Fragile Eternity (3 page)

“I don’t deserve you.” He stared at her as if she was his world. In that look—the same look that she’d fallen for innumerable times—he seemed to hold all of the words she longed to hear. In moments that she collected like treasures, he was her perfect match. Moments weren’t enough. “I’ve never deserved you,” he said.

“Sometimes I’m sure of that…but I wouldn’t love
you if that was entirely true. I’ve seen the faery king you can be and the
person
you can be. You’re better than you think”—she touched his face carefully—“better than I think sometimes.”

“I want to be the person I could be with you…” he started.

“But?”

“I need to put my court’s needs first. For nine centuries I’ve wanted only to reach where I am now. I can’t let what
I
want—
who
I want—get in the way of what’s best for my fey.” He raked his hand through his hair again, looking like the boy she’d met back when she thought he was a human.

She wanted to comfort him, to promise it would be fine. She couldn’t. The closer summer came, the more he and Aislinn were drawn together. He hadn’t come to see her but a few times since spring had begun. Today, he’d come making demands. Loving him didn’t mean letting him rule her—or her court.

“I understand. I have to do the same thing…but I want
you
, Keenan, not the king.” She leaned her head against his arm. As long as they were careful, not forgetting, not losing control, they could touch. Unfortunately, touching him made self-control a challenge. She sighed and added, “I want to set aside the courts when we are together, and I need you to accept that my loving you doesn’t mean that dealing with my court is different from any other business of yours. Don’t think that what we share means that my court is malleable.”

He held her gaze as he asked, “And if I can’t do that?”

She glanced at him. “Then I need you out of my life. Don’t keep trying to use my love to manipulate me. Don’t expect me not to be jealous when you bring her to my house and stare at her like she’s your world. I want a real relationship with you…or nothing at all.”

“I don’t know what to do,” he admitted. “When I’m around her I feel like I’m enthralled. She doesn’t love me, but I
want
her to. If she did, my court would be stronger. It’s like buds opening in the sunlight. It’s not a choice, Don. It’s a need. She’s my other half, and her decision to be ‘friends’ weakens me.”

“I know.”

“She doesn’t…and I don’t know if it’ll get any easier.”

“I can’t help you with this one”—she entwined her fingers with his—“and I hate you both sometimes for it. Talk to her. Find a way to be with her or find a way to be free enough to be truly mine.”

“She doesn’t hear me when I try to talk to her about this, and I don’t want to quarrel with her.” Keenan’s expression was that of enchantment. Even talking about her distracted him.

Donia looked at him, the same lost faery she’d loved for most of her life. Too often she’d been the one to soften when they were at odds, too often she’d helped him because they’d both wanted the same goal: Winter and Summer to balance. She sighed. “Try again, Keenan, because this is going to end badly if something doesn’t change.”

He kissed her pursed lips softly and said, “I still dream that it was you. No matter how many times I’ve looked, in my dreams it’s always been you who were meant to be my queen.”

“And I would be if the choice were mine. It isn’t. You need to let me go or find a way to distance yourself from her.”

He pulled her closer. “No matter what happens, I don’t want to let you go.
Ever
.”

“That’s a different problem altogether.” She watched the frost form on the steps beside her. “I’m not meant for Summer, Keenan.”

“Is it so wrong to want a queen who loves me?”

“No,” she whispered. “But it’s not working to want two queens to love you.”

“If you were my queen—”

“But I wasn’t.” She laid her head on his shoulder.

They sat there like that, leaning together carefully, until morning came.

Sorcha had summoned Devlin after breaking her fast. True to form, he was there within mere moments. In their eternity together, her brother had never been anything other than reliable and predictable.

He stood just inside the doorway, silent as she crossed the expanse of the hall. Her bare feet made no sound as she stepped onto the dais and sat upon the single polished silver throne. From here, the cavernous hall was beautiful. There was a symmetry of design that was pleasing to behold. This room—and only this room—did not fold under her will. The Hall of Truth and Memory was impervious to any magic but its own. Once, when the Dark Court resided in Faerie, this was where inter-court disputes were resolved. Once, when they shared Faerie, this was where sacrifices were made. The slate-gray stones held those, and many more, memories.

