“But it will restore the balance of power and prevent other Fae families from breaking our laws,” Grian said. “The doorways need not concern you.”
“They do concern me. My family and friends are at risk from the Fae and mortal worlds mingling.” How unreasonable was this woman? Everyone spoke of her as if she was some sort of malevolent dictator. Surely it didn’t have to come down to fighting, to my death. “I can close them,” I said. “The doorways. Isn’t this reason enough to let me live?”
The Queen lifted her chin. “No.”
I gritted my teeth. “You’re not making this easy. Just give me back my nephew. Give him back, or I’ll…” I lifted my sword, swung the tip around to face her.
“Or you’ll what?” the Queen said, her voice sharp. “Did you truly think you could walk into my palace and take what you wanted by force?”
Tristan didn’t notice any of this exchange. He stared at the ball in his hands, unnaturally focused. I sniffed the air. Lavender. “You’ve charmed him somehow,” I said.
“Very bright, this Changeling,” the Queen said. She stood, and the floors of the palace trembled. The chandeliers dimmed. “Kill her.”
The air around me solidified, revealing eight Guardians, dressed in silver armor. They advanced.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The sword and shield felt suddenly inadequate—play toys in my hands. My confidence eroded as the Guardians rushed toward me. This was the end. I was going to die here, sliced up by eight swords, no one at home aware of what had happened to me. And then Kailen’s words rang like a bell in my mind.
“I invoke my right to challenge!” I cried out.
The hall ceased to tremble, the lights returned, and the Guardians stopped in their tracks. My nephew, unperturbed, continued to pass the ball from hand to hand, a faint smile on his lips.
“I challenge the Guardians,” I said, “on behalf of the Aranhods.”
For a long time, no one moved.
Then one of the Guardians spoke. A man with black hair pulled into a tail. “Such a request is unprecedented.” He looked to Grian, as did the others.
Grian sat back on her throne and took a moment to arrange her skirts. “An interesting request,” she murmured, “and one you did not come up with on your own. What are you playing at, Kailen?”
I waited, sword and shield limp in my hands. It seemed everyone in the Fae world knew Kailen. He’d said he wanted me to know him better, and yet at every turn, he withheld information from me. What did Grian know of him? “Will you accept?”
“It is up to the Guardians to accept.” Even as she said the words, she gave the barest of nods to the man, broad as two of me put together.
He stepped forward. “I am Haldor, and I will accept this challenge on the Guardians’ behalf. If you win, the Guardians will no longer come after you.” He held out his hands, palm up. In the next instant, a fire sparked to life in one hand, and ice formed in the other. “If you win.” He smirked and turned away.
“The challenge will take place three days hence, mortal time,” Grian said. “In the Arena. No one will be allowed to harm you until then.” She leaned down and picked up Tristan, placing him in her lap. He giggled as she bounced him on her knee, his wispy brown hair falling across his forehead. He did not drop the ball. “Now leave my realm.”
“Not without my nephew,” I said.
“Go on,” Grian said. “Try to take him then.”
I moved the sword to my shield hand, took two steps toward the throne, knelt, and held my arms out. “Come on, Tristan. It’s your auntie, Nicole. Your momma’s waiting back home for you.”
Tristan didn’t even glance in my direction. Grian smiled.
I hadn’t become the top salesperson at Frank Gibbons, Inc. by being shy. I pushed past the Guardians and headed for the throne. Before anyone could stop me, I’d plucked my nephew from the Queen’s knee.
He screamed, and his face went pale. I reached to dislodge the ball from his hands. As soon as I touched its golden surface, a jolt went through my body. It felt like an electric current, hard as a slap. My breath went out of me. Tristan continued to scream.
As soon as I could breathe, I tried again to touch the ball. The shock this time was harder and made me fall to my knees. I cradled my nephew to my chest. His screams had reduced to low sobs. I barely felt the stone beneath me. I must have bruised myself, but the pain running through my chest obfuscated any other discomfort. Time to change tactics. I concentrated, lifted a hand, and tore a doorway through to the mortal world.
