Briar Queen (34 page)

“I know you, yet I don't.” He turned and vanished into the forest. Finn ran in the opposite direction.

Something large swept down, rattling the branches. She caught herself against the nearest oak and almost collapsed, wondering what new monstrosity was about to descend upon her.

A girl emerged from the gloom between the trees, her coat billowing around a black gown. She carried a staff that resembled an antique hobbyhorse, but the toy horse's head had been replaced with a reindeer skull. She had Sylvie's face, but she wasn't Sylvie. Her eyes glimmered Fata silver. “Do you know who I am, Finn Sullivan?”

“You're Sylph Dragonfly. The witch.” Finn felt unbalanced.

“I do wish your kind would stop using that word. Come along. We'll have to walk because you can't fly. Your friends aren't far.” The Dragonfly twirled her staff.

“Jack . . .”

“He's with them. He was dragged away by a wolf.
Jack's
in fine shape. The wolf is not.” Sylph Dragonfly began moving gracefully away. Finn followed, noticing that the witch's heeled boots didn't leave prints in the earth. “You are quite the firecracker, Finn Sullivan—or rather, an atomic bomb.” She grabbed Finn's wrist and pulled her close. “Hush. Don't move.”

Finn followed her gaze to an upright shadow loping through the trees to their left. She glimpsed a white, ghastly face above a mouthful of teeth.

As the wolf Fata loped away, Sylph Dragonfly jerked her head. She and Finn continued on. When Finn felt safe enough, she whispered, “Why weren't Sylvie and Christie, as kids, taken by your people and replaced by you and Sionnach Ri?”

“Our originals were flawed and protected. My people don't like flaws and they don't like being exorcised. So.”

“Flawed and protected.” Finn wondered what that meant.

“Could you lose that backpack? You're too encumbered.”

“There are things in it that I need.”

“Like what?”

“Stuff.” Finn hoped they were getting closer to Jack and Lily and the others. This replica of Sylvie was making her nervous.

“Stuff to slay a wolf? You dropped this.” Sylph Dragonfly tossed something to Finn, who caught it and stared down at the tiny sphinx bottle labeled
Tamasgi'po
. She'd forgotten about it. It must have fallen from her boot as she ran.

“Spirit in a kiss.” Finn quickly reached down to check that the elixir was still in her other boot.

“
Tamasgi'po
. Where”—Sylph gracefully turned—“did you get such a thing?”

“From the Blue Lady. What is it?”

“Hellaciously dangerous.” The Dragonfly began walking again. “What is memory, Finn Sullivan?”

“A storage of life events.”

“It is conscious spirit. It is being
something
over being
nothing
. Therefore, memory for us is a tricky thing. Here we are.”

“
Finn!
” Lily ran from the trees and embraced her. When she stepped back, she gripped Finn's shoulders and shrewdly looked her over. “You okay?”

“I'm fine.” She wasn't.

Lily nodded once to the Dragonfly, who curtsied as if Lily was a queen. Behind Moth and Leander stood two girls dressed in fashionable black, Egyptian designs painted around their eyes. Each girl held a staff adorned with ribbons and topped with animal skulls.

“Finn.” Jack walked toward her. He had a bloody scratch on his face, but he smiled like his old, wild self, and his eyes were the beautiful gray and blue. He touched her face and said, “I knew I hadn't lost you.”

Finn glimpsed a shadow in her sister's gaze when Lily looked at Jack.

A howl broke the quiet. Sylph Dragonfly glanced at the other two girls. “We counted twenty wolves. Half went in another direction, as if led that way. The other ten—”

A huge, spiky shadow launched itself from the trees.

The humanity sloughed from Jack like a shed skin. He moved with feral grace, flinging Eve's silver dagger into the shadow, which became a Fata man, who fell to the forest floor.

Lily looked impressed as Jack put one booted foot on the Fata's shoulder and pulled out the dagger. The Fata blackened and bled until all that was left was a fur coat and some fossilized bones that didn't seem human at all.

“He had teeth.” Lily gazed down at the monstrous skull that remained. Again, something dark passed behind her eyes. She raised one foot—she wore black Converses—and smashed it down, shattering part of the wolf's skull. Everyone stared at her.

