Текст книги "A local habitation"

Автор книги: Seanan McGuire

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Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 22 страниц)

THIRTY-THREE

IN THE END, THIS is what happened:

April turned to me as the sound of wings faded, pulling her hand out of mine. “How do we get him down?” she asked timidly, indicating Quentin. “Elliot must be retrieved.”

“That’s true,” I said, studying her. She was small, but she looked sturdy. “Can you carry live people when you disappear?”

“Only if I can lift them.”

“Try.” I stood, hoisting Quentin and passing him to her. She was able to support him, barely, by looping his unwounded arm around her neck and wrapping her own arms around his middle. A haze of static rose around them, and they were gone.

I raced to the edge of the catwalk and looked down, keeping my eyes away from the place where Gordan fell. Elliot was a dark shape on the floor, and in its own way, looking at him was almost as bad as looking at her would have been. I glanced to the side and saw April appear near the door, looking almost comical with Quentin hanging unevenly from her shoulders. When she saw me looking, she waved. Blinking back tears I hadn’t realized were there, I waved back.

It took almost ten minutes to descend the ladder: my left hand was only grasping weakly, and it was harder to go down exhausted than it had been to go up panicked. But in the end, there was solid ground under my feet, and I was standing on my own. I nodded to April, leaving her to support Quentin as I went to kneel by Elliot’s side.

His shirt was drenched with blood, and his pulse was shallow, but he was breathing. If we got him to a healer soon, he’d live. I slid my arms under him and lifted, straining until I got back to my feet. Elliot was smaller than I was: I could carry him, if I took it slow. Nodding to April, I turned, and we carried our respective burdens out into the afternoon sunlight.

Things ended quickly after that. April left me halfway across the lawn, teleporting herself and Quentin to the futon room before her strength gave out. I walked through the knowe with Elliot in my arms, accompanied by a cascade of cats. Justice had been done. They’d scatter soon, but for the moment, they still belonged at ALH. I don’t know whether it was April or the cats who told Tybalt it was over, but he met me in the hall, scooping Elliot out of my arms without a word. That was good. I wasn’t certain I could talk without starting to cry.

Riordan’s men could only hold Sylvester for so long. He arrived at ALH almost an hour after Gordan fell, finding us clustered on the lawn in the midst of a sea of cats. Connor was awake and feeling well enough to snipe at Tybalt. Elliot’s wounds had been tended as best we could, and Quentin . . . he wasn’t any worse. That would have to be enough to tide me over until Jin could look at him. We were leaving ALH.

For good or ill, January’s strange dream died with Gordan. The worst part is that I still don’t know whether it would have worked. If she’d had the time, maybe Jan really could have done what she set out to do—but the clock ran out, and we’ll never know.

I never saw Sylvester and Jan together, but the family resemblance between him and April was too strong to deny. He hugged her. He told her he was sorry about her mother, and that he’d send her people back as soon as he could. And then his men carried the wounded to the van, myself included, and he took us away. There would be no invasion. Not even Riordan could interpret a man coming to his lost niece’s fiefdom as an act of war. I fell asleep in the back of the van with my head on Connor’s shoulder, and I didn’t dream.

Tybalt stayed behind, saying it was to take care of the cats who had been Barbara’s subjects . . . but he didn’t look at me. That strange new expression that had come to his face when he saw me wake Alex was still there, lurking. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Mostly, I just felt tired.

The healers were waiting at Shadowed Hills, and I started breathing again as Jin, the oldest and best-known of his healers, came to take my hands. The others took Connor, Elliot, and Terrie away, but Jin treated me and Quentin together. She took care of me first, despite my protests; conditions hadn’t been ideal for any of us, but the infection in my hand was farther along than the infection in Quentin’s arm. Gordan really seemed to have done her best with the medical care—something that made a sick sort of sense, since she wanted us intact when she killed us. She did her best. It just wasn’t quite good enough.

I started crying when Quentin opened his eyes. I couldn’t help it. Part of me was certain we’d lost him until that moment; that the infection was too much, and he’d die without giving me the chance to say I was sorry.

“Jeez, Toby,” he said, squinting at me. “You look awful.”

I smiled through my tears. “You, too, kid. You, too.”

The physical wounds were the easy part. There’d be a scar on his arm and he’d have to wear a brace for a few months—not even magical healing can completely repair damaged muscles, and there was a chance he’d hurt himself if he wasn’t forced to take it easy—but that was all. My scars were worse. Blood magic leaves marks. Still, they were nothing I couldn’t live with. The emotional wounds would take longer to heal. For all of us.

