Tiernan tensed and even started to stand up, but after a deep breath, he settled in again. "And how would you propose I do that?"
“Destroy your pikes. Or bury them deep. Whatever works.”
“You cannot—” Tiernan began, but Orlaith interrupted him.
“You cannot harm your current enemy with them, only arm them. Don't they have arms enough?”
There was a long, long pause.
“Very well,” Tiernan said. He gestured to his men. “Get our other pikes. They're better for the task at hand. Make sure the iron ones cannot be used by the Fomoire.” He looked to Orlaith. “I'm not taking orders from the Northman.”
“That's an argument I'm willing to delay,” the Seelie Queen said. “Consider your people an independent unit for now. But I'll want your word.”
“Oh, here it comes.”
"Swear yourself and your soldiers to the defense of Faerie. The realm must endure. We lost our cities, so many of our people, our unity. It must not happen again. No more time in the dark while our enemies run free."
Tiernan seemed surprised. “...I can do that.”
Chapter 32: Flowers, Silk, and Reality
The feast had gone over well. It wasn't that everything was settled, or even close to it. The discussion had gotten quite loud at times, but it was a discussion in earnest about how precisely to face the problem of the Fomoire, rather than whether to.
Eventually, all delegations adjourned to their tents. Despite the peaceful advantage of the cauldron, Megan noticed, Riocard posted extra guards near hers. She didn't let it worry her. She couldn't afford to: her recent 'nights' of sleep had been spread over too many days.
The next day, after more negotiations and lunch, a break was called in the debates, allowing tempers to cool—or side deals to be made, perhaps. Ashling busied herself tending to errands for the king, and Cassia was preparing to go talk to the apparent cyclopes and ogre coalition.
“Are you going to be okay with them?” Megan asked.
“Yeah,” Cassia said. “The other satyrs are keeping their mouths shut. And I think I saw the dryad talking nicely with the huntin. Granted, there's probably only one kind of Greek-Xhosa relations that she's interested in, but it's better than picking fights.”
“Huntin?” Megan realized some of the introductions had been lacking.
“African nature folk. Trees, specifically.”
“Nature folk called huntin? Are there any called fishin?”
“Do you have any idea how often we get that joke?” asked a low, susurrating male voice somewhere behind and to the left of Megan. She turned to see a figure that could certainly be described as tall, dark, and handsome, but the hair made of fibers interspersed with red flowers was certainly atypical.
Megan blushed. “Sorry. I guess it's a lot?”
He flashed a smile. “Nope. Why would we? The word for ‘hunt’ is 'zingela.' Cassia, I believe we have a factional meeting of sorts?” And off they went.
Megan, Justin, and Lani spent a little while talking amongst themselves, letting Lani explain who some of the host of unfamiliar folk were, as well as going into more detail about some traditional alliances and animosities. Then they went in search of Lani's father, ultimately finding him walking and talking with Riocard.
It was quite a contrast to see them. The Unseelie King, in briarmail armor up to his neck, stood six and a half feet tall. With no Earthly distortions, the Kahuna of the Menehune Engineering Corps was barely more than half that. They both seemed likely to get a crick in their neck during the discussion as they walked.
“Obviously, we're going to want to stand our ground as near the 'Fishing Hole' as possible,” Mr. Kahale said. “But there will still be much to decide in terms of where precisely. I'd like Your Majesty to have both pixies and sprites scouting the terrain, as they'll catch different issues.”
“Granted. What's the next point of concern?”
“We'll want all blueprints finalized before work begins, so the diurnal crews won't worry about 'correcting' the nocturnal crews, or vice versa.”
“Dad?” Megan and Lani said in unison.
Mr. Kahale went to them directly. "I'm glad you made it, but I'm sorry you're here," he said, hugging his daughter. After all the times she'd seen them on the other side, Megan wasn't sure she'd ever get used to seeing Lani as so much taller than her father when he looked like his true self.
“Do you want me to go home?” Lani asked.
