Wicked Lovely Page 17

  She didn’t even realize he was invisible until he said, “So you truly can see me?”

  “I…” She stammered, stumbled over the words she’d been about to say, the questions she needed to have answered.

  “Mortals can’t see me unless I will it.” He acted as calm as if they’d been talking about homework, as if they weren’t discussing something that could get her killed.

  “You see me, and they”—he pointed to a couple walking their dog down the street—“don’t.”

  “I do,” she whispered. “I’ve always seen faeries.”

  It was harder to say this time, to tell him. Faeries had terrified her as long as she could remember, but none so much as Keenan. He was the king of the awful things that she’d fled from her whole life.

  “Walk with me?” he asked, although they already were.

  He faded into what she now thought of as his normal glamour—dulling the shimmer of his copper hair, the rustling sound of wind through trees—and she fell in step with him, silent now, trying to think of how to ask him.

  They had just passed the park when she turned to him and blurted, “Did you? Did we? Sex, I mean?”

  He lowered his voice, like he were sharing secrets with her. “No. I took you home, saw you to your door. That’s all. When the revelry ended, when they all left, and it was just us…”

  “Your word.” She trembled, hoping he wasn’t so cruel as to lie. “I need to know. Please.”

  As he smiled at her reassuringly, she could smell wild roses, fresh-cut hay, bonfires—things she didn’t think she’d ever been around, but knew nonetheless in that moment.

  Solemnly he nodded. “My word, Aislinn. I swore to you that your wishes would be as my own as often as I am able. I keep my vows.”

  “I was so afraid. I mean, not that you would”—she broke off and grimaced, realizing what she’d implied—“it’s just that…”

  “What can you expect of a faery, right?” He gave her a wry grin, looking surprisingly normal for a faery king. “I’ve read the mortals’ stories of us, too. They aren’t untrue.”

  She took a deep breath, tasting those strange summer scents on her tongue.

  “But the fey I…hold sway over don’t. Will not do that—violate another.” He acknowledged the bows of several invisible faeries with a nod and a quicksilver smile. “It is not the way of my fey. We do not take the unwilling.”

  “Thank…I mean, I’m glad.” She almost hugged him, her relief was so great. “You don’t like those words, right?”

  “Right.” He laughed, and she felt like the world itself rejoiced.

  She rejoiced. I’m a virgin. She knew there were other thoughts she should ponder, but that one precious sentence was all she could think. Her first time would be one she would remember, one she would choose.

  As they walked on, Keenan took Aislinn’s hand in his. “In time I hope you’ll come to understand how much you mean to me, to my fey.”

  The scent of roses—wild roses—mingled with a strange briny scent: waves crashing on rocky shores, dolphins diving. She swayed, feeling the pull of those faraway waves, as if the rhythm of something beyond her was creeping inside her skin.

  “It is a strange thing, this chance for openness. I’ve never courted anyone who could truly know me.” His voice blended with the tug of foreign waters, sounding more musical with each syllable.

  Aislinn stopped walking; he still held her hand, like an anchor to keep her from leaving. They were standing outside The Comix Connexion.

  “We met here.” He caressed her cheek with his free hand. “I chose you here. In this spot.”

  She smiled languidly, and suddenly she became aware that she was happier than she should be.

  Focus. Something was wrong. Focus. She bit her cheek, hard. Then she said, “I gave you your dance, and you gave me your word. I know what I want from you….”

  He ran his fingers through her hair. “What can I give you, Aislinn? Shall I weave flowers in your hair?”

  He opened his hand, letting go of her hair. An iris blossom sat in the palm of his hand. “Shall I bring you necklaces of gold? Delicacies mortals can only dream of? I’ll do all those things anyway. Don’t waste your wish.”

  “No. I don’t want any of that, Keenan.” She stepped back, putting more distance between them, trying to ignore the cry of gulls that she heard under the rhythm of waves. “I just want you to leave me alone. That’s all.”

  He sighed, and she wanted to weep at how sad she suddenly felt. Faery tricks, it’s all faery tricks.

