Roadside Magic

by Lilith Saintcrow

  Still, people had to have places to live. And he’d done his share of running a dozer, or a chainsaw. Each time he saw mortal buildings rising, or a mortal street running straight and true, half of him felt a nasty secret joy.

  He just didn’t know which half.

  What the hell was Robin doing here? There was some sense to her wanderings, she was going far too directly to be simply hoping to throw off pursuit.

  The sunlight dimmed, and Gallow’s back prickled. The scars writhed madly, but he denied the lance its freedom and simply turned, slow, his hands loose and easy.

  Scrubwood and bushes, the freeway in the distance making a high-pitched humming. She’d come along the line of Highway 4, crossing and recrossing the river of iron cars—it was a nice trick, but he had the locket. It tugged insistently under his shirt-collar, but instead of drawing it out he focused on the stillness in the shrubbery.

  And waited.

  When the shape melded out of scrub and a tangle of blackberry vines, the lance poked and prodded for its freedom even more relentlessly. Gallow denied it, but his weight did shift slightly.

  The man was a shade taller than Gallow but built much leaner. Brown leather cut sidhe-fashion, a jerkin and trews, and a pair of brown engineer boots, of mortal make. He still had the earring, a hoop of dull iron, and his hair was still long and brown, green tints drying out. Looks like he’s been fen-hopping. Wasn’t he in Marrowdowne, last I heard?

  It didn’t matter.

  A gleam of eyes through the curtain of shaken-down hair, glaring. Two hilts riding his shoulders, and his capable hands were just as empty as Gallow’s own.

  That was also meaningless. Even without weapons, the new arrival was dangerous.

  “Gallow.” A baritone, rich enough to charm a bird or two from a branch and into his nets.

  “Crenn.” Jeremiah tilted his head.

  A long silence. Clouds drifted, the sunshine intensifying, dimming again. The other man leaned forward slightly; Jeremiah did, too. So much of a battle was decided in the first few moments, before hand met hilt, far before blade met blade.

  “I am,” Alastair Crenn said, “not here for you.”

  That only leaves one other reason. Shit. “Then what for?” If he’d get his hair out of his face, it would be easier to tell what he’s thinking. That was why he didn’t, Jeremiah supposed. There were also the scars. Burning tar did things to a man.

  Even a Half.

  “There is a certain lady in distress.” A gleam of white teeth. It couldn’t be a smile; it was probably a feral grimace.

  One who finds you attractive? That was an asshole thing to say, even if they hated each other. Still, it trembled on Gallow’s tongue before he found a more diplomatic brace of words. “No doubt.”

  “I shall be plain.”

  “Please do.”

  “Cease following the Ragged, and I shall let you live.”

  What? A chill slid down Gallow’s back. Just hold on a minute. “Summer granted her life to me, Alastair Crenn. You will not interfere.” There. That’s honest, at least. As long as Summer thought he wanted to kill Robin . . .

  But Jeremiah had faced Unwinter for Robin’s sake. Like an idiot, he’d telegraphed it. My lady Robin.

  That gleaming, teeth and eyes, didn’t alter. Did he wear a mask of chantment, or did he just abhor being seen so much it created a glamour all its own?

  “I warn you again, Armormaster.” Crenn all but hissed the last word, lingering over the sibilant. “The Ragged is under my protection. And this time you have no mortals to do your dirty work.”

  I never did in the first place. But had he lingered too long, and Crenn paid the price? That night, the fire and screaming as the police bore down on the Hooverville shantyslum, the bubbling tar and the stink of mortal death . . . “I was not of Summer then, Alastair, and neither were you. I still would have spared you that, if—”

  “I needed no sparing,” the man replied, not hotly, as he once would have. No, it was a soft, deadly song of words repeated over and over in the dead watches of the night.

  How did Gallow know? Because he had his own cantos to sing in that same tone. “We are not at cross purposes here—”

  Crenn was already gone, down the hill in a blur, following the fading traces of Robin’s passage.

  Did Robin know him; had she made a bargain with him? What man would say no to the Ragged, with those eyes of hers, and that hair? Or was it just that Jeremiah was a fool? How well did Crenn know her? Did he owe her something?