“You can't send away one of the heroines of the hour, Kahuna,” Riocard said as he put a hand on Megan's shoulder.
Mr. Kahale was still addressing Lani. “Not now. I'm not going to neglect a good resource while we're sorting so much out. But you 'officially had the flu' for long enough, young lady. Come Monday, you're going back to school. You can go to An Teach Deiridh for the May Day Dance that evening. You can come here—or wherever we agree on—every afternoon and weekend afterward until graduation, if you choose. But I won't have you disappointing yourself by dropping out of school to spend all of May arguing fortifications with dwarves. Deal?”
“Deal,” Lani said, smiling.
“Good. Now did your mother say anything in reply to your latest message?”
Lani blinked. “I...didn't send a message,” she admitted. “I've been a little … out of it today.”
Megan was even more wide-eyed. She'd turned her own mother's world upside down and sideways, left on a dangerous errand, and hadn't even thought of sending word that she was okay.
Mr. Kahale frowned, then looked to Megan's father. “Could a messenger sprite please be sent?”
“Sure,” Riocard said, not yet noticing Megan's expression as he raised a hand to call for one. “The things you fret about, at a time like this. I guess that's what you get for taking solemn vows every time you put flowers in someone's hair.”
The Kahuna rolled his eyes. “That, twenty of the best years I've had in centuries, and responsibility for two of the potentially brightest minds in more than one world. Yeah, weep for me, Majesty.”
“Dad!” Lani muttered weakly, blushing.
Whatever may have been the Unseelie King's retort, he apparently dropped it when he finally noticed Megan's face. “Is... your mother all right?” he finally managed.
“Not really,” Megan said. "I told her."
Riocard nodded, looking distant for a few moments. "I can only imagine that was difficult. But she let you travel here?"
Megan nodded. "She may not be happy with it, but she and I are... doing better. She knows I'm committed to being here when I'm needed, even if it's dangerous."
"So you'll be staying?" Riocard said.
Megan shook her head. "Lani needs me at least half as much as I need her. I'm also not going to be any help with a lot of the tactical things, engineering things, or other preparing things. I still want to try to finish school, and not all with brownie assistance. But I'll come back."
"For the best, if you're going to take part in this war. Those who'll be fighting with us should see the Princess now and then."
Megan almost objected to the comment, but held off, thinking of both her father's previous comments and, just as importantly, Justin's. "That makes sense. I'll try. I think I have a lot to figure out, still."
Riocard smiled. "And you will."
Megan smiled and nodded. A breath.
Lani passed Megan a slip of message paper as she filled one out herself. Megan scribbled down 'I'm safe. Home in a few days. Promise. Love you.' She started to doodle a heart—and then shade it with Painted Lady markings—as she listened to the next shift in conversation.
“So you're coordinating the usual menehune and knockers with the dwarves, Dad?” Lani asked.
“And the domovoi for refitting and maintenance, and the ohdows for ground stability,” Mr. Kahale replied. “As to why, considering relative experience with military maneuvers, I couldn't tell you.”
“Rather obvious,” said Riocard. “I know why you're here.
A future paycheck is a fine but tentative thing. Knowing that what you're building is standing between the Fomoire and those potentially brightest minds of yours is a lot less tentative. Besides.” Megan heard the touch of a laugh in her father's chocolatey voice. “We've worked enough together that you're used to functioning in my reality.”
“Your reality?” Lani asked nervously.
“As in Star Trek, so in life. Never ask an engineer whether something is possible. Tell them what's possible, and they'll work out the details.”
Lani grinned. “I see what you did there—um, Your Majesty.”
Megan canted her head slightly as she handed over her paper to the messenger sprite. “Is that what you meant by my 'natural leader' thing, Lani?”
The kahuna sighed. “Megan, honey, I'm sure when you do it, it's charming.”
Justin cleared his throat. “Majesty, may I ask what the Queen is up to?”