The howling came from all sides now, growing closer. More big shadows were moving through the trees. Finn said, “They've found us.”

Sylph strode to Moth. She grabbed him by his hoodie and kissed him as everyone stared. He flinched back from her but didn't change. Then she and her witches walked to three points around Finn and her companions, facing outward. The air began to hum. Finn heard another sound in the distance, like roaring, and whispered, “What—”

Lights danced through the trees. The roaring grew louder.

The wolves howled, circling closer. Feral eyes glowed in the dark.

The bright lights and thunder of the motorcycles that sped from the night to surround them seemed like the descent of battle angels. As the lead rider glided up to Finn, she counted a dozen riders.

Removing his helmet and handing it to her, Sionnach Ri smiled. “Nick of time?”

She grinned and put the helmet on. “You do that on purpose, don't you?”

This maiden had scarcely these words spoken,

Till in at her window the elf knight has leaped . . .

“Seven kings' daughters have I slain
.

And you shall be the eighth of them.”

                
—“L
ADY
I
SABEL AND THE
E
LF
-K
NIGHT
”

S
ylph Dragonfly and her sisters vanished into the night as Finn, on the back of Sionnach's speeding bike, glanced over one shoulder and saw a pack of silver-eyed Fatas in fur coats emerging from the forest darkness behind them.

The wolves had lost their prey.

As the fox knights sped onto a highway with Finn and her companions, Finn yelled into Sionnach's ear. “Where are you taking us?”

“To Thomas the Rhymer.”

The name belonged to a character in a ballad about fairies. Finn sighed. “You're not going to betray us again, are you?”

“Sylph Dragonfly threatened to turn me into a fur coat for her next lover if I did. So, no—also, I'm scared of your boyfriend. The Rhymer is a friend of yours, isn't he?”

“I don't know.” Finn looked over at Jack, who rode with a leggy fox knight. When his eyes flashed silver, Finn's heart ached; now that they had left the Wolf's house, Jack's mortality had fallen away and the Dragonfly's spell was taking root again and becoming a reality.

AS DUSK CRIMSONED THE SKY,
the fox knights' motorcycles curved onto a street of deserted-looking mansions untouched by age or neglect—a Ghostlands suburbs, as silent and perfect as a painting. They halted in front of a large oak door set in one of the ten-foot-high hedges lining the avenue, and Sionnach said, “You've got a key, Finn Sullivan. Don't you? I saw it.”

She lifted the dragonfly key on its chain around her neck and gazed at it doubtfully. “Will it work here?”

“I'm sure it will. It has the
Dubh Deamhais
's scent all over it.”

“My friend died,” Finn told him, her voice tight. “The one who gave this to me.”

“I know.” Sionnach Ri was somber. “I scented the death on it as well.”

Jack glanced at the fox knight. “Don't think this makes up for you and your tribe handing Finn over to the Mockingbirds.”

Sionnach nervously tugged at a gold hoop in his ear.

Finn climbed from the motorcycle, stepped forward, and jammed the dragonfly key into the lock of the door in the hedge. When the door swung open, she breathed out and felt like crying.

Beyond was a Mediterranean garden of fig and olive trees, with a townhouse of pale stone rising in the center, its large windows depicting stained-glass scenes of fairy-tale menace: a knight in thorns; a girl in a red coat, with a beast's shadow; two lovers, heads bowed, holding a bleeding apple between them.

“Go on in.” Sionnach nodded to Finn. “The house door's open.”

With a little shiver of apprehension and relief, she handed him the helmet he'd let her borrow. “Thanks.”

Sionnach glanced at Moth, who was frowning, his face shadowed by the hood of his jacket. Then Sionnach smiled at Finn. “Any girl who can make Jack Daw grow a heart deserves my undying loyalty.”

“That so? And how is
your
heart doing?”

“Fine.” He put the helmet on. “Now that you've got time to breathe, maybe you and your man can go madly for the zippers, eh?”

“Good-
bye,
Sionnach.” She waited until he and his knights had sped away, before turning and entering the garden with her companions. She said to Jack, “Thomas the Rhymer?”

