There was something wrong with my head.
No, no, it was my ankle that was hurt, a bright, stabbing ache. I liked some pain in battle—gave me an edge. But this was off-putting. Nauseating. It hurt.
But I couldn’t concentrate on it.
There was something wrong with my head.
It had been hit, a few times, against a very unforgiving railing, and you had to give it to those old shipbuilders who had put this place together. The captain had some of the guys from the docks work on the house, and damn, if they didn’t know how to build a railing! Nobody was falling off this ship, nope, nope.
There might be something wrong with my head.
I blinked and there was a tree limb in front of me, as big around as my body and covered in hoary old bark, like it had been there forever, only I didn’t think so. Because a blast of dirt and rock came with it, like somebody had just unloaded a dump truck on me. It made me cough and gag, because I’d had my mouth open, and now on top of everything else, I could barely breathe.
And then some apples fell on my head.
Probably not a good thing.
There was already something wrong with it.
But at least the limb seemed to have taken out a couple more rock creatures, like a bark-covered fist shooting out of the kitchen. Where I guess the apple logs had sprouted again, and slammed into two assailants I hadn’t noticed until what was basically a sideways tree smashed through the middle of them. And sent a crap ton of fruit bouncing down the stairs.
I just lay there, watching it go, because I couldn’t do anything else. The limb was lying across me like it meant business, and anyway, my brain didn’t seem to be taking orders right now. But I wasn’t too concerned, and not just because of the comfortable darkness that kept trying to eat at my vision. But because of the crashes and yells and renewed clang, clang, clang of metal on stone.
The fey had arrived, lighting up the hallway as if dawn had come in a moment. I flashed on that scene with Gandalf showing up with the Rohirrim at Helm’s Deep. Because even half-dead, I am a huge fucking nerd.
“To the king,” I whispered, laughing, and then couldn’t remember why.
There was something wrong with my head.
And this time, I could name it, because it was weirdly like static, only no.
Static didn’t hurt this much.
I think I screamed. I’m not sure, since all I could hear was that awful white noise, but I felt like screaming—and rending and tearing and stabbing whoever was repeatedly sticking an ice pick in my fucking ear. But there was no one there.
Except for Caedmon, who was looking slightly weirded out.
“What?” I said, as the static retreated, and watched him blink at me. It seemed to take a long time. But maybe not, because then he was gone again.
I heard the front doors slam open, and peered over the tree limb to see everything start to get sucked out. Or blown out, because it seemed like the wind was coming from in here. I didn’t know. I just knew that pieces of wood and other debris, even some of the smaller rocks, went flying. And disintegrating, in the case of the latter, as they sailed through the air outside. I could see them through the transom, puffing away into nothingness above the streetlights, like dirty fireworks.
Big dirty fireworks, because a few of the creatures were getting blown out, too.
It looked like some of the fey had tiny whirlwinds in their hands that they were throwing at the rock monsters, but obviously not.
There was something wrong with my head.
“They can’t hold their form too far off the ground,” Caedmon yelled, because he was back again, his long blond hair whipping around his face.
I nodded.
That explained why they hadn’t just formed upstairs to begin with.
Good to know, I thought, dizzily.
And then I blacked out, because there was something wrong with my head.
* * *
—
I woke up on the kitchen table, screaming in pain. “Be still!” Caedmon said, holding my ankle and looking harassed.
Normally, it would have been funny to see him with his shining fall of hair a frazzled mess, his shirt sleeves rolled up, and his face red.
But not when his hands were red, too. Because it looked like I hadn’t been the first one on the table tonight, and wouldn’t be the last. There were several battered and bloody fey sitting on stools, their heads resting against walls or cabinets, as if they were too tired to hold them up. It looked like the manlikans hadn’t gone down without a fight.
And then somebody else started screaming, and he sounded worse off than me.
“I said, be still!” Caedmon snapped, but I barely heard him because it was back again, that terrible static that sounded like a swarm of bees.
Angry bees.
Angry stinging bees, inside my skull.
Caedmon appeared in my vision, grabbing the sides of my head, saying something. It looked like it might be important, and felt like he was pouring power into me, but I couldn’t concentrate on anything but the bees. They were making my body jerk and strain from their constant stinging, dozens and then hundreds of them, all at once. I tried to read his lips, until my field of vision was overlaid with static, too, like an old-fashioned TV on the fritz, where sometimes you got a clear picture, and other times it was just snow.
Stop it! I told myself. I’d had enough shocks for one day. I didn’t need my brain deciding to break a little more for no apparent reason.
Only there was a reason; I could feel it.
I just didn’t know what it was.
And then I was screaming some more, because it hurt that bad.
* * *
—
I awoke to light and pain and noise, which wasn’t unusual. And to a glowing being bending over me, holding my head between his hands, which was. I realized I was screaming and stopped, caught his shoulder and swung my legs off the side of a table before pushing him against some counters.
He looked surprised, but not as much as I was.
What . . . was he?
It was hard to tell. He glowed so brightly that he was difficult to see. Liquid light, white-hot and yellow, outlined his body, and boiled through the middle in a shimmering dance of—
Gah! I didn’t know. I couldn’t look directly at him, not for long, and even when I did it was useless. I’d never seen anything like him.
I glanced to the side, quick flicks of the eyes, trying to see where I was, and so that he had no opportunity to break away. Not that he was trying. He was simply standing there, permitting the scrutiny, because he knew it didn’t matter.
I couldn’t take him.
The realization struck deep in my stomach, like a thudding blow. It had been a long time, a very long time, since I had felt outmatched. I could be bested by numbers or taken down by trickery. But sheer power, in one being?
That . . . was rare. And even when I’d felt it, I’d never been sure of the outcome. Battle is fickle; the strongest doesn’t always win. A thousand things go into it: strategy, patience, experience, determination. The outcome was always in question—
Until now.
I couldn’t take him. I felt it resonate in my bones, with an assurance it had never had before, felt my lips pull back from my teeth, in anger and denial. What was he?
Not alone, I thought, because there were others in the room. Scattered about, all of them tense, unhappy, wary. And glowing softly in my mental landscape.
Fey.
They were wounded but on their feet, with weapons out, despite the fact that one could barely hold a knife. He was shaking, imperceptible to a human, but I saw. Ready to fall with barely a strike. But the others were combat ready, despite their wounds, and still more ran through the door.
These were almost untouched, with only a few cuts and bruises that showed up as dark patches in my mind, not even enough to slow them down. But it didn’t matter. They weren’t attacking. They were looking to the one I held for guidance, as if they weren’t sure what to do.
And for the first time in a long time, neither was I.