“Almost always?” I asked.
“Yes.” He smiled like the sunrise. “I wished you would marry me, and unless you inspire a level of stabbing that is awe-inspiring even for you, my Lady of Knives, in three days, my wish comes true.”
“Three days? Not tomorrow?”
“Then Quentin did not actually ‘mess up and tell you everything,’ as he said over the phone,” said Tybalt, sounding faintly annoyed. “We travel tomorrow. We leave at sunset and should be in Toronto by dinner. It would make me a monster to demand you cross a continent, enter a new demesne, and wed, all on the same night. We’re to enjoy the hospitality of the High Court for a day,” a twist of his mouth made it clear how much he was looking forward to that, “while final preparations are made, and you are afforded the opportunity to approve of those things as are not absolutely required and can yet be changed.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Like what?”
“If you despise the cake for some reason, I’m sure Kerry would be delighted to commandeer the knowe kitchens and abuse the staff to make you something more to your immediate liking. Knowing her, she might actually view that as a gift, as it would save her from assisting with placement of the flowers. If you detest the flowers, I am afraid you’ll have a longer negotiation on your hands for any changes; they have been selected according to their meaning, and to avoid any allergies or insults to the attendees. You would need to propose substitutions that would avoid causing a war.”
I blinked very slowly. “This is way more complicated than I expected it to be.”
“Yes, well.” He shrugged. “I was honestly relieved when you elected to remove yourself from the process, as I was quite sure it would drive you to climbing the walls and repudiating the touch of man. As I very much enjoy touching you, I would prefer to avoid that unhappy future.”
I snorted. Tybalt smiled.
“I am truly forgiven, if you are making such indecorous sounds in my presence once more.”
“You’re a jerk,” I said mildly.
“Indeed, I am, for I am a cat, and what those of a more two-legged mindset view as ‘jerkishness’ is only feline, and only natural to me. But as you seem to be reasonably fond of such behavior, I do not regret my nature.”
“I only like it from you,” I said. “Because you’re my jerk. Now tell me what happens tomorrow.”
Tybalt read my tone as the invitation it was and shifted closer on the bed, plucking my phone from the mattress where it had fallen and setting it gingerly back on the bedside table. Despite April’s growing fae-focused cell network, he had yet to start carrying his own cellphone, choosing instead to be difficult to reach and require us to go through convoluted message chains when we need to get hold of him. Tracking spells, pixies, and Spike’s uncanny ability to find its people no matter where they go has made this slightly easier, but only slightly, and sometimes it’s annoying.
Although it doesn’t annoy me nearly as much as it does the boys. I skipped from 1995, when cellphones were new and strange, to 2009 in an instant. I’m used to a delay when I want to talk to someone. They really aren’t. They’re purebloods who will one day inherit kingdoms, but they’re also children of the modern human world, as changeling as I am, in their own ways.
Tybalt slid his arms around me, shifting positions until my back was pressed against his chest and he was holding me. Nothing more complicated or suggestive than that. Just holding me. Sometimes that’s the most wonderful thing in the whole world, having someone who wants to hold me for the sake of holding me, not because he thinks he might get something out of it later or because he thinks it’s expected of him.
“Well,” he said. “After you have packed up whatever horrors you choose to carry from your wardrobe—and pack for the assumption of a week away from home, if you would be so kind; Ginevra will be sending some of my subjects to feed Spike and the cats while we’re away, and I’ve given them temporary keys to the wards to ensure nothing goes awry—we will proceed to Muir Woods, where we’ll meet our traveling companions, and Arden will open our first gate.”
“Arden has a range of about . . . I don’t know, San Francisco to Portland is what, eight hundred miles? Where are we coming out?”
“We will be met by a detachment from the court of the Kingdom of Salted Skies, and from there, one of their courtiers will be able to take us another four hundred miles or so, to Highmountain.”
“So Utah to Colorado?”
“I believe that’s what the humans call those locations, yes.” Tybalt rested his chin against the crown of my head—something only possible when we were both sitting or lying down—and continued, in a calm tone, reciting the list of jumps we’d be making across the continent, naming Kingdoms I knew only from my childhood geography lessons and Etienne’s endless drills on courtly etiquette. I closed my eyes again, letting his voice soothe me.
Yes, this was worth it. Yes, this was why. They hadn’t lied to me, just held back information until I actually needed it, and now we were going to get married, peacefully and with as little pomp and circumstance as possible. We were getting married.
This was going to work.
four
“This isn’t going to WORK,” I said, folding my arms as I looked from the small crowd that had formed on my driveway to my car, which persisted in being a VW Beetle and not something larger. Like, say, a bus.
Quentin, who still looked wrong to me, with his stranger’s face and too-light hair, looked from the pile of our collective baggage to Raj and then offered, somewhat weakly, “Raj and Tybalt could be cats for the drive?”
“Oh, we will be,” said Tybalt. “I have too much sense to trust my life to a motor vehicle while large enough to be flung through the windscreen.”
“We could take the Shadow Roads,” said May.
“Only if you’re willing to leave your bags behind,” said Raj. “Carrying a person through the shadows is hard enough. We aren’t a luggage service.”
