Give Me (17 page)

Elyse went up to the roof deck to gather a sense of the village. The countess’s husband was worried about her. She’d been missing for months. Perfect. Elyse wyrded him to believe that he’d received a telegram. It informed him of Beverly’s tragic death from a drug overdose. She’d been on a cruise and fallen overboard. Lost at sea.

No remains.

This time, Elyse prepared ahead for the day she’d need a new body. She created the legend of the Handover and wyrded the story into every human memory in the county.

Lady Dumnos was fine—a bit muddled from so much pot and acid, and too weak to fight. Still, Elyse never would have taken her if she’d known her history. Sun and moon! From Beverly’s time in Piccadilly, the memories of sex were astounding. Men, women—men
and
women! The poor thing had run into a band of fairies on mischief night. Elyse could tell they were fairies because she recognized one—Aubrey!

Elyse stopped the memory right there and wiped it from both their minds.

And then the boy. That was awful. Beverly had a child. Her despair over missing little Cade was so intense that Elyse had to wyrd the boy with an aversion to Glimmer Cottage to keep the two of them apart. She didn’t need that drama added to her collection.

Beverly was docile, but she had a clever streak. Passive-aggressive, they called it these days, but Elyse just called her sneaky. Sometimes when Elyse’s focus was off, Beverly would get out. She couldn’t get away or break her binding to Elyse, but she’d assert her independence in little ways. Drink peppermint tea, which Elyse loathed. Eat avocados, sun and moon save us. Marion brought them in.

The sister. Marion, the cheerful innkeeper who came by one day with scones and strawberry jam and clotted cream and screamed when her sister opened the door. That problem was easily addressed with a forgetting wyrd. She came again with gossip of the world and more good things to eat and eventually made herself wholly necessary to one’s happiness.

“Did you like the avocados?” Marion asked one day. “I found your note in my bag after I left last time.”

“They were perfect,” Elyse lied. Sneaky Beverly, finding a way to smuggle in contraband foods.

Beverly didn’t stop at food. She assimilated a pinch of wyrding skill, not enough to do harm, but one day Elyse found herself staring into the glimmer glass without remembering having picked it up.

“Beverly, what did you do?” Cade was in the glass, at an awkward age, talking to a girl.

I don’t know. I picked it up, and he was there.

Elyse was about to set a boundary on the glimmer glass to keep it away from Beverly when the girl in the glass laughed. A cruel laugh, not with the boy, but at him. Elyse felt the pain sear Beverly’s heart.

“Don’t look too often,” Elyse relented. “It will make you sad.”

After a few years it seemed Beverly had given up the glimmer glass until one afternoon when Elyse awoke from napping on the roof. The glass was in her lap, showing the boy—a young man now. He held a cat in his lap and scratched behind its ears, his face animated as if he was watching a play.
It’s a telly
, Beverly told her.
You should get one.

Ten years later, Elyse woke with the glass on her bed, focused on Cade accepting a cup of tea from Marion.

Elyse didn’t stop Beverly from watching her child. There was no harm in it once every ten years. Anyway, the bond between Beverly and Cade reminded Elyse of her bond with Frona. She renewed her resolve to atone for what she’d done to Galen and Diantha and to Lourdes.

Marion became the only friend Elyse had ever had. She visited, made tea, and told fantastical lies about the world. Airplanes, Elyse could believe—and she’d seen Spitfires fly over Dumnos during one of the wars. She confirmed the existence of television. But men on the moon? Utter hogwash. Still, the stories were entertaining.

Until Marion betrayed her.

14
Lily

E
lyse was frozen on the outside, but her mind raced. While Marion pulled on the oracle’s ring, grunting and panting, Elyse ticked through the possibilities. How had Marion, neither wyrder nor fae, done this to her?

Beverly snickered from some corner of the brain. That was it. Drugs! Marion had drugged the tea. Stupid woman.

Elyse wyrded off the drug’s effects just as Marion pulled golden Galen away from silver Diantha. The lovers screamed in agony in Elyse’s brain, and rage boiled through her veins and exploded. Elyse thought she might nearly have another soul to atone for, but Marion wasn’t hurt.

“I’d do anything to see my sister again.” She retreated and ran to the door, the gold band still in her clenched hand. “Just one more time.”

“Silly woman. You’d do anything to get your sister back? Well, so would I!” Elyse wyrded the door shut and threw a boundary around Marion. “Stupid, stupid human beings!”

That was it!
Human beings.
That’s where she’d made the mistake, inhabiting human bodies. She needed a body with fae blood. So obvious. The wheels clicked and whirred in her mind. Mother wasn’t the only human ever to lie with fae. Elyse knew that much from her brief exposure to Beverly’s life. There must be someone else like Elyse in the world.

“I’m going to let you go,” she said. “Give me the ring.”

“No.” Marion shook her head.

“Give me the ring, Marion. I’m not going to die. You only got half of it.” She held up her hand with the silver band still there. Marion’s face fell. So forlorn, Elyse felt sorry for her.

“I want to make a deal with you.”

Elyse put a wyrd on the Galen half of the ring so it would attract a faeling, a human with fae blood. “Send this half of the ring out into the world. If it brings the person I need, I’ll let you see the Beverly again.”

Of course Marion agreed. What choice did she have? She took the Galen half to an antique dealer in London.
Antique,
ha. They had no idea. Then they waited. A month passed with no response, and they were all miserable, Elyse, Marion, Beverly, and Diantha.

