Iron Kin: A Novel of the Half-Light City

by M. J. Scott

  “Here.” Lily gave Simon the food she’d brought in. “Eat.”

  Simon nodded and took the plate. He started to eat while the rest of us found places to sit. I took a chair opposite the window after Fen sat on one of the small sofas. I wasn’t going to sit beside him. That would be inviting unwelcome scrutiny.

  Lily stayed by Simon at the window.

  “Can you tell us what happened?” I asked Simon.

  He swallowed, then shrugged. “Guy will know more than me. I spent most of the night tending the wounded.”

  “Did anyone die?” It seemed unlikely that all of them would have survived. Not with the extent of the some of the injuries.

  “Franklin Jones from the human council and a few others who were supporting that delegation.”

  The council delegation had had the front rows of the human quadrant of the hall, so they would have borne the brunt of the blast. A councillor dead. That just added another layer of complication to the situation.

  “What about the Beasts and the Blood?”

  “I assume they’re taking care of their own. None of them presented themselves for treatment at St. Giles.”

  I’d expected as much. Each race would be sticking close to home and trusting its own at this point. No point risking further fanning the flames by causing an incident at a Haven.

  Unless further fanning the flames was what you wanted to do, of course. Ignatius seemed to be the most likely candidate to want to do that, but for now, it seemed, he hadn’t made a move. Not one that had reached the hospital, at least.

  Guy would know more. If he ever got here. “What does Bryony think?”

  “She’s not . . .” He stopped, looked at Mother, then at me. “It was hard to talk last night. Some of the Fae healers went back to Summerdale when they heard what had happened. Bryony spent half the night trying to convince the rest of them to stay.”

  I winced. The sunmages like Simon were powerful healers, but the Fae had skills that went beyond human magics. Beside which, sunmages were not that commonplace, and Fae healers who were willing to risk a potential schism with their Family to come and work amongst the human healers were scarcer still. Any depletion of our healer ranks was a bad thing.

  “She seems to have succeeded for now.” Simon’s face was grim.

  I wondered how long “for now” was. “Did she know the Speaker?”

  All night I’d tried to avoid thinking about the Speaker. Seeing a dead Fae had been . . . shocking. Worse than a human body somehow—not that I’d seen many of those. The Fae lived so long, and looked so young, it had seemed like a violation to see one so still and broken. Even now, the memory made me feel ill.

  “All the Fae know the Speaker,” Lily said when Simon didn’t reply. “He’s been part of the court forever.”

  It wasn’t exactly what I’d meant, but I didn’t want to push the topic. Things were bad. Maybe worse than we knew, but we’d have to wait for Guy to find out exactly how bad.

  FEN

  * * *

  The waiting stretched into an hour and then slid toward two. When the cathedral bell rang the half hour, I drew Simon away.

  “How much longer are we going to wait?” I asked softly.

  Across the room Saskia made no pretense of not watching us, even if Lily and Hilary DuCaine hid their interest better.

  “Guy will be here soon,” Simon said. His voice was calm, but there was a thread of strain in the tone.

  “What if he isn’t?” I asked. “There are a lot of people in this house to move. Isn’t it better to do it now? While the sun is up.” And while it was early enough that most of the Beasts would be sleeping. Unlike the Blood, they were free to walk under the sunlight, but they still led largely nocturnal lives. If they’d stayed up strategizing, then the alphas and guerriers would need to sleep for at least a few hours before they took any action.

  Like Martin coming for me.

  I was keen to be somewhere more protected than this house if and when that happened.

  Simon frowned. “I told Guy we’d wait.”

  “That was when Guy was expecting to be here early in the day. It’s midmorning now. You have to give your servants time to get home to their families too, after they help you. You have to make sure they go.” I’d overheard the house steward, Edwards, arguing with Hilary DuCaine about leaving earlier that morning. He wanted to stay and ensure that the house was safe. Hilary had flatly forbidden such a thing, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if Edwards, who from what I’d been able to gather had served the family since before Guy was born, defied his mistress and tried to sneak back.

  “Plus we need to strengthen the wards once everyone has gone.” So that there would be a house for them to return to. If all went well. “That takes time.” I was half surprised by my calm tone. Just as I was surprised by the fact that I was apparently staying with the DuCaines through whatever happened.

  I still didn’t know quite when I’d made that decision. But at some point last night, with Saskia curled in my arms, I’d known I couldn’t leave. But I didn’t know what my decision meant, by any stretch of the imagination.

  Other than that I was well and truly screwed.

  And didn’t that just make me as big an idiot as any man who’d ever set his cap for a woman who belonged to an entirely different world? It was one thing for Simon and Guy to choose partners who didn’t exactly fit the human standards of normal, but it would be lot harder for Saskia. Unfair, but there it was. Humans had different rules for men and women.

  So I needed to keep a cool head. I wasn’t going to say no to her if and when we found a chance to be together again. But I was going to keep a firm grip on my reason. Not let myself be fooled into believing that there could be more between us than the desire we shared. I still wasn’t sure that that desire wasn’t fueled, in large part, by Saskia wanting an escape from the reality that faced us.

