It felt good.
Human.
Small.
Beautiful.
He said, “I quit.”
MAC
I was stretched out on the Chesterfield in front of a hissing gas fire, listening to the rain patter against the windows of the store, indulging myself in a time of reflection before I got up to tackle what would surely be another eventful, fascinating day.
Tomorrow was Halloween—and Barrons’s birthday—and the sidhe-seers were having a huge party out at the abbey.
Dani had moved back into the fortress with Shazam and was quickly becoming a living legend, bristling electric with energy and intellect, traveling the slipstream with her enigmatic, flamboyant Hel-Cat. Kat and Enyo were gathering yet more sidhe-seers, and there was talk of reestablishing a global order.
The black holes had vanished from our world and the song had awakened life in even the Shade-devastated Dark Zones. Although it was late fall, we were having a rainy spring and I suspected our seasons might be completely out of balance for a few years.
Deep in the earth, connected to the core by the True Magic, I felt a new, subtle magic in the planet. Our world was alive in ways it hadn’t been for hundreds of thousands of years.
Dublin was bustling again, each day we reclaimed another part of the city, and life was slowly returning to as close to normal as it would ever be again.
The unique Fae hues still stained our world, and, until I figured out how to either sing the walls back up between the realms or unearth the power of our court and move it to a new planet, they would continue to do so.
What to do with my race of immortals was the next stage of my journey. It was bound to be an interesting one.
My parents had settled in Dublin with no intention of ever returning to Georgia.
We’d lost and gained things, we’d grieved and celebrated. The future was a mystery to us all. One we would explore together.
My greatest concerns were for Dani. Getting Shazam back had alleviated some of the anguish I’d been so worried might turn her back into Jada. But she wasn’t fully Dani anymore either, the way she had been when Dancer was alive. There was a coolness to her diction, a distance in her gaze that I suspected might be there for some time.
Still, all in all, life was good and rich and there was no other place I’d rather be.
I rolled over onto my back and stretched out, staring absently up at the ceiling, five stories above my head.
Slowly becoming aware of the distant mural.
I narrowed my eyes, wondering for the hundredth time what it was. Then, with a snort, I invited the elements around me to erect a tall, shining scaffold, kicked up off the sofa and climbed the handy ladder on the side. There were quite a few things about being the Fae queen I didn’t at all mind. Still, sifting and hanging midair was something I wasn’t yet comfortable with, hence the scaffolding.
As I climbed the rungs higher and higher, the scene etched into the plaster, layered with paint and gold flakes and crystals, became clear and I gasped.
I stretched out on the platform and stared up at it for a long time, absorbing it, letting the truth seep into me in a way I could never have allowed when I first arrived in Dublin.
I marveled at the beauty, trying to understand how it eluded me for so long when it was so clearly detailed, in extraordinary Fae-kissed colors. I’d finally found the cause for the spatial distortion in my bookstore. The shimmering mirror in the scene painted above my head was an open Silver, one of the most powerful ever created, and I was pretty sure I knew where it went.
Then the air around me changed and my body fired on all pistons like it always does whenever Jericho Barrons is near.
He topped the scaffolding and stretched out on his back beside me. I looked over and met his dark gaze.
I knew him intimately now: who he had once been, who he was, and who he was becoming. I loved each incarnation and never wanted to be without him.
What are you doing up here, Rainbow Girl?
Looking.
Are you seeing?
I am.
We all played our parts in the pageant of life, and as with any stage production, while the method of acting can be as varied as the individual, there were a limited number of roles.
All were offered.
You tried out.
You chose. Live or die. Understudy or star.
“You knew this was here. You were waiting for me,” I said. “Since before I ever walked into your store.”
“Yes.”
“Who painted it?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “No idea. It was here when I bought the place. But the building has morphed over time.”
I saw things so clearly now. How he’d taught me, helped me evolve, gave and withheld information, even misled at times so I could find my own path, sought to level the playing field so we would be equals, and tried to avoid the Unseelie King’s mistakes. I remembered the night he’d nearly repeated a significant one, when he thought I was dying in Mallucé’s lair deep beneath the Burren. He’d growled that it wasn’t what he would have chosen, as he’d poised on the brink of changing me into a creature like him to keep me alive with him forever.
