer enough," she said.
I cursed softly inside my head--sometimes in trying so hard not to give something away, the very effort screams your answer. The big question was: Did the police know that it wasn't a matter of stepping down from the throne, but execution, for having cursed his court with infertility a century after Taranis knew he was infertile? The old idea that your health, prosperity, and fertility came from your king, or queen, was very true in faerie. Taranis was fighting for his very life. Did Lucy know that?
"What happens if he steps down?" she asked.
"He ceases to be king," Doyle said.
"That part I figured, but is he exiled from faerie?"
"No, why do you ask?" I said.
She shrugged. "Because exile would explain why he's so desperate to prove one of the babies is his."
"I think it's simpler than that, Lucy. I think he just can't stand the thought of not being absolute ruler of the Seelie Court after all these centuries. I think he'd do anything to keep his throne."
"Define anything," she said, and I didn't like the very shrewd look in her brown eyes. She was smart and very good at her job.
One of the babies made a sound from the cribs. Lucy had ignored them except for a brief glimpse at the cloth-wrapped bundles. She was here on business, not to see babies, but the noise made us turn to find out which baby was waking up.
It was Bryluen, moving fitfully in her basket like a crib within a crib. Doyle picked her up with his big, dark hands. The baby looked even tinier. Some of the fathers had been awkward holding them, but Doyle held our daughter with the same physical ease and grace with which he did everything. Bryluen's eyes were open enough to gleam in the light like dark jewels.
"May I hold her?" Lucy asked, and the request surprised me.
Doyle looked to me, and I said, "Of course. We're waiting for the nurse to bring the wheelchair; they won't let me walk out, and most of the other men are helping load the gifts."
Lucy didn't seem to hear me as Doyle laid Bryluen in her arms. Lucy didn't know how to hold the baby, which said she'd never really been around them. Doyle helped move her arms into place, and once she had the baby tucked into the crook of her arm she just stared down. Lucy's face got this happy, almost beatific glow to it, as if the world had narrowed down to the baby in her arms.
I hadn't expected Lucy to be that entranced with babies, but maybe she was having that "I'm in my midthirties and the clock is ticking" moment.
"Detective Tate," Doyle said.
She never reacted, just started humming softly and rocking Bryluen gently.
"Detective Tate," he said again, with a little more force to his voice.
When she didn't react this time, I moved closer to her and said, "Lucy, can you hear me?"
She never reacted, as we hadn't spoken.
"Lucy!" I said it sharply this time.
She blinked up at me as if she were waking from a dream. She stared at me, trying to say something, but she had to blink twice more to finally say, "What did you say?"
"I need to get Bryluen ready to go downstairs." I took the baby from her arms, and she was reluctant to let her go, but once she wasn't holding the baby Lucy seemed to recover herself. She shook visibly, like shaking off a nightmare, and said, "Wow, I just had that sensation like someone walked over my grave."
I nodded. "It happens."
She shivered again, and when she looked at me her eyes looked normal. Detective Tate was in there again.
"I'm sorry, Lucy, and I hope it doesn't get you in trouble with the higher-ups in your department, but we need to take more precautions against my uncle, and Maeve Reed's estate is more magically guarded than any safe house would be."
"We'll have police wizards on the detail, Merry.
"
"The last time you and I worked together, one of the bad guys was one of those wizards," I said.
"That's not fair, Merry."
"Perhaps not, but it's still true."
"You're saying that you don't trust the police?"
"No, I'm saying that no matter how safe you think you are, you're probably wrong."
"That sounds pretty hopeless," she said.
"I thought it sounded realistic."
She smiled, but it wasn't entirely a happy one. "We'll put extra patrols in your neighborhood. Call and we'll be there."
"I know that," I said.
"Promise if anything goes wrong you'll call the police and not try to handle it yourselves."
"I can't promise that."
"Because you're not allowed to lie," she said.
I nodded.
"You'll handle this internally, if you can, won't you?"
I nodded again, cuddling Bryluen to me.
