by Amy Lane
“Mitchell. Ratso. Jon. Janine. Gary. Emil,” he said simply, naming the shape-shifters who had been killed by Sezan, the man who had killed his beloved. His voice took on a thunder and a lightning that filled the living room with electricity and fear. “Adrian. You ugly, arrogant, icy bitch—he could have lived. They all could have lived. One lousy fucking phone call….” He looked back at Cory and saw the mute rage in her eyes, the helpless pain, the useless regret, and his mad took on a whole new dimension.
“Do you see that child there?” he demanded. “She has lived barely twenty mortal years, and she wore her first lover’s blood like a sheen of sweat because of your callousness. Her rage overwhelmed her…. Do you know what happened to Crispin’s people?” he asked, and was not surprised when Orson and Morana both looked bewildered. Clorklish, older, compassionate, and human in a way that even the human-born Orson was not, looked at Cory with the weight of the world in his eyes.
“We assumed they joined yours,” Orson said numbly.
“They would have,” Cory told him, her small voice empty and shell-shocked. She looked at Morana, bitter and lost. “If I hadn’t killed them all, down to a man.”
Morana gave a short bark of laughter, suspended in motion as she was, but it died in her throat as the two sidhe and the girl in front of her stared back with bleak, angry faces. Cory’s hand reached out from her position in Bracken’s lap and she pulled out a lock of his hair, which now reached only down to his shoulder blades. She held it out to Morana like an angry talisman.
“It fell down to his knees, like a dark waterfall,” she whispered, looking at Bracken in anguish, and then she turned to Morana, anger burning in her voice. “I almost killed him,” she choked out. “Adrian died—he flew to my rescue and died, and I killed a hundred men, and Brack and Arturo barely made it out with their lives, and….” She looked helplessly at Green. “Why wouldn’t someone warn us?” she asked, bewildered. “Why would someone send that madness up and not even tell us we were at war? All of that pain….”
And the pain in her eyes was Green’s undoing. With a fearful gesture and a sweep of green lightning, he threw Morana from her place standing before the couch and into the closed front door. “You are forbidden from my home. If you ever venture here again even accidentally, you will pay with your own life.” A shaft of light passed through her, and her eyes bulged out in surprise. “You feel my power. You know that it’s true.”
“You are not this strong…,” Morana protested, but another surge of power passed through her, and her silence was shocked and frightened. With a final and mighty surge of anger, Green smashed the elven woman’s body through the door and into the hall outside. There was a startled yelp—from Renny and Max, who had just come up the elevator—and suddenly a happy growl from Renny and an exasperated “For Christ’s sake, not again!” from Max. The last the people in the living room heard of Morana that day was her startled shriek as she turned tail and inelegantly raced down the hallway, pursued by a very familiar giant tabby cat.
Cory giggled once, weakly, and Bracken repeated the sound helplessly into her hair. Green chuckled for a moment, and then the three of them stilled. Green’s aura of power abruptly faded, but the face he turned toward Orson and Clorklish was grim.
“I think discussions are over for this day,” he said quietly, and his lips only twisted a little at the understatement. “But before you go, I need you to answer one thing that Morana refused to. Where are the vampires?”
Orson looked back at Green and all but rolled on his back and grinned like a submissive retriever. “I don’t know,” he whined. “We all have contacts here. Their leader, Andres, keeps one were on retainer for each vampire so that his people always have food. After you called, I contacted my people. None of us have had a call from a vampire in over three days.” He swallowed, looked away. “Tasha is a friend—she has a number of steady donors, so I don’t get to be food that often, but I… I hope that she’s okay.”
Green nodded. “Grace told me this morning that she hasn’t met any of Andres’s people. No one’s answering messages—not Andres, not his second—there’s forty vampires in this city, and not a one of them available to talk. She’ll be going out tonight on a true hunt. She will need one of your people for sustenance, and as many as you can spare to help.”
“They’ll be here tonight,” Orson agreed eagerly, trying to make up for his earlier obstructionism. “Eleven o’clock.”
