Set after the Wicked Lovely series
Irial looked at the letters that had been delivered to the current house in Huntsdale. He stood in the doorway, exposed in his bare feet and bare chest. Spring, fortunately, was a true and reliable event the past few years. If anything, the former Dark King was wondering if the season had come a touch early this year. Trees were erupting in new growth, and the ground seemed speckled with flowers. If not for the curious, hand-delivered package, he’d be debating popping over to Winter’s abode and asking for a last frost, just a brief freezing before the Summer Queen had her way with nature.
Not that he minded an early summer, of course, simply that he was the embodiment of Discord. Stirring a minor tiff over the greenery seemed the right path. It had, in fact, been his plan. Now, though, he couldn’t focus. In his hand was what appeared to be the key to his unraveling. Yellowed pages were covered in protective sheaths. It was the word on the top that left him, the man who had led the Court of Nightmares and Monsters, terrified.
Da
Dadaih.
Athair.
Father.
Irial was the embodiment of chaos, of discord. He’d fought, slain, and even died. He’d loved and lost—more than once. His first love, Niall, abandoned him for many centuries. His next love, Thelma, left and died without their even reuniting. The third love, Leslie, had risked death to leave him.
Dadaih.
The script went from childish to mature. The sophistication of the words changed, and the tone grew cold.
Father.
With a jolt, Irial realized that the door was still open. Still, he stood at the threshold of his home, a house he shared with the current Dark King, and read. Flowers bloomed outside, and the sky was clear. Somehow, Irial felt as if a storm was about to erupt. Sadly, his was not a court of nature, as the Winter Court and Summer Court were. He could not send storms free to vent his feelings. All he could do was draw shadows to his skin.
Da.
Irial read that one word in all its forms repeatedly. He didn’t need to read the pages that were stacked in the other envelope to know that sender’s name. Thelma was the only of the three people he’d loved who had died. She was gone.
And between leaving me and dying, she had my child.
Niall stood in the grand lobby of the Benedum Center, appreciating the now-familiar chandeliers of theater. In the latter part of the 1900s, it had been a concert hall of a different sort. He’d seen both Prince and Bob Marley there in the ‘80s. These days, it housed both opera and ballet, and as much as some faeries mocked his fondness for both, the current Dark King knew that anyone who doubted the appeal of opera simply hadn’t been paying attention. It was often terribly tragic stuff, rife with manipulation, murder, and mayhem. Any faery worth his salt would like theatre.
Luckily, even the fey like the Hounds, who might not understand his love of this type of art, appreciated arts and music in general. Even better, Leslie shared his interest. Typically, Irial did, too.
Tonight, they had planned to see Faust, a French opera of the medieval scholar who makes an ill-fated deal with a devil. Niall had, not so secretly, always wondered if Méphistophélès was inspired by Irial. An unwise bargain with a “devil” who is clever . . . the idea seemed rather more fitting than a mortal dealing with the fey, and although Irial never owned up to it, Niall recalled the years the courts all gathered in Germany. Goethe met fey creatures.
Of that, Niall was certain.
But the devil in question, Irial, had made excuses to miss the opera tonight. Worse yet, he’d done so badly. Now, Niall was left trying to convince Leslie that all was well—an illusion neither she nor he believed.
A glass of wine. A smile. A stroll under beautiful chandeliers that sparkled in the high-ceilinged lobby that was filled with mortals and more than a few fey things. It should’ve been lovely.
“You look beautiful,” he told his date again.
“And you look handsome,” Leslie replied.
This is when Irial would’ve made an inappropriate remark, fished for praise, or simply kissed one of them. His absence rankled. The lights all seemed to dim at once as shadows swarmed to Niall like a ripple of midnight seeping into the evening.
Leslie’s hand tightened on his arm, and Niall sent his emotions like a nourishing elixir toward the rest of his court. Some of his faeries perched in nooks in the high ceiling, and others languished in the room, dressed in human guises, pretending to be nothing more than ruffians amongst the gentry in their fine dresses. It was far from the theatre of the past, where everyone was bedecked in gems and formal attire, but it was still very much a crowd where those who have wanted to be clear that they were superior.
Or maybe they were as smitten by the grand spectacle of the opera as he was. His box seat was not a statement of status. It was simply a space where he could have privacy. No one not with him was in the box. The idea of reserving only a few seats in the box seemed odd. Privacy mattered.
He and Leslie made their way to the Dark Court’s seasonal box and took their seats.
She was silent, uncharacteristically so, but he was attempting to respect that. They were never awkward, with or without Irial at their sides, but tonight things were tense in a palpable way. Irial had asked Niall to excuse him, had put Niall in the position of misleading Leslie. There was no good answer, so Niall had chosen evasiveness as his solution to the mess.
Leslie vibrated with tension at his side. The lights dimmed, and he thought that the moment of risk was over. Then she leaned closer.
“He’s not ill?”
And as much as Niall wished he could lie, he could not do so. “No.”
“Injured?”
As much as he did not want the former Dark King to be ill, he could not help the flicker that came over him in that moment. “Not yet.”
Leslie smiled wanly.
“I don’t understand either,” Niall admitted. “He’s avoiding me.”
The show began, and with every tear that trickled down Leslie’s cheek, Niall thought about strangling Irial. Avoiding him Niall could forgive. Avoiding her? There was no excuse that Niall could imagine accepting.
After the show, Niall and Leslie walked to the street, and there a steed waited. It was a living creature, one that had the heart of a wild steed but chose to serve as Leslie’s personal guard. Not quite a horse, not exactly a car, it was a member of the Hunt, but was riderless and technically remained so. Leslie was not a Hound, so she couldn’t be its rider—and the steed tolerated no other unless Leslie was there, too. Tonight, it wore the illusion of being a fire-red convertible.
Leslie caressed the side of the car, much the way one greets a beloved pet. The fact that this particular “pet” was a monstrous beast with fire glimmering where eyes ought to be was immaterial. She was beloved by the whole of the Dark Court.
“He’ll explain, or we’ll make him,” Niall swore to her as he walked around to the passenger seat.
The engine roared when Leslie’s hands touched the steering wheel. She didn’t steer, not really. The steed carried her home or wherever else she wanted, as if it were a car. And Niall chose not to linger long on the thought that this once-mortal woman had tamed a steed so thoroughly that it functioned as her car—and seemed quite content to do so.
When they reached the apartment where she lived—in a building he’d recently and stealthily bought when the landlord was causing her anxiety—Leslie stayed in the car, as it purred loudly enough to mimic a fine engine. She stroked the dashboard and steering wheel. After a moment she announced, “I’ll handle Irial.”
And Niall wasn’t fool enough to argue. If anything, he was certain that when he returned from his trip the issue would be resolved. Leslie wasn’t meek, and she’d become downright formidable these last few years.
“Should I warn him?” Niall asked lightly.
“Not unless you want to get caught in the crossfire.” Leslie stepped out of the car. “I won’t have him ruin our night, though. Join me?”
If Méphistophélès were a woman, she’d be no more tempting than Leslie as she held out a hand. Niall would give her his soul, his vow, whatever she wanted. He was certain Irial would, too.
“Forever,” Niall told Leslie as he took her hand.
And she smiled with a sweet darkness that made him wonder how he could have earned such love.
The weekend would come, and they would confront the secretive faery they both loved. Whatever Irial was hiding was something they could figure out together. First, Niall would attend to business, and Leslie to her classes.
Irial was no closer to knowing what to do about the news of his child than the day he’d learned the news. Niall was away, and Leslie should be in class. Irial had counted on that time to figure it all out.
The doors to the study opened with a thunderous noise.
“You’re avoiding me.” Leslie stood in the doorway to the library after flinging open the doors in a burst of temper. Her once-blonde hair had become increasingly shadow-dark over the last three years, finally reaching the black of the ink that Rabbit had once tattooed in her skin.
