Summer (7 page)

Water-Bearer was curled in a tight ball, chin on bony knees, ugly face further wrinkled in uneasy repose, wings tented around its head. The
sluagh
didn’t stir until Richard let loose with a piercing whistle.

“I think she’s feverish,” Richard said when that single green eye focused on him. “She needs water.”

The water here makes that one ill
. It was Water-Bearer’s voice in Richard’s head, only softer, and clearer.
She’s too much of the Court still in her blood.

Richard drew his shoulders up around his ears. He was used to Bobby’s nagging in his head, and Winter’s wisdom, and his mother’s ghostly pleadings, but he’d long ago realized those voices were schizophrenic bits of his own self. Water-Bearer’s whisper was real, something entirely not-Richard.

“Get out of my head!”

The
sluagh’s
mouth twisted. It rose with a sigh, shuffling across gravel to Richard.

“Here.” The ghoul unslung the water jug from its chest, offering. “Don’t give her too much. We’re almost home. The springs are clearer in
Reilig na Rí
.
”

Aine sat upright, almost clipping Richard in the chin with her head.

“Nay,” she said, shrill. “I’ll not be buried again.”

“Aine.” Richard couldn’t lift his hands to squeeze her shoulders, so he leaned hard against her spine, trying to comfort. “I won’t let them hurt you.” But he’d been slowly teaching himself the Gaelic, before—before.

“Cemetery?” he translated, scowling at the
sluagh
.

“Burial mound of the kings,” Water-Bearer replied.

It was free of fettering chains, and able to steady Aine and help her drink. Richard tried not to notice how gently the monster wiped dripping water from Aine’s mouth and how careful it was with its own wicked claws.

“Slow sips, changeling,” it cautioned. “Too much and you’ll be sick again.”

Aine, being Aine, gulped, gagged and spat. Water-Bearer made a noise of dry amusement. Aine licked her lips, then sagged back against Richard’s side, eyes closed.

“That one’s in better shape than you,” the
sluagh
said, looking Richard up and down. “The ointment she wears is dearly come by. We won’t let her die before she’s useful.”

Chains kept Richard from striking the ghoul. Instead, he turned his head and spat blood. Water-Bearer only laughed.

“Don’t fret, mortal. I’m beginning to see your worth, and it’s not your hearts-blood I’m after. Rest, now. The river’s treacherous mid-year.”

“River?” Richard asked.

Water-Bearer only smiled and shrugged. It drifted away, jug merrily sloshing. Richard wanted to spit again, but his tongue had gone dry.

“Miach,” Aine said into Richard’s shoulder.

“What?”

“Miach One-Eye. Be careful, Richard, Miach has run with the Dread Host a very,
very
long time.”

The river fell out of broken black cliffs, crashing against boulders, then roaring its way toward the now distant lake.

The path had been winding ever steeper in the last half day, so much so that Richard could feel the grade in his calf muscles. The cliffs shot up to where low hills had been. Richard thought he spotted small twists of shrub and brush growing out of the harsh slant.

“Anything that grows in this place is stunted,” Aine said when Richard pointed out a spike of brown flowers bobbing halfway up a cliff face.

Richard thought she was probably right, until the Host pulled to a halt above the river, and he noticed soft green moss curling on wet boulders.

“Look,” he said.

Several of the
sluagh
had left the path and had dropped, wings spread, down thirty feet to the river below. As Aine and Richard watched, they plucked at the moss, collecting it from the rocks. Richard saw Water-Bearer in amongst the others, wading in the shallows as they scavenged the plant.

“What are they doing?”

Aine frowned. She leaned against Richard, one hand on his elbow, unbothered by his chains.  She was still too warm to the touch, but she’d walked without complaint and appeared to have regained some strength.

“It looks like threadwort.”

“What’s that?”

“Medicinal herb,” Aine said, brow wrinkled. “The
aes si
burn it. The smoke is said to ease pain, and the ashes are mixed with rabbit grease to soothe burns.” Self-consciously she lifted a hand to her face, rubbing at the ointment on her cheeks.

