Chimes at Midnight

SIXTEEN

TYBALT PICKED ME UP before stepping onto the Shadow Roads. I huddled against him, holding my breath and squinting my eyes tightly shut. Better a few frozen eyelashes than a pair of frozen eyeballs. Before I got hit in the face with an evil pie, I would have joked about my eyes growing back. Now . . . well. Until we got things sorted, these were the only eyes I was going to get.

The thought was morbid enough that I clapped a hand over my mouth to stop myself from laughing. Given how little air I had left, that would have been a terrible idea.

Then we were stepping out into the warm, still air of the San Francisco night. I coughed as Tybalt put me down, steadying me with one hand while I wiped the ice from my face. Finally, I opened my eyes and said, “That’s it. You’re nice and all, but I need something with a little more horsepower if I’m going to be running back and forth across the Bay Area.”

He quirked a faint smile. “Are you dumping me for your car?”

“Come on. You always knew it was coming.” I coughed again, grimacing as my cold-chapped lips threatened to split. “But seriously. I can’t keep taking the Shadow Roads everywhere we go. If it means the Queen can track me, so be it.”

“Ah.” Tybalt paused, indecision clear. “I suppose this would be a bad time to point out that your vehicle remains in Pleasant Hill.”

“We’ll work it out.” I started walking toward the Luidaeg’s apartment. None of the Queen’s men were lurking this time—at least, none that I could see. There was always the chance that . . . wait. I stopped dead in my tracks.

“October?” asked Tybalt. “What is it?”

“I’m an idiot,” I said.

“Yes, frequently, but what now?”

“The Luidaeg said I’d be able to see through any illusion while I had the fireflies, and so what did I do? I left them in their damn flask, and then I left the damn thing at the Library.” I started to walk a little faster now. “I need my car, and I need those fireflies, at least until I can get my hands on a hope chest. You know, I did not sign up for a crazy fairy tale scavenger hunt this week.”

“Yes, you did,” said Tybalt, pacing me. I shot him a sharp look. He shrugged. “You got out of bed. The universe does seem to take that as a personal affront.”

The urge to call him something unforgiveable was strong. I settled for glaring and walking faster until we reached the Luidaeg’s door. It looked the same as always. I’d never been able to see through her illusions anyway. Raising my hand, I hammered against the water-damaged wood loudly enough to wake the dead. Then I stepped back, and waited.

It wasn’t a long wait. The door opened just a crack, revealing the scowling, suspicious face of the Luidaeg. She blinked when she saw me, suspicion fading first into puzzlement, and finally into raw shock. Allowing the door to swing the rest of the way open, she said, “Toby?”

“Yeah,” I confirmed.

“Bullshit.”

I blinked. “Okay, that’s not the reaction I was expecting. Look. I have my knife, I have my jacket, I have my sarcastic tag-along . . . what else is required for the position? Because I’m way too tired to stand out here and argue about my identity any longer than I need to. I need your help.”

“What you don’t have is a hell of a lot of fae blood,” the Luidaeg said. Her hand shot forward, grabbed my upper arm, and hauled me into the apartment. Tybalt followed, not protesting her rough treatment of me. Even Kings of Cats have to come with some sense of self-preservation.

“Ow!” I protested, trying—and failing—to pull myself out of her grasp.

She raised her head, eyes narrowed, and turned toward Tybalt. “Close the door,” she said. Then she started walking, hauling me toward her bedroom.

I had time to note that the illusions normally filling her apartment were gone, leaving the place visibly impeccable. She knocked three times when she reached her bedroom door—she almost always did that, and I never knew why—before opening it to reveal the dark, candle-filled cavern of her bedroom. The walls were lined with saltwater tanks. I couldn’t make my eyes focus on half of them, although I knew their contents: that one held hippocampi, brightly-colored as reef fish and the size of my hand; that one housed a pearl-eyed sea dragon the length of my arm. His name was Ketea, and the Luidaeg once used one of his scales to turn me into a Merrow.

