“Bloodier, too,” said Quentin. He sounded almost cheerful about it. I shot him a glare. He grinned. There was an element of relief in his expression, like he was glad to finally have everything out in the open. “Don’t worry. Like I said, my parents approve of you.”
“That worries me even more,” I muttered.
“What does?” Arden demanded.
I turned.
She was standing by the base of the stairs, with foxtail briars snagged on the legs of her pants and a distinctly windblown look to her hair. She folded her arms, glared, and said, “Your shoes are now safely hidden on Alcatraz. In the middle of a field. In a hole. Is that good enough, or do you need me to put them somewhere else? After all, it’s not like there’s anything urgent I need to be taking care of.”
“We’re going to get your brother back,” I said. It seemed like the only thing I could say. Arden kept glaring. I pushed on. “Right now, the Queen having your brother is a good thing.”
Her mismatched eyes widened. “What?”
“Hear me out.” I raised my hands to ward her off. “She’s not going to hurt him. He’s bait. She wants you to rush in there half-cocked, so she can arrest you on some bullshit charge. She arrested Dianda for sedition. There’s no reason for that, unless she’s planning to try and present you as a figurehead. The way I see it, if the Queen gets close enough to offer you a deal, she will: your brother for you publicly renouncing your father. Say you’re not a Windermere. Let her keep the throne, and ensure you have no valid claim to it in the future.”
“Fine,” Arden snapped. “If it gets my brother back, fine.”
“And if it gets Dianda convicted?”
“She’s a big girl. She can stand on her own two fins.”
“You have watched way too many Disney movies.” I stepped closer. “If you renounce your claim to the throne, Dianda stays in the Queen’s dungeon for however long it takes to set up a trial with the Undersea. I’ve been in that dungeon. The amount of iron in there will break her long before she sees the open sea again. Her family will never get her back. You want to do all this to save your brother. Think about what that does to Dean’s mom.”
Arden’s glare didn’t waver. “She made her choice.”
“I know. But what you don’t seem to understand is that you’re not making your choice. You’re making the choice the Queen is trying to force you into, and that isn’t going to be the right choice for you or your brother. Where are you going to go, Arden? With Dianda in custody, you can’t take Nolan and run to the Undersea. Silences is a puppet government. Angels has its own problems. You could head inland I guess, to Frozen Salt or Skytower, but you’d never be able to stop running. Your parents were assassinated. Do you honestly think the Queen of the Mists is above making sure Nolan doesn’t wake up and start this all over again?”
“This is your fault,” said Arden quietly.
“Maybe. Or maybe it was always going to happen. The Luidaeg sent me to find you. Someone would have done it eventually, if not me.” My stomach was starting to ache again. I had to fight to keep from reaching for the baggie of blood gems. “As long as she has Nolan but not you, he’s safe. This is the moment where you step up. This is when you fix things.”
She kept glaring for a few more seconds. Then she seemed to wilt before my eyes, her shoulders slumping, her chest collapsing as she stopped holding herself rigidly upright. “I was supposed to protect him,” she said.
“This is how you protect him,” I said. “You protect your family by making the world a better place for them to live. Not by running away.”
“I don’t know what to do,” said Arden. Madden whined and put his hand on her shoulder. She sighed, resting her cheek against it.
And I smiled.
“That’s okay, because I do,” I said. “Danny, can you drive Quentin back to the house?”
“Not if it means leavin’ you here,” he said.
“You won’t be,” I said. “I just don’t want Arden going out in public yet. She and I will meet you there.”
Arden blinked. “We will?”
“We will,” I said. “I have a plan.” It was a terrible plan. It was still a plan.
After a moment, Arden nodded. “All right,” she said. “What do we do?”
TWENTY-ONE
THE PASSAGE THROUGH ARDEN’S PORTAL was surprisingly easy, especially when compared to my recent trips through the Shadow Roads. One second, we were in the basement at Borderlands, and the next, we were standing amidst the riotous explosion of carefully overgrown flowers that was my backyard.
