The Winter Long

by Seanan McGuire

  “Help me move her,” I said, shoving my knife back into my belt and sliding my hands under her arms before I started to stand. Every shift of my position brought another of her wounds into view. There was so much blood.

  Tybalt moved immediately around to lift her feet, asking, “Where are we going?”

  “Her room. Even if it’s trashed, the bed’s big enough that we should be able to find a flat space to lay her out on, and I’m going to need room to maneuver.”

  “October . . .” He frowned at me, expression speculative, even as he began backing across the living room toward the hall. He knew me and my limitations better than almost anyone else, and he wasn’t going to make me walk backward across a dark, cluttered room. “Are you preparing to do something utterly foolish, or simply stupid?”

  “Remember that time I raised the dead?” In the basement at Tamed Lightning, just me and my knife and the body of Alex Olsen, who’d had information that I needed. I hadn’t even known what I was back then; I’d thought I was just another Daoine Sidhe, one with an unusually high tendency to wind up bleeding all over the damn place.

  Tybalt’s eyes narrowed. “I recall something that might fit that description,” he said. “I recall, for example, that I did not speak to you for quite some time afterward, since you had done something that should have been impossible.”

  “We know it’s not impossible. Not for me.”

  “October—”

  “I have to try!” I wasn’t intending to shout. I did it anyway. My voice seemed to echo in the small, dark space of the hall. Tybalt looked at me, his eyes opening wide in surprise. I looked back at him, trying to make him see how desperate I was. “If there’s anything I can do . . . she’s been threatening to kill me since the day we met, and she’s been saving me the whole time. I can be with you because of her. I’m here because of her. I have to try.”

  “I would never have asked you not to try,” he said quietly. “I only need you to tell me what I can do to help you.”

  I smiled a little. “Just hold me up when my legs give out.”

  “My dear, that is something I will always be here to do.”

  We carried her through the junk-clogged hall to her bedroom door. It took some shuffling, but we managed to transfer her entirely into Tybalt’s arms. The Luidaeg had never been larger than a human teenager. He held her easily, and I was grateful for her long, blood-matted hair, which hid her face from me.

  The door to her room swung open as soon as I touched it, and the light of a thousand candles flooded out into the hall, seeming to chase away the clutter and the grime with its touch. Inside, the walls were lined with saltwater tanks rich with exotic fish and stranger creatures, things that were never meant to thrive in the oceans of this world. The pearl-eyed sea dragon she kept in the largest tank reared back when it saw us framed in the doorway, me with my bloodstained clothes, Tybalt with the Luidaeg in his arms.

  I held up my hand. “Don’t freak out,” I said. “We’re not the ones who hurt her. I just want to help.”

  The dragon glared at me, but it didn’t break the glass of its tank and come rampaging out into the room, so I was willing to call that a victory, however small. I gestured for Tybalt to put the Luidaeg down on the wide expanse of her four-poster bed. Its frame was ornately carved with mermaids and seaweed, and it reminded me of the furniture Arden had kept with her during her exile from her own Kingdom. It’s funny the things the mind throws up to protect itself from panic. Trivia suddenly matters more than anything else in the world.

  The Luidaeg’s head lolled like a dead thing’s as Tybalt maneuvered her onto the mattress, setting a pillow under her neck to support it. He stepped back, glancing at me, and for a moment I could see the naked terror in his eyes, the fear he’d been hiding under bravado and efficiency. I managed another small smile, forcing it until the corners of his mouth relaxed, just a little.

  “I won’t do anything I haven’t done before,” I said.

  “That’s what I am afraid of,” he replied.

  Talk was just putting off the inevitable. I drew my knife for the second time before gingerly lifting her right arm and turning it until the underside of her wrist faced the ceiling. I winced. A deep cut had split her flesh, opening it to reveal the pale ice-blue of her bones. It ran parallel to the vein. That explained the blood. Someone had been trying to bleed her out, and they might well have succeeded.

