Ashes of Honor

“She had to, Mom,” said Chelsea. “It was the only way to make me stop jumping. I was going to get a lot of people hurt if I didn’t stop. This was to save me.” She shrugged, smiling a little as she added the bravest lie I had ever heard: “It didn’t hurt.”

“What did you do?” Bridget wheeled on me, clearly seizing on the word “she” as proof of my guilt. “You fairy-tale bitch, what did you do to my daughter?!”

“I saved her life,” I said, as calmly as I could. “She’s not human anymore. Not even half. But she’s still your little girl, and she’s still here. That’s better than it could have gone.”

Bridget stared at me. Then, bitterly, she turned to Etienne. “So you’ve won. You’ve stolen her after all.”

“No, Bess,” said Etienne. His tone was gentle. “I don’t want to steal her. I never wanted to steal her. Had you told me about her sixteen years ago, I wouldn’t have stolen her then. Things might have gone differently over these last few days…but I wouldn’t have stolen her from you.”

“Then…” Bridget stopped, taking a breath before she continued, “Then can she stay with me? Can everything be like it was? Will you leave us alone?”

“No, Bess,” said Etienne again, even more gently. “I can’t do that. Faerie has rules. You know that as well as anyone.”

“Ah.” She straightened. “Then you’re to kill me, are you?”

“What?” squeaked Chelsea, eyes going wide.

“I’d rather not,” said Etienne. “You can’t stay here, knowing what you know. And Chelsea can’t stay with you—she’s Chosen Faerie, and that means she has certain obligations to it, even as I have obligations to her. But there is another way.”

I stiffened. Beside me, Quentin did the same. This wasn’t something Etienne had mentioned on the ride over here, and oak and ash, I was afraid to hear what he might say next.

Bridget paused, expression cycling from misery to disbelief to thoughtful canniness. She looked at Etienne and asked, “You’re offering to take me into Faerie, aren’t you?”

He nodded. “I am. There is precedent.”

“How recent?”

Now Etienne cracked a smile. “Not for a very, very long time. But if you’d come, Bess, if you’d live with me beneath the hill, swear to keep our secrets, and let me claim you as my responsibility, you could stay with your daughter, and you and I…” He paused, and shrugged, and said, “We could try again. We have reason to, now. It’s not like you’ll ever be quit of me.”

“No,” said Bridget. “I don’t suppose I will.”

“How would this work?” I asked. “I don’t mean to sound, I don’t know, pessimistic, but no one’s taken a human into Faerie in a long time.”

“There are rules,” said Etienne, in a tone that implied he knew exactly what every one of them was, how to use them, and how to bend them without breaking them. “If my liege agrees, I may claim her as my own.”

“He’s right,” said Quentin.

“It’s your funeral,” I said. I glanced to Bridget, and added, “No offense.”

Her smile was faint, but it was there. “None taken.” She focused back on Etienne. “I’ll not quit my job, you know.”

“Nor would I ask you to,” he said. “With the proper geas, you can come and go as you like, and no one will ever need fear that you would reveal us.”

Bridget frowned. “I’ll want to see the wording. I do have classes to teach.”

Etienne laughed. Chelsea smiled. And for the first time in a while, I started feeling like maybe things would be all right.

TWENTY-SEVEN

TWO NIGHTS SLIPPED BY in a haze of questions, phone calls, and cleaning the house. The damage Samson had done was so extensive that it took longer to clean up than it took for our wounds to fade, since we had magical healing but didn’t have a magical cleaning service. Several times, I considered going to Tamed Lightning and begging to borrow Elliot. Every time, I put the thought aside. Cleaning the house was something we could all do together, and that was important. We needed to feel like a family again. We had gone too long without really being one. I had gone too long without really being part of the family we made.

At the end of the second night, I went out into the backyard and sat down with a cup of coffee in one hand, watching the sky get lighter. Dawn was approaching fast. Inside, May and Jazz were sound asleep, the one at the end of her day, the other getting ready for hers to begin. Quentin was at Shadowed Hills, helping Chelsea get acclimated. He’d be back after he got a good morning’s sleep. I wasn’t all that worried.

Li Qin was holding Dreamer’s Glass for the moment, while the Queen of the Mists looked into the “mysterious disappearance” of Duchess Treasa Riordan. Somehow, I didn’t think she was going to find much. Li Qin would hold the Duchy until everyone politely forgot she wasn’t supposed to be there, and then she would officially take over. With most of Riordan’s subjects stranded in Annwn with her, it was unlikely that anyone would object.