Arden frowned at the house. “I recognize this neighborhood.”
“We’re pretty close to the bookstore; you should feel right at home. Dolores Park is right over there.” I started up the path to the back door, grimacing as I walked. It seemed like I was stepping on every possible pebble and twig the yard had to offer, and my bare feet didn’t appreciate the experience. “I should warn you, I have roommates, and they’re a little . . . well, unique.”
“I live in a basement with my comatose brother, and one of my best friends thinks a good afternoon is spent chasing Frisbees around the dog park,” said Arden. “How unique can they be?”
“Just keep thinking that, okay?” I said, and unlocked the door, stepping into the kitchen. “May! Jazz! I’m home, and I brought company!”
“Toby!” May came hurtling into the kitchen, still holding the remote control in one hand. She ignored both Arden and the open door as she flung her arms around me, pulling me into a hug that was tighter than my lungs approved of. “You’re okay! Jazz said she didn’t see you when the flock mobbed the intersection, I was so worried, don’t do that to . . . me . . .” Her voice trailed off as she finally noticed Arden. “You meant actual company.”
“I did,” I said, and disentangled myself from May’s arms. “May, this is Arden. Arden, this is my housemate, May.”
“You must be Toby’s sister,” said Arden, shutting the front door.
“I’m her Fetch, actually,” said May, staring at Arden. “I . . . forgive me. You look a lot like someone I used to know.”
“Fetch?” said Arden, looking horrified.
“It’s a long story, and she’s not a death omen anymore,” I said. “May’s retired.” May also had the memories of every face she’d ever worn back when she was a night-haunt. The odds that she’d eaten someone who knew King Gilad were more than reasonably high, given how many fae died in the 1906 earthquake. I elbowed her before she could say anything. “Is Jazz here? I wanted to let her know how much I appreciated the assist.”
“Um, yeah, she’s here, but she had to go back to bed,” said May, shaking off whatever memory she’d been trying not to share. “Diurnal, remember?”
“I remember.” I started toward the dining room, gesturing for Arden to follow. “We’re just here to pick up supplies—and you—and then we have to get moving. The Queen has Arden’s brother. We need to get him back.”
“Oh,” said May, blinking. “Well. That’s not good. I’m happy to be picked up, I guess. There’s nothing on TV right now anyway. Where are your shoes?”
“Alcatraz.”
May looked at me blankly.
“Arden took them there when we realized the Queen was using them to track me. Remember how she didn’t turn my sneakers into high heels? She turned them into tracking devices instead. Remind me never to assume that she’s doing anything without an ulterior motive.” I paused at the base of the stairs. “Arden, there’s stuff for sandwiches in the fridge, if you want one. May, Danny and Quentin are behind me.”
“Make sandwiches, got it,” she said. Hooking her arm through Arden’s, she said, “You can help,” and hauled the startled-looking Princess back into the kitchen. I shook my head fondly. Then I turned and walked up the stairs to my room. I needed shoes, and jeans that didn’t have gaping holes where the knees used to be.
More than that, I needed weapons.
I used to carry two
knives everywhere I went. I still carried the silver one, but I’d been forced to put the iron knife away after Mom shifted the balance of my blood to turn me more fae than human. Well, I was almost human now. That had to come with a few advantages.
The bedroom door was closed. I opened it, reaching inside and fumbling for the light switch. I never found it. Instead, hands grabbed my wrists and hauled me forward, into the darkness. I had time to squeak before a mouth was clamped over mine, and I was being kissed with ruthless firmness. The hands released my wrists, going to my waist, pulling me closer. I didn’t fight; my brief panic had passed as quickly as it had come. I couldn’t taste his magic—my senses were wrapped in cotton by the change in my blood—but a man can’t kiss you as many times as Tybalt had kissed me without becoming familiar.