Everyone turned to look at Tybalt. He put his hands up. “Don’t expect miracles from me. It’s not my job.”
“It’s mine, and this is a miracle that’s not within my purview,” I said. “Sorry. Even I can’t fit four adults and three teenagers in a VW. I didn’t go to clown college when I was young enough to listen to the lectures on distorting space for fun.”
Someone in front of the house leaned on their horn, hard. I scowled, not bothering to turn around. We were in a residential neighborhood after dark, but we were also in San Francisco, within walking distance of the Castro District. If I insisted on silence after sunset, I’d be an asshole, not to mention a hypocrite, since it’s not like the fae shut up as soon as we get out of bed.
I went back to surveying the unreasonable amount of stuff piled on my driveway. Even if everyone had been able to restrain themselves to a single bag, we would have had way too much for the car, and the only person with a single bag was Raj, who seemed to be intending to conjure all his clothing from a handful of feathers and dried leaves stuffed into a backpack. A good gig—if you had the illusion magic to make it work.
I know how to conjure a gown when I need it, but my illusions have never been amazing, or sturdy, unless I’m pissed when I weave them—and I’d rather not make plans for my own wedding that involve being angry for days at a time. Not when I was still having to fight the lingering urge to be annoyed at everyone but Tybalt, who had admitted to the “what if we just . . . don’t tell her when the wedding is?” aspect of his harebrained scheme. It wouldn’t have worked if the rest of them hadn’t gone along with it.
The person who was blowing their horn honked again, longer this time, leaning on it like it was their job. I whipped around, ready to storm down to the sidewalk and inform whoever it was that we had kids living in this neighborhood, only to stop and blink at the edifying sight of Danny McReady, Bridge Troll and cab driver, parked in front of my house. Ther
e was a teenage girl sitting in his passenger seat, her dark hair pulled into pigtails and secured by what looked like strips of electrical tape. She leaned out the window, far enough that I was briefly worried she’d fall, and waved violently.
I blinked, hoping I didn’t look too much like I was on the verge of having an actual stroke, and waved cautiously back.
“Who is it?” asked Quentin, whose view of the street was blocked by the corner of the house. For him, for the moment, the world still made sense. Must have been nice.
“It’s Danny,” I said. “He brought the Luidaeg.”
I started walking toward the car before anyone could ask another question I didn’t know the answer to. The Luidaeg stopped waving but didn’t pull her torso back into the vehicle. Instead, she fluttered her eyelashes in an exaggerated manner. “Howdy, sailor,” she said. “Going my way?”
“Technically true, since you’ve been on a ship with me, and you know I am,” I said. “I have more people than I do vehicle.”
“Not a problem anymore.” She slapped the roof of Danny’s car, causing him to grimace and make a deep rumbling noise that never quite rose to the level of actual words. He was smart enough not to argue with the sea witch, even when she was in her charming human teenager disguise. Smart man. “This puppy already had about a dozen expansion charms on it before I got in.”
“Of course it did.” Danny is eight feet tall and built like a civic park storage shed. One of the square concrete ones the kids break into during the winter when they need to get out of the rain. Without expansion charms, he would never have been able to wedge himself behind the wheel, much less navigate his car over speed bumps.
“Had to add a few extra so Dad’s antlers would have the clearance they needed,” she continued blithely.
I tried not to choke on my spit or stop breathing. Instead, I blinked hard and took a half-step back, asking, in a tone that was only somewhat strangled, “You mean he’s really, uh, coming to the wedding with you? I mean, I know you can’t lie, so you were telling the truth when you said you were going to invite him, but I didn’t think he’d go along with it.”
“Do you want to tell my father he’s not allowed at your wedding?” She asked the question with a faintly abstract air, like she was discussing a possible change in the weather or a new fashion trend, not the idea of Oberon himself, King of all Faerie, attending my wedding.
“I—no, but I assumed he’d have something better to do with his time.” Like literally anything. “And I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to inform King Sollys before we bring another monarch into his territory.”
“Oh, Toby. My delicate, rule-abiding little flower.” She looked at me, and between one blink and the next, her eyes went from mossy green to solid black, and while I didn’t actually see her teeth change shape, they suddenly seemed much sharper than they had been half a breath before. “All territories in Faerie, from the deepest water to the hottest volcano, belong to my father. He needs no permission to trespass there, for trespass is impossible for one who carries his name and place among us.” She blinked again, and her eyes returned to a less alarming state as she smiled sweetly. “So it’s going to be fine. You told May I was going to be bringing two guests like I asked, didn’t you?”
“Um.” To be honest, it had completely slipped my mind. The fact that I was now comfortable enough with the sea witch to forget about direct requests probably wasn’t a good thing, but that’s where we were.
“Oh, whatever,” said the Luidaeg, rolling her eyes. “It’s not like she’s going to argue with me.”
Danny looked past her shoulder to me, mouthing “Help me,” in an exaggerated fashion.
