by WB McKay
There was a look somewhere between pity and jealousy in her blue eyes when she looked up at me. Her and Owen had dated at some point. I had no idea how it had ended, but they were on good terms. "You're either very brave or very stupid," said Siobhan, eliciting a snort from both Ava and Phoebe. "I can never tell the two apart. I'd offer you my support if I had any to give. You are going to need help. The lot of you are more creatures of Earth than you are of Faerie." She paused, chewing on her bottom lip. "You should talk to Greta."
Recognition struck me and I jumped with surprise. "Greta? She was in rough shape when I last saw her." She'd been held prisoner for years by a bunch of zealots who drained her magic in an attempt to please The Morrigan. My mother's most devoted worshipers had some odd ideas about how to please her. They'd been thanked for their efforts when The Morrigan showed up and swallowed them whole. "What does Greta have to do with this?"
"Greta has been a creature of Faerie her whole life, and she's a dragon. One who I believe owes you a favor."
I scoffed. I wasn't really the type to collect favors, so I definitely wasn't the type to call them in. "I'm not going to call in a favor on someone who recently escaped a torture dungeon. Greta is finally reunited with her children and I'm just going to waltz in and ask her to go on a mission that might get her killed? No."
Siobhan shrugged. "It's up to you to decide when the favor is due, but Greta offered her thanks freely. She knows what that means. That's on her."
I heaved a sigh. She was right. Greta knew that I'd saved her life and that I could ask for a favor in kind, yet she'd still given me thanks. "It doesn't feel right."
Siobhan took my hand. "You've never called in a favor before, have you?"
I definitely felt some judgment to the question, but I didn't care. Well, maybe it bugged me a bit, because I liked Siobhan, but it didn't bother me enough to huff about it. "No."
She smiled. It was a bit impish. It reminded me that I owed her a favor and that she held all the cards when it came to calling it in. "It's up to the person calling in the favor to set the terms. You can leave it up to her to decide whether this is her opportunity to pay you back, if that's how you want to play it. But you need help, and it's dishonorable to Greta not to give her the opportunity. She owes you. You need help. It's that simple. Go find Greta before you enter the green mist."
I hated to admit it, but Siobhan was right. If I was going to be heading into a place that even most Faerie-born fae avoided, it would probably be best to have a guide who truly knew the ways of Faerie and its people. Honestly, I could use any and all help on offer. I had no plan, knew nothing about what I was attempting, and everyone else believed it was impossible. Any help would be good, but still, going after Greta meant taking the time to do that.
"Fine. I don't like it, but I'll seek out Greta. Do you have any idea where she is?"
Siobhan nodded. "Aye, I'll have a map ready for you in the morning. Make sure you get plenty of rest. Treating with dragons isn't something to be done when you're half asleep."
"I will," I agreed. Owen was easy to deal with most of the time, but his mother was a much more accurate representation of dragons. Even Lou, who I had to retrieve objects from on a regular basis, while mostly benign, was a pain in the ass. "I have something for you, by the way. Let me get it out of my bag."
When I turned around to grab my bag, all I saw was empty floor. A scan of the room didn't find it anywhere. It should have been right next to my chair at the dining table.
"It's in the bedroom," said Siobhan, a mischievous grin splitting her tan face.
"Hearth magic," I muttered, and walked back to the small bedroom. Somehow, without my notice, Siobhan had set up her second bedroom with three beds that might even be tall enough our feet wouldn't hang off them. From what I could remember, the space shouldn't have been large enough to hold them, but now they fit comfortably. On each of our beds sat our bags. I rummaged through mine and fished out the enchanted cloth satchel.
Phoebe and Ava said goodnight to Siobhan and filed into the bedroom as I went back into the kitchen. Siobhan held out her hand expectantly.
"I'm sorry it took me so long to return it." I placed it in her hand. "I don't exactly make regular trips to Faerie."
"It's probably wiser that you don't." She peered out the window. "It's wonderful here, but it's not a forgiving place." She turned back to face me. "Don't worry yourself about the timing. If I'd needed it sooner, I would have sought you out."