I slid my hands up his arms to his shoulders, and then into his hair, allowing myself a few precious seconds of melting into his arms. Tybalt pulled back first, his eyes glittering green in the light that bled through from the hall. “Welcome home,” he said, voice rough.
“Hi,” I said, barely above a whisper. I pulled my hands out of his hair, resting them on his shoulders. He didn’t let go of my waist. “Have you been here long?”
“I arrived seconds before you did,” he said. “I was going to ask May to phone you when I heard your voice from downstairs.” He kissed me again, more softly. Then he stopped, nostrils flaring. “I smell blood. Are you hurt?”
“It’s nothing major. I fell down while I was running away from the Queen’s guards on Valencia,” I said. “I need new jeans and some Neosporin, and then I’ll be as good as new. Did you find Mom?”
“Don’t evade. Are you aware that ‘when I was running away from the Queen’s guards’ is not a reassuring statement?”
“Who’s evading?” I held up my skinned palms, showing him the damage. “I used to hurt myself worse than this falling off the playground swings. I’m fine. But if we want this sort of thing to not be a problem, we need to get me back to normal, and that means finding Mom. Did you have any luck?”
“Her tower gates were closed.” He sounded defeated. His shoulders slumped. “I circled, but there was no entry to be found. I called for every cat in the Summerlands who would answer me, and some who would not. None of them had seen her. Your mother has vanished, October, and I know not to where.”
“Then we stick with Plan A. We get Arden on the throne, we get access to the treasury, and we hope chest the extra human right out of me.” I pulled away from him, turning to flip the light switch.
Tybalt caught my wrist. I turned to blink at him.
“What?”
“Would you return yourself to your former state if it weren’t for the goblin fruit?” he asked. “I remember a time when this was what you wanted.”
“Would you leave me if I still wanted that? If I still wanted to be human?”
Tybalt laughed a little, shaking his head. “No. But you would eventually ask me to. I am . . . not sure . . . I could stop myself from wanting to protect you. I want to protect you anyway, but normally you can do that on your own. Now . . .”
“I wanted to be human once,” I admitted. “I wanted to sleep at night, and age like the people I saw on the street, and not have to worry about being carried off by a Kelpie just because it was hungry and I was in the wrong place to stay out of its way. I mean, the Kelpies would have still been there, I just wouldn’t have known, but . . . that’s not the point. People change. I changed. I have a life in Faerie. I’m not giving it up for anything, and definitely not because of something as stupid as getting hit with a pie.” My stomach clenched again. I winced. “Okay. You need to let go of me now.”
“October? What’s wrong?”
“Seriously, let me go.” Tybalt released my arm. I dug the baggie of blood gems Walther had made out of my pocket and popped two of them into my mouth. It barely took the edge off. I didn’t care. That was going to have to be enough, because I would need to be in way worse straits before I took another piece of the Luidaeg’s blood.
“Toby?”
I raised a finger, closing my eyes as I waited for the snarling in my stomach to subside. Tybalt was watching me with open anxiety when I opened them again. I sighed. “Better, for now. We need to move. Are you sticking with us?”
“Unless you have another fool’s errand for me to undertake,” he said.
“The only fool’s errand I have left is deposing a Queen, installing a Princess in her place, and fixing my,” I waved a hand to indicate my too-human body, “little problem.” I started for the dresser where I kept my iron knife, safely muffled in a bundle of yarrow branches and silk.
“Have you considered that curing your addiction may result in humanity no longer being an option for you?”
The question was mild. I stiffened but didn’t turn as I opened the drawer and started moving sweaters aside. “I did.”
“And?”
“And I’d rather not give up my humanity—not yet—but if that’s what has to happen, then that’s what I’ll do.” I untied the cord that held the silk in place and began unrolling the bundle across the top of the dresser. “If I come away from this completely fae, then so be it.”
“Ah.” Tybalt packed an amazing amount of relief into that single syllable.
The last of the silk came away, revealing my iron knife in all its menacing simplicity. There was nothing splendid about it: it wasn’t ornate or decorative. It was just a piece of metal, designed for killing the fae. And it was very, very good at its job.
