The Brightest Fell

  May preened. “I told you you’d have a good time if you’d let yourself. Everyone else is having fun, too.”

  She was right about that. Walther and Marcia were carrying their song selections to the front, while Bridget—possibly the only person here aside from me and Quentin who wasn’t over-awed by the Luidaeg—was congratulating the Luidaeg on her performance. Arden was laughing so hard that she looked like she was going to hurt herself, while Madden grinned and took a drink of his own beer.

  So many of my friends and allies were here. So many people who trusted me, and who I trusted to have my back, no matter what. It was an odd thing to realize that I was outside my house and utterly relaxed, but I was. Maybe for the first time in a year, I felt like I could drop my guard and just exist.

  The stranger finished his song. Stacy jumped up onto the stage without waiting for the DJ to say anything, grabbing the microphone.

  “We’re here tonight because our friend Toby is getting married!” she shouted. The bar cheered, even the parts of it who weren’t with us.

  I groaned. “Oh, sweet Titania, no.”

  “Yes,” said May, taking my beer away.

  “Yup,” agreed Quentin, and pushed me off my stool.

  Kerry and Cassandra were suddenly there to grab me by my wrists and haul me to the stage, where Stacy had produced a headband that looked like a cross between a bridal veil and one of those ridiculous “fairy crowns” hippies like to sell at open-air farmer’s markets. They pushed me up the stairs. She plopped it onto my head and shoved the microphone into my hands, turning me to face the karaoke screen as the lyrics for “White Wedding” began to appear.

  “I am going to kill you all,” I said, and lifted the microphone, and sang.

  My life’s not so bad these days.

  TWO

  THE MINT STOPPED SERVING alcohol at two; the karaoke DJ left at two-thirty; thanks to some reservation magic on May and Stacy’s part, they didn’t kick us out until three, by which time everyone was well on their way to sober, or at least competent to get home without passing out on somebody’s front step.

  We thronged on the sidewalk, hugging, laughing, and saying good-bye one by one, like we wanted to make the party last as long as possible. I realized, with some surprise, that I was doing just that: I didn’t want the night to end. For once, nothing was trying to kill me or complicate my life. I didn’t have any quests to finish or problems to resolve. I got to exist, with no qualifiers. It was nice. I wanted it to continue.

  Arden walked over, offering an awkward smile and a fist-bump to the shoulder, which was about as close as the two of us were prepared to come to hugging. “I need to get back,” she said. “Nolan gets anxious if I leave him alone for too long.”

  Nolan is her younger brother. He’s technically Crown Prince in the Mists now that she’s Queen, and most importantly, he’s awake. That part’s new. He spent more than eighty years asleep, courtesy of the usurper who’d been sitting on his family’s throne. He’s a nice guy. A little flustered-looking every time I’ve seen him so far, but that makes sense, given how dramatically things have changed—both in the mortal world and in Faerie—during the years he missed.

  “May invited him,” I said. “We would have been happy to have him.”

  Arden’s laughter was bright and sincere. “Oh, no. He’s not ready for The Mint. I’ll try him on a piano bar first, someplace nice and calm where they serve wine and sing old standards. We’ll get there. It’s just going to take time.”

  “Well, I’m glad you came,” I said.

  “Me, too.”

  Madden was less restrained. He walked over and hugged me hard, the action lifting my feet off the ground. “Bye, Toby,” he said.

  “Good-bye and put me down,” I replied.

  He laughed.

  That was enough to break the seal on the party. Arden and Madden walked around the corner of the nearest alley; the scent of redwood sap and blackberry flowers drifted through the air, erasing the normal mortal scents of gasoline and stale beer, and I knew they were gone. Danny loaded Kerry, Stacy, and Cassandra into his cab, promising to get them home safely, all while trying to lure me into the cab for a ride that I neither wanted nor needed, but appreciated all the same. Dianda, still in her sequined cocktail dress, ruffled Dean’s hair, waved to me, and started walking down the street toward the Bay, her shoes dangling from her hand.

