by Julie Kagawa
A nurse peeked into the room, saw me and frowned, tapping her wrist. I nodded, and she ducked out.
I stood, wishing I didn’t have to leave so soon. “I have to go,” I told her as she blinked sleepily up at me. Reaching down, I gently brushed the hair from her face. “I’ll be back tomorrow, okay?”
Her eyes closed once more and didn’t open this time. “Ethan?”
“Yeah?”
“Bring chocolate? The food here sucks.”
I laughed quietly, bent down and kissed her. Just a brief, light touch of her lips to mine, and she sank back into the pillows. Already asleep. I watched her for another heartbeat, then turned and left the room, vowing to come back as soon as I could.
As I stepped into the hall, a shadow pushed itself off the wall and moved toward me, blocking my path. I blinked and stumbled to a halt as a tall, dark-haired man loomed over me, cold black eyes regarding me with suspicion. He wore a business suit that probably cost more than my truck, a large Rolex on one wrist and an air of aggressive superiority. He didn’t look distraught. In this corridor of rumpled, haggard-looking people, he was tall and clean shaven with not a hair out of place or a wrinkle in his clothes.
We stared at each other, and I narrowed my eyes. I didn’t like the way this guy was looking at me, like I was a stray dog wandering around and he wasn’t sure if he should call animal control. I was about to shove past him when his lips twitched into a cold, unamused smile, and he shook his head.
“So.” The man’s voice wasn’t loud or even hostile. It was cool and pragmatic. “You’re him, aren’t you? The boy that took my very sick daughter away from her family, and her medicine, and her doctors, to go gallivanting up to New York for the week.”
Oh, crap. You had to be kidding me. This was Kenzie’s father. Kenzie’s very rich, very powerful lawyer father. The father who, by Kenzie’s own admission, had had the entire police force searching for his missing daughter all week.
I was in trouble.
I didn’t answer, and Kenzie’s dad continued to regard me without expression. His voice didn’t change; it was still perfectly reasonable, though his eyes turned steely as he said, “Explain yourself, please. Tell me why I shouldn’t press charges against you for kidnapping.”
I swallowed the challenge on the tip of my tongue. The unfairness of it all burned my throat. He wasn’t making idle threats. I’d dealt with my share of lawyers, though they were all public defenders, not the same caliber as Kenzie’s dad. If he decided to press charges against me, there was little I could do. My word held no weight; if the cops did get involved, who would they believe—the rich lawyer or the teenage thug?
I took a deep breath to cool my anger so when I spoke I wouldn’t sound like the delinquent brute he thought I was. “Kenzie wanted to see New York,” I began in the most reasonable voice I could manage. “She asked me to take her. It was a split-second decision and probably not the smartest thing we could have done, but...” I shrugged helplessly. “We should have talked to you about it first, and I’m sorry for that. But it’s done now. And you can try to keep me away, have me arrested, whatever. But I’m not abandoning Kenzie.”
He raised a skeptical eyebrow, and I wanted to kick myself. Nice, Ethan. Keep antagonizing Mr. Big Shot lawyer; that’s a great way to stay out of jail. But he was still waiting calmly for me to go on, and the next words out of my mouth were the absolute truth. “I swear, I would never do anything to hurt her. I wouldn’t have taken her anywhere if I’d known she’d end up here.”
He regarded me with a practiced blank expression, giving no hint of what he was thinking. “Mackenzie speaks very highly of you,” he said. “She told me that while you were in Central Park, you fought off a gang of thugs who tried to hurt her. She has never lied to me before, so I have no reason to doubt her words. But I think, in this case, I must ask you to stay away from my daughter.”
I blinked, taken aback by his quiet bluntness, unsure of what I’d just heard. “What?”
“You are not to see Mackenzie anywhere outside of school,” Mr. St. James continued, still in that cool, unruffled voice. “You are forbidden from calling her. You are not to speak to her if you can help it. If you come around our house, I will call the police. Do you understand, Mr. Chase?”
“You can’t be serious.” I was torn between laughing and wanting to slug this guy in the jaw. “You can’t forbid me from seeing anyone. And good luck getting Kenzie to agree to anything like that.”
