Faerie Winter Part 3

Jayce ran a hand over his bald head and looked to Kate. "You're willing to take responsibility for this boy?"

"Absolutely," Kate said.

Jayce leaned on his cane. "Three days, then," he said. Brianna gave him a withering look.

Ethan began s.h.i.+vering. We needed to get him out of the cold. "He won't be ready to go anywhere in three days," Kate said.

"That's as close as we're likely to get to a fair compromise. It will have to serve." Jayce glanced at our burned house, then at Mom. "Let us know if there's anything you need, Tara." Mom nodded.

The last of the light had left the sky, and yellow moonlight shone through layers of cloud. The townsfolk began breaking up into smaller groups. Kate turned back to us. "Let's get him inside."

"No way in h.e.l.l h.e.l.l they're sending him away," Hope muttered. they're sending him away," Hope muttered.

"He'll stay with Matthew and me for now." Kate laid a hand on Mom's shoulder. "You and Liza will stay with us, too. Your place isn't in any shape to sleep in tonight."

Mom sighed. "I'm honestly not sure it's safe for Ethan to be in anyone's home."

Kate pressed her lips together. "Only until we can clear out the shed. I'm no fool, Tara."

"I know." Mom smiled wearily. "You're the least foolish person I know. If you and the children can handle getting Ethan moved, I'd best see to the house. Come with me, Liza. We have to talk."

"Yes. We do." We had to talk about how Mom needed to stop putting her life at risk. I followed her to the house, while behind me, Kate asked Matthew to get a stretcher. The temperature was dropping, and cold bit my ears and bare fingers.

Mom disappeared inside, but I stopped when I heard Charlotte's cane tapping the snow, with a lighter sound than Jayce's cane made. She'd lost her leg below the knee the year our town had tried to grow tomatoes, back when we were toddlers. Charlotte had crafted her wooden replacement leg herself, using, I now knew, her magic. It fit so well that beneath her pants and boots, the two legs looked almost alike.

Charlotte gestured toward the house. "Dad and I will take a look in the morning, see if we can't fix the damage."

"Thank you," I said.

Charlotte ducked shyly beneath her curtain of black hair. As children we'd been friends, but then she'd drawn away from me, afraid, she'd said later, that she wouldn't be able to hide her magic from me otherwise. "Afters stick together," she said, just as Seth had, only from Charlotte it sounded like an apology.

I didn't know how to answer it. "I'd better help Mom," I said, and went in.

The living room stank of smoke. Mom walked around it, untacking the nylon over the windows. In one hand, she held a glowing rock, no doubt lit by Seth's sister, whose magic was for calling light to stone. The rock cast eerie purple light on the smoke that lingered in the air around us. Many of the townsfolk still hesitated to use stones such as this, fearing, as I'd once feared, to touch any stone that glowed.

The coals in the fireplace were dead, the house as cold inside as outside. I opened the kitchen shutters to let more smoke out. Mom finished in the living room, found her coat draped over the couch, and pulled it on. We didn't speak as I followed her up the stairs. The railings were cool to the touch. Ethan had left no hint of heat behind when he took the fire into himself.

In the hallway the smell was worse, not only of wood smoke and burned wool but also the melted-plastic stench of burned nylon. There were scorch marks on the walls, and ash dusted the floor. The soot was thicker in Mom's room, and the walls were streaked with black burn marks. I removed what remained of the melted window coverings, and smoke drifted out the windows.

Mom set the glowing stone down on the dresser, against the far wall, which hadn't burned. She opened a drawer, lifted a nightgown, and sniffed it. "This will all need airing." She sighed and opened another drawer, reaching beneath a pile of wool socks and long underwear to pull something out. A silver disk, laced with narrow veins-Caleb's quia leaf. She clutched it and the chain it hung from in one hand, shutting her eyes as if the thing pained her.

"Liza." Mom sat down on the edge of the bed. The purple light gave her eyes a sunken look. "I need your word you won't use magic on me ever again."

Wind gusted through the open windows, sending icy s.h.i.+vers down my neck. "You could have died here."

Mom rocked back and forth, not looking at me. "If you cannot promise not to compel me with your magic, perhaps it'd be best if you leave and let Karinna teach you, because I'm not sure I can."

"What?" My hand gripped the windowsill, and charcoal crumbled between my fingers. I released the wood and paced the room. "You're not sending Ethan away. Why does everyone else always matter more than me?" My hand gripped the windowsill, and charcoal crumbled between my fingers. I released the wood and paced the room. "You're not sending Ethan away. Why does everyone else always matter more than me?"

