The Roach bites off the last piece of gristle from the chicken bones, cracking it between his teeth. He’s finished the whole plate of them and, pushing it aside, starts on the pickles. “You made a bargain for me to train him, and I’ve taken him under my wing. Sleight of hand. Pickpocketing. Little magics. He’s good at it.”
I think of the coin playing across his long fingers while he slouched in the burnt remains of his rooms. I glare at the Roach.
He only laughs. “Don’t look at me like that. ’Twas you who made the bargain.”
I barely recall that part, so intent was I on getting Cardan to agree to a year and a day of service. So long as he pledged to me, I could put him on the throne. I would have promised him much more than lessons in spycraft.
But when I think of the night he was shot at, the night he did coin tricks, I can’t help recalling him gazing up from my bed, intoxicated and disturbingly intoxicating.
Kiss me until I am sick of it.
“And now he’s playacting, isn’t he?” the Roach goes on. “Because if he’s the true High King of Elfhame, whom we are to follow to the end of days, then we’ve been a mite disrespectful, running the kingdom for him. But if he is playacting, then he’s a spy for sure and better than most of us. Which makes him part of the Shadow Court.”
I drink down my coffee in a scalding swallow. “We can’t talk about this.”
“Not at home we can’t,” the Roach says with a wink. “Which is why we’re here.”
I asked him to seduce Nicasia. Yes, I guess I have been a “mite disrespectful” to the High King of Elfhame. And the Roach is right, Cardan didn’t behave as though he was too royal for my request. That wasn’t his reason for taking offense.
“Fine,” I say in defeat. “I’ll figure out a way to tell him.”
The Roach grins. “The food’s good here, right? Sometimes I miss the mortal world. But for good or ill, my work in Elfhame is not yet done.”
“Hopefully for good,” I say, and take a bite of the shredded potato cake that came with my omelet.
The Roach snorts. He’s moved on to his milkshake, the other plates bare and stacked up to one side of him. He lifts his mug in a salute. “To the triumph of goodness, just not before we get ours.”
“I want to ask you something,” I say, clinking my mug against his. “About the Bomb.”
“Leave her out of this,” he says, studying me. “And if you can, leave her out of your schemes against the Undersea. I know you’re always sticking your neck out as though you’re enamored of the axe, but if there must be a neck on the chopping block beside you, choose a less comely one.”
“Including your own?” I ask.
“Much better,” he agrees.
“Because you love her?” I ask.
The Roach frowns at me. “And if I did? Would you lie to me about my chances?”
“No—” I begin, but he cuts me off.
“I love a good lie,” he says, standing and setting down little stacks of silver coins on the table. “I love a good liar even better, which is to your benefit. But some lies are not worth the telling.”
I bite my lip, unable to say anything else without spilling the Bomb’s secrets.
After the diner, we part ways, both of us with ragwort in our pockets. I watch him go, thinking of his claim on Cardan. I had been trying so hard not to think of him as the rightful High King of Elfhame that I had entirely missed asking myself whether he considered himself to be High King. And, if he didn’t, whether that meant he thought of himself as one of my spies instead.
I make my way to my sister’s apartment. Though I’ve donned mortal clothing to walk around the mall and tried to behave in such a way as would be above suspicion, it turns out that arriving in Maine in a doublet and riding boots draws a few stares but no fear that I have come from another world.
Perhaps I am part of a medieval festival, a girl suggests as I pass her. She went to one a few years ago and enjoyed the joust very much. She had a large turkey leg and tried mead for the first time.
“It goes to your head,” I tell her. She agrees.
An elderly man with a newspaper remarks that I must be doing Shakespeare in the park. A few louts on some steps call out to me that Halloween is in October.
The Folk doubtlessly learned this lesson long ago. They do not need to deceive humans. Humans will deceive themselves.
It is with this fresh in my mind that I cross a lawn full of dandelions, go up the steps to my sister’s door, and knock.
Heather opens it. Her pink hair is freshly dyed for the wedding. For a moment, she looks taken aback—probably by my outfit—and then smiles, opening the door wide. “Hi! Thanks for being willing to drive. Everything’s mostly packed. Is your car big enough?”
“Definitely,” I lie, looking around the kitchen for Vivi with a kind of desperation. How is my big sister thinking this is going to go if she hasn’t told Heather anything? If she believes I have a car instead of ragwort stalks.
“Jude!” Oak yells, hopping down from his seat at the table. He throws his arms around me. “Can we go? Are we going? I made everyone presents at school.”