Loose Changeling: A Changeling Wars Novel (15 page)

She gave me a little smirk and shrugged. “It’s funny; I always thought things would be the other way around, with you, Mom, and Dad bailing me out. Look, you didn’t tell me not to tell them, and Mark and I have been on a tight budget since Justine was born. Mom offered to kick forward the cash.”

I looked to my mother. She'd retired a year back but still dressed in a business-casual way. She wore black slacks, a button-up white sweater with an argyle pattern, and had her silver hair pulled into a bun. She hesitated and then stepped closer. “Lainey told us that you'd found out we adopted you. This didn't have anything to do with it, did it?”

“It might have,” I said.

She clutched at her chest. I was certain that beneath the sweater lay a crystal on a chain, or some symbolic pendant. “You really ought to keep your temper, Nicole.”

“And you should have told me a lot sooner!”

My father, ever the peacekeeper, stepped between us, pushing his glasses up his nose. “Can we discuss this in the car, or maybe back at the house?” He looked to me, blue eyes earnest. “Why don't you come back to the house, have a cup of tea, and we'll explain.”

“Fine.” I crossed my arms. “But I can’t stay long.” Angry as I was, I didn’t want to bring the Fae about their ears.

“Lainey?” Dad said.

“Oh, I'll come, too,” she said. “Wouldn't miss it.”

I glared at her, but she ignored my warning look and linked her arm with mine. “It's not that bad, is it?” she leaned in and said to me. “Whoever your biological parents are, they can't be as kooky as Mom and Dad.”

Oh, she had
no
idea.

She squeezed my arm. “Hey, no matter what, you and I are sisters. Forever. I never treated you any different after I found out, did I?”

Lainey had a way of getting under my skin, staying there, and then somehow becoming less irritating. “No, you were as much a pain in the ass as always.”

She laughed as we followed Mom and Dad out into the parking lot. “Yes, well I've gotten better, haven't I? More respectable.”

“Marginally.”

Lainey and I crowded into the backseat of my mom’s blue Prius. My dad took the wheel. It felt almost like old times, except Lainey and I were both grown, and we were pulling out of the parking lot of a jail. I checked the clock. Two in the morning.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, once we’d hit the first stoplight.

“A lot of reasons,” my mom said. She turned in her seat to look at me. “You’ve manifested, haven’t you? You look different than you used to.”

“You knew about that, too?” I clutched at the edge of the seat. I couldn’t believe this.

“Your mother and I were going to tell you,” my father said. “We just never found the right time.”

“The adoption wasn’t exactly, well, legal,” my mother said. “So, we figured it would be best to wait until you were older to tell you.”

“I’m thirty-two,” I said. “How old did I need to be? Sixty?"

Mom and Dad exchanged brief glances. “Let’s wait until we get home,” my mom said. “There are some things we should show you.”

I sat back in the seat, huffing out a sigh. My thoughts tumbled about in my head like loose change in a dryer. I needed to call Kailen when we reached my parents’ place. No sense leaving him in the lurch. I wasn’t worried about the obstruction of justice charges—those would be dismissed as soon as Jane turned up as a human. What I was worried about was facing a champion of the Guardians—in a fight to the death. Did I have it in me to kill someone else? Even if they were one of the Sidhe and not human? Assuming Grian would even make it happen. I'd already decided that I couldn't move every few days. I didn’t want to live my life like that—alone, hunted, and constantly wary.

After what felt like forever, we pulled into the driveway of my parents' home. It looked deceptively small from the outside, but I knew the stats. Three bedrooms, two and a half baths, and one den, which my mother had claimed as an office. As soon as we walked inside, my mother swept past and beckoned us toward the den.

If there was one place in the house Lainey and I had been forbidden from entering, it was this room. Mom had worked from home twice a week once I'd turned eight, and she hated any interruptions. She'd always told us that every interruption made whatever task she'd been doing take twice as long.

It felt strange even now, at thirty-two, to walk into that space. A desk lay against one wall, a bookshelf on the opposite wall. Beneath the window were two long file cabinets, each with three drawers. Various paraphernalia hung on the walls and sat on shelves. Crystal wands, dream catchers, even a replica Excalibur sword. I'd never really understood my mother. She'd treated salespeople's claims with the highest doubt, and yet she believed in burning three white candles under a new moon to bring luck.

