Lies and Prophecy

by Marie Brennan

  “Kim,” Robert said. Raising my head, I realized that he and Falcon were both looking at me. From the sound of it, this must have been the third or fourth time he’d called me.

  “Sorry,” I muttered, smoothing my hair out of my face. “My mind was … elsewhere.”

  “I asked about Julian’s condition,” Robert repeated.

  Julian. Hospital. My mind lurched back on track. “Middling. He was more or less insane when they found him.” Robert looked ill. “He’s better now, but not well. And they don’t dare try any of the usual mind-healing on him; his nerves are shot, and they don’t have anyone qualified to work on a wilder. He’d kill whoever tried.”

  Robert scowled. He seemed adjusted to Falcon’s presence, but it was just as much a lie as my own calm was. I didn’t need Liesel to tell me that. And Falcon probably didn’t, either. “The bastards would not let me in to see him.”

  They must have tightened up security after I blasted through. “I’m surprised I got in, myself.”

  “You made it inside? What did you see?”

  I ran through the details in my mind, remembering what I’d said to Falcon, trying to decide if I should keep anything back for now. The sidhe watched from the chair, with what I couldn’t help thinking of as a raptorial air. “He thought he was still in the Otherworld. They had him tied down, but I got them to free him, and that helped. From what I picked up from his mind, the Unseelie did something horrible to him before the Seelie rescued him.” I made myself nod thanks toward Falcon, who didn’t respond.

  “You’ve touched his mind?”

  Robert’s sudden vehemence took me aback. “Yes.”

  His long legs carried him across the room in a sudden spurt of energy. “This is perfect. I did not think it could be done, but if you’ve touched Julian and still retain your sanity—if he did not attack you—then perhaps it can work.”

  Now both Falcon and I were both staring at him. “What can work?”

  “A healing circle.” Robert stopped in front of me, gripping my shoulders with feverish intensity. “No one else here can do it. As you said, none of these doctors are trained to cope with a wilder—the need for it has been nonexistent. I wanted the Palladian Circle to try, but could not predict whether Julian would recognize us as friends. But if you read him successfully, I am certain we can do it. You will lead the circle; he knows your touch, and will not fight.”

  I stared at Robert. Of all the idiotic stunts we’d tried in the last few weeks, this would set a new record.

  But it was still a good idea. Julian needed some kind of help. “What do the others think?”

  “I have not yet asked. The thought came to me just recently. I was in the Arboretum, venting some of my irritation at the fools in the hospital.” I winced. He’d probably detonated a few bushes into oblivion. “I thought to ask you first. If you thought it worthwhile, then we would try the others.”

  By “worthwhile,” he meant “not suicidal.” But he had a point; I was a better judge of that than Michele would be.

  Could we get them to risk it? Julian wasn’t their friend—not like he was to Robert and me, or even Liesel. We could only ask. “It is a good plan,” Falcon said, without anyone soliciting his opinion. “We could do little for him ourselves. His mind is alien to us, and he had difficulty distinguishing us from the Unseelie.”

  “I hope we don’t have the same problem,” I muttered. It all depended on how much Julian had calmed down.

  “Indeed.” Falcon stood again, and I consciously prevented myself from backing up a step. Then I wondered if he could tell I’d almost retreated. I’d be damned if I let him overawe me. Much. “I shall leave you, then.”

  Leave? Both Robert and I gaped at him. But you just got here, an inane voice wailed in my head. Maybe it was just afraid of being thought crazy. If I hadn’t had Robert as a witness … dorm room. Sidhe. I still couldn’t put the two together, and now one was going away.

  “Where are you going?” Robert demanded.

  The sidhe paused and looked at him with cool amusement. “Back to my own people. This place is not comfortable for me. And I do not think you wish me to accompany you.”

  “But we’ll see you again,” I said, alarmed.

  “Of course.” He nodded at me, blandly ignoring Robert’s frustration. “Not tonight, I think. The journey is not an easy one. But I will return soon; we are anxious to know how the changeling recovers.” He tipped a second nod to Robert. “Farewell.”