College would end soon, and their lives would change. Irial wasn’t sure how—and he was afraid to ask.
What if she wants to move away?
He did not stand. “What do you mean?”
“The opera?”
“Ah.” Irial nodded. “You weren’t alone, though.”
She sighed. “Is it because you are feeling guilty?
Irial shrugged. Guilt? Perhaps. He’d unknowingly abandoned a child—and he was hiding it from both Niall and Leslie. He paused. “Aren’t you to be in classes today?”
Leslie scowled. “I couldn’t concentrate.” She stared at him. “You promised not to meddle. I know there aren’t threats like there used to be. Bananach is dead. Ren is . . . ”
“Apparently missing,” Irial filled in helpfully.
She’d never asked, and he’d never volunteered an answer on that particular situation. Ren had threatened Leslie, their Leslie, in order to draw out the faeries who loved her. They’d been drawn out, and when they had, Niall had removed the threat to their shadow girl.
“I don’t want you to meddle, but if you do . . . don’t avoid me afterward,” she ordered.
One of the abyss guardians—sentient shadows that were typically only tied to the Dark King or his consort—slithered over to encase Leslie.
“Hello, sweetie,” she whispered to the shadow-wrought creature as she came into the room and pulled the door behind her.
The soft snick of the door catching was loud in the still of the room, and Irial felt strangely like prey for a moment.
“I don’t only need you when there’s trouble,” she announced. “Don’t you understand that?”
Mutely, Irial nodded. The shadows glided back to the walls as if they’d only ever been the ordinary shadows any lamp or shelf would cast.
After a moment, Leslie crossed her arms and held his gaze. “What are you hiding?”
“Hiding?” Irial echoed. The sight of her, the sheer force of her mortal self striding through the house of monsters, left him longing.
“I know you, Irial,” Leslie said.
“That you do, shadow girl.” Truth be told, he’d slaughter near every being in the world at her whim. Leslie’s very existence was a balsam on a soul that felt increasingly shredded these last few decades. Denying her was physically painful.
Of course, seeing her today ripped at his heart more than he expected. Thinking about her inevitable death seemed impossible now that he was thinking of Thelma, and tangled into that was the thought of a child. His child.
Half-fey children lived much longer than mortals, but not as long as faeries. Would he want that? Would Leslie? Would Niall?
A child would be complicated, but the thought of watching his own daughter or son grow up made Irial struggle to breath. He had never had that, and according to the letters he’d received, he should have. The closest he’d come was the half-fey children that Gabriel had sired. He was an “uncle” of sorts to many halflings, but the thought of his own child suddenly filled him with longing.
As she walked toward Irial, her footsteps were muffled by the overly thick burgundy and gold rug. Shadows puddled where she stepped as if to soak up some sort of magic in her very touch.
“I do not ask you to be my tiger on a leash,” Leslie explained softly.
“Mmmm.”
She paused, despite the catch in her breathing and the widening of her eyes. The control she had made him certain that she could rule a nation of pirates . . . or monsters. Leslie was not immune to his allure, but if he didn’t know better, he might think she was.
The sound of her breathing, of her trying not to run to him, was enough to make him have to resist leaning forward. For all of his centuries of living, only one other mortal had made him feel so oddly human. That was over a century before Leslie had been born, and he still wondered if he ought to mention it to her.
Niall knew. Gabriel had known. The only others who remembered his brief relationship were fey of his court, those who would not share his secret—even with Leslie.
“You’re staring,” she teased, voice breathless as he felt.
“As are you.”
“It’s been three weeks since I saw you. Staring is sort of inevitable.”
“Ah, and here I worried you were immune by now,” he kept his voice teasing, but they both knew that he could not lie.
It was a fear—one of many these days. The gazes of others, fey and mortal, still raked over him. From thistle-skinned creatures of the Dark Court to the Scrimshaw Sisters of the Winter Court to the vine-bedecked Summer Girls, faeries watched him as if he was every dream they had. Although he knew Leslie wanted him, she could—and did—leave for weeks.
Niall did the same. It made Irial prone to waves of melancholy. If those who loved him didn’t long for every moment with him, was he . . . lacking?
“Immune? To you?” Leslie laughed softly. “We both know that’s impossible. Staring would be just as unavoidable if I’d seen you last week. I always want to see you, Iri. That’s part of love.”
“I do love you,” he assured her.
There was a question in her words, though, one he was trying to avoid answering. Telling her she had his heart didn’t seem to be enough this time. Niall had delivered Irial’s excuses to Leslie, but neither of them believed him. The difference, of course, was that Niall was more tolerant of Irial’s tendency toward secrecy. They lived together more peacefully than he’d hoped possible because they both kept more than a few boxes of secrets hidden away.
Leslie had no such patience.
She stood in front of Irial now, her knees not quite touching his, and he had to resist the dual urges to reach out and to run away. “But you could’ve come with Niall last week. Perhaps I am not irresistible these days . . . ?”
“He told you that I wasn’t able to come,” Irial hedged.
“He told me a bunch of excuses, and I’m not so innocent as to believe them. Lies are lies, Iri, even when they are delivered by someone who knows how to distract me.” Leslie caressed his face. “Why don’t you tell me you weren’t able to come, Irial? Say those words to me.”
The half-accusing, half-angry tone in her words made his resolve falter. He couldn’t lie outright, and those words were a lie.
“I would say them if I could,” he admitted. “I chose not to visit.”
Leslie withdrew her hand, leaving him wishing he could lean closer, but too proud to do so. “Because? Tell me, Irial. Is it because of threatening my landlord? He offered to extend my lease suddenly. And there was some error, apparently. I no longer owe back rent. Are you feeling guilty?”
The former king leaned away, more to resist his own temptations than anything else.
“I know you can’t help yourself sometimes,” Leslie allowed.
“If I have meddled, I’m certain it was justified.” He’d far rather discuss his supposed sins than his actual ones. Then, at least, he could be truthful with her. He hadn’t avoided her from guilt, so there was no harm in owning whatever she thought him guilty of this time.
His reasons for avoiding her were harder to discuss.
Once, almost four years ago, they were bound together by blood and ink. Her emotions were the food that sustained him, the wine that intoxicated him, but their bond changed him even as it nourished him. She’d severed all but the barest thread of their connection, setting him adrift in the world, feeling like a strange new version of himself. Back then, Irial had been willing to give up everything . . . except her. Now, he was facing the possibility of losing her. It was an intolerable fate.
“You’re hiding something,” she announced.
“Trying.”
“Failing.” She reached out again, hand not quite touching him but near enough to make him feel like a hapless insect drawn to destruction.
“Don’t ask me why I didn’t visit,” he half-begged, half-ordered. “Tell me how to atone for this meddling you say I did.”
He’d ruled the monsters that were only spoken of in whispers, but for the second time in his life, a human girl held power over him.
“You didn’t do it, did you?”
Irial shrugged. There was no harm in being held accountable for what Niall had likely done. From all of his years in the Summer Court, Niall carried an impulsiveness that sometimes made him unable to use caution or common sense—and those outside the Dark Court thought Irial guilty of many an ill-thought out act that was Niall’s doing.
“So. . . not you.”
“I didn’t say that, love. I am guilty of all manner of things. I simply asked which has you in this mood.” He lit a cigarette, pulling the smoke into his lungs with the comfort of a man who will never weaken or die from the poisonous stuff. It was a pleasant perk of being fey.
“No. I can feel your emotions, Irial. It’s not the same as before, but it’s growing stronger the past few months.” Leslie spoke carefully as if she were weighing the words, sliding invisible fingers over the tendrils that flowed between their bodies again. “When I . . . cut the ties, it was like a ghost that passed by me sometimes, but now, it’s like I can feel you more and more every month.”