“Sit,” she commanded, shoving me toward the large bed. I stumbled backward, barely managing to avoid hitting my hip on one of the carved wooden posts that held up the canopy. She planted her hands on her hips, eyeing me. I squirmed, but didn’t say anything. It seemed better not to. Finally, she said a single word: “How?”

“Someone hit me in the face with a pie,” I said.

The Luidaeg blinked, expression going slack. The candlelight threw strange shadows over her cheeks, and made my stomach clench. I don’t like candles. “That’s . . . wait . . . what? You’re almost human because someone’s been watching too many damn Bugs Bunny cartoons?”

“I don’t know whether I should be horrified or impressed that you know who Bugs Bunny is.” I leaned back to rest most of my weight on my hands and said, “It was a goblin fruit pie. Jin at Shadowed Hills thinks my body liked the fruit so much that it wanted to experience the stuff more strongly, and so it shifted itself around without consulting me. I was sort of overdosing at the time.”

“And you can’t turn yourself all the way human,” said the Luidaeg grimly. “Thank Dad for that.”

I blinked at her. “I didn’t know that.”

“Faerie protects itself, and good thing, too. If you didn’t have that particular failsafe built into your powers, you’d be mortal, and we’d be screwed.”

“But couldn’t we find a hope chest and . . .”

“You’ve said it yourself, October: you can’t make something stronger when it’s not there. If your body had been capable of chasing the goblin fruit all the way into mortality, you’d be off the playing field permanently. Have a nice life, all sixty or seventy years of it, and try not to remind your old enemies who you are. It can be done to you, but it’s not a thing you can do to yourself.” She reached out and grasped my chin, turning my face roughly one way, and then the next. “Right now, you’re basically a merlin. Ten, maybe fifteen percent fae. Even when Amy was fucking with you as a child, she never jobbed you as good as you’ve just jobbed yourself. Gold star, moron.”

“Is there nothing that can be done?” asked Tybalt. I pulled my head from the Luidaeg’s grasp and turned to see him standing near the open bedroom door.

“There’s plenty, assuming you can keep her alive long enough to do it.” The Luidaeg snapped her fingers, pulling my attention back to her. “Hey. Look at me, human girl. How bad is the craving? How many of us would you stab for a jar of jam?”

“It’s not bad right now,” I said. “We went to Walther before we came here. He figured out a stopgap that I should be able to use long enough for us to figure out something more permanent.”

The Luidaeg raised an eyebrow. “Methadone won’t work.”

“I’m not even going to ask why you know what methadone is, but no.” I pulled the baggie of blood gems out of my inside jacket pocket. “He made these from my blood. They dull the wanting for a little while.” But not for long. I could feel it starting to twist in my gut again, telling me that nothing in this world mattered half as much as seeing the beautiful things the goblin fruit had to show me.

“Your little alchemist does delight in surprises, doesn’t he? May I?” She didn’t actually wait for permission before snatching the bag out of my hand, opening it, and removing one of the larger blood gems. She held it up so that it glittered in the candlelight. “Hmm. Good work. I couldn’t have done better.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously.” She dropped the blood gem back into the bag. “I’m not an alchemist. What he’s done is tricking your body into believing that it’s being fed. That’s flower magic, like illusions, and he gets that from his connection to Titania. I’m all blood and water. I could turn you into a turtle so you’d die a little slower, but I couldn’t make your mind into a turtle’s mind.”

“That’s a charmingly specific distinction.” I reclaimed the baggie, tucking it back into my pocket. “I need help.”

The Luidaeg snorted. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

“I can’t stay this human. The goblin fruit will kill me. I’m not sure how to call my mother—and given what she wanted to do to me before, I don’t know whether calling her would do any good.”

“Ah,” said the Luidaeg softly. “I guess I can see where that would be a concern.”