Mom choked on an indrawn breath. "Is that what you think? Oh, Lizzy..." She reached for me, but she still wouldn't meet my eyes. I wanted to let her stroke my hair and whisper my problems away-but the problems had never gone away, no matter what she did.

"Nothing matters more to me than you, Lizzy." Mom's voice was hoa.r.s.e.

I stopped pacing and stared at the purple stone on the dresser. My father's knife lay beside it, unsheathed. "First you teach the others, but not me," I said, my own voice near breaking. "Then you talk about sending me away. What else am I to think?"

"I'm sorry, Liza, but I won't have my will subject to someone else's magic. I can't do this again, not after..." Her voice trailed off as I turned to her, and her fingers tightened around the leaf.

I return all your choices back to you, Caleb had said. He'd saved Mom's life-but that had been later. In my vision, Mom had run from him. She'd been so afraid.

More oaths. More bindings. Beneath my coat, my sweater felt clammy against my skin. "What did Caleb do?"

Mom looked down, as if ashamed. "No more than all his people did, Before." Smoke drifted through the room. "Glamour, they called it. All faerie folk have it, though none of our human children with magic seem to. The faerie folk used it on us without thought, as easily as breathing, more easily than the magics they had to be taught. I'd not understood how akin to glamour your own magic was until I stood outside my own home, powerless to take a single step to help the child burning within." Mom swallowed. "Glamour's in some of the old books from Before. I should have known better. But once I caught my first glimpse of Faerie, I couldn't let it go. I wanted magic so badly. I'm lucky Kaylen found me. Some of the others weren't as gentle with their human captives."

"Captives?" My voice was too small to bridge the s.p.a.ce between Mom and me. In my vision, Karin had called Mom a captive, too.

Mom's laugh was bitter. "All of us who found our way through to Faerie became captives. My father tore the city apart looking for me, but he had no idea how far I'd gone, not until later, and then-" Mom's shoulders slumped. I wanted to put my arms around her, to say she didn't have to tell me any of this.

But I wanted answers too badly. I said nothing. When Mom spoke again, her voice was strained. "I once watched a faerie lord command a human girl to throw herself into a river-and she did it, her eyes on him all the while, laughing right up until the rus.h.i.+ng water clogged her throat."

"Caleb wouldn't-"

"No." Mom shut her eyes, seeing things I couldn't. "He watched, though, and made no move to stop it. So I had to watch with him. I think I laughed as well. Glamour is like that. It convinces you everything of theirs is so d.a.m.ned beautiful. There was a boy, the Lady herself turned him into a stag and hunted him like a wild thing. I remember the sound of the horns, the flash of his red flank through the green trees, the way the setting sun outlined his antlers-" Mom's voice tightened around her words. "That was unusual. The Lady can change bodies as well as minds. It's in the nature of her magic. At least with your magic, my mind-my thoughts-remained my own."

Wind blew ash across the room. No one should die like that, with someone else moving their thoughts and limbs. I looked back toward the dresser and Father's knife. I touched the blade. It was sharper than mine.

"At least I was the last," Mom said. "Kaylen lifted his glamour from me in the end, and he gave his word he'd never use it again, on me or anyone else. If grief resulted from that decision in the end, that, at least, wasn't his fault."

"So you forgave him?" Mom hadn't looked anywhere near to forgiving him in my vision.

"I've had time." Mom moved to my side and set Caleb's leaf back inside the drawer. "And I forgave him sooner than he forgave himself. I understand that now. But I would sooner die than have someone else control my thoughts and my actions once more. So I need your word. You must never use your magic on me again."

It was too cold with the windows open. "So long as you're not in any danger, you have my word."

"That's not enough. I know you mean well, Liza, but you truly don't understand."

The fire could have killed her. Did she expect me to just let her die next time? The stone's purple light was dimming. I took it in my hands. "If you don't trust me with my magic, how can you trust any promises I make?"

"It's a funny thing about the faerie folk." Mom shut the drawer. "They cannot say things they do not mean, and once they give their word, they cannot easily break it."

"But I'm human." I knew well enough that humans could lie.

Mom laughed uneasily. "I've noticed that once the children in this town come into their magic, they develop an odd unwillingness to lie. This has presented challenges in keeping their magic hidden."

No magic controlled my words. I opened my mouth, meaning to tell Mom I wouldn't use my magic to save her life, just to prove I could make false promises as well as anyone.

No words came out. I tried again. My chest tightened, and my breathing went shallow. I couldn't seem to get enough air.

