Rosemary and Rue

painted purple and filled with cement before I came to live there. I don’t know why, but I’m sure that there was a lot of beer involved. A Gwragen half-blood was slouching against the sink, a cigarette dangling from her candy-apple red lips. The color was definitely not lipstick. She straightened as I entered, dropping her cigarette to the tile floor and making a hasty exit. I watched her go, blinking. Root and branch, was I that frightening?

Steeling myself, I turned to risk a glance in the mirror. I was ready for anything, except what I actually saw.

“What the . . . ?”

The change Toby’s clothes while she’s asleep trend had continued: my bloody bathrobe was gone, replaced by a gauzy purple nightgown probably purchased from the sort of catalog that came wrapped in brown paper. It was ankle-length, but left my shoulders—more than just my shoulders—bare. That might have bothered me, but I was too busy taking in the view to care.

My hair was tied in a ponytail, uncovering my face and neck. The dark circles under my eyes were gone, and my skin was smooth, not even bruised. I still looked like death warmed over, but it wasn’t an immediate death anymore; more like something found in a ditch.

A knot of scar tissue marked my left shoulder, exactly where I expected the gunshot wound to be. There was no pain. Slowly, I pulled up the nightgown and bared my right leg to the hip. The bullet hole through my thigh had been healed the same way. No wonder I could walk: as far as my legs knew, they were fine. Devin somehow managed to patch me up all the way while I was out.

Of course there were scars. There’s no magic in the world that can heal iron without leaving a scar.

I paused, registering the other thing that had changed. My head was clear. Whatever healed the gunshot wounds also managed to cure my iron poisoning. I didn’t think that was possible. How could that be possible?

The taste of roses tickled the back of my throat. I stiffened. “Oh, no, not now . . .”

That was all the time I had. Evening’s binding flowed over me like a wave, strengthened by my return to health and anxious after my enforced idleness. Memories of her death slammed down on me, smothering the room in a veil of red, and my blood rose to meet the memories headlong, not giving me time to brace myself. Silly me, thinking I could act like I was Daoine Sidhe without paying the cost. There are always costs. The pixie, the key, the gunshots and the blood and the screaming—they were in the roses, waiting for me and dragging me down. They were all the same, as they had always been the same and always would be. Death doesn’t change. Death never changes.

Breaking free before the memory pulled me all the way into Evening’s grave was even harder this time. My blood had been in contact with iron, and recently. It didn’t just remember what it felt like to die by iron—it knew.

Let me go, I thought. If I die here, you lose, too. Let me go . . .

I slammed back into my body to find myself clinging to the edge of the sink, dry-heaving over the floor. I didn’t remember dropping to my knees or anything else after the roses hit. The world was spinning, making my chest and stomach ache.

Moaning, I let my head drop against the sink. I knew the binding would keep me moving; that sort of thing never lets you hold still for long. I just hadn’t realized how far it would go to motivate me.

It was at least partially my fault. The memories I took from Evening’s blood strengthened the binding, wrapping it around me until there was no way out. It would have goaded me on and made me miserable if I hadn’t ridden her blood, it would even have killed me, but it wouldn’t have used her death against me. And it was getting stronger. Eventually it would be strong enough that I wouldn’t be able to fight it, and it would force me to ride the memories of Evening’s dying moments until my heart gave out.

She probably didn’t mean for it to be that way, but unfortunately for the both of us, she thought like what she was: she thought like a pureblood. A pureblood could have ridden the blood without complications, gathering the information they wanted and shrugging the rest of it away. Evening thought in terms of what she knew, but I was just a changeling, and my magic wasn’t that strong. Her binding was too much for me to hold off forever. And it was getting stronger.

I was in serious trouble.

The door opened behind me. I didn’t move, keeping my eyes closed and trying to steady my breathing. Anything that wanted to kill me would have to come through Devin and his kids, and if they’d done that already, there was no point in trying to run. Leaving my head against the sink seemed like a much better idea. At least that way there was a chance I’d die without throwing up again.

Hesitant footsteps crossed the floor, stopping about a yard away. “Yes?” I said, still not taking my head off the sink. It was a nice sink. Well, actually, it was a filthy, disgusting sink, and I didn’t want to think about the things caked around the drain, but it was giving me something to prop my head against, and that was what counted.

“Ms. Daye?” Dare, sounding uneasy and a little scared. For once, I couldn’t blame her. I’d made it pretty clear that I didn’t like her, and Devin was probably threatening to do all sorts of nasty things to her if she didn’t get along with me, or at least keep me alive. The two have never been mutually exclusive. That was a good thing; Evening and I would never have been able to handle it if we were required to get along.

“Yes, Dare?”

She took a step forward, feet scuffling against the linoleum. I lifted my head to watch her progress, not bothering to try and stand. I’m not that stupid.

“Are you feeling okay, Ms. Daye?”

“Of course,” I said, putting my head back down. “I always snuggle up with the bathroom fixtures.”

“You don’t look like you feel okay,” she said, coming a few steps closer. Brave girl. “Should I get Devin?” That showed a certain unexpected courage on her part—Devin’s kids never called him by name where anyone could hear them.

“I’d rather you didn’t.” I abandoned the comforting stability of the sink and climbed back onto my feet, bracing one hand against the mirror. I was ready to catch myself if I fell, but that didn’t mean I was looking forward to the possibility. “I’m fine.”

Dare eyed me dubiously, saying, “You don’t look fine . . .”

“Okay, let’s try I’m better now than you’re going to be if you call Devin.” I leaned against the mirror, trying to look fierce. There are better conditions under which to look intimidating—any conditions that don’t involve me being dressed in a low-cut purple nightgown, for a start. “I think he’s worried enough, don’t you?”

The implied threat actually seemed to relax her. You take comfort in the things you know, and what she knew was the chaotic and sometimes violent world of Home. “You want me to give you a few minutes to get back together?”

“That’s probably a good idea, yeah.” I swallowed, trying to clear the taste of roses from my mouth. It wasn’t working very well. I hadn’t really expected it to.

Dare hesitated, rocking back and forth on her heels before turning wide eyes toward me again. I was grateful for the reprieve in the rocking—watching her do that in high heels had been making me dizzy. “Can I ask you a question, Ms. Daye?”

“Sure,” I said, with a shrug. It wasn’t like she couldn’t learn my darkest, deepest secrets just by breaking into Devin’s files. I expected her to ask something vulgar or pointless and be finished.

She surprised me. “How did you meet Devin?”

“Devin?” I straightened, really seeing at her for the first time since she entered the room. She looked anxious, almost strained, like she was breaking some sort of vast, unwritten law. I didn’t understand it. “It was a long time ago,” I said slowly.

“Do you remember?”

Of course I remember, I thought. The question is why you care. “I met him a long time ago, when I ran away from . . . never mind what I was running away from. I was trying to avoid places where people might know me, and I managed to get myself pretty messed up. One day I just turned around and he was there. Said a friend told him where to find me. He asked if I might want to try something new.” I shrugged. “I came Home with him.” And that was the end of that. By the time I realized what I was getting myself into, it was too late.

“Were you . . .” Dare paused.