A Killing Frost

by Seanan McGuire

  I looked across the table to Tybalt, who was struggling to contain his laughter. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You simply looked so offended by the recitation of market price fish and clever ways of preparing lamb.”

  “We’re at a steakhouse,” I said, picking up my menu. “I’m going to eat a steak, not a scallop salad or a creative vegan facsimile of a chicken. A steak and probably a potato of some kind, I haven’t decided.”

  “You know, it wouldn’t hurt you to broaden your culinary horizons,” he said, opening his own menu.

  “Are you sure about that? Because Mom says she can taste the death of trees when she eats maple syrup. I already have to get my steaks well-done to avoid the ghosts of all the dead cows I’ve swallowed from appearing in my head. Broadening my culinary horizons might hurt me. It might hurt me a lot.”

  “My mistake,” said Tybalt, sounding distinctly amused.

  I scowled at him for a beat before I returned my attention to my menu. The steaks at Cat in the Rafters really were excellent—enough that I didn’t mind having them cooked more thoroughly than I would once have preferred. The side dishes were even better. Thanks to this being the only local restaurant owned by one of the Cait Sidhe, this was where Tybalt and I tended to end up on our rare date nights—although that made it sound uncomfortably like a Denny’s. No one goes to Denny’s. People just end up there.

  There was a faint scrape of wood on wood as one of the other diners pushed back their chair and rose, followed by the tapping of shoes against the floor, which told me who was approaching even before I looked up. If Duchess Lorden was using her wheelchair, she didn’t currently have legs, and if she didn’t have legs, she didn’t have shoes. That meant her husband, Patrick Lorden, was making his way to our table. That didn’t make an enormous amount of sense. The Lordens have about as much trouble getting away for private time as Tybalt and I do, and I would never have taken time out of my date to interrupt theirs.

  But then, I’m a Hero of the Realm, not a person who needs to call upon a Hero of the Realm on a regular basis. It’s sure fun to have a job with nebulous and intentionally ill-defined duties. I lifted my head and turned, directing a smile at the approaching Daoine Sidhe.

  Tybalt wasn’t being as friendly. He was also looking at Patrick, but he was scowling, and if his ears had been more feline, they would have been pressed flat against his scalp. Someone did not care for interruptions.

  Well. It wasn’t like his possessive streak was anything new, and it wasn’t like Patrick was coming over to try stealing Tybalt’s fiancée, although he might have a job for me. When he was close enough that I wouldn’t need to shout, I tilted my head and said, “Duke Lorden. To what do we owe the pleasure?”

  “My apologies for interrupting your evening,” said Patrick, mild Boston accent stronger than usual, possibly due to nerves. He turned his attention to Tybalt. “You have my assurance that I’m not planning to disrupt things more than absolutely necessary. My wife is very interested in the salmon, and she might do me material damage if I got in the way of the meal I’ve promised her.”

  “I lack her authority to harm you, so I would have to throw myself upon her good graces if you were to break your word,” said Tybalt, in a tone that implied he would absolutely ask Dianda for permission to harm her husband if Patrick spent too long at our table. “Pray, continue.”

  Patrick nodded before turning his attention to me. “I felt it appropriate that I offer congratulations on the impending occasion of your marriage,” he said. “I remember my own wedding fondly.”

  It was starting to feel like I needed to hurry up and get married just so people would stop trying to talk about it. “Yeah, we’re pretty excited,” I said. “I think Tybalt might tie me up and drag me to Toronto if I don’t agree to a date soon.”

  “Toronto?” asked Patrick politely.

  “The High King and Queen have requested the honor of hosting the celebration, and we could not in good conscience refuse them,” said Tybalt. “It answers the question of where to conduct the ceremony, since we cannot wed in the Court of Cats, and my lovely lady wife-to-be is currently estranged from her liege. Queen Windermere would have been willing to host, but the fear of giving insult to Duke Torquill would still have loomed troublingly over the event.”

