Page 56 of The Innocent Sleep

Nothing was going to happen to October, because Ginevra and I were going to head for Dreamer’s Glass, and see to it that whatever task Li Qin had summoned her to complete was done well and properly and without putting her into any danger. She didn’t know who she was. She didn’t know what she could do. She was going to get herself hurt, and given her current condition, I couldn’t allow that to happen.

“How do you think you’re going to achieve that?” asked Sylvester wearily.

I frowned at him. “As your brother said, the Cait Sidhe and Candela walk the same roads.”

“Yes, and this is my knowe.” He leaned forward, watching me. “The only roads that open here are those I allow. So tell me, how were you intending to leave?”

Automatically, I reached for the shadows, and nearly recoiled as the knowe’s wards flared and forced me away from them. We were cut off. Sylvester’s memories of hunting and killing our kind might be false, but he’d been a hero in both realities, and his skills were real ones. I wasn’t October, to sweet-talk his knowe around to doing things my way. We were far enough into the room that even changing forms wouldn’t guarantee an escape, and Sylvester had no doubt taken our conversation as an opportunity to move his guards into position outside the doors.

I saw the moment Ginevra realized how neatly we had been trapped. Her shoulders drooped, only a fraction of an inch, and fear flickered across her face, hot and fast and honest. That was all. Her composure otherwise remained perfect, and in that moment, I was so proud of her I could have wept. She was still coming into her power. She already had the heart of a lion.

“Sir, you’re making a grave mistake,” I said.

“The Cait Sidhe were killed for good reason,” said Sylvester. “Sneaks and spies and liars all, and you’ve been spying in my halls for months. Do you even have a wife to search for? Could a beast like you truly love, much less marry?”

“Leave her out of this,” I spat. “My lady is none of your concern.”

“Nor yours, it seems, given how long you’ve searched in vain.”

The receiving room doors swung open, and a group of Sylvester’s guards marched into the room. Garm and Grianne were not among them. Neither was Etienne, I noted; he must not have returned from Dreamer’s Glass yet.

“I find that a little isolation makes everyone more communicative,” said Sylvester. “Don’t worry, Rand. We’re not the animals here. You won’t be tortured.”

“You’re making a mistake,” I said again. I could attack, could prove myself to be the beast Titania had convinced them I was, but all three of the people in front of me were precious in some way to people I cared about. October would never forgive me for assaulting Sylvester or Simon, and Patrick and Dianda seemed truly fond of August for her own sake as well as Simon’s. Without the option of seriously wounding any of them, standing and allowing myself to be taken was the best of options.

So I stood, and they grasped my arms and tied them behind my back, and did the same to Ginevra, and neither of us spoke as they marched us away, out into the halls, and onward, to the dungeons.

SIXTEEN

SYLVESTER HAD NEVER BEEN much of one for taking prisoners. In the world I knew, the dungeons at Shadowed Hills were mostly used for storage. Lots of gardening supplies, lots of tools, lots of outdated statuary that Luna had stripped from the grounds but not yet managed to regift or dispose of. It only took a few minutes in these reimagined confines for me to decide that I liked them far better when they were used for pruning shears and not for people.

The guards had been sensible enough to put Ginevra and me in cells with solid doors instead of bars a cat could easily slip through. There was no iron or rowan in the makeup of the cell; we would be perfectly comfortable captives, for as long as Sylvester chose to keep us here.

At least until Titania’s false Eira ordered Simon to ask his brother to slit our throats. How many steps did a command have to travel before the one who gave it was absolved? Titania wasn’t allowed to harm me. Was she allowed to create a facsimile of her daughter who wouldn’t hesitate to do precisely that, then stand back and just . . . let it all happen?

“I understand now,” said Ginevra, voice muffled by the wood and distance between us.

“Understand what?” I asked.

“Why you had to stand aside for Raj. Why you can’t be King any longer.”

“Why, pray tell, did I have to do those things? Because at the moment, it seems like a futile sacrifice.”

“Because you could have killed them all. They were all unarmed, and if you’d attacked, you could have incapacitated them at the very least. I’m not the fighter you are. I held back to let you act.” She sounded frustrated but not surprised.

“And?”

“And you didn’t, because they’re October’s family, and hurting them would hurt her. I knew you’d put her first. I knew it before Titania put us into this impossible situation with the Court and trying to keep everyone fed. But knowing something and seeing it aren’t the same thing, and I saw it in that receiving room. You’re standing aside because you can’t put yourself ahead of her.” She sighed, the sound heavy enough to cross the hall between us. “You haven’t stepped down yet, but you’ve already left us.”

“Your father intends to do the same for your mother, one day.”

“Is it worth it?”

The question made me pause. There were times—so many times—when I could have answered yes without hesitation or thought. Here and now, confined to a small stone cell with no obvious means of escape, that answer was more difficult to give, and so I didn’t even try.

Silence spun out between us, like a miller’s daughter spinning seconds into gold, or perhaps lead, to belabor the metaphor beyond all recognition. I let my head rest against the wall and closed my eyes, trying to force down my fear. It was Moving Day. Things were finally starting to happen. I just had no idea what those things would actually mean, and Mary’s enjoinder to be patient hadn’t come with any actual guarantee of success. We could still lose. We could still lose everything.

October had been here. We had been here at the same time, together, and I had allowed her to slip away, vanishing into another fiefdom, while Ginevra and I had both been taken prisoner, caught by two men I’d all but dismissed as possible threats.