to interact with customers. That the customers included me was just a bonus.
“October,” he said. He had the decency to try sounding surprised. He just lacked the acting skill to pull it off. He glanced at May and Danny, eyebrows rising in much more realistic confusion. Whoever warned the staff that I was in the store hadn’t bothered to pass along the fact that I was traveling with my identical twin.
“Pete,” I replied. “Busy night?”
His cheeks reddened. “Inventory.”
Inventory would mean more staffers in the store, not fewer. I didn’t call him on it. “Right. Well, this is my friend Danny,” Danny nodded, his sheer size making the gesture intimidating, “and my sister, May.”
“Hi!” May grinned, rocking back on her heels. “Nice to meet you. Thanks for being so awesome to Tobes when she worked here.”
“Uh,” said Pete. “Right.”
I couldn’t blame him. Meeting May has that effect on people, especially the ones who’ve known me for any length of time. She looks almost exactly like me, and people don’t expect that level of pep to come out of my mouth. She’s taken steps to distinguish herself from me, piercing her ears six times and getting a feathered bob before streaking her ashy brown hair with magenta and electric blue, but the underlying bone structure has stayed the same.
Pete rang up the groceries on a sort of swift autopilot, bagging them himself when no one came out to help him. He didn’t try to make conversation. In a rare display of mercy, May didn’t try to force him.
The total was over three hundred dollars: painful, but not unexpected, considering that we’d been down to ramen noodles and mystery cans from the back of the cupboard. I paid cash. Pete frowned but didn’t comment. Sometimes it’s better not to know.
“Nice to see you again, Pete,” I said, starting to push the cart forward. Danny and May followed, both keeping quiet for once.
We’d almost reached the door when Pete called, hesitantly, “Are things … you were pretty miserable when you were here. Are things better now?”
I looked back over my shoulder, breaking into a wide, honest smile as I said, “Things are wonderful.”
Pete nodded. I nodded back, and we left the store without another word.
We were trying to fit everything into the car when May stiffened, eyes narrowing. “Someone’s coming.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Someone’s coming,” she repeated. “From …” She turned to scan the shadows edging the parking lot before raising an arm and jabbing her forefinger decisively toward the spot where the building gave way to the surrounding bushes. “Over there.”
“Danny?” I put down the bag I was holding, reaching for the silver knife belted at my left hip. I keep the iron on the right, for emergencies that don’t let me play nice. I have that sort of emergency way more often than I’d like.
“Got it.” His human disguise crackled around him as he took a step forward, blurring to show the true slate color of his craggy skin. He curled his hands into fists. One punch from him would stand a good shot at stopping a freight train.
Neither of us questioned May’s conviction that we were about to have a visitor. The normally transitory nature of Fetches means no one really knows what they’re capable of. Every day with her is a whole new adventure.
The source of all that new adventure was shifting uneasily from foot to foot, eyeing the shadows she’d indicated. “I’m feeling a little unarmed here.”
“Get in the car, May,” I said.
“We sure this is somebody unfriendly?” Danny asked.
“If they were friendly, I wouldn’t know they were there,” May said.
Another bit of trivia for the growing compendium of Fetch abilities: she does laundry and she detects hostile guests. “Charming,” I muttered, and inhaled deeply, the copper and cut grass smell of my magic rising around me.
My mother was the most skilled blood-worker in Faerie, before she went crazy. I’m not in her league, but I’m good enough to roll the air over my tongue and feel for the fae heritage of the people around me. May’s magic tasted like cotton candy and ashes, and her blood was pure Fetch. Danny was the heavy stability of granite, Bridge Troll through and through. Fetch, Bridge Troll, and changeling. What else? I pressed further, feeling the first warning tinge of a migraine in my temples. Changelings have limits. Some of us more than others.
“Toby—” began Danny.
“Wait.” I almost had it. The trace was slippery, probably because the person was invisible, but it was
For a moment, I was too surprised to make sense of what I tasted. Part of me hadn’t expected that little trick to work. Then I swallowed, focusing on the point where the blood seemed strongest, and said, “We know you’re there. I didn’t think the Daoine Sidhe were into sneaking up on people.”
The taste of cardamom flared in my mouth, chasing my magic away and leaving a pulsing headache in its place. I winced, blinked, and missed the point where a man replaced the empty air.
He was tall, slender, and movie-star handsome, with dark hair and sharp-chiseled features that were about as natural as my own round-curved ears. The flicker of an illusion spell colored the air around him, hiding his fae nature from anyone who might glance out the Safeway window. And he didn’t look happy about being caught. “October Daye?” he asked.
“Correct,” I said. “You are?”
“The Queen of the Mists has sent me to inform you that your presence has been requested,” he replied. His expression smoothed as he spoke, becoming the still, calm mask of a properly trained courtier. “You are to come at once.”
“Still not answering my question.” I dropped my hand from my knife, disgusted. I don’t expect manners from the Queen of the Mists, or from anyone who works for her. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t appreciate them. “Did she give a reason?”
“My name is Dugan Harrow. As for the other, Queens are not required to provide reasons to their subjects.” His condescending smile barely concealed his irritation.
“Is this an order or a request?” I hadn’t seen the Queen since I finished settling the affairs surrounding the death of Evening Winterrose, Countess of Goldengreen. I doubted she’d been any more broken up about my absence than I was.
He raised an eyebrow. “I was unaware the two differed. Your arrival is expected within the hour. I don’t recommend disappointing Her Majesty.” He left that dire proclamation hanging in the air as he turned on his heel and stalked away. The smell of cardamom rose again, now mixed with cinnamon, and he was gone.
Since Daoine Sidhe aren’t teleporters, he was probably walking invisibly to whatever he was using to get home. The illusion was his way of making a big exit. That’s the purebloods for you: always going for the special effects.
It was effective in this case, because we all just stood there, staring after him. May finally broke the silence, asking, “Do you think we have time to take the ice cream home and get it in the freezer before she gets really mad?”
Danny and I exchanged a look, and I groaned, pinching the bridge of my nose.
“Looks like we’ve got a date with royalty,” I said.
“Well, crap,” said Danny.
I lowered my hand. “My thoughts exactly.”
TWO
WE REACHED A COMPROMISE and drove back to the apartment, where May and I shoved all the perishables into the refrigerator while Danny waited in the car with the engine running. There was no question of whether he’d be coming with us—Danny’s been driving taxis in San Francisco for fifty years. If anyone