“You could have told me. Saved me from worrying that I was you.”
“Some things can’t be told. Only learned. Or not.”
“Then it was destined.” The idea chafed.
“Never destined. And still not written in stone. Merely possible. As are many other outcomes.”
I glanced back up at the man and woman in the mural on the ceiling of Barrons Books & Baubles.
His wings.
Her crown.
Barrons’s face.
Mine.
I studied them, the happiness in their eyes, the promise of a tomorrow I embraced. “Maybe we’ll do better.”
He laughed. “Ah, the unquenchable human hope.” Then, “Mac,” he said, and held out his hand.
It was so much more than a hand he was offering: it was nights of love so consuming it burned, days of grief that chilled, a kingdom of black ice and a mansion of alabaster. It was all possible mistakes and every imaginable success.
We would do better. What was painted above me was no more than an invitation for a future. We could accept it or turn away. The Fae were starfish, regenerating, as old ones passed, new ones arose. One thing I did know was whatever path we chose to go down, we’d do it together.
I took his hand. “Jericho.”
Fire to his ice.
Frost to my flame.
Forever.
Great, dark wings trailed behind him as Cruce moved deeper into the laboratory.
He’d felt the precise moment the king had abdicated. Like the Seelie Queen’s magic, the Fae power of the Seelie/Unseelie King had to pass to another.
It hadn’t come to him.
Yet.
Nor, however, had it gone somewhere else. It hovered in the distance, apparently undecided.
He intended to help it decide.
Cruce stood at the king’s mixing table, blending a dash of this with a bit of that, according to the spells he’d taken from the Sinsar Dubh, and in short order created his first child.
Rules. Malleable, said the one who’d spoken for the king, yet claimed not to be him.
They certainly were.
The Court of Shadows was already being reborn.
THE END
While, for MacKayla, escaping her psychopath was as simple as walking away, she had a magical method with which to restrain her stalker, and their battle occurred in a fictional world.
In a nonfictional world it’s rarely that simple.
There are many support groups and avenues of assistance to pursue if you find yourself in such a situation. The author in no way means to imply one can simply walk away. Escaping a relationship with a psychopath, sociopath, or narcissist can be difficult, damaging, and dangerous.
You are your kingdom. A vibrant, empathic, all-the-colors-of-th
e-rainbow kingdom. But there are those who walk among us that lack such a rich internal landscape.
Courage, above all, is the first quality of a warrior.
This one is for you, intrepid readers, for picking up a copy of Darkfever and following me into the Dark Zone, keeping the faith and staying to the light, and being outstanding company until closing time.
I tip my glass with a slainte and a heartfelt go raibh maith agat.
The Fever series wouldn’t exist without you.
My debt of gratitude for Feversong could be a short book in and of itself, but since I just finished writing a very long one, I’ll endeavor to keep it brief. I’ve been living in the Fever World for eleven years and have formed so many wonderful and lasting friendships because of it. Bringing it to a close has been bittersweet yet exhilarating.
Enormous, everlasting thanks to my brilliant editor, Shauna Summers, who championed the series from the very beginning; a huge shout-out to my outstanding team at Random House: Kara Welsh, Scott Shannon, Matthew Schwartz, Gina Wachtel, Gina Centrello, Sarah Murphy, Hanna Gibeau, Alex Coumbis, Kate Childs, Kim Hovey, Katie Rice, and Ashleigh Heaton; kudos and much appreciation to Lynn Andreozzi and the art department for the fabulous covers over the years.
A deep debt of gratitude to my brother, Brian, who knows the Fever World nearly as well as I do, and tirelessly hashed out the psychological/emotional nuances with me until we were both satisfied I’d done justice to my original vision.
Many thanks to Anne Wessels-Paris for the Friday afternoon coffee/talks as we navigated the darkest parts of the labyrinth, and to Dr. Joseph Dagenbach for consulting about Dancer’s condition.
Much love and appreciation to Mia Suarez (aka Happi Anarky) for years of inspiration and Fever art. It’s pure joy to trip the slipstream with you. You’re made of all the right stuff: love, passion, a backbone of steel, and a teaspoon of stardust.