“You know him as the dean of HallowHeart.” Jack opened the townhouse door.

They stepped into a modern parlor illuminated by a chandelier of orange crystal. A wall of shelves held books with true-world titles. Antique furniture circled a fireplace carved with the image of an oak tree. Another wall was hung with green man masks spouting leaves and ivy.

“Welcome. At last.” Rowan Cruithnear entered the parlor and he looked as aristocratic as ever in a Brooks Brothers suit, his hair seeming more silver than before. “Miss Sullivan, Christopher Hart and Sylvia Whitethorn have returned safely to the true world. Hopefully, you'll not be more than an hour later.”

“But we can't go all the way back to that station—”

“You won't. I've arranged another way. It'll be a bit tricky.”

Of course
. Finn straightened when what she really wanted to do was fall onto the sofa. “Who are you, really?”

Jack answered, “This is Thomas the Rhymer, Thomas Learmont, whom I'm sure you've read about, your father being what he is. He's the only true love of the biggest, baddest fairy queen who ever lived—Titania—who gifted him with immortality.”

“‘Gifted,'” Rowan Cruithnear said wryly, “is a matter of opinion.”

“You're like the Black Scissors?”

“Not quite, Miss Sullivan. I don't hate the Fatas as he does. And I have a conscience.” Rowan Cruithnear turned to Moth and Leander. His gaze fell upon Lily and his smile faded. He whispered, “Lily Rose.”

Lily stood silently, looking as if she'd stepped out of a Rackham illustration. She frowned at Cruithnear. Jack moved to stand in front of her, as if to protect her from Cruithnear's shocked gaze. “We're taking her home.”

“Jack”—Cruithnear seemed about to voice an objection, then apparently changed his mind. He glanced at Leander and Moth. “This is Leander Cyrus, I presume? I've met . . . Moth.”

Jack said, with that dangerous calm, “We need to get home before the Wolf figures out a way to come back at us out of the shadows.”

“I think you first need to rest and replenish—I've real food. Afterwards, you'll be heading home.”

“How did
you
get here?” Moth spoke coldly.

“Our key is working again—the Ghostlands, young man, is my second home.” Rowan Cruithnear's response was stern. “I arrived the way Finn and Jack were
supposed to. The key we gave you was set to bring you to the Green Road Station, not far from here. And I fear it was one of my people, not Phouka's, who hexed the key. It certainly wasn't Lulu.”

“Then one of the professors is a traitor,” Finn said grimly, “who sent us to the Wolf.”

THE BOYS DIDN'T SEEM TO MIND
being grungy and sweaty, but Lily and Finn headed for the bathroom on the second floor after Rowan Cruithnear gave them clothes that belonged to occasional guests of his. Finn wondered what kind of lady friend wore cocktail dresses and elegant coats.

Waiting for her sister outside the bathroom, seated on the floor in the hall, Finn shattered.

Quiet sobs racked her. Jack was suddenly crouched before her, pulling her against him. She pressed her face into his bloody shirt as he stroked her back, whispering, “Finn. Your sister is
safe—
”

“Don't leave me.” She knotted her fingers in his shirt. “Okay? Just don't.”

He didn't say anything. He didn't reassure her. And that should have warned her.

WHILE JACK SPOKE
with Rowan Cruithnear in the parlor and Moth brooded in the kitchen over a cup of tea, Finn went to check on her sister, who had left to take a nap. When she knocked on the bedroom door, Leander called out, “Come in,” and she stepped into a room where lilacs in a vase cast a soothing fragrance into the air and curtains drifted around an open window through which could be seen a picturesque view of the hedge maze.

Leander sat in a chair, his head in his hands. Lily was curled on the bed, asleep. Jack's coat and her Converses were neatly set on an ivory trunk.

“She was crying out before, in her sleep.” Leander didn't look up as Finn sat on the bed, gently lifting the dark hair from her sister's face.

“Tell me how you met her.”

Leander gazed at Lily with such longing, it made Finn ache for him. “I had just joined Lot's court, ten years ago, because I was alone and desperate. I didn't know what Lot was. He seemed solid. I saw Lily in Golden Gate Park. She was sitting on a fountain and she was in sneakers and a hoodie and a black ballet costume, like some delinquent ballerina.”

