Rosemary and Rue

The paths inside the Tea Gardens were narrow enough that keeping Simon in sight meant following more closely. I shortened the gap between us, trusting my elementary illusions to hide me. The more powerful someone is, the less time they spend looking for small magic. Changeling games are the most primitive of all. I was betting Simon would overlook me completely, because my illusions were too small to be a threat.

Simon walked on for a good twenty minutes before stopping at the base of the arched moon bridge that was the gateway to the fae side of Lily’s domain. I fell back, stepping behind a stunted Japanese maple. I couldn’t risk moving any closer; that would be pushing it, illusions or no. I’d just have to wait. He seemed to be waiting, too, hands in his pockets as he gazed across the water, the perfect picture of a tourist admiring our city. I forced myself to stay alert, waiting for him to act.

“Simon!” called a laughing female voice. He turned, suddenly smiling. I mirrored the gesture, looking toward the source of the voice, and froze.

She looked like just another teenage girl, dressed in skintight clothes, black hair unbound and hanging past her hips. I knew better. I knew her name. Oleander de Merelands: nine hundred years of nasty wrapped up in a pretty little package that could pass for sixteen in any mortal setting. She’s half Tuatha de Dannan, half Peri, and entirely hazardous to your health. The Peri have always been a race that enjoys causing pain, but they aren’t social—avoid them and they’ll avoid you. The Tuatha, on the other hand, enjoy the company of others. Oleander got her fondness for hurting people from the Peri side of the family, and her willingness to seek them out from the Tuatha. Rumor puts her at the sites of half the assassinations in the last hundred years and there are rewards on her head in half the kingdoms I can name. The other half just haven’t gotten around to it yet.

“It’s wonderful to see you, my dear.” Simon folded her into his arms and delivered a kiss that made several passing tourists blush and look away, embarrassed by what they perceived as a pervert with his jailbait girlfriend. If only they knew. The Torquill brothers are barely five hundred years old; if anyone was cradle robbing, it wasn’t Simon. I put a hand over my mouth, appalled for reasons that had nothing to do with anyone’s age. There had always been rumors, but no one had ever been able to prove a direct connection between Simon and the fae underworld. Seeing him with Oleander changed everything.

I had to get to Sylvester. I had to tell him. I started backing up, getting ready to run.

“This is getting dull, darling,” Oleander informed Simon, pouting in a way that would have been pretty if it hadn’t been for the malice behind it. “Finish it?”

“Of course, sweetheart.” He raised his head, looking past the tree I was crouching behind and right into my eyes. “You can come out now. We’re ready.”

“Oh, oak and ash,” I hissed, and scrambled backward—or tried to. That was the order I gave to my legs, which were suddenly not obeying my commands. I staggered into the open, dropping to my knees. I tried to stand. I couldn’t. I couldn’t do anything but wait.

Lily, where are you? I thought desperately. She was the Lady of the Tea Gardens; this was her fiefdom and her domain. She should have been there by now, rallying her handmaids and running to my rescue, but she was nowhere to be seen. There weren’t even any pixies in the trees. The mortal tourists looked at us the way they would have looked at air. I had never in my life been so afraid, or so alone.

Simon’s smile was almost warm as he knelt, placing one hand beneath my chin and raising it until our eyes were level. I tried to struggle, to find some way to look away from him, but couldn’t force myself to move.

“Hello, my dear,” he said. “Did you enjoy our little walk?”

“Go . . . to . . . hell,” I managed through gritted teeth.

Oleander laughed. “Oh, she’s a sassy one.” Her expression darkened, mood shifting in a heartbeat. “Make her pay for that.”