  I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: blood magic is based on a potent combination of instinct and need. The two feed and inform each other, shifting their balance as the situation demands. Need something that the blood can give you badly enough, and there’s a very good chance that you can have it . . . if you’re willing to pay the price. If you’re willing to bleed for it.

  There was a time when I would have taken care in injuring myself. That time was long past. I slashed my knife hard across my own wrist, hard enough that a few drops of blood spattered the Luidaeg’s cheek, standing out against what was already there only because they were fresh and red, not brown and dried. The smell of cut grass and copper rose around me, bloody and aching, as my magic responded to the wound. I took a deep breath, gritting my teeth against the pain. No matter how fast I heal, pain will always hurt. I guess that’s a good thing. It keeps me from getting more careless than I already am.

  Gingerly, I placed my knife on the bed next to the Luidaeg’s unmoving body, trying to remember what I’d done to resurrect Alex Olsen. It hadn’t been that long ago. It felt like a lifetime. Blood ran down my arm and covered my fingers, dripping onto the duvet and leaving little red spots everywhere it hit. The wound itched, already healing, but it was too late; I had what I needed.

  I raised my hand and caressed the Luidaeg’s cheek, wiping away the old blood in a veil of the new. My magic rose around me, cresting and filling the room with the smell of potential. It was up to me to sail this ship safely through the storm and into whatever port I could find, no matter what. I pressed my hand flat over the Luidaeg’s heart, leaving a bloody handprint behind. Her skin was so cold it felt almost like it burned.

  “Oak and ash and rowan and thorn are mine,” I chanted, bringing my wrist to my mouth. “Salt and wind and witch-willow flame are mine.” I licked what blood I could from the rapidly healing cut, and when that wasn’t enough, I bit, cutting my own flesh with the jagged ivory edges of my teeth. It hurt as badly as anything I had ever done to myself, and that was exactly right, because this should hurt, this should cost. If it didn’t, I would be lost.

  This time, I got a solid mouthful of blood before the bleeding slowed too much to be useful. I swallowed, and it froze all the way down.

  “Blood is blood and power is power,” I said. “By the root and the branch and the tree, by our Lord and Ladies, live.” I paused, and added more softly, “For Maeve’s sake, live. What are mothers with no daughters left to live for?”

  Nothing happened. My magic hung heavy in the room, the smell of it almost strong enough to be overpowering. “Live!” I commanded, and grabbed my knife. No time for chewing now; the ritual, if you could call it that, was too far along. I slashed the inside of my wrist open, cutting too hard and too deep for safety, and filled my mouth with my own blood. Then, before I could think better of what I was doing, I leaned forward and clamped my lips over the Luidaeg’s, forcing my blood through them until some of it was forced down her throat by simple gravity.

  The magic snapped solid with a painful flash, the blood suddenly rushing out of my mouth, and off of my body, like it was being pulled into a whirlwind. I could feel the heavy stickiness being pulled from my hands and arms, leaving them clean. I tried to pull away, and the Luidaeg’s arms closed around me with impossible strength, holding me fast.

  I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t pull away; I couldn’t breathe. So I bit her, and the cold strength of her blood filled my mouth, strangely devoid of mem
ories. I swallowed it anyway, trying to use it to break free. It didn’t work. Black spots were beginning to swim in front of my eyes as I struggled ineffectually against her hold. I could hear Tybalt shouting something in the distance, but he was too far away to help me; only the ghosts of his hands could reach me where I was, scrabbling uselessly at the edges of the world. I shouldn’t still have been bleeding, but I was, and the Luidaeg was somehow taking it all.

  There’s only so much blood a body can afford to lose, and the hammering pulse of my heart warned me that I was rapidly running out. Then, abruptly, the Luidaeg let me go, and I was shoved away, collapsing like a rag doll into Tybalt’s waiting arms.

  “October?” He sounded closer now. That was a good thing, since he was holding me. I raised my head, and found him staring down at me. “What just happened?”

