Rosemary and Rue

ONE

DECEMBER HAD COME to San Francisco in fits and starts, like a visitor who wasn’t sure he wanted to stay. The skies were blue one minute and overcast the next; tourists overheated or shivered in their prepacked wardrobes, while residents traded sweaters for tank tops and back in a single afternoon. That’s normal around here. The Bay Area exists in a state of nearly constant spring, where the color of the hills—brown with a strong chance of brushfire in the summer, green and suffering from chronic mudslides in winter—is the only real difference between the seasons.

It was half past six in the morning, and the Safeway grocery store on Mission Street—never much of a happening nightspot, no matter how you wanted to slice it—was virtually deserted. The usual rush of drunks and club kiddies had passed through several hours before, and now all we had was an assortment of early risers, grave-shift workers, and homeless people looking for a warm place to spend the tail end of the night. By silent, mutual agreement, the homeless and I ignored each other. As long as I didn’t admit I could see them, I wouldn’t need to ask them to leave, and we both got to avoid the hassle.

I’m getting good at ignoring things I don’t want to see. Call it an acquired skill. It’s definitely one I’ve been working on.

“Paper or plastic, ma’am?” I asked, not bothering to conceal the weariness in my tone. Half an hour and my shift would be over, leaving me with just enough time to get home before the sun came up.

“Plastic’s fine, honey,” said the woman occupying my lane. Running a hand through oily black curls, she gestured toward my name tag. “Is that really the name your parents gave you?”

Plastering a smile across my face, I began bagging her groceries with the automated ease that comes with long practice. “It is.” She was buying six pints of gourmet ice cream and a twelve-pack of Diet Coke. I’ve seen stranger.

“Hippies, huh?”

No; a faerie woman and her Irish accountant husband. But that was impossible to explain, and so I simply nodded. “Got it in one. That’ll be eighteen fifty-three.”

She swiped her Visa with a grunt, barely waiting for the machine to catch up before she was grabbing her groceries and heading for the door. “You have a good night, honey.”

“You, too, ma’am,” I called. Grabbing her receipt off the register, I held it up. “You forgot your—”

Too late; she was gone. I crumpled the receipt and dropped it into my trash can, leaning against the divider separating my lane from the next. She could come in later and complain to my manager about not getting a receipt, if she felt like it. With my luck, she’d feel like it, and I’d wind up with another black mark on my record. Exactly what I didn’t need. This was my third job since I won free of the pond; the first two were abject failures, largely thanks to my limited working hours, general lack of cultural awareness, and incomplete understanding of modern technology. Who would’ve believed that it could take so much computer know-how to be the night clerk at a 7-Eleven? Not me, that’s for sure, until my inability to reboot the register got me fired. Checking groceries on the graveyard shift might not have been my last chance, but it sure felt like it. At least at Safeway, there was a manager to fix things when they broke.

My fellow employees were nowhere to be seen. Probably hiding in the stockroom again, smoking Juan’s reportedly excellent marijuana and trusting me to hold the front of the store. I didn’t mind. I didn’t take a job as a check-out girl because I wanted to make friends; I did it because I wanted to be left alone.

A flock of pixies was circling the display produce near the side door, flitting in wide circles as their sen tries watched for signs of danger. Dressed in scraps of cloth and bits of discarded paper and armed with tooth-picks and sandwich-spears, they looked ready to go to war over a few grapes and an overripe pear. I braced my elbows on the conveyor belt and dropped my chin into my hands, watching them. I don’t care much for pixies as a rule. They’re pretty but savage, and they’ll attack if you provoke them. Maybe that doesn’t sound like much of a threat, considering that the average pixie is about four inches tall and weighs three ounces soaking wet. They’re like mice with wings and thumbs, except for the part where mice don’t usually come armed with knives carved from broken beer bottles and homemade spears that may have been dipped in equally homemade poisons. At the same time, I had to admire the way they’d adapted. They had an entire community thriving inside this downtown grocery store, and nobody knew about it but me.

