by Melissa Marr
Irial turned to face Niall. “My daughter wrote to me, and Thelma saved each letter. She wrote, too.”
Memories of the past crowded in as Irial tried to contain the massive well of loss, of anger, of confusion that threatened to swallow him.
They stood, awkwardly in silence, until Leslie joined them. Her hand was shaking when she held up a letter.
“This was delivered to the house,” she said. Before he could panic much at the thought of Leslie unprotected, she added, “Chela brought it to me.”
Irial opened it and pulled out a single page of spidery handwriting.
Father,
I grew up hearing of you. I wrote letters as soon as I could write—at Mother’s order. Mother wrote as well, but she often wept when she did. I don’t know how things ended, but I know that she never married. As I grew older, never quite aging as children should, we moved a lot. We stayed clear of fey things, and she often spoke in terrified words of the Summer King . . . and of my father, a beautiful man who saved her.
* * *
What she failed to tell me, of course, was that the man who saved her was also the Dark King. I knew your name, but not what role you filled in that world. Had I known, I would not have written.
* * *
When the Summer King—the same faery that you saved my mother from—came to my door for my daughter, Moira, I tried to figure out how to find you. I discovered then that my beloved grandfather, a good faery in a sea of monsters, was the king of the worst of fey. Still I was prepared to reach you, but Moira died, and she left behind a child. No tale my mother told was enough for me to risk that love had blinded her, that you were as awful as I feared.
* * *
I believe you are already acquainted with your great granddaughter, Aislinn.
* * *
Ash is powerful enough that I thought about writing to you when she became fey.
* * *
At the least I wanted you to have the letters I wrote before I knew what you were. I decided that if you came to the house where I was conceived, I would tell you. Mother said you left the house boarded up because you could not bear to be there without her. Every so often, I would check to see if it stood empty. One of my granddaughter’s faeries has been watching it for me—the whims of an old lady--so if you ever read this, I believe you’ve proven that Mother was right, that you loved her. If so, some day, if you would like, I would welcome the chance to meet you.
* * *
I have questions about my longevity that sooner or later I’ll need to address with Ash. I was old (despite appearance and strength) when my own daughter was born, and I seem to age no further despite the passing of years. I’ve learned to appear to age, but often I simply moved. Now, though, I’d rather not leave Ash. Perhaps it is time for meeting.
* * *
your daughter,
Elena Foy
* * *
Irial handed the paper to Niall. “My daughter is alive.”
As Niall and Leslie read, Irial knew when they understood the import of what the letter contained.
“Of all the people in the world, why did it have to be her?” Niall muttered.
“So the women in Ash’s family were always the ones who would be the Summer Queen,” Leslie pronounced. “Grams, Ash’s mother, Ash.”
“And Thelma,” Niall added.
“Thelma had the Sight,” Irial said. “She saw me, and she still chose me.”
The three stood in silence as the sheer enormity of the thing settled on them. He was blood family to the Summer Queen. Aislinn Foy, the Summer Queen, was Thelma’s great-granddaughter. His great-granddaughter. How in the name of all that he held sacred was he going to navigate that relationship? He couldn’t fathom her taking that well.
Her partner, at least, tolerated him. He and Seth weren’t friends precisely, but they had a relatively congenial acquaintance.
Then Irial grinned. “Wait till the whelp realizes you’re his stepfather-in-law!”
“Not quite how that works,” Niall pointed out.
But Irial was, in his heart of hearts, the embodiment of Discord. He wasn’t going to do anything to hurt his daughter or great-granddaughter, of course, but his mind was already spinning on the possibilities of teasing Seth and on strengthening the alliance between Dark and Summer. It might not seem like discord or chaos, but it strengthened some court alliances, which necessarily weakened others.
“Shall we go out on the town to celebrate parenthood?” Irial draped an arm around both of his beloveds. The issue of Leslie’s mortality still lingered as a fear, but that was a trouble for tomorrow.