I stayed as long as I could, listening as the reports on the others came in. Connor’s transformation into his seal shape had probably saved his life. Gordan shot him twice. As a seal, his blood circulated more slowly; Tybalt was able to patch him up after coaxing him back to human form. Elliot lost a lot of blood before April got to him, but they were able to save him. The healers said he’d be up and walking in a matter of days. Not bad for someone who’d been at death’s door a few hours before.

Terrie was another matter. The sun went down and there was no change. Jin knew the situation by then, and told the rest of the healers to wait until morning before they passed a final judgment. I was pretty sure they’d get a surprise when the sun came up. When I perform a resurrection, I do it for keeps.

And then Sylvester called, and I had to go. I entered the throne room, got down on one knee, and explained everything. He and Luna listened in silence as I explained January’s last days and the things leading up to them, the broken dreams and betrayals, the impossible hopes for salvation. It didn’t take long enough. That sort of thing never does. When I finished, Sylvester said I was free to go, and I walked out without another word. I didn’t say good-bye to Quentin. He’d be better off without me. I took a bus to the BART station and caught the next train home, where I fed the cats, coaxed Spike out from under the sink, called Stacy to offer vague reassurances, and went to bed. There’d be time to think about things later; there’s always a later.

But later came and went, and somehow, there was always something else for me to worry about. There were bills to pay and laundry to do; there were cases that needed to be taken and solved. They were small, human things—missing children and wayward husbands—nothing supernatural or strange. Once again, I reacted to pain by turning my back on Faerie, and for a while, it worked. There were no deaths and no mysterious screams in the night, and I started thinking I might be able to sleep again.

The Luidaeg didn’t come to kill me, and after a week had passed, I decided to stop waiting. I showed up on her doorstep with bagels and told her she could kill me if she wanted to. She laughed and called me an idiot, and we played chess for six hours. I still think she’ll kill me someday. It’s just not going to be anytime soon. Somewhere along the line, loneliness turned into friendship—maybe for both of us.

Sylvester called a month after I walked out. I hadn’t seen or heard from anyone at Shadowed Hills during that time; not even Quentin. Not until the day I came home from following a cheating wife and found the message on my answering machine. “The funeral will be held at our estate in the Summerlands on the new moon. Please come.” That was all he needed to say—I ran away from him once, but now, I always come when he calls. Gordan was right about that much. When you get right down to it, I’m Sylvester’s dog.

Quentin called the next day, asking nervously if he could escort me to the funeral. I said yes. What choice did I have? If he needed to see me half as much as I suddenly needed to see him, refusing would have been cruel. We agreed to meet at the Japanese Tea Gardens and walk from Lily’s knowe to the edges of the Torquill estate. I wasn’t ready to go back inside the knowe at Shadowed Hills. Not yet.

Maybe not ever.

The day of the funeral dawned bright and clear. I met Quentin in the Tea Gardens five minutes after I’d said I’d be there. His arm was in a sling, and he was wearing a black doublet and hose that made him look like Hamlet’s forgotten younger brother. A don’t-look-here spell shielded him from tourists, eliminating the need for a mortal disguise; anyone watching saw me smile and link arms with nothing, then climb the garden’s tallest suspension bridge. If they watched closely enough, they may have even seen me disappear. I don’t think anyone saw. People almost never look that closely.

We walked through Lily’s knowe, stepping out the back gate into the Summerlands. All the glory of the endless Faerie summer was on display, and I stopped, catching my breath. I’ve been living in the mortal world too long, and it takes time for me to adjust. Summerlands air is too clean for lungs accustomed to modern pollution, and the constantly changing twilit sky disorients me. I still love those lands, but they’re not home anymore, if they ever really were.

The sky was the color of burnished amber, and the hills were bright with flowers. I picked a blue daisy, and smiled as it dissolved into a dozen tiny butterflies. The Summerlands are like that. Logic is just a convenience there; change is the only constant, and even that’s false, because the Summerlands are founded on the concept that life—our life, the life of Faerie—can last forever. They’re wild and strange and slowly dying. They weren’t the first home of my people. They’ll almost certainly be the last.

I was a child in the Summerlands. I won’t say I grew up there, but I was a child there, and they’ll always be a part of me. They have a lot in common with stories of Never-Never Land—no one there grows up, just older. Faerie is a world filled with eternal children, forever looking for the next game and never quite learning what adult life is like. That’s what we learn from the mortal world.