“Water-Bearer said the salve was dearly bought.” Down below the
sluagh
splashed in the river, feathers and tentacle buffeted by a sudden gust of wind off the cliffs.

“Water-Bearer?” Aine asked.

Richard didn’t reply.

A bridge spanned the river, constructed of rough stone blocks and more bronze chains. The Host drove Richard and Aine across it. Many of the
sluagh
crossed the ravine on dark wings, but many more shuffled, stuck to the ground as solidly as their mortal prisoners.

Their army’s in bad shape
, Bobby whispered.

They’re dangerous,
Winter cautioned.

Richard shook his head, willing the voices away. Aine looked up, a question in her eyes, but Richard turned his face away. When he did, he caught Water-Bearer watching him from three regimented rows back.

The bridge quivered at its center, rocked by wind. The waterfall roared, muffling any other sound. Aine’s hand tightened on Richard’s arm. Richard inhaled cautiously, but his nose wasn’t wrong. The air tasted of ozone rather than poison, and the spray from the waterfall didn’t sting his already singed eyelids.

The stones in the middle of the bridge were slick and wet. Richard was more interested in their shape; rough-hewn and lopsided. Hand-made, he thought, scored with a sharp blade of some sort, or equally sharp claws. The chains that bound them were a twin to Richard’s own, only thicker than his arm, and coated in rust.

Still—

“Manufactured,” he muttered. “It doesn’t make sense.”

Aine was too busy setting one foot in front of the other to notice. The bridge rocked from side to side and she staggered. Richard held her up as best he could. Spray from the river rose in visible whirlwinds, skirling over the Host, dampening their wings and ugly faces. Richard lifted his chin, enjoying the cool caress.

On the other side of the bridge the trail widened to twice its previous width, then rose at a steep incline through foothills and toward the mountain. Aine was growing short of breath. The
sluagh
didn’t exactly prod her forward, but they weren’t gentle with claws and wing. The army had picked up its pace until the march was almost a run. Richard looked at those blank alien faces and couldn’t tell if the
sluagh
were eager or frightened.

“Piggy-back,” Richard said to Aine.

The changeling blinked, uncertain and remote.  She shook her curls, confused.

“On my back,” Richard suggested. “Hop on my back. I’ll carry you.”

He’d only known Aine a short while, but he knew she was proud, and fierce, and determined. He admired the strength in her tiny body. But he was stronger, and prouder. So when she started to argue, he simply stepped in front of her and bent her knees.

“Now,” he ordered. “Hands around my neck. Before they knock you over.”

“They won’t—”

Before Aine could finish, Water-Bearer appeared at Richard’s side. The
sluagh
lifted Aine with uncanny ease, boosting her onto Richard’s back. Richard’s beaten body registered painful protest. He ignored the shrieking pain and straightened before Aine could protest. Her hands locked automatically onto his shoulders. Satisfied, Richard walked on.

“Thank you,” he said, but Water-Bearer was gone again.

Aine laid her head in the curve of Richard’s neck. Her breathing slowed and Richard thought she’d fallen asleep, even though her fingers gripped his shoulders like a lifeline. His left hand was aching in its makeshift splint, sending spikes of heat all the way up his arm. The path crept steadily upward until the sharp grade felt impossible and dangerous.

Richard counted steps to keep from crying.

Close your eyes if you like
, his subconscious said in Winter’s gently mocking tones,
but don’t turn away. Never let your nightmares see you flinch.

“Richard,” Aine breathed in his ear, awake after all. “Look.”

He’d been watching his feet to keep from falling. Dully, he lifted his head.

“Oh,” he said, feeling stupid. “Is that it? The catacombs?”

They’d been climbing a mountain and Richard hadn’t noticed. It was a mountain out of picture books or movies, wide and jagged at the same time; its final crooked spire appeared to balance the white sun like a golf ball on a thumbtack. Richard thought he glimpsed snow on the highest peaks.

There was an opening in the mountain one third of the way up, a cave or a gate, where the path dead-ended. The opening was black and squat and square—unnaturally so—but tall enough to swallow the front ranks of the army in twos and threes.