  Quentin stepped up next to me. “She’s going to get mugged,” he said.

  “And that will be very educational for the muggers,” I agreed. Dianda fought to win. Anyone who tried to get in her way was going to have a bad night indeed. “Dean coming home with you?”

  “Not tonight.” Quentin yawned. “He has stuff to do at Goldengreen, so he’s escorting Marcia home. Bridget parked there.”

  “Then it’s down to family.” That was nice, too. There’s something to be said for returning to a quiet house after a night out with friends.

  May and Jazz waited a few yards away, arms around each other. I waved to the remaining party-goers one last time before walking over to join them. May smiled at me.

  “I told you you’d have a good time,” she said.

  “Yes, you did,” I agreed. “Let’s go home.”

  Walking through San Francisco after last call is like stepping into a different world. Sure, there will be a few drunks on the streets, but they tend to disappear once the bars close, retreating to their homes or slipping into the nearest alley to look for someone who can provide them with a drink. It was late enough that the homeless population had mostly pulled back into the parks and their tent cities under the freeway overpasses, trying to get a good night’s sleep before the day people woke up and started complaining about them ruining property values by daring to exist.

  Humans can be surprisingly cruel to their own kind sometimes. The fae may be terrible, but at least we largely don’t pretend otherwise.

  “We.” That’s an interesting word choice. My father was human: my mother is fae. Not just fae, but Firstborn, barely removed from Oberon himself. That makes me a changeling, and for years, my human heritage was the only thing I wanted to acknowledge, like the things I’d inherited from my mother were just inconvenient tweaks of biology that would eventually go away.

  They haven’t gone away. They’ve gotten stronger, thanks to my talent for winding up in situations where blood is the only answer. I’ve been sliding farther and farther from my humanity, burning it out of myself one drop at a time in exchange for the power I need to survive. Coffee used to wake me up. Alcohol used to stay in my system for more than fifteen minutes. I used to stay hurt, instead of healing so fast that my skin has been known to heal around the weapons used against me. My body has become a locked-room mystery only I can solve, and every time I feel like I’ve figured it out, something else changes.

  The commercial streets dropped away, leaving the four of us to wander down residential streets, past quiet brownstone homes with their Victorian facades and tiny, artfully tended gardens. This was the old San Francisco, far-removed from the tech boom consuming downtown. Most of the people who lived here had been in the city for generations, clinging to their family homes with all their might, refusing to let go, refusing to be moved, despite increasing pressure to sell to millionaires who liked the idea of living in a classic home.

  Some of the millionaires are baffled by how hard it is to buy into this neighborhood. They keep accusing tenants of collusion, of conspiracy, of snobbish insistence that only the “right” people should live in the area. They’re sort of right. There is a conspiracy to keep them out. It’s just that the conspiracy is a lot less human than they assume. Fully half the rental properties in the neighborhood are owned by fae landlords like my liege, Duke Torquill, who bought them for a song when they were newly-constructed and still smelled like fresh wood and paint.

  Pureblooded fae have a
thing about land. They like to own it. In the Summerlands, the last of the fae realms accessible to us, the king is the land, and a demesne will thrive or fail based on the health of its ruler. They like owning land more than they like having mortal money, especially when owning the land makes them rich without needing to do anything more than refuse to give it up. Those tech millionaires could offer forever, but the fae landlords of San Francisco would never sell.

  Sylvester and I have had some rocky spots recently, starting when he lied about some life-changing details of my mother’s past and progressing from there. I’m working on forgiving him; he’s working on being honest with me. But even when things were at their worst, he’d tried to look out for me the best way he knew how; that much, at least, has always been true. Among other things, he’s the reason my little band of weirdoes has a place to live in one of the most expensive cities in the mortal world. The tech millionaires might not know how to get into this neighborhood. All I’d had to do was ask.