  It was public knowledge that I was currently persona non grata at Shadowed Hills, and had been ever since I’d convinced Sylvester to wake his twin brother, Simon, who had been in an enchanted sleep thanks to elf-shot, and then lost him. Simon, not Sylvester, although in a way, I had lost Sylvester, too, in the moment when his brother—now spell-mazed and unable to remember all the progress he’d made toward becoming a good person again—had turned on his temporary allies and disappeared.

  Sylvester might have been able to forgive me. His wife, Luna, was not. As far as Luna was concerned, I was responsible for every ill that had befallen her house since I was born, and having me around the knowe was nothing more than a reminder that her life, so carefully constructed and designed, was falling apart around her. So I stayed away. I waited for the moment my liege lord, the first person who had ever treated me like I might matter despite being the unwanted changeling daughter of a local woman who didn’t even belong to the political structure enough to have a minor title, would remember that I was his responsibility and call me home. He might not want me around right now, but I would be loyal to him until the day I died.

  That didn’t make me happy about the reminder of my current outcast status. I kicked Tybalt’s ankle discreetly under the table and was rewarded with a slight flinch, followed by an apologetic look. He was annoyed, but he knew he’d overstepped.

  “So no date has been settled upon?” asked Patrick. “I assume that means invitations have yet to be delivered?”

  So that’s what this was about. I relaxed marginally. “Don’t worry,” I said. “You’re on the list. You and Dianda both, and Peter, of course. Even if we weren’t friends, there’s no way Quentin would let me get away with not inviting Dean, and if I invite Dean and not his parents, that’s sort of a slap in the face, right? I know you may not be able to attend—Toronto is pretty far away, and I’ll understand if Dianda doesn’t want to leave Saltmist unattended—but you’ll be receiving invitations.”

  “I wasn’t concerned for myself,” said Patrick uncomfortably. “Is it safe to assume you’ll also be inviting your father to the event?”

  I blinked, surprised by the cruel thoughtlessness of the question. I hadn’t been expecting that from him. “My father is dead,” I said, in a sharp tone. “He died a long time ago, believing I was dead, that I’d been killed in the house fire Uncle Sylvester started when he gave me my Changeling’s Choice. I can’t invite a dead man to my wedding, even though I wish I could.”

  Humans don’t join the night-haunts. There’s no reason they couldn’t; changelings do, which means mortality isn’t anathema to them. I can ride the memories encased in human blood, and as far as I can tell, that’s what the night-haunts thrive on. But human bodies rot and decay, while fae bodies don’t, and that puts humans outside their purview. More’s the pity.

  “You should go now,” said Tybalt, tone suddenly formal in a way it hadn’t been before. He set his own menu aside and pressed his hands flat against the table, fingers flexed just enough to show the points of claws beneath his human-seeming nails. Oh, he was pissed. I knew I liked him for a reason.

  My father would have liked him, too, if he’d been able to see me grow up and fall in love. I didn’t remember him well enough to make many sweeping statements about how our relationship would have been when I reached adulthood, but I was absolutely certain he would have liked the man I was going to marry.

  “I’m sorry, but you misunderstand,” said Patrick, seemingly oblivious to the danger he was putting himself into, which was ridiculous—the man was married to Dianda Lorden, whose first response to any situation was t
rying to figure out how she could most efficiently punch it in the throat. Not every situation has a throat, but that’s never stopped Dianda.

  I narrowed my eyes. We hadn’t ordered yet, which meant Jason hadn’t brought out the steak knives, but I always bring my own. Maybe a little light stabbing would make Patrick drop whatever this was and go sit down. “Was there something else you needed to say?” I asked coldly.

  Patrick took a deep breath, standing up so straight that it looked as if his spine had been starched. “I was referring to your legal father.”

  I stared at him, aghast. “You’re talking about Simon?”

  “He was, and presently remains, your mother’s husband,” said Patrick. Then he stopped, looking at me, clearly waiting for me to connect the lines he was drawing.