“If you take him through with the ball, he will die,” Grian said, her voice filling the hall.
“Then we'll go without it.”
“Each time anyone but me or the boy touches it, the pain gets stronger. It will kill you.”
I met her cold blue gaze with my own and grabbed for the ball again. The world around me faded into black and red. The pain numbed my brain, became my center. When I came to myself again, I was stretched on the floor. Tristan had wandered away from my arms and into the folds of Grian’s skirt.
“Get out,” Grian said. “Before I change my mind.”
Wounded, defeated, my heart in the vicinity of the soles of my feet, I stumbled through the doorway and back into the mortal world.
I landed on the side of the road in a heavily forested area I didn’t recognize. I closed the doorway behind me and leaned my back against a nearby pine tree. I’d failed. I had to find a way to win against the Guardians now, if only to live long enough to bring Tristan back. That golden ball—there had to be a way to get it away from him.
I climbed the slope to the road. Trees and asphalt stretched as far as I could see. I didn't have a phone on me, or any money. When I picked a direction and started to walk, my feet ached in protest. I turned the sword and shield back into a coaster and a stick, dropped them back into my pocket.
The sweater I wore was torn, the knees of my jeans covered in grass stains. I probably hadn't brushed my hair in a day. A couple cars passed and I put out my thumb, but neither stopped. I couldn't blame them. I didn't look very reputable at the moment. How had this happened? I'd gone from a woman with a promising career to someone on the run from the laws of both the Fae and mortal worlds. Owen had been right, though. I had to stop blaming everyone else. I wasn't perfect. It had been stupid of me to turn Jane into a mouse. I'd let my temper get the better of me. Sure, I hadn't known I had magic, but my anger should have been focused at Owen, not Jane.
I could have had both a career and a life at home—I'd chosen not to. I'd gravitated toward Owen in college because he'd been fun, different. Too different, apparently. I wouldn't take the blame for his cheating—that was his stupidity, not mine. At the same time, I hadn't been kind to him. He had tried to talk to me, several times, and I'd constantly dismissed him.
And I'd been too upset about these changes in my life to concentrate, as I should have, on learning magic. Now my nephew's life hung in the balance. Doorways were opening between the mortal world and the Fae world, swallowing unsuspecting mortals. I'd not been the first to dance in that fairy circle. The strange murders with the impossible time frames? Something or someone in the Fae world must have committed them. It was the only thing that made sense. Time passes differently in the Fae world. People were dying because of the doorways—doorways I could close if I could turn off the big "kill me" sign I seemed to have hanging over my head. And since no one else seemed invested in it, I needed to find out who was opening them in the first place.
Damn it, this was bigger than me and my problems. To hell with Kailen and Owen, Penelope and Grian. I had to get my shit together.
The sound of an engine rose from the distance. I stuck my thumb out. This time, to my surprise, I heard the car rumble to a stop.
“I’ve heard hitchhiking can be dangerous. Mortal world 101.” Dorian, the Sidhe man we'd fought the night before, had his head out the window of a beater car. The paint peeled, and one window was missing, repla
ced with duct tape. The bumper was dented. He still wore the black silk bathrobe.
“Are you here to finish me off or something?” I asked. My hand crept toward the pocket with the stick and coaster.
“Grian called for a ceasefire. The other Fae families echoed it. You're dead as doornails in three days anyways.” He jerked his head toward the car. “Come on. I'll give you a ride.”
I hesitated and then strode to the passenger door. Grian had said that no one would hunt me until the challenge had taken place. Besides, I really didn't want to keep walking, and Dorian had been polite about trying to kill me. The door stuck when I tried to open it, but with a tug it swung wide. I slid onto the cracked vinyl seat. It didn't have a seat belt. “Do you even have insurance?”
“In-shore-ents?” Dorian raised an eyebrow.
“Never mind,” I said. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, right?