Sorcha slid her feet over the cool earth and rock upon
which her throne was placed. When one lived for eternity, memory grew hazy at times. The soil helped her keep focus on Faerie; the rock tied her to the truth of the Hall.

Devlin wouldn’t move until she was settled. In some ways, her adherence to order and rules was essential to Devlin. The structure helped him keep to the path he’d chosen. For her, order was instinctive; for him, it was a choice he made every breath of every day.

The words were rote, but he said them all the same: “Are you receiving, my lady?”

“I am.” She settled her skirt so that the bare tips of her feet were hidden. Silver threads shimmered in her hands and on her cheeks; they shimmered elsewhere that she’d sometimes reveal, but her bare feet stayed covered. The proof of the nature of her connection to the Hall was not something to show her court.

“May I approach?”

“Always, Devlin,” she reassured him again, as she had for longer than either of them could recall. “Even without asking, you are welcome.”

“You honor me with your trust.” He dropped his gaze to her concealed feet. He knew the truth she shared with none other. Reason made clear to both of them that her trust in him was going to be the source of her stumbling someday. Reason also made clear that there wasn’t a better choice: trusting him secured his loyalty.

And we haven’t fallen yet.

He was her eyes and hands in the mortal realm. He was
her violence in times when such a thing was needed. But he was also Bananach’s brother—a fact that none of the three of them ever forgot. Devlin saw their sister regularly; he cared for the mad raven-faery, even though her aims were utterly disorderly. His affection for their sister made it so that no amount of time or service could erase Sorcha’s slivers of doubts in his loyalty.

Will he side with her someday? Does he now?

“Dark fey have drawn the blood of one of your mortals…on Faerie soil,” Devlin began. “Will you judge them?”

“I will.” Again, the words were rote: she always judged. It was what Reason did.

Devlin turned to retrieve the accused and the witnesses, but she stopped him with a raised hand.

“After this I need you to visit the mortal world. There is a mortal who walks among three courts untethered,” she said.

He bowed. “As you wish.”

“War thinks he is key.”

“Would you have me eliminate the mortal or retrieve him?”

“Neither.” Sorcha wasn’t sure what the right move was just yet, but hasty action wasn’t it. “Bring me information. See what I cannot.”

“As you will.”

She refocused on the trial. “Bring them in.”

Moments later, four Ly Ergs were brought into the room
by guards under Devlin’s command. In the land of mortals, the red-palmed faeries’ habit of drawing blood wasn’t a concern; out there, most of the depravities that happened weren’t Sorcha’s concern. However, these four weren’t in the mortal world.

Several score of her own court followed the accused into the room. Hira and Nienke, handmaids and comfort to her these past few centuries, came to sit on the stair at her feet. They were clad in simple gray shifts that matched her only slightly more ornate garb, and like her, they were barefoot.

She motioned to Devlin.

He turned so he was angled, not putting his back to her but facing the Ly Ergs and the court attendees. Standing thusly, he could see everyone.

“Does your king know you are here?” he asked the Ly Ergs.

Only one replied: “No.”

“Does Bananach?”

One of the four, not the same Ly Erg, grinned. “Lady War knows we act to bring about her wishes.”

Sorcha pursed her lips. Bananach was careful—not acting to overtly sanction an attack on Faerie ground, but undoubtedly encouraging it.

Devlin looked to Sorcha.

She gave a curt nod, and he slit the Ly Erg’s throat. The movement was steady, but quick enough that it was silent.

The other three Ly Ergs watched the blood seep into the rock. The Hall absorbed it, drinking in the memory of
the dead faery. The Ly Ergs had to be physically restrained from touching the blood. It was their sustenance, their temptation, their reason for almost every action they undertook.

Scuffling ensued as the Ly Ergs tried to reach the spilled blood—which both displeased and pleased Devlin. He smiled, scowled, and bared his teeth. It was a brief series of expressions that the court would not see. They knew not to look to Devlin’s face when he was questioning uninvited guests.

