The Vanishing Throne (32 page)

“I don't know,” I tell him. “If Lonnrach overpowers me again, I'll end up back
there
, Gavin. I can't—”

Now you know precisely how it feels to be that helpless
.

I can't be like that again. I won't go back to being the girl Gavin saw curled up on the floor, reliving memory after memory, trying to recall what it was like to be human. To be loved.

This time Lonnrach won't let me escape. “He'll try and kill me for my power, and I don't even know how to use it against him,” I say. Gavin looks up at me quickly, as if he's struck with an idea. “What? What is it?”

“You won't like it.”

“In case you haven't noticed,” I say, “I don't have a wealth of options.”

He hesitates. “Seers wake up with the
taibhsearachd
after dying and coming back, like I did when I was ill. Maybe power works in the same way.”

I consider his words. Derrick told me that when you die, you go beyond the veil. If the gift of Sight runs in your family and you manage to come back from the dead, you return with the ability.

Of course, Derrick told me long ago that only men have the Sight. There wouldn't be any guarantee that I'd come back different.

But if I did, Lonnrach would never be able to bind me again. I'd have the power to prevent him from getting into
my mind. He couldn't manipulate me. He couldn't break me. I'd have exactly what I needed to help Aithinne kill him.

It would be worth dying for that.

“What is it like?” I ask him. “Dying?”

Gavin stiffens. “I wish I could forget,” he says.

“That bad?” I had hoped death would be more peaceful.

“When you cross the veil, it's not . . .” He considers a moment. “It's like a purgatory. Designed to draw you in and force you to move on to wherever finality is.”

“Did you see your father?” I can't help but ask. That would be worth it, too. If I could see my mother one last time.

“No,” he says softly. “He would have moved on from that place. There's a reason the dead mostly stay dead. When you're on the other side everything fights to keep you there.”

A thought occurs to me. “What if you have someone who can bring you back?”

Gavin pauses, his eyes searching mine. “Then it might be less of a risk.”

A
FTER LEAVING my imagined Edinburgh, I stand in the doorway of the closet and tell Derrick my plan. He sews a coat as I speak, barely giving any indication that he's listening except for the occasional nod. At the end, he's silent.

“Well?” I prompt.

“Let's see . . .” He taps his chin. “Fraught with danger. Uncertain chance of success. Personally, I think it's a terrible idea. I've heard death is exceedingly unpleasant.”

I didn't think Derrick would approve, but at least he could have made it clear before I told him the
whole
blasted plan. “Would you care to elaborate, please?”

“It's unpleasant because you have to
die
, that's why,” he says stitching a pocket onto the coat. He looks at Gavin. “She didn't get this pish from you, did she? Because I'm still looking for a reason to lop off one of your appendages after what you did to her, and this looks like the perfect excuse.”

“For god's sake,” I mutter.

Gavin backs up with his hands raised. “Don't blame me. I might have presented the idea, but she's the one who sauntered off with it.”

Derrick narrows his eyes. “Aileana, is that true?”

“
Yes
,” I snap. “Well, not the sauntering. I don't saunter.”

“Does . . . this mean I get to keep my appendages?” Gavin asks.

“For now,” Derrick says, holding up the needle in a clear threat.

I inspect the pile of fabric he's sitting on and see that it's not just my imagination—it
has
gotten bigger. Like he's making up for three years of no dressmaking with an entire wardrobe all at once. God, he's
already
made it! He's going to create a closetful of things I can't wear or take with me.

Gavin eyes the pile of clothes. “So are you planning a ball, or is this just something pixies do for amusement?”

Derrick glares. “It's something I do to keep myself distracted, you ninny. I'm being forced to abandon my closet because your friend the Cyclops had some damned premonition.” He lands on a dress, wings flicking. “I don't even know why we're listening to what some unidentified voices have to say, anyway,” he mutters. “Now I'll have to burn her entire wardrobe before I begin anew someplace else.”