He pulled the car back onto the road. “As I said before,” Dorian said, “I don't have any hard feelings against you in particular. You seem like a nice enough lady. I'm not fond of Kailen, but then, a lot of the Sidhe aren't.”
I leaned my head against the window, my hand in my pocket, just in case. “Is it because he pissed off the Arbiter?”
“Nah,” he said. “That's between the two of them.”
I threw up my hands. “Okay, what is it then? He said he wants me to get to know him better, but it seems like everyone knows more about him than I do. Every time I feel like I've learned the last secret about Kailen, someone or something pops up to tell me that's not all.”
“Hmm,” he said.
“What's that supposed to mean? Hmm?”
“I've just never met a Changeling before,” he said. He tilted his head to the side. “But as I was saying—I don't like Kailen, and you're not doing yourself any favors by associating with him.”
“Tell me why.”
“He's Grian's son.”
If I'd been drinking anything, I'd have sprayed it all over the front windshield. “What?”
Dorian gave a noncommittal shrug. “Kailen's a liar. Everyone in the Fae world knows it.”
“Then why do the Aranhods...?”
“Trust him? I don't know. Probably because there was no one else. He used to be one of the Guardians. Real bastard, that one. Did a lot of shady things—anything Grian didn’t want to dirty her hands with. Confiscated things that others rightfully owned, interrogated Sidhe and Fae that did nothing wrong. He and I used to be friends when we were both young. Fifty or so years back, he quit the Guardians and disappeared into the mortal world. Before he did, he came to me, asked for my forgiveness, and wanted to know if we could reconcile. I opened my home to him, gave him my hospitality. The next morning, he'd gone, and had stolen a piece of moonstone.”
I swallowed. “How do I know you're telling me the truth?”
Dorian glanced at me, pale blue eyes catching my gaze. “Who's been more forthcoming with you—me or Kailen?” He turned back to the road. “Besides, if you don't believe me, next time you see him, ask him. Ask him whose son he is and where he got his moonstone. Don't let the hobgoblins fool you,” Dorian said. “I'm not a bad guy.”
Kailen, why did you lie? How could I trust him now, knowing who he was and what he'd done? I buried my face in my hands. “What am I going to do?”
“Let me guess,” Dorian said. “He's a good-looking Sidhe, with a Talent for elicitation. He's been reeling you in, bestowing some physical favors on you, telling you no one has made him feel this way, yadda, yadda. He's good at it. Sometimes you can't even tell he's doing it.”
“Oh, God. I'm such an idiot.” I rubbed at my temples, trying to dispel the growing headache.
He patted me awkwardly on the back. “Hey, I'm sorry you had to hear it from me. Someone should tell you these things.”
“What does it even matter?” I said. I gritted my teeth and shook my head. “I'm going to die.”
Dorian cleared his throat. “Challenges are a great spectacle in the Fae world. Very primal, like the heartbeat of the earth. The winner receives a crown of roses from the Queen. She allows them close, very close, in order to bestow this honor. She is good at crafting, but all crafted items have a weakness. The weakness has to do with what the crafter fears.”
He told me this casually, but I could hear the undertone in his words. He was trying to help. If I could win and get close to the Queen, I might find a way to dispel the magic of the golden ball and take my nephew back. I wound my hands together in my lap. I’d have to do it. I’d have to find a way.
The faint scent of black pepper drifted by my nose. When I looked up, the car was pulling into a street near my sister’s home. There was no sign of the road we’d just traversed. “How?”
“One of my Talents,” Dorian said. “Travel.” He pulled the car to the curb and stopped.
I gripped the handle of the door. “Thank you,” I said. “For the ride and the information.”
“Hold on a second.” He slid out of his door and came around to my side. He opened my door. “I forgot. It doesn’t open from the inside. Broken.”
This was all too weird. "Why are you doing this?" I burst out as I slid from the car. "You tried to kill me, and now you're giving me advice?"
He glanced back at the car and licked his lips. "Things in the Fae world are not as stable as you might think. Grian hasn't always been in power." He went back to the driver's side and started the car.
