Foul is Fair (6 page)

"Finally, he wanted you in Faerie. Maybe he was just worried about sudden redcap incursions because you might not be a secret anymore, but maybe he thought you could help. Meanwhile, the Queen thinks someone of human blood can help. Great minds might have thought alike, so we're taking you to Faerie, and starting at the towers. Speaking of which, tomorrow is going to be a really long day, and it's getting late. Ashling is going to lead us to the quickest path first thing tomorrow. Cassia's girlfriend should be home around 3, so there'll be at least one interruption. We should try to get some sleep while we can. Seeing Faerie tomorrow will explain a lot of things better than I could now."

"Yeah, good luck with getting to sleep," Megan said, but tried to settle in on Cassia's couch anyway, while Lani curled up in a loveseat. "Good night, Lani."

Megan's head was whirling while she tried to get comfortable. Amidst all of the wondering about faerie courts, the existence of magic, what, exactly, that meant for her, her mother's state of mind, and so many other things, she also realized she'd forgotten to ask anyone to get her medication. Not the Vitamin C that had replaced what only one out of four doctors had recommended, but the pills that four out of four doctors thought helped her function.

Oh, well. She had bigger problems now.

Ashling's way to the nearest passage turned out to require a trip to Fremont Peak Park. The small group navigated the gravel paths that wound through the park, and then the crow and pixie led them out onto the grass and through some of the shrubbery to a spot that would be hidden from the view of most casual passers-by.

"So, you did promise. Why's he called Count?" Megan asked, while Ashling was moving about the ground, amidst a ring of mushrooms mostly hidden under the brush and grass.

"Dressed in black, with a widow's peak," Ashling began.

How matters of hairstyle could be applied to a bird was, technically, a question that Megan could have asked, but she just stood and watched and listened as Ashling walked in a figure-8, still talking at a mile a minute.

"—and of course my cousin Nessa has told him that it's a shame he's not named the Marquis because he travels the far reaches and all, but considering his fondness for Monte Cristo sandwiches..."

Megan was seeing by now what Lani had meant about pixies, so she directed her next question to Lani. "So, it's not dawn or dusk. Why am I not seeing a butterfly?"

"It will start happening more and more. You know what she really looks like, you've accepted that pixies exist, and you're starting to acknowledge the sidhe blood thing."

"My dad being a faerie lord who decided to leave his magic realm and come join a rock band for a few years? That little thing?"

"Gee, when you put it that way, it almost sounds silly," Lani said, unable to entirely avoid smiling. "You're sounding more like yourself, though."

They glanced back to Ashling, who had stopped talking and stopped pacing. "Okay, ready," she said, before looking to Megan. "So, did you have any other questions? I like questions."

"I'll get back to you. So, how do we do this?"

Ashling was about to respond, but Lani interrupted. "Just step into the ring, close your eyes, and then step out again." While she explained, raising her voice just a bit, Ashling attempted to answer anyway, with some directions that sounded to Megan like they might have been lifted piecemeal from the hokey-pokey, the Macarena, and the time warp. Noticing no one being inclined to go through her dance, Ashling huffed, then stepped into the ring, followed by the Count. Both disappeared when they started to step—or, in the Count's case, hop—out of the ring. Lani went next, demonstrating on a larger scale. As she stepped back out of the ring, she too disappeared.

Megan took a deep breath, then stepped where Lani had been, careful to avoid the mushrooms, then closed her eyes, released the breath, and stepped back out, a little surprised when she kicked something crunchy-sounding that seemed almost to hook into her shoe.

When she opened her eyes, the entire world had changed. The first thing she noticed were the colors. Everything was brighter, starting with the sunlight, especially in comparison to the gray skies of Seattle in October. The light made it no warmer, but just added to the golden sheen in the air. This brought out the color in the marigolds and golden columbines that peeked from the vibrant green grass amid the chill. The golden haze of the air also matched the golden apples hanging within some of the dense expanse of trees, the apples that weren't red or yellow or green or mottled or pink.