  Then he was out the door and gone.

  ~

  Both Robert and I stood frozen for a few eternities. My mind, freed from the entrancement of Falcon’s presence, reeled. All I could think about was what would happen if someone ran into him on the stairs. Was he going to just stroll out the front door of Wolfstone? Where was he headed, anyway—did he have to be somewhere in particular to get back to the Otherworld?

  My thoughts were interrupted by a sudden explosion of motion from Robert, who ran to the door, looked both ways down the hall, and slammed it. “Modern architecture be damned,” he growled. “I never thought I would wish for more steel around us.”

  Steel—iron. Our eyes met, and Robert swore again. “How did he get in?”

  We both rushed to inspect the doorknob, as if we’d see any signs of tampering. The lock was made of iron, to prevent telekinetic manipulation, but that didn’t seem to have stopped Falcon. “Damnation,” Robert growled. “If iron will not bar him, we have no defenses against them.”

  I slumped against the wall. The thought of him—or worse, the Unseelie—entering at will made me shiver.

  Then I realized the cold wasn’t entirely in my mind. The room itself was chillier than normal—which meant one of two things. Either the sidhe sucked the heat out of the air by his very presence, or—

  “What?” Robert called after me as I lunged into the bedroom.

  The window, which Liesel often left open a crack to admit fresh air, was gaping wide. Robert stopped behind me, and we both stared at it stupidly for a moment before sinking onto my bed in a shared fit of hysterical laughter.

  “I feel only a little safer,” I said when we had control of ourselves again.

  Robert rose to shut the window. “I agree. Even if we’re certain the lock’s iron will stop him—which we are not; this window proves nothing, and he touched the knob in leaving—we still have scant clue what their other limitations are.”

  He was echoing my own thoughts from earlier. “I know. Maybe Julian will be able to tell us something when he wakes up. Falcon said he was a guest of theirs, after he did that first summoning. He might have picked up some things.”

  “He might well have, but without those memories, it will be a moot point.”

  I swore. “I’d forgotten that. The Seelie took those from him; Falcon admitted it. But he said it was with Julian’s permission. They wanted to keep a low profile.”

  “Wanted. Have they changed their minds?”

  Leaning my head back against the wall, I studied my knotwork poster, as if there were answers to be found in its twists. “He didn’t exactly say.”

  Robert sprawled on Liesel’s bed, carefully keeping his shoes off the comforter. She’d reamed him out once for getting it dirty. Interesting, how my mind could spare attention for such idiotic details, in its desperate attempt to ignore what had just happened. I mentally smacked myself back on track as Robert said, “I believe he implied it.”

  “He said he came to warn us.”

  “But he did not say you specifically.” Robert shook his head. “Damn the English language for its imprecise pronouns. Was ‘you’ singular or plural? You, Kimberly Argant-Dubois, or the human race as a whole?”

  “I’m pretty sure he meant everybody. I mean, what the hell could I alone, or even with you and Julian, do against the Unseelie? This is going to affect more than just us.”

  Robert snorted. “It most certainly shall. You heard what he said. On the winter solstice, the way will open. It wi
ll affect the whole world, then.”

  There was a gaping silence as we both contemplated that thought. “We have to tell someone,” I said at last.

  He cocked his head to one side to consider it. And then we said in unison, “Grayson.”

  A former Guardian, and she knew all three of us. And she was one of the University Ring anchors. If I had to break news like this to anyone, I’d choose her.

  “You should be the one to give the tale,” Robert said. “She’ll not think it some jest, coming from you. And you were the one to speak with Falcon first.”

  I cursed his logic. He was right, but a part of me had been hoping he’d volunteer. Not bloody likely. “All right.”