I hung near the doorway with Lainey and my father as she made her way to the left file cabinet, unlocked it, and opened the bottom drawer. She pulled out a file box. “This is all of it. I thought about throwing it out when you'd not manifested by your twenty-first birthday. But I didn't.” She walked over me and held it out.

I took it, more than a little mystified. “That's it?”

“Open it,” she said.

I sat down on the white shaggy carpet and lifted the lid. Lainey sat next to me, shoulder-to-shoulder, her presence offering me support. A collection of odd items, piled one on top of the other, met my gaze. I reached in and pulled out the first one to meet my fingertips. It was a tiny dress, made of a shimmering, gauzy material. Blue butterfly wings had been sewn onto the front, in the pattern of a flower.

My mother pulled up the chair from the desk, as my father leaned against the doorframe. “It's the dress you came to us in. You were so tiny, so perfect. You had eyes dark as chocolate, but when I picked you up, your eyes turned green—my green.”

I pulled out the next item—a stuffed horse. Its hair was softer than cashmere, white and fluffy. As I held it, it moved, nuzzling its head beneath one of my palms. Lainey shrieked. I dropped it, adrenaline giving a brief kick to my heart.

“Well,” my father said, “you can see why we didn't let you keep that one.”

“Did that just move?” Lainey said.

“I'm not human,” I said. The words felt as though they fell from another person's lips. “I'm Fae. I'm a Changeling.”

“Oh shit,” Lainey said. “For real? Like those fairytales Dad used to read to us?”

“Not quite.” My dad spoke up from behind us. “We weren’t duped, and we didn’t give up a human child in return.”

“We really wanted to have a baby,” my mother said. She clasped her hands in front of her and leaned down. For one of the few times in my memory, she looked worried. “We tried for five years. When we’d just about given up, I found an old book in the library that mentioned a fertility rite. It seemed stupid at the time, but I was willing to try anything. It didn’t make me pregnant, but it did put me in touch with Maera and Faolan. They offered to bring me you.”

“In touch with them?” I asked. “They came here?”

My mother flushed. “I saw them in a dream. They set certain conditions—I couldn’t tell anyone, and they’d come for you when you manifested your Fae powers. They told me you’d adjust to look like us. I agreed. Maera told me she would bring you in six months. The next day, I quit my job, told people I was pregnant, and started preparing for your arrival.”

Lainey let out a breathless laugh. “My God, Mom, you were crazy!”

She shrugged. “A little.”

“It wasn’t the best time in our marriage,” my father said, “but I’d stick by your mom through anything. Well, I got the shock of my life six months later.”

My mother reached down and put a hand into the file box. She pulled out a photograph and gave it to me. “He showed up in the middle of the night, and he brought me you.”

I looked down at the photo and my fingertips went numb. It was the entrance hall of a house I no longer remembered. Standing by the door, a confused look in his eyes, was Kailen. He was dressed in a collared shirt, a black peacoat, and gray slacks and scarf. He didn’t look a day younger than when I’d seen him at the dinner table. Bundled in his arms, in a white blanket, was a baby, mouth open in a wail, face pink. Me.

He didn’t know why Faolan and Maera created a Changeling? He
respected
them? The things Kailen had told me echoed in my head. Lies. He’d been there, from the very beginning. From my beginnings.

CHAPTER TWELVE

I couldn’t put the photograph down. I stared at it, Kailen’s startled gaze looking straight back into mine.

“I'm going to go make some tea,” my dad said. He retreated.

I breathed out and finally tore my gaze away from the photo. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“As I said before, your adoption wasn't strictly legal.” My mother's tone became brusque. “If I told you, and you told someone else, not only could your father and I have gotten into trouble, but the state might have taken you away from me. That was the last thing I wanted.”

There was something she wasn't telling me. I knew, because she had that high-pitched, breathy tone at the end of her words—the same one I had when I didn't tell the whole truth. I reached back into the box and pulled out an odd trinket. It was a lock of hair, bound with a silver chain. “What's this?”

“That...well. Remember I said that the last thing I wanted was for you to be taken away from me?”

Lainey reached over and took my arm. I turned the full force of my attention on my mother, lifting the lock of hair. “What did you do?”