  Or was this a gambit of Summer’s? What inducement could the Queen offer Crenn, of all people?

  You know she’s got ways. Gallow was already moving, the lightfoot blooming under his own boots. Don’t worry about that. Focus on Robin.

  You’ve got to get to her first.

  PLAGUE

  17

  Pavilions stretched under a dusk-darkening sky, each tall and fair with its sides held open to permit passage. Pennons snapped in a warm breeze. In some tents, sap flowed up through stumps coaxed from warm, forgiving earth; in others, evergrape and honeywine, eldar liqueur and more potent drinks dripped into jugs and were measured out with generous hands by brown-skinned, leering satyrs. Outside the pavilions, dryads and naiads fluttered by, unwilling to approach the goatborn and not needing liquor on this marvelous night. The wind, pregnant with appleblossom and a hint of salt from the Dreaming Sea, was draught enough for them. Dwarves of the Red Clans clustered in groups, their cunning, filthy hands at work upon marvels—fireworks that would rise later, showering the crowd with light and scent and perhaps small trinkets, tiny popping chantments tossed freely to laughing nymphs or cautious brughnies, evanescent ornaments made of sighs and hair-fine glittering threads. Come dawn they would revert to cobweb and leaf, but for tonight the flash and fire was enough to delight every sidhe fortunate enough to attend.

  Music roamed the crowd, bright and sprightly, Summer’s own minstrels settled in corners and nooks, perched in tree branches, plucking gitterns, lutes, pipes wailing. A vast open greensward, growing tall and fragrant and studded with star-white, starshaped eltora flowers, was the dance floor, and the drums of stretched skin too fine to be animal stood at the left-hand side of the temporary dais hung with dark green and the flames of jewels that echoed the stars even now beginning to glimmer above.

  The drummers were motionless, their beaked and feathered masks quiescent above oiled chests and hanging arms. Some had two, some had four, and the Master of the Drums, a massive mountain of half-troll muscle with four fine upper appendages, crouched near the huge taiko named Heartbeat.

  They poured onto the green, the highborn fullblood. Lady and lord in velvet and silk, coruscating chantments attracting the gaze and quickening the pulse. Long flowing hair of every shade, high-pointed ears, the slim six-fingered or extra-jointed hands peeping from trailing sleeve. The men, fierce and beautiful at the same moment, bowed to their ladies, each pair arranged to please Summer’s eye—or gratify her vanity.

  “Summer!” The cry went up from many throats, the throng pressing against the borders of the sward, impatient for the dance. The musicians struck up a merry tune, and the fullblood highborn moved through a slow, ancient pavane, bow and curtsy, hands meeting and feet treading stately measures. The high and mighty of Summer’s Court danced, each lady with an extra flutter at her left wrist. It was the fashion now, a scarf or something graceful knotted about that arm, to ape the Queen’s adoption of such an ornament.

  Those who had not been chosen for the dance clustered at its edges, painted lips behind piercelace bone fans, darting glitter-glances. A sharp thrill ran through them and the crowd behind—naiad, dryad, dwarf, selkie, wight and woodwight of the Seelie, those-who-could-speak. Behind them, the mortal-Tainted, from the Half to those with only a drop or two of sidhe. Behind them, more pressed of the Lesser Folk, drawn to the heat and light, the Tongueless but not nameless.

  Some of the whispers held there were few
er of the mortal-Tainted this year, that some of those accorded pride of fullborn place had a mortal ancestor or two, and claimed insurance from the blackboil plague. And at the very periphery, knights in armor held guard—for the last revel had been broken.

  “Summer!” The cry went up again, an edge to its sibilant. Did they think they could command her appearance?

  The traditional dance ended, and the drummers tensed. A ripple went through the assembled, and the fullborn turned as one toward the dais.

  Silence, broken only by the pennons snapping, the sough of the sweet night breeze. Normally such a dance would be held in the orchards, but a blackened scar slashed through those fleece-blossomed trees, a tang of smoke still lingered in their branches, and their bark-grown faces were shallow-drawn, not thick-graven as they had been before, though their roots were just as deep.

