There it was, the door to Gordan’s lab, looming ahead of me like the next level in a video game. There would be a boss battle on the other side, something complicated and chaotic and distracting. There would be power-ups and potions and—
And none of that was true. There would be a lab, deserted and dusty, left to rot while the County sought a way to heal. There would be nothing but the shattered hopes and dreams of a changeling who had reached too far and found she could not grasp what she desired. It was difficult to feel bad for Gordan. She did so much damage, and some of it will never heal. Still, she was my friend, once, and I could not forget that. However much I sometimes want to.
The door was locked. That was easy enough to get around. I set the upload device carefully down and allowed myself to turn insubstantial, hazy as a sunbeam. Then I vanished, reappearing on the door’s other side.
The lab was as dark, dusty, and cold as I had expected. My mother’s office had been shut up out of grief. This room had been sealed out of rage. The anger still hung in the air, tainting it.
What I was about to do would cleanse it. It had to. I unlocked the door, only distantly surprised by how weak the security really was, and opened it, scooping the upload device from the floor. The battery’s pulse was growing weaker by the second. I slammed the door, casting wildly around until I spotted the charging station, half-obscured by drifts of blue paper. The green light at its base was still on. It was still functional.
Sparing a grateful thought for our Summerlands-side wind generators, which kept us from needing to worry about the electrical bill, I raced across the room and nestled the upload device into the docking port. There was a soft beep, and the green light was joined by a second, amber light.
Cautiously, I reached out and felt the buzz of electricity streaming into the battery, refueling it faster than it could drain. I sagged, my outline flickering and returning to its adult dimensions. The storage system hadn’t failed. The data was intact. Terrie was intact. My mother was intact.
Her body, however, was not.
The phone lines hummed, whispering my name. I glanced around, settling on Gordan’s abandoned desk phone, and dove into the wires.
“April?” said Li Qin. “Elliot said you wanted me to call.”
“Yes,” I said. “Have you spoken to October yet?”
There was a pause. “I haven’t been able to reach her. I left a message.”
“Do you believe she will do it?”
“She’s a hero.”
It was a tautology. It was also true. In Faerie, heroes do the things they do because, on some primal level, they have no choice. Once the heroism has them, they can’t refuse. No matter how much they try, the weight of it will always fall upon their shoulders.
“Quentin may not be pleased with the notion of sending his knight to sleep for an extended period of time.”
“All the blood-workers in our records are Daoine Sidhe or Baobhan Sith. None of them possess October’s regenerative capabilities.” A half-amused note crept into Li Qin’s voice. “We may need to host another company blood drive and pump half of it into her as her reward for bleeding on our behalf, but I think we can mitigate the exhaustion described in the stories. Assuming it is a description of exhaustion, and not some magical penalty for raising the dead.”
“I hope you are already preparing your explanation,” I said. “Quentin will be displeased. Tybalt will be furious.” October’s suitor was a King of Cats, and while he was not a hero, he was perfectly willing to play the villain when he felt there was a need. I had a great deal of respect for his straightforward nature, and for his willingness to pick people up by the throat. It seemed efficient.
“I’m sure it will be fine,” said Li Qin. “I’m very glad you’re willing to allow this, April. It shows maturity on your part.”
She was only saying that because she believed neither of us would be getting what we really wanted. As far as she was concerned, January was gone forever; we were restoring the sleepers out of duty, not because we would profit from it in any way. Our penance was to see those we were responsible for reunited with their loved ones, while the one we loved was lost.
It didn’t have to be that way. It didn’t have to be over. I simply couldn’t tell her that—not until I was sure. Not until—
Wait. “When was the previous company blood drive?”
“Shortly before Barbara died,” said Li Qin. “It was Yui’s idea. We don’t have—didn’t have—a resident healer, and it’s easier to brew unique restorative potions, or to cast healing spells, when there’s blood on hand. If the blood was taken before the injury, the sympathy it contains will be with the uninjured form. It makes things easier.”
“Did many participate?”
“Almost everyone.” There was a pause. “I suppose you wouldn’t have noticed. It wasn’t like we could ask you to donate. You don’t have blood, after all.”
And if it had been before Barbara’s death, I would still have been leaving the world to my mothers to manage. January kept the company and Li Qin kept everything else, and all that was asked of me was that I better learn how to fit into this world that was theirs, and was slowly becoming mine. If I looked back, I could remember cheerful red-and-white posters on the walls, exhorting people to make a donation. I had never considered what they might be donating.
Blood. They had donated blood.
“What was done with those donations?”
“They’re in storage. Blood can be frozen for a long, long time, and still be useful for spell purposes, even if it couldn’t be used for a transfusion.” There was a pause. “Why?”
“That is unimportant.” I had never dismissed her questions so bluntly before. “Contact October. Arrange her visit. Arrange for their resurrection. I will organize things here.”
I terminated the connection before she could ask me anything further. The upload device was still charging, the green-and-amber lights burning steadily. I cast them a wistful glance, wishing I dared dive into the code to brush my mother’s edges once again. Then I disappeared, back into the wireless signal, looking for . . . what?
The blood had to be stored somewhere. The blood had to be kept cold, and close, or else it would do little good in the face of a true emergency. I spread myself throughout the company, bouncing from relay to relay, until I sketched out the shape of a large emptiness, a place where no boosters or direct connections had been installed. But it was still connected to the power grid. It had to be, to keep its contents cold.