And always, always, thanks to you, intrepid readers, who are the reason I get up each morning, eager to rush to that blank page where I strive to make the magic happen.
Somewhere along the way, Mac and Barrons, Dani and Ryodan, and the rest of the crew became as real to you as they are to me, and that’s both the greatest reward and most cherished compliment.
I’m looking forward to the next adventure with all of you.
Stay to the Light.
Karen
PEOPLE
* * *
SIDHE-SEERS
SIDHE-SEER (SHEE-SEER): A person on whom Fae magic doesn’t work, capable of seeing past the illusions or “glamour” cast by the Fae to the true nature that lies beneath. Some can also see Tabh’rs, hidden portals between realms. Others can sense Seelie and Unseelie objects of power. Each sidhe-seer is different, with varying degrees of resistance to the Fae. Some are limited; some are advanced, with multiple “special powers.” For thousands of years the sidhe-seers protected humans from the Fae that slipped through on pagan feast days when the veils grew thin, to run the Wild Hunt and prey on humans.
MACKAYLA LANE (O’CONNOR): Main character, female, twenty-three, adopted daughter of Jack and Rainey Lane, biological daughter of Isla O’Connor. Blond hair, green eyes, had an idyllic, sheltered childhood in the Deep South. When her biological sister, Alina, was murdered and the Garda swiftly closed the case with no leads, Mac quit her job bartending and headed for Dublin to search for Alina’s killer herself. Shortly after her arrival she met Jericho Barrons and began reluctantly working with him toward common goals. Among her many skills and talents, Mac can track objects of power created by the Fae, including the ancient, sentient, psychopathic Book of magic known as the Sinsar Dubh. At the end of Shadowfever we learn that twenty years before, when the Sinsar Dubh escaped its prison beneath the abbey, it briefly possessed Mac’s mother and imprinted a complete copy of itself in the unprotected fetus. Although Mac succeeds in reinterring the dangerous Book, her victory is simultaneous with the discovery that there are two copies of it; she is one of them and will never be free from the temptation to use her limitless, deadly power.
ALINA LANE (O’CONNOR): Female, deceased, older sister to MacKayla Lane. At twenty-four went to Dublin to study at Trinity College and discovered she was a sidhe-seer. Became lovers with the Lord Master, also known as Darroc, an ex-Fae stripped of his immortality by Queen Aoibheal for attempting to overthrow her reign. Alina was killed by Rowena, who magically forced Dani O’Malley to trap her in an alley with a pair of deadly Unseelie.
DANIELLE “THE MEGA” O’MALLEY: Main character. An enormously gifted, genetically mutated sidhe-seer with an extremely high IQ, superstrength, speed, and sass. She was abused and manipulated by Rowena from a young age, molded into the old woman’s personal assassin, and forced to kill Mac’s sister, Alina. Despite the darkness and trauma of her childhood, Dani is eternally optimistic and determined to survive and have her fair share of life plus some. In Shadowfever, Mac discovers Dani killed her sister, and the two, once as close as sisters, are now bitterly estranged. In Iced, Dani flees Mac and leaps into a Silver, unaware it goes straight to the dangerous Hall of All Days. We learn in Burned that, although mere weeks passed on Earth, it took Dani five and a half years to find her way home, and when she returns, she calls herself Jada.
ROWENA O’REILLY: Grand Mistress of the sidhe-seer organization until her death in Shadowfever. Governed the six major Irish sidhe-seer bloodlines but rather than training them, controlled and diminished them. Fiercely power-hungry, manipulative, and narcissistic, she was seduced by the Sinsar Dubh into freeing it. She ate Fae flesh to enhance her strength and talent, and kept a lesser Fae locked beneath the abbey. Dabbling in dangerous black arts, she experimented on many of the sidhe-seers in her care, most notably Danielle O’Malley. In Shadowfever she is possessed by the Sinsar Dubh and used to seduce Mac with the illusion of parents she never had, in an effort to get her to turn over the only illusion amulet capable of deceiving even the Unseelie King. Mac sees through the seduction and kills Rowena.