  She scowled. “Don’t do that.”

  “Do you know how many mortals I’ve wooed in the past nine centuries?” He stared through the window at a display for the release of yet another vampire movie.

  A wistful expression on his face, he said, “I don’t. I could ask Niall, probably even ask Donia.”

  “I don’t care. I’m not interested in being one of them.”

  The ocean faded under the acrid taste of desert winds, searing her skin, as anger flared on his face. “How very fitting.”

  He laughed, softly then, like a cool breeze on her burning skin. “To finally have found you, and you don’t want me. You see me, so I can be as I truly am—not a mortal, but a faery. I am still bound by other rules: I cannot tell you why you matter to me, who I am—”

  “The Summer King,” she interrupted, moving away from him, ready to run. She tried to keep her temper in check. He’d done the right thing by her, but that changed nothing. He was still a faery. She shouldn’t have let herself forget that.

  “Aaah, so you know that as well.” In an inhumanly quick move, he stepped closer until they were chest to chest. In less time than it took to blink, he stood there as he truly looked—not wearing his glamour. Warmth rained over them, as if sunbeams fell from his hair like warm honey pouring slowly over her.

  She gasped, feeling like her heart would burn out from racing so fast. The warmth rolled across her skin, until she was almost as dizzy as she’d been when she danced with him.

  Then he stopped it, like turning off a faucet. There were no breezes, no waves, nothing but his voice. “I promised you I would do anything you asked of me within my power. What you ask is not within my power, Aislinn, but there is much that is.”

  Her knees felt like they’d give out; her eyes wanted to close. She had the awful temptation to ask him to do that—whatever it was—just once more, but she knew that didn’t make sense.

  She shoved him away, as if distance would help. “So you lied.”

  “No. Once a mortal girl is chosen, she cannot be un-chosen. At the end you may reject me or accept me, but your mortal life is behind you.” He cupped his hand in front of her, scooping the empty air and coming up with a handful of creamy liquid. Swirls of red and gold shivered in it; flecks of white floated among the other colors.

  “No.” She felt her temper—her lifetime of anger at faeries flare up. “I reject you, okay? Just go away.”

  He sighed and poured the handful of sunlight out, catching it in the other hand without looking. “You’re one of us now. Summer fey. Even if you weren’t, you’d still be mine, still belong with us. You drank faery wine with me. Haven’t you read that in your storybooks, Aislinn? Never drink with faeries.”

  Though she didn’t know why, his proclamation made sense. Somewhere inside she’d known she was changing—her hearing, the strange warmth just under her skin. I am one of them. But that didn’t mean she had to accept it.

  Despite her growing anger, she paused. “So, why did you let me go home?”

  “I thought you’d be angry if you woke up with me, and”—he paused, mouth curled in a sardonic half-smile—“and I don’t want you angry.”

  “I don’t want you at all. Why can’t you just leave me alone?” She fisted her hand, trying to restrain her temper, a thing that she was finding more and more difficult the past week.

  He took a step closer, letting the sunlight drip onto her arm. “The r
ules require you to make a formal choice. If you don’t agree to the test, you become one of the Summer Girls—bound to me as surely as a suckling child to its dam. Without me, you’ll fade away, become a shade. It is the nature of the newly-made fey and the limitation of the Summer Girls.”

  Her temper—so well controlled after all these years—beat against her like a cloud of moths pushing against her skin, aching to be set free.

  Control. Aislinn dug her fingernails into her palms to keep from slapping him. Focus. “I will not be a faery in your harem or anywhere else.”

  “So be with me, and only me: it’s the only other choice.” Then he bent down and kissed her, lips open against hers. It was like swallowing sunshine, that languorous feeling after too many hours on the beach. It was glorious.

  She stumbled back until she bumped into the window frame.

  “Stay away from me,” she said, letting all that anger she’d been feeling show in her tone.

  Her skin began to glow as brightly as his had. She stared down at her arms, aghast. She rubbed her forearm, as if she could wipe it away. It didn’t change.

