Page 76 of The Innocent Sleep

“And did she?”

“She did.”

“And why is August’s comfort with losing her sister more important than anyone else’s?” The question was reasonably calm, no anger or malice in his words.

I blinked. “It isn’t. I don’t—”

“What if not everyone thinks your version of the world sounds like the better one?” He cocked his head, watching me. “Everything I’ve heard so far makes me think Arden and I got the better deal in this version of things. We didn’t get crowns or thrones, but we got to stay together. I didn’t sleep away decades while she struggled on her own, no family, no support, no one to grieve our parents with her. We have a job we’re good at, lieges who care for us and make sure our needs are met, a community that appreciates us for who we are, and not the titles we wear—this is a good life. Why would we want to trade it for the life you say we’re ‘supposed’ to have?”

“Because it’s a lie,” I said. “And the Nolan Windermere I know is an honest man. Because people are missing. The inconvenient ones, the ones Titania couldn’t wave a hand and explain away. Where I come from, a woman named May is October’s sister in every way that counts. Blood if not birth, shared memory, shared history, and so much love between them that no one who sees them together would ever question their familial relationship. In this world, she can’t leave the Library of Stars, or she begins to dissolve. Among the Cait Sidhe, only the royal cats like myself and Ginevra can leave the Court—the Shadows are closed against all others. Well, if we stop hunting for the rest of our people, stop bringing them what they need to survive, they’ll starve, sealed away from the rest of the world. I’m not sure even the night-haunts will be able to reach them. Our allies in the Undersea aren’t captivated by Titania’s illusions, but they’re trapped behind a barrier keeping them from reaching the friends and family members who had the poor fortune to be on land when this all began. Why would you want to trade this life for one you like less when you only have a thin description of it? Because people are suffering. Because changelings are suffering. You ask why you’d want to go back to the life I know you from? It’s because you’re still a good person, no matter what elements of your past have been changed.”

“He’s right, Nolan,” said Arden. She sounded utterly miserable. “I mean, he’s a little self-interested here—his wife’s one of the people under the spell—but he’s right. Too many people are too much worse off in this world, and you know Titania doesn’t do anything that doesn’t benefit her in some way. If there’s a way to break this, we pretty much have to. Even if we have to turn back into people we don’t know and don’t necessarily want to be, we have to put things back the way they’re supposed to be.”

“That kind of self-sacrificing bullshit is going to turn you into the Queen in the Mists,” said Nolan.

“Mom would be proud of me,” said Arden. She looked at me, then, mismatched eyes sharp. “You should get inside, cat-man. They’re about to call us all to dinner.”

I frowned. “How do you know?”

The promenade door opened, and a servant in the royal livery appeared. “Dinner is prepared,” he called, before turning to go.

I raised an eyebrow. Arden smirked.

“I saw him coming through the window,” she said. Both of them stepped into portals then, vanishing.

After a beat to laugh at the simplicity of her answer, I followed.

TWENTY-ONE

WE EMERGED INTO A vast ballroom that clung stubbornly to the gold-on-gold color scheme of the rest of the knowe. The lack of variation stole the luster from the precious metal, making it all seem a little dull and undifferentiated. Not that I was here to critique the décor, but the temptation was strong.

The center of the room was occupied by round tables, each large enough to seat ten people without crowding, allowing for a dinner party of roughly a hundred and fifty people. That would be quite an assembly, and made me suspect that they allowed their changelings to dine with the rest of the Kingdom. I had never spent much time in Golden Shore. Everything I’d seen tonight made me think that might need to change in the years to come. I wasn’t considering a permanent relocation, but agrarian amusements have always been popular with children. Perhaps October and I could bring our child here for berry-picking and pumpkin selection and all the other little harvest rituals of the modern year.

It was a pleasant thought.

Two of the walls were occupied by banquet stations, laden with food and drink and guarded by casually watchful servers who seemed quite prepared to smack anyone who approached too early with a ladle. I quite approved. A third wall was dominated by a long, shallow stage, of the sort I would have expected to present pantomimes or other small entertainments. Perhaps a band. Instead, the high table had been established there, already occupied by Theron and Chrysanthe, who nodded to me and gestured toward an open table near their seats.

Arden and Nolan appeared on the stage and settled to Chrysanthe’s left, Arden pausing first to kiss the Queen on the Golden Shore’s cheek. All four of them began a conversation, absorbed in each other.

It was nice, to see a family so united. It was too bad I was here to make sure they wouldn’t be a family anymore. Once this was over, Arden and Nolan would go back to the Mists, and this sort of domestic moment would become a diplomatic event between two Kingdoms, not a casual meal.

Or as casual as the Divided Courts ever got, anyway. People began entering through doors arrayed around the edges of the room, nodding politely to the servers as they made for their tables with a minimum of fuss. It seemed tonight’s banquet was not an unusual occurrence in this area. I moved to the table Theron had indicated, and issued my own polite nod to the server who came over with a basket of bread and a pitcher of water, leaving them both at the table’s center.

This small nicety accomplished, I turned my focus to the crowd.

The people around me were an eclectic mix, purebloods and changelings, even a few merlins with rings of fairy ointment around their eyes. Their clothing was equally varied, ranging from formal gowns and velvet suits to jeans and overalls accented with mud and flecks of straw, as if the people who wore them had just come in from the field.

The main door opened. I looked automatically toward it, and felt the scowl which had only recently left my face reform as the rest of my party stepped into the room, October gawking like a country bumpkin at everything around her. Had she ever been that unpolished, or that incapable of controlling her reactions? Was this some cruel fabrication of Titania’s, or was this how Stacy had always seen her childhood friend? Ideas about people that form when we’re young are often slow to change.

It was a question for another time. I watched them approach through the crowd, not rising from my seat to pull back their chairs or filling their glasses with water. Ginevra settled beside me, putting a hand gently on my forearm. I resisted the urge to hiss at her, although I did transfer the focus of my glare briefly in her direction, and paused at the sight of the scratch marks on her cheek, red and angry. They had stopped bleeding, but had not yet scabbed over, and were a cruel reminder of my temper.

The others settled, Simon looking anywhere but at October. I had known him more than long enough to recognize the shame in his expression. Something had happened while I was off gathering information. Something that might yet prove important.

I returned my attention to October, staring at her like I thought I could force her to tell me everything I needed to know.

Instead, August elbowed her and gestured to a Satyr in servant’s clothing pushing a silver serving cart between the tables. “I think that’s the food,” said August, a bit too loudly for propriety, but loudly enough to make October crack a small smile and look around.

A second server approached, this one carrying a mug of spiced tea. She began filling the glasses I had neglected. October leaned toward her, asking, “Is it like this every night?”