Richard stood still, Aine on his back, while the
sluagh
eddied about him.

“Shit,” he said, with emphasis.

“Aye,” Aine replied. “
Reilig na Rí.
Cemetery of the kings.”

Summer knew that it was Barker keeping Hannah from running off. At first she couldn’t figure out how it worked and supposed it was some kind of Binding Cant, the sort the First Kings had used to ensure the loyalty of the
sidhe
Court. Summer was suitably impressed, because she’d never believed any of her mama’s people were still strong enough to exert that sort of power.  Not after centuries of exile on mortal soil.

So maybe she caught herself making eyes at Barker again, even though she knew he wasn’t likely to ever notice. He was brave and fine to look at, and a little scary, and the closest thing to a piece of the Fairy Court she had left.

Besides, pretending to fall in love with Barker was much more fun than thinking about Winter locked away in the
sluagh
world, maybe forever, probably forever. And she’d been the one who’d made it happen.

So she spent the entire drive from D.C. through Virginia staring out the window of the embarrassing minivan Brother Daniel had insisted on renting, and she wasn’t watching the boring scenery ghost past. Because Barker didn’t travel in cars. Barker rode a motorcycle, one of those sleek black machines with tons of chrome and a purr that rose to a growl when he really had somewhere to be.

Her papa had given Barker the motorcycle before Summer was born; she didn’t remember a time without it. In her head Barker and his ride were intertwined.

Once, right before her sixth birthday, she’d decided the motorcycle was some sort of mechanical pony, and she’d wanted a ride. Mama had protested vehemently, so loudly even Papa hadn’t dared challenge her.

Barker had taken her on a ride anyway, waiting until her parents were out or simply unaware. He’d even found Summer a child-sized helmet, black with pink flower decals, and he’d made her dress in her best leather boots.

“It’s like flying,” he whispered in her ear as he set her on the seat between the handlebars and his lap. “Only better.”

The only flying six-year-old Summer had ever done was in her dreams, and she was quickly convinced that Barker’s bike was much more fun. It wasn’t like riding a pony at all, it was like dreaming in fast-forward.

Mama found out, of course. Barker limped for a whole two weeks after, so Summer tried not to hug him too tightly so he wouldn’t bleed through his shirt.

She still thought that midnight ride through Manhattan, wind screaming over the crest of her helmet, Barker laughing into her shoulder, was the best almost-birthday present she’d ever had.

Lolo interrupted her daydream, spoiling it because he ruined everything, always.

“Man, I’d like to ride that rocket,” he said. He made the words sound dirty. He leaned over Summer’s shoulder to stare out the window at Barker. “Think he’d let me try?”

Summer pushed Lolo away.

“That’s a
Ducati
,” she said, smirking. “Barker doesn’t let anyone touch it.”

Lolo sighed. He shifted restlessly on the bench they shared. Then he glanced ahead at the front of the minivan and lowered his voice.

“Did you notice?”

“What?” Summer wished Lolo would shut up. She wanted to stare out the window some more and pretend they weren’t already more than halfway to Yorktown.

“What Hannah’s wearing.”

Hannah was wearing vintage Versace pulled from Summer’s closet because the fancy gown the changeling had been wearing when Winter kidnapped her was pretty much ruined by the time they’d made Manhattan, covered with burns and sweat-stains and ripped in several places. Winter didn’t appreciate fashion.

“Vintage,” Summer said promptly. “1990s. Christy Turlington wore that shirt and trousers. Pink’s not really Hannah’s color, but—”

“No,
princess,”
Lolo hissed. “On her wrist. Look familiar? Don’t stare!”

Summer wasn’t sure how she could pretend not to stare from three feet away. Luckily Hannah didn’t look like she was paying attention to anything around her. She’d curled up in a ball on the front passenger seat, feet tucked up under her thighs, head tilted against the car window, long black hair flipped forward, concealing her face.

She’d scooted about as far away from Brother Daniel as she could get, and she was either asleep, or pretending really well.