  One moment the dais was empty. The next, before the low bench serving as a throne, there was a quiver . . . and she appeared.

  Tall and fair in jade silk, her mantle deep-pine velvet, her golden hair just as deliciously lustrous as ever, the Jewel at her forehead glowing green—no hurtful spear of emerald radiance, as was usual, but a considerable light nonetheless.

  “Summer!” they cried, as her ladies-in-waiting appeared behind her, the Veil parting lovingly, caressing them as they stepped through in her wake.

  Sometimes she would toy with them, allow them to anticipate. But not tonight. She lifted her arms, the scarf at her left wrist a deep heartsblood crimson, knotted gracefully and allowed to flutter.

  “My children!” she cried, the ancient words of Danu herself, in the mists when the Folk were united and mortals merely a bad future-dreaming. “Dance for me!”

  Thud. Thudthud. Heartbeat spoke, the Master of the Drums beginning his long race, and the sound reverberated through every corner of Summer, spreading out to lap at the edges of her realm.

  They crowded the greensward, leaping and gamboling, the fullborn retreating to before the dais to engage in their more-mannered gyrations. The quickening Heartbeat spread through dell and clearing, forest and pasture, even the homefast sidhe or those who paid only nominal homage to Summer hearing it through the ground, a thunder communicated through whatever foot a sidhe wore, spilling through the air itself to turn birds dizzy-drunk, even those a-nested for the night.

  Heartbeat settled into a rhythm, the Master’s oiled limbs weaving complicated chantment, and the first fireworks arced high over the revel, light and scent showering all underneath. Sweat sprang early, satyrs chasing nymphs who shrieked and leapt to escape, selkies whirling and splattering salt water, naiads sinking down to writhe on the rushed grass, a sharp expectancy cresting through them all.

  It went on and on, whirling color and motion, fireworks flashing, the Queen motionless upon her bench, her face a statue’s. Tonight she was not the laughing nymph a dance sometimes provoked her into seeming.

  No, tonight Summer looked . . . worried? Certainly not, she was Queen of all she surveyed, and—

  A single drop of poison in the ocean of sidhe. A lone, stumbling step, a naiad with long cinnamon hair and sharp white teeth falling, twitching as the dancers leapt away from her. Normally, the weakened or the overly mortal could drop and be trampled, their blood and bone worked into hungry earth beneath, but this was not such a thing. The crowd exploded, screams piercing even Heartbeat’s thundering.

  For the nymph lay, her scattered blue and silver finery smoking all about her, and twisted upon the bruised grass. The small, white, starlike flowers crisped, blackening, and died. Black flowers bloomed on the naiad’s skin—she was of the Echo riverfolk, the pattern of daggered raindrops worked into her skirts said as much—and hardened, crusting as the horrified onlookers stilled.

  They burst, those black cancerous boils, and the screams took on a fever-pitch. Heartbeat faltered, and the Queen rose angrily, her white hands turned to bone-slim fists, stalking through the sweating, scurrying folk.

  She arrived just in time for the nymph to choke on a tide of blackened excrescence, heels drumming as the river-maiden turned to sludge herself, even sharp fishbones dissolving. The Queen’s face did not change. She stared down at the bubbling, steaming mass.

  When the illness struck, it took the lowborn sidhe the quickest. A highborn could stave off decline by pure will, it was rumored—but only for a while. Once the black feather brushed, it was only a question of time.

  “Plaaaaaaaaaague!”

  Ever afterward, nobody could agree on who screamed the single word. The sidhe fled. Howling, gibbering, they broke the pavilion supports and trampled the smallest among them. Even the Half and mortal-Tainted fled, even the Queen’s ladies, mad with fear.

  The blackboil plague, the scourge of the sidhe untainted by mortal blood, was loose in heretofore-inviolate Summer.

  A NEW ANIMAL

  18

  A slow, sleepy afternoon, Daisy cuddled against her side in the sagging single bed. “What are we gonna eat, Rob?”