“Yes,” Kenzie’s father agreed. “I know my daughter. And I know I cannot control what she does. But I can make your life very unplesant, Mr. Chase. Which is why I am asking you, politely, to stay away from Mackenzie. I think we both know that you’re no good for her. I think we both know that she ended up here—” he gestured back to Kenzie’s doorway “—because of you.”
That hit me like a punch to the gut. I stared at him, unable to find the words to defend myself or disagree. Kenzie’s dad regarded me a second longer, then moved aside. “You should go now,” he said, a hint of warning below the smooth tone. I glared at him, then shoved past. I was tempted to tell him to go screw himself, just to prove he couldn’t order me around, but tempting fate right now seemed like a bad idea. There was nothing to be gained from it tonight.
“Think on what I said, Ethan Chase,” St. James added as I stalked down the hallway, silently fuming. “I will protect my daughter at all costs. Do not think you can fight me on this. You will lose, and you will lose badly.”
I continued to the parking lot without looking back. I saw the cop standing in the waiting room again, and he might’ve given me the evil eye as I ducked out. Maybe Kenzie’s dad had said something to him before confronting me...I didn’t know. I did know one thing—there was no way that A-hole would keep me from seeing Kenzie.
As I climbed into my truck and yanked the door shut behind me, my phone buzzed. Digging it out of my pocket, I checked the number and winced. Mom. Damn, I hadn’t called to let her know where I was. Guiltily, I hit the answer button and braced myself for the explosion. “Hey, Mom.”
“Where are you?” her frantic voice screeched in my ear. “I told you to call me if you were going to be late!”
“Um, yeah, sorry. I’m...uh, I’m at the hospital.”
“What?”
“Visiting a friend,” I added, mentally kicking myself. “I’m just visiting a friend.”
A long, shaky sigh, the kind that hinted she was holding back tears. “Come home, Ethan. Right now.”
“On my way,” I answered softly, and she hung up.
I expected a lecture when I got home. Something along the lines of “It’s only been three days since you vanished into Faeryland for a week, do you know how worried we were, you’re supposed to call if you’re going to be late.”
You know, the normal issues.
However, when I walked through the front door, bracing myself for scolding or yelling or general parental displeasure, it wasn’t Mom who rose from the living room couch to greet me.
It was Meghan.
CHAPTER THREE
THE IRON QUEEN’S WARNING
My stomach flip-flopped. My half sister, the queen of the Iron fey, was standing in my living room, looking as normal as any average, non-faery-related teenager. Almost. She wore her standard jeans and T-shirt, and her long, straight blond hair was pulled up behind her head. Only the slender, pointed ears gave her away; though the glamour concealed her true appearance, making her look perfectly human to mortals, my Sight always let me see through the disguise.
I cast a furtive glance around the room for other fey, well, for one faery in particular. For a long black coat and a glowing blue sword, silver eyes appraising and wary. Was he in my house, lurking in some dark corner? He’d never come inside before....
“He’s not here,” Meghan said quietly. Embarrassed, I flicked my attention back to her, finding her solemn blue eyes on me. She looked...tired. Worried. “I need to talk to you, Ethan,” she sa
id. “In private, if we could. I don’t want Mom or Luke overhearing us, and there are some things that need...explaining.”
“Yeah. There are.”
I motioned her down the hall to my room, following her through the frame and closing the door behind us. Meghan perched on my bed while I dropped into my computer chair, facing her.
So many questions. So many secrets she had kept from me, from Mom, from everyone. Where should I even begin? I opted for the largest one.
“Keirran,” I said, and she closed her eyes. “When were you going to tell us? Or were you hoping to keep him from us forever?” When she didn’t answer right away, I nodded slowly, even though she couldn’t see. “That’s why you stopped coming around, isn’t it?” I muttered. “You never wanted us to meet. You didn’t want Keirran to know about his human family.” My chest squeezed tight as I thought of all those years, waiting for my sister to come back, just to visit, and she never had. “Are you ashamed of us?”