Quentin watched me, frowning at this odd frivolity. He was as serious as he’d been when we met; he’d lost a lot of the ground he’d worked so hard to gain. I could understand why: part of his innocence was gone forever, and while I hated the way he’d lost it, I couldn’t say I was sorry it was lost. We all have to learn that leaving the Summerlands means leaving the nursery; he’d grow up or he’d die. Maybe that’s cruel . . . but that’s the world.

I straightened, wiping the pollen off my fingers. “Come on. We need to get moving.”

“Of course,” he said, and followed me across the fields toward a spiraling rose-colored tower. It was like something from a fairy tale, all spun sugar and elegance, and we reached it faster than perspective indicated we should.

The gardens around the tower were a maze of greenery and untended roses. I led Quentin through them, stopping at a tiny door almost concealed behind a wishing well. He looked at it, frowning.

“You know your way around pretty well,” he said.

“I should.” I pressed my hand against the door. It swung open and I smiled sadly. At least the house still knew me. “I used to live here.”

“Will your . . .”

“Don’t worry, Quentin. My mother’s out.” She’s been out for a long time now. No one knows exactly when Amandine went crazy; she collapsed a few years after I vanished, moving into an internal world far stranger than the Summerlands. She doesn’t spend much time in the tower anymore. Most reports place her wandering endlessly through forests and standing, motionless, at crossroads.

I wish I knew what she was looking for.

“I’m sorry,” he said, subdued. “I didn’t think.”

“It’s not your fault.” I stepped inside, motioning for him to follow.

Amandine’s tower has no mortal aspect: you can only get there via the Summerlands. I led Quentin through the gallery and up the stairs to my suite. My door was still closed, sealed with the wards I set on my last visit. Amandine was the only one who could open that door without breaking my wards, and she never would; my rooms would stay the same until the end of time unless I chose to change them. There was something reassuring and deeply sad in that thought. We stopped in what had been my living room; it was almost as large as my entire mortal apartment. Quentin looked around wide-eyed, air of sophistication fading as he took in the high windows and tapestry-draped walls.

“This is really nice,” he said, sounding surprised.

“I suppose. Can you wait here? I need to change.” We were only visiting the tower so I could raid my own wardrobe. I had nothing suitable in the mortal realm, and I didn’t trust my magic to obey me well enough to keep me properly dressed for the entire funeral.

“Sure. But . . . why don’t you live here anymore?”

“Quentin? If you don’t already know the answer, there’s no way I can explain.” I walked through the door into the bedroom and closed it behind me, leaving him alone.

My old bedroom isn’t large, but it’s the only room in the tower that looks like it’s been lived in. The bed grew to match me as I aged, and the shelves lining the walls are still piled with small, interesting items collected from the forests and fields nearby. I never cared much for toys after I came to live in the Summerlands, but I always loved running and finding things out. Everything I loved went into that room, right up until the day I left it.

The wardrobe doors came open at the touch of my hand, spreading to show a rainbow of gowns. Most of them were designed for a young girl I don’t remember being and may never have been at all. They were made of things both wild and strange: butterfly wings and cobweb silk, peacock feathers and dragon’s scales. Faerie clothing is a bit like Japanese cooking—we use what we have. Amandine always chose the wildest dresses she could for me, putting me in colors that brought out the mortal tints of my skin and hair. It was a long time before I realized that was what she was doing. I’m still not sure why she did it.

The dress I was looking for was hidden in the back of the wardrobe, buried under the brighter gowns. It was made of dark gray velvet trimmed with slightly paler silk roses; I wore it to a ball in the Coblynau caverns when I was eleven years old. Amandine brought me with her, a small, half-mortal accessory for a haunted evening. I remember that they lit the darkest corners of their halls with jack-o’-lanterns and sparks of gleaming mist, and that the Candela came with their globes of dancing flame, and that when I danced with the master of the mine, his smile was kind. I remember.

The dress fit like it had been sized for me the day before. Faerie tailoring fits forever, no matter how much you change. I looked down at myself, swishing my skirt back and forth, and looked away. I’ll always be Amandine’s daughter. No matter how far I run, Faerie catches up with me in the end.

Quentin was staring up at one of the tapestries when I stepped out of the room, closing the door behind myself. I cleared my throat. He jumped.

“Come on,” I said. “It’s time.”

Amandine’s estate borders Shadowed Hills on the far southern side. Distances are smaller in the Summerlands: it took less than twenty minutes for us to walk to a place that I knew was more than an hour’s drive from where we’d started. The grove where the funeral was to be held was at the heart of the family forest. It took another twenty minutes to navigate the paths through the forest. Long dresses weren’t designed for walking in the woods. My mother could’ve made the walk without stumbling; she fits into the world that well, even insane. That’s what it means to be a pureblood. I stumble and fall, and I always get up and keep going. That’s what it means to be a changeling.

