Winter (The Manhattan Exiles) (11 page)

“
Unless it’s something Richard’s built,” Lolo qualified.

Siobahn settled herself on a needlepoint stool beneath the mantle. She adjusted
the long silk tunic she often wore for warmth.

“
Tell me what happened. My daughter’s been reticent when it comes to details.”

Summer busied herself with a macaron. Lolo studied the toes of his boots. Gabby smoothed her whiskers and flicked her tail.

Siobahn sighed. “Very well. I suppose I should be pleased he continues to inspire loyalty. Although someday he may wish his friends had the courage to speak more caution.” She pinned Gabby with her stare. “Can I assume no one was badly hurt?”

“
Winter’s nearly grown. He doesn’t need a mother to tend his wounds.” Gabby refused to be cowed by Angus’ child. “But I do believe it’s best we keep the Wards up and limit our communication to mortal technology, just as the boy did. At least until we’re sure of our footing.”

Siobahn’s stare narrowed. Gabby stood as tall as she possibly could, and willed her Queen to remember that she had once been far more than a rodent.

“I haven’t forgotten,” Siobahn said. “It’s you who hide from the past,
aes sí
. Now show me the stones.”

Lolo brushed crumbs from his shirt, and hastily stood up. He reached, not into the rucksack at his feet as Gabby expected, but under his coat. Summer made a small sound when she saw the gleam of Winter’s knife, but Siobahn shushed her with a gesture.

Lolo crossed to Siobahn’s side, and carefully set a rectangular packet in her palm. The Fay Queen stiffened as she turned the packet over in her hand. Gabby could feel heat beginning to rise in waves as Siobahn scowled.

Overhead the lights in the chandeliers flickered.

“Cigarettes? Does he think he’s being funny?”

“
Oh, no, ma’am,” Lolo said quickly, abashed. “Win and I figured a pack of cigs was a pretty safe camouflage. No one would give them a second look.”

“
Twelve-year-old boys shouldn’t be carrying cigarettes.” Siobahn rose from her chair. “Twelve-year-old boys should be carrying comic books and chewing gum. Winter knows very well I think tobacco’s a filthy habit.” The last she spoke directly to Summer, who squirmed.

Siobahn closed her long fingers around the cigarette pack. When she opened them again the Glamour had vanished, and she held Angus’ knotted pouch.

“My son thinks he’s clever and amusing,” the Queen said, “but the truth of the matter is his trickery aids you not at all. No one seeking these particular rubies would have been deaf to their call. Even muffled by my father’s mark, the stones scream of betrayal.”

6
. Libraries

Aine sat on a pile of books. She stared at the map tacked to the library wall, trying to make sense of the underground passages.

At first glance the tunnels appeared to be laid out quite logically. The larger passages tended to run like spokes in a wheel, each black line extending from the same central spot in the center of the knot. The spokes were linked by ‘stations’: the rank, cold shelters where humankind stood in disjointed crowds, waiting to board the train of their choosing. The stations were marked with simple, heavily inked X’s.

Red foil stars glittered in loose clusters around almost every black X: forty-seven tiny red brilliants. Aine had counted them three times to be sure.

There weren’t any abandoned bowls of candy waiting in the room when Aine had grown weary of trying to sleep, and found her way to the library. She nibbled on a fingernail instead.

The more she studied the map, the less sense it made. Logic was lost in a nest of shorter branches, some of which appeared to dead end. Or mayhap the cartographer hadn't followed the tunnels to completion.

What were the chances, Aine wondered, that somewhere in the tangle a single unexplored passageway led up out of the ground beneath an icy lake?

“Have you heard of the
Lough Gur
?” she asked around her fingernail.

She’d found Winter in the library when she’d given up sleep. The flickering of h
is lamps had led her past half-pulled tapestries and through empty rooms.

She’d found him sitting on a cushion, made lovely by the shifting lantern light, apparently lost in the pages of a large and dusty tome.

He’d grunted, but not looked up, so Aine borrowed one of his lanterns and took it to the map.

“
Gair’s lake?” He translated without glancing from the book. “Not particularly. Siobahn had a young cousin, Daniel Gair. I believe he was killed by dysentery in the early 1900s.”

“
Lough Gur
,” Aine said pointedly, “is far more than a loch. It’s one of the dark places between, a dangerous place where our folk might cross into mortal lands and back again, and where time is terribly muddled.” She shuddered.