Sorcha listened to the truths the Hall shared with her: she alone heard the whispered words that shivered through the room. The High Queen knew that the Ly Ergs weren’t acting on direct order. “She did not specifically instruct them to come to Faerie.”

Her words drew all gazes to her.

The floor rippled slightly as the stone opened and enfolded the Ly Erg into the firmament of the hall. The soil under her feet grew damp, and she felt the silvery veins in her skin extend and burrow like roots into the hall, taking nourishment from the necessary sacrifice to Truth—and magic.

Blood had always fed magic. She was the heart of that magic. Like her siblings, she needed the nourishment of blood and sacrifice. She, however, took no pleasure in it; it was mere practicality to accept it. A weak queen couldn’t keep Faerie—or the magic that fed all faeries in the mortal world—alive.

“Your brother’s death is an unfortunate consequence of treading in Faerie without consent. You did not come to me upon entering Faerie. Instead you attacked members of my court. You bled one of my mortals.” Sorcha looked out at the assembled members of her court, who watched her with the same unwavering faith they always had. They liked the stability and safety she gave them. “Over there, other courts also have rights and power. In Faerie, I am absolute. Life, death—these and all things are at my will alone.”

Her fey waited, silent witnesses to the inevitable restoration of order. They understood the practicality of her choices. They didn’t flinch as she let her attention slide over them.

“These three intruders struck one of my mortals in my lands. Such a thing is not acceptable.” Sorcha caught and held Devlin’s gaze as he looked up at her. “One may live to explain their transgression to the new Dark King.”

“As my Queen wills, so be it,” he said in a steady, clear voice that was in extreme contrast to the gleam in his eyes.

The court attendees lowered their gazes so the sentence could be carried out. Understanding did not mean relishing the bloodletting. High Court faeries weren’t crass.

Most of them at least.

With a slow, steady hand, Devlin dragged a blade across another Ly Erg’s throat. Here in the Hall, touching the soil and stone, Sorcha knew Truth: the blade wasn’t as sharp as it should be and her brother took pleasure at the finality of these deaths. Most important, she knew that he cherished
the fact that his action gave her the nourishment that she needed for the High Court to thrive, that this was another secret they shared.

“For our court and at our queen’s will and word, your lives are ended,” Devlin said as he lowered the Ly Erg to the gaping hole that opened in the stone.

He repeated the action, sacrificing the third faery.

Then he held out his bloodied hand to her. “My Queen?”

With her feet in the soil, she knew that for an instant he wanted her to rebuke him for enjoying the Ly Ergs’ deaths. He dared her to chastise him as he stood with spilled blood on his hand. He hoped for it.

The court lifted their gazes to the dais.

Sorcha smiled reassuringly at Devlin and then out at them. “Brother.”

The silvered threads in her skin thrummed with energy as they retracted into her skin again. She took his hand and stepped to the already immaculate floor where the remaining Ly Erg stood and looked longingly at the blood on her hand.

“Neither your king nor Bananach can grant consent in Faerie. Follow the rules.” She kissed his forehead. “This time you are granted mercy in exchange for carrying word to your king.”

She turned to her brother and nodded. Without another word, he led her through her faeries, away from the Hall and into the still of her garden. That, too, was routine. They did
as order required, and then she retreated to nature’s quiet while he retreated to the mortal plane.

This time, however, Devlin would seek out the errant mortal. This Seth Morgan was an aberration. If his actions had drawn Bananach’s attention, he required further study.

When Seth came out of the stacks that afternoon, Quinn was waiting. The guard’s expression was falsely friendly.

“I don’t need an escort,” Seth muttered as he passed the guard and went to check out his newest folklore books.

His objection didn’t matter.

Once Seth shoved the books into his satchel, Quinn motioned toward the exit. “If you’re ready?”

