A Red-Rose Chain

“Ah, but, you see, I have wooed and won the woman of my dreams. Admittedly, some of those dreams would be more properly termed ‘nightmares,’ but I don’t believe we get to be that picky when talking about such things.” He led me out of the alley and onto the tree-lined street. I didn’t know Portland well enough to know where we were—I didn’t know Portland at all, really—but he walked without hesitation, and I followed him. Whatever strange methods Cait Sidhe used to mark their holdings for each other, I trusted him to know how to interpret things. “If my ego had not grown, it would surely be a sign that I was no true cat, and you would leave me for another.”


“I don’t know,” I said. “I love you, but the cat part has never been the most important thing to me.”

The corner of Tybalt’s mouth curved upward. “And, truly, that is excellent to know. I was considering becoming a horse, or a stag, or perhaps a dairyman.”

“You know, if I ever forget that you’re a weirdo, the fact that you class ‘dairyman’ with horse and deer will remind me.”

“Stag, please,” said Tybalt. He tried to sound wounded. The laughter sort of spoiled the effect. “Do not shame my manhood, I beg of you.”

“Stag, then,” I said. We turned a corner, starting down a street packed with odd little shops. Half of them had candles in the window. Sobering, I asked, “Tybalt . . . are we doing the right thing? Getting involved, I mean? We could go home and start rallying our allies.”

“Preventing a war is always the right thing to do,” he said gravely. “War is not a game, for all that some would play it as they would a round of whist. War is a tragedy in motion. Everyone is innocent, and everyone is guilty, and the crows come for their bodies all the same. The only ones who benefit in war are the night-haunts, and even they would rather their feasts came in smaller portion.”

I thought of May, who had willingly left the night-haunts to become my Fetch, and the way the night-haunts sometimes spoke of death: like it was a waste. They lived because other fae died, and even they understood that living was better. “I just feel like we’re starting to interfere on a level that’s sort of . . . extreme.”

“But that’s what heroes do.” He stopped in front of a comic book store. There were no candles in this window: only men in tights and women with improbably good, improbably invisible bras, striking heroic poses that seemed much more sincere than my own weary resignation. I didn’t have time to dwell on that, however. Tybalt pulled his arm out of mine, put both hands against the sides of my face, and kissed me.

No matter how many times I kissed Tybalt, no matter how many situations and places I kissed him in, part of me always marveled at the fact that I was allowed to do it at all. He wasn’t the sort of man who kissed scruffy changelings in tank tops and tennis shoes—and yet somehow, he was exactly that sort of man, because he had kissed me over and over again, with the same delicate amazement that I felt when I kissed him. Like we were getting away with something that should, by all rights, have been forbidden. Like we were winning.

The taste of pennyroyal and musk on his lips was stronger than usual, thanks to the human disguise he had crafted and was still powering. It overpowered any lingering trace of Quentin’s magic, which was good; I would have been a little unnerved to suddenly have my squire involved in our embrace. Tybalt kissed me slowly and thoroughly, until my ears and cheeks were burning red and felt like they must be hot to the touch.

I was panting a little when he pulled away, smiling smugly. I glared at him.

“That was entirely unfair,” I said. “You can kiss me like that, but we’re not going to be able to do anything about it for days.”

“We have a bed,” he said.

“And we are not doing anything in it when we’re in the house of a man who wants to collect my bodily fluids for icky alchemical purposes, okay? Nothing’s going to happen, bed-wise, until we get home.”

Tybalt sighed extravagantly. “You see, even now, you torment me so.” He stepped back, taking my hand in his. There was something purposeful about the gesture, like it was less casual affection and more a statement of ownership. That feeling grew stronger as he turned toward the comic book store and started for the door, pulling me along with him.

“Tybalt?” I asked, in a low voice.

“Yes?”

“Did you just kiss me to show off for whoever’s inside here?”