Keenan’s smile was far from human then. He looked every bit the ageless creature he was—utterly emotionless in his voice and guise, sitting in a mundane room like an ancient god among the rabble. “You do realize I could have you killed. By morning, you could be nothing more than a pile of charred ashes. Your very presence weakens my court. After centuries of waiting, I am unbound, but my queen is weakened by clinging to her mortality—because of you. She is drawn away from what would strengthen me—by you. I don’t have any logical reason not to want you dead sooner than you already will be.”
Seth leaned forward so his words wouldn’t be overheard. “Are you going to order my death, Keenan?”
“Would you kill for her?”
“Yeah. For her, especially if it was you”—Seth smiled—“but not as a way to win her attention. That’s weak, and she deserves better than that.”
“She’ll mourn you sooner or later. The worry over you saddens her. The maudlin focus on your brief life span distracts her. It would strengthen my court if you were gone already and she were truly my queen….” Keenan’s words faded as he looked at Seth with an unreadable expression on his face.
“If you have me killed, she’d find out, though. Would that strengthen your court?” Seth looked away to watch Aislinn walk through the room toward them. She frowned as she saw them but didn’t rush or do anything obvious.
He turned back to Keenan, who was lion-still again, watching Aislinn too.
The Summer King spoke quietly, “No. Your death by my word would upset her. Tavish recommended it, despite the complications, but I think the dangers to my court outweigh the benefits of your death. I cannot order your removal—tempting though it may be. It would push her further away.”
Seth’s heartbeat sped. Suspecting your death had been discussed so coldly was one thing; hearing it confirmed was entirely different. “Is that why you don’t do it?”
“In part. I had hope that I could be with Donia, at least for a while. Instead, Aislinn and I are both worried over the lovers we can’t keep. It’s not the way Summer should feel. Our court is about frivolity, impulse, and that dizzy blur of pleasure. It’s not love I feel for Aislinn, but our court would be stronger if she were mine. Every instinct I have pulls me toward her. It drives a wedge between Donia and me. We all know that if you weren’t in the way Aislinn would be mine.”
Seth watched the Summer King watch Aislinn. His mouth was dry as he prompted, “But?”
With effort, Keenan pulled his gaze away from Aislinn. “But I don’t kill mortals…even those who stand in my way. For now, I’ll deal with the way things are. It won’t last forever.” He sounded a little sad as he said it, but Seth wasn’t sure if Keenan was sad that Seth was in the way or that he wouldn’t always be in the way. “So I’ll wait.”
Later, Seth would ponder it, but just then, Aislinn slid into his arms.
Aislinn motioned toward Damali. “She’s good.”
They both murmured assent.
“It makes me want to dance.” She swayed in his lap. “Do you want to?”
Before Seth could reply, Keenan reached over and touched her hand. “I’m sorry, but I need to leave.”
“Leave? Now? But—”
“I’ll see you tomorrow.” He stood slowly, moving with the faerie elegance that seemed to announce their Otherness. “The guards will be outside to escort you…wherever you go tonight.”
“Seth’s,” she whispered. Her cheeks flushed.
Keenan’s expression didn’t change. “Tomorrow then.”
And then he was gone, moving faster than mortal eyes—even Sighted ones—could follow.
CHAPTER 11
Seth wasn’t surprised when Aislinn became restless a few songs later and wanted to walk. She’d been that way before she became a faery. That was one of the things that hadn’t changed—like keeping things from him. She’d always had to keep secrets, and her first instinct when she feared rejection was to continue to do so. Understanding why she was secretive didn’t mean accepting it, though. They’d only gone a block or so when he asked, “Are we going to talk about what’s bothering you?”
“Do we have to?”
He raised his brow and stared at her. “You get that I love you, right?” Seth leaned his head against hers as he said it. “No matter what.”
She paused, tensed, and then her words tumbled out too fast. “Keenan kissed me.”
“Figured that.” He kept an arm around her as they resumed walking.
“What?” Her skin flickered as her anxiety spiked.
“He was being weird. You were weird.” Seth shrugged, but he didn’t alter his pace. “I’m not blind, Ash. I see it. Whatever this tie is between you two is getting worse as summer comes.”
“It is. I’m trying to ignore it, but it’s not easy. But I will. Are you mad?”
He paused, weighing his words before telling her. “No. Not pleased, but I expect it of him. It’s not about what he did. Tell me what you want.”
“You.”
“Forever?”
“If there were a way.” She held tight to his waist like he was going to vanish if she let go. It hurt. His skin was mortal, and hers wasn’t. “There isn’t, though. I can’t make you this.”
“What if I want that?” he asked.
“It’s not something you should want. I don’t want to be this. Why would—” She slipped in front of him and looked up at him. “You know I love you. I love only you. If I didn’t have you in my life…I don’t know what I’m going to do when you”—she shook her head—“but we don’t have to think about this. I told him no when he kissed me. I told him that I love you, and he’s only my friend. I resisted him when I was mortal, and I’ll do it now.”
“But?”
