One Salt Sea: An October Daye Novel (2 page)

June 30th, 2011

—William Shakespeare,
King Henry V

 

 

T
HE SWORD SWUNG FAST AND HARD toward my face, leaving me with barely enough time to raise my own sword into position to parry. The force of the blades colliding knocked me back a step and made my wrists ache even more than they already did.

“Oberon’s balls, Sylvester!” I snapped. “What are you trying to do, kill me?”

“That’s generally the point of hitting someone with a sword,” he said, almost cheerfully, and swung at me again.

Having Sylvester Torquill—Duke of Shadowed Hills, pureblooded Daoine Sidhe, and most importantly, my chosen liege—swinging a sword at my head wasn’t getting less unnerving, or more fun. Not even the knowledge that our blades were magically blunted could stop my atavistic “oh,
hell
no” response. I blocked this stroke marginally faster than the last, shoving his sword aside and sliding my own blade under his arm. Theoretically, this should have let me hit him.

Reality wasn’t that forgiving. Sylvester twisted his sword underneath mine and slammed the flat of his blade against my fingers, causing them to open involuntarily. My sword dropped to the ballroom floor, clattering on the polished marble.

The sudden disarmament startled me enough that I forgot to dodge. Sylvester grabbed my arm, spun me around, and slammed my back into his chest, pressing his sword against my throat. “Dead again,” he said conversationally. “Can you tell me what you did wrong?”

I swallowed, trying to ignore the blade pressing against my skin. It wasn’t easy. “I didn’t run away the second you suggested I learn to use a sword?”

“You left an opening.” He let me go, stepping back. “You need to watch that.”

“I’m sticking with my first answer.” I took a moment to wipe the sweat from my forehead before bending to retrieve my weapon. Cold moonlight flowed in through the windows above us, filling the ballroom with shadows. “Are we done yet?”

“I’ll tell you when we’re done. Now, on my word . . . begin.” Sylvester fell into a defensive position. I mimicked it as well as I could. At least he’d managed to teach me that when someone’s about to swing a sword at you, you should be prepared to stop them. Not that I ever seemed to succeed, but hell, I was trying. That was something, right?

We started circling. Sylvester was annoyingly cheerful, as always, making supposedly helpful comments about my form as he watched for the chance to hit me again. I didn’t really care about hitting him. I just wanted to take his damn sword away, since that would make
him
stop hitting
me
. It didn’t look like I was going to be getting what I wanted any time soon.

It had been a month since King Sollys—the highest fae authority in North America—pardoned me for my role in the death of Blind Michael. With my so-called crimes forgiven, the Queen of the Mists was forced to let me go, rather than setting me on fire like she really wanted to. Her life is
so
hard. A month was sufficient time for me to do a lot of laundry, take a few freelance jobs, pay some bills, assume control of the knowe I semi-inherited from Evening Winterrose, and learn more than I ever wanted to know about the proper use of a sword. Sylvester Torquill’s an excellent teacher, blessed with a degree of patience I’ll probably never have. Patience isn’t one of my strong suits.

I was starting to think swordsmanship wasn’t a strong suit either. He’d swing at my head and I’d duck instead of blocking; he’d move in quick and I’d fall over my own feet getting away. I was, in short, hopeless.

Sylvester aimed for my torso. I already had three bruises on my ribs, and I didn’t want another one. Bruises hurt, no matter
how
fast I heal. Maybe that was the motivation I needed, because I managed to bring my sword around in time to block him. Sylvester beamed. “Good!”

“Right.” I feinted, trying to hit his left leg. He parried and turned the blow aside. “I still don’t see why I need to learn this.”

“You have a talent for getting into trouble.” Sylvester pushed his advantage, keeping me off-balance with a series of quick thrusts. The bastard wasn’t even breathing hard. “I’d like you to continue getting out of it again.”

“And you think giving me a sword is the answer? I could hurt somebody with this thing. Probably myself.” I scrambled to keep my guard up, watching to see where he’d go next. I needed to keep him from pushing me back to the wall. If that happened, it was all over. Goldengreen may be my home ground, but that doesn’t actually give me any advantage I’ve been able to find.