“Not enough to know whether I’m truly guilty, though.”
“True,” she murmured.
He caught her hand and pressed it to his cheek. “Does that help?”
Leslie laughed before saying, “Touching you always helps, but it doesn’t always make you easier to read.”
She caressed his face for a moment before settling onto his lap. There was no doubt in her, no insecurity as there had been when he’d first seen her. Back then she was a broken doll hiding her fears behind a false bravado. She’d survived an assault that left her screaming inside and trying desperately to pretend she was untouched by the pain. She’d been everything he needed for a conduit to feed the Dark Court: all but destroyed but still fierce inside.
For the past several years, the Dark Court had been her home. The monsters she’d saved would willingly kill or die for her. Admittedly, they’d also willingly kill for a cookie, but they wouldn’t die for just anyone. They’d donned glamours and cheered her every victory while she was at university. They’d been planning a party for her upcoming graduation that even Irial thought might be a bit over the top, but he wasn’t their king anymore and their current king would agree to any excess if he thought it would please Leslie.
“Niall’s away,” Irial said, trying to remember that she wasn’t only his, not now.
“I know. I saw him last week. He isn’t avoiding me.” She slid her hand from Irial’s cheek to his throat. “I’m here to see you, Iri. You can’t hide from me if I’m in here with you.”
Possessiveness flared at the thought of a few uninterrupted days with her. He ground his unfinished cigarette. No amount of time with Leslie was ever enough, could ever be enough. She was too mortal, too fleeting, and fate had a horrible habit of stealing those he loved.
As Leslie twined her arms around him and pulled him into a kiss, Irial stopped thinking. She was here now, touching him, and that was more than he’d ever expected when they’d first been bonded. Ink exchanges were often fatal, so by the time he realized he loved her, he’d expected her to die. When she severed their bond, it held a likelihood of killing her. When he’d been poisoned, he hadn’t even had time to see her before he slipped into a comatose state. So to be kissing her several years later was . . . whatever came after miracles.
And like all miracles, he couldn’t even quite believe this was real. He’d been the thing that led the worst of Faerie’s monsters for over a millennium, the embodiment of Discord for the past few years, and his greatest fear was losing the two people he loved.
He’d done so once. Twice. Three times. Centuries ago, he’d lost the faery he now shared his home with, and then he lost the mortal he’d loved, and then he’d lost Leslie briefly, and then he’d died.
Dying ended up being a temporary state, but he felt the finiteness of life since that unfortunate event.
Losing a loved one always hurt, but with Niall and Leslie, they were still alive even when they weren’t his. He’d been separated, partly, from them when he died. That, too, was bearable. Death of a loved one, on the other hand, was a far uglier thing. He’d gone through it once, and he’d thought the madness of losing the only other mortal he’d loved would break him. He wouldn’t do it again.
“You must never die,” he whispered to the woman in his arms.
Leslie smiled, kissed him again, but she made no such promises.
Mortals age. They die. And Leslie thought she was mortal still. He hoped she was wrong, but he wasn’t sure. The thought that he might be wrong made him pull her tighter to him. “Never. Ever. Leave. Me.”
Not long after, both of them half-drunk of kisses, Leslie watched Irial decided what and how much he could still misdirect her. It was a lie, but he had been king of the Dark Court for literal centuries. He was good at lying by way of omission, misdirection, and other subterfuge.
“I need answers,” she nudged.
From the comfort of the sofa, Leslie watched the centuries’ old faery pace as he acted only slightly older than the boys at university. Faeries age slower than mortals, and Irial had been a creature of self-indulgence so long that he reacted to restrictions, rules, or confusions with a mix of temper and embarrassment.
“Time to talk,” she announced.
“Fine.” He sulked—and she tried not to laugh. Learning to live with the Dark Court meant learning that the monsters were often not as scary as people thought, and not nearly as scary as they pretended. At least it seemed that way to her.
Certainly, after the battle between the courts in which Bananach died, Leslie could admit that there was a violence to them that she rarely saw.
“I graduate in a few weeks,” she nudged. “Is that what has you upset?”
“No.” Irial poured himself a drink.
Lightly she said, “Sometimes I swear you have single-malt bottles in every room.”
He grinned, drank, and refilled his glass. “I usually do, but this is the study. What sort of study lacks liquor? Or books? Or a comfortable sofa?”
As Leslie was stretched out on said sofa, she wasn’t likely to argue. “Fair enough.”
He shook the glass. “Drink?”
Leslie shook her head. She was legal now, but she didn’t often drink. “My liver isn’t as eternal as yours.”
His face darkened.
“Is that what this is all about?” Leslie stared at him. “My lack of eternity?”
“Perhaps.” Irial downed his drink. “I dislike how easily and quickly mortals die.”
“I’m here right now.” She stood, hands on her hips, but regretfully not terribly intimidating. “I’m in my second decade of life, Iri. Second.”
“And unless something changes, you only have a handful left. Not even a century.” His voice grew louder, not quite yelling but far louder than normal speech.
Leslie took a step back. He was far from perfect, but it wasn’t like him to yell. He was calm, sardonic, charming, and a million other things. He could be irritating, and on a few occasions, she’d seen him seem cold or cruel when he and Niall were at odds.
Never to her, though.
“Something else is going on.” She stepped toward him, approaching as if he were a feral animal that might flee.
“I don’t know if I can do this again,” he said quietly. He bowed his head.
“Do what?” Leslie reached out, and he withdrew further.
“Love someone who is going to die,” he admitted.
As pieces started to click together, she stared, mouth agape.
Again.
He was afraid to love someone again who would die. Foolishly, she’d assumed there had only been Niall. He’d lived for centuries, though. No one was sure how many. He was older than Keenan, the reigning Winter King and former Summer King, and Keenan was over nine hundred years old.
“A human?” she asked.
At first, Irial simply stared at her. Then he gave a nod.
“I had no idea,” she said, as gently as she could.
Irial shrugged. “I don’t discuss her.”
Leslie felt like her heart would break as his wave of sorrow washed over her. The ties that bound them were still fragile things, but even the edge of his grief brought tears to her eyes. Once, before them, Irial had loved deeply. Not Niall. Not her. A stranger. The thought of it made her understand his attempts to withdraw from her. What was confusing was why now? Why did he feel so much fear now when she had always been mortal?
“How old was she?”
Irial smiled sadly. “Young when we met. Older than you, but times were different then.” He took Leslie’s hand in his. “You are very different people. . . and I’ve lived longer than I can fathom. Do not feel jealous, love.”
Leslie kissed him gently. “I am well aware that I am not the first woman in your life, Iri.”
He nodded, and they were together quietly for a moment longer.
Then, sheepishly, she admitted, “I just figured that you hadn’t loved any of them.”
He lit a cigarette and paced. His energy, the sheer emotional chaos that rode in his expression, reminded her that while he was gentler with her, he was still something of a caged tiger.
“I almost started a war over her,” he said quietly. “When I lost her, I wondered why I ought not start it anyhow.”
There was little that she could do. His withdrawal and her healing connection to him— Leslie had to wonder if it was all connected.
“I am not good at grieving,” Irial said lightly, as if she had forgotten how devastating grief could be.
Leslie thought back to Niall when he’d been grieving.
She walked into the room to find Niall holding a fire poker which he’d just tried to shove into Seth’s eye. There was a madness there that she’d not ever seen before, but struggled to forget. Inside one of the two faeries she loved was a darkness that was more unstable than Irial’s calculated coldness.
“You are not this person,” Leslie told Niall.
He dropped the poker to the warehouse floor when he saw her.
Slowly, carefully, Leslie walked farther into the room. Niall’s skin sizzled from gripping the poker, and Seth’s face was burned. The smell was unsettling, but not as much as the lost look on Niall’s face.
She stepped in front of the cage that held Seth, the beloved of the Summer King and friend to Niall until today.
