Ashes of Honor od-6

by Seanan McGuire

  I pulled up in front of Bridget’s house, turning to look at Etienne. He looked back at me, edges slightly blurred by my hasty human disguise. “Are you sure you’re up for this?”

  “This is something I should have done sixteen years ago,” he replied. “Chelsea?”

  Chelsea sighed. “I don’t think it’s going to get any easier if we put it off.”

  “If it were done…” I muttered. More loudly, I said, “You’re right. Okay, everybody. Let’s go.”

  Etienne and Chelsea were the first out of the car. I lagged behind, and Quentin did the same, waiting until the passenger-side doors were closed before he asked, “Do you think Bridget’s going to go after us with her frying pan?”

  “Just be ready to run,” I advised as I opened my door. It was a little ironic; here we were, escorting the most powerful teleporter in the last few hundred years to her mother’s house, and we didn’t have a means of making a quick escape if we needed one. Tybalt had gone to check on Raj as soon as Chelsea was ready to make the trip to her mother’s house. We’d stopped at Tamed Lightning long enough for Elliot to work a little Bannick magic on everyone’s skin and hair, while April produced fresh clothes from an undisclosed location. I just hoped she hadn’t robbed an Old Navy or something.

  Oh, well. Not my problem if she did.

  Bridget must have been watching the street. She was out her front door by the time I was out of the car, and she intercepted Etienne and their daughter midway down the front walk. I saw the frying pan in her hand a split second before she flung its contents over both of them, resulting in Chelsea and Etienne being doused again with Walther’s power-dampening solution.

  Etienne blinked. Chelsea blinked. Bridget dropped the frying pan, threw her arms around her daughter, and burst into tears.

  Quentin gave me a sidelong look. “Did you hold back because you knew that was going to happen?”

  “I suspected it might. It was either going to be something like that, or it was going to be water balloons.” I gestured for him to follow as I started up the walk. Bridget was still hugging Chelsea. Possibly a little too tightly—I wasn’t sure the girl could breathe. “Hi, Bridget. Nice use of aim, there. I’m glad I didn’t go first.”

  “The bastard deserves it.” Bridget lifted her head, glaring daggers at Etienne, who looked uncomfortable. “He can learn how it feels to live like the rest of us mortals.”

  Etienne’s look of discomfort deepened. “Bridget, please. Can we take this indoors?”

  “Why?”

  “Mom,” said Chelsea. She sounded more tired than any girl her age should be capable of being. “We need to go inside.”

  Bridget looked at Chelsea, the animation draining from her face. Finally, she nodded. “All right, sweetheart. We’ll go inside. All of us.”

  “Can we get some towels?” asked Chelsea.

  Bridget didn’t answer her. She didn’t even smile. She just walked a little faster, reaching the door ahead of the rest of us, and she held it open while Etienne and Chelsea walked past. For a moment, I thought she was going to slam the door on me and Quentin, but she relented before she did more than twitch in that direction. “Come in if you’re coming,” she said.

  “We’re coming,” I replied, and walked past her into the house.

  Silence fell once the door was shut, all of us standing there like strangers, no one quite sure where to begin. Finally, Etienne said, “October. The masks, if you would be so kind.”

  “Right.” I gave Quentin a nod, and together, we released the illusions that made us look human. There was a pause as Bridget got her first look at Etienne without a mask between them. She’d never really seen the father of her child before. There was something incredibly sad about that.

  Then she saw Chelsea. The details that seemed subtle to me must have been glaring to her mother’s eyes. Bridget’s face went so pale I was afraid she might pass out. “Chelsea?” she whispered, in a voice that seemed as faint as wind in the trees.

  “She had to, Mom,” said Chelsea. “It was the only way to make me stop jumping. I was going to get a lot of people hurt if I didn’t stop. This was to save me.” She shrugged, smiling a little as she added the bravest lie I had ever heard: “It didn’t hurt.”

  “What did you do?” Bridget wheeled on me, clearly seizing on the word “she” as proof of my guilt. “You fairy-tale bitch, what did you do to my daughter?!”

  “I saved her life,” I said, as calmly as I could. “She’s not human anymore. Not even half. But she’s still your little girl, and she’s still here. That’s better than it could have gone.”

  Bridget stared at me. Then, bitterly, she turned to Etienne. “So you’ve won. You’ve stolen her after all.”