“Yeah.” When my mother first changed my blood, she wasn’t trying to make me more fae; she was trying to turn me human, to protect me from whatever lunatic destiny she was afraid lurked for our bloodline. And maybe we have some sort of destiny. I’ve had more than a few soothsayers and prophets predict that I’m going to be involved in something big, whether or not I want to be. She thought that turning me human would save me, and maybe she was right; I don’t really know one way or another. But I do know that when I was elf-shot and would have died immediately, she’d changed the balance of my blood to make me more fae.

I just wasn’t sure she’d be willing to do it again.

“What were you hoping I could do for you? I don’t have Amy’s gifts. I can’t make you any more or less mortal than you are right now.” The Luidaeg grimaced. “I could wrap you in a Selkie’s skin, but that’s a step that can’t be taken back. You’d never be Dóchas Sidhe again.”

My eyes widened. For the Luidaeg to even offer . . . “No. I don’t want that. I was hoping you’d be able to tell us whether there were any hope chests in the Kingdom other than the one the Queen is holding.”

“Ah.” The Luidaeg looked relieved. I couldn’t blame her. The Selkies were skin-shifters, and the skins they wore had been flayed from the living bodies of the Roane. Every Firstborn had his or her own descendant races. The Roane had been hers.

The Luidaeg’s relief faded quickly, and she shook her head. “I’m sorry, Toby, but no. The only hope chest in this Kingdom is the one you surrendered to the Queen. If you want it, you need to get access to the treasury.”

“And we’re back to insurrection.” I sighed. “That’s still the plan, mind you, but I was hoping to be a little more indestructible when I pulled the trigger. Also, alive. Alive figures heavily in my long-term plans.” As human as I was at the moment, I wasn’t even sure the night-haunts would come if I died. The thought filled me with a new form of sick terror. Faerie lives on in the night-haunts. They’re the closest we can come to actual eternity. I’ve never been in a hurry to join them, but the idea that I might not join them at all was . . . unsettling.

“So what’s next?”

“There’s a book at the Library. No title, bound in blue samite, written by Antigone of Albany. It has records of where the hope chests went after they were handed out—including the one the Queen has now. Got any ideas on where we could find her? Maybe this Antigone lady can give us some suggestions on where to get our hands on an alternative.”

The Luidaeg stared at me for a long moment. Then, mirthlessly, she laughed. “Oh, how quickly they forget. Yeah, Toby. I know where to find Antigone.”

“Great!” I moved to stand. “Where—”

“That’s the name my parents gave me, after all.”

I jumped the rest of the way to my feet. “What?”

“Oh, Toby, Toby, Toby.” The Luidaeg reached over and pushed me gently back into a sitting position. “You didn’t think Maeve looked at me in my cradle and went ‘let’s name her Luidaeg,’ do you? My name—my given name—is Antigone. I was born in Scotland. We called it ‘Albany’ at the time. To be honest, I like that name a lot better, but what kind of vote do I get? I moved out centuries ago.”

“You—I—what?”

“All Firstborn have names, Toby. We chose to hide them behind titles a long time ago, when we realized it was time for us to take a big step away from Faerie. Even the strongest of our descendants were weak compared to us, their parents and originals. We didn’t have to leave. But we did have to create a barrier, to remind the children of our children that we were something more than tools to be used.”

“Blind Michael,” I said, softly.

“Yes. And Black Annis, and Gentle Annie—her name was Anglides, before she shortened it and turned it into a warning. The Mother of Trees.” The Luidaeg looked at me levelly. “We took titles as a warning. ‘Stay away. Here there be monsters.’”

“So you can’t help me,” I said quietly.

“I didn’t say that.” She held out her hand. “Give me one of those chunks of blood.”

I pulled out the bag, eyeing her warily. “Why?”

“Because I asked you to, stupid.”

“Right. Do not argue with the woman who could take your head off.” I pulled one blood gem from the bag and dropped it into her palm.

“See, if you were always that smart, we’d have a better working relationship.” The Luidaeg closed her hand. “I’ll be right back.” She turned and left the room, leaving the two of us alone.