“Niall? You don’t really want to hurt yourself . . . or him.”
Niall looked lost, as if his very world had vanished. He stared at her. “Seth Sees things. He knew and . . . He knew that Irial . . .”
“I heard what happened.” Leslie approached Niall with her hand outstretched, as if she could touch him and heal him with it. She understood as no one in the world did. Irial wasn’t the sort of person who could be replaced, who could be lost without a ravine in the middle of her heart. She knew what Niall felt because she felt it too.
“Ash called me. Donia called me. . . . You sent for me. Do you remember that, Niall? You sent Hounds.”
“I didn’t want to tell you,” he whispered.
“I’m here.” Leslie looked over her shoulder.
Behind her, a Hound stood in the open doorway. She wasn’t sure if he was there for her safety or Niall’s. It was all the same though. The court—and it was her court, too—was in pain. They were grieving, and their new king was unraveling.
“I am here with my court,” she assured Niall. “I am here with you . . . because you needed me. They need me to be here with you.”
She took Niall’s uninjured hand in hers, careful not to look at the burned flesh on the other hand, and used the only words she was sure would matter just then: “Irial wouldn’t want you to hurt. You know that.”
Leslie remembered that sorrow, how it had nearly destroyed the entire Dark Court.
Her own grief was less horrifying in its results, but she would never forget that utter terror that washed over her at the thought of never again touching or laughing with Irial.
She reached out and caressed his cheek. “You’re in pain, and I understand.”
He stared at her.
“I lost you once, Irial. In all the world, there is no one like you, and you were dead. . . and I love Niall as fully as I love you, and he was grieving.” She felt tears escape her eyes. “Do you think I don’t understand your fear?”
Several hours later, Leslie lifted her head from his chest and stared at him. “Are you okay?”
At some point in their lovemaking, Irial felt a tear slip from his face to hers, and he hoped she hadn’t noticed. He hadn’t wept, but in the moment of union, he was overwhelmed.
“Mmm.” He pulled her down and kissed her, enjoying the sheer novelty of trusting a woman enough to have her on top of him.
She’d gotten far too able to read between his words, so his default with her was typically distraction. It was an excellent plan, if he did say so himself. Kissing Leslie was high on his list of favorite pastimes, alongside touching Leslie and making love with Leslie. Luckily for him, she didn’t seem to object.
When she pulled away for real finally, she kissed both of his cheeks and his forehead affectionately before straightening back to a seated position and saying, “I’m never sure if I should be offended that you think I’m that easy to sidetrack. It doesn’t work on Niall either, by the way.”
Irial shrugged as best he was able with her on top of him and offered her his most innocent look. “You’re the one who closed the door and attacked me.”
She pressed her lips together and narrowed her gaze. “That’s your summary of our day?”
“You made accusations, and we talked. Then you seduced me—after insisting I ought not meddle. So I was merely not meddling in your obvious plans to seduce me,” Irial continued with the closest approximation of innocence he could muster.
“You might be delusional.”
“I’ve been accused of far worse.” Absently, he traced the tattoo of his eyes and the wings that still graced her back. He could feel the inky tendrils that once bound them snaking out to answer his touch.
“It’s healing,” she said. “The tattoo is almost healed.”
“I know.”
“That’s why I feel you.” She leaned back so his hand was tighter against the tattoo. The smoky threads that had stretched out to meet his touch tightened like vines grabbing his hand. The sensation rocked through him, burning along pathways that she’d once yanked out in her—quite justified—anger and fear.
He shivered, the wash of emotions that he felt from Leslie catching him off guard and bringing his own tangled mess of emotions surging to the surface. “Steady, love.”
She didn’t listen, though. She reached back and held his hand to her skin. He could’ve jerked away, but . . . he also couldn’t. She could read his feelings as if he were a book open before her. He wouldn’t reject her and risk her turning away from him.
Once Irial and Niall had been gancanaghs, addictive to mortals. When Niall became Dark King and Irial became the embodiment of Discord, they were no longer addictive. Irial had wondered more than a few times over the past few years if fate had a sense of humor. Leslie could stay away from them, but they both craved her nearness the way junkies craved their drugs.
“You’re afraid,” Leslie murmured, her voice heavy with shock.
Instead of speaking, Irial let her taste his emotions.
“It didn’t used to work this way.” Her voice was wonder-filled then. “You’re worried that I’ll leave, that I’m hurt, that I’ll die, and . . .” She paused and closed her eyes. She bit her lip, and then opened her eyes and looked directly at him. “You love me more than before. When we were connected, you didn’t love me like this.”
“I loved you then,” he objected weakly.
“Not this much.” She studied him in silence for a long moment before adding, “You let down a wall, unwillingly, and it scares you.”
At that, Irial came to his feet and had the unexpected urge to don his trousers, as if clothing would somehow shield him. After tugging clothes onto his bottom half, he walked away to pour himself a drink. It was bad enough that he had to deal with Niall’s ability to read his every emotion; adding Leslie to the mix meant that he would have no walls left to shelter him. Sometimes a faery simply didn’t want to have his heart laid bare on the table.
“Come to New Orleans?” he asked Leslie, turning to face her once more.
“New Orleans?”
The former Dark King nodded. “Once, a century or so ago, I lived there.”
She smiled, and in a drawl far too like his own, said, “Of course you did.”
One of the Hounds pounded on the door. It was not Gabriel, who had been lost to the same forces that had nearly taken Irial, but one of his brothers who rumbled through their home with the same sense of force and thunder.
“The rest of the boxes from the buildings that were flooded are here,” he announced as he shoved the door open.
Irial started, “Good, but—"
“Leslie!” Cam grinned at seeing her. He held his arms wide open to hug her.
“Cam,” she said, not rising.
Irial pinched the bridge of his nose. “Cameron, close your damn eyes before I pluck them out and feed them to you.”
The massive man frowned. “Why?”
“Because I’m naked, Cam,” Leslie said, visibly trying not to laugh at either Cam’s confusion or Irial’s frustration. Her gaze floated between them, and the shadows from the floor zig-zagged toward her.
Cam closed his eyes quickly. He nodded, and eyes still tightly closed, he fumbled for the door. In the process, he knocked a painting from the wall and set a floor lamp to rocking precariously.
Abruptly, he paused and turned back, frowning. Without opening his eyes, he asked, “How come you’re not naked then, king? I mean, Discord. Err, Irial?”
“Because I have already pulled my trousers on, Cam,” Irial said with exaggerated patience. Cam was a fine Hound. He simply lacked the common sense of an average goose.
Leslie giggled.
Cam waved in her general direction—still not opening his eyes—and said, “Good to see you . . .” He paused and amended quickly. “Umm, not that I could see you.”
Irial sighed again. “Goodbye, Cameron!”
And Leslie’s giggles turned into belly laughs as Irial watched. This, this moment, was what she deserved: happiness. He wasn’t sure how to make sure she always had it, but he wanted to do so. He didn’t want any distance, any secrets between them.
When she stopped, Irial blurted out his great secret: “I think I had a child.”
Leslie stared at him.
“I don’t know if I meddled in your life, but if I did, I’m sure I had a reason,” he added to fill the silence.
After a long minute of staring in silence, Leslie said, “I think I need clothes for this conversation. You do, too.”
She tossed his shirt at him, and all Irial could do was think that an event in his past was about to destroy his present happiness. He had no idea that Leslie would react this way. “Before you,” he added quickly. “The child was before you were ever even alive, shadow girl.”
“Oh, Irial! I’m not angry. I just find all of that”—she gestured at him—“a bit distracting, and I need to focus, especially if I am going to need to buy baby supplies.”
The wave of relief that rolled over him was palpable.
Leslie trailed her fingers down his bare chest and pause at his trouser buttons. “Nothing will make me reject you, Iri. Nothing. Don’t you realize that yet?”
