Late Eclipses

Everything after that is black.”

“Jin’s with Luna and Sylvester now, but you need to have her take a look at you. You could have a concussion.”

“Just what I always wanted,” said Connor dryly. Touching the back of his head, he winced again. “It hurts like hell. Do you really think you saw Oleander?”

My own head was still pounding, and I didn’t even have a concussion to blame it on. “I didn’t see her. I thought I sensed her magic, and with Luna in something close to a coma, I’m not ready to write the idea off.” I paused, twisting to face Etienne. “Oh, oak and ash. Etienne? Has anyone seen Rayseline? The last time Oleander was here—”

“Sweet Titania,” said Etienne, catching my meaning. Pointing to three of the guards, he snapped, “You! Locate Rayseline, now!” The guards stopped arguing, gave him a uniformly horrified look, and ran.

I turned back to Connor, whose face had frozen in the pained expression of a man who didn’t know how he was supposed to feel. “Hey,” I said, squeezing his knee before pulling my hand away. “It’ll be okay.”

“Liar,” he said softly, and let me go.

I straightened, realizing as I did that the way my dress was hacked off meant I’d been giving anyone behind me a free peepshow. “Where’s May? She can’t have gone home. She doesn’t have the car keys.” What she did have was access to my memories leading up to her “birth,” including Devin teaching me to hotwire damn near anything with wheels. It was better not to think about that too hard.

“She refused to go with the others. She’s in the western antechamber,” said Grianne, cocking her head. “She has sandwiches.”

“Sandwiches.” Grianne nodded. I resisted the urge to yell at her. “Oleander may be in the knowe, and you left May alone with a plate of sandwiches.” If our unknown assailant could get to Lily and Luna, who was to say she or he couldn’t get to a Fetch? Fetches are supposed to be invulnerable. I didn’t want to test it. “Etienne, can you take me to my Fetch?”

“Of course,” said Etienne.

Connor stood shakily, tucking the cup under one arm. “I’m coming with you.” He must have recognized my impending protest, because he added, “Come on, Daye. Do you really think you’ll feel better about my survival chances if you leave me?”

“Sometimes I hate how well you know me,” I muttered. More loudly, I asked, “Is anyone else planning to play tagalong?”

Quentin stepped forward.

I sighed. “I should’ve known. Grianne, can you make sure no one walks barefoot on this section of terrace until after the Hobs have a chance to scrub it down?” That was technically destruction of evidence, but any poison on the cobblestones would also be in the cup. I wouldn’t be losing anything, and the last thing I wanted was for somebody else to get hurt because of something as stupid as an unwashed terrace.

True to form, Grianne didn’t answer out loud. She just nodded, the constant spinning of her Merry Dancers throwing green-and-white shadows across her face.

“Good,” I said, skirting dangerously close to the forbidden thanks. “Guys, come on.” I started into the ballroom, where I could cut across to the receiving hall, and walk from there to the western antechamber, as long as the knowe hadn’t rearranged itself again. Quentin and Connor followed close behind me; Etienne and Garm followed them. Between the five of us, we had two knives and two ceremonial swords. At least one of the knives was iron, and even so, I have never felt so unarmed inside the walls of Shadowed Hills.

Connor was walking even more slowly than normal, probably due to the head injury. I dropped back a bit to walk between him and Quentin, glancing from one to the other. “You guys doing okay?”

“Fine,” said Quentin.

“My head hurts, but I think I’ll live,” Connor said.

“You’re going to see Jin when this is done,” I said. “No one gets to ignore a concussion on my watch.”

Connor frowned. “Are you going to see her, too?”

“Huh?” I realized I’d been rubbing my temple as we walked. Suddenly scowling, I leaned over to pluck the cup from his unresisting hands. “It’s just a headache. Changeling, remember? I gave myself a bad case of magic- burn.”

“I thought that was a real dress,” said Connor, frown fading into bafflement. “What did you do? Try to cast a don’t-look-here on the entire ballroom or something?”

I hesitated. Had I used any magic since we reached the Ball? I didn’t remember doing anything since resetting the apartment wards, and that was a small enough spell that it shouldn’t have been an issue, even for me.

I didn’t have time to answer; we’d reached the antechamber door. I reached for the latch, pausing as I realized we hadn’t passed a single person during the walk from the terrace. The knowe might as well have been deserted. “Now there’s a pleasant thought,” I muttered, and opened the door.

May looked up, mouth half-full of cucumber salad, and mumbled something through the gooey mass of mashed-up bread, cream cheese, and vegetable matter. My leather jacket was on the bench next to her. Swallowing, she tried again: “Did you find out who pulled the fire alarm?”

Raising an eyebrow, I looked at Etienne.

“We couldn’t precisely evacuate the knowe on account of attempted regicide,” he said. He at least had the grace to look embarrassed.

“So you pulled a fire drill?” I shook my head. “Oberon’s ass, this place gets weirder all the time. May, Luna’s been attacked. I need you to go down the hill and call Danny to come give you a ride home.”

She stared at me, sandwich dangling forgotten in her hand. “Luna’s been what? Is she going to be okay?”

“We don’t know yet, but she—”

“Will do far, far better when she knows that you’re far, far away,” replied a familiar voice behind me. I stiffened. “Not that she knows much of anything right now, since she’s basically a corpse that happens to be breathing. Nasty business all the way around.”

I squared my shoulders, taking a breath before I turned to face the next unpleasant challenge of the night.

“Hello, Rayseline,” I said.

What do you get when you cross a Daoine Sidhe with a Blodynbryd pretending to be a Kitsune? Something that scrambles my capacity to read bloodlines. I used to wonder where Raysel got her height. Sylvester’s about average for a Daoine Sidhe, and since I didn’t know about Luna’s stolen skin, I always thought it was weird for such a short woman to have such a tall daughter. Having seen Luna’s true form, the fact that Raysel was almost six feet tall was less strange. That didn’t make needing to tilt my head back to meet her eyes any less annoying.

“October,” she said, with acid sweetness. “I’d expected you to flee the scene by now.”

I shrugged. “I’ve never been good at fleeing.”

“You’ll learn.” Her smile was vulpine, baring the tips of the blunted fangs she somehow inherited from her mother. That’s about the only thing she got from the Luna I grew up knowing. Raysel has her father’s fox-red hair and Torquill gold eyes. Those eyes were filled with a malicious glee I’ve never seen from any other member of the Torquill family—not even Simon. “This would be an excellent time to start.”

“I have nothing to flee from. I didn’t hurt your mother.”

“Didn’t you?” Raysel’s eyes flicked to Etienne and Garm, who stood like silent statues to my left. “How many people in this knowe will believe you? How many in this Duchy? In this Kingdom? You killed my grandfather, and everyone knows he had a way of breaking his toys. You were his. Your word is suspect here.”

A wave of coldness washed over me, bringing the phantom taste of candle wax to my lips. Blind Michael had me long enough to do a lot of damage. I sometimes think he’ll always have me, in my dreams. “What Blind Michael may or may not have done hasn’t changed my loyalty to this Duchy. I serve your father. I’d never hurt Luna.”

“Do you truly think my father is going to be capable of such distinctions when she dies?” Raysel infused the question with almost believable curiosity. “They tell me he was less than reasonable when we were missing.”

Connor paled. I reached over to give his shoulder a reassuring squeeze, keeping my attention focused on