Page 105 of The Innocent Sleep

“And lose my wife, my child, my family. What of your daughter? What of January? If you and I had been wed, back when I courted you, you would never have borne her. Would you take her from her wife, erase your granddaughter? The alchemy January learned from her father allowed her to save April. Without it, the girl is gone. She’s not someone we could have made together.”

“I don’t want to die again.”

“I refuse to betray my family.”

She moved closer, pouting, looking through her lashes at me. “You can’t say you aren’t tempted.”

“Of course I’m tempted, although least of all by you. I miss my sisters, I loved my niece, my sweet Anne, and dear Chalcedony—they all deserved so much better than the world offered them. If I were going to be swayed, it would have been by one of them. But I’ve always been stubborn. I like the life I made for myself, and I’m selfish enough to want to keep it. I’m not interfering with the rescues.”

Her face distorted with uncharacteristic rage. When she spoke again, her voice was half her own, half Titania’s. “I offer you everything, and you settle for scraps! You’d choose a world where you’ll never be free of fear, never know that your lover will come home safely come the dawn, never have the position you deserve!”

“Yes,” I said, and turned steadfastly away. “I would.”

Titania screamed, and her voice was entirely her own as the room around me shattered into mirrored shards and fell away, leaving me standing in the circle of white light, stars shining overhead.

Titania was still screaming.

Behind me, Raysel said, “Quentin’s okay. Dean and the Luidaeg, they have him.”

I turned to face the sound of screams, waiting until I found Titania. She was back on her horse, and had probably never gotten down at all—why make an effort when an illusion would do just fine?—her hands wrapped around the pommel, shrieking her fury into the unyielding night. Finally, after it seemed her screams must have shattered her voice into cutting shards, she sat up, pointing at the circle with one shaking finger.

“You have made an enemy of me on this day, and you will live to regret it,” she said.

The sky lit up in a cascade of rainbows, colors chasing one another from horizon to horizon, obscuring the stars in a blurred cacophony. It wasn’t even beautiful. It was just huge. Titania’s eyes glazed over, expression smoothing into neutrality as she took her horse’s reins in hand, turning its head to the west, and resumed her Ride. The rest of her company rode with her as the lights grew brighter and brighter, becoming too much to look at directly. Finally, they flared with blinding iridescence and vanished, leaving the pristine night sky behind.

“She’ll be back,” said the Luidaeg wearily, stepping up behind me. “She always comes back. But we’ll have time.”

August and Garm both wailed, collapsing to the ground. Then Dean yelled, “Luidaeg? Luidaeg?! Quentin fainted!”

The Luidaeg’s smile was a terrible thing. “We win,” she said, and crumpled where she stood, lying silent where she fell.

TWENTY-EIGHT

SIMON, WHO WAS NAKED save for October’s leather jacket wrapped around his shoulders, staggered to his feet. October stayed on the ground, grabbing August by the shoulders and shaking her fiercely.

“August? August?! Wake up, you walnut,” she snapped, then looked up, at me, expression pleading. “What happened? Why did they fall down?”

“If I had to guess, given who was impacted, I’d say that breaking Titania’s Ride broke her spell, and when she went to pay the sacrifice herself, it shattered and rebounded on everyone who was still enchanted,” said Simon. “They should have their memories back when they wake, if I’m correct.”

“And the Luidaeg?” asked October. “I already unbound her.”

“I can’t speak to the Luidaeg,” said Simon. “Given the way my own head is pounding, it may be as simple as the iron poisoning catching up with her.”

“There are five of us and four of them,” I said. “That means we can carry them as needed, without October having to lift anyone by herself.”

She looked like she was about to object. I glared at her, and she quelled.

“You are pregnant,” I said. “I’m not fool enough to try to order you to stillness, but I won’t have you exerting yourself without cause.”

I moved to scoop the also-naked Quentin off the ground, leading to Dean objecting and fluttering around me, trying to take his boyfriend back. I glared at him, much as I had glared at October.

“Get Garm,” I said. “He’s lighter, and we need to do this sensibly.”

“I’m not seeing how this is sensible,” said Dean.

“I am a King, and you will do as you are told,” I snapped.

“You’re not my King,” he snapped back.