Seth would rather walk alone, but he had no chance of convincing the guard to disobey orders. The world was dangerous to a fragile mortal. Aislinn insisted the guards look after him at all times. He got it, but it took increasing effort to bite back vitriolic replies and resist escape attempts.
Which is stupid.

He walked silently past Quinn and kept silent as they made their way to the Crow’s Nest, where he found Niall waiting at the street-side door. The Dark King leaned against the wall, smoking a cigarette and tapping his foot in time to whatever music they had playing inside. Unlike Keenan and
Aislinn, Niall had no guards accompanying him or lurking nearby. It was just him—and he was a very welcome sight.

Quinn spared Niall a look of contempt. “He’s not of our court anymore.”

Niall stood silent as Quinn scowled at him. He’d changed since he’d become the Dark King; the obvious difference was that he was letting his previously close-shorn hair grow. That wasn’t the real difference though—when Niall had been with Keenan’s court, he moved with a sense of caution, as if being alert to potential threats was essential. It hadn’t mattered where they were; even in the safety of the loft, Niall was vigilant. Now, he held himself with an easy comfort. His casual nonchalance said that nothing and no one could harm him—which was true to a large degree. The heads of the courts were vulnerable to only the other reigning monarchs or a few exceptionally influential solitary faeries. Niall, like Aislinn, was nearly impervious to fatal harm now.

Quinn lowered his voice as he added, “You can’t trust the Dark Court. Our court and theirs do not mingle.”

Seth shook his head even as a smile threatened. Niall’s intentionally provocative posture, the way Quinn resituated himself as if for an attack—a few short weeks ago, Niall would have responded the same way to the last Dark King.
It’s all relative.
Niall had changed. Or maybe he was always this ready to provoke trouble, and Seth hadn’t noticed.

Seth held Niall’s gaze as he asked, “Do you mean me harm?”

“No.” Niall gave Quinn a deadly look. “And I am far more able to keep you safe than Keenan’s bootlicker.”

Quinn bristled but didn’t speak.

“I’m not going to be safer anywhere else. Seriously,” Seth told Quinn in an even voice, not letting either amusement or irritation show. “Niall’s my friend.”

“What if—”

“Gods, just go away,” Niall interrupted as he stalked toward them with a menace that suited him far too well. “Seth is safe in my company. I wouldn’t put a friend in danger. That would be
your
king who treats his friends so carelessly.”

“I don’t imagine our king would approve,” Quinn insisted, speaking only to Seth, looking only at Seth.

Seth arched one brow. “
I
have no king. I’m mortal, remember?”

“I’ll need to report this to Keenan.” Quinn waited for several heartbeats, as if the threat would matter to Seth. When it was apparent that it didn’t, he turned and left.

Once he was out of sight, the menace vanished from Niall’s expression. “Nitwit. I can’t believe Keenan raised him to advisor. He’s a yes-man without any moral compass, and—” He stopped himself. “It’s not my concern. Come.”

He opened the door and they went into the pervasive gloom of the Crow’s Nest. It was a comforting sort of dankness—no swooping birds or frolicking Summer Girls. Seth felt at ease there. Back when his parents were still around, he’d spent many afternoons there with his father.
In truth, Seth had practically grown up in the Crow’s Nest. It’d changed, but when Seth looked at it, he could still see his mom behind the bar sassing some fool who made the mistake of thinking she was a pushover.
More like a bulldozer.
Linda was tiny, but what she lacked in size she made up for in temper. Seth hadn’t been more than fourteen when he realized that his father’s presence at the bar was simply an excuse to be around Linda. He’d claimed he got bored at home, tired of retirement, restless without a job, so he did small repairs at the bar. It wasn’t boredom; it was about being nearer to Linda.

I miss them.
Seth let the memories come. It was okay to do so here. It was the closest thing to a family home he had these days.

Linda hadn’t really taken to the whole mother thing. She loved him; he had no doubt about that, but when she married Seth’s dad it wasn’t in hopes of settling down and starting a family. The moment Seth was old enough, she had another scheme to go somewhere new. His dad had shrugged and gone along without hesitation.

Or thought to invite me along.