“She
is
a delinquent ballerina.”

“Her hair was in her face and she was smoking.” He sat back, and a smile tugged at a corner of his mouth. “She told me to fuck off when I tried to talk to her. I wanted to take her picture.”

“When did she find out what you were?”

“Well, pretty soon afterwards. I mean, she only saw me between dusk and dawn and I didn't have a heartbeat. She asked me, point-blank, if I was a vampire. She told me, if I was, she'd stake me with a wooden spear your dad owned. I wondered what kind of girl has a dad who owns spears.”

“That's my sister. No sense of romance whatsoever. The ballet thing was eccentric.” She hesitated. “How did . . . why did Seth Lot want her?”

“The Wolf”—Leander's voice shook—“found the darkness in her, the part that raged because of your mom's accident. Lily had always seen things when she was a kid. It's my fault for opening that door, for revealing myself. All the Wolf had to do was promise her a place at his side as a queen of shadows.”

Finn had known her sister hadn't been happy—all those late nights and sneaking out and coming home through the window with the bite of alcohol on her breath. Finn knew her sister's flaws; Lily was not some brave, adventurous hero—but rather selfish, reckless, and angry with the world.

But in Lot's house, Finn suspected with a glimmering of unease, Lily had become something else.

Leander said quietly, “Finn, Lily can't leave the Ghostlands.”

Although she'd heard it before, the shock of this statement made her cold. She told him, “I know you're worried Seth Lot will follow her. But we've got friends back home, people who can protect us. We'll be safe.” She changed the subject. “How did
you
become a Jack?”

The rosy light haloed his tangled hair. His short fingernails were grimed and his suit was still grubby. He looked so beaten, she regretted the cruelty of her question.

Then he answered it: “It was in 1987. In San Francisco. I found one of
their
places. I met a girl. Her name . . . can you believe I've forgotten it? She was a Jill.” He hesitated as if trying to find his way around gruesome details. “She didn't understand what she was doing. The Fatas . . . they're drawn to the lost and lonely like sharks to blood.”

“She fell in love with you. The Jill.”

“I loved
her
. But the Fata who made her—
that
name I remember—it was Amphitrite. She was a sea witch and she wasn't happy that I was taking away her Jill. As twisted as she was, Amphitrite saw her Jacks and Jills as her children. So I made a deal with Amphitrite. My girl was returned to almost human, enough to forget what she'd been and go home. And I drowned.”

“Returned her to
almost
human?” Finn didn't want to comment on his drowning.

He nodded. “A spell. She was still a Jill, physically, but the illusion of being human would keep anyone, even physicians, from noticing. And
she
believed it.” He continued, gently, “Like what happened to Jack after the Teind. He
believed
he was mortal.”

“But”—Finn spoke with bitter realization—“he wasn't.”

Lily twisted in her sleep, cried out, and pushed at the air with one hand. Finn curled beside her and put her arms around her.

Leander came and stretched out on Lily's other side and, together, they cradled the stolen-away girl they both loved.

ROWAN CRUITHNEAR WOULD LEND THEM
his car in the morning. He'd given Jack directions to a train station not used by the Fatas anymore—one unknown to Seth Lot.

“Then we're almost home.” In the second-floor room Cruithnear had given her and Jack for the night, Finn sat on the bed. Outside was a deep forest of evergreens—a completely different view from the hedge maze in the front of the house. She'd changed into the summer dress of silver silk Cruithnear had given her. She'd put on a fur hunter's cap and wrapped herself in a fur jacket because she wanted the terrace doors open. Jack had started a fire in the hearth, but the cold air felt good—it cleared her head. “It's beginning to snow.”

Jack sat beside her. He'd changed out of his bloody clothes into a black jersey and jeans—Cruithnear apparently had many visitors who left clothing.

Finn thought of Lily Rose in the house of the Wolf and pictured Leander drowning to give a girl back her life. She thought of Hester disintegrating, never to be seen again. She curled her fingers in the fur coat. Her jaw clenched.

“Do you see those lights flickering through the trees?” Jack's voice soothed the prickly sorrow of her thoughts.