She turned to Doyle. "Don't you or any of the people she loves play hero and get killed when we could have prevented it, okay?"
"We will endeavor not to," he said.
"I mean it. Merry loves you, and I don't want to hold her hand while she mourns you, or Frost, or Galen, or any of you guys. We're the police; it's our job to risk our lives to protect and serve."
"It is our job, as well, where Merry and the babes are concerned."
"Yeah, but Merry won't be devastated if we get hurt, and police dying in the line of duty won't lose the babies their dads."
He gave a small bow from his neck. "I will remember what you said, and thank you for putting our lives above yours for Merry's sake."
"I don't want to die, none of us do, but it's our job to stop this bastard from hurting her again."
"And ours," he said.
She frowned and made a little push-away gesture. "You're going to do what you're going to do; I'll tell them I tried."
"We really do appreciate you coming down, Lucy."
She smiled at me. "I know you do. I just really want to get this guy."
I realized that Lucy had taken my rape more personally, because we were friends. It made me care for her even more, and say with real feeling, "Thank you, Lucy."
She smiled a little wider. "I'll leave you to get the little tykes ready to leave, and go join the cops helping to keep back the crowd."
"I assume the press," I said.
"And just people wanting to see the little prince and princess; it's not every day that America gets newborn royals."
"True," I said, and smiled at her.
She smiled back and then left us with, "I'm not usually into babies, but she's a cute one."
We thanked her, and once the door closed behind her, Doyle and I looked at each other. He came to stand beside me, and we both looked down at Bryluen.
"Mustn't bespell the humans," I said to her.
She blinked those exotic-looking eyes at me. The little knit cap was tucked over most of her red curls and completely hid the horn buds. She was tiny and perfect, and already magical.
"Do you think she understands?" I asked.
"No, but that answers one question."
I looked up at him. "What question?"
"Maeve Reed has a human nanny for her baby, but we cannot risk human caregivers."
"You mean we can't risk the human caregivers being ensorcelled by the babies."
"Yes, that is what I mean."
I looked down at our little bundle of joy. "She's part demi-fey, or part sluagh, one has the best glamour in all faerie, and the other is some of the last of the wild magic left in faerie."
"There is wild magic about, my Merry." He motioned at the tree and the wild rose vines.
I smiled. "True, but I've never seen a baby bespell someone that quickly and that well. Lucy has a strong will, and was likely wearing some protections against faerie glamour just as a precaution. Most police that deal with us do."
"Yet Bryluen clouded her mind and senses as if it were nothing," Doyle said.
"It was very quick and well done. I've known sidhe with centuries of practice who couldn't have done it."
He placed his hand gently on top of her head, so very dark against the multicolored cap. Bryluen blinked up at us. "They are going to be very powerful, Merry."
"How do we teach them to control their powers if they have them this early, Doyle? Bryluen can't understand right from wrong yet."
"We will have to protect the humans from them until they are old enough to learn control."
"How long will that be?"
"I do not know, but we know now that they have come into the world with instinctive magic and there is no waiting until puberty for their powers to manifest."
"It would have been easier if their magic had waited," I said.
"It would, but I do not think our path was ever meant to be easy, my Merry; wondrous, beautiful, exciting, thrilling, even frightening, but not easy."
I raised Bryluen to lay a kiss upon her cheek. I loved her already; she was mine, ours, but I was a little frightened now. If she could make humans like her, want to hold and rock her, what else could she make them do? Child psychologists say that children are born sociopaths and have to learn to have a conscience. It happens around the age of two, usually, but until then there's no conscience to appeal to, no way to understand that something is wrong or right.
I held our beautiful little sociopath and prayed to the Goddess that she wouldn't hurt anyone before we'd had time to teach her that it was wrong.
The scent of roses filled the room, and it wasn't just the clean sweetness of the wild rose vine, but that richer musk that is more from cultivation than nature. It was a heady scent, and reassurance from the Goddess. Normally, it would have been enough to lay my fears to rest, but this time there was a kernel of unease that stayed inside my heart. How could I doubt her, after all she'd shown me, all she'd awakened around me? But it wasn't the Goddess I doubted, it was more just worry. I was a new mother, and mothers worry.