  “No, Bess,” said Etienne. His tone was gentle. “I don’t want to steal her. I never wanted to steal her. Had you told me about her sixteen years ago, I wouldn’t have stolen her then. Things might have gone differently over these last few days…but I wouldn’t have stolen her from you.”

  “Then…” Bridget stopped, taking a breath before she continued, “Then can she stay with me? Can everything be like it was? Will you leave us alone?”

  “No, Bess,” said Etienne again, even more gently. “I can’t do that. Faerie has rules. You know that as well as anyone.”

  “Ah.” She straightened. “Then you’re to kill me, are you?”

  “What?” squeaked Chelsea, eyes going wide.

  “I’d rather not,” said Etienne. “You can’t stay here, knowing what you know. And Chelsea can’t stay with you—she’s Chosen Faerie, and that means she has certain obligations to it, even as I have obligations to her. But there is another way.”

  I stiffened. Beside me, Quentin did the same. This wasn’t something Etienne had mentioned on the ride over here, and oak and ash, I was afraid to hear what he might say next.

  Bridget paused, expression cycling from misery to disbelief to thoughtful canniness. She looked at Etienne and asked, “You’re offering to take me into Faerie, aren’t you?”

  He nodded. “I am. There is precedent.”

  “How recent?”

  Now Etienne cracked a smile. “Not for a very, very long time. But if you’d come, Bess, if you’d live with me beneath the hill, swear to keep our secrets, and let me claim you as my responsibility, you could stay with your daughter, and you and I…” He paused, and shrugged, and said, “We could try again. We have reason to, now. It’s not like you’ll ever be quit of me.”

  “No,” said Bridget. “I don’t suppose I will.”

  “How would this work?” I asked. “I don’t mean to sound, I don’t know, pessimistic, but no one’s taken a human into Faerie in a long time.”

  “There are rules,” said Etienne, in a tone that implied he knew exactly what every one of them was, how to use them, and how to bend them without breaking them. “If my liege agrees, I may claim her as my own.”

  “He’s right,” said Quentin.

  “It’s your funeral,” I said. I glanced to Bridget, and added, “No offense.”

  Her smile was faint, but it was there. “None taken.” She focused back on Etienne. “I’ll not quit my job, you know.”

  “Nor would I ask you to,” he said. “With the proper geas, you can come and go as you like, and no one will ever need fear that you would reveal us.”

  Bridget frowned. “I’ll want to see the wording. I do have classes to teach.”

  Etienne laughed. Chelsea smiled. And for the first time in a while, I started feeling like maybe things would be all right.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWO NIGHTS SLIPPED BY in a haze of questions, phone calls, and cleaning the house. The damage Samson had done was so extensive that it took longer to clean up than it took for our wounds to fade, since we had magical healing but didn’t have a magical cleaning service. Several times, I considered going to Tamed Lightning and begging to borrow Elliot. Every time, I put the thought aside. Cleaning the house was something we could all do t
ogether, and that was important. We needed to feel like a family again. We had gone too long without really being one. I had gone too long without really being part of the family we made.

  At the end of the second night, I went out into the backyard and sat down with a cup of coffee in one hand, watching the sky get lighter. Dawn was approaching fast. Inside, May and Jazz were sound asleep, the one at the end of her day, the other getting ready for hers to begin. Quentin was at Shadowed Hills, helping Chelsea get acclimated. He’d be back after he got a good morning’s sleep. I wasn’t all that worried.

  Li Qin was holding Dreamer’s Glass for the moment, while the Queen of the Mists looked into the “mysterious disappearance” of Duchess Treasa Riordan. Somehow, I didn’t think she was going to find much. Li Qin would hold the Duchy until everyone politely forgot she wasn’t supposed to be there, and then she would officially take over. With most of Riordan’s subjects stranded in Annwn with her, it was unlikely that anyone would object.

  Riordan and her subjects weren’t the only ones stranded in Annwn. Officer Michael Thornton of the San Francisco Police Department was also among the missing, and with Oberon as my witness, I had absolutely no idea how we were supposed to get him back again, or if he was even still alive. At least the SFPD didn’t seem to have connected me to his disappearance. I hadn’t noticed them looking for him at all. One last bit of Li Qin’s luck, working in our favor. Hopefully, any bad luck rebound would fall on her. Two disembowelments were about my limit.

  Getting Officer Thornton back was something for the Luidaeg to worry about. When I called her, she yelled at me for leaving her charm in Annwn, told me to bring her a box of donuts on Sunday, and hung up on me. Sometimes it’s nice to have a few predictable things in life. It was almost dawn, and Chelsea was with her parents, and I finally had room to breathe.

