The Winter Long

“The Cait Sidhe had three Firstborn where most races had only one,” agreed Tybalt. “Our First worked together with Oberon himself to make this place a sanctuary for our kind. This Eira, no matter how powerful she may be, will not have the power to overcome a spell woven by three of her equals and one of her superiors.”


“That would be swell if we were staying here, but we’re not,” I said. Tybalt frowned at me. So did Raj. Quentin was looking away, watching the fire, expression blank. I shook my head. “Look: you can’t pull everyone I give a damn about into the Court of Cats while we wait to see what, if anything, Evening is planning. May and Jazz are still at Arden’s Court. The Luidaeg is still asleep. Sylvester doesn’t know why his brother is . . . oh, root and branch.” I stopped mid-sentence, a wave of bitter understanding washing over me.

“October? What’s wrong?” demanded Tybalt.

“Simon admitted to me—admitted—that he was responsible for kidnapping Luna and Rayseline, but he said he did it because he was hired to by the person who’d geased him. She offered him something he said he ‘couldn’t resist,’ and so he agreed. But whoever hired him also wanted me dead.” I raked my hair away from my face with one hand, feeling strangely numb. “She wanted me killed. That was part of the deal. And Sylvester doesn’t know. He knows Simon did it, but he has no idea that it was Evening who hired—we have to get to Shadowed Hills. We have to warn him.”

“We don’t even know that Evening is going there,” said Tybalt. “And even if you’re sure, can’t we call? Sylvester will listen to you. He’s learned the value of your words, even when what you say is a seeming impossibility.”

“Yes—yes!” I seized on the suggestion, digging my phone out again and dialing the number for Shadowed Hills. It was ringing when I raised it to my ear. And it kept ringing, and ringing, until dread gathered in the pit of my stomach, whispering to me of disasters and double-crosses. We didn’t know where Simon was. He could have doubled back, he could have—

The ringing stopped. “Hello?”

The voice was Sylvester’s, and wasn’t Sylvester’s, all at the same time. The dread solidified into a hard ball of anger. “Simon. Why are you answering this phone?”

“Why hello, October. It’s lovely to hear from you. I was hoping you would call. You don’t call nearly as often as I would like. You should really move back home.”

I hesitated. I’d identified him by name. If it had been Sylvester on the phone, he would have corrected me, and probably been horribly offended. So why was he talking to me like I didn’t know who he was? “What the fuck, Simon?”

“Yes, I’d really like it if you could bring Quentin to lunch next week. That seems like a fair compromise.”

“Simon . . .” The anger was thawing back into fear. It wasn’t an improvement. “Are you in trouble? Is Sylvester in trouble?”

“Yes, absolutely.” His tone didn’t waver, remaining absolutely genial. It was the sort of tone someone would use if the threat was in the same room.

“Okay. Got it. We’ll be right there.” I hung up the phone, looking back to the others. “Simon’s answering the phone at Shadowed Hills, and for whatever reason, he can’t speak freely. It could be a trap. I have to go anyway. We need to get to Sylvester.”

“Next time you have need to choose a liege, I beg you, select one closer to your place of residence,” said Tybalt. He rubbed his face with one hand. Then he nodded. “All right. We stay together. We’ll travel through the Court for as long as we can, to shorten the time spent in shadow.”

“I don’t think we can walk from San Francisco to Pleasant Hill,” I objected.

“You won’t need to,” Tybalt said. “If the Summerlands are smaller than the world they encircle, the Court of Cats is smaller still. Those who walk here may as well be wearing seven league boots, for all the distance we will cover.”

“How far can we get?” I asked bluntly. “Name a place, please.”

Tybalt sighed. “There is very little poetry in precision.”