“It’s like a pressure inside me sometimes. Like being away from him is wrong.” She looked desperate, like she wanted him to tell her the lies that she was trying to tell herself. “It’ll get easier with time. It has to. This being-a-faery thing is new. And his being unbound is new. It’s just…it has to get easier with time or practice or something, right?”
He couldn’t tell her what she wanted to hear. They both knew it wasn’t getting easier.
She looked down and lowered her voice, “I asked Donia…before. About you becoming this. She told me it was a curse, and she couldn’t do it, and neither could I…or Keenan. Keenan didn’t change me or the Summer Girls. Neither did Beira. That was something Irial did. It’s not something we can do.”
“So…Niall…”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” She leaned into his embrace, but her words weren’t ones he wanted to hear. “But maybe it’s better this way. You getting cursed so we can be together isn’t cool. What if you hate me someday? Look at Don and Keenan. They’re stuck dealing with each other forever now, and they fight all the time. Look at the Summer Girls. They’ll wither away without their king. Why would I want that for you? I love you…and being this…My mother died rather than be a faery.”
“But I want to be near you always,” he reminded her.
“But you’ll lose everyone else, and…”
“I want forever with you.” Seth lifted her chin so he was able to look directly into her eyes. “The rest will fall into place if I can be with you.”
She shook her head. “Even if I didn’t think it was a bad idea, I can’t make it happen.”
“If you could…”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t want to have power over you, and I don’t trust Niall, even if he could…and…” She was getting more and more upset as she spoke. Sparks flickered from her body. “I do want you with me, but I don’t want to lose you. What if you were like the Summer Girls? Or—”
“What if I wasn’t? What if I die because some faery is stronger than me?” Seth asked. “What if you need me and I can’t be there because I’m mortal? Being only halfway in your world makes me vulnerable.”
“I know. Tavish says I should set you free.”
>
“I’m not a pet to be released into the wild. I’m in love with you, and I know what I want.” Seth kissed her, hoping his emotions were as clear in his touch as he was trying to make them in his words. The sun sparks tingled against his skin—electricity and heat and some weird energy that mortal words couldn’t name.
Forever. Like this. It was what he wanted; it was what she wanted too.
He pulled away, half drunk on her touch. “Forever together.”
She was smiling then. “Maybe there’s another way. We can…Tell me we’ll be okay either way?”
“We will,” he promised. “We’ll figure it out.”
He kept one arm around her as they started walking again. It would be okay. The Summer King claimed that his objection was to Seth’s mortality, to his pulling Aislinn away from her court. If Seth were a true part of the Summer Court, there would be no room for objection—but even as he thought it, Seth knew it wasn’t that simple. It could be. He’d never wanted anything as much as he wanted forever with Aislinn. He just needed to find a way.
“Riverside?” She glimmered then, her entire body pulsing with sunlight, and he held on to her, his own fallen star. “There’s music tonight.”
He nodded. He didn’t ask how she knew: it called to her. Large gatherings of her faeries were like beacons to her now.
“Can we run?” In her eyes endless blue lakes were shimmering. She might claim to not like being a faery, but part of her liked some of it very much. If Aislinn could set aside her fear of who—what—she was now, she’d be happier.
He nodded, and then he held on to her. His feet barely touched the sidewalk, glancing off the earth like they were flying. If he let go, he’d crash horribly, but he wouldn’t let go of her, not now, not ever.
When they stumbled to a stop at the bank of the river, she was laughing at the joy of speeding over the earth, at the freedom of who she was and what she’d become.
A band was set up alongside the banks. One of the singers was a merrow. She languished in the water, chirping orders at others on the shore. Her skin was tinted moss green, slightly phosphorescent in the dark. She wore a silver cape over a kelp-strand dress that revealed far more than it covered. From the waist down her body was a scaled fishtail, but somehow even that looked elegant. Behind her, a trio of male merrows lolled about with kelpies, but unlike her, the other merrows were hideous. Their faces were those of catfish, whiskered mouths gaping open as they watched their sister with a protectiveness that made Seth wonder if the Dark Court faeries really were the ones to fear. Water-dwelling faeries were creepier.
But then she started to sing, and her brothers joined in on a chorus, and Seth forgot that they were anything other than glorious.
It wasn’t a language he knew. It wasn’t even a proper song, just them preening a little. Every cell in his body seemed to struggle to find a way to align with that music. His breathing found their rhythm. It wasn’t glamour; his charm protected him from that. They were just that good.
He and Aislinn stood silently, lost in the sound and the feel of the music. The notes lifted them, stealing their secrets, their souls, and spinning them into the air and water where pain was gone. There were no worries. There was no fear. It was every perfect moment filling him until his skin couldn’t contain it.
Then the music stopped.
The spell broke; gravity returned to his spirit and anchored him to the earth. Their music was like that, lifting you away from the world only to drop you without warning. The drop ached; the absence was like a physical blow.
“They’re amazing,” Aislinn whispered.
“More than.” Seth looked away from the merrows. The only time he and Aislinn could find a space to sit was between songs. When the music began, it was either stand transfixed or dance. He suspected that Aislinn could resist the pull of the songs, but he couldn’t. Faery music was all-consuming.