The grove was filling when we arrived. They were coming from all directions, meeting and falling silent: no one knew what they were supposed to say or feel. Pureblood wakes are things of deep, bitter mourning, but they exist for the living. Human funerals are sadder, holding a mixture of sorrow, relief, and terror, and they’re held for the dead. Jan was a pureblood, but her funeral would be the first of its kind in living memory. That made it a changeling affair, mixing two worlds that didn’t understand each other, and didn’t want to. I think she would’ve liked that.

A pyre of oak, ash, and rowan boughs stood at the center of the clearing, piled in imitation of a phoenix nest and covered with a white silk sheet. Jan was at the center, hands folded over her midriff. They’d dressed her in a long red-and-gold gown that brought out the highlights in her hair and concealed her wounds. I winced when I saw her. All the obvious signs of who she’d been were gone, leaving only what she was. Pureblood. Daoine Sidhe. Fallen. That wasn’t even half of her, but it was all she had left, and all she could take with her to the grave.

Quentin stopped beside me. “She looks like she’s sleeping.”

“I know.” Fae flesh doesn’t rot. She looked like she should wake up and demand to know where her glasses were. She wasn’t going to. Even if the process was eventually reversed and the other casualties of ALH brought back to life, Jan was gone forever. Thanks to Gordan, she wouldn’t even have the dubious immortality of the night-haunts. For the first time in centuries, a child of Faerie was genuinely lost.

Sylvester and Luna stood by the pyre, hands locked together. Luna nodded to me as we entered, one ear flattening in silent greeting. I curtsied deeply in reply, and then walked to the opposite side of the grove, standing in the shadow of the trees. Quentin followed. After a moment, Luna patted Sylvester on the arm and murmured something in his ear before walking over to join us.

“My Lady,” I said. Quentin bowed.

“Toby—Quentin,” she said, and offered a small, sad smile. “You’re well?”

“As well as can be expected,” I said.

“Good. We were worried.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll come visit soon.” She probably knew I was lying. I didn’t care.

“Good. And Toby . . . he’s not angry. You did the best you could. Both of you.” She smiled again and turned, walking back to her husband.

I suppressed a bitter smile as I watched her go. If ALH was us doing our best, I never wanted to see our worst. Quentin’s expression looked as conflicted as mine felt, and I was willing to bet that his thoughts were running along the same lines as my own.

Letting my eyes drift across the crowd, I froze, my stomach dropping as I saw a flash of silver-blonde hair attached to a willowy woman in a tattered green-and-brown dress. “Mom . . . ?”

“Toby, what—”

“Wait here,” I said, and started across the grove, yanking my dress up around my knees to keep myself from stumbling. Several people shot startled glances in my direction at my lack of decorum, but no one stopped me. It didn’t matter.

By the time I reached the place where I thought I’d seen my mother, she was gone.

Quentin came running up behind me, wide-eyed and bewildered as he said, “Why did you run off like that?”

“I thought I saw someone,” I said, closing my eyes and sighing. “Somebody I knew. Guess I was wrong.”

“Oh,” said Quentin, and quieted.

We were still standing there, silent, when a voice spoke behind me. “Please do not jump or scream or make any other exclamations of surprise. I am very tired.”

The voice was almost familiar: female and slightly flat, like it had been run through a synthesizer. But it was an adult voice, not a child’s. I turned. “Hello, April.”

“Hello.” April had changed in the last month, going from a teenager to someone that could have been Jan’s twin, if you ignored the blonde hair and too-perfect skin. When she grew up, she grew up fast. She was wearing a black dress made of some glittering material that I suspected was actually solid light. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Quentin was gaping. I understood the impulse.

“We couldn’t miss it,” I said. “I didn’t think we’d see you here.”

“Elliot has used my mother’s notes to establish a portable server unit. It only works for short periods, but it expands my range of motion considerably.”

“That’s good,” I said.

“April?” Quentin asked, wide-eyed.

“Yes,” she said, and smiled sadly. I looked at her expression, and realized she’d had a crush on him at ALH. Had; past tense. However strong it might have been, it was over now.

She’d outgrown him.

“It’s good to see you,” he said.

Elliot walked up behind her, leaning on his cane. He looked battered, but at least he was moving. “Toby,” he said.

“You made it,” I said.

“I had to.” We embraced. It was a short, awkward thing; I was being careful not to hurt him, and he didn’t seem to know how to balance his cane. Still, I think we both felt better by the time I pulled away. “It’s good to see you again.”

