The Unkindest Tide (October Daye)

by Seanan McGuire

  “I’m never going to meet anyone I like better,” she whispered.

  “Not if you stay locked up in your house, you won’t, but maybe. You’ll get help and you’ll feel better and you’ll go to Trader Joe’s to buy cheese and trail mix and meet some nice Hob working at the free samples station, and you’ll realize you never wanted to be with a Cait Sidhe who forgets what time he’s supposed to be places.” I shrugged. “The future’s really big. It has a lot of stuff in it. Why don’t we worry about right now first, and see what that gets us? I’ll try not to jump in front of any more cars. You’ll look for someone to talk to. We’ll both get better. That’s what matters, right? We’ll both get better.”

  “Together,” said Helen, and squeezed my hand.

  I smiled. My stomach grumbled, and she laughed. I ducked my head, sheepish but pleased.

  “Right now, maybe what matters most is our eggs,” I said.

  “Maybe,” Helen agreed.

  They were still delicious, even though they were cold. I sat on the bed next to Helen, our shoulders touching, and I ate every single bite.

  NINE

  When I came downstairs carrying our empty plates, Helen following close behind me, Cal was standing at the base of the stairs, nervously shifting their weight from foot to foot. Willis was leaning in the doorway. I swallowed my sudden panic and looked past him to where Ginevra was waiting for me, sitting on the couch like she had all the time in the world. Her clothing was mortal—jeans and a sweatshirt—and completely at odds with her fae, faintly feline appearance. I shot Willis a panicked look.

  “I didn’t want to interrupt, but I think you’re grounded, kiddo,” he said, and took the plates out of my suddenly nerveless hands. “Don’t worry. It was a first offense. I’m sure she’ll go easy on you.”

  “I’m not,” said Ginevra. I winced, focusing on her face. Then I blinked.

  She didn’t look angry, or cold, or imperious; none of the things I had expected from her. She looked . . . exhausted, like she’d been awake all day, and wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep it up. Her hair was frizzy and her sweatshirt was baggy and shapeless, not at all befitting a Princess of Cats.

  This was bad.

  “Do you understand what you’ve put me through?” she asked, standing and moving toward me. “You didn’t come back when you said you would. You gave me your word and then you didn’t come back. I thought . . . I thought you’d run away to make the point that I didn’t get to tell you what to do. I thought you were dead in the Bay. I thought you’d been kidnapped. I thought a lot of things, and somehow, none of them was worse than you getting hit by a car and taken to a mortal veterinarian! That was the worst thing I could possibly have imagined happening, and it happened! Do you understand what you’ve done?”

  “Um,” I said. “I got hit by a car?”

  Ginevra stared at me.

  “In my defense, I didn’t do it on purpose,” I said. “I was saving Cal. They’re going to be one of my subjects someday. I couldn’t stand there and let them die.”

  Cal grimaced, but said, “He really did save me. I couldn’t move.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I would have come and told you I was all right, but you don’t have a phone that works in the Summerlands, and I didn’t trust myself on the Shadow Roads after getting all those painkillers pumped into me.”

  Ginevra opened her mouth like she was going to object. Then she stopped, and took a deep breath, and said, “You’re right.”

  Now it was my turn to stare at her.

  “You couldn’t have stood there and watched Cal die. If you’d been able to, I would have needed to tell your uncle that my regency wasn’t going to end with you on the throne, because you’d be completely unsuited to the position. You acted like a Prince of Cats. You acted like a good man. So you didn’t do anything wrong, and your punishment, such as it is, is going to be getting me a phone so that this never happens again. All right?”

  I looked at Ginevra, my Regent, the woman who was making it possible for my uncle to move on and remember how to be happy. I looked at Cal, my subject-to-be, who would follow me to the ends of the earth for what I’d done for them. And then I looked over my shoulder at Helen, my girlfriend, who I loved, who was finally going to get the help she needed.

  When I returned my attention to Ginevra, I was smiling.

  “All right,” I said. “That seems fair.”

  I can be a Prince of Cats—I can be a King, someday—and still be a good man. Somehow, if I can manage that, I feel like I can manage anything. I feel like I can save the world.

  In my own way, I feel like I can be a hero.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Seanan McGuire lives and works in Washington State, where she shares her somewhat idiosyncratic home with her collection of books, creepy dolls, and enormous blue cats. When not writing--which is fairly rare--she enjoys travel, and can regularly be found any place where there are cornfields, haunted houses, or frogs. A Campbell, Hugo, and Nebula Award-winning author, Seanan's first book (Rosemary and Rue, the beginning of the October Daye series) was released in 2009, with more than twenty books across various series following since. Seanan doesn't sleep much.

  You can visit her at www.seananmcguire.com.

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