“Stepdad. Stepmom. We have so many years to make up for with Elena,” Irial said.
“I’m not her stepmom. She’s Ash’s grandmother,” Leslie objected.
“I think I should start with a house,” Irial mused. “This house. And a pony. Kids like ponies.” He frowned. “Kelpie or steed?”
Niall and Leslie exchanged a look of horror that Irial pretended not to see.
“Think of it as preparation for our little ones,” Niall said.
Irial stopped. Leslie froze, but Niall could taste her hope, her joy at such thoughts.
“Come now,” Niall said mildly. “Leslie said she wants children. Once she’s finished with school and moves in—”
“She’s moving in?” Irial said with raw hope. He stared at Leslie as if he’d just been granted a gift. “There will be children.”
“Eventually,” Leslie murmured.
“Oh, when Ani and Tish were tiny, I bought them this little toy shoppe in Philadelphia.”
“No,” Leslie said firmly. Her flood of amusement surged toward Niall, and undoubtedly to Irial, too, through their ink connection. Leslie folded her arms and announced, “Our children will not get their own stores.”
“So just one store,” Irial said. “We could do that.”
“Not what—"
“We really ought to think about buying more property,” Irial announced. “For Ash. For Elena. For Elena’s half sisters and brothers.”
In a faux whisper Leslie asked, “He does realize that Ash may not be as excited by this as he is, right?”
“Pish!” Irial gave them both big smacking kisses. “What about water parks? How old do the children need to be before we buy that?”
“I’m not pregnant,” Leslie reminded him.
Irial waved his hand, as if to brush the objection away. “When you’re ready, love.” He motioned toward the stairs. “For now, I shall dote on Elena and Ash. My girls.”
They followed him down the steps, all but tumbling when he came to an abrupt halt. “They should have guards. Give me a moment to talk to Chela before--”
“They have guards,” Niall reminded him. “Summer Queen. Her grandmother.”
“More guards!” Irial went to see Chela.
Niall and Leslie stood in the house. He glanced at her. “Have you told him yet that you’re moving in after graduation?”
“Not yet. He hasn’t been visiting, and . . .” Her words faded, and she shrugged. “He’ll figure it out when I stop leaving.”
Not a single month without drama, but Niall loved them both. Petulant. Mercurial. All around maddening. Riddled with complications he couldn’t imagine. They were everything he could want in life.
“Perhaps we should ask Seth to use that future-seeing of his about your mortality or semi-fey nature before Irial tells them he’s Ash’s great-grandfather,” Niall suggested.
“Agreed,” Leslie said with a laugh.
Then they went to join the new father to enjoy a rare, beautiful event in anyone’s life: celebrating life and parenthood.
* * *
The End
“Summer Bound: A Wicked Lovely Story”
Set after the Wicked Lovely series
* * *
Siobhan flinched as Tavish took another blow to the face from Tracie. Her Summer Court co-advisor, on the other hand, smiled joyously as he rarely
did in public. Their makeshift gymnasium was filled with cool air and the soothing sounds of soft jazz. It had not been designed to encourage the fighting they were there to do.
Most of the others had left. Only Siobhan, Tracie, and Tavish were still there. Siobhan wanted to be left alone with him, and he’d demanded Tracie stay.
“Are you afraid of Siobhan?” Tracie taunted as she kicked out at him.
He caught her ankle. Blood already dotted his typically impeccable clothes, and strands of tinsel-like hair fell into his face. The plait that usually bound his silver hair tightly back had become loosened after several hours of training the small group.
“Not bad for a Summer Girl,” Tavish said, shoving Tracie toward the ground before he sneered at Siobhan. “Unlike you, Siobhan. Unable to hit me?”
Siobhan winced. He was intentionally being a prick. Tracie, one of the few of the former Summer Girls who had become a guard, was ruthless, though. Kicks followed punches, and Tavish blocked almost all of them.