Summer couldn’t help feeling a tiny bit sorry for her. Summer knew what it was like to be the daughter of a
sidhe
queen. Hannah would never have a chance to find out.

“Win says she’s a right bitch—” Lolo whispered, rolling his eyes, because he knew Summer well enough to guess what she was thinking.

“Lorenzo,” Daniel cautioned quietly from behind the wheel. “Language.”

Lolo groaned, then actually leaned forward, plucking at Hannah’s closest sleeve, pulling it gingerly up her arm, revealing a thin wrist.

“See,” he said, low-voiced. “Fairy handcuffs. Your mother doesn’t miss a trick, does she?”

Hannah sighed but didn’t stir. Summer blinked. Not real handcuffs like the NYPD carried, but a single thick bangle of seamless fairy amber, gleaming yellow against Hannah’s pale flesh.

“Oh,” Summer said.

She looked away from the yellow bangle and stared out the window, swallowing hard, because Lolo ruined everything, always.

It wasn’t a Binding Cant after all, nothing so romantic as old magic and Barker’s hidden talent. It was Siobahn and her vicious, clever parlor tricks, and when Summer squinted through the tinted window, she thought she could see the matching glow of amber on Barker’s wrist beneath the edge of his sleeve.

Hannah didn’t stir until they turned off Highway 17 and into Yorktown proper. The clock on the dashboard said twenty minutes after midnight. Lolo was snoring, knees pulled up under his chin, garish jacket balled up under his head as a pillow. His beaded braids looked even more like a bird’s nest than normal. And he was starting to stink.

“Turn left,” Hannah said. She had a voice like sugar, deep and mellow, dripping with Southern charm. Just like Scarlett O’Hara, Summer thought, remembering an essay she’d written in tenth-grade English. Scarlett O’Hara used her voice and her eyelashes and her Southern charm to make men do whatever she liked.

Hannah was
sidhe
. She could make mortals fall at her feet without batting a lash or saying a word. Still, Summer couldn’t help be just a tiny bit jealous of that buttery accent.

“Now right,” Hannah ordered. Brother Daniel complied without speaking.

Hannah hated the minivan, but not because it was ugly. Hannah hated the mini-van because she thought she was allergic to iron, thought she’d break out in hives or puke or turn into ash all because she was surrounded by steel. Summer had tried to explain to her that iron sickness only applied to the original fay, but Hannah hadn’t listened.

The changeling was shivering a little in her seat as she directed Daniel through the city streets. Summer couldn’t help feeling sympathetic. She rolled down her window a crack, because whenever she got motion-sick over Morris’ Manhattan driving, fresh air always helped.

Yorktown air smelled like salt, like real ocean, and something else, something ancient and muggy. Trees, Summer decided, very old trees. Roots, deep in the sandy soil. And mortal history. Human bones buried under the foundations of two-hundred-year-old houses.

She could hear the ocean and wished it wasn’t too dark to see the shore.

“Three more blocks down,” Hannah whispered. “Pull up beneath the dogwood.”

Summer didn’t know what they’d do without Brother Daniel. The friar had managed to insert himself into their adventure without so much as a ‘please’ or ‘thank you.’ Even Mama hadn’t kicked up a true fuss when he’d insisted on coming with them, and Winter had practically fallen on his knees in relief. Only Summer had noticed
that
.

“You’ll need me,” Daniel had said, and it turned out he was right, because now Winter was gone and Summer and Lolo really shouldn’t drive, and Barker and Hannah flat-out refused to take a train down the coast.

Brother Daniel pulled up alongside a low green hedge, then shut off the van. Barker coasted to a stop behind them. Summer watched through her open window as the older
sidhe
hopped off his bike. He plucked off his helmet, shaking his head. Even in the dark his wild red hair managed to catch light and shine.

“What now?” the friar asked mildly.

Hannah stretched.

“The servants will be asleep,” she said, sounding oh-so-very-bored. “Willa keeps a key under a flagstone by the back stoop. We’ll go in that way.”

“Maybe we should just find a hotel,” Summer suggested, even though she’d grown sick-to-death of cheap mattresses and heavy curtains. “We could come back in the morning.”