He exhaled loudly, fears he’d not yet named falling away briefly. He still needed to tell Niall. Hell, he still needed to decide if he’d look up his descendants in person if they existed. One disaster at a time, though. A man doesn’t discover children and lost years with them every day.
He pulled his shirt on and watched Leslie dress. It never ceased to amaze him that even the act of dressing was enticing with her. He’d forgotten that charm in the centuries between Niall and Thelma, and the decades between Thelma and Leslie. With most people he’d had in his bed, his interest was only held in the disrobing. Once the present was unwrapped, his interest faded quickly and inevitably.
With Leslie, Irial was as enchanted by her dressing as with the way she covered her mouth as if to keep the giggles from escaping. He could paint her on every canvas he found, and still he wouldn’t grow tired of studying her. It was unsettling after so many years of solitude. Now, he had her and Niall in his home, and he felt unmoored.
Once she was dressed, she stood in front of him and said, “Spill.”
“Once, many years ago, there was a girl. Human. Unusual.” Irial smiled remembering Thelma. “She was bookish when most women were focused on husbands and homes.”
Leslie nodded.
“I came near to starting a war. There were people seeking her, and—”
“Irial.” Leslie gave him the sort of look that came from knowing him better than most people could imagine. “What people?”
“Influential ones,” he hedged.
“Influential as in . . . mafia or as in rich parent or politicians or . . .?”
“Politicians of a sort.” He turned away, hand on the glass door knob to open the door and flee. Admitting who Thelma was, who had pursued her, would add complications he’d rather she could avoid. In as casual a voice as he could summon, he said, “Let’s not talk about that. What matters is that I protected her, and I did so because I was developing a fondness. Who they were is not the point.”
Behind him, Leslie put a hand on his back, stilling him, stopping him. “Are you asking me not to ask who pursued her?”
He nodded. Without looking back at her, Irial added, “He didn’t deserve her. He wasn’t going to love her as I did. Sometimes . . . I am impulsive.”
Leslie’s arms slid around him, and she kissed his back. “You’re an absolute fool when you love.” She squeezed. “And I am grateful for it. As is Niall. I suspect your missing love was, too.”
Irial hoped so. The day he’d decided to pursue Thelma was as clear as if it had been that morning. The downside of near immortal lives was that he couldn’t always keep track of time. That day, though, was one he hadn’t forgotten.
Gabriel’s steed shifted into a handsome horse-drawn carriage, one fit for nobility or the American equivalent of it.
“Well come on then.” Gabriel climbed aboard and took the reins, although they weren’t technically necessary with the bond between Hound and steed.
“No horseless carriage then?” Irial teased.
“Bah.”
The new mode of transportation irritated Gabriel for reasons that seemed to be primarily a matter of loving his steed in its natural equine-like form. Irial, unlike a lot of faeries, was fascinated by technological advances. He’d even had several images of himself made in the last few decades, including a daguerreotype and a tintype. In time, Irial intended to own several horseless carriages as well. What was the point in immortality if one continued to live as if it were centuries past?
“Without being seen,” Irial ordered.
Gabriel gave him another raised brow look, but said nothing.
“I don’t want her to feel stalked,” Irial explained.
Ignoring Gabriel’s snort, Irial continued, “I simply need to move to the house in the city for a short time.”
“And the Hunt?”
“It’s not as if you cannot fetch me if needs be,” Irial stated.
“Or we can come with you, Irial.” The rumbling in Gabriel’s voice clarified that even as he pretended to be suggesting the answer, he was actually demanding it.
“Fine. You can come, too.”
As the steed swept by the girl who was walking toward the city, Irial wished he could pull her to him. It was foolish. A wise man would vacate the city, ignore the mortal, stay as far from the quarrel between Beira and Keenan as he could. This one, though, had looked right at him.
“I ought to leave the state,” Irial said aloud.
“Are you going to do so?”
“No.”
“I’m not going to lecture you, Iri.” Gabriel grinned, all teeth and menace, and added, “You’re more use when you’re not pouting.”
“I don’t . . .” Irial made a crude gesture at his closest friend and added, “I am not pouting, Gabe. I am simply enjoying a vibrant city, filled with music and distractions. A favorite city, as you know.”
Gabriel laughed.
Prostitution was newly legal in New Orleans now. The Crescent City was the first city to legalize it in this country, and the Dark Court enjoyed the profits of that law. His fey fed on darker emotions, and the so-called Storyville District added to the court’s already-deep coffers.
“She might simply be a distraction,” Irial claimed, careful to phrase his words in such a way that they were not a statement of absolutes. Lying, after all, was not possible for a faery.
“Or a way to cope with your guilt,” Gabriel added.
“Or boredom,” Irial admitted.
Or something else. He didn’t say that aloud though. Far better to think of guilt or boredom as motivators.
Irial smiled. Thelma—much like Niall before her and Leslie after her—was far from boring. Irial, if he did say so himself, had excellent taste.
“I treasured her,” he said. “And she hid my child.”
Later that afternoon, Leslie and Irial rode to the airport in the company of assorted Hounds. There was something about feeling so cherished that never grew old for her. The massive fey creatures, looking for all the world like a multicultural biker gang, escorted them to the ticket counters.
Cam carried the small bags that she and Irial had packed. In truth, she was surprised that Irial had agreed to pack things. He had the ridiculous habit of believing that a credit card and a whim would suffice when it came to most clothes. His suits, of course, were tailored, but things like jeans or shirts were a matter of little concern.
“No time for stores?” she asked.
“I need all the time to research,” Irial murmured, not even looking up from the latest of the letters he’d retrieved from a locked fireproof box and slipped into his Italian leather satchel.
The pages were yellowed, ink faded, but each letter was in a protective sleeve, as if a careful librarian had stored them. Leslie wanted to read them, to know his every secret, but her life with Irial and Niall worked because she had the ability to be patient—and the ability to be brash. She knew the two men well enough to know which trait she needed, and right now, the living embodiment of Discord needed her support and her patience.
They checked their bags, cleared security, and went to stand at a gate. The Hounds, of course, still stood like fierce guards around them. The difference was that no one saw them now. However, in that way of such fey things, they radiated a kind of terror that meant no one came near Irial.
“You really want us to stay here?” Cam asked.
Irial lifted his eyes, met Cam’s gaze, and nodded once. To anyone looking their way, it would appear as if he nodded to himself upon reading something pertinent.
“King’s not going to approve,” another Hound muttered.
“Does Niall know?” Leslie asked, even though she knew exactly what Irial would say.
Or not say.
Irial lifted a shoulder in a small shrug.
Leslie texted: “With Iri. Airport. NOLA. Love.”
Then she looked at Irial, back at the Hounds, and said, “Go.”
“Leslie?” Cam asked in apparent confusion.
“We need a little time to ourselves,” she said, leaning into Irial even with the metal arm rest jabbing into her side. “Just us.”
To a bystander, she seemed to be talking to Irial, but the Hounds knew what she was saying. They—like most of the Dark Court—acted as if she were their queen. No one really pressed the matter, and she was cautious not to issue orders. Today, though, she was taking advantage of their obedience to her.
“Just the two of us,” she repeated with emphasis.
Irial lifted his gaze, looked around at the fey creatures that were standing there watching over them. Hounds were stronger than many faeries, but this much steel had to be unpleasant for some of them.
“Begone,” Irial ordered.
They rolled through the airport boarding areas, an invisible wave of discomfort that the observant could track simply by noting the ripple of fear and anxiety that the passengers’ faces showed. Even seasoned businesspeople seemed suddenly ill-at-ease. The trick for those without the Sight was to notice waves of joy, or fear, or chills that seemed to roll across a crowd or street. That was often the result of passing faeries.
