“
I have no plans to ever set
foot in Faerie again, or to interfere in the affairs of either
Court.” She stopped in the dead center of the room and looked about
her with a ferocious intensity. When she spoke again the power of
her voice made the ancient stone of the chamber walls shake and
dust and pieces of rubble fell from the vaulted ceiling. “But if
any of you bitches comes anywhere near me and mine again, I’ll come
back here and burn every single one of you to a fucking
cinder!”
The fae just stood there, frozen in
fear, staring at Min’s little sister like she was the devil
herself.
Andy cocked her head to the side, a
haughty expression making her face look mean as hell. “I’m sorry,
I’m not looking for silent fear here. What I want right here and
now is for all accounted to swear that they will never come near or
bother in any way me or mine again.” She rubbed her hands together
and sizzling flashes of light hissed between her touching
flesh.
A long moment of silence stretched out.
“Swear it!” Andy snarled.
The Sidhe lords fell into a bowing
stance before Andy, and they all said, in a frightened murmur of
English and fae, that they so swore it.
Min could feel the thrum of magick as
so many powerful beings made a promise. The energies that washed
over the room were intoxicating and rich. It made her swoon, and
made the warm power of Summer that still lay within her stand up
and take notice. She thought she could almost hear the tinkling
laughter of the Summer Queen.
That almost sound sobered Min up
fast.
That bitch!
They were so going to have a talk after
all this was over…but on second thought, looking at her sister,
healthy and whole, and Luca…maybe she would just let it go. If
storming the stronghold of a faerie Queen had taught her nothing
else, it was that she was egregiously outmatched.
Andy turned to Min and smiled. “I don’t
think any of these guys will cause us any more trouble.”
Luca snorted. “You think?”
“
Yeah, sister mine,” Min
said as she pulled Andy to her in a fierce embrace, “you stomped on
them real good.” She laughed. “I can’t wait to see mom’s face when
you tell her what you did.”
Andy’s face suddenly turned serious.
“Where is she? Is she alright?”
“
She’s fine,” Min said,
holding onto Andy’s hand. “She got possessed by the Summer Queen
for a minute, opened a gateway here, and has been holding it open
from the other side.”
“
Oh.” Andy looked surprised,
and then leered at Min. “I bet she just loved the being possessed
part.”
“
I imagine it was the
highlight of this whole operation for her.”
Min and Andy broke out in full-throated
laughter. Luca looked on with just a hint of an impatient scowl.
“Speaking of the porthole, Katarina said she wouldn’t be able to
hold it open forever. And I doubt anyone will want to go back the
way we came.”
Min looked behind her at the anteroom
they’d entered through. It was empty, except for some charred
mounds of faerie, and the glowing, empty net of moonlight that the
shadow cat had been imprisoned in.
Graysyn had apparently
escaped.
She groaned at the thought of crossing
over that damn invisible bridge again. And then the cool, collected
voice of the Summer Queen spoke in Min’s head.
If you will forgive, I know
a much easier, quicker route you could take to get back to your
world…
Min rolled her eyes and tapped her foot
impatiently.
Is there an extra price for
this favor?
Min could practically sense the evil
bitch smile.
Shall we call this even? You
did me a great service, and now I’m returning that
favor.
Not even close to even…but I
really don’t want to go over that bridge again. Fine!
Even.
Min felt a sudden warming in her chest,
and then in her head. Somehow she just knew that if she turned and
walked out of the throne room, and down a hall that only opened
when you touched the hand of the mermaid frozen in the wall, that
at the end of that corridor was a balcony.
Min opened the silver and glass door
that led out to the balcony, and there, swirling in lurid, living
color was a porthole. The swirling stopped for a moment and showed
an image of Katarina sitting in a chair facing the porthole, effort
making creases in her face.
“
Mom!” Andy and Min blurted
at the same time. They grabbed each other’s hand, and then Min
reached back and took hold of Luca’s hand. They moved to the
porthole and stepped through.
~*~
Just passing back into their own world
felt like the weight of the world had fallen off Min’s shoulders.
She sighed and drew in a giant breath.
Katarina’s eyes shot open, and she
laughed one perfect “Ha!” and then flung herself up out of the
chair and toward her daughters. She looked weak, and older than she
had when they had left, but that didn’t stop her from getting to
her daughters.
“
Oh my precious girls…I was
so…” her voice cracked from strain, and she began to sob
uncontrollably. But, to Min’s immense relief, they were sobs of
joy. “I can’t believe you did it.” She kissed Min on the cheek.
“You brought her back to us.”
“
Well,” Min said, pushing
back her own tears, “your little girl did most of the heavy
lifting. You should have seen her. Really scary.”
Andy laughed. “Yeah right! You should
have seen this one storm into the stronghold of the Winter Queen,
the fires of hell blazing out of her freaking hands. It was
amazing.”
“
But you should have seen
yourself—”
“
Ladies?” Luca interrupted.
“There will be plenty of time to tell the whole tale, but for now I
suggest we move this to your house, and to those nifty wards you’ve
told me about.”
Min smiled, and was about to pull her
vampire into a deep, rhapsodic kiss, when she abruptly realized
that there was an object in her hand—the silver fae dagger from the
Summer Queen. She opened her hand and looked down upon it, just as
one of the Summer Queen’s huge hounds appeared from under the veil
it had been hiding under.
The hound’s eyes glowed a sinister red,
and it opened its great, fanged mouth and stared silently at
Min.
“
R-right,” Min stammered,
and very slowly set the dagger into the hound’s gapping maw. And
just like that, the beast disappeared behind the veil again. There
were no sounds of it moving across the tiled floor of the diner,
but the door to the outside banged open, the bell over it ringing
harshly.
