Jayce handed the faery a plate of food while Rika balanced her own plate on the vaguely table-shaped rock outcropping. “Why does Maili have issue with you?”
“It was inevitable.” Sionnach suddenly looked uncomfortable, not meeting Rika’s eyes.
“Why, Sionnach?”
“Seriously, Rika . . .”
“A girl,” Jayce said in relief. The injured faery might have feelings for Rika, but he obviously also had someone else in his life that he hadn’t told Rika about. “There’s a girl.”
“No.” Rika laughed. “Shy doesn’t do relationships, so that’s not it. So what is it?”
After a long moment of silence, Sionnach asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Because you flirt with Rika to get her to do what you want, but you say you aren’t interested in pursuing her that way, right?” Jayce flashed Sionnach a smile, half daring him to admit that he hadn’t been honest with Rika about his feelings but half hoping the faery would keep his secret. He admitted to himself that he felt threatened by the history the two faeries shared, but they both insisted that there was nothing more. Jayce hoped his expression was not too revealing as he added, “And because a girl being involved seems like the only thing you’d be hesitant to admit.”
“Shy?” Rika sounded puzzled.
“So maybe there is a girl. . . .” Sionnach sat up straighter in the bed. “I spent some time with a mortal lately, but it’ll pass. I’ve never been one for relationships, Rika. Everyone knows that.”
“But?” Jayce prompted, enjoying watching him squirm.
“But I told Maili and the rest that we ought to be a bit less invasive with the mortals and maybe consider being more respectful. She thinks it’s because of my mortal.” Sionnach looked defensive, tilting his chin upward and staring directly at Jayce, as he continued, “I think treating mortals like toys is just not where we need to be. The world’s changed and—”
“So have you. Good idea,” Jayce interjected with a faux-somber look.
Rika looked stunned and a little speechless.
“It’s not just because of Caris— . . . the mortal,” Sionnach added hurriedly with a look at Rika. “Now that the Summer King has power for the first time in centuries, there will be trouble. He’ll be trying to be strong enough to overpower the Winter Court.”
“So it’s about Keenan? Or mortals?” she asked.
“Both. I said that he’d come messing around. He has already. He’s always been fond of mortals, so I figured we’d avoid trouble by treating them better. It wasn’t because of Carissa. It’s you too.” The fox faery’s voice dropped with his last admission, and Jayce felt a little sorry for him.
“Me?” Rika sounded like she didn’t know if she should cry or hug him.
“I saw when you were a mortal, princess.” Sionnach looked heartbroken. “I hated what he did, but then I knew you and . . .”
Rika stepped toward Sionnach. “That’s why you became my friend. Because of what I was before?”
“Not just that,” Sionnach said.
Jayce watched them, not with jealousy but with curiosity. Whatever the two faeries shared needed to be discussed. Jayce suspected that Sionnach had manipulated his relationship with Rika—and he suspected that the fox faery had far deeper feelings for her than he admitted to any of them. The same history that made the two faeries friends was what had kept them from having a relationship. Jayce picked up his sketch pad and began drawing Sionnach and Rika.
Rika leaned over and kissed Sionnach’s forehead. “So you fought over mortals.”
“Not entirely. I’m the Alpha; I imposed some rules.” Sionnach took her hand, squeezed it, and then gave her a mischievous look. “Some of the others objected to my suggestions.”
“Objected?” Rika echoed. “You were stabbed. That’s not objecting to suggestions.”
Rika paced away, her mood turned from sad to angry in a moment. “I’ll go to her and explain—”
“Explain? Princess, explain is a verbal thing. I think you mean beat.”
“I can use words.”
“‘Can’ and ‘will’ aren’t the same.” Sionnach turned to Jayce. “Faeries can’t lie. You need to listen carefully to what we say and don’t say.”
“Oh, I have been,” Jayce said levelly.
Sionnach smiled approvingly at him like he was a good pupil, but there was a glint in the fox faery’s eyes that made clear that he realized what Jayce wasn’t saying. Rika, however, was oblivious to the undercurrents in the conversation.