  I couldn’t ignore that reality, not when a dozen variations of it, each more disturbing than the last, danced in front of my eyes every time my control over my power slipped.

  Which was happening more and more, no matter how tightly I wrapped my wrist in iron. Maybe I needed a thicker chain.

  I knew in my heart that wouldn’t help. I could climb into one of Guy’s mail shirts and it still wouldn’t be enough iron. In fact, I could probably lie across Saskia’s forge and let her beat me with a hammer and that pain still wouldn’t drive away the visions.

  Holly was right. I needed more help than I currently was getting or the visions would kill me eventually.

  But there was still time before I reached the point of desperation. There was only one avenue left to me now. I had cut myself off from the Beasts last night when I’d let my name be read out as part of the human delegation. There was a very slim chance that Martin might take me back if I crawled to him on bloody hands and knees, but it was far more likely that he would kill me for denying him.

  Which meant I was left with the Fae for the solution to how to control my powers. I doubted that they were any more likely to be setting out a welcome mat for half-breeds than any of the other races. Especially not after the explosion last night.

  So until I grew desperate enough to bargain away whatever they might demand of me in return for their help, Saskia was my salvation, the way to hang on a bit longer before necessity forced me to go to Summerdale.

  Hell, maybe we’d all be dead before that happened anyway. But I needed Saskia’s touch until then, in more ways than one.

  I glanced up and realized that all three DuCaines were watching me expectantly. I’d obviously missed a question somewhere in my musings. “I’m sorry. I was thinking. What was the question?”

  “I asked if there was anything you needed from the Swallow,” Saskia said.

  I shook my head. I had clothes at the Brother House and whilst there were things in my rooms that I valued, my money and other valuables were either banked or stashed in various hidey-holes around the City. There was no
thing that I needed badly enough to risk going to the border boroughs and potentially running into a Krueger or three.

  “Good,” Simon said. “Then the plan is to take Mother, Father, and Hannah to St. Giles. They need me there anyway and it will be safe for now. We can move Mother and the girls to the Brother House once Guy’s free.”

  I wondered if he really thought he’d be able to convince Saskia to do that. The elder DuCaines would probably comply, to protect Hannah if for no other reason, but Saskia wasn’t going to sit quietly by and let herself be locked away.

  Besides, she was a named member of the Templar delegation. If my recall of treaty law was clear, that meant she had to be present during each day the negotiations took place. The system was designed so that no decisions could be made without each race’s full complement of delegates. Though what the hell happened now that some of those delegates were dead and injured, I had no idea.

  I imagined that both the human council and the Templars had probably spent large parts of the night reading the fine print of the treaty law, trying to decipher just that. Hopefully at some other point in the City’s history somebody had died or been taken ill during the negotiations and had had to be replaced. Because if the law didn’t cover substitutions, either there would be endless wrangling about what would be acceptable or the delegations would have to go on with their reduced numbers, which might have some interesting impacts on the voting blocs.

  “All right,” I said. “Then let’s move.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  SASKIA

  St. Giles was orderly rather than frantic. I’d expected crowds of worried relatives and harried healers. Instead there was a sense of things being under control, even though the foyer under the great dome was busier than any other time I’d been there. Granted, some of the healers looked tired as they greeted Simon, but that was not entirely unusual. Healers tended to run their powers low in saving their patients.

  Simon herded us up to his office—a tight squeeze once Mother, Father, Hannah, Lily, Fen, and I were all in the room. Then he left again to direct the servants, find out where we were to be lodging, and check on his patients.

  Being this much closer to the action made the waiting even more difficult. My skin crawled with the need to know what was happening, my eyes felt like I’d rolled them in sand after my shortened night’s sleep, and my stomach ached. Surely someone could provide us with an update.

  It seemed from the lack of chaos downstairs, that the immediate problems presented by the wounded from the explosion had been dealt with. Maybe Bryony could give us an update. I knew where to find her office; it was another floor up and across in the metal-free part of the hospital. I could go fetch her and—

  “Sit down, Saskia,” Fen said, and I realized I’d half risen from my seat without knowing it.

  I sat. No one was going to let me go anywhere. Not yet.

  Luckily for our collective sanity and patience, the next person to open Simon’s door was Guy.

  Mother rose as he stepped through and Hannah flew across the room and hugged him hard.

  “Whoa there, halfbit,” he said, squeezing her in return. “Let me breathe.”

  Hannah let him go reluctantly. Guy pushed her gently back toward the chair she’d been sitting in.

  “Good morning.” He nodded a general sort of greeting, then came over and sat down in a spare chair, a weary noise of relief escaping from him as he leaned back and stretched.

  I studied him carefully. His face was grubby and he seemed just as tired as the rest of us, but there were no signs of injury or any lasting harm from the queen’s binding. He could speak again—that much was plain.

  I let out a breath of relief and rose from my chair. “Shall I go and fetch Simon?”

  Guy waved me back down. “I ran into Holly downstairs.” His expression lightened briefly as he spoke her name. “She’ll bring him.”

  “What can you tell us?” Mother said, her hands twisting in her lap.

