Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception

by Maggie Stiefvater

Surprised by the question, I looked at him. His face was green and peaked, illuminated by the lights in the dashboard, and his expression was genuinely concerned.

  “Why would I be mad at you?”

  “You’ve gone all quiet. That’s the only way I could tell you were mad before, so I assume I’ve done something to tick you off.”

  “You’re the one who went all quiet. I thought you were mad at me for—” I stopped short. I didn’t know if I was supposed to mention the church or not.

  Luke sighed and made a vague gesture. “This is all just unfamiliar territory for me.”

  “What is?”

  “You.” He shrugged uncomfortably. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “About what?”

  “You.”

  “About what happened in the ch—”

  Luke interrupted hastily. “No. Just about you. You, yourself. I keep waiting for you to tell me to leave you alone. To tell me I’m creepy.”

  I pointed at him. “That’s why I haven’t told you to leave me alone.”

  “What—why?”

  “Because you keep telling me how weird you are. Truly sketchy people don’t tell you how sketchy they are.”

  “I also forced myself on you, in an alleyway. That’s sketchy.”

  So that’s what this was about. The kiss. It was sort of charming that he was worried about it. I laughed. “You didn’t force yourself on me. And it wasn’t even an alley.”

  “I didn’t ask.”

  I wasn’t up on the rules of dating, but I didn’t think anyone ever asked permission to kiss a girl. Maybe in the movies. “I kissed back.”

  He looked at me out of the corner of his eyes. “I don’t want to go too far—do the wrong thing—and get myself in trouble.”

  Crap, that sounded familiar. “Luke, I’m not mad at you. And …” I had to look away when I said it, and I blushed, too. “You’re not going to get yourself in trouble. Or—maybe I’d like the sort of trouble you’d get yourself into.” Afterward, I thought maybe I shouldn’t have said it. Maybe he’d think I was a slut. Maybe he would go too far. Maybe he wouldn’t know what I meant. Maybe—

  Luke gave me a halfway smile, somewhere short of humor, and reached across the car to brush my chin with his hand. I wanted to close my eyes and lean into his touch, to forget about everything that made me Deirdre.

  “You’re a baby. You don’t know how much trouble I can get into.”

  I bristled, pulling my face away. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I didn’t mean it like—aw, see, now you’re pissed at me again.”

  I regarded him frostily. “No, really? You called me a baby.”

  Luke thumped back in his seat, voice frustrated. “It was a compliment, really.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “Because you make me forget how young you are.” He struggled to explain, looking away from my glare. “You’re just—you’re just so like me. You know—you take everything in like you’ve done it a hundred times before. The way your eyes look when you’re playing music—I just forget you’re only sixteen.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to add ‘incredibly beautiful’ and ‘dazzlingly intelligent’ while you’re pouring on the unreasonable compliments?” It would have been nice to believe him—but my mind couldn’t reconcile stunningly invisible with stunningly desirable.

  “I’m being serious. You are incredibly beautiful, though.” His voice was earnest.

  I shook my head. “Eleanor is incredibly beautiful. I know what I am, and beautiful I am not. I’m fine with that, too.”

  A weird look crossed his face at the mention of Eleanor. “No, Eleanor’s something else. You’re beautiful. Especially when you’re staring at me with that boy he’s a condescending asshole expression—yeah. Beautiful.”

  I studied my hands; the lights from the radio cast a weird colored glow over them, like I was lit from within. Softly, I said, “You could say it again.”

  But he didn’t. Instead, he said, “You’re different.”

  His voice sounded like it was the best compliment in the world to be called different—“different” like a brand-new species of butterfly, not like a cardigan-wearing girl in a sea of tank tops.

  I heard Luke shift in his seat to gaze out the windshield into the darkness. “You’re like me. We’re watchers of this world, aren’t we? Not players.”

  But I wasn’t a watcher of this world, the little planet inside the confines of his car. In this world, scented with Luke’s summer-smell, I was an irreplaceable player. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to cry or bust out the biggest smile in the universe.

  “Dee,” Luke said softly. “Where are you?”