  But when I called Grayson, it went straight to messages. Hi, Professor? I had a sidhe in my room just now, and—No. “Circle first,” I said; it was easier than doing nothing. “After we do that—if they even let us, and if we even get the others to agree—I’ll go find her. But you’re coming with me.” I fixed Robert with what I hoped was a formidable stare. He ducked his head in reluctant agreement. We split up the calls; he took Michele, Rafael, and Arthur, while I took Liesel, Ana, and Geoff. Luck did us one favor: they all answered, and agreed to meet at the hospital, where I would explain more.

  I was careful to lock the door behind me as we left.

  ~

  The hospital lay off the edge of campus, a fair hike away. We were waiting at a street corner to let the shuttle pass when Robert said, “I do not think we should tell the others.”

  I looked sideways at him. He had his hands jammed into his pockets, but he was no longer staring at the snowy ground. His gaze roved ahead, as if he could see the hospital already. “Them?”

  “The Circle. No one should know of Falcon’s visit save Grayson.”

  “But they’re part of this, too. They’ll pick it up from Julian—”

  “How? You will be the only one of us touching his mind.”

  He was right, but leaving the Circle in ignorance didn’t sit well with me. “They deserve to know.”

  “Everyone does. And soon enough, everyone will. But think, Kim, of what would happen, should this become common knowledge.”

  Not should, but when. Once it did? Panic. People would freak out. The sidhe were a pretty theory; lots of people liked it when Henry Welton told them they were partly descended from mystical creatures of legend. It fit, on an instinctual level—at least it did if you were a blood. It was one thing, though, to believe the sidhe were living in a separate, untouchable dimension that had parted from ours ages ago, and another thing entirely to see them come back. No one was ready for that. But still. “They’ll understand this needs to be kept secret.”

  Robert shook his head. I thought I saw a smile on his face; was it just the light that made it seem twisted? “Not everyone is as resilient as you, Kim.”

  Resilient? Because I hadn’t fainted, I supposed. But hearing the word only made me aware of how close I stood to the cliff, with helpless terror waiting at the bottom. I could only ignore it so long as no one brought it up. “Not so tough as you might think,” I said quietly. “If I could undo the last hour and live in ignorance, I would.”

  There was a pause. Then Robert asked, “Would you?”

  I bit my lip. The prospect was tempting: to go through the next few weeks like a normal person, unaware that my world would soon be turned upside-down. It wasn’t possible, of course, short of letting someone erase my memories. But if it were….

  “No,” I said, both to myself and Robert. “I wouldn’t.” Because that was the response of a child. And whatever was coming for us, I had to face it on my feet. Not cowering in a corner, pretending the Unseelie monsters would go away if I didn’t look at them.

  Then we were at the hospital. Most of the others were already waiting outside, and by the time we reached the group, Rafael and Ana came into view. Once they joined us, Robert laid out his plan, and what we laughingly called the logic behind it.

  Liesel barely let him finish. “Kim, touching a wilder isn’t just asking for trouble; it’s lying down in its path!”

  “Trouble for me—if there is any,” I said. “And I don’t think there will be. Not if I lead, with you telling me what to do.”

  Michele was the one we had to convince. She didn’t know much about mind-healing, but the Circle had always been her baby, and the others would be persuaded by her. Facing her, I said, “Look. I know this isn’t the kind of thing you guys signed up for, letting me into the Circle. Not for somebody who isn’t part of the group, and especially not when he’s a wilder. But—”

  “But nothing,” Michele said. “We’re doing it.”

  I did my best not to gape. That easily? Then a faint touch brushed my mind: Liesel. I touched back, and her shielded voice whispered in my telepathic ear. Did you intend to blackmail her into this?

  What? No!

  A ripple of amusement. No wonder it worked. Kim, you’re a part of the Circle—you and Robert both. We pledged to lend you our strength. And Michele holds that sacred.

  It filled me with both warmth and unease. I hadn’t thought much about that promise. I devoutly hoped I wasn’t going to repay their support by bringing the Unseelie down on their heads.

  We had other problems to deal with first, though. A new security guard sat at the desk; the man I’d blitzed by was gone. This woman looked at me suspiciously when I asked after Julian’s doctor. “Why do you want to see him?”

