A Local Habitation

“So you think it’s one of us,” Jan said, without preamble.

How far can we push you before you snap, little hero? I wondered. Aloud, I said, “It’s the only answer that makes sense.” I felt Gordan’s glare on the back of my neck. Sorry, kid. Sometimes you have to tell the truth, even when you’re talking to heroes. Maybe especially when you’re talking to heroes.

Jan’s expression was bitter. I’ve seen that mixture of resignation and hopelessness before; it’s usually in my mirror. “You’re sure?”

“As sure as I can be.” I stood. I knew I was falling into a subservient posture, but I couldn’t help it. Half of me is fae, and the fae know how to obey their lords. “Monsters don’t lay that kind of trap.”

“I see.” She looked down at her hands. Her nails were bitten to the quick. “I trust everyone that works for me. I can’t imagine who would do this.”

What was I supposed to say? I exchanged a glance with Quentin. Jan built herself an ivory tower to keep the wolves out; she never dreamed they were already inside.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I meant it: no matter how much of an idiot she’d been, none of them deserved this. “We’ll do what we can.”

“I know.”

“And we’ll figure out what to do about the bodies.” I shook my head. “I still don’t understand what’s going on with them.”

“The night-haunts always come,” said Quentin.

“Maybe they aren’t really dead.” Jan looked at me, suddenly hopeful. “Can you bring them back? Wake them up?”

“No.” I didn’t know how to tell her how dead they really were. Jan hadn’t tried riding their blood; she hadn’t tasted the absence of life like sour wine. Quentin and I did, and we knew they were gone. Worse than gone: their blood was empty. Blood is never empty. It remembers all the little triumphs and tragedies of a lifetime, and it keeps them for as long as it continues to exist. Their blood remembered nothing. Whatever lives they’d lived and whoever they’d been, it was lost when they died. They took it into the darkness with them, out of Faerie forever.

Jan sighed. “I see. I . . . oak and ash, Toby, I’m sorry. You should never have gotten wrapped up in all of this.”

“My liege sent me, so I came.” I shrugged. “I’m not leaving until this is over.”

“And Quentin?” asked Terrie, biting her lip.

Quentin shot me a worried look. Clearly, he’d been wondering the same thing.

It was going to come out eventually. “Sylvester is sending someone to get him. Until then, we just need to keep him safe.”

“Toby—”

“She’s right,” said Terrie. “This isn’t your fight, Quentin. You don’t have to stay.”

“I want to,” he said.

“Hey, I say we let him,” said Gordan. “At least if the killer picks him, we get to live a little longer. Call it a learning experience.” You have to respect self-interest that focused. Most people at least try to pretend your welfare matters as much as their own.

“Gordan, that isn’t fair,” said Jan.

“Fair isn’t the point, and this isn’t a discussion. Sylvester’s calling him home. He’s going,” I said. Quentin’s expression was one of sheer betrayal. Tough. I wasn’t going to be responsible for getting him killed. “I’ll be here until this is over. You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

“I don’t think anyone ever has,” Gordan muttered. She’d given up glaring: now she just looked sullen.

“In the meantime,” I said, ignoring her, “we’re going to need all the things I asked for. The information on the victims, access to their work spaces, everything. I don’t want any of you going anywhere alone. Is it possible for you to go somewhere else in the County until this is fixed? Someplace outside the knowe?”

Jan shook her head. “No.”

“Jan—”