  I looked at him. “Right here.”

  He shook his head.

  I smiled self-consciously. “I was imagining my life as a little planet all its own.”

  Luke ran a finger in a circle along the steering wheel: a shape without end. “With very attractive aliens.” He reached over and carefully drew the same circle lightly on the back of my hand, raising goose bumps along my arm. His soft, level voice was completely devoid of emotion when he asked, “Are you still pissed at me?”

  I half-closed my eyes as he traced the finger up my arm toward my shoulder, his touch as light as a feather. It tickled in a way that made my gut clench and my breath stop. He leaned across the console and kissed my lips, just as softly. I closed my eyes and let him kiss me again, one of his hands cupping the side of my neck, the other hand braced against the dash. Headlights flashed against my closed eyelids as a solitary car drove by on the highway.

  “Do you want me to stop?” Luke whispered.

  I shook my head. He kissed me again, biting my lower lip gently. It drove me crazy in ways I hadn’t even thought of. Irrationally, I suddenly thought, So this is making out. I didn’t even know if I was doing it right. Was I drooling too much? Did he like it? What the hell was I supposed to do with my tongue?

  But a part of me was immune from self-doubt, and it was begging me to touch him and be touched. I felt as if I was sitting in the back seat, watching Luke and me kiss. I saw the way the dash light lit up the side of my face as I tipped my chin for his mouth to touch mine. I saw how his tongue carefully traced where my lips parted. From outside of my body, I watched while I leaned into his hand as it pressed down my side, fingers ironing out the wrinkles in my shirt. I heard my breath grow unsteady, saw his eyes close, felt his fingers on my thigh, asking for me to go further, to places I hadn’t yet explored.

  I froze, and Luke sat back hastily, looking ill, as if his hand had moved of its own volition. His voice was uneven. “I’m sorry.”

  I wanted to say I’m not, but I didn’t know if I meant it. I didn’t know what I wanted. Lamely, I said, “It’s okay,” which wasn’t what I meant.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I wasn’t trying to—” He closed his eyes for a minute, and then opened them. He released the parking brake.

  My leg burned where he had touched it. I could still feel the desire in his touch, and I couldn’t stop shivering. I wanted him to kiss me again. I wanted him to start driving so I wouldn’t want him to kiss me again.

  Luke pulled out onto the highway again, swallowing, not looking at me. He looked faraway and unfamiliar in the dim glow.

  I reached across the console and took his hand, and without looking away from the road, he knotted his fingers tightly in mine

  seven

  I slept on the couch that night. The idea of sharing a room with some faceless faerie thingy wasn’t exactly appealing, and even though I knew it could just as easily be faceless downstairs in the living room, I slept easier on the couch.

  I woke up giddy. Last night, I’d been weirded out by the experience in the church and the idea of faeries stalking me, but this morning, fully rested, with early pale light filtering in through the delicate white curtains, I felt on top of the world. All the negatives seemed far away, and my mind just kept replaying his
kisses over and over again.

  Upstairs, I heard movement and thumping in my parents’ room. Mom was awake. I’d seen the look on her face last night when Luke dropped me off at eleven and apologized for keeping me out so late. I wasn’t keen on having that conversation right now. Or ever, for that matter.

  “Rye,” I whispered. He looked up from his post at the base of the couch. “Walk?”

  He leapt up, tail whipping, and I followed him to the kitchen, wiping sleep from my eyes and pulling my hair into my usual choppy ponytail. I donned a pair of jeans from the laundry room, folding the bottoms into uneven cuffs so they wouldn’t get wet in the grass, and went outside into the morning.

  God, the sun was gorgeous today, light trickling through early morning mist. The morning was still cool—dew hanging in spiderwebs, the air smelling of freshly mown grass. Everything was beautiful.

  He kissed me. He kissed me.

  Rye, oblivious to my inner fireworks, pushed past me, white tail high as he bounded through the still wet grass.

  Not that way, faerie dog. We’re going this way. Down the road.

  He stopped, ears pricked as if I had spoken out loud. Then he wheeled around and trotted toward the road. He paused, waiting for me.

