by Karen Lynch
“I wish you had, but I understand why you felt you had to keep your family’s secret.” He rubbed my back gently. “I don’t want you to ever feel like you can’t tell me something.”
“No more secrets. I promise.”
He rolled onto his back, and I laid my head on his chest. “Has there been any word from Seelie?”
Lukas sighed. “Seelie is in chaos. Rhys told their council what Anwyn did to your family. There is no proof he isn’t the rightful heir, but he has stepped aside. Anwyn’s younger sister Coralia has taken the throne for now, but there are already challengers. It will take a while for them to recover from this.”
I thought about my brother. His life had been ripped apart, and everything he’d believed about it had been based on a lie. Then he had watched the person he’d believed was his mother die. I was glad he had Bayard and his other friends to help him through this, but I hoped he would reach out to our parents and me when he was ready to take that step.
“I guess the council here is waiting to talk to me, too,” I said without any enthusiasm.
“Don’t worry about them. They will wait until you are ready to speak to them.” He paused. “Korrigan and Faolin questioned Rashari. She admits to going to see you in the cells but denies any involvement in your abduction.”
I scoffed. “Did they actually expect her to cop to that?”
“No. They’ve started questioning the guards, and they will get to the bottom of it. You won’t have to see her ever again.”
“Well, that’s one good thing to come of this,” I said dryly.
Lukas chuckled. “I have some good news for you. Davian Woods was apprehended in the south of France four days ago. The Agency is holding him until his trial, which I’m told will happen late next year.”
I rose up to rest my chin on his chest. “Does this mean my family can go home?”
His lips curved. “They’ll be back in their apartment today. The team Faolin hired is going to stick around until they’re sure none of Davian’s men are going to cause trouble.”
Excitement rippled through me. Now that the storms had stopped, the king would allow travel to the human world to resume.
“I want to go home,” I blurted.
His hand stilled. “For good?”
How did I explain this to him? I needed to be back in a familiar setting, somewhere I could feel like the old me again. This life had been thrust on me, and I’d never had time to get used to it before I was running around trying to save the world and getting kidnapped. Anwyn hadn’t broken me, but I felt banged up emotionally. I needed to go home to heal.
“No,” I answered. “For now.”
* * *
I adjusted the strap of my backpack on my shoulder and exited Widener Library. Outside, Harvard’s mostly deserted campus was blanketed in several inches of snow and more was falling. Inhaling deeply, I pulled up my coat collar and started down the steps.
Bad to the Bone started to play in my pocket, and I grinned as I pulled out my phone. “I’m leaving right this second.”
“You’re still at school?” Mom huffed out a breath. “I thought your last exam was this morning.”
“I had to return a few books.”
There was a clamor in the background, and Mom called, “No, not like that.”
“What is going on there?” I asked as I avoided a patch of ice on a step.
Mom sighed heavily. “Finch said you were taking too long, so they started decorating the tree without you. If you love me, please hurry home.”
I snickered. “Be there soon. Love you.”
The call disconnected, and I returned the phone to my pocket. The back of my hand brushed against the metal rail, and a shudder went through me. Six months back in my world, and I was still getting used to being a faerie in a human world. Iron was everywhere, especially in the city. I was adjusting and slowly building up immunity to it. Sometimes, I missed my goddess stone, but I didn’t have a single regret about giving it up.
Ducking around the side of the steps, I raised my hands and felt for the traces of magic in the barrier. Creating portals was something else I’d had to learn since coming home. They weren’t as easy when you didn’t have a goddess stone amplifying your magic. I was getting pretty good at them, but I only used them to travel home because they required a lot of magic, especially when you had to shield whatever you were carrying.
The portal formed, and I stepped through it into a familiar courtyard. I immediately created the second portal, and I emerged on the landing outside our apartment. There was a big wreath on our door and a matching one on Maurice’s. Christmas music and laughter came from inside our apartment.