  My headache, almost gone before, had blossomed anew like some perverse flower, spreading to fill my entire skull. I groaned as I forced myself to turn toward the bed, squinting against the candlelight. “I don’t know,” I said. “Hopefully, something good.” My vision cleared and I sighed, half from relief, and half from simple exhaustion.

  The Luidaeg was sitting up.

  Whatever force had cleaned up the blood that had been covering me had done the same for her; her clothing, while torn to the point of uselessness, was spotless, and her hair fell in its usual heavy curls, shining and unsnarled. She was staring in awe at her hands, looking at them like she’d never seen them before. Her wounds were gone. Even the bruise on her cheek had vanished.

  “Hey,” I said, trying to pull away from Tybalt and stand on my own two feet. I stumbled, and he caught me, lending me the stability I needed. My head was pounding. I did my best to ignore it. “Welcome back to the land of the living.”

  The Luidaeg raised her head, focusing on me. Her eyes were a clear, simple driftglass green. “What did you do?” she asked.

  “Do?” I echoed. There were still black spots dancing around the edges of my vision. I tried to shake them away. Bad move; shaking my head just made the black spots double while my headache throbbed.

  “Do,” said the Luidaeg, holding her hands out to me like they were all the answer I could possibly need. There was a thin white line of scar tissue on her left arm, where the deepest of the cuts had been. I was willing to bet that, given time, even that would fade away.

  “I . . . you weren’t responding, but I thought there was a chance you weren’t quite dead yet, and so I . . .”

  “You brought me back.” There was no mistaking the quiet wonder in her tone. “I was dead.”

  “Not quite.”

  “Yeah, Toby, I was dead.” She shook her head. “I know what dead feels like. It’s cold there. It’s very cold. And I was dead.” She wrapped her arms around herself, shivering hard.

  “I couldn’t let you go,” I said. It was a small statement, too awkward to encompass everything that it meant: I didn’t have the words to encompass everything that it meant. Then again, I had just brought her back from the dead, so she probably had some idea of what I was trying to say. “I just . . . I couldn’t let you be dead.”

  “Thank you,” she said. She sagged backward on the bed. “I can’t . . . I didn’t stay dead long enough. The geas still holds.”

  “That’s okay,” I said. “I didn’t . . . I wanted you to be okay not because you could help, but because you’re my friend. I couldn’t just let you die.”

  “There are people who won’t be very happy with you for this.” The Luidaeg closed her eyes. “You have to hide me. I can’t stay where I am.”

  “Okay, Luidaeg. Just rest, okay?” I was saying “okay” so much that the word was losing all meaning. Maybe that was more accurate than I liked to think. It felt like the world was never really going to be “okay” again.

  The Luidaeg sighed. “I can’t tell you what’s coming, Toby, even though I want to. But I can tell you one thing that might help.”

  “What is it?” I pulled away from Tybalt, moving to stand closer to her. Everything still smelled like my blood. That helped, a little, even if it wasn’t enough to chase the black spots entirely away.

  “Your mother,” said the Luidaeg. “She told you to beware the Lady of the Lake, but to be more afraid of Morgane. Do you remember?”

  I blinked. “I do, but I don’t remember telling you.”

  “Your lover was a Selkie; he told me quite a bit, after he died,” said the Luidaeg. “My name . . . my name is Antigone. But there was a time when they called me Viviane. When everything was swords, and stones, and so simple . . . your mother feared the wrong woman. I think I’m going to sleep now. I’ll trust you to survive what’s coming.”

  “Wait—what?”

  Tybalt’s hand closed on my shoulder. “‘Viviane’ was one of the names for the Lady of the Lake,” he said.

  I stared at the Luidaeg. “You cannot drop this on me and go to sleep. Luidaeg? Luidaeg!”

  She didn’t wake up.

  ELEVEN

  MY PHONE RANG. I stiffened, instinctively pulling away from the Luidaeg before I recognized the sound and pulled the phone from my pocket. “Hello?”