Me, and the members of San Francisco’s fae community who chose to shop here. I’d chosen this store specifically because it was so far away from the likely haunts of the people I’d known in my other life. I hadn’t considered the fact that some of them might come looking for me.

“Is this lane open?”

The voice was gruff, familiar, and more than enough to shake me out of my reverie. I jerked back, one arm going out to the side abruptly enough to knock my chin against the conveyor. Vainly trying to recover a shred of my dignity, I forbade myself to rub it as I straightened up, pasted on a smile, and turned toward the source of the voice, replying, “Yes, sir. Just put your groceries on the belt.”

The man at the end of my lane stared at me, concern evident in his expression. “Root and branch, Toby, didn’t that hurt?”

I forced my smile to stay in place. It wasn’t easy. Through my teeth, I said, “I’ll put some ice on it later. Can I have your groceries, sir?”

The man sighed, beginning to unload his cart. “Are we still doing this? I really hoped we’d be done by now. You sure you don’t want to be done? I can wait around. You can come home with me after your shift. I’m off for the night, and Stacy would love to see you. She’d even make pancakes if I called and told her you were coming . . .”

I didn’t answer him, busying myself instead with running his groceries across the scanner. I’d been doing the job long enough that it didn’t require any concentration to take care of such a simple task. That was a good thing, because he didn’t take my lack of answer as a reason to shut up; he kept rambling, trying to catch my interest as I focused on ringing and bagging his groceries.

Once upon a time—not my favorite phrase by a long shot—I let myself admit that the man now standing in front of my register had a name. Mitch Brown. We were kids together in the Summerlands, the last of the fae countries, the place that exists on the other side of every mirror and beyond every unpierced veil of mist. We were both changelings, mixing human blood with stranger things; Nixie and Hob in his case, Daoine Sidhe in mine. We were about the same age, and both of us were struggling to figure out who we could be, living in a world that was nothing like the one we’d started out in. It was natural that we’d latch onto one another, and to the other changelings who came our way—Kerry, half Hob, half airhead; Julie, half Cait Sidhe, all trouble; and Stacy, weak-blooded Stacy, my best friend and his eventual wife.

“That’ll be twenty-six fifteen,” I said, looking up.

Mitch sighed, brushing colorless blond hair back from his forehead. “Toby . . .”

“Cash or charge, sir?”

Mitch paused before sighing again and pulling out his wallet. “You can’t do this forever, you know,” he said, as he handed the money across to me.

“Three eighty-five is your change,” I replied, putting it down on the divider between us. “Thank you for shopping at Safeway.”

“You have the number,” he said, taking the change and shoving it into his pocket without looking. “Call when you’re ready. Please. Call us.”

Then he was gone, walking toward the exit with broad shoulders clenched tight and grocery bags dwarfed by the size of his hands. Hobs are usually tiny people, but in Mitch’s case, his human heritage won out: he could give your average Bridge Troll a complex. Stacy’s barely five foot three. I’ve never understood how the two of them worked things out, but they must have done it somehow, because they had one kid before I vanished and four more while I was gone. I didn’t want to know that. Mitch told me, just like he insisted on telling me everything else I didn’t want to know. He was trying to pull me back into my life while all I wanted to do was run away from it.

Their eldest, Cassandra, is almost the same age as Gillian.

That thought was enough to send my mood crashing even further down. I closed out my register with quick, automatic gestures, counting out the cash drawer and locking it down before anyone else could try to get through my lane. Not that there was much to worry about—the front of the store was deserted except for me and the pixies—but I didn’t care. I needed out.

Three of my fellow employees were in the break room, settled around the coffeepot like vultures around a dying steer. They barely looked up when I came storming in, yanking my apron off over my head and throwing it over the hook with my name on it. Retail: where everybody makes fun of your name.

“Something wrong, October?” That was Pete, the night manager. He always tried to sound compassionate and caring when he was talking to his underlings; mostly, he just managed to sound bored.