Sylvester just laughed.

The thing was, he was right: I
do
have a talent for getting into trouble. I’m just not sure giving me a weapon I can barely use is the solution. I guess it’s better than nothing, but I’d still feel safer with something more my speed, like my knife. Or maybe a brick in a burlap sack.

Sylvester feinted for my ankle. I parried, bringing my blade down on the wrist of his off hand before a sharp hit from his pommel forced my hand to open. My sword hit the floor. Again.

I stepped back, breathing heavily. “Jerk,” I said, between gasps.

“You’re getting faster. I would have lost that hand if your blade weren’t blunted.” He picked up my sword and offered it to me, hilt first. “Shall we take a break?”

I glared and snatched the sword from his hand, sheathing it as gracefully as I could before I bowed. He bowed back a heartbeat later, doing his best to conceal a smirk. The session wasn’t over until we exchanged bows, and walking away without observing that little formality would leave me open to an ambush. He’d managed to hit me upside the head three times before I caught on, but now I wouldn’t turn my back on Sylvester without seeing him bow. He was sneaky. He also hadn’t taken a student in a long time, and he was positively glorying in the chance to beat me around the block.

“Fifteen minutes, and then it’s back to work,” said Sylvester, straightening. “Let’s get something to drink. You look terrible.”

I groaned. “Fifteen minutes? You’re killing me.”

“You’re only complaining because you’re used to being lazy.” Sylvester sheathed his sword as he walked. If I tried that, I’d probably stab myself. “This will be easier when you’re in better shape.”

“Says you.”

What Sylvester was carefully not saying is that I’m in better shape now than I’ve been in for years, if ever. I was born a changeling, half-human, half-fae. My heritage made me slightly faster and sturdier than the human norm, but it was still nothing to write home about. I got tired. I got broken. I nearly died—several times. A little fae blood doesn’t make you immortal. All it does is make you slightly harder to kill.

All that changed when a paid assassin hit me with elf-shot, a type of enchanted arrow that puts purebloods to sleep for centuries and kills changelings. It should have killed me. Instead, my mother emerged from her private madness and saved my life by changing the balance of my blood, burning out part of my mortality in the process. What Amandine did was impossible . . . for everyone but her.

I grew up knowing my mother was the best blood-worker in Faerie. I also grew up believing she was Daoine Sidhe, which meant that I was, too. That’s just one of the lies my mother told me. It turns out that Mom is Oberon’s daughter, making her just as much Firstborn as the Luidaeg or Blind Michael. The normal rules don’t apply where she’s concerned, and her descendants—namely me—aren’t Daoine Sidhe at all.

Some things started making sense after Amandine’s little parlor trick. My crappy illusions, for one; Daoine Sidhe are supposed to be great illusionists, and mine, frankly, suck. Titania is the Lady of Illusions, and I’m not hers. Everything else just got more confusing.

According to the Luidaeg—Firstborn daughter of Maeve and Oberon, which technically makes her my aunt—I should have always been this way. Amandine didn’t want a changeling daughter, so she tried to turn me human when I was too young to understand. She didn’t succeed, but she did weaken me enough that for years I believed her when she said that I was just a low-powered Daoine Sidhe. All she really did when she changed the balance of my blood was restore me to my original state. Too bad it was entirely new to me.

Some of the changes were immediate, like the blonde streaks in my stick-straight brown hair. Others came with time. I’ve been speeding up and getting stronger as my body adjusts, coming closer to what the purebloods consider “normal.”

It’s scaring the crap out of me.

Sylvester knows me well enough to know that the changes were scaring me, and I suspect that’s why he finally decided to make good on his threat to teach me to use a sword. By his logic, if I learned to work with my body again, it might start feeling less alien. It was worth a try.

At the moment, my instructor was looking at me with amused affection. “Days like this remind me that you were never a proper squire. If you had been, your knight would have worked you the way I’m working you now.”

“Etienne tried.” I was knighted for solving a murder and finding a new knowe for the Queen. I was never trained as a squire, although Sir Etienne did his best to train me after the fact . . . until I got on his last nerve and he begged to be released from his teaching duties, that is. What can I say? I’m gifted in the art of making people crazy.