  Room to breathe—and time to wait. I’d been waiting for two days. I gave the sky another look, frowning a little at how light it was getting. I’d need to go inside soon. “I can give him another minute,” I muttered to myself, and took a sip of coffee.

  “I’d like more than just a minute, if I may,” said Tybalt. I looked to my left. He was there, watching me with a guarded anxiousness in his eyes. “I assume you were waiting for me?”

  “You assume right. What took you so long?”

  “I had affairs to settle. Raj was, understandably, upset. He sends his regrets and promises to return here soon. As for the rest of the Court…” Tybalt clucked his tongue. “I doubt any of those who remain will mirror Samson’s folly any time soon. Those who were loyal to him have left my lands—and no, I didn’t kill them. I simply made them understand that it was time to seek residence elsewhere.”

  “That’s reassuring.” I took another sip of coffee, studying Tybalt. He was casually dressed, in jeans and a dark T-shirt that matched the stripes in his hair. He could have been anyone.

  He was the only person I wanted to see.

  He saw me looking and said, “I didn’t feel the need to dress up for you.” He sounded slightly abashed, as though this was the wrong answer.

  It was the best answer I’d ever heard. “I’m not exactly dressed for the ball, here,” I said, waving a hand to indicate my attire. “The best I can do is tell you that I’ve taken a shower since the last time you saw me. Several, actually.”

  “Decadent,” he said, with a small, uncertain smile.

  I took a deep breath, putting my coffee down on the step. It was now or never, and I was definitely not in the mood for “never.” Standing, I took a step toward Tybalt and offered my hands. He hesitated for only a second before he took them.

  “You said you loved me,” I said. “Did you mean it?”

  “With all my heart. October—”

  “Do you know how long I’ve been telling myself you hated me? Or how hard it’s been to keep believing it? You’d do things, these amazing, insane things, like stealing me back from Blind Michael or breaking me out of jail, and I’d say, ‘Oh, he just wants to pay his debts,’ or, ‘Oh, who knows what a cat is thinking?’” My voice broke a little on the last word. Dammit.

  Tybalt’s eyes widened, hope kindling in their depths. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying—oak and ash, Tybalt, I’m saying I’m in love with you, I’ve been in love with you for a while, and the only way I was dealing with it was by not dealing with it, ever.” I shook my head. “I knew I’d never have you, so I told myself I didn’t want you, and if you don’t really want me, if you want some idea of me, or just want to chase and not catch, I’ll understand, but this has been a hard week, Tybalt, this has been such a hard week. I’ve been waiting for you to come here, because I need you to tell me. Okay? Just tell me what you want.”

  “Oh, October. Toby. My Toby.” He pulled one hand from mine, reaching up to tuck my hair behind my ear. His fingers were shaking. That was what I focused on, more than anything else. His fingers were shaking. “Do you think I’m cruel enough to do that to you?”

  I sniffled. “No,” I admitted.

  “Thank Oberon,” he said, and pulled me close, and kissed me.

  We were still standing there when the sun rose, our bodies pressed so close together that we might as well have been one person. Dawn ripped the air out of the world, but I already wasn’t breathing. Tybalt kissed me through the sunrise. It wasn’t until I smelled the ashy remains of dying magic that I realized we had no illusions on. I broke the kiss, pulling away.

  Tybalt blinked, looking faintly bewildered. I tapped the tip of one pointed ear. “Ah,” he said, nodding his understanding. He couldn’t keep the regret from his voice as he asked, “Will I see you tonight?”

  “No.”

  “What?” His earlier bewilderment had nothing on the look he gave me now.

  I smiled, taking his hands and pulling him onto the front step as I opened the front door. “You’ll see me right now.”

  Tybalt’s laughter as he followed me inside was one of the sweetest sounds I’d ever heard. I shut the door on the morning, leaving my long-cooled cup of coffee outside as I led the King of Cats through my silent house. Nothing stays the same for long, not in Faerie, not in the human world, not anywhere, but some things are worth starting, just like some things are worth fighting for. Li Qin would have Dreamer’s Glass. Chelsea would have her parents and a chance at a relatively normal life, under the circumstances. Maybe that was all Tybalt and I would have—a chance—but as he put his hands around my waist and pulled me closer, I found I didn’t care.

  Sometimes a chance is more than enough. Sometimes that’s all you need to have everything.

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