“She has it coming,” Rika muttered.
“You know, I never even said it was Maili.” Sionnach’s eyes widened in false innocence. “Maybe it was—”
“Was it Maili?” Rika interrupted.
“Well, yes.”
“So tell me why I shouldn’t go explain that she best not be so stupid in the future?”
There was an extended pause where the two faeries faced off, and Jayce wasn’t entirely sure what was going on then. Their moods had changed abruptly. It had been a seemingly mild conversation, but suddenly, Rika looked more menacing than he’d seen so far. Her chin was up, her shoulders squared. Sionnach, even though he was in a bed, still looked fierce enough that cowering might be wise.
“Because if you do and she knocks you down, we are without recourse,” Sionnach said gently. His lighter attitude vanished, and Jayce finally glimpsed the faery who was strong enough to keep order in the desert. He and Rika matched each other in subtle ways, looking fierce and projecting a heightened sense of Otherness. They seemed like two animals vying for control, and Jayce realized that to some degree that was exactly what was happening. He was all but invisible to them as they tried to establish which of them was in charge here.
Sionnach held Rika’s gaze and added, “And I really dislike the Summer King . . . almost as much as you do.”
At that, Rika deflated. “She stabbed you, Shy. I can’t just ignore that.”
He held out a hand. Rika went to him, took his hand, and sat on the cave floor.
“And we’ll deal with her, but not now. Not when doing so would leave you, Jayce, me and . . . all the others vulnerable. I cannot be Alpha right now. You can. You could even if I wasn’t injured. Although you back down from me every time you start to challenge me, everyone in this room—most everyone in the desert—knows that you are stronger if you want to be.” He used their combined hands to catch the underside of her chin and forced her to look at him. “You can’t be Alpha if you back down, and I’m injured. We need to be smart about this. Maili’s treacherous. If you fall, she’s the next strongest here. She’s not what we want in power even for a breath. Please?”
“For now. If I’m strong enough—”
“You are beyond strong, but you’re not cruel enough, princess,” Sionnach interrupted.
“You underestimate me, Shy. I think I’m quite able to be cruel.”
“Are you sure enough to risk all of our safety on that belief?”
“No.” Her gaze dropped. “Fine. I won’t go looking for trouble. Yet.”
“Good.” Then the fierce faery who had just convinced Rika she was strong enough to be Alpha, yet also convinced her to bow to his wishes, fastened his gaze on Jayce. It wasn’t an entirely friendly look. “There’s a salve I brought for Jayce, Rika.”
She stilled, her entire body tight and tense, but her voice sounded calm as she said, “There are rules, Shy.”
“None higher than us out here,” he countered. “He’s no use to me if he’s unable to see what’s around him.”
“Right here, Sionnach,” Jayce interjected. “And being of use to you isn’t my top priority.” He glanced at Rika, who looked increasingly nervous. “What’s the salve for?”
“Seeing,” she whispered.
Jayce waited, knowing that there was obviously more to it than what she’d said. He knew that faeries could be invisible to humans and were inaudible when they couldn’t be seen. So, the obvious meaning was that the
salve would let him see them. When neither of them spoke further, he prompted, “And?”
Sionnach waved his hand, earning a glare from Rika.
“Giving a mortal the Sight is not something we’re to do,” she said in a shaky voice as she stood and walked over to Jayce. “It’s risky for mortals too. Some of the courts take mortals who can see them, those born with the Sight. Others just take the mortals’ eyes.”
Jayce wrapped an arm around her, but didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure he was ready for that particular risk, but he would rather discuss it away from Sionnach.
When Jayce didn’t reply to Rika’s words on the Sight, Sionnach suggested, “Why don’t you two go do something more fun? All this maudlin business isn’t particular romantic.”
Jayce shrugged and said, “Call if you need us.”
Sionnach held Jayce’s gaze. “I do need you both.”
