An Artificial Night

“And Katie?”


“Katie . . .” Getting her first might be the easiest way; she wouldn’t be with the others, so we could hide her in the woods while we went back for the others. If she would stay hidden. Terror is an unpredictable thing, and Katie was human. She had less experience with monsters than her fae counterparts.

Katie’s humanity raised another issue. The twisted children I’d encountered said the human children would be ridden and changed, becoming horses. If she wasn’t herself, I didn’t want Quentin to see her until we’d already done everything else we had to do. “We may have a problem there.” When his eyes widened, I raised my hand, saying, “I need you to stay calm while we go over this, okay?” He nodded. “Okay.”

Lowering my hand, I explained what I’d seen during my brief time as one of Blind Michael’s captives—and what they’d said to me. Quentin’s eyes narrowed as I spoke, and when I finished he asked, coldly, “Why didn’t you mention this before?”

“Because there wasn’t time. I’m sorry, and you can hate me if you want, but even if I’d told you before, it wouldn’t have changed where we wound up, which is here, needing to rescue all of the captives. All right?” He nodded, reluctantly. “Okay. We go for the others first.”

That was the wrong thing to say. He sat bolt upright, quivering with fury. “We aren’t abandoning her just because she’s human! We—”

“Be quiet!” I hissed. “We need to go for the others first because there are more of them, and they’re a lot less likely to be traumatized by all of this. You said yourself that Katie doesn’t know about the fae. How do you think she’s handling this?” He sagged, expression going bleak, and I nodded. “Exactly. We get the others first, because they might be able to help us find her, and if not, at least they’re less likely to make things more difficult.”

“Fine,” he muttered.

“Hate me later,” I said. There’d be time to worry about Katie after we found the other children—but that was the real problem. How were we supposed to find them? I turned the candle over in my hand, muttering, “You can get there and back by the candle’s light . . .”

“Toby?”

“Just thinking out loud about how we do this. We don’t want to open the wrong door.”

“No,” he agreed. Neither of us wanted to see what skeletons Blind Michael might be keeping in his closet.

I shook my head. “There has to be a way to find them. Blind Michael has to play fair.”

“Why?” Quentin frowned. “What’s going to make him?”

“The rules. This is a kid’s game, and they’re always fair—that’s what makes them worth winning.” I turned the candle again. “There has to be a way.”

“Oh.” He sighed. “I don’t really hate you.”

“I know.” I paused, eyes widening as I stared at the candle. The game was fair. The game had to be fair. “Hang on a second.”

“What?”

Shushing him, I raised the candle. The Luidaeg used my blood to create it, and it sang to me. More and more, I’ve been finding that most of my strength is in my blood; there had to be a way for me to use it. Everything in Blind Michael’s lands seemed to be based off broken, childish logic, all doggerel and jump rope rhymes. If the rhyme said that I could get there and back by the light of a candle, I probably could, as long as it was the right candle. It was the only lead I had. I might as well try taking it.

“How many miles to Babylon? I fear we’ve lost our way,” I chanted, ignoring Quentin’s quizzical look. “Can we get there and back by the candle’s light . . .” I tapered off, cursing inwardly. Rhyming has never been one of my strengths.