  Awesome. Everything was friggin’ awesome. I could call Rye in my mind, and Luke kissed me. With Rye, I walked out onto the road, sticking mostly to the side, though at this time of the morning I didn’t think I’d meet any cars.

  My bare feet making no noise on the asphalt, I led Rye to a quieter back road near the house and together we walked down the dead middle of it, watching the mist move and shift slowly over the cow pasture to our right. I slowed, fascinated by a snowy white rabbit that was watching me. Its perfectly colorless ears were pricked, unmoving. Aside from the rabbit, I was alone with Rye and my thoughts.

  So Rye was a faerie dog. And faeries wanted to steal me away. It was kind of flattering, actually. Nice to be noticed.

  Where did that leave Luke? Why did he know about the faeries, anyway? Were they trying to steal him as well? And why had Granna talked to him like she did? It wasn’t the malice in her voice that was the most puzzling. It was the familiarity. Sort of like how Mr. Hill, the band director, had seemed to recognize him at the competition as well. My mind skipped carefully away from the subject. Remembering how little I knew about Luke definitely cut into my morning giddiness. I knew I ought to care who he was and what he was when he wasn’t with me, but I didn’t want to. I wanted simple.

  Deep down, I knew he wasn’t a high school student. But was it wrong that that was part of what I liked about him?

  By my side, Rye growled and dropped back, and I followed his gaze. Up ahead, backed into an unused dirt driveway, was a familiar beat-up Audi. My heart leapt—it’s Luke!—and my brain turned over the information a second later—what’s he doing here?

  Padding quietly up to the car, I saw Luke in the driver’s seat. His arms were behind his head, his eyes closed. Sleep erased all care from his narrow features, making him look young and fresh—almost believable as a high school student. His raised right arm exposed a beaten gold band around his biceps, partially eclipsed by the edge of his shirt sleeve. I didn’t know why I hadn’t seen it before.

  I glanced down. His doors were unlocked. When I pulled the passenger side open, Luke jerked to immediate life, his hand flying down to his ankle.

  “Shouldn’t leave your doors unlocked,” I advised. “Never know what kinda weirdos will get into your car.”

  He blinked at me for a long moment before pulling his hand away from his ankle and thumping his head back on the seat with closed eyes.

  I pulled the door shut behind me, watching Rye glare at Luke and then retreat to the side of the road. “I didn’t sleep in my own room, either.”

  He didn’t open his eyes. “It’s hard to sleep while you’re being watched, isn’t it?”

  I wanted to ask him why They would watch him, but I was afraid he wouldn’t answer. I wanted to ask him why he was sleeping in his car a stone’s throw from my house, but I was afraid he would answer. I thought about his hand darting to his ankle and wondered if there was something hidden beneath his pants leg, something a bit more deadly than the golden band his shirt sleeve had obscured. Sudden doubts crowded in my mind during his silence, but then he opened his pale blue eyes and smiled at me, and the doubts were swept away like so many cobwebs.

  “You’re a nice thing to see first thing in the morning.”

  The giddiness came rushing back as if it had never gone. I grinned. “I know.” Why did I become this strange, light creature when I was with him?

  Luke laughed. “Well, sing something for me, nice thing.”

  Entirely shameless, I sang a made-up song about walking without shoes and strange men sleeping in cars, to the tune of “The Handsome Cabin Boy.” Seeing his face lighten, I added another verse about the dangers of cow pastures and men who stayed near them. “Lure” and “manure” rhymed nicely.

  “You’re in a good mood today.” He sat up and rubbed his hands through his hair, looking in his rearview mirror. “I’m self-conscious. You’re seeing me without my make-up on.”

  It was my turn to laugh. “You’re hideous. I can’t see how you stand yourself in the morning.” With careful fingers, I lifted the very edge of his shirt sleeve, revealing the gold band just under it, beaten into a multitude of different facets. “I didn’t see this before.”

  He looked away, out the window, voice oddly dead. “It was always there.”