"I appreciate all of your help Siobhan," I said, turning toward the bedroom. "I'll be glad to repay the favor I owe you when you call upon me."
Siobhan responded through a laugh. "Oh, I highly doubt that. If I ask for a favor to be repaid, it likely won't be any fun at all."
It didn't go without notice that she'd said "If" very intentionally in that sentence. She wasn't absolving me of my debt, but it wasn't very likely that she'd ever call it in. Some fae were like that. They delighted in the knowledge of being owed rather than what they could get out of those that owed them.
"Good night, Siobhan," I replied, and slipped into the bedroom.
Phoebe and Ava were already well on their way to sleep. I was out before my head hit the pillow.
The smell of cinnamon and bacon teased me awake the next morning. Through crusted eyes, I saw that Phoebe and Ava were already sitting up. In Ava's case, she was getting dressed. Phoebe rubbed her eyes sleepily.
I found myself focusing on Phoebe. I couldn't remember ever seeing her sleep. As a rule, she disappeared into her tree at night, so I didn't think about it much. Now, seeing her with hair all mussed and her eyes droopy was almost disturbing.
"I thought you woke up all bright-eyed and bushy tailed," I told her.
Phoebe leveled a glare at me. "This is very different. Waking up in my tree is not anything like waking up in a bed." She sneered at the last word and then shook out her curly locks. "Besides, I'm usually awake for a couple of hours before you crawl out of bed."
That was true enough. She got up before sunrise. The only way I saw sunrise was if I hadn't yet made it to bed for the night.
"Well, I hope you two enjoy sitting here all morning teasing each other," said Ava as she slipped on her boots. "I'll be having my way with the whole of Siobhan's cooking."
When Ava opened the door to the room, the smells intensified and pried me out of bed. I was dressed in an instant and strapping on my swords by the time Phoebe walked out of the room. I scooped up my bag and looked around to make sure we hadn't forgotten anything. "Owen? Are you--" I almost swallowed my tongue in shock. I'd woken up to the smell of food, and thoughts of Owen's situation had fallen out of my head. It came rushing back in, and it was all too much. I was standing in an empty room. I was in Faerie because Owen was gone. Someone took Owen. They might have done it because of me. Because I couldn't leave Erik Bresnan alone.
There it was. I wanted to believe perhaps his disappearance had something to do with Lana, or the many other things in Owen's life, but the timing of it just screamed my fault. Somehow, that made it so much more impossible than if it was someone else's fuck up.
I doubled over and held my head between my knees. That was supposed to help with the dizziness, but it didn't help with the reality of the situation. No. "No, no, no." I shook my head and forced myself to stand straight up again, gulping deep breaths of air. Panicking was not allowed. Panicking never managed to help me find anything. And that's what these people had done. They'd grabbed Owen off the street like he was a pair of flip-flops or some other dangerous magical object. He was a person--he was my person!--and they…
I slapped my own cheek. Somehow, it hadn't occurred to me how much that might hurt. "None of this," I told the empty room. I swallowed hard. "I'm coming, Owen." The room felt lonelier for my unheard words. I marched from the room with a calm expression forced on my face, determined not to start the day in such a melancholy mood. I tried for a smile. There was breakfast to eat, after all.
&n
bsp; Thanks to the help of Siobhan's hearth magic, breakfast was done and consumed in a fraction of the time it would have taken in a mundane kitchen. I ate more french toast, bacon, and eggs than one should eat at one time, but I told myself that it wasn't everyday I was sitting at Siobhan's table. She could have been the best short order cook in New York City if it struck her fancy.
"You get your tiny little asses out of my raspberries," Siobhan shouted out the window.
But, she'd rather stay in Faerie and wage war over her garden with pixies. One such pixie buzzed by her window and made rude gestures with her hands so quickly that they were practically a blur in front of her tiny body.
"You tell 'em," I replied, shaking a fist at the pixie. I'd learned a little respect for the tiny buggers when Clarissa had been killing them off, but it hardly balanced all the trouble they caused at my job. "Annoying little thieves, the lot of 'em."
