Page 22 of Night and Silence

Jocelyn looked back and forth from Bridget to me, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. Catching herself, she closed it with a snap, and spat, “I should have known you were working together to keep me out. I should have known. I hope you rot.”

She spun on her heel and stalked away before any of us could reply, hurrying to get the last word in. We let her. If it meant she would actually leave, she could have the last word, the last sentence, the last soliloquy. I didn’t need it as much as I needed this to be over.

“Well,” said Bridget into the pause that followed. “That was bracing. Now what in the world are you doing here?”

I stared at her, and I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

FIVE

SILENCE STRETCHED BETWEEN US. The students who’d come to watch the police at work talked and pointed, not noticing our dismay. The wind rustled through the leaves and the sound of cars drifted over from the nearby neighborhoods, but in that moment, I would have sworn that everything else in the universe had simply stopped. The world was frozen, or it should have been. It should have shown at least that much respect.

Slowly, Bridget frowned. “Toby? What’s wrong?”

I shook my head.

Bridget had applied the fairy ointment to her eyes more lightly than Jocelyn had, and with a defter hand, blending it into her makeup so that it added a certain shimmer but didn’t make her look quite so much like she had an addiction to glitter gel. It helped that her supply was almost certainly more refined than Jocelyn’s. Her husband, Etienne, is Sylvester Torquill’s seneschal, and as such, has access to the finest ingredients in the duchy. Even if he can’t mix the stuff himself, he can give the components to Bridget, who can pass them along to Walther. Walther isn’t just one of the best alchemists I’ve ever known, he’s something of a social activist among the fae and has been working for decades to make simple alchemical tinctures accessible to changelings and fae who live outside the Courts.

It’s an admirable thing to do. It’s even more admirable considering that now that his aunt is back on the throne of Silences, he could easily go home and live the pampered, privileged life of a court alchemist, adored by his people for his part in getting their Kingdom back, wanting for nothing. Instead, he chose to stay in the Mists, to stay at UC Berkeley, and to keep supplying people like Bridget with the fairy ointment they need to be a part of our world.

Bridget isn’t a changeling. She’s as human as they come, a fact evidenced by the traces of gray at her temples. When she married Etienne, she got a special dispensation from the crown to continue working in the mortal world while also living with him at Shadowed Hills. It helped that she had made it clear that she wouldn’t move to Shadowed Hills if it meant giving up her job, and where she goes, Chelsea goes. Etienne loves his wife, but he dotes on his daughter.

Bridget gets to be human and part of Faerie at the same time. She gets to have everything I used to think I wanted, and I can’t even hate her for it, because she’s too kind, and because I don’t want it anymore. I haven’t wanted it in a long time.

“Did Jocelyn call you here somehow?” she asked, in a slower, more carefully measured tone. “She hasn’t got the authority to do that. I know her mum. I’ll give her a call, remind her this is neutral territory—” Her voice dropped toward the end of the sentence, automatically shielding her words from prying ears.

I shook my head and gestured toward Gillian’s car. “I’m here for her.”

“The missing girl?” There was no recognition in Bridget’s voice. She sounded curious, yes, but not concerned on my behalf. Maybe a bit on Gillian’s. Bridget was a professor, after all, and she had to worry about her students. “Who called you?”

“Her father.” My mouth was suddenly dry. I swallowed, fighting the urge to look away as I said, “My ex-boyfriend.”

Bridget’s eyes widened with sudden, if flawed, understanding. “Oh, my. He called you to help him find his daughter? It’s kind of you to be willing. I know many people who wouldn’t even try, in your position—”

“Our daughter.”

“What?”

“He called me to find our daughter. Gillian’s my child.”

Understanding faded, replaced by momentary confusion. “How can that be possible? She’s . . .” Bridget stopped, sobering. “Oh. I see.”

“Yeah,” I agreed.

Chelsea Ames was born a classic changeling: fae father, human mother. Half and half. Unfortunately for everyone involved—especially Chelsea—she got all her father’s power and none of his control. She had been teleporting wildly, ripping open doors that Oberon himself had intended should stay sealed. In order to stop her, in order to save her, I’d been forced to give her a modified version of the Changeling’s Choice: did she want to be fae, or did she want to be human? She had chosen fae. I had pulled the human blood from her veins and left her immortal and weeping and safe. Finally safe.

Chelsea was the inverse of my own daughter in more ways than one. Both had been raised by their human parents. Both had discovered Faerie in the most painful, traumatic ways possible. But Gillian had chosen to be human, to give up any trace of the fantastic in her heritage, and, because it was only a choice if I honored it, I’d done as she had asked.

“I’m so sorry,” said Bridget, raising a hand to her mouth. “I had no idea.”

“Most people don’t. It’s not exactly something I go around advertising.” With no fae blood, Gillian had no protection from magic. If her abduction had anything to do with me . . .

I would carry that guilt for the rest of my life, and no one would ever be able to make it any lighter.

“No,” said Bridget. “I can see where you wouldn’t. I’m so sorry. When I heard it was Gillian who’d been taken—”

“Wait.” I cut her off, staring. “You know my daughter?”

“She took my introductory folklore course this year,” said Bridget. “She has a quick mind, and an excellent eye for detail. You should be proud.”