Tybalt moved to sit down next to me on the bed. I scooted over so that my leg was pressed against his, and rested my head on his shoulder. He sighed, a sound that was somewhere between exhaustion and relief, and raised a hand to stroke my hair.

“We will come through this,” he said. “If I have to find your mother myself, and drag her kicking and screaming from whatever hole she is currently hiding in, we will come through this.”

“And if we don’t?” I twisted so I could see his face. “What if it’s me, and chunks of frozen blood, and a human grave? What then?”

“Then I stay beside you for as long as we have.” He kept stroking my hair. Cats like to be petted. Cait Sidhe like to pet. “October, I meant it when I told you I was not leaving you. I will never leave you while both of us are living. You were not quite this human when I met you, and you were far less human when I finally allowed myself to love you. But the essential core of your being has remained the same no matter what the balance of your blood.”

“How is it that you always know the exact right stupid romance novel thing to say?” I asked, leaning up to kiss him.

He smiled against my lips. When I pulled back, he said, “I was a student of Shakespeare centuries before the romance novel was even dreamt. Be glad I do not leave you horrible poetry on your pillow, wrapped securely around the bodies of dead rats.”

“Cait Sidhe romance,” I said, and laughed. “It’s definitely different.”

“I simply wish to ensure you are never bored.”

“Toby doesn’t do ‘bored,’” said the Luidaeg, walking back into the room. She was carrying a baggie of her own. This one was smaller, and contained what looked like a handful of black cherry cough drops, larger and darker than the blood gems I’d gotten from Walther. She thrust it toward me. “Here.”

“What—?” I took the bag.

“I can’t transform your blood into something that can sustain you, but I can freeze mine. If things get desperate, try one of these. Just . . . make sure things are bad, okay? They’re going to have a hell of a kick.”

I looked at the lozenges with newfound respect, and more than a little wariness. “You froze your own blood?” My magic drew power from blood—any blood. But the blood of a Firstborn wasn’t something to mess around with. I could do myself some serious damage with her blood, if I took too much of it, if the power overwhelmed me.

And that was a risk worth taking, if the Luidaeg really thought that it would help.

“I have plans for you, October Daye. They don’t include you dying human of a stupid addiction.” The Luidaeg shook her head. “I can’t help you get a hope chest. I can’t even necessarily help you find your mother—although I can go looking for her, and I will, as soon as you people get the hell out of my bedroom. Don’t come looking for me. I’ll find you.”

“On that terrifying thought . . .” I stood, tucking the bag of lozenges into my jacket. Both my inside pockets were filled with solidified blood now: mine and the Luidaeg’s. I just hoped I wouldn’t confuse the two. “Tybalt, you good for a trip back to my car? It’s time for me to go back onto the grid, and stop wanting to pass out every time we move from point A to point B.”

“Or you could call your friend the taxi driver,” said the Luidaeg. “Don’t exhaust your allies, Toby. You’re going to need them before the night is through. Now get out.”

I considered asking what she meant, but knew I wouldn’t get anything but vague implications of danger to come and maybe some profanity I hadn’t heard in a while. So I just nodded, and said, “I’ll call if anything changes,” before following Tybalt out of the bedroom and heading for the front door.

I was about to step out when a hand descended on my shoulder. I looked back to see the Luidaeg standing behind me, concern written baldly on her face.

“You’re fragile right now,” she said. “Try to be careful, okay? You’re the only niece I’m actually speaking to these days. I’m not in the mood to see you dead.”

“I’ll try,” I said.

She scowled. “Next time, say it like you mean it. Now out.” She pushed me over the threshold, slamming the door behind me.

Tybalt blinked.

I looked at him, and smiled. “She really does care,” I said, before digging my phone out of my pocket. I flipped it open, scrolled through my contact list, and raised it to my ear. A few seconds later, I said, “Hello, Danny? It’s October. I need a ride . . .”