Siobhan quirked a brow at me. "You stay around here much longer and people will start to think we're sisters."
"What?" I asked, then recalled the way I'd just spoken. "Sorry, I love your accent. It rubs off on me."
Siobhan chuckled. "Don't worry about it." She pulled a folded piece of paper out of a pocket and shoved it across the table. "Here's that map."
Phoebe scooped it up and unfolded it. Spoon held in her mouth, she squinted at the paper and then furrowed her brow, turning a scowl on Siobhan. "Is this some sort of joke?"
"No," replied Siobhan, giving Phoebe a scowl of her own. "Are you as bad at map reading as you are at seasoning food?"
Ava and I both gasped at the sharpness of the comment, but Phoebe just stuck out her tongue. "Your map leads us into the middle of nowhere."
Ava took the map and examined it. "Phoebe is correct. To my knowledge, this path winds through increasingly barren terrain."
"See," said Siobhan. "That's why you need the help of someone who lives in Faerie. Things are almost always not as they appear. I promise that if you follow my map, you'll find Greta and her family."
I took the map from Ava and tucked it into my bag. "Siobhan's word is good enough for me." Ava and Phoebe still didn't look convinced. "We're following the map." The two of them immediately relaxed and looked back at their plates. I looked over at Siobhan to see if she'd noticed what had just happened, but she was wiping down her counters. Maybe it was in my head, but it seemed to me that Phoebe had given up mighty easily. She'd given more of a fight over the asparagus. I reached up to the top of my head, but stopped before my fingers connected. Was that you? The crown didn't answer my thought, but I thought I knew.
We finished off the last of our coffee and gathered around the door while Siobhan pulled packages out of the refrigerator.
"I whipped up a few things that travel well. Mostly bread and sausages." She gave me a hard look. "You know better than to eat anything unless you're already very familiar with it, right?"
I nodded and took the foil-wrapped packages. I figured there was no need to explain that we'd already messed that rule up once during our journey. To be fair, we'd been enchanted before we ate the berries, so my judgment was impaired on that one. None of that would have left Siobhan feeling confident we'd survive the next few days, so instead I told her, "We'll try to stop by to say hey on our way out of Faerie."
Siobhan's smile was weak. "I'll pray to the old gods that it be so."
"Don't get all sentimental on me, Siobhan," I said with a grumble. "I'm harder to kill than I look, and Owen is a tough bugger. Besides, I'd never dream of dying before I repay that favor."
"All right. Out of here, the lot of you. I've got a war to wage." As if to make her point, a group of pixies zipped by the open door, issuing a chorus of giggles. "Go rescue Owen."
Her words echoed in my head as we set off down the trail in the direction indicated on her map. We were headed east, not at all in the direction of the green mist. I really hoped she knew what she was talking about. I hoped we both did.
CHAPTER NINE
The terrain changed quickly as we headed east. The forest gave way to rocky hills after a couple miles, giving our legs a real workout and slowing our progress. As if Faerie was determined to make sure we were drenched with sweat, the temperature rose dramatically, seeming to deny the fact that it was still before midday. Having crested one of the bigger hills and spotted a tree large enough to provide actual shade, we decided to take a break. I gulped down several swallows of water and pulled my soaking wet shirt away from my chest. "This heat is horrendous. I know most dragons are into fire and all, but Owen keeps his thermostat a couple of degrees too cool for me. This is ridiculous."
"It's not so bad if you pretend you're on the beach," replied Phoebe.
"That's easy for you to say with your nudity--" I stopped, realizing the ridiculousness of the fact that I was wearing clothes when I didn't have to. It took only a second's thought to form the picture of my winged human self, and my magic took care of the rest. The change wiped away the sheen of sweat that had coated my body, and I knew my feathers would regulate some of the heat. It would be even cooler than being naked, and I felt much less vulnerable in this form. "Much better."
Ava stood with her arms out at her sides, letting the breeze catch under her dress and puff out like the marshmallow man. She took deep breaths in through her nose and released them through her mouth. I thought she was too busy meditating to notice me until she said, "Sophie, please apply fresh sunscreen to your exposed skin."