“Ethan.” She sighed, and the pain in her voice made me wish I had never opened my mouth. When she opened her eyes, I caught the sparkle of tears on her lashes and felt like a complete ass. “I’m sorry,” Meghan whispered and took a deep breath, composing herself. “I’m sorry,” she said again in a stronger voice. “No, I’m not ashamed of you, Ethan. I love you, and Mom, and Luke, more than anything. You’ll always be my family, even if I can’t be here.”
“Then...why the big secret?” I had to swallow the lump in my throat to continue. I remembered, suddenly, Puck’s look of concern when he’d seen Keirran and me together; Keirran’s own words about secrets being kept from him by everyone. “It’s not just you,” I said, watching her reaction carefully. “There’s something about Keirran that has everyone nervous. What’s going on?”
“I...can’t tell you.”
Stung, I stared at her. Meghan paused, seeming to gather her thoughts, her face suddenly pinched and agonized. “I know I’ve failed you, Ethan,” she said in a shaky voice. “I wanted to protect you from Faery, from everything. I wanted...” She swallowed hard, and her eyes glimmered. “I wanted you to know Keirran. I wanted Mom to meet her grandson, and it killed me that she might never know him.”
Meghan sniffed, then composed herself once more. “You don’t understand now,” she said, “but there are reasons why I chose what I did, why I decided it was best that you and Keirran stay away from each other.” She sighed again, but her voice was steady when she continued, “I am sorry, Ethan. I know how hard it’s been. The last thing I wanted to do was hurt you and Mom, but I thought this was the best choice.”
I wanted to be angry with her. For years I had blamed her for abandoning us, for putting her life as a fey queen before her own family. But...maybe she couldn’t come back. Maybe it was just as hard for her to stay away. I didn’t understand why she was still keeping me in the dark about Keirran, but there was something else going on here.
“Well, I guess Keirran and I sort of screwed that plan up, didn’t we?” I said, wanting to ease some of the tension in the room. My attempt at a joke did not have the effect I wanted.
Meghan’s brow furrowed. “From the moment you walked into the palace, I knew what was going to happen,” she murmured, almost to herself. “I even sent someone to track Keirran down once you arrived, but he pulled one of his vanishing acts before we could find him. Then when I heard he’d helped you and Kenzie sneak out of the palace...” She shook her head. “He has no idea what this means, what it has started. Neither of you realize what could happen now. Ethan...” Her blue eyes met mine, angry and pleading all at once. “Where is he?” she asked. “Please, if you know where he is, tell him to come home.”
I gave a start. “Who? Keirran? Why would I know where...” I stopped as the very obvious answer hit me in the face. “He’s gone, isn’t he?” I guessed. “That’s why you’re here. Keirran’s run off again.”
“He disappeared not long after you went home,” Meghan replied, her face lined with worry. “No one has seen any sign of him since.” She looked around the room, as if hoping to catch him hiding in the closet or something. “I was hoping...he might’ve come here.”
I shook my head. “I haven’t seen him.” She stared at me, suspicious, and I raised my hands. “I swear, Meghan. I haven’t seen him, or Annwyl, or anyone since New York. If Keirran is gone, he hasn’t come to me.”
In that instant, I wondered if I did know exactly where Keirran was and if I should voice that concern to Meghan. The Iron Prince, as he was called, was in love with a faery of the Summer Court, a love that was forbidden according to ancient faery law. Annwyl was a banished Summer fey who lived with the self-proclaimed Exile Queen, Leanansidhe, in the Between, the Veil between Faery and the real world.
When Annwyl had been kidnapped by the Forgotten, they’d used her to draw Keirran out, forcing him to appear before their queen. But when Kenzie and I had gone to rescue him, as well as Todd, Annwyl and a whole troop of half-breeds robbed of their glamour, Keirran had been shockingly sympathetic to the Forgotten and their cause. I didn’t know exactly what had been said between the Iron Prince and the Forgotten Queen, but when we’d left, Keirran had made a promise to return to her, of his own free will, sometime in the future.
Could he be with the Forgotten Queen right now?