“Female troubles,” I said, turning around to face him. He took an automatic step backward. “I know my shift doesn’t end for fifteen minutes, but tomorrow’s my day off, and I didn’t take a break tonight. Can I—”

“Go home. I’ll clock you out.” His gruffness barely concealed his dismay. He was clearly afraid that if I stuck around, I’d start giving him details.

It’s best not to question good fortune. I kicked off my uniform shoes and shoved them into my locker before grabbing out my coat and sneakers, pulling them roughly on, and taking off for the door without giving Pete a chance to change his mind. Three long steps past my disinterested coworkers and I was free, charging out into the freezing cold of the alley behind the store. The door slammed shut behind me, and everything was reduced to a pale, watery gray lit by the distant glow of streetlights.

The fog had rolled in since my shift started, making it impossible to see more than a few feet in any direction. I shoved my hands into my pockets, shivering. When it decides to get cold in San Francisco, it doesn’t mess around. As a little added bonus, I could feel the moisture already beading on my hair and skin. My shoes and the cuffs of my pants would be soaked through long before I made it home.

“Whee,” I muttered, and turned to start for the mouth of the alley. Once I was on the street, I could begin the long, mostly uphill walk home. If I’d stayed to the end of my shift, I would’ve taken the bus, but the encounter with Mitch had left me shaken, and the walk would do me good.

The chill dropped away as I began climbing the first hill between me and my destination, exertion providing the warmth I so desperately needed. I glanced at my watch. If the almanac at the supermarket was correct, we were about thirty-three minutes to dawn. It was enough time, if I didn’t slow down, stop, trip, or do anything but walk. The dawn destroys small enchantments, and that includes everything I’m strong enough to cast—like the illusion that allows me to pass for human. Worse, it’s incapacitating, at least temporarily. If I was in the open when the sun came up, I could find myself with a starring role in a tabloid before noon. Still, there was time, as long as nothing got in the way.

The street curved as it moved up the hill, taking me through the slowly paling morning. I kept my hands in my pockets and kept walking, trying to focus on getting home, trying not to think about Mitch going home to his family, or about much of anything else. All thinking did was make me remember what I’d already lost.

Everything was quiet, save for the distant rumble of traffic on the freeway. Shivering, I walked a little faster, heading down a side street into a neighborhood that smelled like rotten fruit and sweet decay. A black horse stood by the curb in the deepest part of the shadow, the smell of debris masking its characteristic blood-and-seaweed scent. Its eyes were red, and the look it gave me was inviting, promising wild adventures and fantastic delights if I’d just get onto its back. I waved it off with one hand, walking on. Only an idiot would trust a Kelpie this close to the water. Getting on its back with the scent of the sea in the air would be a fast, painful means of committing suicide, and I’m not a fan of pain.

The Kelpie took a few steps forward, eyes glowing. Hard as I’d been trying to deny the existence of Faerie, ignoring the threat wouldn’t make it go away. I sighed and stopped, folding my arms. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

It continued to advance.

Right. A more direct approach was needed. Unfolding my arms, I shoved my hair back and dropped the illusion hiding the shape of my ears. Careful to keep the exhaustion out of my voice, I asked, “Really sure?”

Kelpies are smarter than horses, and they recognize a threat when they see one. I’m just a changeling, sure, but I was apparently willing to face down a Kelpie, alone, on a foggy night, within spitting distance of the water. It couldn’t count on my willingness being based on bravado. It took a step backward, baring an impressive array of fangs.

“Just keep going,” I said. That seemed to be the last straw. The Kelpie snorted, as if to say that there was bound to be easier prey somewhere else in the city, and took another step back, outline fading into the fog until it might as well not have existed. Camouflage is the hunter’s first and best defense. I stood there for several minutes, waiting for it to reappear, before slipping my hands back into my pockets and starting to walk again, a little faster now. Maybe the Kelpie was gone, but there was nothing stopping it from coming back with friends. More than one would be more than I could bluff.