I rolled my eyes.
"Sophie, Sophie, Sophie," said Ava, her eyes still closed. "Some would suggest that your eye rolling is a thing of your age, but I never adopted the habit. Your youth is no excuse to be rude to your friends."
"You like me when I'm rude."
Her nose twitched. "You would think that."
"She would," Phoebe agreed.
"Oh, is that how it's going to be now? The two of you ganging up on me?"
"That sounds splendid!" Ava dropped her pose and looked at Phoebe expectantly.
"Definitely. What do you think we should tease her about first?"
"Oh, the choices."
"Enough, you two." My lips pinched together, holding back a laugh. "I'm glad to see you're both in such good moods. With this heat, if either of you were to be the least bit bitchy I'd probably bite your heads off."
"What's your excuse the rest of the time?" asked Phoebe at the same time Ava said, "You're royalty now. Don't use your teeth, beheading is something you should really order someone else to take care of for you."
The two of them looked at each other, both so pleased with themselves I had no choice but to roll my eyes.
"Ava's right, you know," said Phoebe. "You never see portraits of royalty rolling their eyes. You should really cut that out."
"I. Am. Not. Royalty."
"Whoa there," said Phoebe. "I thought you weren't going to bite my head off unless I got bitchy?"
"I said that would be one way I'd bite your head off, not that other ways were excluded."
Ava nodded. "An important clarification."
"All right, enough making fun of me."
"Are you sure?" asked Ava.
"I've definitely not had enough," said Phoebe.
"Yes, I'm sure. Let's get a move on. This can't go on for much longer. These hot, miserable hills have to change sooner rather than later."
"Not that there's any sign of it," replied Ava, peering into the distance. The day was hazy; it was hard to make out more than the next few hills. "Magic pollution is a Faerie wide problem."
"I know!" exclaimed Phoebe. "I don't know how they stand it."
"Most of them love it," said Ava, moving her eyes in a suspiciously roll-like gesture. "I spent my youth living with people who exemplified this trait."
Phoebe shuddered. "If I'm going to soak myself in magic, I'd rather it be my own, you know?"
The two of them went on like that, talking about the landscape and making jokes about me as we trudged through the heat. Hours
passed, and we sweated and strained our muscles. With nothing to see, the landscape settled into a tedious sameness, and between that and the heat, and Owen still being missing, and us walking away from his last known whereabouts, my grumpiness was bound to go from playful to violent at the drop of a hat. I thought it best to excuse myself from the conversation. Skills like this were essential to learn when you wanted to maintain friendships, I was learning.
But then that left me responsible for coming up with something to occupy my own brain, and boy was that not something I was up for doing. I worked high pressure jobs all the time. I was used to constantly reminding myself to stay on task. But this was different. So different. I wasn't going after a magical object. I wasn't responsible for the weight of the world or some political bullshit, either. I was responsible for saving Owen. I could not be responsible for the direction of my thoughts, and yet I had to be. It was my mind I was depending on to figure out a way to find him, after all. Do better, brain. More information was what I needed. I considered taking to wing and scouting ahead, but I knew it was a bad idea. I would be more vulnerable alone and in the air, and so would Ava and Phoebe if I left them behind. This was still Faerie, even if it felt awfully boring right now. I hadn't seen anything more threatening than a few immature golems, which still creeped me out a bit, but I was getting used to them. Otherwise, strange plants and the occasional fae animal scampering across our path were the only ways to differentiate this part of Faerie from Earth. As soon as I took for granted that I knew what was around us and we were safe enough, that's when some foreign thing would jump out and bite us. I knew enough to know that.
"You've got to be kidding me," said Phoebe, jerking me out of the walking daze I'd fallen into.
When I focused again, I wanted to fall to my knees in defeat. Rolling sand dunes had replaced the rocky green hills in front of us. "This is bullshit," I growled. I knew it. Regret gnawed at my guts. I knew I shouldn't have gone off to chase down someone else to help. I knew better than to nod my head and agree with Siobhan like I didn't have a mind of my own. I knew better than this, and Owen was going to die because of it.