Once they were gone, and Leslie saw no other lurking faeries in the area, she turned to Irial and gently prompted, “Tell me what’s happening.”
Silently, he slipped the letter back into his case.
“A very long time ago, Thelma asked me not to seek her out. She was mortal, and I was not,” he paused and smiled. “Am not. Will never be. I knew she lived a long life because I looked her up from time to time.”
He leaned forward.
“I gave her a vow. In fact I gave her”—he laughed as if there was a joke she hadn’t heard—“quite a number of them. The first before we acknowledged that she knew what I was, but the last vow . . . I never saw her again after it. Never spoke.”
All traces of laughter were gone, and Leslie felt waves of loss assail her.
“And so I never knew, and she never sent word. I don’t know how she could’ve, but if she had . . . I’d have known my daughter.”
Leslie stared at him. “She intentionally hid your child from you?”
“I don’t know,” he whispered.
Leslie reached over and took his hand. There weren’t a lot of words. Being a woman meant that her child—if she had one—would not be a secret. One notices such things. For men, though, the fear that a child out there might be yours, that you might never know, was a real possibility.
“She lived in New Orleans?”
He nodded. “A long time ago, I was there, and she was there, and we met, and . . . if things had been different . . .” Irial shook his head and simply noted, “I would have liked to know my daughter.”
They sat in silence, Leslie feeling his emotions and trying to send calm his way, until the plane boarded. They remained the same on the flight to the city at the mouth of the Mississippi River. She’d never been there, although it was on her list of places to see, but not like this.
By the time they landed, Leslie no longer worried that Irial’s sorrow would drown her. So she asked, “What year?”
He looked her way.
“When did you know her?” Leslie clarified.
“We last spoke at the turn of the century.”
“Which one?” Leslie kept her voice pitched low.
“In the 1800s, love,” he said. “She’s dust and ash now. Gone from me.”
Irial stared at her so intently that Leslie worried that he was about to become inappropriately affectionate—not that she ever minded, but ending up naked in the middle of a deplaning crowd would be awkward.
“You must never die,” he said, not even trying to be quiet. “I couldn’t live without you. Swear it.”
A nearby older couple looked at them curiously.
“Love . . .” Leslie started.
Irial pulled her to him and kissed her breath away. They were still both dressed when he released her, but the aisle was filled with people who were waiting for the doors to open.
“Newlyweds?” a woman asked.
Leslie leaned against Irial and said, “Close.”
Behind her, he was holding her hips in his hands now, as if to keep her from flying or pull her closer to his affections. His fingers tightened, and she was suddenly more than ready to be off the plane and in the French Quarter hotel he’d booked.
“Niall’s madness would be two-fold if you died,” Irial whispered. “Mine would rival his, exceed it, demolish the world.”
“I am right here.” She covered his hands with hers and glanced over her shoulder at him. “Healthy. Yours. I love you.”
He nodded, but he looked far from convinced. “Mortals die in a blink. Like mayflies and falling stars. You expire so soon.”
When they’d left the plane and were walking from the gate to baggage, Leslie kept her hand in his.
“Do we even know I’m still mortal?” she asked.
She hated to bring up the ink exchange, but she was—quite literally—the only mortal who had survived it. No one expected her to live. Irial had hoped, but even he had thought she’d perish. “It’s grown back, roots in my flesh, tendrils stretching to you.”
“I’m not sure. Maybe it will tie your life to mine. That was the initial intent.” Irial shrugged. “But you burned it, severed it, so I have no idea what it means.”
This time Leslie shrugged. “So, love, you may be stuck with me for centuries.”
She didn’t mention her fears that she had grown less emotional again because of it. What was different now was that she had still chosen to be involved with both Niall and Irial when she was clear-minded. They were what she wanted, and who could blame her? After being loved by them, how could she go back to dating mortals? Being loved by the former Dark King and the current Dark King had taught her that she needed a partner—or partners—who were a little bit feral.
The way she’d handled the monsters she’d met because of them convinced her that she had a spine that was wrought of whatever was stronger than steel. Leslie was able to find the monster in herself when those she loved were threatened, and because of them, she learned that although love can be scary, it can also be empowering.
They’d encouraged her to go to university, respected her desire to not accept their money, and not because they thought she would change her mind but because they’d have done the same. In a stubborn ass contest between the three of them, she wasn’t sure who’d win. The only real difference was that Niall attempted to avoid conflicts whereas Irial thrived on it.
Miles away in New Jersey, Niall was ready for a long, peaceful weekend—one that didn’t require a suit or manners. He loosened his tie and looked at his mobile. In the assorted messages from Seth, Chela, and Donia was one that stood out: “With Iri. Airport. NOLA. Love.”
The text Leslie had sent a few hours ago had plenty of information, but no actual answers. The Dark King lit a cigarette and pondered. He’d never understood the appeal of drawing burning toxins into his body as much as he did now. The Dark King, the whole of the Dark Court, was made for poison.
Shadows from the coming evening crouched at his sides, drawn to whatever strange thing made him a king. Shadows ought not move on their own, but they did. None so often as the abyss guardians that traveled from one shadow to another anywhere in the world. Right now, the same guardians that had touched Leslie earlier that day were now slithering along his arms. He could sense her skin as they did so; the taste of her sweat and perfume lingered in these shadows.
She was safer than most anywhere if she was with Irial.
On the other hand, the man was now the embodiment of Discord. He’d protect Leslie, but that didn’t mean he was making wise choices in general—at least not wise by Niall’s standards.
For all that was right in his life, Niall was unable to have a single month without drama. This time—hell, a lot of times—it originated in the faery who had bequeathed the court to him. Niall stood in the hotel lobby where he’d finished up sorting out the accounting discrepancies at the two new Atlantic City casinos the Dark Court financed. For all his comfort with the dark, Niall preferred when vices were controlled.
Irial’s voice, from when they’d first met, came echoing over the years: You like them. Mortals, that is. Genuinely like them.
Some things were unchanged. Irial wasn’t prone to liking humans. He’d bedded his share, but genuine fondness for them was as rare as a blizzard in the Mojave. It could happen, but now that the last Winter Queen had been replaced, it was unlikely.
He looked again at the text Leslie had sent a few hours ago: “With Iri. Airport. NOLA. Love.”
He could reply, but getting answers when Discord was involved was as likely as turning coal to diamonds. It could happen, but not without a degree of pressure that Niall was unwilling to apply via another person.
Niall glanced at the time. By now, they were on the ground. Why? That was the real question. Of all the cities in the world, that was one of the few Irial avoided. That hadn’t always been the case. Niall remembered seeing him there, thinking that it was a city positively designed for the Dark Court. Back then, Niall had been advisor to the Summer King, and Keenan had toted the court there in pursuit of a potential Summer Queen—one who’d vanished.
He called Irial. Once. Twice. Tried Leslie’s number, too.
Then he did what any sane Dark King did when Discord was not easily located: he booked a trip of his own. His, however, was a bit more primal than steel tubes hurtling through the air as if by magic.
“Chela?” He spoke the word into the air, the shadow slithered across the ground, and the word moved at the speed of darkness. He ought to call her by her title, but he’d known her too long for that. Before her, her mate—Gabriel—had led the Hunt, but upon his death, Chela assumed the mantle.
“Gabriela,” Niall added, using the title out of respect.
Then he ordered a coffee. There was no way to keep up with Irial in New Orleans of all places and catch a bit of much needed sleep. Coffee was the best solution. Again. Some days, Niall wondered if he’d have flat-out refused the crown if he knew how little rest there would be.
Before an hour had passed, Niall could feel them: The Hunt rode. The earth itself seemed to quake, as if the soil would shake loose the dead. The weight of the fear that rolled out before them made the very air heavier, thicker, as if moving was impossible. Several mortals in the street shivered. The roll of terror that surrounded the Hunt made more than a few passing mortals look to the sky as if a storm rode overhead.