Megan noticed the second thing very quickly, because if she hadn't, she would have fallen right into the raspberry bush rather than recover her balance. As it was, she barely managed to extricate her foot from the thicket it was ensnared in. The raspberry bushes, too, were filled with all varieties: red and black and purple and blue and yes, golden. All the fruit was large and ripe and glistening—in the cold.

Lani was waiting calmly by one of them, with the Count perched on one of her shoulders, and Ashling perched on the crow's neck. She turned at the sound of odd footsteps. Megan didn't blink, thanks to the 'preview' of the night before, but it was a better look this time. The woman behind her was still Cassia—the facial features were right, she was the right size, and she still had the Sax & Violins t-shirt. Now, however, the rest of her clothing was a distinctly more ancient Mediterranean style. She had loops of bronze-plated leather covering the top portion of her now-fuzzy-and-hooved legs, while the Vespa helmet had become a bronze and ivory helm, with holes left for her impressive, curving horns. The kittens were again full-sized adult leopards—one still wearing a leather helmet and goggles—and the Vespa she'd been wheeling beside her had become a small chariot. The letter opener had likewise transformed, leaving Cassia with a straight bronze sword on one hip. The satyress grinned, striking a pose.

"Time for showing off later. We have a lot of walking to do," Lani called.

Cassia sighed. "Spoilsport." There was a grin, though, and she set to securing the chariot to the pair of leopards, though once the apparently tame cats were strapped in, Cassia just walked alongside it.

As soon as everyone appeared ready, the Count lifted off of Lani's shoulder and began weaving through the trees, doubling back often to make sure the others didn't lose him.

For a while, Megan just marveled at the world around her. When there was sufficient breaks in the trees to see them, towering peaks that looked like they'd dwarf the Cascades—and probably the Rockies as well—loomed in the distance. There was the occasional sound of birds. More disturbing, Megan was constantly feeling like she was being watched and occasionally would swear she saw motion out of the corner of her eyes. Any time she turned her head, there was no sign of anyone but herself and her companions. The others weren't exactly relaxed, but they also weren't looking around every few seconds, so she did her best to convince herself it was her imagination, fueled by the haze of golden light, which was occasionally almost lens-flaresque.

She therefore stared straight ahead, which for the moment, was at Cassia. “Now, wait a minute,” Megan said after considering for a moment. “You've got the horns, like the fauns in Etruscan and Roman art, but the outfit is Bronze Age Greece, and that—” she pointed at the horse-like tail emerging from the armored skirt. “—is an old-school Bronze Age satyr's tail.” Mrs. Chang's Art History Thursdays, sophomore year, had been more fun for Megan than regular history.

“While I appreciate your checking out my ass, Megan, satyrs and fauns have been mixed up for millennia.”

“Yeah, but you can't actually be both at once.”

“Don't tell me what I can't do,” Cassia said good-naturedly.

After the sighing and eye-rolling, there was a pause, a silence she wanted filled with something other than the shuffle of shoes—or hooves—across the vibrantly colored ground or the thought of what was on the edge of her vision. “You said something last night about attachment issues. Is that about how my mom stopped liking music because my dad left?”

“No,” Cassia said. “I think she'd have still been able to heal, get another guitarist, and enjoy music just fine if Riocard hadn't dated her for four freaking years, almost.”

“That's … not that long.”

“It was for him.”

“What's the longest you've dated someone?”

“Going on two years now, but I'm young. And a satyr.
With my girl, I've just got to be careful about how often we get to drinking. The mad revels and all. Go wild, fun times, dangerous, exhausting, etc. And then we're done with it for a bit. Break down and let it all out, you know? But the sidhe aren't like that. They're always on. Always. It's not one wild moment. Get too wrapped up in them, and you'll never just get a moment again. Not ever. There's a reason 'fae-touched' used to mean 'crazy.' Too much time with a sidhe will burn a person out."