Unlike Siobhan, Tracie seemed to be making up for their centuries of semi-dizzy lust with bursts of rage. She had found her place as guard, and Siobhan felt pride in seeing one of her own flourish. They had never been competitors. The Summer Girls were bound by Summer, trapped by the Summer King, and they had a bond that was unbroken still—even as a number of their group left.
Tracie stayed. Eliza did, too. A few became solitary, and a few went to the High Court. Siobhan had stayed with the Summer Court, but not as a guard. She’d become an advisor, not interested in unnecessary violence after the fight between the courts had ended.
Not that Tavish cared.
“And here, I’d heard that the Summer Girls were only good for—"
Tracie’s fists flew, and Siobhan watched as the other woman hit Tavish repeatedly and say, “I am not. a. Girl. Asshole.”
“And you?” Tavish dodged Tracie’s last blow and snaked out his leg to pull Siobhan off balance. She toppled to the ground in their makeshift gymnasium.
“What use are you, Siobhan?” he asked.
Siobhan glared at him as she launched to her feet. “Jerk. I serve Ash by advising her, and I learned enough to stay safe.”
“Pay attention. If someone comes here, you’re vulnerable,” he said, as if forgetting the guards that kept watch over the doors—and the queen herself, who was as fierce as any faery in any court.
Several centuries of playing at foolishness made Siobhan instinctively pout. It wasn’t an act that worked on Tavish anymore, though. His next punch was hard enough to knock her backwards.
“I’m not a guard, Tavish.” Siobhan spread her feet to give herself a more stable stance and shot her fist forward with as much force as she could. Her punch wasn’t enough to knock him backward, but it did distract him. “I don’t like to hit anyone.”
He was smiling, now. “Even me?”
Then, Tracie landed a solid blow across his throat. Tracie grinned. “I like hitting you, or anyone else I can.”
Tavish coughed hard, hand to his throat, not far from the black sun tattoo there. No one knew exactly how or why it had been put there. With his stern expressions and tightly bound hair, he didn’t seem the type for a tattoo on his throat, but one night over a lot of tequila, he’d told Siobhan that it was older than the then-king and had been applied when Miach, father to Keenan, ruled. That made it over nine hundred years old.
“Are you injured?” Siobhan asked
Rather than being upset, Tavish beamed at Tracie and said, “Well done.”
“Thanks, boss.” Tracie rolled her shoulders and asked, “Are we done?”
“You are,” Tavish said.
Then he turned to look at Siobhan. His approving smile vanished. “You can stay. You need to be able to defend yourself. What if you’re alone or with our queen and—”
“When am I ever alone?”
Tracie leaned up and kissed Tavish’s cheek. It meant nothing. Theirs was a court with little hesitation about affection. For a horrible moment, Siobhan hated Tracie for being the recipient of the approval she coveted. It was foolishness, but the more time she spent with him, the more his rare sweet words charmed her. She knew better. Faeries—especially Summer Court faeries—were notoriously fickle in their affection.
Far better to dream of a solitary, a Winter fey, a Dark fey. Not Tavish. Siobhan knew better.
She thought about all of the reasons he was precisely not what she should want. Tavish was the Summer Queen’s advisor, head of the guard, and—as far as Siobhan knew—the oldest member of the court. And, Siobhan was the second advisor to the queen; she was expected to stand in opposition to Tavish’s advice when necessary.
Tracie paused and kissed both of Siobhan’s cheeks. Then she whispered, “Kick his ass.”
Tavish made a sound of disbelief. Obviously, he’d heard. He didn’t respect Siobhan in any way, as far as she could tell. How could he? She’d gone from frivolous member of the Summer King’s harem, one of the many women who were wooed by him in his search for the queen, to the advisor to the Summer Queen.
“If you can land three solid blows—”
“No.” Siobhan shook her head. “I’ve proven that I can hit you, Tavish. I’m not here for games. I come to these sessions to show support of you, but in this court, I advise. I do not like to fight.”
