“I know,” said Faith, stroking her arm. She sat pigeon-toed, looking worriedly up at Rosie.
“I’ll be fine,” Rosie sighed. “Hey, your roots are showing, Fai. Do you fancy a different color? How about black underneath and blond on top? Go wild.”
Faith frowned, self-consciously pushing her hair behind her ear. “Matthew likes me to keep it natural.”
“What the hell’s it got to do with Matthew?” Rosie exploded. Then she managed a laugh. “We’re a sad pair, aren’t we? Look at us. Both pining after men who couldn’t care less.”
Faith frowned harder. Her eyes were glittering.
“What?” said Rosie. “Don’t tell me you’ve slept with Jon as well!”
“Of course I haven’t! I’m not pining. We’re getting married.”
“Who is?” Rosie was floored.
“Me and Matthew, of course. Oh no, I knew you’d have that expression!”
“What expression?”
“Complete disbelief!” Faith stood up, as animated as Rosie had ever seen her. “He’d never look at someone as mousy as me, that’s what everyone thought, isn’t it? Well, they were wrong. I was wrong.”
“No, I—I believe you,” Rosie gasped. “But it’s so sudden. You and Matt—how did I miss that happening?”
“Life at home doesn’t freeze while you’re at college, you know,” Faith said tightly. “Things go on when you’re not there.”
“Obviously.” Rosie found a smile, and Faith visibly relaxed. “Tell me, then.”
“We just sort of . . . started getting close. We tried to pretend nothing was happening at first, but I kept ending up in his room and it was so amazing . . . The first time, I was really nervous, but when I told him I’d never done this before and that I’d been saving myself for him, he was so thrilled I thought he was going to cry.” Her eyes shone. “I wanted to tell you ages ago, but I was . . . embarrassed. Trying to find the right moment. It seemed insensitive, when you were unhappy over Jon.”
“You don’t have to tiptoe around me, ever.”
“Well, you’d better make it up with Mel, because I need bridesmaids.”
Rosie took this in, steadying herself. “Oh . . . how soon?”
Faith touched her own stomach. “As soon as possible, because this baby’s due next May.”
Rosie gaped, washed away on the tide of other people’s lives. Once the power of speech came back, she said, “Do my mum and dad know?”
“Yes. Jessica was the first person I told. She’s thrilled.”
“That’s great but—gods, Fai, are you sure about this? We’re hardly twenty. A child is a huge responsibility. I’m nowhere near ready for it.”
“Well, I am,” Faith said firmly. “It’s all I’ve ever dreamed of. A real family of my own. Please be happy for us.”
Tears flowed down her cheeks. Rosie wrapped her arms around her. “Oh my god, you were planning to announce it tonight, weren’t you?” She groaned. “Instead you get upstaged by my drama-queen whining. Forgive me, honey, I didn’t know.”
Mel appeared, leaning in the doorway, red-eyed. “Are you two speaking to me?”
“Yes.” Rosie sighed, turning with one arm around Faith’s waist. “We’re fine. Fai’s got news.”
“I heard,” Mel smiled. “Surely you realized I was listening? I just need to clear things up with you first, Ro. About Jon . . . It was as if this demon of curiosity inside me said, let’s have a taste of what Rosie wants and see what the attraction is. It was a kind of envy, if I’m honest.”
“You—envious of me? What for? You’re the man-magnet!”
“It’s not about men.” Mel looked at the floor. “It was more about the magical tradition stuff you had going on. I never wanted to believe it, but I could see it was real for you. I felt left out. This selfish bit of me thought that having Jon would be like stealing a piece of it.”
“And was it?”
Mel met her eyes. “No. It was just bad sex.”
“Jon’s not an experiment, not a door you can go through to a higher state of consciousness.” Rosie sighed. “He’s a person. Maybe that’s the mistake I made, thinking he was some demigod.”
“I know what I did was cruel and thoughtless,” said Mel. “If you can’t forgive me, I don’t blame you, but I wish it hadn’t happened. Please don’t let this be the end of our friendship.”