Right. This was another of those things where the ending was preordained; arguing about it would do nothing but make me look like a stubborn fool. I am stubborn, and I can be pretty foolish under the right circumstances, but this didn’t need to be one of them. I took another step back, turning the motion into a pivot as I spun on the ball of my foot, so that I was once more facing the much less alarming group standing around my car.
They looked at me with plain and unconcealed curiosity. I took a deep breath, then clapped my hands together like I thought I was getting ready to lead some sort of spirit rally.
“Okay!” I said brightly. “Danny is going to give us all a ride to Muir Woods. Grab your bags and get in the car.”
I didn’t mention the fact that Oberon and Poppy were apparently already in the back. Instead, I looked hopefully to Tybalt.
“I don’t want to boot Annie out of the front, and if it’s just the two of us, we could take the shadows, couldn’t we?”
He laughed. “I remember a time when avoiding the Shadow Roads was a thing you most deeply and devotedly cared about. Yes, provided the rest of our company does not object or feel abandoned, I will happily carry my bride to our carriage.”
I looked over at the others, pleading silently. Quentin had gathered my bags in addition to his own, doing his duty as my squire, even if it made him walk a little awkwardly. I was probably the most lightly-packed bride in history, since I wasn’t bringing my own dress, or any makeup. When I’d attempted to pack my own sad collection of brushes, May had come very close to slapping my hand before assuring me that she and Stacy had everything under control, and I didn’t need to worry my pretty little head about a thing.
Since I didn’t care about the process as long as I wound up married to Tybalt in the end, I had backed off again. Sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.
May shook her head and waved her hand dismissively.
“Go,” she said. “Enjoy your endless run through the cold dark nothing with the man of your dreams, while the rest of us ride in a spacious cab that has things like windows we can roll up, a working heater, and yeah, I guess, the missing King of Faerie.”
Jazz snorted, barely hiding the gesture behind her hand in time. I grinned.
Very few people actually know, for a fact, that Oberon is back from his long exile, and most of them were about to be in the car with him. The rest, well. I expected to see all but one of them at my wedding. August, my biological sister, technically knows Oberon is back, since her father’s return home had depended upon that happy event, but I was more than reasonably sure she hadn’t received an invitation to the wedding. As long as Simon didn’t decide to bring her as his plus one, we’d be fine.
“Enjoy the ride,” I said and turned to Tybalt, who spread his arms for me. I linked my hands behind his neck, not resisting as he swung me up into a surprisingly fitting bridal carry and took three long strides toward the shadows at the side of the house.
Every one of the deeper roads through Faerie has its own requirements—and its own costs. So far as I’m aware, only the Shadow Roads are still widely accessible. The Blodynbryd can reach the Rose Roads, but there are only two Blodynbryd left in the world as far as I know, so it’s not like they can set up a bus service. All Cait Sidhe can access the shadows, when they want to, although how well they navigate them and how long they can stay inside them is tied to the same sliding scale of power as whatever it is that makes a kitten a Prince or Princess, and eventually a King or Queen. As San Francisco’s King of Cats, Tybalt had been the living anchor of the Shadow Roads for decades, and when he set them aside, Raj would be right there to pick them up, keeping them accessible for the cats of their Kingdom. All the other roads might fall and be forgotten, but the Shadow Roads would endure as long as there were Cait Sidhe to run along them.
Tybalt stepped into the shadows, which parted for him like theater curtains, and we were plunged into a lightless, airless void, all heat and light replaced by the pounding of his heart and the thudding of his feet against the unseen ground. I curled into his arms, utterly helpless in this place where I would always be an intruder, no matter how many times I was invited, no matter how much he loved me.
Faerie keeps it
s secret places well-hidden when it can, and well-protected when it can’t. The Shadow Roads would suffocate me if I dared to relax and stop holding my breath.
Or they’d try, anyway. Access to the shadows is a gift of the Cait Sidhe bloodline. Being basically impossible to kill, no matter how hard you try, is a gift of mine. I’ve drowned, been stabbed, bled to death, and—my personal favorite—fallen from such a great height that impact with the ground broke every bone in my body. And every time, I’ve gotten better. If Tybalt tripped and dropped me in the darkness, there was every chance I could stay lost there for decades, suffocating and then recovering, only to suffocate again without a chance to take a breath and start searching for my own exit.
Was it any wonder that when he carried me, I didn’t struggle or try to get away? I’ve been dropped on the Shadow Roads once, when Raj’s father, Samson, led a short-lived rebellion against Tybalt. Those few seconds ranked among the most terrifying things I’ve ever experienced, and that’s saying a lot, given what else I’ve been through.
Now, though . . . now he carried me, the smell of musk and pennyroyal suffusing the . . . not air, because there was no air, but the space around us, so that they tickled my nose even as I held my breath to keep the cold from getting in. I could feel the ice forming in my hair, but his body was warm against my own, and his arms were tight, and I knew I was safe.
Just as my lungs began to truly ache from my refusal to take a breath, Tybalt tensed, and leapt, driving us out of the dark and back into the light . . . sort of. Gone was the eternal semi-twilight of a city after sundown, replaced by the much deeper natural dark that gathered among the redwoods of Muir Woods.
When Sorrows Come Page 6