  “I can’t. You’ve belonged to me for centuries. You were born to belong to me.” He stepped closer again and blew on her face as if he were blowing the head off a dandelion gone to seed.

  Her eyes almost rolled back; every pleasure she’d felt under the summer sun combined into one seemingly endless caress. She leaned against the rough brick wall next to them. “Go away.”

  She fumbled in her pocket for the packets of salt Seth had given her and cracked them open. It was a weak throw, but the salt sprinkled over him.

  He laughed. “Salt? Oh my lovely, you’re such an exquisite prize.”

  It took more strength than she thought she had, but she pushed away from the wall. She pulled out the pepper spray: it worked on anything with eyes. She flicked the safety off, exposing the nozzle, and aimed it at his face.

  “Courage and beauty,” he whispered reverently. “You’re perfect.”

  Then he faded away, joining the rest of the invisible faeries walking down the street.

  He paused halfway down the block and whispered, “I’ll allow this round to you, but I shall still win the game, my beautiful Aislinn.”

  And she heard it as clearly as if he were still beside her.

  CHAPTER 23

  [T]heir gifts usually have conditions attached, which detract from their value and sometimes become a source of loss and misery.

  —The Science of Fairy Tales: An Enquiry into Fairy Mythology by Edwin Sidney Hartland (1891)

  Donia knew who it was before she reached the door. No faery would dare pound on her door like that.

  “A game?” Aislinn stormed into the room, her eyes flashing. “Is that what this is to you too?”

  “No. Not in the same way, at least.” At Donia’s side Sasha bared his teeth and laid his ears back, welcoming Aislinn as he’d once welcomed Donia. He knew that—despite the waves of anger flowing off Aislinn—she meant no harm.

  She stood there, glimmering as Keenan did when he was angry, and prompted, “How then?”

  “I am a pawn, neither king nor queen,” Donia said with a shrug.

  Anger gone as quickly as it’d come, Aislinn stopped.

  As volatile as he is too.

  Aislinn bit her lip, silent for a moment. “One pawn to another, will you help me?”

  “Indeed. It is what I do.”

  Glad to look away from terrible brightness hurting her eyes, Donia walked over to the old wardrobe and opened it. Intermingled with her daily wear were clothes she’d no use for: velveteen tops with impossibly beautiful embroidery, shimmering blouses that looked like nothing more than a net of stars, dresses fashioned of sheer scarves that bared as they concealed, and leather clothes of every cut a girl could want.

  She held out a crimson bustier that Liseli said she’d once worn to the Solstice Ball, the year after she’d become Winter Girl. He wept, tears of sunlight, she’d told Donia. Show him what he cannot ever have.

  Donia had never been able to be so callous, but she’d wanted to.

  Aislinn’s eyes widened as she looked at the bustier. “What are you doing?”

  “Helping you.” Donia hung the top back up and held out a strange metal halter, strung with black gems.

  Aislinn pushed it away with a frown. “This is helping?”

  “It is.” Donia found it then, the one that fit Aislinn: a Renaissance chemise that had been altered into a blouse, strikingly white with an almost lurid red ribbon lacing from bosom to waist. “Faeries respond well to confidence. I learned that too late. You must show him that you are not meek, that you will not be commanded. Go there—act as his equal, not a subject—and tell him you want to negotiate.”

  “For what?” Aislinn took the blouse, fingering the soft cotton.

  “For some sort of peace. He’s not going away. Your mortality isn’t coming back. Don’t start eternity with him believing he can tell you what to do. Start by putting him off kilter: dress for battle.”

  Donia sorted through the skirts and overdresses. They all seemed too regal, too formal. Aislinn would need to remind him she was not like the others, bound to do his bidding. She was a girl who’d grown up in a world where women had choices. “Be more aggressive than he is. Summon him to you. If he takes too long, don’t wait. Go to him.”

  Aislinn looked helpless, standing there clutching the blouse. “I’m not sure I can.”

  “Then you’ve already lost. Your modernity is your best weapon. Use it. Show him that you are entitled to some sort of choice. You know what he is now, so demand that he talk to you. Negotiate for what control you can wrest from him.” Donia drew out pants, sleek and modern. “Go change. Then we’ll talk more.”