  Unfortunately for me, I could. I just didn’t see why it should matter. “Simon was gone before Mom met my father. He has nothing to do with me.”

  “He has everything to do with you,” Patrick patiently corrected. “Under fae law, since he remains married to your mother, and humans are not recognized as viable spouses, he is legally your father, and always has been.”

  “I know all that, but she left him when he went all dark side and started working for Evening!” I countered.

  “She left him. She didn’t divorce him. She couldn’t divorce him, as your sister wasn’t there to agree to the proceedings. A pureblood divorce requires approval from all children involved, as they declare for their chosen family lines. It keeps inheritance from getting complicated.”

  “Because this isn’t complicated at all,” I said sourly.

  “I repeat my question,” said Patrick. “Will you be inviting your father, who is very much alive, to your wedding?”

  “Since he currently wants to kill me on behalf of the nasty-ass Firstborn he works for, and who he’s probably trying to wake up right now, which is something I do my best not to think about more than I have to, and there’s nothing I can do to stop him short of elf-shooting him again, and that would require finding him, which no one’s been able to do—no, I wasn’t planning to invite him to my wedding,” I didn’t try to keep the frustration out of my voice. It would have been a losing battle. “And I frankly don’t appreciate you interrupting my date to ask about it. I thought better of you, Patrick.”

  “And were we discussing any other man, I would never have brought it up,” said Patrick. “You realize you must invite him, or the wedding can’t proceed.”

  I blinked. “I realize no such thing, and I’d appreciate it if you’d go back to your table now and leave us the fuck alone.”

  Tybalt didn’t say anything. He had gone pale and was staring at Patrick, pupils reduced to thin slits against the banded malachite-green of his eyes. I scowled, looking impatiently between the two men.

  “Is this where you reveal yet another way in which Faerie is planning to screw me over because I got too complacent?” I demanded. “Because if it is, I’d really, really like you to just walk away. Don’t say anything else. Let us order our dinner and eat in peace. Please.” Not that there was much chance of that. Based solely on the expression on Tybalt’s face, we had already missed the window on “peace” for the evening.

  “Yes, it is,” said Patrick. “And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I didn’t know how many holes there were in your education. I’d say I thought better of your mother, but it would be a lie. I never once in all my days thought better of Amandine. And no matter how poorly I’ve thought of her, she’s continually found ways to disappoint me. Truly, that woman is an artisan of letting people down.”

  “Normally, I’d be thrilled to sit around trash-talking my mom,” I said. “Right now, not so much. What are you trying not to say to me right now?”

  Patrick sighed heavily. “That’s the problem. It’s nothing you’ll want to hear, and I hate to be the one to say it to you.”

  “Then why say it at all?”

  “Because it wasn’t his idea,” said Dianda. She had wheeled herself over while I was focused on her husband, and was looking at me levelly, her hands resting on the curve of her wheels. Like Patrick, she was dressed in date night finery; unlike Patrick, hers ended at the waist. Since there were no humans here, she wasn’t bothering with the blanket I’d sometimes seen her drape across her legs, leaving the jewel-toned sweep of her tail exposed. Merrow are basically the classic human idea of mermaids, and Dianda Lorden is a perfect example of her breed.

  She took her hands off the wheels and leaned forward, resting her elbows against her own tail. Her fins twitched at the pressure, not quite slapping the floor. “Patrick and I were discussing Dean’s excitement about your upcoming wedding when we realized it was entirely possible your mother had never bothered to explain to you what it meant that she’d been married when you were born. That sort of omission is Amy to the bone. But if we could realize the problems that could cause for you now, others could realize it as well. People who’d be less inclined to help than we are.”

  “So far all you’re helping to do is ruin my evening,” I said. “How did you know we were going to be here?”

  “Dean mentioned that your fiancé was planning to take you out for a private evening, and there aren’t many places where a King of Cats and a Hero of the Realm can do that,” said Dianda. “I doubt we’ll be able to get a reservation after this.”