“Talking to the General, several of the other delegations, and her nephew about, respectively, patrols, supply coordination, and a suit fitting.”
“A suit fitting?” Megan asked.
“Oh, you'll have to see it, dearest.”
For a man nearly covered in spiders, Tiernan looked only mildly irritated. As he stood, arms out, dressed in light gray cloth, more and more spiders came out of the woodwork, sometimes literally. They swarmed and skittered among the grasses and climbed up Tiernan's legs and torso, and each other, settling into place. As they grew thick enough in any single location, their legs seemed to interlock, and for a few moments, Megan thought perhaps the arachnids were, themselves, going to become some kind of scale armor. Then, starting at Tiernan's neck, they began crawling downward, until they reached the floor and skittered back into hiding, leaving the sidhe in a feet-to-neck suit of white, woven silk armor.
“But...why?” Megan was having trouble seeing how that even worked, and watching the process left her feeling sure there were things crawling on her.
“The briarmail armor is your Dad's most formal wear,” Lani said. “Spider-silk for the Seelie royalty.”
“Spiders are Seelie?” Megan said.
“Most, yeah,” Lani said. “Orlaith and Arachne herself go back ages.”
“Really? I mean, most creepy stuff is Unseelie.”
“First, have you met Tiernan? Second, painstaking craft-workers known for their overweening pride. It doesn't get much more Seelie than that.”
“Oh. Okay.” Megan was still confused. “Why is he getting a suit now?”
“That is my prerogative,” Orlaith said, using all her elocutionary zeal from less than a dozen feet away.
“Yes,” Megan readily agreed. She couldn't knock queens' prerogatives. However manipulatively, they had gotten her Justin, in a way. “Are you okay with saying why?”
“My nephew and recognized heir should dress the part.”
“And heir?” No one had asked Orlaith to be anything but civil. Megan wondered if she was overcompensating. “Why are you saying stuff like that?”
“Because Beltaine is approaching, and things happen. As you know, it wouldn't be the first time someone else had to dance, and the Ballroom only recognizes blood of the line.”
That was when a gray sprite in very distinctive furs and ragged denim sped into the area. Megan missed the days when Gilroy was merely annoying, before she knew where he worked—before she'd even heard of the 'Fishing Hole.'
“The ice broke, Majesties,” Gilroy said, somehow managing to be breathless, ominous, and disturbingly chipper all at once. “All the way. They're out.”
Chapter 33: Mazes
Megan kept reminding herself that Lani was okay, that the Menehune Engineering Corps had all headed of off together in their coordinated way. For the first few minutes, at least, Megan just stood there with her father on her right and Justin on her left.
“I thought we had another month...” she said.
“My boys did say it was only an estimate,” Inwar said between shouting instructions. “This was all unprecedented.”
Peadar and one of the Jennies Greenteeth dropped the corpse of something that looked like five or six different creatures had been twisted together in order to make one hideous—but also very, very fast—creature.
“We went with Plans F through M,” the redcap told the general, “But it probably only bought 12 hours until the first of them get here.”
Word spread through the camp quickly as more and more of the 'fishing hole' crew showed up, some bearing bodies, or parts of bodies, of additional rapid-looking things. Others bore their own wounded, some cut open with tooth, claw, or jagged iron weapons, while others looked whole, but seemed to have dozens of black worms writhing under their skin, radiating out from small burns or scratches. Megan had seen Fomoire poison at work before, though mostly in the initial stages. The advanced versions of the magical wounds looked vastly more painful.
A combination of panic and excitement spread through different groups as pixies and sprites struggled to remain ahead of rumor, even if the actual news was almost as bad as anything that could be imagined and relayed. Ashling herself kept reporting facts without a single preposterous story or etymology. And all Megan was doing while she did was stare at the torn pink membranes on her wings—or the queen's scars, or the spots on the sleek, spring-muscled monster corpse.
Riocard was calling out instructions, but Megan never managed to hear a whole sentence. There was a squad of brownies advancing on the cauldron with dishwashing gloves. Her father mentioned echinacea and thistles, and Megan had to fight the impulse to keep one of her wind-songs off her lips.