  Aislinn took the slick black pants with a shaky hand. “Is there a way to win?”

  “The Summer Girls believe they’ve won.” Donia hated saying it, but it was true. The girls were happy: they didn’t see their dependence as a burden.

  Aislinn twisted the cotton blouse in her hands, wringing it like a wet cloth. “What’s the alternative? There has to be another choice.”

  Donia paused. She put a hand on Aislinn’s wrist, shook off her glamour, and revealed the snow falling in her eyes. “Me.”

  Although the winter chill was awful for the summer fey—which she now was—Aislinn didn’t look away.

  So Donia let the cold slip into her fingertips, leak out until frost blossomed on Aislinn’s arm, forming small icicles that dangled on her elbow, then fell to the floor with a clatter. “This.”

  Wincing finally, Aislinn pulled back. “I want neither.”

  “I know.” Donia reigned the cold in, trembling with the effort. “But given the two…They are free in ways that I’m not. To be a Summer Girl is to live forever, to dance and play, and have the freedom from almost everything. It’s a life of eternal summer. They have no responsibility; they leave that behind with their mortality, and he”—she almost choked on the words but she still said them—“takes care of them. They want for nothing.”

  “I don’t want that.”

  Donia wanted to tell Aislinn to refuse it, but it wasn’t her place. That was his job. Instead Donia told her, “It’s what you’re becoming already. Surely you’ve noticed?”

  At that, Aislinn’s shoulder’s slumped.

  Donia remembered it—that strange dissociative feeling that accompanied the changes. It wasn’t a pleasant memory, even now with the cold settled deep inside her. She kept the pity from her voice and said, “To not join them, you must take the test.”

  “What kind of test?” Aislinn sounded even younger then, frightened.

  No one had asked it before. By the time the test was an issue, the girls were already decided. They might not have verbalized it, but their choice—to risk everything to be with Keenan or not—was already made in their hearts. In Donia’s time, none had loved him enough to attempt it. Nor, for that matter, had he truly loved
them—at least that was what she’d told herself each time he wooed them.

  “That’s for him to say. I cannot. He’ll hold out a third choice, the prize, as it were. In nine centuries, no one has ever become that third thing. If you take the test and lose, you become what I am. If you do not take the test before the next season comes upon us, that too is a choice: you simply join the other girls.” Donia gave Aislinn a gentle push toward the bedroom. “Go change.”

  Aislinn stopped in the doorway. “Is there any way out of whatever mess this is? To just walk away? I want to go back to my life. Isn’t there someone we can talk to?”

  Donia carefully closed the wardrobe door, not looking at Aislinn. No one had ever asked that, either.

  Still facing the wardrobe, she said, “Only one girl has ever avoided choosing.”

  “How?”

  Turning, Donia caught Aislinn’s gaze and killed the hope that had crept into her voice. “She died.”

  CHAPTER 24

  He is no less a personage than the King of Faerie…. Very numerous indeed are [his subjects] and very various are they in their natures. He is the sovereign of those beneficent and joyous beings…who dance in the moonlight.

  —The Mabinogion (notes) by Lady Charlotte Guest (1877)

  Keenan stirred his drink idly. The Rath usually cheered him, but all he could think about was how to convince Aislinn that she was essential. He had let his emotions go earlier, let his power leak all over her, and she’d swooned—recognizing it as it called to her own changed self—but he’d need another tactic for their next meeting.

  Never the same move twice.

  “If you aren’t going to talk, go dance, Keenan.” Tavish spoke calmly, as if he weren’t worried. “It will do them well to see you smiling.”

  Beyond him, the girls were dancing, spinning in that dizzying way that they liked, and giggling. Guards—on and off duty—circulated through the crowd. Though it was his club, the winter fey and the dark fey both frequented it more and more, making his own guards increasingly necessary as time passed. Only the high court fey seemed able to follow house rules somewhat regularly. Even his own summer fey weren’t well behaved most nights.