“Derrick, I
told
you about the dresses.”

Generally I try never to get between an obsessive pixie and his clothes-making, but Derrick really might burn them
all if he feels offended. He has always been protective of his creations, and I've never had to refuse them before.

Derrick spits out a sewing needle and lifts a sumptuous piece of thick brocade lined with fur. He flies to me with the garment, his wings glittering and glowing gold. “Fine, no more dresses. Put this new coat on.”

Resigned, I remove my tattered, bloodstained wool coat. “I need to find Aithinne. Where is she?”

“Don't know. Lift your arm.” I sigh and let him fit the coat around me. It's gorgeous, a form-fitting garment that cinches at my waist and makes me look smaller and more delicate than I actually am. “Why do you need Aithinne?”

“Because she can heal me and bring me back.”

“Oh, I see you're still entertaining this ridiculous idea.”

I'm quiet as he straightens the wrinkles down the front of the coat. Derrick might know what happened with Lonnrach, but I don't think he's realized how it's affected me. How it's changed me.

“You
know
why,” I whisper. “You know why I have to do this.”

He stops at my shoulder, suddenly serious. “I do,” he says quietly. “That doesn't mean I have to like it or approve of it.”

“Then just accept it.” I try to say it lightly.

Derrick stares at me for so long, I watch emotions flicker across his face before he finally goes back to smoothing wrinkles. “Fine,” he says reluctantly. “If we're doing this, it's a hell of a lot more complicated than just having Aithinne mend you. Even if she is able to revive you, that doesn't mean
she'll be able to find you on the other side. What use is the body without the mind?”

Gavin considers that. “It makes sense. I told you: Everything fights to keep you there.”

“Any ideas, then?” I ask Derrick.

“If you insist on going through with your reckless plan,” he says, inching back to inspect the coat, “you'll need something to direct Aithinne once you go through the veil.”

He's zipping around me so quickly to check his stitching that I give up trying to track him. “Like what?”

“
Brìgh
, perhaps,” he says. “
Sìthichean
used it in the past to trap human essence within the bulb of the plant to feed on later. If we trapped some of yours, Aithinne might be able to use it to track you.” He stops to think, his wings buzzing. “Then again, maybe it won't work.”

“
Maybe
it won't?”

Derrick shrugs. He starts undoing stitches at my shoulder, then pinning and sewing again. “I can't be certain. You could just die and not come back at all.”

Helpful. Very helpful. “Where might we find some?”

“I hear it grows along the river on the other side of the door, but I don't go in there.”

We don't go in there. Never go in there
.

As if he reads my mind, Gavin says, “No. Don't even think about it.”

I suppose it wouldn't be wise to point out the obvious: that Gavin had absolutely no problem asking the fae beyond the door to torture me when I first arrived.

I set my jaw and look away from him. “We can ask Aithinne to retrieve it, then.”

“I wouldn't have her do that,” Derrick says. “You risk her energy interfering with yours in the
brìgh
. It might obscure your path through the veil.”

“Then we're going to have to go through the door.”

Derrick stops, just finishing up a stitch. “I wasn't suggesting that, either.”

“Do you have a better plan?”

“Well, no.” He looks over at Gavin, as if to say,
Can you help, please?

Gavin puts up his hands. “Don't look at me for ideas. I just got to keep my body parts.”

Derrick glares. “Fine.” He buttons me up. “There. Now you don't look quite so horrid.”

I sigh. “Can you find Aithinne?”

“She's probably behind the door with the others. She leaves a trail down there that smells like snowdrops and rainy mornings.” He looks resigned when he sees the look on my face. “Very well. Let's go.”

Derrick flutters out of the closet past me and follows Aithinne's scent through the darkened labyrinthine tunnels to the faery door beyond the field of
seilgflùr
. When we reach the door, he runs his fingers over the carvings and sniffs. “Aye,” he says, “she's definitely in there. God, this is a terrible plan.”