Seeing Kelpies on the streets of San Francisco is annoying and a little unnerving, but it’s nothing to worry about. They have illusions to hide them when they need to be hidden, and even I can handle a Kelpie—they bite if you get too close, but they’re not that dangerous if you just refuse to ride them. There’s nothing wrong with having a few monsters in the shadows. They keep me remembering what it is that I’m walking away from.

My name does the same thing, and that’s why I’ve never changed it to something more normal. My mother was what she was, and I am what she made me, and she thought “October” was a perfectly normal name for a little girl, even one born in 1952 at the height of human conservatism. If that little girl’s last name happened to be “Daye,” well, that was all the better! She was a loon, even then, and I miss her.

The sky was getting lighter; my encounter with the Kelpie had slowed me down enough to take me into dangerous territory. I started to walk a little faster. Getting caught outside at dawn won’t kill me—sunrise is painful, not fatal—but dawn also means a massive increase in the human population, and the last thing I needed was someone deciding I needed medical aid while my illusions were off. I look closer to human than a lot of changelings do, but “close” doesn’t cut it on the streets of a human city.

The streetlights above me flickered and went out, giving a final warning of morning’s approach. Time was up. Hiking up the collar of my coat for a little more cover, I started to run. Not that it was going to do much good; I was still blocks from my apartment, and the light was moving a lot faster than I was. There was no way I was going to make it.

A narrow alley stretched between two buildings about half a block ahead. Forcing one last burst of speed, I raced to the alley’s mouth and ducked inside, moving as far back as I could before the growing pressure of the dawn forced me to stop and slump against the wall. I could feel it spread across the city, ripping down all the small illusions and minor enchantments of the night. Then the light hit the alley, turning my slump into a collapse, and I stopped thinking about anything more complicated than taking my next breath.

There’s nothing kind about the way sunrise affects the fae. Just to make it even less fair, it’s harder on changelings than it is on purebloods, because we have fewer defenses. The light didn’t quite burn, but it came close, filling the air around me with the ashy taint of dying magic. I kept my eyes closed, forcing myself to take slow, measured breaths as I counted down the moments between the dawn and the day.

When the pressure of the dawn passed enough to let me move again, I straightened, taking a shaky breath, and moved deeper into the alley. The aftereffects of sunrise last for five minutes—ten at the most—but most spells just won’t take during that time. That’s part of why it’s so dangerous to be outside at dawn. The threat of discovery is always there, and it’s not a good idea to take chances.

It helps that humans don’t believe in faeries anymore. Not even the people who say that they do. Oh, sure, they may believe in cartoon sprites and sexless fantasy creatures, but they don’t believe in the real thing. There are reasons for that, and some of them are even good ones, but there are also the reasons they believed in the first place. Dawn is one of those reasons. It pulls down our illusions, making us too easy to see and too hard to deny; after all, even the most stubborn humans will usually believe their own eyes. All it takes is one moment of carelessness on the part of the faerie world, just one, and after that . . .

After that comes the iron and the silver and the rowan wood, and the mass graves on both sides, and the burning. In the end, it always comes down to the burning, and that’s a risk I’ve never been willing to take. I may be playing at being human, but that doesn’t make me stupid.

People were starting to pass on the sidewalk outside the alley. Humans have always preferred to live their lives by daylight. I used to think it was because human beings have crappy night vision, and it wasn’t until I got older and more cynical that I realized it was because they have less to be afraid of during the day. Illusions don’t last as long in broad daylight. The monsters can’t find as many places to hide, and all Faerie’s lies get easier to catch and define. You can be human and still be safe, during the day.

Something rustled behind me, and I tensed. I wasn’t alone.

“Great.”

First I got caught outside at dawn, and now I was sharing an alley with somebody who could see me for what I really was. If this day got any better, I was going to scream.

I turned, hiking my coat up around my chin. Anyone who looked closely would be able to see that something wasn’t right, but the alley was dark and narrow, and frankly, the sort of person you meet in dark alleyways at dawn is looking for things besides pointed ears. “Hello?” I peered into the shadows.