Min reached out and kissed her vampire,
breathless and exhilarated, and exhausted. He tasted so very good.
“Let’s go home.”
Chapter 32
They talked for hours. Not much came
from Andy’s lips about what happened to her before Min showed up at
Winter’s Keep, but what she did talk about came in excited bursts.
She’d been so unbelievably happy to see Min. She had given up, but
just seeing her sister, knowing how much she had to have gone
through just to get there—it had ironed her flagging will. It was
the reason why she could have done what she’d done.
“
So how did you know…know
that you could destroy her like that?” Katarina asked, shaking her
head.
“
I knew Min needed help…and
I remembered the Summer Queen telling me how hard she had worked to
make the Winter Queen want to have me. And she had said that it had
worked so well that the Winter Queen had forgotten that I was a
being of light.
“
Plus the Queen couldn’t
feed on me until I allowed her to. That had to mean something. So I
just rolled the dice.”
“
It was amazing,” Min
yawned. She felt happy. The tension in her shoulders had relaxed
away as her vampire held her close. She wanted nothing more than to
fall asleep there and then, in her lover’s arms.
Andy cleared her throat and winked at
Katarina. Their mother didn’t look thrilled to have a vampire in
the house, but since he had just helped save both of her daughter’s
lives, it seemed she was going to work around it.
“
Looks like we could all use
a little shut eye.” She caught Min in the crosshairs of her mighty
gaze. “I think we all need
sleep
.”
In other words, Min translated, no
fooling around. She nodded her head. “Yes ma’am.” There would be
plenty of time in the morning to blow her mother’s mind with tales
of hot vampire sex. She led the way upstairs, pulling Luca along.
When they were finally alone in her room, he helped Min undress,
kissing her sore flesh at every visible bruise, and before she knew
it she was lying in bed, the covers pulled up around her, her
vampire naked beside her, pulling her up against him as she fell
fast into sleep.
~*~
Andy felt warm and safe in her old
room. Her mother was well again, and it only seemed right that she
was back under the same roof as her mother and sister. But a couple
of hours later she was still lying in her old bed, wide
awake.
Why can’t I
sleep?
Because this isn’t who you
are anymore.
She punched her pillow and scrunched up
her eyes. She was so tired. Vaporizing a faerie Queen really took
it out of you. But she just couldn’t relax completely. Part of her,
a very big part of her, wanted to be home, and this just wasn’t
home anymore.
Her little dog looked up with worried
doggy eyes from where he lay on the bed beside her. Andy rumpled
his little furry ears, and then pulled herself up out of bed and
got dressed again.
She gathered up Brutus, who was
quivering with excitement, and called for a cab. The taxi company
called a couple of minutes before the cab would arrive. Standing
all alone, even on a well lit street, made Andy’s nerves stand on
end. She turned and looked down the street to find nothing. Then
she turned the other way and about jumped out of her skin. Min’s
vampire, Luca, was standing there silently, looking across the
street.
“
This is really stupid of
you.”
She scowled at him and then turned to
face away from him. “My cab should be here any minute. You should
go back to Min.”
He shook his head ever so slightly.
“Min would want me here, with you.”
“
I can’t sleep, okay? I
thought, since none of the fae would be coming near me for a very
long time that it would be safe to go home, to my own
bed.”
“
I get that.” The vampire
stood unbelievably still for a moment, not breathing, not blinking.
He was like a statue, literally. “But I can’t let you travel there
alone.”
Andy glared at him menacingly. “I’m not
going back in—”
“
I’ll ride with you, and
make sure you’re safe.”
“
Oh,” Andy said, the anger
dying from her like a snuffed out candle. “Uh, thanks.”
The cab pulled up a moment later, and
Andy and the vampire got in. It wasn’t much of a drive, and
thankfully the vampire didn’t feel too chatty. But Andy finally
found herself babbling, about how she understood now why her mother
had kept this from her, but that it still kind of pissed her off.
And she was glad that Min had him, but “If you ever hurt her,
I-I…I’ll…”
Luca looked at her
nonplussed.
“
I’ll make what I did to the
Winter Queen look like a bad sunburn. We clear?”
A smirk played on the edges of the
vampire’s lips. “Crystal.”
Andy turned away, shaking her head, but
a smile was pulling at the sides of her mouth. She liked the
vampire. It was hard not to like someone that had literally risked
life and limb to help save you. You’d be a sorry piece of work if
you didn’t.
Finally the cab arrived in front of
Andy’s house. She sighed as she looked up at the huge granite
edifice. There were lights on here and there, but mostly the
apartment building was asleep. It was well after midnight, after
all.
Andy pulled her dog closer to her and
looked over to the little park where she usually walked him. It was
usually dimly lit, but the moon was full and illuminated everything
until it practically sparkled.
That’s how she saw that Sam was sitting
there at the lone picnic table, his big beast of a dog by his side.
Her heart leapt up into her throat, and then she felt a surge of
adrenaline. She wanted to go talk to him in the worst way. And
since he was just sitting there, it seemed that he might be waiting
for her too.
“
I thought you were going up
to your apartment?” the vampire asked. And then he looked over to
where Andy’s eyes were focused. “Oh, I see.” And then he gave a
little laugh. Not an unkind sound, just amused. “Well, he seems
safe enough.”
Andy glanced at him, not really knowing
if he’d meant that last as a small insult, or whether he meant it.
In truth she didn’t care. She just wanted to get to her
not-so-secret crush. The dark creatures and monsters of the world
would just have to find someone else to hassle for a little while.
She had plans.