  Our house is one of the few on the block that was never split into a duplex. It’s painted in eye-searingly bright colors that seem garish and aggressive during the day, but are beautiful at night, which is when fae eyes are most likely to see them. I smiled wearily as we started up the walkway to the front door, already digging in the pocket of my leather jacket for the keys.

  Quentin stopped one step from the top. May and Jazz stopped below him, and I took the last step on my own, raising my hand to tap the air in front of me. It flashed red, a tingle running through my fingertip as the wards reacted. I relaxed a little. Nothing had tried to break in while we were all out of the house.

  “Not to rush you, but some of us need the bathroom,” said May.

  “That is rushing me,” I said. I tapped the air again, and chanted, “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage.” The wards flared more violently before dissolving into the smell of cut-grass and copper.

  May wrinkled her nose as she pushed past me, snatched the keys out of my hand, and unlocked the door. “Most people don’t use Macbeth to seal their wards, you know.”

  “Most people are boring,” I said. I took my keys back, following her into the hall.

  The lights were on. So was the television, the sound drifting out of the living room. May and I exchanged a glance. Then she smirked, patted me on the shoulder, and said, “It’s your problem,” before heading for the bathroom.

  “I’m going to make some tea,” said Jazz, and ducked into the kitchen, leaving me alone with Quentin.

  “Cowards,” he said amiably.

  “Yup,” I agreed. “But we love them anyway.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I’ll be honest. I don’t really know.”

  He laughed, and walked with me to the living room door, where we peeped inside. One of the recent BBC versions of Much Ado About Nothing was playing on the television. Tybalt has his reservations about much modern technology, but the discovery that he could order DVDs from England and watch Shakespeare performed in London in the comfort of my own home had been a revelation to him. I was pretty sure he’d forgive humanity for almost anything if it meant he could have his Shakespeare.

  I love him for a lot of reasons. The way he looks in leather pants is surprisingly far down the list.

  Nothing moved apart from the TV. I stepped into the room, walking around the couch and stopping to smile. Besottedly, if the look on Quentin’s face was anything to go by. He could cope. I had just come from my bachelorette party, and if I wanted to take a moment to be soppy, that was my prerogative.

  Tybalt was asleep, slumped against the armrest. The reason he hadn’t stretched out was easy to see: Raj was taking up the rest of the couch, head in his uncle’s lap. It was a beautifully domestic moment, and I would have been tempted to take a picture if not for the fact that neither of them was wearing a human disguise. The stripes in Tybalt’s hair were visible, black against the darker brown, as were the sharp points of his ears. Raj’s hair was long enough that his ears were hidden. Nothing, however, could hide the black ticking on his otherwise russet hair, a color pattern that doesn’t naturally occur in anything except for Abyssinian cats.

  I took a moment to stand there and appreciate the two of them, my Cait Sidhe boys, both comfortable enough to go to sleep in my house and stay that way through the sound of the door opening. It was no mystery how they’d gotten in: Cait Sidhe have access to the Shadow Roads, one of the hidden routes through Faerie, and the wards were designed to let the two of them through. It wouldn’t make sense to lock my fiancé, or my squire’s best friend, out in the cold.

  Finally, I walked to the couch, knelt, and touched Tybalt’s hand, releasing the illusion that made me look human at the same time. The scent of it perfumed the air around me. “Hey, Sleeping Beauty,” I said. “Don’t make me kiss you in front of the boys. I’d never hear the end of it.”

  Tybalt opened his eyes and smiled. My chest seemed to get tighter and lighter at the same time. It wasn’t a strange sensation anymore. I felt that way every time he smiled at me like that, like I was some sort of miracle.

  “October,” he said, voice still hazy with sleep. “If you do not wish to kiss me in front of our charges, I’m afraid our wedding will be a dull affair.” He paused, smile fading into a puzzled frown. “What in the world is that thing on your head?”

  “Party hat,” I said, reaching up and whisking the offending veil away. “Blame May.”

