“I tasted her magic, Etienne,” I said wearily. “Just trust me on this one, okay? You can copy someone’s face and body, but if they use magic around me, I’ll know that they’re not really who they say they are.”
“Forgive me for being less confident than you are,” he said, standing up a little straighter as he pulled his dignity around himself. “I do not share your particular skills.”
“Don’t put yourself back in the box, darling, it’s not good for you,” said Bridget, pausing to kiss Etienne’s cheek before handing me the socks and sweater. “I can’t say I’ll take her word over yours, but you’ve already admitted she has skills you lack. Maybe that means you should listen to her.”
“I dislike the dead returning to life,” said Etienne, his shoulders slumping again. “It’s untidy and inappropriate.”
“And that’s Etienne in a nutshell,” I said blithely. “Anything inappropriate should cease immediately, because otherwise it might disrupt the natural order in the course of killing us all.”
Chelsea smothered a smile behind her hand. Raj simply watched, expression neutral. He was getting better at the Cait Sidhe trick of hiding his feelings behind a mask of vague disinterest.
“You say that as if it’s a bad thing,” said Etienne.
I was saved from needing to reply by Quentin running into the room. He was faintly out of breath as he said, “The Duchess will see you, but she’ll only see you, and she wants to see you now.” Tybalt ran into the room a few steps behind him, not as out of breath, but definitely more annoyed. Then again, Tybalt had less reason to be forgiving of the Torquills than Quentin did, and he knew how complicated my relationship with Luna really was.
“Let me change and I’ll be ready,” I said, holding up my dry clothes. I turned to Bridget. “Is there a place I can change without doing it in front of everybody?”
Most of Faerie lacks a nudity taboo, but I was raised human for several years, and sometimes it’s nice not to strip in a room full of people. Luckily for me, Bridget understood my reluctance; she nodded and said, “Right this way,” before starting toward one of the doors out of the kitchen.
“Be right back,” I said, and followed her.
We walked down a short hallway to a half-open door. Bridget pushed it the rest of the way open, motioning for me to go inside. “You can change here,” she said. “Bring your wet clothes out with you, and I’ll get them on the rack to dry.”
“Okay,” I said. I closed the door behind myself, leaving Bridget in the hall.
The room contained a large, perfectly made bed, a wardrobe, a desk loaded to the point that I worried about its structural integrity, and several bookshelves that made the desk look empty. More books were stacked on the bedside table. The one on the top of the pile was called A Field Guide to the Little People. I blinked, unsure whether I should be insulted or amused. This was clearly Etienne and Bridget’s room; she couldn’t be blamed for her reading material. Most of it was probably for class, and it was a good thing if she was teaching her students some things that weren’t quite true. The last thing we needed was a bunch of overenthusiastic human college students showing up and asking to meet the local Fairy Queen.
It only took a few minutes to swap my wet shirt and jacket for the dry sweater, remove my wet shoes and socks, and wipe my feet dry enough to let me pull the new socks on. Putting my wet shoes back on over them sort of canceled most of the benefit, but I’d take whatever I could get at this stage in the game.
Bridget was gone when I emerged back into the hall; instead, Quentin was waiting for me, his hands shoved down into his pockets and a distressed look on his face. “What is it?” I asked.
“I don’t like you going to see the Duchess by yourself,” he said.
“Neither does Tybalt, I bet, so why are you the one telling me this?”
He shrugged. “Because he doesn’t like the Torquills much these days—not like he used to—and he thought you’d be a little bit more likely to listen if it was coming from me.”
I raised an eyebrow. “How much more likely are we talking here?”
Quentin raised his hand, holding his thumb and forefinger about half an inch apart.
“That may be a small exaggeration,” I said, and started walking back down the hall to the kitchen. “I am going to go and talk to Luna because with Mom being . . . well, Mom, and the Luidaeg out of commission, Luna is the person most likely to be able to tell me more about Evening. Assuming she is who I think she is.”
“And what if she is?” demanded Quentin. There was an anguished note in his voice that actually made me stop and blink at him. He shook his head, repeating, “What if she is? What if she’s the mother of my kind, October? Do you honestly think I can stand against her? That I can side with you against the Firstborn of my entire race?”
“I don’t know,” I said quietly. “My mother is the Firstborn of my entire race, and I do pretty good standing against her, but my situation isn’t the same as yours. I guess that if I’m right, we’re going to find out whether or not you can be on my side when I’m going up against the root of your tree. But either way, you’ll still be one of my best friends, and I’ll still love you. So don’t worry about it too much.”
“Okay, Toby,” he said, with a smile wobbling at the corners of his mouth.
“Besides, you know that if it comes to that, I’ll go easy on you.” I ruffled his hair before resuming my walk down the hall, leaving him to chase after me. It seemed like the only reasonable way to end the conversation. Because if I was being completely honest . . .
There are a lot of Daoine Sidhe in power in the Westlands, from High King Sollys on down. If Evening was the Daoine Sidhe Firstborn, and her descendants couldn’t bring themselves to stand against her, I was in a lot of trouble.
SEVENTEEN
GETTING QUENTIN AND RAJ to stay behind was surprisingly easy after Chelsea revealed that she had an Xbox and a number of video games that allowed for cooperative play. The boys needed the break. Tybalt and I left Bridget and Etienne’s quarters to the sweet sound of teenagers arguing viciously over who was going to drive the blue car. I smiled despite the situation as I slipped through the open hole in the wall and back into the servants’ halls beyond.
Tybalt glanced at my expression and raised an eyebrow. “Something amusing?”
“Just the kids,” I said. “I like teenagers. I never really thought I would.”
“Ah,” he replied. “Well, I suppose that’s excellent luck on your part, as we’re stuck with them for the time being. Teenagers turn out to be surprisingly difficult to get rid of.”
“I’m pretty good at it.”
“I meant for longer than the duration of an action movie.”
“Yeah, that’s harder.” I shrugged. “But they usually bring me back popcorn, so I’m okay with it.”
Tybalt snorted. “You are too flippant for your own good,” he said. “October, what we are walking into . . .”
“Is dangerous, I know.” I reached out and took his hand, lacing my fingers through his. “Luna sent me to face her father without telling me who she really was because she was scared. I know that. I also know that I haven’t trusted her since then, and that her daughter is in an enchanted sleep because of me. We used to have this really straightforward, sweet relationship, and now it’s like I’m afraid to be alone in a room with her.”
“Growing up often comes at the cost of our heroes,” he said.
I glanced in his direction, even though it was dark enough that all I could really see was the outline of his body. “So what does that say about my relationship with Quentin? I’m a hero of the realm now, remember?”
“You’re his hero, but also his friend, and he idolizes you less than he used to,” said Tybalt, with patient thoughtfulness. “Perhaps if you had never become his knight you would have betrayed his sense of who you were one day—and perhaps it would have been as bad as the betrayal the Duchess Torquill offered you. But you removed yourself from any pedestals he could build as fast as he assembled them. I don’t think you’ll break his heart. Not in that manner, anyway.”