“It’s good to see you, too, Elliot.”

He looked toward Quentin, asking, “How are the Hippocampi doing?”

Quentin blushed as I looked at him, brows raised. “You took the Hippocampi?” I asked.

“They were a gift,” he mumbled.

“Cool.” I turned back to Elliot and April. “Is Alex . . . ?”

“He didn’t want to leave our lands,” April said. I was right about Terrie: when dawn came again, she’d turned back into Alex, and awoke. Every sunset brought on the same collapse. Somehow, I wasn’t surprised that he wasn’t feeling up to going out.

“I’m sorry,” Quentin said.

“We’re going to have to wait and see whether he recovers. Still, we thank you for all your help. None of us would be here without you.” April offered her hand, and I took it, squeezing. Her fingers felt faintly unreal. I knew better.

“Not a problem,” I said. April is too young and strange to share the standard prejudices about certain things—like saying thank you. Watching her grow into herself was going to be a lot of fun.

The arguments over succession in Tamed Lightning were venomous, but in the end, tradition won. April was Jan’s daughter and the knowe recognized her as such, and so—in the absence of another legal heir—the County was hers. There would be no dissolution and no war; just a bit more healthy chaos. Duchess Riordan would have to wait.

In a way, April’s assumption of her mother’s throne was the final, most bitter irony of all. She’d been a killer when she was too young and alien to understand what she did, and Faerie forgave her for her ignorance; Gordan led her astray, and for the justice of Faerie, that was enough. If she’d stayed ignorant, we might have called her a monster and killed her anyway, for our own protection . . . but she didn’t. Her mother’s death forced her to become a real person, and now that she understood her own crimes, she was fighting to undo them. By understanding her own guilt, she became innocent again.

Elliot started to say something, but stopped as Sylvester stepped to the center of the grove, clearing his throat. The murmur of the crowd faded, replaced by an expectant hush. Sylvester looked at us and faltered. Luna stepped forward, ready to catch him if he fell. He took her hand and cleared his throat again, steadier now. Sylvester never falls; he just teeters on the edge. I’ve never seen him refuse a helping hand. He’s one of the bravest men I know. He survives.

“In the beginning, we were given a promise,” he said. His voice was almost too soft to hear, and still loud enough to carry to every corner of the grove. I don’t know where he found the funeral rites; there have been no funerals in Faerie since the night– haunts were born. But part of me recognized his words—they were the right ones. He found the right words.

“We were told we would live forever,” he continued, looking straight at me. “That promise has been betrayed, and now Countess January ap Learianth, who lived among the mortals as January O’Leary, lies slain. She has crossed the line from which there is no coming back, and the promise we were given did not protect her.”

He turned and leaned over the pyre, kissing her forehead before looking over the crowd once more. “She was my sister’s daughter. She was my niece and the mother to my grandniece, and a thousand things to a thousand people, and she is gone. Mortality can strike even the immortal. Remember that, and keep the ones you love around you, and live each day as well as you can.” He glanced toward the edge of the crowd. I followed his gaze and saw Raysel standing there, arms folded, looking bored. Oh, Sylvester. It’s always the good ones that die.

“But there is hope.” He took a deep breath, and repeated, “There is hope. In a world where one promise can be broken, perhaps others can be kept. She may yet find peace . . . but she will find it without us.” He waved his hand and the pyre burst into flames. He straightened and stepped away. “Good-bye, my dear one,” he said, even more quietly.

Jan remained visible through the smoke for a brief moment; then it closed around her, and she was gone. She didn’t save Faerie—she didn’t even save herself. She lived and died and left us mourning for her, and for all the lost souls of ALH, both the living and the dead. None of us got out the way we went in.

Not one.

Watching the smoke curling against the amber sky, it was hard to believe anything could last forever. Maybe Jan was right; maybe Faerie was dying, and this was the last gasp of a world that was already on the way out . . . but there was still time. April would rule Tamed Lightning in Jan’s place. If there was a way to bring back the others—Barbara and Yui, Peter and Colin, even Terrie—she’d find it. Elliot and Alex would have time to rebuild their lives; Quentin would have time to heal; I’d have time to remember that not everything ends badly. We all had time, and a second chance to survive.

I would find my mother, and find out what was wrong with her. Why she’d broken; why, when she saw me crossing the grove, she’d chosen to run.

I put my arm around Quentin’s shoulders, keeping my eyes on the sky. Maybe Faerie isdying, and maybe nothing lasts forever, but I’m going to believe Sylvester. Something endures, no matter what happens.

Something lasts.