Page 32 of The Innocent Sleep

“Best of luck, then,” said Shade.

“Open roads and kind fires to you all,” I said, and dove into shadow before anything else could require my aid, running hard in the direction of Shadowed Hills.

It would be a close thing: between explaining our plan to Shade and carrying out our raid of the Costco, I had been left with little under a quarter of an hour to get to Shadowed Hills and locate Garm, lest he go to the Library without me. I didn’t have a card, never having sought to obtain one, and the only person I knew locally who did was Simon Torquill. I might not suspect him of harming October intentionally—if anything, he was likely to be as much a victim in the current situation as she was—but that didn’t mean I trusted myself in a room with him when he was part of the group keeping her away from me.

Nor would he have any reason to do me a favor if I asked. No. I needed to play nicely with Garm for the time being, and that meant arriving when I’d said I would.

I ran as fast as I had ever run, and dropped out of the Shadows onto the promenade as the clock was striking the hour. I stopped there, breathing hard, before I moved toward the glass doors and peeked inside.

A small gathering was assembled in the ballroom. Not large enough to be considered a party, not properly so, but a dinner perhaps. Sylvester was not in evidence. Neither was his brother. Etienne was there, looking uncomfortable as he spoke with a noblewoman in a blue velvet gown. None of the other faces were familiar, save for a Candela in guard’s livery who stood in one corner, her Merry Dancers circling her head and a bland scowl on her face. Grianne, another of Sylvester’s knights with whom my relations had been cordial in the past.

I frowned. If I entered, Etienne might have questions; if I tried to go around, someone else might. I didn’t know where, exactly, I was meant to meet with Garm, only that he was hopefully expecting me. I turned and walked away from the door, dropping down onto all fours and continuing onward in feline form. As Sylvester’s guest, the wards here were already inclined to welcome me, and for all that I often told October I wasn’t a bloodhound, being able to trace Garm by scent was an advantage I couldn’t push away.

I didn’t know Garm well enough to pick him out of a crowd, but there was only one fresh Gwragen trail on the promenade, scented with moss and stagnant water. I put my nose to the stone, sniffing, and followed it, taking the rail around the outside of the manor rather than trying to invade the ballroom. On the other side, I found a high, open corridor, the stars twinkling overhead, and dropped back down to the main trail, trotting faster as the scent grew stronger.

At the end of the corridor was an open door, and a stairway leading up to the guards’ quarters. I followed the trail to another door, this one closed, and rose onto two legs to rap my knuckles against it.

“Coming!” called Garm, a bare moment before the door was opened and he was looking at me in mild confusion. He was half out of his livery, having removed his tunic but not yet his breeches, and his grayish cheeks were flushed. “Oh. You’re quite timely.”

“I try to be.” I stepped into the room. It was small, simple, and well appointed. The furnishings had clearly been where they were for some time, acquiring a layer of clutter and sinking into their places like well-set tentpoles, each clearly set where it belonged.

The bed was unmade. He hadn’t been expecting company.

I turned to watch as he pulled a fresh white under-tunic on over his head, rumpling his hair still further. “I didn’t expect you to be on time. Royalty rarely is.”

I blinked, briefly confused. “I never claimed a title.”

“You didn’t need to. You said only royal cats could pass after what had been done to the world, and I can read. I went by the ducal library on my lunch, and looked up what we had on Cait Sidhe. It said you kept your own Courts, granted by Oberon himself, and divided yourself into royal and common cats, based on power rather than birth. You’d have to be either a Prince or a King, to be considered royal. The book was unclear on what the difference is, from a power perspective.” He paused, clearly waiting for me to fill in what the book hadn’t supplied.

“There isn’t one, or if there is, it’s more about experience and time than pure power. A Prince who’s new to the area won’t have deep ties to the local Shadow Roads, or know all the ways in and out of the Court. So the local King can easily defeat him, if it comes to a challenge. Given time, the shadows begin to bend more and more to the individuals, to understand what they’ll want, and the Court chooses its favorites, always. So a Prince and a King are likely to be comparable in power, but only the one who can defeat the other may claim the higher title.”

“Fascinating. Which are you, then? Unless that’s an unspeakably rude question, I’m just excited. I’ve never met a Cait Sidhe before.”

“King,” I said, with a small curl of my lip.

“Your Majesty,” said Garm, and pulled a pair of trousers from a drawer. “We can head for the Library as soon as I finish getting dressed. I was able to get a pass, and it allows me to bring a guest, as long as we both promise not to start any trouble while we’re there.”

“I know the rules of the Libraries,” I said. “If there’s trouble, it will not begin with me.”

“Excellent. Were you able to find your lady?”

I tried to control my face but must have schooled myself too slowly, for Garm winced as he looked at me. “It went that well?”

“I . . . found her,” I said, gravely. “As I said before, she is a changeling, and not Cait Sidhe. She knows me not. She doesn’t even know herself. I had no way of approaching her without frightening her unduly, and so I chose to retreat and help my own people while I seek more information on the situation.”

“Hence the Library,” said Garm. “Well, if you love the Maiden October, then I wish you only well. She’s a good, dutiful daughter to her household, and she deserves better than what Titania’s Law intends for her.”

“That is the second mention of that law I’ve heard,” I said, tamping down my annoyance at his accurate guess. “It describes no decree I have ever been aware of.”

“It is the duty of all noble households, and all Firstborn, to provide at least one changeling child to be pressed into service to Faerie,” said Garm, with the vague detachment that meant he was reciting a proclamation, not giving an opinion. “In the occasion that a titled noble has not yet produced their own heir, the duty may be delayed to avoid possible questions of succession.”

“Does that mean changelings can inherit?” Maybe Titania had created a fairer world than I would have expected of her.

Garm shook his head. “No.”

Maybe not.

He wasn’t finished, however: “After Maeve betrayed her sister, husband, and all of Faerie, and was lost to us, the hope chests were destroyed for our protection. There might yet be one remaining—there are always rumors. So I suppose it’s possible a changeling could find a way to become purely fae and challenge for a crown, and that possibility is best avoided. That avoidance is why our Duke is spared the performance of his duty for the time being, as he has yet to take a wife.”