“Then you have things to do,” Green told him, and Orson backed out and down the hall, running into a surprised Max on the way.
The face Green turned to Clorklish was not the face he had turned toward Morana or even Orson. “I’m grateful for all you’ve given us so far,” he said and nodded toward Cory, who was lying with her head on Bracken’s shoulder, looking empty and lost. “I’m especially grateful for the help you’ve given to my beloved. Please, all I ask of your folk is that you keep us apprised of any other overtures Goshawk makes to you.” He paused, and his look turned conspiratorial and grim. “And be sure to make it known that I have sided with you—and so have my people. By all means, spread the fact that Folsom has no more vampires—but try to keep Cory’s name out of it, agreed?”
Clorklish bowed, truly respectful. His wizened little face focused for a moment of concentration, and he used a thick fingernail to open a small red line on his wrinkled brown arm. “It would be my honor to ally with you, Green of Shadows, Green of Streams, Green of Quiet, Green of Floods and Droughts,” he sang, licking his blood from his wrist as he did so. Then, with surprising dignity, he offered his wrist to Green, who bowed to the offering and touched the little gnome’s wrist to his lips. “By touch, blood, and song, my sidhe,” Clorklish said formally, “mine are bound to you.”
“I thank you, Master Clorklish,” Green said, moved beyond words. “Completing the binding could make you formidable enemies—are you sure?”
Clorklish smiled in earnest, and his wrinkled face suddenly appeared wicked and puckish. Green could see, in that wicked grin, how the images of the nasty little goblins had spread throughout Christendom like wildfire back in the Dark Ages of Europe. “I’ve prayed to the Goddess for a chance to align with you, Lord Green,” he said gleefully. “Your call this morning was like hearing her voice in matins bells.”
Green bowed again and, much as Clorklish had, ran his nail along his wrist so that a small red line against his cloud white flesh followed it, and he offered it to Clorklish, humming under his breath. A sudden flash of green and blue light colored the room like a disco ball, and Clorklish crowed with triumph. And with that sound and a deep bow, the little man practically skipped out of Green’s living room. He looked behind him for a moment and turned to flash a quick grin at his now acknowledged leader. “I’ll send some brownies up here to fix your door, sir.” And with a bare acknowledgment of Green’s surprised thanks, the little gnome was gone from the room.
“Green….” Bracken’s voice, empty and lost, called Green back to the two on the couch. “Green… I think she’s in shock.”
“As are we all,” Green agreed, looking musingly after the little gnome who had just brought more than a thousand tiny but devoted lives under Green’s aegis with one surprising move. He came back to Bracken abruptly, and to the new pain added to the fragile skin barely grown over the old one.
“Come here, my loves,” he ordered and helped Bracken up with his arms full of Cory. With infinite gentleness he guided them into Cory’s room and took her from Bracken, and they were all so stunned and exhausted, there was not even a hiccup of power from the three-way touch.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered, and he soothed nothing words against her face, which was pointed now, almost pixie-like in its plain prettiness.
“Sleep,” he said at last. “We’ll be here when you wake.” Her eyes closed without a flutter, and he pulled the comforter back and laid her down on the sheets, removing her shoes and tucking her in carefully.
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��I don’t understand,” Bracken said behind him, a hint of irony in his voice, and Green reached out and took Bracken’s hands in his own. Bracken had been a lover early in his adulthood, when elves tend to sleep with anyone handy. Until Cory, who had changed everything for all of them, Bracken and Adrian had been especially close. When they hadn’t been lovers, they had been best friends, brothers of the spirit, and friendly competition for the same women. Green believed truly that all that had kept Bracken alive when Adrian died was the fact that Green and Cory survived.
He pressed his face against Bracken’s, putting his hands on the other elf’s shoulders and kissing him on the forehead. “It means, my brother,” he said, “that you and Arturo are the best of our people, and that you must hold on to that greatness, or we will never survive.”
