The Earl's Childe (13 page)

“What the…” Her brow furrowed in confusion as she saw a message had come in from my eldest sister's fiancee.

“What is it, Aims?” My dad also stood, and looked over her shoulder. “Hunter?”

Mum rang her. “Hi, honey, what's going on?” She looked at the phone screen, frowning and heading towards the back bookshelves. Dad followed her, and Isis followed him. “Yeah, I see the picture. But what…?”

Beside me, Ginny started going through Mum's tabs, but I didn't have the energy to lean over and watch, even though I felt chilled without either parent or dog snuggling me. Also, Ginny was not one to cuddle. She liked us all well enough, but she made it clear she worked for our parents and was
not
a nanny. Anita, our actual nanny,
did
sit down, and put an arm around me. I leaned my elbows on my knees and pressed my face into my hands.

Lily sat on the edge of the couch beside me, and I turned my head to look at her better, though my eyes were bleary from rubbing them so hard. She was staring at the shelves Mum had disappeared behind.

Anita said nothing, but kept stroking my back. I always liked that about our nanny, even though I was seriously too old for a nanny and the twins kept her busy enough most of the time. She always seemed to know when we needed space… and when we needed an extra reminder that someone loved us besides our parents.

I put my face back in my hands again, digging the heels of my palms into my eyes. What was the picture my future sister-in-law had sent to Mum? And why was she sending it now?

I thought. When we'd tried to call my eldest sister, Rose, about what to do about Ermie, she had said Hunter was away on assignment. Hunter was a photojournalist. Was she in Bahrain? She always seemed to know where things would happen.

The picture had to be Joe's family alive somewhere, maybe hiding, because otherwise Mum wouldn't be worried about them getting killed. That was good. They were alive.

Joe's dad had snuck into the military during the early war in the Middle East; he wasn't supposed to have been over there or in combat, but he'd gone anyway. And Joe's mum had disguised herself as a soldier and done the same. Princess Maryan had saved Prince Christopher's life, according to the story they told, and that's how they fell in love.

Therefore, they knew how to survive something like this.

But with Joe, Annie, and Rich? “It'll be all right.” Mum emerged from the library shelves, sliding her phone open and closed a few times. “Hunter said she's heard that the British government is sending in heavy black ops—back-up of some sort. They'll be extricated.”

“What's the picture?” I asked.

Anita moved, letting Mum sit beside me. We crowded around the phone screen as she pulled it up.

There was a cluster of three kids and possibly a woman behind the front an overturned Jeep. They were blurred badly in comparison to the sharpness of the rest of the picture. A man with a rifle of some sort in his hand peeked out from the boot side, as if guarding their backs. His face was clear as day, even in the dim photo. It was Prince Christopher.

“This was about an hour ago. They're okay,” Mum said softly.

“They're by themselves! All alone! Where are their guards?” I asked. They never went
anywhere
without a ton of guards.

“They could be outside the edges. Hunter focused in on the Jeep…” Mum wasn't very convincing. She swiped the picture from the screen and slumped back on the couch.

Dad looked at Lily and me. “It's almost midnight.” Taking a deep breath, he said, “I know it's not easy, but you should try to get some sleep. We…we've got to be on our best behavior tomorrow and watch what we say. There will be some important people coming, and Prince Christopher and Princess Maryan have
trusted
us with their private information. If we aren't careful what we say, we could at best put their reputations in danger…at worst, put their
lives
in danger… Do you understand?”

“Understand.” I nodded. I
was
exhausted, but my brain was still going, going, going… How could I sleep?

“Do you want us to lie?” Lily said, chewing her lip.

Dad pinched the bridge of his nose. “I never
want
you to lie.” He took a deep breath. “But…telling the truth, that you know about them being over there…is
very
dangerous. So, yes, if you absolutely must, to keep them all safe, lie.”

Lily frowned but nodded. So did I.

“Now, bed. The both of you.” I closed my eyes and nodded, liking Dad just sounding like Dad.

Mum and Dad (and Isis, who was back to being Dad's shadow) followed Lily and me to our room and gave us kisses goodnight while Ginny and Anita turned off all the lights, the telly, and the computers before going to their own rooms for the night.

I lay awake in my bed, listening to Lily breathing. She wasn't sleeping, though; I could tell. We'd shared a bedroom for nearly all our lives, and I knew her actual sleep-breathing. I considered talking to her, but didn't know what to say. I wondered if she felt the same way.

Rolling over, I sighed. All I could think of was Joe, of where he was, where his family was, if they were okay, what I could do—could I do anything?

Nothing else, not Dad's manic mood or messed-up magick or scared Tom or what was going to happen with the faerie lords and ladies, came into my head.

But just as I started to fall asleep, a stray thought of Ermie—of how fast and far he could run—
did
root itself into my thoughts.

Lily dropped a particularly nasty insult on her music alarm in the morning. That was what woke me up, not the crooning voice of Carrie Underwood from the player, which she quite literally smacked, nor the beeping from my clock.

As soon as I was awake, I sat straight up, jumped out of bed, and ran downstairs to see if Mum or Dad or anyone had heard anything about Joe or his family. The soles of my feet burned a bit as I skidded to a halt at the dining room table and took in the scene before me.