Seth put a stop to that train of thought as Niall led the way to a table that was pushed into the darkest corner of the room. They walked past the diehard drinkers who were already several beers into their afternoon. The midday crowd was an odd mix of office workers and bikers and people between jobs or whose seasonal work hadn’t hit its stride yet.

They picked a table with some privacy, and Seth unfolded one of the battered menus he’d snatched from the next table.

“It hasn’t changed.” Niall pointed at the menu. “And you’ll order the same thing.”

“True, but I like looking at it. I like that it’s the same.” Seth waved one of the waitresses over and placed his order.

Afterward, when it was just the two of them, Niall gave him an odd look and asked, “Do I seem the same to you?”

“There’s more shadows”—Seth gestured at the air around Niall where whispery shapes swayed and spiraled into each other—“around you, and the whole weird-eyes thing is new. Creepier than Ash’s too. She gets seas and nice stuff mostly. You? There’s weird abyss people.”

Niall didn’t look happy about that detail. “Irial still has the same eyes.”

Seth knew better than to pursue
that
topic. Niall’s relationship with the last Dark King was never something to bring up when Niall was already melancholy. Instead, Seth told him, “You seem happier.”

Niall made a rude sound that might have been a laugh. “I don’t think I’d call it happy.”

“More comfortable in your skin then.” Seth shrugged.

This time Niall laughed for real, a sound that seemed to cause everyone in the room—except Seth—to shiver or sigh longingly. Without thinking, Seth reached up to touch the stone he wore on a cord around his throat. It was an anti-glamour charm that Niall had given him; arguably it was
to protect him from Niall’s uncontainable appeal to baser traits, but it had the side benefit of helping Seth resist other faery magicks as well.

Keenan never offered or even told me there were charms….
Seth shook his head. It was no secret that the Summer King wasn’t going to volunteer to do anything that would make life easier for Seth. If Aislinn suggested something, Keenan cooperated without hesitation, but he never initiated it. When Niall became the Dark King, he’d been free to share all manner of knowledge with Seth.

Niall said, almost casually, “Have you mentioned the charm to Ash?”

“No. You know she would ask Keenan why he hadn’t offered me one first…and I’m not sure I want to be the reason for yet another fight between them.”

“You’re a fool.
I
know why he didn’t offer you a charm. So do you. And if Ash found out about it, she would know as well.”

“All the more reason not to tell her. She’s having a rough time with the changes and balancing,” Seth said.

“And he’ll use every one of those things to his advantage if he can. He’s—” Niall stopped with a fierce look.

Seth followed Niall’s gaze. A dark-haired faery, with woad-written art on her face and arms like warriors in Celtic battle paintings, stood surrounded by a cluster of six shorter faeries with red-stained hands. The image of a raven shimmered over the top of the female faery’s face. Blue-black hair that was somehow also feathers stretched to her waist
in tangled snarls. Unlike most faeries, both her faux-mortal face and birdlike features were visible, blinking in and out of dominance.

“Don’t get involved.” Niall moved his chair back away from the table as she approached.

She tilted her head in a decidedly not-human way. “What a pleasant surprise,
Gancan—
”

“No.” Niall’s temper snapped out with actual tendrils of shadow, invisible to the Un-Sighted mortals in the club. “Not ‘Gancanagh.’
King
. Or have you forgotten?”

The faery who’d spoken didn’t flinch; instead she let her gaze slip slowly over Niall. “That’s right. Things are cloudy in my mind some days.”

“That is not why you chose to not-name me.” Niall didn’t stand yet, but he had angled his body in a position that would make sudden movement easier.

“Too true.” The birdlike faery’s posture tensed. “Would you fight me, my
king
? The battles I need are not near enough.”

Seth felt the tension grow increasingly thick. The other faeries had dispersed, taking up posts throughout the Crow’s Nest. They looked gleeful.

“Is that what you want?” Niall stood.

She licked her lips. “A little tussle would help me.”

“Do you challenge me?” He reached out and ran a hand through the faery’s feather-hair.