I stopped attempting to speak. Air rushed into my lungs. I gasped, stumbled, and caught myself. I couldn't do it. I really couldn't. I'd always hated to say things that weren't true, but I'd thought it a choice. My My choice. choice.

"So you can see," Mom said quietly, "why your refusal to give your word makes me uneasy. I'll meet you at Kate's." She turned and left the room.

In my hands the light went out, leaving me in the dark.

My hand clenched the dead stone. How could I refuse Mom, after all she'd been through?

How could she ask such things of me, after all I I had? had?

I felt my way down the dark hall to my room. I pulled the coverings off my bedroom windows and took two nightgowns from my dresser, one for me and one for Mom. They smelled faintly of smoke, but there was no helping that. I added clean sweaters, pants, underwear, and socks to the pile. I went back downstairs, pulled on my hat and scarf and gloves, and headed to Kate's.

The path through town was silent now, with just a few faint stars piercing the clouds. Lantern light spilled out around the shutters of the houses and made their tacked nylon glow.

"Sorry about your house, Liza."

I dropped the clothes and spun around, only to find Kyle's brother, Johnny, standing right behind me. He laughed. At fourteen he had a wiry build that made him look taller than he was, along with the wispy beginnings of something no one but him called a mustache on his upper lip.

I hadn't heard him coming. I never did. "Don't do do that," I said darkly. that," I said darkly.

Johnny shrugged. His magic was stalking, meaning he was the only human I knew who walked as silently as faerie folk did.

"Don't go spooking the caller, Johnny." Hope's steps crunched toward us through the snow. "That can get you in all sorts of trouble. Almost as much trouble as spooking me me."

Johnny slouched down in his fur-lined denim jacket. "I'm not afraid of a little wind."

"You should be." Hope helped me pick up the dropped clothes. She sniffed at a sleeve. "We'll find better for you and your mom," she said to me.

"I don't mind." As I folded the clothes, Johnny disappeared the way he'd come, without a sound.

"Everyone else will, if you walk around smelling like this." Hope laughed, and acorns clattered around her face. "Seriously, it isn't any trouble. I was already planning to come by later to check on the firestarter." She walked with me halfway to Kate's house before peeling off for her own.

Johnny appeared again at my elbow. "I really am sorry about the fire."

I flinched but kept walking, as if I'd known he was there all along. Johnny stopped to scratch at the leg of his pants. Kyle's ants Kyle's ants, I thought, and wasn't sorry. I hoped the leather kept them warm. I hoped they stayed a good long time.

As far as I could tell, Johnny didn't follow me any farther. I glanced into Kate's backyard as I neared her house. Light glowed from within the shed, and tools and sc.r.a.ps of wood and metal lay on a tarp beside it. They must have already gotten Ethan inside.

I'd head out there soon, too, but first I crossed Kate's front porch and entered the warmth of her living room. I set the damp clothes down near the fireplace, where a pot of water boiled above the coals. Kate's walls were covered with bright wall hangings; I glanced at the one that hid her mirror. Most mirrors had been destroyed during the War, out of fear that the faerie folk could step through them into our world, but this one was a family heirloom, so Kate had secretly kept it. No faerie folk had found their way through the silvered gla.s.s, but I had used the mirror to bring Mom home from Faerie.

I heard voices from Kate's kitchen.

"What he really needs is a burn clinic," Kate said. Adults were always wis.h.i.+ng for medicines and facilities from Before. The way they talked, it used to be that any hurt could be cured, no matter how severe.

"Well, we don't have one." Matthew's voice was quieter-angrier. "That's why I have to go."

I put my hat and gloves in my pockets and joined them. "Go where?" Matthew and I drew each other into a quick hug. He smelled of smoke, too.

"To Caleb and Karin's town," he said as we drew apart. "Ethan-it's bad."

Kate drew a jar from a cabinet. Ground valerian root-it was a sedative, used when pain became too much to bear. "Bad enough I was debating between this and something rather more deadly," she said.

"If Caleb can heal him, it won't come to that," Matthew told her. As far as I could tell, Caleb's healing magic was as powerful as anything from Before.

I tried to picture Caleb controlling Mom's thoughts. He'd risked so much for her-if not for my vision, I might not have believed it, even now, though I knew he was as capable as anyone of pus.h.i.+ng too far.

Matthew and I followed Kate to the fireplace, where she sprinkled the valerian root into the pot. I wrinkled my nose as its sweaty-sock smell filled the air. Kate said herbs hadn't worked nearly as well Before as now. I wondered if that meant they'd at least smelled better then.