“Maera told me that there's some witch blood in my family, going way back. So I tried a binding spell. To stop you from manifesting your powers. See, the deal was, as soon as you manifested, you'd be Maera's and Faolan's again.”

The room swam. I wasn't sure whether to be angry, sad, grateful that my mother loved me that much, or just numb. “When was I supposed to manifest?”

My mother grimaced. “Twelve? Thirteen? I guess I couldn't hold it off forever.”

I shivered, feeling another cold flash coming on. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “It was selfish. Please don’t hate me.”

“I can’t,” I said. “You’re my mom.”

She started to cry. I couldn’t stand it when my mom cried. It happened so seldom that it always made me uncomfortable, and she never just shed a tear or two. She full out bawled, rosy cheeks going blotchy, nose running, tears gathering at her chin.

Lainey and I exchanged glances. “Calm down, Mom,” she said. “Nicole isn't going anywhere.”

I cleared my throat. “Actually, I really should go. And I need to use the phone.”

“Oh, I called Owen already,” my mother said between sobs. “I told him we were picking you up. He”—she stopped, reached for a tissue on her desk, and blew her nose—“he said he'd be over soon.”

Three days of mayhem. I hadn't told my parents that Owen and I were on the outs. “Did he say anything to you?” I asked.

My mom sniffed, pulled another tissue, and wiped her nose. “No. Just that he'd be here.”

Owen
would
leave me to explain things. I supposed it was my place. “Mom, we're getting a divorce.”

She burst into fresh sobs.

My dad walked in, carrying a tray with four tea mugs. “Tea?” He set it down on the desk and sighed. “For goodness sake, Ellie.” He rubbed her shoulders and handed her another tissue. “You know no one can talk to you when you’re like this.”

At least it didn't take very long for the sobs to run their course. She wiped at her eyes and blew her nose one last time. “Tell me what happened.”

I did, from the time I'd manifested to the police showing up at my door. “So I have to issue a challenge to the Guardians and hope that Grian manipulates them into accepting it. Otherwise I'm dead.”

My mother turned and pulled out a drawer in her desk. She lifted a book out of it—leather binding, yellowed, uneven pages, the works. “Don’t go until I've made you a protection charm,” she said, flipping through it, her back straight. “It's the least I can do, after how I've messed things up.”

“Cool,” Lainey said. “So does that mean I might have witch powers too?”

“Maybe,” my mother said.

I glared at Lainey. I'd just told her I would probably die, and she was excited about having powers?

My sister caught my glare. “You're going to be fine, honey. If there's anything I know about you, it's that you never give up and you're tougher than Mom’s attempts to grill steak. Sucks that you have to kill someone though.”

I just shook my head, got up, and took my mug of tea. It warmed my hands, chasing away the chill that had crept to my shoulders. I leaned against the wall next to my dad, looking down at the items that revealed my past.

He clinked his mug to mine. “You okay?”

I rested my head on his shoulder. “I don't know. I might be, someday.”

“Well, I hope that someday is sooner rather than later,” he said.

“Thanks, Dad.”

The doorbell rang. Lainey jumped to her feet. “I'll get it.” It rang again, before she left the office. “Yeah, yeah,” she said.

I breathed in the steam.
Be calm, Nicole. Calm. Kailen has to have an explanation
. The smell of mint and green tea wafted up my nose. I heard Lainey open the door. “Oh! Someone help!”

I set my mug on one of the file cabinets, not caring that the tea sloshed over the edge at my careless movements, and rushed into the hallway. Owen stood in the doorway, Jane hanging out of his pocket. He had Kailen's arms slung over his shoulders and his blue sweater was covered with blood. Kailen's blood. Lainey was already next to Owen, helping him drag Kailen inside. “We have to call an ambulance,” she said.

They laid him down on the tile floor of the hallway. Owen closed the door.

“No,” Kailen choked out. “No ambulance.” He cracked an eye open, saw me. “Good, you're here.” His teeth were red with blood. The collared shirt he wore was torn in two places, exposing wounds that still trickled. “Just turn off the light.”

Lainey reached over and flicked the switch. As soon as she did, Kailen closed his eye, his breathing becoming slow and steady. Neither Owen nor Lainey could see in the dark, but I could.