  I deliberately crumpled my face and let some of my emotions leak at her. She had enough sidhe blood to feel my worry if I hit her over the head with it. “His patient’s a friend of mine. I want to talk to him, find out how Julian is. When I’ll be able to visit him. That kind of thing.” A slight tremble of the lower lip. “Please?”

  She favored me for a moment with the requisite hard-eyed security guard look, then relented. “He’s in his office right now. Down the hall, turn left, first door on the left.”

  I thanked her and hurried off, Circle in tow. “I had no idea you had such drama in you,” Robert murmured in my ear as we went.

  “Shut up. I had to get her to listen to me somehow.”

  He snickered, and then we were at the door. The name plate read “Dr. Stone.” Not an auspicious name, if we were looking for leniency, but I could hardly ask for a replacement. Taking a deep breath to steady myself, I knocked.

  I waited so long that I began to wonder if he was even there. But finally a voice, dimly remembered from my time at Julian’s bedside, called out. “Come in.”

  The rest of the Circle waited outside as Liesel, Robert, and I went in. And there, to my unpleasant surprise, I found that Dr. Stone already had a guest.

  “I seem to remember telling you to go home and rest, Kimberly,” Grayson said.

  No wonder she wasn’t answering her port. Damn it—I hadn’t counted on having to get past Grayson. Tears and trembling lips would get me nowhere with her. And unless things had changed since I left, she had the authority to countermand the doctor. Our grand plans might come to a crashing halt right here, before we even had a chance to try them.

  Or maybe not. Grayson had wanted me to read Julian, after all. Far from having an enemy in the room, I might just have an ally.

  “Dr. Grayson,” I said as calmly as I could. “You’re just who I was looking for.” Next to me I felt Robert and Liesel shift in confusion.

  “Is that so,” Grayson said. She was still eyeing me skeptically. “For what?”

  “We’d like to try a healing circle on Julian.”

  “Out of the question,” Stone said. “You’re not trained.”

  Grayson held up one hand to silence him, and I felt a small surge of triumph. She might be an ally indeed. If I could just convince her. “What were you planning to do? He’s right; you aren’t trained.”

  “I am, a little,” Liesel said. “Not much, I know, but we’re not planning anything elaborate. We just want to see what we can do for him. Reassure him, maybe do som
e blocking, that kind of thing.”

  “But you can’t lead,” Grayson countered.

  “None of them can,” Stone interjected. “How are they planning on shielding themselves? He’ll destroy them. His control is gone right now. Even my people can’t deal with a wilder.”

  “I’m leading,” I said.

  Stone snorted, but Grayson nodded. “I thought so.”

  “What?” The doctor looked appalled.

  “Julian won’t attack me,” I continued. “He didn’t before, when I read him. So I’ll lead the circle, and Liesel will guide me in what to do.”

  “Dr. Grayson, surely you can’t be considering this.”

  Grayson turned a look on Stone that suggested she was losing patience with the man. “I can and I am. You have no one here who is trained to work on him, and the University will take days to decide whether or not to fly a specialist in. In the meantime, you have an insane wilder on your hands. He’s quiet at the moment, but how long before he starts to lash out again? How long can the shields on that room hold up?”

  “But you’re risking these students’ minds if you let them try this!”

  “I’ll shield them myself before they begin.”

  “Why don’t you lead?”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” Grayson snapped. “I lack talent at this kind of thing, and more importantly, Julian Fiain doesn’t trust me. Not to the degree necessary for this. Kimberly, on the other hand, is a close friend of his, and has already proved she can touch his mind without danger. That will count for more than my marginal skill at mind-healing ever could.”

  “But—” the doctor began again.

  “No. I’ve decided. They may try their Circle, provided I shield them first and am present in the room for the duration.” Grayson’s tone left no room for argument. The doctor looked mad enough to chew nails, but he didn’t say anything. I felt a brief flash of pity for him; the man’s authority had been trampled a lot lately. It would take a saint to endure that and not feel slighted.