  “A sentence with merit in almost all situations,” he agreed. He sat up, stretching languidly, before shaking Raj brusquely by the shoulder. “Up, kitten. It’s time for napping somewhere that is not atop your King.”

  Raj made a grumpy noise, and didn’t move.

  “Awaken, Prince of Cats, or suffer the consequences.”

  Raj made a grumpier noise, and didn’t move.

  “Alas, you did not heed my warnings, and now you must pay,” said Tybalt, before reaching over and hauling me into his lap, a gesture which planted my butt atop Raj’s head.

  That was enough to wake Raj. He squawked in startled disapproval and sat up, leaving me to drop the final few inches into Tybalt’s lap, where I fit comfortably. It was a position I had a lot of practice with.

  “You sat on me!” Raj protested. His hair was ruffled, sticking up in all directions.

  It was all I could do not to laugh as Tybalt slid an arm around my waist, looked serenely at Raj, and said, “No, she did not. I placed her atop you, when you refused to wake and move. This is why you should listen to your betters.”

  “I’m a Prince of Cats,” said Raj.

  “And I am a King, and she is my consort. You see? There are two people in this room who are better than you. Go and torment Quentin, if you wish to match wits with an equal.”

  “I heard that,” said Quentin from the doorway.

  “I intended that you should,” said Tybalt, without rancor.

  Raj glowered at us both before running a hand through his hair to smooth it and hopping over the back of the couch. A few seconds later, I heard him talking to Quentin in the hall, voice pitched low enough that I couldn’t tell what he was saying. Their footsteps moved down the hall.

  “At last,” said Tybalt. “We’re alone.” With that, he leaned in, and kissed me.

  Kissing Tybalt is an activity I used to fantasize about, back when repression and denial were my only bedfellows. These days, it’s something I get to do, and reality has never disappointed. He kissed me slow and languid, like he was in no hurry, like there was nothing in the world he would rather be doing. I knew that wasn’t entirely true—there were plenty of things he liked to do with me that didn’t involve kissing, largely because our mouths were otherwise occupied—but that sort of focus was undeniably exciting. I shifted in his lap, pulling myself closer, easing my arms around him, until we were necking on my living
room couch like a pair of teenagers.

  That was nice, too, and definitely a point in favor of my increased alcohol tolerance. In the old days, I would either have passed out already, or be nursing my third cup of coffee as I attempted to combat the impending hangover. Instead, I was awake, alert, and raring to go.

  Tybalt was smiling when he broke away, leaning forward just enough to rest his forehead against mine. “I take it the party went well?” he asked.

  “The Luidaeg showed up.”

  He blinked. “That raises more questions than it answers, I think.”

  “She sang. It was possibly the weirdest thing I have ever seen. But she was pretty good. It was fun. I wish you could have been there.”

  “The entire point of the bachelorette party is for the bride-to-be to get out and explore the nightlife without her betrothed on her arm. My presence would have confused the issue. Besides, I have no doubt your lovely Lady Fetch would have demanded I sing also, and I had no desire to make a public spectacle of myself.” He settled back into the cushions, smiling at me languidly. “Well, then, bride-to-be? Did you find yourself a finer suitor during your night of freedom? Am I to be cast aside, never again to know the safe haven of your arms?”

  “You’re a nerd,” I said, and swatted him in the arm. “You seemed all cool and mysterious back when I was afraid of you, but I’m not afraid of you anymore, and I can see clearly that you are a nerd.”

  “I never denied it,” he said, and leaned in to kiss me again.

  The doorbell rang. We both froze.

  The doorbell ringing isn’t that unusual. In addition to serving as a knight errant and hero of the realm, I still work as a mortal P.I., handling cheating spouses, small thefts, and the occasional custody dispute. Since I don’t have an office, my clients come to the house, and people who want to hire a private investigator aren’t usually bound by normal business hours. I’ve had human clients show up as late as one o’clock in the morning. Fae are largely nocturnal and have been known to show up at two or three, apologizing for the proximity to dawn, but fully expecting me to be awake.