“You are no longer some helpless mortal, Siobhan.” Tavish raised his fists in a boxer’s pose. “Or hapless plaything.”
“Plaything?” she echoed. “Is that what you thought of me all these years?”
“You didn’t even have the ambition to try to be queen.” He shrugged. “You chose his harem. Why would I think you more?”
“Because you know me,” she said. In fact, Tavish knew her when she was mortal, when she refused the test to be Summer Queen, when she was sent by their king to seduce another king. He’d once been the faery she’d wept on when she was newly cursed.
“I was a spy for the king,” she reminded him. “That’s a fair bit more than hapless.”
“But you were a seductress there, too.” He stared at her. “You can’t kiss your way out of every crisis. What if--”
“You’ll never truly see me as an equal, will you?” she asked, although the question wasn’t one he could answer. It was hard to recreate her identity when he knew her so well. He was the reminder of what had been. Of the original trio of power in the Summer Court, only Tavish remained. Niall was the Dark King, and Keenan was the Winter King. But Tavish remained—and they had centuries of history that meant he still saw her as someone who didn’t matter.
All of which means that he’s not going to form an attachment to me. Or even see me as a worthy advisor.
Siobhan met Tavish’s cool gaze. “I am done for the day.”
He frowned, but was silent for several moments as she gathered her things. The blood dripping from his cut lip seemed not to bother him, but Siobhan found it irritating—more so because she was not the cause.
“Is it wrong to want you to be safe?” he asked.
Despite logic, Siobhan paused. “I am safe, Tavish.” She reached out to wipe the blood drop away.
Tavish caught her wrist. “No.”
“You didn’t used to mind my touch.” Siobhan wasn’t sure she’d ever been among his favorites, but they had memories over the years. Blurry ones, admittedly, but they’d enjoyed each other. “If all you think of me is as a seductress, perhaps—"
“You weren’t an advisor to my queen then.” Tavish squeezed her wrist, holding her in place. They stayed, caught in some silent battle for control until he asked, “Do you still visit the Dark? Do you still spend time in their court?”
And that was the trigger to her rage. She wrapped her leg around his knee and punched his shoulder with her free hand, using the push and pull of the combined motions to knock him to the ground.
“Do you doubt my loyalty? Or are you jealous?” she asked.
He tugged her forward, not releasing her wrist even
as he fell, and she landed atop him. Chest-to-chest. Hip-to-hip. “My duty is to the Summer Court.”
“Not an answer,” she said, glaring down at him.
“Do you still warm the Dark King’s sheets?” he asked.
She tugged her wrist free, hating that she could only do so because he allowed it. A part of her thought he was jealous, but such a thing wasn’t normal for a Summer Court faery. If he was jealous, he was a fool. She had interest in exactly one faery—and unfortunately, he was the one who was currently insulting and rejecting her.
“I answer to the queen, Tavish. Not you.”
The next day was no better. Tavish was already in a foul mood when Irial himself arrived at the loft where the advisors and queen of the Summer Court made their home. He stood in the doorway as if posing for cameras, dark eyes sparkling and a smile that could only lead to trouble.
The guards parted at Siobhan’s nod.
“Irial,” Siobhan greeted. She knew him well enough to know that the king who had become Chaos was not here without reason.
“May I enter?”
The guard at the door looked toward Tavish and Siobhan. It wasn’t as if they could refuse him, not truly, but seeing him seemed to evoke unease in those who had been born fey.
“No,” Tavish said, just as Siobhan said, “Yes.”
Siobhan muttered a curse that had Irial laughing aloud. He strolled into the room.
“Lovely to see you, too.” Irial was no longer the Dark King, and in truth, he had a unique status among their kind. As Chaos, he could not properly be refused welcome in any court. “It has been too long, lovely.”
Siobhan gave him a look no one else could see, and his smile grew cunning. After his death, he’d managed to finagle resurrection as the embodiment of Chaos, and he had the unique position of also being the unofficial consort of the current Dark King.