“Paige, you don’t understand,” Lee says. “My father lost his arm—”
“‘I haven’t seen my brother in years.’ ‘I need to know he’s alive.’” Paige’s mocking imitation of Lee is actually pretty good. “I was helping you because I thought you cared about him.”
“That’s enough of this,” Lena cuts in, descending to the middle step of her dais. She looks at Naito. “You know where your father is keeping the serum?”
“I can find out.”
“I’ll have Trev fissure you home,” she says. “But you have to promise not to go after your father on your own. We need the serum first.”
We need more than the serum, actually—all his father’s notes and research, his backed-up documents, hell, maybe even his scientist—but something in the way Lena’s talking about all of this bothers me. It’s like she’s hinging all her hope on winning this war on getting the serum. Or, more specifically, getting more Sighted humans.
“You know you can’t actually use it, don’t you?” I say.
Her head tilts ever so slightly. “We don’t have enough humans to watch all portions of the wall and palace.”
“I know, but who are you going to give it to?” I ask. “Most humans have no clue the fae exist.”
“We’ll introduce ourselves,” she says. I can’t tell if she’s being sarcastic or not.
I shake my head. “You can’t interfere with people’s lives like that. They shouldn’t be made to fight a war for you.”
She exhales sharply. She’s annoyed with me, but I don’t care. I won’t let her do this.
“I won’t force them to help us,” she says. “I’ll ask. And with their help, this war shouldn’t last much longer.”
“So what are you going to do? Give the humans the Sight, then dump them back on Earth when you’re finished with them?”
Aren steps forward. “Maybe we should talk about this later. We’re all tired.”
“I’m not,” Paige says. “I still want to talk to Tylan.”
Lena levels a cool gaze on my friend. “I don’t know who you’re talking about. We’ve captured a lot of remnants in the last week.”
We’ve killed a lot of them, too, but I’m glad Lena doesn’t go there.
I cut in. “They can stay for now in a room near mine—”
“Two rooms,” Paige interjects.
“Two rooms near mine,” I amend.
Lena’s eyes narrow. “She can go when she answers my questions.”
Questions, not question. Lena will turn this into a full-fledged interrogation if I don’t get Paige out of here now. It’s my fault Paige is mixed up in all of this; I have to keep her safe. And more, I want to talk to her. Alone. I need to convince her that the rebels aren’t the bad guys. I look at Aren, hold his gaze long enough for him to know what I want.
“Let them go,” he says to Lena. “McKenzie will talk to them.”
I move too quickly to grab Paige’s arm. My ribs protest, but I grit my teeth and pull her toward the exit before Lena gets it into her mind to object again. I half expect her to order us to stop or to put up a wall of air to prevent us from going any farther.
When we’re almost to the end of the hall, Paige leans toward me, and says quietly, “I don’t like her.”
I give her a tight smile. “I didn’t either.”
“So why are you helping them?” she asks. “They kidnapped you, didn’t they? Because you’re the best shadow-tracker or something.”
“That’s what the remnants of the Court told you.”
“Yeah. And they promised me they’d free you. It was one of those if-I-help-them, they-help-me things. I wasn’t even sure you were alive, but…” She shrugs. “You are. They didn’t lie about that.”
“They just lied about me being a prisoner, still.”
“I’m not sure if they knew what your status was.”
Oh, they definitely knew. They’ve tried to capture and kill me enough times in the past couple of weeks that there’s no denying it.
We turn down a hall, and I catch a glimpse of Lee behind us. He’s quiet, walking with his hands in the pockets of his jeans. From his conversation with Naito, I take it he’s anti-fae like his father, and I wonder if it’s hard being here around the people he hates. I wonder if it’s just Naito he’s come to kill.
Lena must be concerned about that, too, because farther behind us is Trev. He doesn’t exactly look happy to be stuck with this babysitting duty. I actually don’t blame him. It seems like he’s always getting put on the crappy assignments.
“The Court fae lied to me when I worked for them,” I say. “They let me believe they were capturing the fae I tracked for them. They didn’t. The king was brutal in how he tried to win the war. He manipulated things to keep himself in power. Lena isn’t like that. She’s been very open about what she’s done and what she plans to do.”
“What about Aren?” she asks. “He’s the Butcher of Brykeld, right? You acted like you hated him at Amy’s wedding.”
I try to suppress a grimace but fail. I know how my relationship with Aren will sound, and, sure enough, Paige stops.
“Oh, God,” she says, eyes wide. “McKenzie, tell me you didn’t fall in love with your kidnapper. Is that why you switched sides?”
“No!” The word comes out harsher than I intended, but she’s been aware of the fae no more than two weeks, and she’s acting like she knows everything. “I told you why I switched.”
“I thought you were smarter than that,” she continues, as if I didn’t say anything.
“I am,” I snap back. Then I draw in a breath, trying to stay calm. If she’s half as tired as I am, she’s probably on a short fuse, too. I don’t want to fight with her. I want her to see that the rebels are okay and that I am okay. Then I want her to stay out of this war.
“I’m trying to be,” I say, softening my tone. “I’m taking things as slow as I can, but Aren…” This is awkward, talking about my love life. I’ve never done this before. “I don’t really want to take things slow.”
“You’re not sleeping with him?”
I shake my head.
“Because,” Paige continues, “if you are sleeping with him, I want details.”
I almost laugh. Paige doesn’t exactly agree with my relationship with Aren, but she’s not holding it against me. Her ability to accept me for who I am, no matter how crazy I seem…that’s why she’s been my friend for so long.
“This lightning”—she holds up her hand, waits for a chaos luster to strike across it—“I bet it makes just kissing a fae explosive. By the way, I totally get why you never let me shake Kyol or Aren’s hands.”
I smile. “Yeah, sorry about that.”
Something inside me loosens. It’s nice to talk about something other than false-bloods and war, and that little part of me—the one that was so much bigger a month ago—that wants to retire resurfaces. I’m trying to get a job so I can support myself and have something that makes me feel human, but balancing two lives never worked in the past. I don’t know why I think it will work now. I could leave the Realm and the war behind. Lena would flip, but Aren would understand.