Bracken nodded, weeping still tears. “As are you, leader,” he said at last. Green kissed the side of his temple and told him, “Sleep, my brother,” and then caught Brack’s body in his arms as he fell. He laid him next to Cory and pulled off both his shoes, tucking the dark green coverlet under their chins. As he did so, he thought with bitterness and bemusement that he might want to get used to that idea.
Feeling a little lost, he wandered back into the living room, noting that the brownies were there already and that Max was leading Renny past them by the scruff of the neck. Renny had a scrap of material hanging from her teeth that looked suspiciously like Morana’s once-impeccable white jumpsuit, and Green summoned up enough energy to grin wickedly.
“Come here, lovely,” he said to Renny, and obligingly she hopped into his lap with a thump. She was tiny as a girl, but a hundred-pound girl still made a hundred-pound house cat. She purred, kneading slightly on his blue jeans and rubbing her cheek against his face. “We all love you, right?” he whispered in Renny’s ear, and was rewarded by the steady rumbling sound from her chest. “Good. I’ll tell you what, then, ’kay, luv?” She licked his face, and he laughed a little, stroking her gently behind the pointed tabby ears. “You promise to stay girl for a whole day, and I promise to let you chase that snotty rat from here to home as a pussy cat, yes?” Renny gave him what amounted to a kitty-cat chuckle, and she jumped smoothly off his lap to curl up on a violet throw pillow and fall instantly asleep.
Green cocked his head at Max, saying, “Obviously she’ll think about that.” And then he scrubbed his face with his hands and gave a sigh.
Max flopped down onto the couch next to Green with a similar sigh. “Nice door,” he said, gesturing loosely to where the brownies, apparently extremely grateful for Green’s offer of protection, were building a lovely piece of art featuring light oak, brass work, and glass. He didn’t hardly blink as the tiny brown creatures swarmed over the handiwork, pulling materials from what appeared to be thin air.
Green watched them for a moment and gave an actual laugh. “They’re a marvel, aren’t they?” he asked sincerely. “Morana thinks marvels like that are her due.”
“How?” asked Max, watching the show just like Green. Green could tell by his widened eyes that the stalwart officer was trying to hide his delight.
“Court was already established here when Adrian and I got off the boat in San Francisco,” Green said, seemingly out of nowhere. “Mist and Morana weren’t in charge then, but it didn’t matter—they were on the ship right behind me, trying to rein me in. But I wasn’t good enough to be free at court, so I didn’t want their grace or their tribute, and Adrian didn’t give a fuck about them anyway, and we just wanted to be left the hell alone. We moved up to the hills, where no one gave a damn, and I promised A that after nineteen years of having the shit kicked out of him and the spirit buggered out the other end, that nothing would ever hurt him again.” He turned to Max, remembering who he was talking to. “It’s a powerful thing, a promise like that.”
“I don’t understand,” Max said honestly, and Green almost laughed again, because there was a lot of that going around. Instead he shrugged.
“People—our kind of people—came to know that Adrian was safe because I would keep him safe. And then the weres started coming to Adrian because he’s a vampire, and the Goddess made them sort of a team—unlimited blood supply from the werecreatures, unlimited muscle from the vampires—and A…. Well, the only good thing Adrian had ever known came with that promise of safety, right?”
Max nodded. He was a cop, and still young and idealistic enough to know what that promise could mean.
“So…,” Green trailed off.
“You keep your promises, right?” Adrian’s face was absolutely guileless with faith in the lamplight.
“I do my best!” Green had protested, rolling over from his stomach and looking at his beloved lying beside him in the newly carved bed. He was remembering when he’d had to push a makeshift coffin into soft earth with main strength less than a year before to avoid the approach of a quick dawn. Neither of them had been prepared for the bright brutality of the summers in the Sierra foothills.