They’d taken only a couple steps when a skogsrå caught Seth’s attention. Of all the fey creatures he’d met, skogsrås were among the most unsettling. They existed to tempt; it was their sole purpose. Backless and hollow inside—literally and figuratively—skogsrås’ allure was in their neediness. That space was a hungry emptiness both mortal and faery found difficult to resist. Without the charm Niall had given him, Seth wasn’t sure how he’d overcome the temptation.
The skogsrå, Britta, blew him a kiss.
Aislinn tightened her hold on his hand but didn’t comment.
Seth didn’t react. He nodded but made no encouraging gestures. The music nights were held in areas declared neutral territory for the event, so the skogsrås would all be bolder. Truth be told, Britta would probably be bold regardless of where they were. Any faery strong enough to be solitary but linger where there were several courts in conflict was not to be dismissed lightly.
Britta walked toward them. Neutral ground meant they were all equal here. Seth liked that, but the tension in Aislinn’s body made clear that right now she wasn’t liking it.
A few steps away, Britta tripped, and without thinking, Seth caught her. In doing so one of his hands slid over the space where her back should be. Even though the thin shirt she wore covered most of that void, he still felt the tug of that empty space.
“Nice save, love.” She kissed his cheek with a familiarity that was not earned. Then she looked at Aislinn. “Queenie.”
As she sauntered off, Aislinn murmured, “I’m never going to get comfortable around some of them, am I?”
“You will,” he reassured her. “We both will.”
“Things weren’t easier before, but it seemed like they made more sense.” She rested her head against him.
“It’ll all make sense again. You’re new to this,” he said.
She nodded, and he suspected that it was because she couldn’t answer without trying to twist her words into a misdirection so she sounded less afraid than she was. He was afraid too. If he told her the things Keenan had said, if he told her how much she really hurt him when she forgot her strength, it’d push her away when he wanted to pull her closer. He wanted closer to her, but until she figured out who she was and he found a way to become not just a mortal caught in a world of faeries, distance was inevitable.
Then the merrows began singing in earnest. Musicians joined in from along the river’s edge and from in the trees and farther away in the darkness where mortal eyes couldn’t see them. Thrumming beats and lilting piping, sounds that weren’t made by any instruments mortals had, and voices rising and falling like the fingers of water lapping the shore—pure music was all around them.
Aislinn sighed in contentment. “It’s not all bad, is it?”
“Not at all.” He felt the music, the purity of it, like it was a tangible thing. The world of Faerie wasn’t perfect, but it was so much fuller sometimes. Their casual music was more intense, more enthralling than the music that even the best human musicians could make. No one choreographed the movement of the dancers who interpreted the notes with their bodies; no one directed the musicians who blended together in the darkness.
“Come with me.” Aislinn led him to a dead tree.
In the boughs, three ravens perched. For a heartbeat, he was certain their gazes were affixed on him, but Aislinn tugged his hand and he followed, as consumed by her as he was by the music. He thought his heart would beat right through his chest when she let go of his hand. His back was to the singers, but the music swirled around him. In front of him, she was a vision that rivaled their music. She touched a bit of a vine that was twined around the skeletal tree. It grew under her hand, rustling and extending until a hammock-like chair dangled from a branch.
Then she let go of the vine and took his hand again.
As long as he was touching her, seeing her, lost in her, he could move. The music still held him, but she was more than faery magic. Love can give a person strength to break through glamours and magicks.
“Curl up with me?” she asked.
“With pleasure.” He
sat back into the vine-net and held his arms open for her.
CHAPTER 12
When Bananach arrived, Donia was sitting in a window seat on the fourth floor watching the stars appear in the sky. It was one of her favorite times of day, when the colors that streaked across the sky faded. Things were neither bright nor dark, but caught somewhere between. That was how life had felt for so long: it could get better or worse. She’d hoped it would get better, but tonight War stood at her gate, seeking her out.
Donia watched Bananach stroll up the path, pausing to grip one of the spiked fence posts. The arrowlike tops of the posts were knife-sharp. Bananach didn’t squeeze hard enough to truly wound herself as she stood staring at the house.
Why are you here?
Donia hadn’t spent enough time studying the strong semi-solitary faeries. She’d had no reason to do so. But in the past few months, she’d been observing them as much as she could, reading Beira’s files of old correspondence with various solitary fey and with the heads of other courts. The Dark Court, in many ways, made far more sense to her than the other courts. Keenan’s Summer Court was a fledgling court now. They were still forming an identity. Despite the long history of the court, it was being made new by the recent discovery of Keenan’s lost queen. Sorcha’s High Court was reclusive and unwilling to interact with anyone outside her realm in any but the most minimal ways. The Dark Court was an elaborate network of criminal enterprises. During Beira’s time, Irial had sold whatever drugs were in vogue. His fey had ties to celebrated crime and petty enterprises. He himself owned a string of adult clubs and fetish bars that catered to almost every kink. Some of that had changed when Niall took over the Dark Court. Like Irial, the new Dark King did not cross some lines, but he had more of them. Bananach, however, had no lines. She had only one goal, one purpose—the chaos and bloodshed of war.