Rosie felt the hard edges of her pain softening. She couldn’t forgive overnight, but knew she would eventually. “I’m not mad with you, Mel. More just . . . disappointed. Everything you said about Jon is true, but I didn’t want to believe it. If I can’t trust my own judgment, what can I trust? I needed some sense slapped into me and you’ve done it. Thanks.” She smiled sourly at Mel, who grinned back in relief. “Men come and go, but friends are forever.”
“I’ll get that tattooed around my navel,” said Mel.
Afterwards, Rosie wasn’t angry with Mel or Jon. She felt as if someone had taken her heart out with a wrecking ball, but no one was to blame.
The next day she was in the center of Ashvale, doing a little shopping and lost in her own thoughts, when a figure in a dark overcoat stepped in front of her. She started violently and looked up at the pale, carved face of Lawrence Wilder. “Rosie, might I have a word with you?”
She couldn’t remember him ever speaking directly to her before. His tone, although polite, allowed no possibility of refusal. “Of course,” she said warily.
“I understand you went to see Sam.”
She felt stupidly tongue-tied, like a child in front of a high court judge. Had she committed some hideous faux pas by making the visit? Interfered in his private family shame? “Yes, I did.”
“You appreciate that the only reason I didn’t go myself was that Sam refuses to see me? And I am ashamed of Jon for asking such a thing of you. He will be admonished.”
“No, don’t do that,” she said, horrified. “Really, he’s upset enough as it is. Mr. Wilder, I’m so sorry this has happened, but please don’t blame anyone. I didn’t mind going. It’s a difficult time for you. Anything I can do to help . . .”
Her words dissipated, like sea foam on a tall, cold rock. “How is Sam?” he asked.
She told him. As she spoke, she began to see Lawrence as not simply aloof but forlorn. She guessed that it was against all his natural inclinations to seek her out like this; an immense effort for him to utter the next words. “I must ask a very great favor of you, Rosie. If Sam continues his refusal to see me, would you go instead, on my behalf? He says he will see no one but you.”
A dark shiver went through her. “If he knows you’ve sent me, though, he might refuse my visits, as well.”
“Then don’t tell him.”
“Then I’d be deceiving him.”
“I would not ask you to go against your conscience.” He turned very slightly away, the cold grey eyes under the dark brows still watching her. The shiver became a surge of icy, thrilling dread. It wasn’t fear of Lawrence that made her decide; it was his obvious, stark pain.
“Mr. Wilder, it’s all right, I’ll go,” she said.
“Truly?” The faintest spark of light caught in his eyes. “Why?”
“Because I can see how painful this is for you, and I hate to think of Sam stuck there with no one at all.”
Lawrence broke eye contact and looked down. She could see aspects of both Jon and Sam in him, even though all three men were so different from each other. She could understand why, for all his iciness, her mother had found him devastatingly attractive.
“You must think it absurd that I, of all people, would dare to ask for a trace of compassion,” he said. “Especially in such a situation.”
“No—I don’t think that. The, er, the issues between you and my family . . . well, they’re separate. I want to help you.”
“And you’ll keep me informed of how he is?”
“Yes.” She hesitated. “If you’ll do something for me in return? Mr. Wilder, would you please t
ell Sam about Lucas? Everyone seems to know but him. If he won’t speak to you, write a letter.”
Lawrence drew and released a quiet breath. “I meant to, of course, but events intervened . . . yes, I’ll tell him. Call me Lawrence, not Mr. Wilder.”
That would not be an easy change for her. Carefully not using either form, she asked, “Does Sam’s mother know what’s happened?”
She sensed a closing-off inside him. He looked into the middle distance, his face clouding. “Unfortunately I have no means of contacting her. The day Ginny walked out was the last day I saw or spoke to her. She vanished. She might be in London, Australia or the Spiral itself, for all I know; I can’t open the Gates to look and in any case, what is the point if she doesn’t want to be found? It’s too late.”
“There must be ways to look for her—I’m sorry. You must have been through all that. It’s none of my business.”