“For now, we’re both here,” Jayce agreed mildly. He wasn’t committing to anything more than that. He liked Rika, but he didn’t trust Sionnach or know how he felt about a path that included being a potential target for faeries who were willing to cut up people’s eyes.
“I still get to be the one to knock the arrogance out of her,” Rika interjected.
Jayce answered even though she had been talking to Sionnach. “You’re the only one able to. I’m human, and he’s obviously not tough enough—”
Sionnach’s bark of laughter stilled Jayce’s words. “I might like you, Jayce.” Then he gave Rika a very serious look. “It would be a joy to watch you explain the error of her ways when the time is right.”
“Soon,” Rika added. “You’ll be well soon and then—”
“And then we’ll remind her that the most dangerous faery in the desert is you. . . . Now that you aren’t in seclusion.”
Jayce shivered at the way Sionnach smiled at them as they left the cave. The injured faery was clearly manipulative, but Rika seemed oblivious to it and Jayce wasn’t entirely sure he objected. Whatever Sionnach’s endgame was, for now he’d manipulated things so that Jayce was with the most interesting girl he’d ever met. It was hard to object to that.
CHAPTER 15
Rika wished she could have talked to Sionnach without Jayce there, but she admitted to herself that she wouldn’t have felt the need to confront Sionnach without her mortal boyfriend’s influence. He saw Sionnach without the filter of friendship and gratitude, and in doing so, he enabled her to see the fox faery more truly. While she might have been able to understand objectively that Sionnach was impish and unreliable in his way, she also trusted him as she’d trusted no one else in her life. She saw some of his flaws, but tended to overlook many of them.
She and Jayce followed the passageway to the room with her murals. They both kept art supplies in the chamber now. There were easels and wooden crates with jars of paints nestled in straw. She’d only ever let Sionnach and Jayce into this room, and only Jayce had slept there. Quietly, they both rolled out their sleeping bags.
“We could stay in the room where Sionnach is,” Jayce offered quietly. “If you need to hear him so you can take care of him, I mean.”
“I can hear him just fine from here.” Rika ducked her head, bashful even now. “And I wanted to be with only you.”
Jayce kissed her and then said, “I like that plan.”
“You don’t have to use the salve,” she said gently, moving away from him and not meeting his eyes. “They—we—aren’t all good. Seeing them is dangerous, so you might be safer without the Sight.”
Her words skirted near enough to a lie that she felt them like physical things rolling over her tongue. Was he safer? Maili had already stabbed Sionnach, and she’d shoved Jayce off a cliff. Maili was just one faery, though. If the court fey knew of a mortal with the Sight, they might come looking for him.
The Summer Queen had the Sight when she was mortal.
Rika didn’t know if the new queen’s mortal life would change how things were done, and even so, she was one faery regent in a world of centuries-old creatures with traditions even older than they were. She stared at Jayce, struggling with what and how to tell him without making herself sound like a monster too.
He stepped closer to her, reached out, and stroked her face. “I’ll do it. I can pretend not to see them if I have to. It makes it easier on you if I can see threats near me, right?”
She nodded.
“Tomorrow then.” He wrapped his arms around her. He comforted her, erased her nervousness, and it took but a moment.
Rika motioned toward a blank section of the cave and offered, “You could do one of the open spots if you wanted.”
“I’d feel weird defacing—” He stopped himself. “Not that what you did was . . . I mean—”
“I’ve lived here for a very long time. I didn’t have access to many other supplies when I came here. Most faeries can’t create art.” She shrugged, trying not to make too much of her difference even though it was something that filled her with pride.
“Why can you create?”
“Because I used to be human, I guess.” She looked at the bit of the wall visible in the firelight. “I don’t know what I’d have done without my art.”
He stepped away from the sleeping bag and stood nearer to her, his gaze taking in the portraits on the wall. Miners and farmers stared back at them as if the past could look into the present. Buildings filled the spaces around them; most were ones that had long since fallen under the weight of time and nature. “What was it like here? When you came?”