Two green circles flashed in the dark. I yelped, jumping backward and pressing myself against the wall.

“And may I wish a very good morning to you, too, October.” The voice was amused, underscored by a chuckle like thick cream. “What happened? Did the prettiest little princess miss her carriage home?”

“Tybalt,” I said, surprise dissolving into disgust. I straightened. “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

The shadows parted, flowing around the man who stepped through them into the alley. They slid together again once he was through, closing seamlessly. I’ve always wished I could do that—but then, Tybalt’s pureblooded Cait Sidhe, and he can do a lot of things I can’t. He smirked. I glared.

I’m not short, but Tybalt’s about six inches taller, giving him just enough height to look down on me when the fancy takes him. He’s got the sort of sleek, muscled build that only comes from a few specific types of exercise programs. For most men, that would mean yoga or running. In Tybalt’s case, it means bloody control of the local Court of Cats. He became their King by right of blood; he’s held the position by beating the crap out of anyone who tries to take it away. The Cait Sidhe take a more direct and violent approach to succession than most of Faerie.

Even in the dim light of the alley, I could pick out the darker bands of brown that streaked his short-cropped, slightly tousled hair, mimicking a tabby’s coat. His eyes were narrowed, but I knew that if I could see them, they’d be green, split by cat-slit pupils. Add all that to skin like ivory and the sort of face that winds up on magazine covers, and it’s no wonder that Tybalt’s looks get him a long way with a lot of people. Not with me. That doesn’t mean I haven’t noticed them—the man is basically walking sex appeal—but I’m not dumb enough to do anything more than look. Even when I was interacting with Faerie of my own free will, I only looked when I was sure he couldn’t see me. Some games are too dangerous to play.

“But you’re so easy to sneak up on.” He crossed his arms, leaning back against the wall. “You should be honored that I bother, since there’s no challenge to it.”

“Right,” I said, dryly.

Tybalt has never made a secret of his contempt for changelings in general and me in particular. Not even the fourteen years I spent missing and presumed dead could change that. If anything, it made things worse, because when I came back, I promptly removed myself from all the places he was accustomed to finding me. Hating me suddenly took effort—an effort he’s proved annoyingly glad to make. On the other hand, it’s actually been something of a relief, because it’s something I can count on. Dawn comes, the moon wanes, and Tybalt hates me.

His smile broadened, displaying the tips of oversized canines. “Maybe I should make it a hobby. That might give you something to look forward to.”

“You could get yourself hurt that way.”

If the threat bothered him, he didn’t show it. He just smirked. “Is that so?”

His words were mild, but there was a warning underneath them, telling me that if I pressed things further, it was at my own peril. It’s moments like these when I think he’s not the King of Cats just because he’s so tied to his subjects, but also because of the way he plays with people. And I, of course, had put myself into the perfect position to be a plaything, since I couldn’t exactly claim the protection of my liege lord while I was denying all of Faerie.

“Probably not,” I admitted, as calmly as I could. I didn’t need to get myself hurt just because I was being jumpy. “I just don’t like it when people sneak up on me.” Past experience told me he could smell my fear; it also told me that the anger accompanying it would pretty much cover the scent. It’s good to know how to compensate for your own weaknesses.

“I do adore the costume. What are you these days, a maidservant? A charwoman in one of these glass towers?” Tybalt tilted his head to the side, studying me. “The trousers fail to flatter, but the blouse is sufficiently gauzy.”

“Ha, ha,” I said, pulling my coat closed and folding my arms over my chest. I was blushing, much as I didn’t want to be. Bastard.

“Really, if you’d just do something with your hair, perhaps you could take a few steps up the social ladder. I understand that there are things called ‘scissors’ these days, very advanced, they allow you to—please don’t be alarmed, I promise it’s painless—shorten and even out the strands. It’s far more flattering.”

I reddened further. “Did I miss the announcement that today was ‘mock Toby’ day?”