ISLA O’CONNOR: Mac’s biological mother. Twenty-some years ago Isla was the leader of the Haven, one of seven trusted advisors to the Grand Mistress in the sacred, innermost circle of sidhe-seers at Arlington Abbey. Rowena (the Grand Mistress) wanted her daughter, Kayleigh O’Reilly, to be the Haven leader, and was furious when the women selected Isla instead. Isla was the only member of the Haven who survived the night the Sinsar Dubh escaped its prison beneath the abbey. She was briefly possessed by the Dark Book but not turned into a lethal, sadistic killing machine. In the chaos at the abbey, Isla was stabbed and badly injured. Barrons tells Mac he visited Isla’s grave five days after she left the abbey, that she was cremated. Barrons says he discovered Isla had only one daughter. He later tells Mac it is conceivable Isla could have been pregnant the one night he saw her and a child might have survived, given proper premature birth care. He also says it is conceivable Isla didn’t die, but lived to bear another child (Mac) and give her up. Barrons theorizes Isla was spared because the sentient evil of the Sinsar Dubh imprinted itself on her unprotected fetus, made a complete second copy of itself inside the unborn Mac and deliberately released her. It is believed Isla died after having Mac and arranging for her friend Tellie to have both her daughters smuggled from Ireland and adopted in the States, forbidden ever to return to Ireland.
AUGUSTA O’CLARE: Tellie Sullivan’s grandmother. Barrons took Isla O’Connor to her house the night the Sinsar Dubh escaped its prison beneath Arlington Abbey over twenty years ago.
KAYLEIGH O’REILLY: Rowena’s daughter, Nana’s granddaughter, best friend of Isla O’Connor. She was killed twenty-some years ago, the night the Sinsar Dubh escaped the abbey.
NANA O’REILLY: Rowena’s mother, Kayleigh’s grandmother. Old woman living alone by the sea, prone to nodding off in the middle of a sentence. She despised Rowena, saw her for what she was, and was at the abbey the night the Sinsar Dubh escaped more than twenty years ago. Though many have questioned her, none have ever gotten th
e full story of what happened that night.
KATARINA (KAT) MCLAUGHLIN (MCLOUGHLIN): Daughter of a notorious crime family in Dublin, her gift is extreme empathy. She feels the pain of the world, all the emotions people work so hard to hide. Considered useless and a complete failure by her family, she was sent to the abbey at a young age, where Rowena manipulated and belittled her until she became afraid of her strengths and impeded by fear. Levelheaded, highly compassionate, with serene gray eyes that mask her constant inner turmoil, she wants desperately to learn to be a good leader and help the other sidhe-seers. She turned her back on her family Mafia business to pursue a more scrupulous life. When Rowena was killed, Kat was coerced into becoming the next Grand Mistress, a position she felt completely unfit for. Although imprisoned beneath the abbey, Cruce is still able to project a glamour of himself, and in dreams he seduces Kat nightly, shaming her and making her feel unfit to rule, or be loved by her longtime sweetheart, Sean O’Bannion. Kat has a genuinely pure heart and pure motives but lacks the strength, discipline, and belief in herself to lead. In Burned, she approaches Ryodan and asks him to help her become stronger, more capable of leading. After warning her to be careful what she asks him for, he locks her beneath Chester’s in a suite of rooms with the silent Kasteo.
JO BRENNAN: Mid-twenties, petite, with delicate features and short, spiky dark hair, she descends from one of the six famous Irish bloodlines that can see the Fae (O’Connor, O’Reilly, Brennan, the McLaughlin or McLoughlin, O’Malley, and the Kennedy). Her special talent is eidetic or sticky memory for facts, but unfortunately by her mid-twenties she has so many facts in her head, she can rarely find the ones she needs. She has never been able to perfect a mental filing system. When Kat clandestinely dispatches her to get a job at Chester’s so they can spy on the Nine, Jo allows herself to be coerced into taking a waitressing job at the nightclub by the immortal owner, Ryodan, and when he gives her his famous nod, inviting her to his bed, she’s unable to resist even though she knows it’s destined for an epic fail. In Burned, Jo turns to Lor (who is allegedly Pri-ya at the time and won’t remember a thing) after she breaks up with Ryodan to “scrape the taste of him out of her mouth.” She learns, too late, that Lor was never Pri-ya and he has no intention of forgetting any of the graphically sexual things that happened between them. Although, frankly, he’d like to be able to.