The dining room table was heaped—and I mean
heaped
, as in if people wanted to sit there with plates, I don't know where they'd go—with food. There were waffles, scones, fruit salad, ambrosia salad, “proper” bacon (as Dad called it), American bacon (what Mum called “proper”), slices of fried haggis, blood pudding, scrambled eggs, eggy-in-the-basket, smoked salmon, kippers, a whole loaf of toast, butter, clotted cream, six different jams, Nutella, Biscoff, peanut butter, orange marmalade, apricot preserves, apple butter, Marmite, ketchup, brown sauce, two different kinds of beans, grilled tomatoes, mushrooms, sauteed onions, and a crock of oatmeal.

I may not have slept much last night, but I'm quite sure Dad hadn't slept at all. Not with this level of Apology Breakfast. This was the emperor of all Apology Breakfasts.

The lack of room for plates wasn't too much of a problem, though. Everyone in the room, including my dad, was hardly eating. Mum, with a cup of coffee on the edge of the table and her tablet balanced between her knee and the edge, flipped through tabs with one hand while nibbling on a piece of bacon. Dad was leaning in the doorway, Isis curled in the small space between his feet and the doorjamb. With his brows furrowed at his phone, he wasn't even noticing if people were eating or not. Coach Krissy was sitting with a trembling cup of tea in one hand while she stabbed at her tiny BlackBerry with her thumb. Coach David, who had been looking over Mum's shoulder, since she had the biggest screen, looked up first. He offered me a smile, and then quickly looked back at Mum's computer. “Good morning, Heather.”

“What's the news?” I asked in what I hoped was a neutral tone that met Dad's advice of not letting on how much I knew.

“Nothing new since last night,” Mum said, then looked up and sharply frowned at me. “Why don't you get dressed before joining us for breakfast, honey?”

I looked down at my blue sparkling pyjamas. Like most of last summer's clothes, they were a full size too small, and definitely too short in the arms and legs. The material seemed to stretch everywhere, now, too.
Ugh
, I thought.
I must look like a glittering train wreck
.

Dad glanced at me, then at Mum. “Weren't you heading into Eyemouth for more supplies, Aims? Why don't you take Heather? I think the last time you two went clothes shopping was just after Christmas, wasn't it?”

I rolled my eyes and, despite our company, I couldn't keep myself from stomping back upstairs. Shopping?!
Exactly
what I wanted to be doing when everything in my life was going wrong and my best friend in the whole world could be hurt…or worse! “Let me know if you hear any
important
news, besides, you know, me growing a freaky mutant four inches since Christmas!”

Lily was coming out of the bathroom, reminding me I really had to go, when she saw me. “What? What's wrong?”

“Life!” I growled and continued stomping my way to the bathroom.

I think I attacked my teeth with floss and a toothbrush for ten whole minutes before I went to my room. I grabbed my favorite jeans from Christmas and a yellow T-shirt with a thundercloud and lightning bolt made of blue and yellow rhinestones.

The jeans were a little short, yeah, but I wore boots all the time, anyway, so it wasn't a big deal. The T-shirt was a little tight…well…everywhere. I yanked it off and threw it on the floor. Why hadn't I noticed this before?

Wait, I'd spent all summer dealing with a killer fey horse or dressing up for royal visits. Regular clothes were so totally not on the list of things I cared about right then. Besides, I was going to spend the rest of the summer in riding clothes anyway, and those all fit fine because I'd just ordered those through school. I grabbed one of my school blouses because, hey, I should dress nice with guests anyway.

“What are you staring at?” I snapped at Lily, who was dressed and sitting with her legs crossed at her desk chair. She was wearing shorts just long enough that Dad wouldn't pitch a fit.

“Not sure. Want to tell me before you bite someone's head off today?”

“I'm not going to bite anyone's head off!” I all but shouted at her.

“Want to try and tell me that while not biting my head off?”

“I didn't bite your head off. And what part of how awful a day was yesterday and how awful everything is right now
don't
you get?”

“I get the ‘life sucks' bit; I do.” Lily frowned at me, but it wasn't an angry frown. “But I'm your sister, so whether you believe it or not, I've got your back, and I want to help before you lose your temper and make yourself look like a brat. Because just about everything that sucks about life right now are things you can't tell anyone, so they have no idea why you're so freaking pissed off at the world right now.”

I scowled at Lily. Why is it when someone's right, it aggravates you
even more?
I couldn't think of any smart response, but a sharp growl in my stomach provided a good distraction. Of course, I was also just feeling sick and achy, which probably came from not sleeping well and the extent of horrible crap I'd been dealing with.

“I don't feel like talking about anything. I'm hungry.”

Lily sighed and stood up. As she passed me, she bumped me with her shoulder. “As your loving big sister, I reserve the right to tell you if you're passing the allowable level of bratty little sister.”

“Whatever.” I stuck my tongue out at her, but in that annoying sibling way, I felt a little better knowing she had my back and wouldn't let
me
go off any deep end. My thought from last night came back to me. About Ermie getting Joe and his family. “Wait, Lily?” I caught up to her before she went down the stairs.

She stopped and looked at me. “Yeah?”

“I really need to talk to Mum about something. Can you help me get her alone before everyone starts getting here?” Dad's comment about taking me shopping in Eyemouth flitted through my brain, but I doubted Mum was actually going to do that. She knew I had riding clothes that fit, and besides, we had enough crap going on at the castle.