He spoke softly. “Who could blame her for going? The darkness drove her away. She blamed Ecuador but the darkness was always part of me, and wherever we went, I dragged it with me . . . Now you are staring at me as if I’m mad, Rosie.”
She resisted the temptation to quip, You must get that a lot. “No,” she said, “I just don’t understand.”
“And I can’t explain. It’s inappropriate of me to try. Suffice it to say that after Ginny left things grew worse for me, very much worse. The force that dwells behind the Gates makes it impossible for me to open them, even to look for her, even now. I’ve learned to live with how unpopular this makes me. Understand that I’m doing it to protect you.” He looked at her with special emphasis.
“Me?”
“Yes, you. And all Vaethyr. Even your reckless uncle. And especially my sons.”
“Can’t you tell us . . . what it is?”
She held her breath, waiting for his answer. Lawrence seemed to run out of words; she almost physically saw him close up, as if a gap in his armor plating had sealed shut to keep blood from spilling out. It struck her that it caused him mental torture to talk about it, and she felt bad for asking.
“I’m inexpressibly grateful to you,” he said, “about Sam. Take this.” He was holding out a handful of twenty-pound notes to her. She recoiled, drowned in the ghastly implications of being given money in the street—but Lawrence only gave a thin smile. “To cover your travel expenses. Please.”
“It’s too much.”
“No, it isn’t. You will have to stop for gas and wretchedly overpriced refreshments on the road. Or I could hire a car and driver for you. I’d even drive you there myself . . .”
“No!” she protested. “No, really. I like to be independent. It’s fine.”
“Then take the money,” said Lawrence. “And give my good wishes to Sam.”
He was gone in a swish of black fabric, leaving her with a handful of bank notes and a vaguely sick, shaky feeling in her stomach.
Later, she was at Fox Homes, where Auberon had offered her work experience designing gardens for show homes. She told no one she’d seen Lawrence; it felt like a guilty secret. From the window of the architects’ office, three floors up, she could see the uplands of Charnwood. Even the weather was different there; shafts of sunlight slicing dramatically through cloud. It was like some fantastical painting, cloud and light appearing to form a vortex of energy swirling around the Great Gates.
Rosie wondered if it was her father’s master plan to employ the entire family. Alastair was working at a drawing board on her left. To her right, Matthew sat at his computer, firing off emails and appearing generally busy and important. When Alastair left his work station to fetch coffee, Rosie sidled up to her brother and said, “So, you and Faith, then?”
Matthew turned a 3-D projection of a house on his monitor. One side of his mouth rose in a white grin. “She told you.”
“Well, uh, yeah. She’s ecstatic. Never thought I’d see anyone made ecstatic by you, but it takes all sorts. Jolly well done getting her pregnant, by the way.”
“Cheers.”
“That’s not why you’re getting married, is it? Never thought you were that old-fashioned.”
Matthew sighed and swiveled his chair to face her. “What’s up? We thought you’d be pleased.”
She was watching him for every nuance of body language; twitches of mouth or eyebrows, failure to meet her eyes. “I want to be. I’m making sure I’ve got something to be pleased about.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I didn’t think she was your type, Matt.”
“Right.” He scratched his head. “That’s a bit insulting to your best friend, isn’t it?”
“Oh, like you’re such a catch! She’s so vulnerable. I thought you’d prefer a glossy career girl with a big personality, so you could pose around being the alpha couple. Someone like Sapphire, maybe. Why Faith?”
“I like Faith,” said Matt. “She’s always around. You wouldn’t think it to look at her, but she is incredibly enthusiastic in bed.”
“Too much information, Matty.”
“Really,” he continued with relish. “She saved herself for me. How great is that? I dated a few of those alpha girls at uni, and they were stone-cold, too much in love with themselves to care about anyone else. Faith, though, she was like a flower opening up in the sun. Just amazing for the ego.”
“She loves you.” Rosie folded her arms, leaned in closer to him. “Do you love her?”
He shrugged. “Sure. Whatever love is. She’s happy, so what’s your problem?”
“I need to know you’re sincere.”
He looked at her, still with the same lazy smile and narrow eyes. “What the hell’s it got to do with you?”