Sylvester started walking toward the door. “I’m working you like this because I care about you. A knight’s goal is seeing his squires survive.”

“I know.” I followed him, fighting the urge to sigh. “Sorry. I’m just tired.”

“You’ll recover, and you’ll tire more slowly next time.” He smiled. “You’re a Countess now, remember? No more weakness for you.”

I did sigh this time. “How could I forget?”

When the Queen of the Mists made me Countess of Goldengreen to clear a perceived debt—long story—the knowe of the same name came with the title: a big, slightly insane hollow hill full of pixies, bogeys, and dry-rot. It’s nowhere near the size of Shadowed Hills, thank Oberon, but it’s bigger than your average shopping mall. That’s been sort of a blessing in disguise, since when Lily, the Lady of the Japanese Tea Gardens, died, she asked me to take care of her subjects. All of them.

Most changelings don’t have the resources to house a fiefdom’s-worth of Faerie’s cast-off odds and ends. Most changelings don’t have access to entire knowes. I put two and two together, and things became almost functional, by certain generous definitions.

The ballroom Sylvester and I used for our lessons was one of the first rooms to be cleaned out and restored. The kitchen across the narrow servants’ hall was another. It was a square room almost the size of my apartment, probably designed to prepare banquets for kings and queens. One side of the room was dominated by a scarred oak table, used both for meals and for food preparation; a tray of sliced bread, cheese, and apples was laid out for us there, next to a clay pitcher of water. I smiled, recognizing Marcia’s handiwork.

Sylvester unbuckled his sword, hanging it from a hook on the wall before sitting. I mirrored the gesture, taking a seat at the other side of the table. Sometimes it amazes me how well I’ve internalized the often erratic etiquette of the purebloods, which mixes the sensible and the insane with surprising ease. Never say “thank you” if you can help it; keep your promises even if it means your death; never bring a weapon too big to double as a dining utensil to the table when dining with friends.

I took the cup of water Sylvester handed me and emptied it in a single gulp, holding it out to be filled again. This time, I forced myself to sip, feeling my heartbeat return to normal. Whether or not I appreciated the archaic nature of swordsmanship, I was grateful for the training. I needed to relearn my limits before I got myself hurt.

We were quiet for a few minutes, most of my attention going to the food. I’ve always been a fast healer, and thanks to Amandine’s tinkering, I’m beginning to approach superhero status. It takes a lot out of me; I’m starting to get “hunger” hard-wired into my pain responses. Sylvester ate more slowly, studying me. I quirked an eyebrow upward, watching him watch me.

Sylvester Torquill is classic Daoine Sidhe, with the pointed ears and striking coloration common among their purebloods. His hair is russet red, and his eyes are a shade of gold that’s shared by every Torquill-by-birth I’ve ever met. He’d been looking tired recently, new lines appearing on his eternally youthful face. I wasn’t all that surprised. It had been one hell of a summer, and it wasn’t over yet.

The silence lasted until half the bread and all the cheese was gone. Then he said, “I wanted to discuss something not related to our lessons, if you don’t mind.”

“Sure,” I said. “You’re my liege.”

“Only because you still swear to me—you’re a Countess now, and could ask to be released at any time.” He smiled a little. “I am here on your sufferance.”

“My sufferance has nothing to do with it,” I said, grimacing. “You’re here to remind the Queen that you have a standing invitation to visit my lands and she doesn’t, even if she has a clear line of fealty on me. And it was your idea.”

“Even so, I’m asking you as your friend, not your liege, and I’d like you to consider my request the same way. It’s a request, not an order.”

I sat a little straighter. “Sylvester, what’s going on?”

“Nothing bad. Don’t be so paranoid.”

“I can’t believe you just said that,” I said, eyeing him. In the past two years, I’ve been shot, stabbed, poisoned, betrayed, and nearly clawed to death, frequently while in Sylvester’s service. This endless excitement has left me with too many scars for polite company, nightmares I try not to think about, and a resident Fetch who teases me about my tendency to spend Sundays in my bathrobe watching TV and spending quality time with the cats. I’ve
earned
my paranoia.