She started walking, and her father, occupied with the Queen, the General, and the brownies, let her. Justin kept pace.
As they walked, she saw the Wild Hunt's trophies—or now, perhaps a warning to approaching Fomoire. Set atop pikes placed in the ground, three humanoid heads with all-too-familiar eyes peered sightlessly out onto the fields and overgrown wilds of Murias.
Something about them made Megan, after reeling from the shock, feel better, which made her wonder how she was supposed to feel about that.
“So,” Justin commented. “The other two really weren't smart enough to get out of the way.”
“Pretty embarrassing for the cousins-once-removed of that Goddess Dad fanboys over.”
“I thought they were her bastard stepsons.”
“Probably both. Maybe neither. Serves us right for not knowing when we ask Ashling to translate. At any rate, hey: we got three of them down, right there.”
“Three of them. With the use of an ineffable once-a-year force. And they have relatives that would probably have been immune to it. And those relatives have goodness-knows-what other resources.”
“...Yeah,” she said and kept walking.
Megan caught up with Lani sitting in their tent, scratching at a piece of paper, with a few more beside her.
"What are you doing?" Megan said.
"Same thing every other engineer is doing: trying to figure out what blueprints we can come up with and agree on that we can get even partway up before the Fomoire get here."
"Peadar says 12 hours, tops," Megan said.
Lani sighed and shook her head. "The knockers are talking about materials. The dwarves can rune things up, but they're really meticulous. No one is going to go to sleep, and Dad is more used to temples and hobby rooms. I'm trying to come up with something..." she showed Megan her papers, with the carefully laid out ground assessment, and her early sketches of walls. "But there's just not enough time." A brief, nervous laugh. “At least we can probably get away with skipping class on Monday after all.”
"I could try to put some people to sleep?" Megan said.
"The armies need to prepare, too. And we still don't have a lot to work with. Much longer, and I think my dad will have to recommend a fighting retreat back to An Teach Deiridh."
"Is that so bad?" Megan asked.
"That would be surrendering most of Faerie, includin
g the paths, to them. And it would make a shakier start for the alliances. And it would make Earth easily accessible from the front lines."
“Okay, well, the important thing is to not panic. I don't know anything about jury-rigging battlefield defenses, either, but I promise we're just going to force our way through it somehow before Earth is ever in the picture. Don't start worrying. There will be defenses before Mack has to break out the LEGO fortress.”
Lani was starting to open her mouth to say something, when she blinked in surprise, then her eyes went wide. "Megan, you're a genius! That's it."
"I don't think we have any LEGOs," Megan said, confused.
"Right, but.... just a second, here!" Lani rummaged in her bag. She got out Megan's art supplies. "Where engineering fails, I want to see if faerie inspiration might work. Close your eyes."
"I can't draw if my eyes are closed." Megan said.
"Right, but I want you to picture something, then you'll open your eyes and draw it."
"Okay." Megan agreed, closing her eyes.
"All right, I want you to think of a really simple maze for Mack. There's not much time, so it can't be fancy. But he has to get to a specific place, and hit traps if he goes the wrong way. Keep it quick and simple... and... go!"
Megan opened her eyes, and started scratching her pencil across the page. Partway through her efforts, she paused. "So, even if these work as something people could build quickly, where are you going to get the materials?"
Lani smiled. "We have everything we need right here. We have a whole city under the water. Sure, not ideal for fancy building. But just because it's a little wet doesn't mean Murias isn't useful. It's just hiding. And we don't need to skulk about for friends right now. People are listening now, and there are aquatic fae at the conference: that nereid, the adroanzi, the kushtaka—”
“Are those the otter people? They're so—”
“—Don't call them cute,” Lani warned. “Besides, I figure we'll do a lot of things just by subtracting. We'll make pits and deadfalls, not just walls."
A Fair Fight Page 16
