I wasn’t the only one: basically everyone in my row was holding still, as if that would somehow keep them from being noticed by the outgoing kings and queens. Having the Luidaeg with us probably helped a lot, since no one wanted to poke the Firstborn if they could help it.
Sylvester cast a look in our direction as he walked up the aisle, like he wanted to come over and speak to me, but didn’t quite have the nerve. I turned my face to the side, not waving him over, and eventually, he just left.
Tybalt didn’t look at us at all.
Politics were politics, and I could worry about them later. For now, I had bigger things to focus on. Twisting in my seat, I leaned forward until I could see Karen. “Honey, are you okay?”
Her face crumpled, like she’d been holding herself together by the thinnest of lines. “Auntie Birdie!” she wailed, flinging herself across Quentin to get to me. She wound up mostly in my lap, arms around my neck, legs slung over his lap. Quentin looked nonplussed but didn’t say anything. He knew she wasn’t trying to invade his personal space, no matter how much she was succeeding.
“Oh, honey.” I put my arms around her and held her as tightly as I could, feeling the warm wetness of her tears against my neck. She was crying too hard to talk. I stroked her back with one hand, turning to look at the Luidaeg.
“Karen appeared on my doorstep at sundown,” she said. “I was already planning to come to this shit-storm circus, so she’s lucky she didn’t miss me. Said my scumbag sister had appeared in her dreams and threatened her family if she didn’t come and represent her interests.”
There was a lot of “she” and “her” in that sentence, but I followed it well enough, especially because I knew where the Luidaeg’s restrictions were. She couldn’t say Eira’s name, or any of her aliases. For her, Evening Winterrose was a pronoun and a problem, a looming disaster that had already killed her once and wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
I also knew that whatever Evening had said to threaten Karen, she could follow through on those threats. We’d learned that Karen was an oneiromancer after she was taken captive by Blind Michael, who had been a Firstborn son of Oberon and Maeve, and hence the Luidaeg’s younger brother. He’d stolen Karen while she was sleeping, leaving her body behind while he prisoned her dreaming form in a glass ball. If one of the Firstborn could hurt her that way, I had no doubt that another Firstborn—especially one as powerful as Evening—could do the same.
“You know, I was worried when we started working on this cure,” I said bitterly. “I thought ‘well, hell, we just got Evening out of the way for a hundred years, and now we have to worry about somebody waking her up like the villain from a bad slasher movie.’ Only now even elf-shot can’t keep her from hurting my family. Why didn’t we kill her, again?”
“Because if you were in violation of Oberon’s Law, you’d be imprisoned or executed, and either way, you wouldn’t be able to finish my training,” said Quentin. His voice shook. He was as unhappy as I was about this; he just didn’t know what to do about it. It didn’t help that Evening was his Firstborn. Everything he was told him he should obey and honor her, not side against her. Carefully, he reached over and patted Karen’s shoulder. “Hey. It’ll be okay. Toby’s not going to let her hurt you.”
Sometimes I was so proud of that kid that it hurt. I stroked Karen’s hair with one hand, and asked, “Anybody got any bright ideas about how to keep Evening from using Karen as her catspaw forever once she gets woken up?”
“What?” Karen pulled back, letting me see her tear-streaked face. Her eyes were wide, glossy, and filled with tears. “What do you mean?”
I frowned at her, confused. “I meant that after the cure is approved, and Evening is woken up, what’s going to make her leave you alone?”
“She didn’t send me here because she wants the cure to be used, Auntie Birdie,” said Karen. “She sent me here because she wants it to be buried.”
I stared at her. So did Quentin. The Luidaeg, who had presumably heard this before, sighed and pushed herself to her feet.
“Okay, kids,” she said. “Let’s go eat.”
Karen climbed out of my lap. Walther, Quentin, and I stood, and together, the five of us walked toward the door. When we were halfway there, Karen took my hand. I didn’t pull away.
SEVEN
MOST OF THE LOCAL NOBLES had loaned Arden members of their household for the duration of the conclave, making up for the shortcomings in staffing at the kingdom level. Arden was still getting established, and had a lot of hiring to do before she’d be operating at full capacity. Besides, this guaranteed those nobles a steady source of gossip, even if they weren’t attending the conclave themselves.
It also meant that when we stepped into the ballroom, Karen and I were no longer the only changelings in the place. The fact that we were the only changelings not holding serving trays wasn’t exactly reassuring, but that’s life in Faerie. Sometimes the reminders that we’ll always be a feudal society are impossible to ignore.
Tables were set up around the room. There were no assigned seats, but people tended to stick to what they knew. One table was on a raised dais, reserved for the leaders of the conclave. It held Arden, the High King and High Queen, Queen Siwan of Silences . . . and Tybalt. I stopped dead when I saw him sitting there, talking with High King Sollys, an expression of deep solemnity on his face.
The Luidaeg touched my elbow. “Muir Woods is technically within the bounds of the Court of Dreaming Cats,” she murmured, voice low enough that she probably wouldn’t be overheard. “That gives your kitty-boy equal claim to the land, if he wanted to get cranky about it. By attending this conclave, he said, ‘Hey, treat me as an equal,’ and so they are. I bet he’s on the stage when we resume. They just didn’t know he was coming in time to avoid putting him in the audience when he first showed up.”
Tybalt knew Arden. He could have told her he was coming. The fact that he hadn’t could only have been intentional, a move designed to put her off her guard. It might have been a reaction to her failure to invite him in the first place: I didn’t know. I didn’t know a lot of things, including what sort of game he was playing here, and since I couldn’t ask him, it was difficult to keep the pit in my stomach from opening even wider than it had before.
The Luidaeg gave me a sympathetic look. “Never forget that he’s from a different Court. You can love him—I know you do—and he can love you, but there are places where your differences will always win out. Maybe it’s good that this is happening now, while you still have the distance to see them.” She reached over and carefully untangled my fingers from Karen’s. “You, come with me. We need to do a circuit of the room, so everyone here remembers you’re under my protection.”
Karen bit her lip and nodded, only looking back once as the Luidaeg led her away.
Walther, Quentin, and I stood silent for a moment, taking in the room. Whoever was in charge of the decorating—probably Lowri, given how recently Madden had been woken—had pulled out all the stops. Redwood boughs draped with fog-colored ribbons formed great arcs across the ceiling, heavy with the glittering shapes of pixies and fireflies. The floor was hidden by a warm, conjured mist that smelled of blackberries and the sea. Everywhere I looked there were servers in the colors of the Kingdom, moving through the crowd with trays of drinks and small canapés. Most people were seated by this point, and the servers were bringing them baskets of fragrant bread and larger glasses of sparkling wine.
The only table not being attended by one or more servers in Arden’s livery had been claimed by the King and Queen of Highmountain. They sat alone while their Barrow Wight handmaid rushed back and forth, bringing them trays of delicacies, carting away their empty glasses, and trying to avoid colliding with any of the servers.