The smell of warm gingerbread and fresh pine greeted me when I opened the door, along with the sight of Bayard leaning against the breakfast bar, eating the head off a gingerbread man. He wore his usual detached expression, but he gave me a chin lift, which was practically a friendly greeting from him.
I dropped my backpack and coat on a chair and turned to the living room where Finch was directing Rhys where to hang ornaments on the tree. Above them, Aisla flitted about dropping pieces of glittering tinsel on the branches.
Finch spotted me first and let out a piercing whistle as he scampered toward me. Mom and Dad jumped up from the couch and hurried over. “Hey, Buddy.” I scooped up Finch and gave my parents one-armed hugs.
A year had passed since my parents’ ordeal, and no one would ever guess they were recovering goren addicts. They’d been back at work since the summer, and Levi had plenty of jobs for them. I helped them out sometimes with research, but I left the hunting to them. I missed it sometimes, but school kept me pretty busy.
Over Mom’s shoulder, my eyes met Rhys’s, and he smiled boyishly. He looked less like the Seelie prince every day, and the transformation suited him. It had taken him months to come to terms with Queen Anwyn’s death and the things she had done, but he was doing a lot better now.
“How is the new place?” I asked him.
His face lit up. “I like it very much. Caroline is helping me choose furniture.”
I glanced at my mother. She was happier than I’d ever seen her, and she had called me no less than five times when Rhys told her he’d bought a house in Crown Heights. A mini mansion was more like it, but it had to fit him and his five personal guards, who had refused to leave him after he had relinquished his title.
“How many rooms did you say it has?” I asked.
“Seven bedrooms and four bathrooms,” he said. “It has a total of fifteen rooms I believe.”
“Sixteen,” Bayard corrected wryly.
I raised my eyebrows. “That is a lot of rooms to furnish.”
Rhys nodded. “Everything has been done for me my whole life, so I knew nothing about owning a home. Did you know you must pay the city to have running water in your house?”
A laugh burst from me at his wide-eyed innocence. “Yes, I knew that.”
“He’s learning fast,” Dad said. “He’ll be a Brooklynite in no time.”
The fond look that passed between him and Rhys made my chest swell. We had lost so many years with Rhys, but he was quickly fitting into our family like the missing piece of a puzzle. He had spent Thanksgiving with us, and now we were having our first Christmas together as a whole family.
Aisla whistled impatiently from her perch on top of the tree where she looked like an annoyed angel, complete with a tinsel halo. I followed the others to the living room to help with the tree.
The doorbell rang, and I hurried to get it. Violet had texted me earlier to let me know she was coming over this afternoon. I opened the door and found her straining under an armload of presents.
“Merry Christmas, Jameses,” she sang as she entered the apartment. She saw Bayard and added, “And grumpy faerie who is definitely on Santa’s naughty list.”
Bayard’s lip twitched. I held my breath for the smile that didn’t materialize, but I swear I caught a glint of amusement in his
eyes.
She frowned at him. “Don’t just stand there. Take these before my arms fall off.”
He relieved her of her burden and set the presents on the table. Then he swiped another gingerbread cookie and bit the head off it.
Violet pulled off her cap, and I gasped when she revealed her short hair that came to just above her ears.
“You cut your hair!” I reached out to touch the messy pixie style that accentuated her almond-shaped eyes. She had trimmed her hair many times, but she’d never worn it above her chin.
“It’s for the show,” she said, referring to the series she had just been cast in. “My character has short hair, so it’s either this or a wig. Have you seen how bad some of those wigs are?”
“I love it.”
“Zoe likes it, too.” She smiled dreamily. Zoe was her new girlfriend, a costume designer she’d met while filming the movie. Violet and Lorelle had parted on friendly terms in the spring, and Violet had started dating Zoe over the summer.
“How does it feel to be a celebrity?” I asked her. The movie Violet had filmed in the spring hadn’t been released yet, but she had made such an impression that she’d been offered one of the leads in a new sci-fi series. She was already making the rounds of the nighttime talk shows and being touted as the next Hollywood darling.