“What, you thought you’d get rid of me that easily?” I slid the iron blade into place in the holster around my waist, relaxing a little. Using iron against the fae isn’t something to be done lightly. Iron dulls magic and causes iron poisoning, which can be fatal. It’s the sort of thing you only do when you have to. But if the Queen’s guard came for me again, they wouldn’t find me quite so helpless. “Sweetheart, you’re stuck with me until you decide not to be.”
“At this point, if your foul attitude and utter lack of manners were going to drive me away, they would have done so already.”
“There, you see? Nothing to worry about.” I stripped off my ripped, bloody jeans and pulled a clean pair out of the dresser, stepping into them without bothering to bandage my knees. They weren’t bleeding anymore, and at this point, a little pain could only focus me. I was either going to get back to normal or die before infection could set in.
“October, if there is one thing I have learned over the course of my association with you, it is that there is always the potential for something else to worry about.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere.” My jeans were looser than they would have been even a day ago. My poor metabolism had to be working double-time as it tried to keep me going on a diet of adrenaline, blood, and misery. “Throw me my shoes. We’ve got a Queen to overthrow, and that means we need to get this show on the road.”
Tybalt smiled as he bent and grabbed a pair of sneakers from the floor beside the bed. He lobbed them to me one at a time, and smiled more as I caught them. Catching the shoes stung my scraped palms, but I didn’t allow myself to show it. The last thing I wanted was to worry him more after I had just sent him away.
Voices drifted through the open door. I looked back over my shoulder as I pulled my sneakers on and quickly laced them. “Sounds like Quentin and Danny are here.”
“Ah, yes,” he said dryly. “The cavalry.”
“Stand behind the man made of stone, don’t get shot, remember?” I stepped in and gave him one more kiss before grabbing the first aid kit off the dresser. “Come on. Let’s go.”
“As you like,” he said, and followed me out of the room and down the stairs, to where the dining room was increasingly coming to resemble a surrealist dinner party. Danny was standing in the doorway, where he was less likely to accidentally break anything. May was setting out a platter of sandwiches; Quentin already had one in either hand and was eating like he was afra
id he’d never be fed again. Which was a reasonable concern, given the way things had been going for the past few days.
“Everybody grab what you’re going to want, and grab it to go,” I said, stepping into the room. “Tybalt, that means you, too. You need to eat something.”
“Hey, Tybalt,” said Quentin, waving a sandwich.
“Hello, all,” said Tybalt. He took a sandwich before offering Arden a shallow bow. “Milady.”
Arden frowned. “Hello, King of Cats. Have you come to join this fool’s parade, or are you just here to make snide comments before disappearing again?”
“Ah,” said Tybalt. “I have so missed people making assumptions about my intentions since my fair October learned I was an ally. We shall have to keep you. You’ll provide some much-needed unpleasantness.”
“At least that’s one thing I can be sure will never change,” said Arden. “No matter how much time I spend in or out of Faerie, Cait Sidhe will always be annoying.” She turned to me. “You said you had a plan. What is it? Or was it just ‘feed me sandwiches.’” Her frown faltered. “I admit, I don’t really see what sort of benefit you’d be getting from the sandwiches, but . . .”
“The sandwiches are a side benefit,” I said. “You should eat, if you haven’t already. But the plan . . . your father’s knowe was in Muir Woods, wasn’t it?”
Arden blinked. “How did you know that? The knowe was sealed after his death.”
“I’ve been there, or at least, I’ve been to the part that’s still accessible. It’s a shallowing now.”
“It’s sleeping,” she said. “Father said it would wait for us forever.”
“And there you go,” I said. “We take you to Muir Woods. You reopen the knowe—you reopen King Gilad’s knowe, lost to us for over a hundred years—and you send out letters to announce that you are the rightful Queen of the Mists.” Pixies make a surprisingly good messenger service when bribed, and Muir Woods was swarming with them.