“We come,” the voices echoed. No mortal ear would hear. No human eye could see.
Chela and the Hounds never moved at a saunter.
When they arrived, Chela did not get off her steed, Alba, who appeared to be a massive lion currently. Chela’s shifted shapes the way some people changed clothes. Alba expressed his feelings with his shape. Since Gabriel’s death, Alba was often leonine, feral and ready to hunt anything that threatened Chela—or looked as if it could.
None of the steeds were in car form. Instead, they looked like a deadly menagerie: an oversized lion snarled next to a lizard-like beast; something that resembled a dragon paced next to a chimera; and scattered among them all were skeletal horses and emaciated red dogs. Atop the steeds were equally fierce Hounds.
The leader, Chela, dipped her chin. It was the closest to a bow that most Hounds offered. They weren’t strangers to the etiquette of court, but they weren’t subjects of any court either—and Chela was keen on reminding him of that truth. They stayed because she chose to stay. The fears they roused by their very presence were nourishing to the Dark Court. The terror that rolled off their skins was like the finest wine. And they, not shockingly, liked to be appreciated.
“Home?” The Hound paused and grinned. “Or has the old King done something troubling again?”
Niall walked up to her and said, “I don’t know, but I need to go find out.”
Chela grinned. “Where to?”
“New Orleans.”
Her pause would’ve escaped his notice if several of the Hounds accompanying her hadn’t frozen, too. For one extended moment, they all seemed to stop moving, as if time itself had held its breath. Then, with a falsely casual expression, Chela said, “Sure. We haven’t been there in ages. A little bayou excursion sounds good.” She motioned him toward her. “We’ll drop you at the house and go—”
“The house?”
Several Hounds exchanged glances.
“In the Garden District . . .? I thought Iri would be at the house,” Chela said haltingly.
“What house?” Niall rubbed his temples and lit another cigarette. At some point, Niall figured he might know all the secrets the last Dark King held, but some days he suspected that was impossible.
“You visited,” a Hound said.
“The court owns that house?” Niall clarified. He remembered. It was an ostentatious Garden District mansion, but he’d assumed that Irial had merely rented it as most courts did in most cities.
More shuffling and their glances went everywhere but him. Niall couldn’t order them to obey him. The Hounds only obeyed Chela.
“Sentimental reasons,” Chela offered. “We all do things for reasons other than logic, don’t we?” She glanced at the steed that kept pace with her, riderless still.
The steed that had belonged to Gabriel had remained in the form of a giant black horse with a reptilian head. It flashed pit-viper fangs at Niall, not in threat but in a smile of sorts. Aside from Chela, the steed had only allowed him, Irial, and Leslie to ride. Niall suspected the Winter Queen could, but she simply visited the nameless creature from time-to-time.
Chela could order it to shift or choose a new master, but she had done neither.
“Why do I feel like there is more you could tell me?” Niall asked.
“Because you’re not as dim as I once believed.” Chela watched as Gabriel’s steed stomped over to him.
A rush of sheer exhilaration rolled over Niall as the beast nickered through those pit-viper fangs and tossed its head.
“I’m coming,” he murmured. With a leap he was astride, and the steed was already tensed for motion.
“New Orleans,” Chela said as soon as he was mostly, but not quite, seated.
And the world blurred in a way that was both dizzying and beautiful.
Leslie said nothing as Irial opened a door to a house that seemed more haunted than anywhere she’d been. If a building could be melancholy, it would be this one. The building was in immaculate condition, the marble floors inside the door gleamed as if they’d been polished that morning. The tall wooden balusters lining the upper floor had the patina of hands gliding over them often. The Turkish rugs seemed as bright as if they were new.
But as she followed Irial into the house, she saw that every room was filled with sheet draped furniture. No one lived here. Irial pulled a few sheets away, revealing books that were still open to assorted pages on end tables. An empty tea cup sat next to a pair of hundred-year-old glasses.
And Irial looked into corners as if his memory and will alone could summon a body from the past.
Faeries were magical creatures, capable of any manner of impossible things, but not returning faces from the past or making ghost breathe again. The look of sheer pain on Irial’s face made Leslie wrap her arms around him. There were no words, but she could offer him comfort.
At first he said nothing, simply pulled her closer to his side like a child holding a stuffed toy. Then a few moments later, he said, “I loved her. I would’ve loved my child, too. I do even though I’ve never met her.”
Leslie couldn’t pretend to understand his pain, but she listened and she held him.
Then, they went to the dining room and uncovered a table that would seat a dozen guests. There, Irial spread out the letters and files he had, and they began to read.
When Niall arrived, the last thing he expected to see was what looked like a midnight study session. Containers of take-out, a bottle of wine, and the unmistakable scent of chicory coffee assailed him when he opened the door of the Garden District house he hadn’t entered since the late 1800s.
“The door was unlocked,” he said in lieu of a greeting.
Irial nodded. “I figured you’d be here sooner or later since she texted.”
Leslie was more enthusiastic. She crossed the few feet between them and pulled him into her usual welcoming hug and kiss. Exhaustion fled in that moment. He was home—because home was wherever these two baffling creatures were.
Mutely, Irial kicked out a chair and resumed reading.
At Niall’s querying look to Leslie, the calmest of the three, she sighed and quietly walked over and plunked her hand over the middle of the letter Irial was reading.
“Talk. To. Him.”
Irial stood and paced across the room, where several bottles of whiskey had been hidden under another sheet. “Whisky? Gin?”
Niall nodded. He didn’t simply grab Irial and kiss the answers out of him as he might if they were alone. Sometimes there was a wall that they kept around Leslie still—not that they lacked affection in front of her, but faeries who were well over a thousand years old could be more violent in their affection than he thought Leslie would understand.
“You’re stalling,” Leslie said.
Niall smothered a grin with a sudden need to cough.
“I have—had—a child,” Irial announced as he handed Niall a beautiful crystal highball glass that would’ve hit the floor if not for Irial’s reflexes. He handed the still-full glass back to Niall. “Thelma had a babe.”
“Thelma? The young . . . the potential Summer Queen you spirited away?” Niall emptied his glass and stalked past Irial to refill it.
“The what?” Leslie asked. Her arms folded. “The people who were seeking her were faeries?”
Irial shrugged.
And Niall knew. He knew the secret that Irial hadn’t shared back then. “You made the curse.”
“True.”
“Did you always know?” Niall stared at the faery he’d finally started to figure out the past handful of years.
Again Irial shrugged.
Niall half-fell into the chair Irial had offered when he’d arrived. “So you shagged the woman who would have been the Summer Queen if Keenan had found her, and she had your child?”
Again Irial shrugged.
“We suffered over a hundred more years of winter because you felt like hiding the queen?” Niall wanted to throttle him, simply squeeze until Irial had sense in him, but as such a thing was neither possible nor wise—and the events were all in the past—he simply stared at Irial.
After a few moments, Irial stood and walked away. Niall wasn’t wrong, and Irial was sure that from the outside it probably seemed like a heinous thing he’d done. It wasn’t that simple, though.
Thelma was special.
He didn’t risk the wrath of both Summer and Winter casually. Admittedly, such a thing wasn’t out of character for him, but he wasn’t foolish.
Except when it comes to love.
He turned the door knob, feeling a sharp edge of the glass knob, a memento from when he’d thrown a few things in anger. Just inside the room, Irial paused. The last time he stood here was the day after Thelma left. The room had still smelled of her perfume. Her sheets had smelled the same.
He’d brought her beignets and coffee, as they had shared the first time they had a meal together, and for the first time in centuries, Irial was truly happy. He had been well aware of her mortality, of the fact that loving her as he’d allowed himself to do could only end badly. He’d been equally aware that the then-weak Summer Court and the over-strong Winter Court would both have him skinned alive if they knew that the missing Summer Queen was nestled in his sheets.
