who’d seen their entrance were on their feet now, cameras and cell phones recording, and more people were running their way, voices lifted in curious excitement. For the first time since they’d recovered Dafydd, Lara wished she was in the saddle, so she could stand in the stirrups. Instead she whispered, “For God’s sake, keep the horse still,” and drew her legs up.
Any untrained mortal horse would, she was sure, react badly to her shifting weight, and to the pressure of her feet against its backside as she slowly came to standing, one hand on Dafydd’s shoulder for balance. The Seelie animal, though, simply settled into his stance, becoming solid and comfortable as she stood. Lara had a moment of shrill amusement as she remembered the enchantment sticking her to the horse, and it was with more confidence than she’d thought she could command that she raised her voice.
“Good people of Boston! You see before you the prowess and dignity of a prince! I would like to invite you to Pennsic, a war of the kingdoms to be held in the great state of Pennsylvania! And with this invitation delivered, we must bid you adieu!” She slid down to sitting and wrapped her arms around Dafydd’s middle, trying to fight down hysterical giggles. “Go! Go go go! Go! Glamour us out of their vision if you can, but for heaven’s sake, ride!”
Astonished cheers erupted behind them as they charged across the Common and into invisibility.
“What,” Dafydd asked, mystified, “is Pennsic?” His glamour was at full strength, ripping at the world, and sending sour music through Lara’s bones, but it did disguise them. Of that, at least, she was confident. She’d felt it come over them, twisting her stomach and making her sick, but the fade-out had probably been as dramatic to viewers as their arrival had been. Lara imagined there were dozens of people searching for mirrors and other effects to explain their theatrical performance. Part of her wanted to search the Internet to see what stories people were already concocting. But once out of sight thanks to the glamour, they had merely ducked into one of a multitude of secluded areas in the fifty-acre park. Summer green meant heavily leafed low-hanging branches, which made excellent screens even without magic’s aid.
Lara slid off the horse all the way to sitting on the ground, knocking the staff loose from its bindings with the impact. She let it lie where it fell, looping her arms around her knees and dropping her head instead of rescuing it. Her heart and breath came hard, like she’d been running, not riding, and she gulped air before responding. “I really don’t know. It’s something where people dress up in armor and participate in a mock war. A cabdriver told me about it a few weeks ago, when I opened a worldwalking window myself. It was the only story I could think of. Could you … let most of the glamour go? Maybe keep enough to make people glance past us, but being inside one …” She shuddered, head still pressed against her knees. “It feels like the world is shredding. It keeps screaming at me. Nails on chalkboards and steam whistles and teakettles and—”
The cacophony faded abruptly, leaving comparatively mild dissonance in its place. Lara sagged and swallowed against bile, finally daring to look up. Dafydd retained his headache-inducing glamour, humanity a facade over his elfin features, but the improvement as a whole was indescribable. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. I should have thought to do it before.” Dafydd dismounted and nodded for Aerin to do so as well. “It was a well-told story, Lara. Four sentences, not one of them a lie, but together creating a context that wasn’t true, either.”
Lara smiled tightly. “I hate it when people do that, but I hate telling lies even more. Aerin, can you understand me?”
The Seelie woman flinched, then nodded as she took to the ground. “Well enough. Your words sound strange to my ears. I cannot understand Dafydd at all, though I can hear that he speaks the same language you do.”
Lara’s shoulders dropped in relief. Aerin’s speech still sounded more liquid than usual, but she was comprehensible now. “You sound strange, too, but a minute ago I couldn’t understand you at all. Did you have to learn English when you got here, Dafydd?”
His eyebrows rose. “I did. The worldwalking spell doesn’t offer translation services. I thought, though, that your magic did.”
“It does. It just took a minute to start. Maybe it was the shock of transition? Anyway, good job, both of you, on the glamours,” Lara said. “People will probably have photos of you before they set in, but more will be of you looking human. I don’t know what else to do about that.”
Aerin, carefully and in English, said, “ ‘Photos’?”
Lara cast a helpless glance at Dafydd. “Instant artistic renditions. Perfect ones, so looking at them is like being in front of us. I’ll show you later, if there is a later. Dafydd, what
“I hoped you would tell me. I worked no worldwalking spell.” He repeated himself in the Seelie language, earning an exasperated look from Aerin.
“Of course you didn’t. It was Ioan, eager to separate us.”
“While he rode into the back side of the Seelie army?” Lara asked dubiously. “Dafydd, can you get us back?”
“Yes, but not immediately. The magic …” He sighed and sat down beside Lara, gesturing for Aerin to do the same. “The spell takes some time to prepare, Lara. Hours with very little other distraction.”
“As Ioan had while we rode,” Aerin said.
“Yes,” Lara said, aggravated, “but Emyr’s already upset with him, and he
“I had the spell prepared the first time we traveled to the Barrow-lands,” Dafydd said mildly, as if there’d been no disagreement. “All that was required to trigger it was the will to do so. Any of us coming to your world would have that ready, so in times of great danger we could escape easily.”
“Unless you got arrested and thrown in a human jail full of iron and steel,” Lara muttered.
A smile flickered over Dafydd’s mouth. “Indeed. The point, I fear, is that having been unprepared to come here, neither am I prepared to take us back. We need somewhere that we can be certain of privacy so I can gather my power and return us to the Barrow-lands.”
“Kelly’s apartment. We can go there for privacy, and you can get us all home from the …”
“I believe so.” Dafydd’s voice remained steady despite the bright light of hope. “Lara, is the glamour still bothering you? You look pale.”
It was an excuse, and she knew it: a way for her to move beyond the astonishing reference to the Barrow- lands as home. Lara took it, grateful. “It’s not as bad as it was, but I wouldn’t mind getting away from it. I don’t know what to do about the horses, Dafydd. I can call Kelly—well, we can turn up on her doorstep, since I don’t have a phone or any money on me—but we can’t put two horses in her apartment.”
“I believe that will be unnecessary.” Aerin reached up to pat her horse’s nose. “They’re intelligent enough to remain hidden if we explain the need, but I can encourage them to, as well. The same sort of enchantment that keeps you in the saddle,” she explained. “A staying spell. A glamour cast over their presence should keep them comfortably out of sight until we return for them, and will allow you to escape the magic’s discomfort. Is there water nearby?”
“Nowhere as secluded as this, but there’s plenty of it. The frog pond is …” Lara glanced through the leaves like she could see the city and orient herself, then waved a hand. “That way, I think. Should we bring them there?”
“They’ll do well enough on their own, with glamours keeping them from prying eyes.” Aerin stood, dusting grass from her armor, and caught the horses’ bridles to draw the animals close and murmur to them. Lara watched a moment, then dropped her shoulders with a sigh.
“I wish I knew how much time has passed. You said it could easily be ten years here for a day there, if there was no spell worked to keep time in approximate alignment. I’d been there three days, Dafydd. My mother could be dead.”
He took her hand, fingers gentle around hers. “I don’t think so. The skyline is still familiar, isn’t it? In thirty years it would change. Even if it was still distinguishable, it would change. I think it’s been less time than that.”
“I hope so.” It didn’t matter that she’d been aware that following Merrick between worlds meant she might