I step up to the door and press my ear to it, but I hear nothing, not even the lulling music that drew me to it the
first time. Now that I'm close, I realize the symbols look like they've been burned into the wood. I breathe in the scent of ashes and grip the door handle.

“Wait,” Gavin says. “Perhaps Derrick should go in first and see if it's clear.”

Derrick hovers next to me and levels him with a glare. “Oh, I see. Just throw the pixie to the wolves, eh?” At Gavin's confused expression, he adds, “It's not safe for me in there, either, you outrageous arsehole. They think I'm a traitor for having Aileana as a companion and for letting humans stay here. Good god, don't you know
anything
?”

“Gentlemen,” I say sharply. I check the blade at my hip and glance at Gavin. “I'm going in. If you aren't, then step back.”

Derrick immediately flies to my shoulder and sits there. “I'm going, too. Just in case this silly plan fails.”

Gavin reluctantly steps up beside me. “I suppose I ought to come with you to make sure you don't start a war.” He looks at me sharply. “No killing. If you slaughter any of them, you void the treaty. It's the only thing stopping
them
from going after everyone in the city.”

I hate the reminder of the treaty. What Catherine told me still doesn't make this right. It's like housing a lion with the cage door wide open. “Fine.”

“Promise me.”

Promise me
. I can't believe he's asking that. “Unlike you,” I say tightly, “I've always kept my word.”

Gavin flinches.

“Ouch,” Derrick breathes. “You deserved that, Seer.”

A flash of hurt crosses Gavin's face. “If anything happens, we run,” he says. “The people in the city who went in never came back out.”

I push down the alarm that rises at his words and nod. Then I square my shoulders and twist the knob.

It's quiet and dark as I enter. Too dark. Too quiet. “Do you see anything?” I whisper to Derrick. The fae have better sight than I do.

Before he can answer, the lights suddenly turn on. Like a single switch was flipped and everything—every building—is suddenly illuminated from the inside. I take it all in—the glowing metal architecture, the carved marble streets, the gnarled, twisting trees—and I can't help but be in awe of its beauty. It's even more grand than the human city. Every structure has been carefully constructed with symbols and swirls carved into the metal, designs and pictorial representations of trees and flowers.

The buildings are pointed, towering. Each one has arches above the entrances, so much like those I saw on the outside of the prison at the
Sìth-bhrùth
.

Beneath the glass dome that spans across the entire city, lights twinkle and swirl. No—not lights. What illuminates the city isn't electricity, but fire. Flickering flames that float beneath hovering glass bulbs all over the city. They rise to the sky, casting shadows on the roads.

The streets themselves are made of what looks like white marble, but I know better. Marble doesn't shine like that.
Marble doesn't look like it has trapped gemstones gleaming within.

Gavin swears softly. “I can't say I expected this.”

“Shh.”

There are still no faeries visible. I take a careful step forward and a noise to my left startles me. When I look, there's nothing there. Gavin's hand suddenly clasps mine. His palm is hot, clammy.

“I don't like this,” Derrick whispers. “I don't like—”

Before I even blink, the fae are everywhere.
Everywhere
. Crawling down buildings, flying through the streets, slithering across the marble, coming right for me. Hundreds of them. Some with flashing razor teeth and others with wings that look sharp enough to cut steel. Their eyes glow with an uncanny light as they snarl at me, coming closer as a group.

There are fae I've never seen before—of all different kinds. Running through my mind are Kiaran's lessons for identifying them all. My eyes rove over black-eyed, mud-colored faeries with gray clothes. Massive felines the size of wolves with two rows of teeth they flash in a snarl. Faeries that slither like shadows across the ground.

“I'm just going to say it,” Gavin murmurs. “I really regret this decision.” He jumps as a catlike fae leaps from a building window near us and lands smoothly on its paws. “Really . . . really regretting it.”