  “No,” said Tybalt, voice barely above a growl. “You won’t.”

  “Can everyone please stop talking around the problem and tell me what the hell is going on?” I demanded. “I’d like to salvage what I can of this evening, if you don’t mind.”

  Dianda shook her head. “This is land custom,” she said, and looked to Patrick.

  He took a deep breath. “When two purebloods marry, they can’t divorce without consent of their living children—including any changelings or merlins born outside the marriage bed.”

  “Patriarchal and weird, but okay,” I said. “At least the kids get a say.”

  “Yes, but it meant that when your sister disappeared, her parents—your parents—were no longer able to separate in the eyes of Oberon, because she couldn’t declare whose house she belonged to, and neither could you. Hence their being married when you were born, and still being married today.”

  “Not that Simon would ever decide to leave his wife,” interjected Dianda. “He loves that woman the way the moon loves the sea, not that I understand why. She’s never done anything but betray him to serve her own interests.”

  “Di,” said Patrick. “Be kind.”

  “Oh, I am being kind,” she said. “If I were being unkind, I’d be saying something much worse about her, that self-centered, deceitful, treacherous—”

  “Mother to the very patient woman who hasn’t stabbed either of us yet, despite us giving her plenty of reasons to find the idea appealing,” said Patrick, cutting her off and earning himself a brief but vicious glower. “October, because Simon is currently married to your mother, making him your father in the eyes of any chain of inheritance, if you fail to invite him to your wedding, you’re offering him a public insult too large to be ignored. Any relative of his could claim the right to see it satisfied.” He paused to emphasize his next statement. “His relatives or his liege.”

  I stared at him. “Bullshit.”

  “Yes, but still true.”

  I turned to Tybalt. “Bullshit,” I repeated.

  “I wish I could agree that this claim has no bearing on our upcoming nuptials, but I do my best not to lie to you, as you find dishonesty personally insulting,” said Tybalt.

  “Bullshit,” I said a third time, this time speaking to no one in specific.

  Supposedly, Faerie has only one Law, handed down by Oberon himself before his untimely disappearance some five hundred years ago: no one’s allowed to kill a pureblood. Of course, the Law doesn’t apply to humans or to changelings,
meaning we can be slaughtered with impunity by anyone who decides we’re looking at them funny, but that’s Faerie for you. Only fair as long as it suits the people in power.

  But despite our lack of other formalized laws, a complicated system of manners and etiquette governs everything we do. Giving someone insult is one of the worst things possible, aside from violating hospitality or otherwise transgressing against traditions that date back to the days when our King and Queens still walked among us. Once someone has been given insult, they can demand basically any recompense they like, as long as it doesn’t result in someone winding up dead. Imprisonment, involuntary service, material payment, it’s all on the table.

  Not giving a pureblood the excuse to say that I’d given them insult had been one of the major motivations of my youth, and if I’d lost sight of that in the last few years, well, that was on me, wasn’t it?

  “Oh,” I said faintly.

  “Yeah,” said Dianda. “Oh. I’m sorry we interrupted your dinner. But I’m sure you can understand why it’s important that you find Simon Torquill and bring him home as soon as you possibly can. Patrick?”

  “Yes, dear,” said Patrick, and moved to stand behind his wife, gripping the handles of her wheelchair and turning it nimbly around before wheeling her back to their table.

  I looked at Tybalt. Neither of us said a word.

  THREE

  JASON DIDN’T SEEM to notice the charged atmosphere in the room when he returned to take our orders. He approached our table with a polite smile on his face, stopping at a respectful distance, and asked, “Well? Have you had a chance to look at the menu?”

  Tybalt actually flinched. I was a little surprised when he didn’t hiss. Then he thrust his menu at Jason and said, “The fish of the day, with shrimp risotto.”

  I blinked. We were eating after all? Well, all right. Jason turned to me. I managed to muster a smile as I handed him my menu and said, “I’ll have the filet mignon, well done, baked potato with everything, and a house salad with blue cheese.”