Adrian leaned back to meet Green’s eyes. He’d just finished feeding from the back of Green’s thigh, and the dinner and the lovemaking had left both of them bright and ruddy. For a moment, Green could almost imagine Adrian was still the living, breathing young man he’d rescued two years before, but there was wisdom in Adrian’s eyes now that Green hadn’t seen then, and his beloved hadn’t needed to breathe for a thousand thousand heartbeats. “Your best has worked so far,” Adrian said optimistically, and when Green would have protested, he’d been silenced with a kiss that grew and became passionate before he could even gather his thoughts. Goddess, Adrian had always been able to scramble every rational thought Green had ever had. But still, when the kiss had ended, he tried to put his misgivings into words.
“Shhhh,” Adrian said, his body weight pressing Green facedown into the soft mattress of down and straw. Adrian’s chest was cool and hard and rippled against Green’s back, and his manhood was also cool and hard and rippled against Green’s taut bottom, and it was hard to pull himself from the sensuality of his beloved and into the worry for them both, but he managed. Adrian licked the curve of Green’s ear, his breathy laughter spilling Green into the moment. “You try, I try… the weres will try. That’s the best we can do, right?”
“Right…,” Green promised shakily. “Right. Fine. Just… just….” And Adrian just did, and for a night, a moment, Green believed their best would do.
“So Adrian gave that promise freely,” Green said, yanking himself back into the present with a wrench that was almost physical. “He started looking for others to give it to, in fact. And then other fey started coming to me, hating the whole court thing as much as I had, and… I promised to protect them, to the best of my ability. And when that failed, I gave them whatever I could to ease the pain.”
“Your body?” Max asked, and for once his voice wasn’t full of censure, just the struggle to understand something that was outside his ken.
“My love,” Green corrected simply. “Love is a simple thing, I’ve always believed. Emotionally, love is safety. Physically, love is pleasure. Love is simple to us—it doesn’t come with rules and boxes. Sex is never loveless to the fey.” His face tightened for a moment. “To my fey, anyway,” he amended. “So it’s never a moral problem. Not as long as the respect is there.” There was a silence, and Max nodded as though he could almost grasp what Green was trying to say.
“But the problem with love,” Green continued, trying to make the matter clear to himself as well, “is that it tends to grow.” He looked at the door being quickly built, tiny board by tiny nail, and shook his head in exasperation. “Adrian and I… we managed to build more than five times the numbers of the fey in this part of the state. Do you know why?”
Max shrugged. “Love?” he asked, too lost to be sardonic.
“Close.” Green’s mouth tried not to twist. “Elitism. You know—the force that meant I wasn’t good enough to be a part of the court of San Francisco as an equal? Well, it wouldn’t have taken in
the people that Adrian and I bound to us by love.”
Max’s lips formed the same twist. “So… you basically told them all to fuck off, you’d live your own life….”
“And then they envied the life I lived,” Green finished. “And they couldn’t stand that.”
Green stood abruptly and looked sadly at Max. “I’ve been betrayed by my own people, Officer Max. They knew Sezan was here in the States. They told him where Adrian lived. They must have sent him to Crispin. It’s my bet that they hoped that by destroying Adrian, they’d break me. And as a result, they left us all—Cory, Bracken, Renny, myself, even Arturo and Grace—desolate and empty and hurting. And now I’m here to save their asses.” And with that, Green couldn’t bear to sit in his embassy of a living room any longer. With an abrupt movement, he left the apartment, careful not to slam the lovely new door.
IT WOULD have been wonderful if he could have simply blurred to Mist’s faerie hill. But Green’s apartment was in the city proper, in spite of the scant little park across the street—and the city, however cosmopolitan, was not good enough for the sidhe. They had to make their homes with land, lots of it. An elf lost his life energy when his feet went for too long without touching earth.
However, a century or so earlier, land had been in plenty on the peninsula. Although the more populated the state became, the more dear the land cost, those who had lived there for a hundred and fifty years had at their disposal a good twenty-acre estate tucked back west of the I-280 interchange, somewhere east of Seal Rocks and hidden in the hills. Green could find it. It was a good forty-five minutes of commute from the heart of the city, but Green’s anger hadn’t dimmed in the drive.