Strands of soot-smudged hair fell into Matthew's face. "Three days isn't much time. If we can't stop the Council from sending Ethan away, he'll die out there. If Caleb can't come, maybe Allie can." As Caleb's student, Allie didn't know as much about healing as Caleb, but she still could do more than any of us.

My hands and sleeves were streaked with ash. "I thought you didn't intend to let the Council send Ethan away."

"Even if we stop the Council, he'll probably die as he is now," Matthew said. "I can't let that happen, not when I have another choice."

Kate stared into the boiling water. "At least wait until morning."

I thought of Ethan's blackened skin. I wasn't sure a burn like that could could heal on its own. "Matthew's right. We should go tonight." Once I wouldn't have dared venture out so far into the dark if I had a choice, but that was before the trees slept. heal on its own. "Matthew's right. We should go tonight." Once I wouldn't have dared venture out so far into the dark if I had a choice, but that was before the trees slept.

Downy gray wolf fur shadowed the backs of Matthew's hands, a sign he was uneasy. "I'll go faster alone. It would take us all night to reach Caleb's town on foot, but as a wolf I can get there in a couple hours if I run. If Caleb's willing, he could be back here by morning."

"I don't like it," Kate said.

I didn't like it, either. "If anyone should take risks for Ethan, it should be me," I said. Matthew had warned me not to push the firestarter too far.

"But I'm the one best able to do something about it this time." Matthew rubbed the scar on his wrist. "You're not the only one who can save people, Liza."

"I never said-" The words caught in my throat. I'd spent enough time patrolling with Matthew to know he could manage a couple of hours alone in the winter forest well enough. Unless he ran into owls, or wild dogs-I swallowed a nervous laugh. If anyone could handle wild dogs, it was Matthew. "If you're not back by first light, I'll come after you." We keep each other safe We keep each other safe.

"I'll be back before dawn," Matthew promised. "I'll run ahead of Caleb and Allie whatever they say, so that you'll know whether to expect them."

"I've trusted you before to know where you were needed and to take no more risk than you had to." Kate filled a mug from the pot as she spoke. "I'll have to trust to it now, too, however much I might wish things otherwise. Come. Let's check on Ethan-and tell Tara-before you go."

Matthew shook his head. "Tara will try to stop me. You know that."

Kate drew the mug close, as if for warmth. "I do know. Perhaps I was hoping for it, and that isn't fair of me, is it?" She set the mug down, brushed a few wisps of gray from her face, and hugged him. "It's nearly spring. Keep an eye out for crocuses. Let me know if you spot any."

"I'll be careful." Matthew knew as well as I the danger crocuses held. Until this year, they'd grown even in winter, burning through leather and wool and the skin of those unfortunate enough to miss them hiding beneath the snow. He pulled away from his grandmother and grabbed my hands. I squeezed them hard. As I looked into his gray eyes, it was all I could do not to pull him closer. I feared if I did, I wouldn't let go and Matthew would lose more time. Besides, Kate stood right beside us, and what if I didn't stop at holding?

Matthew laughed softly. "Nothing to pack-I couldn't carry it anyway." He released my hands to step back, and silver light flowed over him. Skin stretched and changed, arms and legs and body all giving up their shape, as if the form Matthew had worn all his life were illusion, nothing more. He fell to all fours, skin s.h.i.+fting to silver-gray fur, hands and feet to paws with dark pads. Dark markings emerged around his eyes and muzzle and ears. Those ears tilted toward me.

I caught my breath. No matter how often I watched, I never got tired of this. I leaned down and put my arms around him. His fur had grown so thick this winter. I inhaled its musky scent. The smell of smoke was faint now. "Be careful out there," I whispered. "Give Allie a hug for me."

Matthew nudged my chest with his damp nose. He licked my chin, then turned and trotted for the door. I followed, stepping around pants and sweater, boots and wool underwear. I never could seem to catch the moment when his clothes were cast aside.

He stopped by the door and looked up at me. I laughed. Whenever we set out together, I had to open the door. As I turned the k.n.o.b, Kate moved to my side. We watched together as Matthew made his way across the porch and down the steps. When he reached the path through town, he burst into a loping run. The moon was hidden by cloud, and he quickly disappeared into the dark.

Kate squeezed my shoulder. "I'm going to see to Ethan." She went inside, gathered up her coat and the mug, and left. I lingered on the porch, staring out into the night, for a long time before I followed.

When I did, I found Kate outside the shed, talking with Hope. Hope's little sister grinned beside them as she s.h.i.+fted from foot to foot for warmth. "I get to stay," she announced.