“No. This is my house. It belonged to my mother, and now it’s mine. I want to sleep in my own bed again, and shower in my own bathroom.” Hannah opened the van door and slid out.

“Gloriana’s her mother, not Darlene,” Summer hissed. “And Winter said she practically burned this place down in a temper-tantrum.”

Brother Dan only shrugged. He’d traded his robes for street togs, jeans and a t-shirt and motorcycle boots, but Summer didn’t think he’d fool anyone. His street tats and gold tooth said gangsta, but the well of calm in his faded eyes said: I believe in something you can’t see, and I’m alright with that.

Summer’s papa had carried the same faith in his own head. Maybe that’s why she liked Daniel more and more every day.

“Lorenzo,” the friar said. “Wake up. We’re here.”

Lolo sighed and stirred. He rubbed his eyes, stretching and yawning, sweet and innocent as the puppy Summer had always wanted but was never allowed to have. Then he woke further and his attention focused. He glanced out the window, sharply observant.

“Where’s here?”

“Hannah’s house,” Summer said. “Near the cave, remember?”

“Of course I do.” Lolo unsnapped the seat belt he’d argued about wearing in the first place. “Where
is
Hannah? You haven’t lost her already, have you?”

“Out,” ordered Daniel. He popped open his own door, unfolding from the front seat.

“Did I miss anything?” Lolo demanded.

“No,” said Summer, struggling with the van’s heavy sliding door. Lolo leaned over to help. The door burst open, and they both tumbled out, falling on top of each other but managing to keep their feet.

Summer felt herself blushing, until she realized Barker hadn’t even noticed their abrupt exit, and then she just felt tired.

“Wow,” Lolo said. “Nice place. Gloriana set her daughter up in
style
.
”

Summer turned. She saw the dogwood first, a massive tree that surely had been growing since before the exiles were banished. The tree grew up and then out, overshadowing much of the street. It was bare of leaves, its trunk thicker than Summer’s ribcage.

Behind the dogwood flowed a large expanse of lawn, winter-brown. Past the lawn a mansion rose out of more manicured shrubs. The house was square with a peaked roof and multiple square windows, aglow even at the late hour. A single old-fashioned gas-lamp burned in the exact center of the lawn.

“I wonder if she knew,” Summer said, out loud, although she’d meant to use her inside-the-head-voice.

“Gloriana?” Lolo scoffed. “Of course she knew. What would your mother do, if she had to give you up? Sure as shit wouldn’t place you in some DumBo triplex.”

“Lorenzo.” Brother Dan ghosted up behind them. “Help Hannah.”

“With what?” Lolo wondered. “It’s not like she has luggage or anything. Winter snatched her up and whisked her away.”

“Ayudarla a no tener miedo.”

“Fine.” Lolo stomped off in the direction of the mansion.

“What did you say?” Summer wondered.

“That Hannah’s frightened,” Daniel replied. “And that it’s unkind to let her wander alone in the dark.”

“The dark is not that child’s enemy,” Barker said from Summer’s shoulder. “Ready,
Samhradh?”

Summer touched the filigreed cross hanging on a chain around her throat:
Buairt
, disguised. She knew Gloriana was still far away, but the sound of waves on sand reminded her that for the
sidhe,
‘far away’ was a relative term.

“Yes,” she said.

Brother Dan strode ahead. The friar walked with a surety of step that made Summer wonder if Daniel, also, was familiar with the night.

The low hedge ran parallel to the street then cut back up the lawn, squaring with the mansion. Halfway between street and house the boxwood was broken by a filigreed garden gate. The gate was unlatched. Daniel slipped through. Summer followed, Barker nothing more than a familiar whisper against her arm.

On the other side of the gate, a curving flagstone path bisected a dormant herb garden, dodged a dry fountain, and rose in three wide steps to the mansion’s back door. Another gas-lamp sprouted from the garden, shedding pale light over clumps of sleeping lavender and dying kale.

Brother Daniel eyed the herb garden with obvious appreciation. “Someone has a green thumb.”