“Emptier. There were some humans here already, but the others that came and built small mortal towns were often violent.” She thought about other faces and places long gone, of a home she’d known on another continent, of other towns that she’d visited before the desert. There she’d felt too crowded by the mortals that she was no longer like. Here in the desert, she’d discovered open spaces. Even so, the people had frightened her. She admitted, “Some of the people who came here were interesting for a heartbeat or two, but I stayed in the cave a lot.”
“And the faeries?”
“Those too weak to survive the growing winter out in the rest of the world or trying to escape notice or hoping for autonomy . . . they came here.” She gave him a wry smile. “Much like the mortals, I suppose—seeking freedom, power, or escape.”
He didn’t comment, waiting in that way of his that made her want to keep talking, that made her think that her words were interesting.
“Much like me, too,” she confessed.
“Which were you seeking?”
“Probably all of it—freedom, power, and escape.” She nestled closer to him, thinking to herself that she still sought escape and freedom, but now she sought it in Jayce’s arms. When she’d started dating him, when he had looked at her and seen her, she’d thought she could have everything she wanted with him. Tonight, though, thinking about Maili had made her accept that she hadn’t been truthful with herself for a long time. Quietly, she told him, “I didn’t admit that I wanted power back then. I didn’t need to because Shy had the power, and he was no threat to me.”
“And now?” he prompted, and she realized that he knew. He had seen her confrontation with Sionnach, a fight that could’ve easily become a challenge for Alpha.
“Now I need to keep Maili from having power and keep Keenan from messing with my freedom.”
Rika needed to go out into the desert and let the faeries see her. Since Sionnach wasn’t up to it, they’d decided that she needed to be the reminder that there were faeries stronger than Maili. That meant leaving Jayce behind for his safety. Walking through the desert had always helped clear Rika’s mind, but she now felt strangely off-kilter being alone. Being with Jayce and Sionnach lately had reminded her that she used to like being around others. Years ago, the solitary life she’d led when she first became fey had been hard, more so because she’d never been on her own until then, even more so because she’d wanted to be with Keenan in the throng of fro
licking faeries that made up the Summer Court. Over time, though, she’d grown accustomed to isolation and to the quiet that came with being the Winter Girl, but she’d never chosen that life. She admitted now that choosing to be alone in the desert may have been a way to protect herself from the devastation that she’d felt when her loneliness had been beyond her control. If one chose to be alone, it was easier than being forced into it—at least that was what she’d told herself.
As she walked, she saw humans scaling the rocks. In the desert, climbers were as common as coyotes. They were part of the landscape. Mortals from all over came to the Mojave to climb and to hike. She’d learned not to notice them overmuch. These mortals were surrounded by faeries though, and she couldn’t help but think of how Jayce had fallen.
In a blur of motion, she ran toward them. “Back off.”
The mortals, of course, didn’t react: this time, she’d remembered to stay invisible.
A faery who looked very much like a barrel cactus, squat and whisker-covered, stepped into her path. “Since when is it your business what we do?”
“Since I decided it was.”
In a nearby crevice in the rock, Maili watched. Rika opted not to look her way yet since she had, in essence, promised Sionnach that she’d not go looking for trouble. She was doing as she’d agreed, but if Maili began a confrontation, Rika would have to respond. No one could expect anything different.
Instead of answering, one of the faeries shoved a human. It wasn’t a true attack; the boy was low enough to the ground that it wasn’t much of a fall. At most, the boy would be bruised and scraped.
“Don’t. Do. That.” Rika bit off each word, but she didn’t strike anyone. She still wanted Sionnach to be the Alpha here. Meting out physical punishments was an Alpha’s obligation and right, not hers. Unless she was the Alpha, all Rika was rightly able to do was respond to aggression.
“You shouldn’t meddle,” Maili said as she stepped out of her hiding place. In her hands were manacles, and since she wore leather gloves that stretched up to her elbows to protect her from the metal, Rika knew that the restraints were fashioned of steel or iron.