  “I’m parked on the street,” said Quentin’s familiar voice. He sounded like he was scared out of his mind, which was only to be expected, given the circumstances. “Toby . . . the shadows that should be blurring the Luidaeg’s alley aren’t there. It’s like she dropped all her illusions.”

  “She did,” I said. “Come on in. Make it quick, we’re not going to linger here long.”

  “Okay,” he said, and hung up.

  I lowered the phone. “Quentin’s here,” I said. “He says the normal defenses are down. I was sort of hoping he’d be smart and go straight for Arden instead of following instructions and coming here.”

  Tybalt chuckled. There was an edge of strain to his voice, but it was fading; I had saved the Luidaeg without killing myself in the process. He could stop worrying about me for a few minutes, at least until he figured out how much blood I’d lost. As long as I didn’t try to stand up ever again, he’d never know. “He simply puts great stock in your ability to survive even the most ridiculous of situations. To be fair, you have yet to prove him wrong. Also to be fair, it is not as if seeking the assistance of the Queen is something you have encouraged him to do. It will take some time to adapt to the idea of the monarchy as an ally, not an enemy.”

  “Whose side are you on, anyway?” I demanded peevishly. I recognized my own relief, spreading through me and trying to make me giddy. I pushed it aside—we weren’t out of the woods yet. We still didn’t know who had attacked the Luidaeg, or whether they were coming back. Raising my voice, I called, “We’re in the bedroom, Quentin. Did you crash the car?”

  “I’m a better driver than that,” my squire protested, steps coming faster as he hurried down the hall to the open bedroom door. “Did you see the apartment? The place is trashed. Where’s—” He stepped inside and stopped, going statue-still as he took in the scene in front of him. Finally, quietly, he said, “Oh.”

  “Yeah, ‘oh,’” I agreed. “She was almost dead when we got here.” No need to tell him that “almost” was understating the case. “I managed to bring her back, but she’s still in pretty bad shape, and she’s not waking up. We need to move her someplace safe before whoever came here and did this to her realizes that they need to finish the job.”

  Quentin blinked, sky-colored eyes widening. “You think they’d know?”

  “Whoever this was knew when the Luidaeg answered one question she shouldn’t have answered,” I said grimly. “They’re going to know she’s not dead. We need to move her before they come back. The only question is where.”

  “What of the Library?” asked Tybalt. “The place has its own defenses, and could no doubt protect her, if the lady Librarian was willing to let her inside.”

  “I don
’t think Mags would agree, and I don’t know that the Luidaeg could handle any of the available Roads, or that we’d be able to carry her,” I said. I hesitated before I continued, “Shadowed Hills is out—”

  “For more reasons than I can list in a day,” said Tybalt.

  “—and so is my mother’s tower. Whoever attacked the Luidaeg has Simon under a geas, and the tower recognizes him as family. He could just walk right in and take her.”

  “Maybe Patrick and Dianda could let her stay with them?” asked Quentin. “She’s the sea witch. Unless her attacker was from the Undersea, she might be safe there.”

  “I think there’s a better option,” I said, looking at Tybalt.

  His eyes widened minutely and then narrowed again, turning considering. Finally, slowly, he said, “You do not understand the scope of what you are asking me.”

  “Actually, I do,” I said. “That’s why I’m asking. A place where no one can go without permission, not even the Firstborn, because Oberon told them they weren’t allowed. A place we can reach and our enemies can’t. A safe place.”

  “A place for things that have been lost,” said Tybalt slowly.

  “Wait,” said Quentin, as the penny finally dropped. “Are you talking about taking her to the Court of Cats? She can’t hold her breath on the Shadow Roads if she’s unconscious!”

  “So we move her to a place where the Court is closer to the surface.” I looked to Tybalt. “Will you do this?”

  Silence. Then, finally: “Yes. But we must hurry.”

  I smiled. I couldn’t help myself. “Okay, you two. Help me get her to the car.” Thankfully, when I stood, my legs agreed to support my weight, and my headache was a dull enough roar that I could walk without crying. I was messed up, but I would heal. Hopefully.