  “Let’s wait for Simon,” Guy said gently. He craned his head backward, twisting his neck until I heard it crunch. His pale hair stood up in messy, sweaty spikes, as it always did when he’d been wearing his helmet.

  My stomach tightened painfully. How had he spent the night? Not doing what I had been doing, that much was certain.

  Simon and Holly appeared soon enough and with them came Bryony, carrying a steaming silver teapot. Holly had the matching tray laden with cups. Fae tea. I kept my expression polite. I had never really warmed to the Fae’s herbal brews, which tended toward green and astringent-tasting rather than sweet. I drank my coffee black but with enough sugar that Guy used to tease me about wasting time actually adding water and suggested that I just mix ground coffee and sugar grains straight and have done with it.

  Everyone said hello again, and chairs were shuffled and rearranged so everyone had somewhere to sit or stand. I wound up close to Fen, with Hannah on my other side. Fen was watching Bryony with an expression I couldn’t quite interpret. I looked at her, then down at myself with a sigh. Bryony had no doubt been up all night, yet she looked as beautiful as the sunlight streaming through the window. Her deep blue dress was immaculate and unwrinkled and her long black hair was piled in neat coils at the back of her head. The rainbow silver of the chain she always wore around her neck glittered faintly, throwing little hints of the blue and purple of the Family ring adorning one of her long fingers into the air.

  She moved gracefully amongst us, pouring the tea. In contrast, I felt stumpy and shabby and slept in. I frowned as I watched Fen watching Bryony. Was she the sort of woman Fen liked?

  Probably.

  Still, I forced a smile as Bryony extended a cup toward me, taking the tea politely, though I didn’t drink. It would probably make me feel better if I did, being brewed by a Master Healer after all, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Childish. Certainly. But it somehow made me feel better.

  I noticed that Fen didn’t drink either and my small spark of satisfaction increased to a glow.

  “All right,” Father said after Bryony had completed the ritual of giving everyone tea and speaking a Fae blessing over us all. “Is someone finally going to tell us what is happening?”

  Mother scowled at him, but Guy half smiled as he drained his tea. Some of the strained look left his face and he held out his cup for more. “Actually there isn’t that much to tell.”

  Was he lying? If he was, I’d brain him with the teapot, precious silver or no. But I couldn’t see any sign of deception in his face. His pale eyes were clear as he looked around the room.

  “The Blood didn’t make a move?” Simon sounded surprised.

  “There were a few skirmishes last night, but nothing out of the ordinary. If you ask me, the Blood were holed up doing exactly what the rest of us were doing.”

  “Which was?” I said impatiently.

  “Reading the bloody treaty to try and work out what sort of mess we’re in.”

  “Did you come to a conclusion?” This time it was Bryony who asked.

  Of all of us, I would have thought she was the one most likely to have the answer. The Fae hold the balance of power in the treaty and they are all schooled carefully in its minutiae. Then again, Bryony was somewhat disconnected from the Veiled Court, spending the majority of her time here in the City and at St. Giles. Maybe she hadn’t brushed up lately.

  Guy gave another shrug, though this one was more a frustrated hitch of his shoulders. “The best the Templar advocates can come up with, the treaty holds until the negotiation period is over. But that’s their interpretation. Others might take a different view.”

  All of us fell silent for a moment. The negotiations happened every five years. The treaty was re-signed on the last day of the negotiation period, or sooner if all the relevant grievances and reallocations had been agreed. But it was always signed before midnight of the last day of that fifth year. Thirteen days from now.

  “What happens if it isn’t signed?”
Fen asked eventually.

  “Nothing good,” Guy said

  “War,” Lily added.

  Guy nodded and beside me Hannah bit her lip. I reached over and took her hand, wishing that I could reach out my other hand to Fen and feel him too.

  “Is there someone who can take Hannah to wherever it is we’ll be sleeping?” I suggested, not liking the pallor in her face.

  “I’m not a baby,” Hannah objected.

  “No, you’re not,” I agreed, feeling somewhat hypocritical. “But there are things we have to talk about that you can’t know.”

  My mother rose. “I’ll come with you, Hannah. Simon will tell us what we need to know later, won’t you, Simon?”

  Simon nodded. He reached out and pulled the bell on his wall. A few minutes later one of the hospital staff appeared and ushered Mother and Hannah out. Hannah’s last-ditch objections floated back from the corridor.

  Fen stood and closed the door. “We were talking about war,” he said as he returned to his chair.

  “There won’t be war if we can help it,” Guy said.

  There was another long silence. We all knew the history. The treaty had come about the first time because the Fae had decided to side with the humans against the increasing depravations of the Blood. Without the help of the Fae, could the humans beat the Beasts and the Blood?

  “It seems to me that the question is what we do to ensure that that doesn’t happen,” Bryony said.

  “That means getting the Fae back to the negotiations,” Simon said.

  Another brief silence as we all contemplated that.

  “Has anyone been looking into what happened at the hall?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Guy said. “Mages from each of the Guilds are looking over the wreckage. There were some Beasts there too.”

  “No Blood?”

  Guy shook his head. “They waited until sunrise. It seemed safer that way. But they can only look outside. The Fae sealed the hall.”