That commentary quieted her again. She thought about the old pictures, the bass tucked away in the closet, and all of her mother's friends in the music and entertainment business, the ones who'd helped her get her job all those years ago. The ones who offered her all the free tickets that she never took. Finally, she managed, "So, my father did that to her?"

"Yes," Lani said, slowing a little to make sure she ended up beside Megan. "Not intentionally. From the bits and pieces I've heard, he really loved your mother. It's complicated, but it's something that can happen, not something he was trying to do."

"And what about your parents? How do they manage the... complicated? They've been together your whole life, and your mother seems fine."

"Menehune are a different kind of intense. They're also a lot more prone to noticing the passing of time, since they work in cycles. But even so, that's part of why my dad goes away so often, to give Mom time to just do human things, where the most menehune things going on in the house are Mack's LEGO masterpieces."

"So you do have some magic things you and Mack can do?"

"Sure. By faerie standards, it's pretty tame. We pick up languages quick, and, well, you've seen the garden, and the house. As long as we do it right, we can all build things, especially things people need. Really, my mom's hobby collection is part of why they work so well. The gardens—flower, vegetable, and rock—the pottery studio, the workout room..." she trailed off. "We're almost there."

"Almost where?" Megan said. Before she got an answer, a pale blue light zipped across the area in front of her before disappearing in the trees. Then another light zipped out of the shadows, but this one paused, hovering in mid-air in front of them. Two more emerged behind it. Looking back, Megan couldn't help but notice that Cassia had her hand on her sword.

Within a few moments, the lights weren't the only company. A dozen tiny people, similar to Ashling, but with undamaged wings, emerged to rest on the branches of the trees around them. Ashling and the Count settled on Lani's shoulder again, both making a point of looking at the floating lights, but conspicuously paying the other pixies no attention.

These arrivals were followed, on foot, by two groups. The first were knights in literally shining armor, marching in one small group. Though the armor largely hid their features, Megan could tell they were all unusually tall and slender, and while hardly silent, she was a bit surprised that they could move as quickly and quietly as they did in the full armor. The second group, Megan slowly realized, must be what redcaps really looked like. They were still very like people in many ways, but their clothing was mostly layers of rags, bearing stains she didn't even want to identify. Their faces were broad, with flat noses and bright yellow eyes. It seemed like a third of their face was grin, showing off their rows of broken and jagged teeth. Each one wore a different type of hat, but each one was mostly red, though they also bore the brownish stains of dried blood. Seeing them like this didn't help, but at least she wasn't freezing in place again.

Lani stepped forward, and one of the pale lights advanced to float a couple of feet in front of her. As it approached, Megan couldn't help but notice that, despite the light it shed, it radiated cold, instead of the slight warmth of a lantern that she'd expected. When it stopped advancing, Lani curtsied to the floating light. Cassia and the cats advanced, flanking Megan on either side. She noted that the satyr hadn't taken her hand off the sword. Megan couldn't make out the words, but though the air was still, she heard the whispering of wind through the trees, getting the idea that the pixies were chattering among themselves.

Finally, the light dimmed slightly, dipping lower as if it was bowing to Lani in return and flitting a little to take in Megan and the others as well. "The Gray Lady will see you." The voice emitted from the light, Megan was sure of it. It was slightly above a whisper, but the words were almost sung more than spoken.

“After the Queen does,” one of the knights said solemnly, stepping forward.

A few of the redcaps managed the feat of rolling their eyes while grinning.

"Who is—" Megan began, before she felt Cassia's hand on her shoulder. She took the cue and quieted, just following after Lani, who was following the light as it started moving away from them through the woods. The rest of the floating lights moved to flank them, and the pixies took to flight, fluttering around the small group, sticking to the trees just a bit out of anyone's reach. The other two groups spent a few moments looking at each other, some glaring, some more subdued, and then they, too, moved to take flanking positions to escort the group. Megan couldn't tell which bunch Cassia spent more time looking at, with the same guarded expression either way.