What he hadn’t know was that Thelma would leave so soon.
“You weren’t trying to thwart Summer, were you?” Niall’s voice came from the doorway to the room.
Irial had heard his steps, known that the first wave of anger would pass once Niall tasted Irial’s feelings.
“Iri? I was rash,” Niall said, not quite an apology, but they’d never been much for such words.
Irial shrugged. When he’d met Niall, Irial could taste every feeling, every glorious bit of desire, of hope, of joy. It was a skill unique to the Dark King. He romanced Niall, Thelma, Leslie, and then Niall again with the unfair ability to taste what they felt. He negotiated with kings and queens with that same gift. It had made him formidable. And still he lost more often than made sense. Sometimes knowledge—or love—was not enough to overcome fears or doubts.
“I hadn’t planned to love her,” Irial admitted, back still to Niall. “Or you. Or Leslie. I’m terrible at it, you know?”
“No,” Niall corrected. “You are terrible at dealing with the fears that come with loving, not at being in love.”
Irial walked over to the bathtub, a claw-footed indulgence that Thelma had thought the single most remarkable part of the house. . . other than books. She’d read the way most mortals breathed or slept, as if death himself would come if she went too long without words.
“I had a child,” Irial repeated. The letters that had been delivered the week prior, the strange missives from the past that had been all addressed to him but never sent, had finally arrived a century late.
Irial turned to face Niall. “My daughter wrote to me, and Thelma saved each letter. She wrote, too.”
Memories of the past crowded in as Irial tried to contain the massive well of loss, of anger, of confusion that threatened to swallow him.
They stood, awkwardly in silence, until Leslie joined them. Her hand was shaking when she held up a letter.
“This was delivered to the house,” she said. Before he could panic much at the thought of Leslie unprotected, she added, “Chela brought it to me.”
Irial opened it and pulled out a single page of spidery handwriting.
Father,
I grew up hearing of you. I wrote letters as soon as I could write—at Mother’s order. Mother wrote as well, but she often wept when she did. I don’t know how things ended, but I know that she never married. As I grew older, never quite aging as children should, we moved a lot. We stayed clear of fey things, and she often spoke in terrified words of the Summer King . . . and of my father, a beautiful man who saved her.
What she failed to tell me, of course, was that the man who saved her was also the Dark King. I knew your name, but not what role you filled in that world. Had I known, I would not have written.
When the Summer King—the same faery that you saved my mother from—came to my door for my daughter, Moira, I tried to figure out how to find you. I discovered then that my beloved grandfather, a good faery in a sea of monsters, was the king of the worst of fey. Still I was prepared to reach you, but Moira died, and she left behind a child. No tale my mother told was enough for me to risk that love had blinded her, that you were as awful as I feared.
I believe you are already acquainted with your great granddaughter, Aislinn.
Ash is powerful enough that I thought about writing to you when she became fey.
At the least I wanted you to have the letters I wrote before I knew what you were. I decided that if you came to the house where I was conceived, I would tell you. Mother said you left the house boarded up because you could not bear to be there without her. Every so often, I would check to see if it stood empty. One of my granddaughter’s faeries has been watching it for me—the whims of an old lady--so if you ever read this, I believe you’ve proven that Mother was right, that you loved her. If so, some day, if you would like, I would welcome the chance to meet you.
I have questions about my longevity that sooner or later I’ll need to address with Ash. I was old (despite appearance and strength) when my own daughter was born, and I seem to age no further despite the passing of years. I’ve learned to appear to age, but often I simply moved. Now, though, I’d rather not leave Ash. Perhaps it is time for meeting.
your daughter,
Elena Foy
Irial handed the paper to Niall. “My daughter is alive.”
As Niall and Leslie read, Irial knew when they understood the import of what the letter contained.
“Of all the people in the world, why did it have to be her?” Niall muttered.
“So the women in Ash’s family were always the ones who would be the Summer Queen,” Leslie pronounced. “Grams, Ash’s mother, Ash.”
“And Thelma,” Niall added.
“Thelma had the Sight,” Irial said. “She saw me, and she still chose me.”
The three stood in silence as the sheer enormity of the thing settled on them. He was blood family to the Summer Queen. Aislinn Foy, the Summer Queen, was Thelma’s great-granddaughter. His great-granddaughter. How in the name of all that he held sacred was he going to navigate that relationship? He couldn’t fathom her taking that well.
Her partner, at least, tolerated him. He and Seth weren’t friends precisely, but they had a relatively congenial acquaintance.
Then Irial grinned. “Wait till the whelp realizes you’re his stepfather-in-law!”
“Not quite how that works,” Niall pointed out.
But Irial was, in his heart of hearts, the embodiment of Discord. He wasn’t going to do anything to hurt his daughter or great-granddaughter, of course, but his mind was already spinning on the possibilities of teasing Seth and on strengthening the alliance between Dark and Summer. It might not seem like discord or chaos, but it strengthened some court alliances, which necessarily weakened others.
“Shall we go out on the town to celebrate parenthood?” Irial draped an arm around both of his beloveds. The issue of Leslie’s mortality still lingered as a fear, but that was a trouble for tomorrow.
“Stepdad. Stepmom. We have so many years to make up for with Elena,” Irial said.
“I’m not her stepmom. She’s Ash’s grandmother,” Leslie objected.
“I think I should start with a house,” Irial mused. “This house. And a pony. Kids like ponies.” He frowned. “Kelpie or steed?”
Niall and Leslie exchanged a look of horror that Irial pretended not to see.
“Think of it as preparation for our little ones,” Niall said.
Irial stopped. Leslie froze, but Niall could taste her hope, her joy at such thoughts.
“Come now,” Niall said mildly. “Leslie said she wants children. Once she’s finished with school and moves in—”
“She’s moving in?” Irial said with raw hope. He stared at Leslie as if he’d just been granted a gift. “There will be children.”
“Eventually,” Leslie murmured.
“Oh, when Ani and Tish were tiny, I bought them this little toy shoppe in Philadelphia.”
“No,” Leslie said firmly. Her flood of amusement surged toward Niall, and undoubtedly to Irial, too, through their ink connection. Leslie folded her arms and announced, “Our children will not get their own stores.”
“So just one store,” Irial said. “We could do that.”
“Not what—"
“We really ought to think about buying more property,” Irial announced. “For Ash. For Elena. For Elena’s half sisters and brothers.”
In a faux whisper Leslie asked, “He does realize that Ash may not be as excited by this as he is, right?”
“Pish!” Irial gave them both big smacking kisses. “What about water parks? How old do the children need to be before we buy that?”
“I’m not pregnant,” Leslie reminded him.
Irial waved his hand, as if to brush the objection away. “When you’re ready, love.” He motioned toward the stairs. “For now, I shall dote on Elena and Ash. My girls.”
They followed him down the steps, all but tumbling when he came to an abrupt halt. “They should have guards. Give me a moment to talk to Chela before--”
“They have guards,” Niall reminded him. “Summer Queen. Her grandmother.”
“More guards!” Irial went to see Chela.
Niall and Leslie stood in the house. He glanced at her. “Have you told him yet that you’re moving in after graduation?”
“Not yet. He hasn’t been visiting, and . . .” Her words faded, and she shrugged. “He’ll figure it out when I stop leaving.”
Not a single month without drama, but Niall loved them both. Petulant. Mercurial. All around maddening. Riddled with complications he couldn’t imagine. They were everything he could want in life.
“Perhaps we should ask Seth to use that future-seeing of his about your mortality or semi-fey nature before Irial tells them he’s Ash’s great-grandfather,” Niall suggested.
“Agreed,” Leslie said with a laugh.
Then they went to join the new father to enjoy a rare, beautiful event in anyone’s life: celebrating life and parenthood.
The End