CHAPTER
NINE
MAEVE REED, THE Golden Goddess of Hollywood since about 1950, came to the hospital to escort us home to her house. We'd lived in her guesthouse when we first moved in with her, but as more fey had flocked to us, Maeve had moved us into the main house with her and left the guesthouse to new exiles from faerie who weren't as close to her. She was an exile herself, so she understood the confusion of being cast out from faerie and being thrust into the modern world.
Though very few exiles had succeeded as well as Maeve Reed at adapting to this brave, new world. The guard outside opened the door, and I heard Maeve's voice. "So happy you loved my last movie. Congratulations on your baby, he is adorable." Her voice was warm and utterly sincere, and in part it was the truth, but she had been a great actress for decades and could turn utter sincerity on and off like a well-oiled switch. I doubted I would ever be that skilled at being "on" for the public, and being merely mortal I wouldn't live long enough for the centuries of practice that had helped her get so very good at it.
She came breezing into the room with a casual wave of her hand that was too big a gesture for the room but would have looked great in a photo, as would the brilliant smile on her face. She was dressed in an oyster-white pantsuit that flowed and moved with her; a silk shell in a deep but subdued blue helped her not look quite the six feet that she was, forcing the eye down once it had started up those long legs. She smiled at me and I had a moment of catching the edge of the smile she'd used on the fan outside. It was a good smile, and sincere in its way, because she was genuinely happy that the woman liked her film, and meant the congratulations, but ... the moment the door closed behind her the smile vanished, and she had a moment where it was as if she laid down some invisible burden across her shoulders. Nothing could make her less than gorgeous with that perfect pale gold tan, the perfect blue eyes in subdued but equally perfect makeup, those cheekbones, those full, kissable lips, but she had a moment of looking tired.
Then she straightened up and those high, tight breasts pressed against the blue shell, perky forever without any need for cosmetic surgery.
Her gaze went to the fruit tree that was shedding its blossoms like a pink snow, and the roses on the other side of the room. "Ah, the new wonders. The nurses asked me when the plants would be going away."
"We aren't sure," Doyle said.
"Doyle, Frost, I stopped by the nursery first and the babies are beautiful."
"They are," Doyle said, as if to say, Of course.
"Welcome home, Maeve," Frost said.
She wasted a few extra watts of smile on him, but she didn't mean it. He wasn't pure sidhe enough for her; most of my men weren't. She'd made no secret about the fact that she'd have had sex with Rhys or Mistral, if they and I had been okay with it. Among humans it would have been an insult; among the fey if you found someone attractive and didn't let them know, it was an insult. She was afraid of Doyle, not because he'd done anything to her, but because she'd spent too many centuries seeing him as my aunt's assassin. She'd lost people she cared about to him long ago, so she never flirted with him. He was fine with that.
Then she turned to me, and the look on her face was suddenly cautious. She'd actually texted me before she came, asking if I was angry at her for neglecting me. I'd reassured her via text but realized I'd need to do more reassuring in person.
I held my hand out to her, and she came to me smiling, but it was a different smile, less perfect than on film, letting me see the uncertainty in her eyes. I valued that I got to see her when the cameras weren't rolling and she let down her guard.
"I'm so sorry that I couldn't come sooner. I saw the babies in the nursery and they are so beautiful."
"You had to fly back from Europe just to see us."
She took my hand in hers, studying my face. "How are you feeling, honestly?"
Her hand was warm, the bones long and delicate as I rubbed my fingers down them. "What's wrong, Maeve?"
"The media circus is in full swing outside, Merry." A frown showed between those perfect brows and those famous blue eyes. If only her legion of fans were ever allowed to see her eyes when they weren't hidden by faerie glamour to appear more human; as beautiful as she was now, stripped of all illusions she was even more so.