“I’m watching out for her, that’s all. You concealed the fact that you were seeing each other. That looks like you were ashamed, or hedging your bets.”
“Rubbish. We’ve got a right to privacy, haven’t we? We decided to tell the world in our own good time.”
“Come on, what’s in it for you?”
His smile grew narrower. His voice dropped. “Look at her, Rose. Aside from the fact she can’t get enough of me—she’s a fantastic housekeeper. Be a great mother. She’s never going to be unfaithful. And the icing on the cake: she’s human.”
Rosie gasped. “You’re marrying her because she’s human?”
“I never wanted an Aetherial wife. You know that.”
“Yes, but she loves you. She hero-worships you.”
He laughed, impervious. “Yes, and? That’s a plus, isn’t it?”
“You can’t marry her as a human slave!” The more Matthew grinned, the more furious she felt. “This is Faith, Matt. Don’t do this to her.”
He leaned towards her, face tilted. “What are you going to tell her, then? ‘Oh, Faith, don’t marry the man you love.’ What d’you expect her to say? She’ll wonder why you’re trying to sabotage her happiness. She might even think you’re jealous.”
Rosie exhaled sharply. “I’m warning you, if you don’t treat her properly—”
“Touched a nerve?” Matthew said, eyebrows rising. “I’ve told you before, if you keep chasing air-brained Aetherial idiots like Jon, you’ll get your heart broken.”
“What’s wrong with Aetherials? We’re Aetherial!”
His eyes became serious. “Let’s just say that some of us—not all of us—are away with the faeries. Do I want a partner who’s preoccupied with the Otherworld, changing shape, having affairs with people like Lawrence Wilder, or even vanishing altogether? Do you? No. I want a sweet-natured all-human woman who thinks only about me and our children.”
“Put like that, you sound almost reasonable,” she said grudgingly. “Perhaps you could get her to wear one of those little Amish-style headscarves while you’re at it.”
“Shut up,” he said. “I want to see you happy too, Rosie. With someone straightforward and dependable.”
She followed his pointed gaze and saw Alastair returning with a tray of coffee, a grin broadening
his cheerful face. He looked as wholesome, solid and comforting as a cushion. Everything Matthew was suggesting she needed. Everything, perhaps, that he’d found in Faith.
“Rosie,” Alastair said, “there’s a new curry house opened up. You don’t fancy giving it a try, do you?”
Rosie woke up with a start in the middle of the night, in Alastair’s bed.
A vague dismay went through her. The sheets felt waxy-cold on her body. The sleeping mound of Alastair reminded her . . .
It had been . . . fine, really. Slightly awkward and embarrassing, as sleeping with your brother’s best friend was bound to be . . . no fireworks, but she couldn’t have handled violent passion . . . not earth-shattering, but certainly not dreadful. It had seemed a good idea after a few glasses of wine. Sturdy and friendly must be far better than malnourished and neurotic. At least he wanted her.
She thought back on their wine-hazed conversation at the restaurant. He was easy company, cheerful with an edge of sadness. A bit on the staid side, but that was okay; she didn’t have to struggle to impress him. She liked his soft Scottish accent and his self-deprecating sense of humor. Pressed, he’d touched on the ex-girlfriend who’d left his self-esteem a mangled pulp. The way his eyes turned dark had aroused her sympathy, which was largely why the evening had ended in bed.
She’d found herself fantasizing while they were in the act. She had begun to think about Jon, but couldn’t; it was too raw. She’d always been drawn to skinny men but it was time to move on, she told herself, and learn to appreciate the attraction of a big, solid, rugby-playing physique instead.
Now she thought, Oh god, was this really such a good idea? She imagined facing Mel across a dinner table and asking, “Pilsbury Doughboy or wet spaghetti?” Involuntary mad laughter shook her. Alastair woke and turned over. Seeing her awake and smiling, he smiled back. “You and me, eh?” he said lazily. “We kind of drifted together. I always hoped we would.”
He wasn’t bad. He was kind. He was safe. It was bound to get better.
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