  “I don’t know.” Robin lay with her arm over her eyes. In a little bit she’d get up and figure it out. There wasn’t likely to be anything in the fridge. Mama was at work, and Robin was babysitter today. Daisy, usually so easy-tempered, was fractious and whining. Robin had tried everything—stories, games, even turning on the ancient black-and-white television—to no avail. A little girl was hungry, and there was nobody to feed her.

  “What are we gonna eat?” Daisy whined again, and Robin pinched her, hard. “Ow! Rooooob! Why’d’ja dooooooo that?”

  “Shhh. Shut up.” Robin tried to think, but the hole in her own belly was so big. Maybe she could chance the corner store. Stealing was bad, but Daisy was hungry and what was Robin supposed to do?

  What could she take? A jar of peanut butter? Maybe too big . . . a stick of butter, anything?

  At least when Mama let Daddy Snowe come back there would be food. But then Robin’s throat might close up, making it hard to swallow when he fixed her with those paralyzing blue eyes of his and—

  A short, sniveling sob from next to her, hot breath against her neck. A bright spear of hatred speared Robin—but she couldn’t hate Daisy, God would surely strike her down into hell if she hated her sister.

  So she stirred, a little. “I’ll go to the store.”

  “Can I get a magazine?”

  “Maybe. Let’s look for quarters in the couch.” Except she knew there wouldn’t be any, and Robin would begin to steal. There was no way around it, and it wasn’t like they would be in this park long enough for it to matter.

  Sooner or later, Daddy Snowe always came back.

  A deep chill woke her. Ugh. Dreaming. Daisy. She was so small. She pushed herself up on her hands and knees, conscious of the desire to get moving but not quite sure why. Her eyes opened, but everything was a haze. She was, for the first time in a long while, cold. Something hard underneath her.

  A persistent nudging at her hip. Robin groaned.

  That’s me. I’m Robin Ragged. That’s my name.

  Names. So many. Mama’s name, before and after Daddy Snowe. Little sister Daisy Elaine, soft and mortal and full of laughter. Daddy Snowe’s names, and what he called both Mama and Robin when he was mad, and then later, among the sidhe . . .

  Sidhe. Danger. Get up.

  Waves of shivering poured through her. Her arms almost refused to straighten.

  Above Half, there were truenames. Half a share of mortal blood, or more, meant no truename for you—which was a gift, since it couldn’t be guessed in a riddle or used against you. It was also another pinch on a bruise, because in the Old Language, only the Named had, well, names. Everyone else was approximated.

  Another nudge at her hip, an insistent nose against the silk of her skirt. Robin forced her eyes to open, to remain open, and stared at her dirty hands against wooden decking. Milk-pale, and the slice along the back of her left forearm smarted. Crusted over and queerly pale at its edges, it stung as she made
a fist, swaying a little on her other hand.

  Ouch. Why isn’t it healing?

  As soon as she wondered, she knew the answer. She sank back on her haunches, pushing the rest of herself upright, and found herself on an expensive deck next to a shattered table, and the prodding was the nose of a sleek, massive golden hound with wide dark eyes.

  No, not so dark. More indigo, a blue so deep it mimicked summer’s dusk.

  Eyes, in fact, the color of Robin’s own.

  “Oh.” A hurt little noise, as if she’d been struck.

  It was as big as a cu sith, but not greenish as those large tail-plaited wonders. It pranced a little, its nails clicking on the wood, and nosed at her again. A candy-pink tongue flicked as it licked its sharp white teeth, but it didn’t growl or bite. Its tail, fringed and fine, whipped back and forth, and Robin’s childhood distrust of dogs rose briefly, filling the back of her throat with sour heat. There was a faint reddish bloom to its fur, each hair tipped with a suggestion of crimson, and the nausea wasn’t just from being so close to a canine.

  Well, I’ve gone and done it now. She swallowed, twice, wincing. Her skirt was faded, and some of the needle-chantment was loosening. The mendings, clearly visible now, were scabs of indigo against frayed periwinkle silk.

  She touched one of her curls. Faded as well, the red leached out, richer than dishwater blond but still not sidhe-vibrant.

  Am I mortal now? No, the music under her thoughts still rumbled along. The noise was faraway, though, not pressing insistently for release. Like the subway in the city, a great beast dozing.