“Don’t be silly. That’s every day. But if you’d like a new topic, we can talk about something else. For example, what brings you out at such an unpleasant hour? Did you feel the need for a little company and come to watch the sunrise from the privacy of my alley, hoping I’d show up?” He put a subtle stress on the possessive, watching me with a territorial air that was more intimate than I liked. He didn’t like me, and he never had, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t take a certain perverse glee in watching me squirm.

“I got caught out, Tybalt. I’m only here until I can hide myself and go home.” I had every right to be where I was, and he knew it. Rules are rules, and this one came straight from Oberon: it doesn’t matter whose territory you’re in, you can hide from the dawn. “And this isn’t your alley any more than it’s mine. You should be in the park.” The Court of Cats is hard to find or pin down, so officially it’s part of the myriad fiefdoms of Golden Gate Park. That was probably part of why he was taunting me—I’d caught him out just as much as he’d caught me.

Tybalt’s answering smile was thin. He wasn’t happy that I’d called him on that one. I spared a moment to consider the wisdom of pissing him off while we were stuck together in an alley and shrugged. It was too late to take it back. “I go where the urge takes me, October; you should know that by now. All places are alike to me, and today I wanted to check on my little fish. To see where she was . . . swimming.”

The last word was almost a whisper, all smooth edges and insinuation. I stiffened, hands clenching as fury cut through my fear like turpentine through oil paint. “That was uncalled for.”

“If you can’t take the heat, maybe you should go back to the pond.” His tone was triumphant. He knew he’d managed to get to me, and at that point, I didn’t really care. All I cared about was shutting him up and forcing the memories back into the hole where they belonged.

“Tybalt,” I said, and paused to choose my words with care. The sunrise lull was ending: I could feel the potential for magic creeping back into my blood, almost unwillingly. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that, and I’m going to leave now. You’re not going to follow me. Understand?”

“Running away already?”

“I’m walking away before I do something we’d both regret.” Reaching out, I grabbed a handful of shadows from the alley wall, molding them between my hands as I ordered them to hide me. Illusions have always come easier when I’m angry—I don’t know why, because nothing else works that way. Still, sometimes it seems like I can only craft a really good disguise when I’m so mad I can’t see straight.

Tybalt didn’t bother to look away as I blunted the tips of my ears and glossed over my eyes with a veneer of human blue. My hair and skin could be left alone, which was a good thing; there are too many steps involved in a stable disguise, and none of them are simple ones. Thanks to my father’s blood, I look almost entirely human. Someone seeing me with my masks off might think I had an unusually fine bone structure, or that there was something wrong with my eyes, but they’d be unlikely to think “fairy-tale creature walking the streets of San Francisco.” Thanks to my mother’s conditioning, I’m basically incapable of taking the risk.

It was a good five minutes before I shook the clinging shadows from my hands and let them drop, resisting the near uncontrollable urge to pant. The smell of copper hung heavy in the air.

“Good job!” said Tybalt, applauding. I glared. He grinned, displaying his fangs. “I could almost believe that you were really a trained monkey and not just the worse half of one.”

“Stick a cork in it, Tybalt. I’m out of here.” The traffic outside was getting more urgent as the city woke. “You should do the same.”

“Should I? Good-bye, then; open roads, kind fires, and all winds to guide you.” He laughed, seeming to fold inward. There was a popping noise as a rush of warm air that smelled of musk and fresh pennyroyal blew over me, leaving a brown tabby-patterned tomcat where Tybalt had been. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have said he was smiling.

All Cait Sidhe are drama queens and jerks as far as I’m concerned. Tybalt’s never seemed interested in proving me wrong.

“Good idea,” I said. “You go your way, and I’ll go mine.”

The cat winked and stood, slinking over to rub up against my ankles. I lashed out with one foot, aiming a kick at his middle, but he dodged effortlessly and bounded away, tail held high. Shaking my head, I watched him blend into the shadows at the rear of the alley. “Damn cat,” I muttered, and left the alleyway for the street and the rest of my long walk home.