  I touched it, rubbing a finger against one of the beaten facets, and noticed that the skin just at the edge was all smoothly calloused and that the muscle of his arm was contoured around the band; the torc had been there a long time. I looked at it for longer than I needed to, wanting the excuse to run my finger along his skin. Staring, I saw something else: pale, shiny marks running perpendicular to the torc. Scars. My mind recreated the dozen slashes running down the length of his upper arm, gashes that sliced his biceps to ribbons of flesh held together only by that torc.

  I ran a finger down one of the scars, toward his elbow. “What’s this?”

  Luke looked back at me and answered with another question. “Do you still have my secret?”

  For a moment I didn’t know what he meant, and then I gestured to the chain around my neck, lifting it to reveal the key. “One of them. Can I have another one?”

  His lips lifted into a smile. “Sure. I’m still fascinated by you.”

  “That’s no secret.”

  “Maybe not, but it’s fairly stunning, all things considered.”

  I pouted. “I can’t consider all things, because I don’t know most of them.”

  “Don’t pout. Sing me another song. A real one. Something that makes people cry.”

  I sang him “Fear a’ Bhàta”—“The Lonesome Boatman”—and it was sadder and more beautiful than I had ever sung it, because it was for him. I’d never wanted to sing for someone else before—was this how Delia felt every time she walked on stage?

  He closed his eyes. “I’m in love with your voice.” He sighed. “You’re like a siren, leading me into dangerous places. Don’t stop. Sing me something else.”

  I wanted to lead him into dangerous places, if I was included in said dangerous places, so I closed my eyes and sang “Sally Gardens.” A car’s not the greatest place for acoustics, but I wanted it to sound beautiful, so it did. I don’t think I’ve ever sung it better.

  I sensed him, close to me, a second before I felt his breath on my neck. I was surprised at the emotion that flashed through me in the instant before his lips pressed against my skin. Fear—only there for a second—but there nonetheless.

  My treacherous body had betrayed me with a start, and Luke pulled away as I opened my eyes.

  “Do I scare you?” he asked.

  Strange way of putting it. Not “did I.”

  I narrowed my eyes, trying to read his face. I felt so strongly that I could see my
self mirrored in his eyes: something about my obsession with music and my battle for control of my life. I wasn’t sure why, but I just felt in my gut that whatever made me me resonated in harmony with whatever made Luke him.

  I answered with a question. “Should you?”

  He smiled mildly. “I knew you were clever.” Then the smile vanished; he gazed past me, and I turned.

  Sitting outside the car, ears pricked and unmoving, staring at us with unblinking black eyes, was a pure-white rabbit.

  My stomach turned over.

  Luke stared at it for a long moment before speaking, and when he did, his voice was tight and low. “You’d better go.”

  Go? “What about—?”

  “What about what?” he asked flatly.

  I stared out at the rabbit, and when I answered, my voice was cold. “Nothing. You’re right. I have a gig today anyway. Mom will have my head if I’m not back soon.”

  I put my hand on the doorknob, ready to get out, but Luke reached over quickly, below the level of the window, and touched my other hand where it rested on the seat.

  I understood. Nothing in view of the rabbit. Climbing out of the car, I shut the door; as I did, the rabbit hopped slowly into the underbrush, as if that would convince me it was ordinary, not some peeping-tom-supernatural-killer-bunny.

  Rye trotted up from the other side of the road and joined me, without a glance toward where the rabbit had gone, and I headed down the road, not looking back. I had gone a hundred feet when I swore I heard the car door open and shut. I snuck a look back, shaking my head and pretending to swat gnats away. Sure enough, the car was empty.

  Where was he?

  Focus. This telekinetic crap has to be good for something useful. I listened hard. Nothing. Just the repetitive twittering of cardinals in the trees overhead. It was hard to concentrate on something abstract like sound; I needed something concrete. I pictured Luke carrying a cell phone, calling me and forgetting to hang up. I imagined the crackling of underbrush as he pushed after the rabbit, the sound of his breath. The sound of his voice, faraway and low.

  “Have I ever failed before?”

  Another voice, earthy and gravelly. Chillingly plural yet singular. “It’s never taken you this long.”