“Like you need to ask.” She tilted her head to study me. “How does it feel to be done with your first semester at Harvard?”
“It feels great.” Faeries didn’t attend college, so I stuck out there in the beginning. Not to mention my celebrity status because of the conversion. Things had settled down after a month when the other students were too busy to focus on me. Now, I was a student like everyone else.
“Jesse,” Mom called. “I made some cookies for Mrs. Russo. Can you bring them down to her? They’re in the blue container.”
“Sure.” I found the container and took it to our elderly neighbor, who invited me in for tea and cookies. I told her I couldn’t do it today, but I’d come by tomorrow.
When I returned to the apartment, Finch and Aisla were arguing over who got to help Dad put the star on top of the tree. For the first ten years of my life, that had been my job. I had been so excited when we adopted Finch that I’d let him take it over. Finch did not look happy about having to share this tradition with Aisla.
I turned to close the door and let out a startled cry. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to creep up on people?”
“I may have heard that somewhere once.” Lukas took my hand and tugged me against him. “Sorry I’m late.”
I slid my arms around his waist and smiled at him. “I’m in a good mood, so I’ll forgive you this time.”
He chuckled. “How were your exams?”
“I’m pretty sure I aced them all.”
“I hope so after you stayed away from our home for the last two weeks.” He lowered his voice to a soft growl. “I plan to make up for lost time tonight.”
Heat flooded my belly. “Is that so?”
“Most definitely.”
“Then you’d better turn on that princely charm if you have any hope of Mom letting me go home tonight.”
He groaned because he knew as well as I that there was little chance of changing her mind about this. She already had my first night home from college planned.
I giggled and stretched up to kiss his chin. “The wait will make it that much better.”
“That is what people say to console themselves,” he grumbled.
“Come in, and shut the door,” Dad ordered in a teasing voice. “We aren’t heating the whole building.”
Chuckling came from behind Lukas, and I looked over his shoulder at Faris and Conlan standing outside. They came in, and our small apartment seemed to shrink with so many people in it. I looked around, and it suddenly hit me that every person I loved in the world was right here in this room. Everything that had happened in the past year had brought us here together, and I would go through it all again for this.
“Oooh.” Violet pointed at Lukas and me. “Guess who is under the mistletoe.”
I looked up, and sure enough, there was a sprig of mistletoe above us. I grinned at Lukas, who clearly had no idea what it meant. “It’s tradition to kiss under the mistletoe.”
“I like this tradition.” He pulled me into his arms and kissed me long and slow. I forgot my whole family was watching us until Dad cleared his throat loudly.
Lukas smiled against my mouth. “Remind me to hang mistletoe all over our house.”
My phone vibrated in my pocket. “Hold that thought,” I said as I reached for the phone. As I pulled it out, it emitted a long distinctive beep. Mom’s and Dad’s phones went off at the same time, and I looked down at my phone as they went for theirs.
The Agency insignia was displayed on the phone, and underneath it was the words LEVEL FIVE BULLETIN.
A level five? I looked up and met Dad’s shocked eyes. Then I clicked on the alert.
A large drakkan has been sighted above Manhattan. Last seen flying over Brooklyn Bridge toward Brooklyn. National Guard is enroute. Requesting all available bounty hunters to respond. Approach with caution.
I stared at the message, and Mom said, “A drakkan in New York? How is that possible?”
“There are still weak spots in the barrier,” Lukas told her. “A drakkan could fly through one of them, although I can’t see drakkans being attracted to this world.”
Finch whistled and jumped up and down on the back of the couch. Maybe it’s Gus coming to visit us for Christmas!
I laughed. “I don’t think Gus knows where we –” I spun to look at Lukas. “You don’t think…?”
“You did say he always knew where to find you,” Lukas said slowly.