“Not yet. Not a real challenge, but blood…yes, I want that.” She leaned forward and snapped her mouth with
an audible clack, and Seth wondered if she had an actual beak.

Niall fisted his hand in her hair and held her head away from him.

She swayed as if they were dancing. “I could ask after Irial. I could mention how wounded he is that you refuse his…counsel.”

“Bitch.”

“That’s all I get?” She glared at him. “A word? I come unbloodied. I come seeking you. I get a
word
? Is this how you treat me after—”

Niall punched her.

She tried to skewer his still-extended arm with the bone-white knife that she was now holding.

They were too fast for Seth to follow. What he could tell was that the faery was more than holding her own. In a few moments, Niall had a series of cuts that looked mostly shallow. He took her legs from under her, but she was up and on him before she even hit the ground.

In the blur of it, she appeared to have a raven’s beak and talons in addition to the short knife. The screeches from her beak-mouth were horrific sounds, battle cries that seemed like they should call the other faeries to her side. Instead, the faeries who’d come with her sat on tables and stools, watching silently.

Niall had her pinned briefly in an embrace of sorts—her back to his chest.

She stayed motionless for a moment. The look on her
face was embarrassing to see: it was not unhappiness but an intimate sort of pleasure. She sighed. “You’re almost worth fighting.”

Then she flung her head backward into Niall’s face with such force that she bloodied his nose and mouth.

Niall didn’t release his hold, though. Instead, he loosed his right hand and cupped her head with it. He took her momentum and spun her to the ground. He kept her on the floor with one hand on her head and his body half on top of her. Niall stayed there, his body pinning the motionless faery.

She turned her bloodied face to his, and the two held each other’s gazes.

Uncomfortable, Seth looked away and realized that the waitress was standing beside him; she said something.

“What?”

The waitress spoke again. “Niall. I didn’t see him leave. Is he coming back?”

With a start, Seth remembered that she couldn’t see the faeries. Only he saw the fight. Only he saw them bloodied and tangled together. He nodded. “Yeah. He’ll be here.”

The waitress gave him an odd look. “You okay?”

“Yeah. Just…you startled me.” He smiled. “Sorry.”

She nodded and moved on to another table.

Behind him, Seth heard Niall say, “My dear?”

Seth turned to see Niall stand and reach down to the faery. “Are we done?”

“Mmmm. Paused. Not done. Never done until you’re
dead.” She took his hand and, with the liquid grace that characterized so many faeries, she came to her feet. Her eyes were unfocused as she gingerly touched her cheek. “That was good, my King.”

The Dark King nodded. He didn’t take his gaze away from her.

“I’ll come for you tonight,” she whispered in what was either a threat or a proposition.

Then she turned her head in a series of short jerky moves, locating each of the six red-palmed faeries unerringly. They moved in unison toward her. Without another word exchanged, the group left as suddenly as they’d arrived.

Niall glanced at Seth. “I’ll be right back.”

He left as well, and Seth sat there, stunned by the random violence and unsure what to think of it.

Seth realized that another person had seen the fight: a faery, invisible to Un-Sighted mortal eyes, stared at him from across the room. Coarse white hair was bound back into a tiny knot at the crown of his head. His features were sharp, angular in ways that made him seem carved. It was a different sort of sculpture than what Seth created, but in the instant, Seth’s hands itched for a block of dark stone to try to sculpt an opposite piece. The pale faery stood staring, and for a moment, Seth wondered if he was alive. He was so inflexible that the illusion of being carved was complete.

Once Niall returned a few minutes later, he was not so blood-covered. His glamour hid the state of his clothes and the cuts on his skin, so the only mortal in the room who saw
that anything had changed was Seth.

When Niall sat down at the table again, Seth said, “Do you know him?”

Niall followed Seth’s gaze to the side of the room where the statuelike faery still stood. “Unfortunately.” Niall removed a cigarette case from a pocket and slid one out. “Devlin is Sorcha’s ‘peacekeeper,’ or her thug, depending on who’s doing the defining.”