Meghan was still watching me, her gaze appraising, almost as if she could see my thoughts. “If he hasn’t come to you,” she asked slowly, deliberately, “do you know where he might be?”
I looked away. I didn’t want to rat Keirran out. We might’ve had our disagreements in the past, but he was still family. And after everything that had happened, I did consider him a friend. But Meghan was my sister, and this whole thing with Keirran and the Forgotten couldn’t be kept a secret for long. Too much was at stake.
“Yeah,” I rasped, still not looking at her. “I have an idea. When we were with the Forgotten, Keirran told their queen he’d come back to see her. He might be with the Forgotten right now.”
I saw the change, the subtle shift from my familiar older sister to the immensely powerful Iron Queen, right there on my bed. She didn’t move, but her energy filled the room, making the air crackle and the lights flicker.
I swallowed. “Hey, sis? I sort of need my computer not to explode, if that’s okay.”
Meghan blinked, and the power surging around her died down. “Of course,” she murmured and rose off the bed. “Thank you for telling me about the Forgotten, Ethan,” she said, back to being normal Meghan. “I know you and Keirran went through a lot, and you don’t want to get him in trouble, but you did the right thing. I needed to know what he’s capable of.”
I felt pretty wretched. Meghan looked smaller now, less a faery queen and more a concerned parent, weighed down by worry, guilt and something much darker. “I have to get back to Mag Tuiredh,” she said, walking to the door. “Ethan, if you do see Keirran, will you please tell him to come home? Let him know he isn’t in trouble—we just want to talk to him. Whatever it is, whatever he’s doing, we can work it out. He isn’t alone in this. Will you promise me that much, at least?”
“If I see him,” I said, “I’ll let him know.”
“And...don’t tell Mom or Luke. Not yet.” She ran a hand over her eyes. “They have to find out about him, but...I want to be the one to explain.”
“I won’t tell them.”
She gave me a sad smile, and I followed her to the front door, where Mom was waiting for us both. Her face was red, her eyes swollen, though she still smiled and hugged Meghan tightly, reminding her that she was always welcome here, that this was always home. Even though we all knew it was not.
Outside, a horse and carriage waited, both invisible to mortal eyes. The horse was a bright copper beast of ticking clockwork, the driver a green-skinned faery in a top hat. He tipped the hat to us and smiled as Meghan pulled away from Mom and embraced me, pulling me close. “Take care of Mom,” she whispered, as she always had back when she still visited us
. I hugged her back and nodded.
“I will.”
And then, as she had so many times before, she left. Glamour shimmered around the Iron Queen as she faded from human vision—though my Sight still allowed me to see her clearly—and walked to the invisible carriage waiting for her on the sidewalk. The driver leaped down, opened the door for the queen to enter and sprang back onto the seat. At the flick of a shiny wire whip, the carriage rolled off down the sidewalk and was quickly lost to the darkness.
I braced myself for the questions as we returned inside; Mom would certainly want to know what Meghan and I had discussed behind closed doors. But all she said was “I don’t feel like cooking tonight, Ethan. Would you be all right with ordering pizza?”
“Sure,” I said, wondering what Meghan had told her before I came in. She gave me a shaky smile and wandered upstairs, probably to her bedroom. Probably to lock herself in and cry for a little while before returning to act like everything was normal. Like her daughter wasn’t an immortal faery queen who hadn’t aged in thirteen years and her son wasn’t a juvenile thug who attracted trouble at every turn.
I figured it was actually a good thing she didn’t yet know that she also had a defiant part-fey grandson who could be anywhere at the moment.
I returned to my room, placed the pizza order online and gazed at the spot where my sister had been moments ago.
So, Keirran was out there now. The Iron Prince had run off again, and no one knew where he was. Not that I was surprised; even in the short time I’d known him, Keirran had never been one to follow the rules. Not that he was spiteful or malicious; my nephew didn’t have a mean bone in his body and was unfailingly polite, amiable and soft-spoken. But he was also stubborn, rebellious and in love with a girl from the wrong court. He’d already demonstrated the lengths he would go to keep Annwyl safe; I wondered if she was the reason he had gone AWOL.