"Wait! Does this mean I have a chance? There are Fae, other than the Aranhods, that don’t care for her?"
He gave me a quick grin, and then he and the beater car were gone.
I puzzled out our conversation as I walked to the stoop. He hadn't shown up at my parents' home with any intention except to kill me. Now he wanted to help. I didn't keep up too much with politics, but I knew a flip-flopper when I saw one. Something had changed between then and now. I'd done something, or Grian had done something, to make Dorian hedge his bets.
The door to Lainey’s home was still unlocked. I knocked a couple times, but when no one replied, I stepped inside. No one was in the house, so I went to the backyard, opening the door quietly. Owen sat on the edge of one of the garden beds, bouncing Justine on his knee. She babbled and giggled. To my left, near the gate, Kailen consoled Lainey.
“You can’t go through,” he told her.
“My son went through there, and so did my sister! You can’t tell me I can’t go in there after them.”
“If you do, you’ll die.”
“Then you go. You get them back.”
“I can’t,” Kailen said. “I might be able to take a peek, but I’m exiled from the Fae world.”
“Then peek!”
I stepped toward them. “That won’t be necessary,” I said. I brushed past them, touched the doorway, and closed it. “I’ve challenged the Guardians. I’m going to find a way to get Tristan back, Lainey. I promise.”
“Has he eaten her food or drunk her water?” Kailen asked.
I rounded on him. “Both. Now you answer some questions for me. Is Grian your mother?”
He shrank before my eyes. “She told you, then. Yes. Grian is my mother.”
“You used to be a Guardian.”
“Yes.” This time, a whisper.
“You stole the moonstone from Dorian.”
“I did.”
“You’ve been using your elicitation on me from the very beginning.”
“I—Nicole, no! After the first time, I haven’t, not once. I swear it.”
I shook my head, an ugly feeling strangling the breath in my lungs, making my voice come out two shades higher than normal. “You’ve lied to me, over and over again. How do I know you’re even telling me the truth now? I’m tired of your lies, of trying to figure out whether or not you’re withholding information. Who are you?”
Kailen didn’t flinch at any of this, only stood there, head low, like a dog suffering his master’s reprimand. “I am who I said I was. I wasn’t
a very good person before. I tried to put all that behind me when I left the Guardians. Faolan and Maera believed in me. I came to the mortal world so I didn’t have to see her again. It gave me hope that I didn’t have to be my mother’s son.” He let out a sigh. “But I am. I am sorry, Nicole. I should have told you everything from the beginning. You should have heard it from me.”
I felt it this time, the response of the world around me to my anger. The grass writhed at my feet, the tiles of Lainey’s small patio threatened to pull free, Tristan’s toys rose an inch from the ground. I could control it. I let the anger simmer. “No,” I said. “You don’t get this many chances.”
Kailen’s head snapped up. No doubt he had expected me to forgive him and to accept him back into my confidence. “But you only have three days before the challenge. I know the Guardians, who they are, what they can do.”
“I’ll manage without you,” I said. “I’d rather face them alone than with the advice of a man I can’t trust.”
“Nicole, please.”
I closed my eyes against the sudden tug on my heart. I couldn’t deny that I felt something for Kailen—some spark, mostly unexplored. Maera and Faolan trusted him. There was so much I didn’t know about him. Too much. I opened my eyes. “You will leave, or I will make you leave.” As soon as I said the words, I knew I could make him leave. The power gathered within me, waiting for me to direct it. A hundred ways I could eject him from Lainey’s yard filtered through my mind.
Kailen stepped back, eyes widening slightly. I wondered, briefly, what he saw in my gaze. “No. I’ll go.” He turned, unlatched the gate, and was gone.
For a moment, silence reigned.
“Oh, honey,” Lainey finally said. “Are you sure that was a good idea?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Now that Kailen was gone, I couldn’t be sure I’d done the right thing. The green fairies’ words echoed in my mind. Though I felt more in control of my Fae powers than ever, I still knew little of the world I would fight for my life in.
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