“I thought it was because of the goddess stone.” I pushed between Conlan and Faris and grabbed for the door. “Oh, no!”
I flew down the stairs with Lukas on my heels. We were at the first floor by the time I heard the others running after us. I burst through the main entrance, barely feeling the cold as I ran down the steps to the snow-covered street.
Standing in the middle of the street, I scanned the gray sky as fat snowflakes hit my face. A horn blew behind me, but I didn’t move as I caught sight of the dark shape soaring over the rooftops toward me.
A quarter of a mile away, horns blared, followed by the crunch of metal. I grimaced but couldn’t take my eyes off the shape that was now close enough to make out its reddish gold scales and thirty-foot wingspan.
“Oh, my God!” Violet squealed.
“You don’t see that every day,” Mrs. Russo said.
Somewhere down the street a man yelled, “It’s a dragon! Betty, come look at this!”
When Gus was two blocks away, he roared, letting me know he’d spotted me. He dipped lower, flying straight down our street, his wings almost brushing the buildings on either side. How on earth was he going to land without damaging the vehicles parked along the street?
Gus swooped in like a hawk going for a mouse. At the last second, he pulled back his wings and landed twenty yards away with the scrape of large claws on pavement. His red eyes fixed on me, and he shook his head in an agitated way.
“Hey, Gus,” I said as I started walking toward him.
He growled and swung his spiked tail, taking out a minivan on one side of the street and an Audi on the other. The Audi’s alarm blared, and Gus brought his tail down on the car, flattening it.
I held up my hands, crooning, “It’s okay, Gus.”
“Jesse,” Lukas called from behind me in a warning tone that said he was two seconds from coming after me.
“I’m good,” I called back. “Gus is just a little upset. He won’t hurt me.”
“My car!” wailed a man from the doorway of a building near the destroyed Audi.
Gus jerked his head to the side and growled, emitting a stream of smoke and flames. The man was too far away for the fire to reach him, but he screamed and ran back insi
de, slamming the door.
“Finch,” Mom cried, and the fear in her voice had me whirling to look at her. I nearly fell over when I saw the little blue figure coming around the wheel of a parked car. Finch, who never left home unless he was tucked inside one of our coats, was running down the street toward me, his tiny feet leaving a birdlike trail in the powdery snow.
I moved to intercept him and pick him up, but he evaded me and headed straight for Gus. He stopped a few feet in front of the massive drakkan, stretched out his arms, and whistled.
The air seized in my lungs when Gus went still and tipped his head forward to look down at Finch. Tendrils of smoke still curled from his nostrils as he focused on my tiny brother, and all I could think was one misstep and Finch would be gone.
Finch whistled again, and Gus cocked his head to one side. Then Gus lowered his head until it rested on the pavement, putting them almost eye-to-eye. The drakkan didn’t blink as Finch reached out and touched his snout as he had the first time they’d met in our apartment.
Gus made a sound like a dog’s whine. Finch shocked me when he climbed up to sit on Gus’s snout and began whistling and signing to the rapt drakkan.
“Would you look at that?” Dad said.
I walked over to Gus and rubbed his head. “I guess you got homesick, too.”
He let out a contented huff, and Finch looked up at me. Can Gus stay with us?
I chuckled. “I don’t think he’ll fit. Besides, he belongs in Faerie where he can hunt and be with the other drakkans.”
My brother’s eyes grew sad. But he misses us.
“I know. We can visit him, though. Would you like to do that?”
Finch nodded eagerly.
The sound of sirens got louder, reminding me we were about to have a lot of company, including hunters looking for a fifty-thousand-dollar bounty. There wasn’t a net or cage that could hold Gus, but that wouldn’t stop them from trying anyway. Things were about to get very messy. There wasn’t any time to think, so I did the first thing that came to mind.
I picked up Finch, and Gus’s head came up. Placing a hand on his snout, I said, “Gus, will you take Finch and me to Unseelie?”