The strategy failed utterly. Galen was gone, and Diantha’s constant wailing gave Elyse a headache even she couldn’t cure. For the first time in a millennium, she sympathized with Aeolios.

Then one morning Beverly made her presence felt above Diantha’s sobs.
Wake up! Wake up! Look!
The glimmer glass lay beside Elyse on the bed.
She’s the one.
The glass showed a young woman lying on a bed, crying.

“How do you know that, Beverly?” Elyse said. “Who is she?” Beside the woman was a paper that contained pictures of Tintagos. There was Igdrasil. And could that pile of rocks be Tintagos Castle? Oh, Brother Sun and Sister Moon, no!

Look. She has a tether. That’s how the glass found her.

She was right. The woman in the glass held a necklace in her hand very much like the one Idris had tried to give Elyse all those years ago. “Beverly, you clever girl. There’s more to you than I’ve realized.”

Elyse touched the glass, and it told her the woman’s name. She was on the other side of the world. Thank sun and moon for airplanes. Elyse sent a wyrd through the glass to call the woman to Tintagos. “You deserve a reward, Beverly. Tomorrow when Marion comes, you can listen when I tell her to prepare a place at the inn for Lily Evergreen.

15
Give Me

L
ilith sat across from Marion in the carriage next to Bella. Cammy got in last. Instead of sitting by Marion, she plopped down between Lilith and Bella and handed Marion her phone. “Our last ride in the Bausineymobile,” she said. “Would you take our picky, Moo?”

Cammy saying “Moo” was just wrong, like nails being dragged across a blackboard. She had been cloyingly sweet since this morning when she discovered Lilith in the lobby, having been stood up for her breakfast date.

When Marion had returned from taking the earl’s breakfast, she said Cade wasn’t feeling well and she’d replace him at the Handover ceremony. She was nervous, and Lilith had been sure she was lying. For one thing, Cade had already told her last night that he wasn’t going to the Handover. Marion was probably covering for him.

Cammy retrieved her camera and moved over beside Marion. “I’d have thought his lordship would never miss the big day.”

Cade had abandoned them all. Likely, he’d come to his senses and realized he wanted nothing to do with Lilith. If only she could remember clearly what had happened last night. One minute they were on the verge of making mad passionate love, and then the prince and princess from her dreams had shown up. Then she was in Cade’s car, and he was taking her back to the Tragic Fall.

Cade must have decided that she was too nutso for him after all.

He’d given such mixed signals. On the roof he’d pulled away as if she was repulsive to him. At the inn he’d begged her not to go to the Handover, as if he sensed some danger and was truly worried about her. And then he didn’t show up this morning. Men! She should take a break from them for awhile. As she had meant to the first place.

Glimmer Cottage was exactly what she’d had expected. Ancient, falling apart, smelling of old wood and older who-knows-what. A souvenir extravaganza, shelves lined from floor to ceiling with Dumnos Dreamless Tea, Glamour Dust For All Occasions, magic mirrors—gaze into one and see your best self, beautiful and wise.

Actually, she looked pretty good in the magic mirror. Her hair was shinier, blonder. Her gray-blue eyes were more like blue delphiniums. Her lips were fuller, and her complexion was fantastic. How did they do that?

“You don’t need a magic mirror, gorgeous.” Cammy picked up a mirror and checked her own features, then sighed and put it down.

The ceremony wouldn’t suffer for the loss of Lord Tintagos, as far as Lilith could tell. Marion was having a wonderful time. She went giddy making sure the tourists had what they wanted—sweatshirts, candies, magic mirrors. She had just gone upstairs to help the wyrding woman get ready to make her entrance.

The cottage was packed to overflowing. If Tintagos Village had a fire code, it was in abeyance today. People spilled out into the little garden and filled the courtyard. It felt like there was no air in the room, and Lilith was getting a headache.

There was no need to stay. She’d seen Glimmer Cottage, her curiosity was satisfied, and she wasn’t interested in the performance to come. She’d rather explore the woods behind the cottage. The trees had called to her the moment she’d stepped out of Bausiney’s carriage. She laughed to herself.
Probably fairies.

“She’s coming!” Marion called down from the rickety stairs. She’d better take care her foot didn’t go through one of the treads. “Take your seats!” At the landing, she caught Lilith’s eye and waved. Drat, that woman moved fast. In two blinks, Marion had her by the arm.

“I thought I’d go outside and make room for someone else,” Lilith said. But there was no getting away now.

Marion took Lilith’s hand and Bella’s and nodded to Cammy. “Come with me, girls. I’ve saved us the best seats.” She dragged them over to a table set with tea and cakes and a big RESERVED sign.

A hush rolled over the room in a wave as attention shifted to the woman on the stairs. She looked like anybody you’d meet on the streets of Tintagos Village. Ordinary, only about ten years older than Marion. She could be your neighbor.

Wyrding woman. The whole thing was ridiculous, couldn’t they see that? But they were spellbound, every one, caught up in playing along.

Great gods. The wyrding woman had reached the bottom of the stairs, her gaze fixed on Lilith. Glittering. Mesmerizing. Lilith wanted to look away, but she couldn’t.

“Oh.” Cammy sounded a little frightened.

“This is real.” Bella sounded shocked.

“Silver and gold find you.”

The wyrding woman’s voice was as normal as any other. This was ridiculous.

“Silver and gold bind you.”

The woman held her hand out to Lilith, palm up. Marion nodded encouragement, in raptures. Everybody seemed to be holding their breath. Oh, what the hell. Why ruin the fun? Lilith gave the wyrding woman her hand.