Winter closed a finger in his book. He regarded Aine thoughtfully, grey eyes sparking in the lantern light. It was hard to tell in the shadows, but she thought the side of his face looked less inflamed. Even scarred he was beautiful in the flickering light, more beautiful than any of the young
fay who regularly swarmed about Gloriana.

Aine thought more than a part of his beauty was that he was so very different than the boys she had known at Court. Gloriana’s suitors were skilled at song and wordplay, quick with the sword and insult, eager to dabble in intrigue and insinuation. They were like lazy forest cats, wiling away the long hours until the sun went down and it was time for the hunt.

“A Way between, you mean.” Winter asked, “Are you going to tell me Smith dropped you in a lake and you surfaced beneath Chinatown? Although I suppose that might explain the lack of clothes. Perhaps you and dear Michael were skinny dipping?”

“
No! I mean, I don’t think so.” If she poked too hard at the gap in her memory it made her head hurt. She chewed her thumbnail. “
Lough Gur
isn’t the sort of place one visits willingly. It’s quite a long way from Court, east of
Gairdin Mhuire
. The Gardens are treacherous enough in themselves. I’d have no reason to journey so far from Court. In fact, I’m forbidden to leave the Queen’s Progress.”

Winter grunted.
“More to the point, Gloriana closed all of the old Ways five hundred years ago. I doubt Smith convinced your queen to change her mind.”

Aine had to agree.
“Her Ladyship has very little use for mortals.”

“
It didn’t use to be so. She used to have a very special soft spot for humankind. She preferred to keep them in her bed.” Winter sighed, rubbing his temples. “If Richard doesn’t fix our power problem soon I’ll we'll run out of kerosene.”

“
He’s very handy, isn’t he? With mortal things?”

“
Generally.” He smiled. “Although Richard has no appreciation for modern improvements. Still, he
is
mortal and more at home with the idiosyncrasies of this place than I am.”

“
Did he draw this? The map?”

“
Most of it. I added some, here and there. How quickly do they grow back?”

Aine blinked.
“Grow back?”

“
Your fingernails. If you’re that hungry, I can find you something to eat, you know. Do they grow back overnight, like the flesh on your feet?”

“
Nay.” Aine regarded her fingernails. “Nay, they don't.”

He grunted again.

“I’m not hungry,” she decided.

“
Oh? Afraid of the dark? Best get used to it. Even with electricity, underground living is more gloomy than not.”

She bristled.
“I’m not afraid. I’m bored. And I want to go home.”

“
The song’s getting old, princess. I can keep you fed, and I can light you candles in the dark, but I can’t help you get back.”

“
But Smith might. And sitting here, like a lump, like two lumps, we’re doing nothing when we should be, could be doing something.”

Winter regarded her in silence. Then he spread open the tome on his knees, and smoothed the page.

“‘On wrongs swift vengeance waits’,” he said. “Even on your pretty lips the words sounded dour and familiar. And I was right.” Winter tapped the pages. “Smith was quoting, from Alexander Pope.”

Aine stood up.
“Then perhaps this Alexander Pope knows where we might find him.”

“
Doubtful. Alexander Pope was a human poet, now long dead. Very proficient three centuries ago, mostly forgotten now, except in places where scholars congregate. Strange that a part-time grocery clerk would find the fellow sufficiently of interest to memorize his dried up words.”

“
Not so strange as wandering through D.C. with a possibly magical fairy sword.” Richard slipped into the library, a smaller, more brightly burning lantern swinging from one hand. “Even those of us born without a silver ladle in our mouth enjoy a little book learning. So please, do, dismount that high horse of yours before it trips up and does you damage.”

Richard’s coat was dusty, his
hair matted. He wore a pair of heavy spectacles propped on the bridge of his nose. He appeared distinctly irritated. Even so, Aine noticed that he was careful not to startle Winter.

She thought it might take some getting used to, living with a companion who could hear your words but not your footsteps.

“Something gnawed through my cable.” He set his lamp on the floor, and folded onto the rug with a sigh. “Not a
sluagh
, I think. More like a particularly odious but unremarkable sewer rat. Easily fixed, once I find the right size of replacement cable. That’s the difficult part. “ He sighed and stretched. “Manager at Harris Teeter said Smith used to quote a lot of poetry, kept a little book with him, in his pocket. Quoted from it over and over again.”

Winter shrugged at Aine’s puzzled frown.
“The interns didn’t pan out so Richard popped across the street to the grocery and asked a few questions. Richard’s good at asking questions. He’s also good at stealing bits of cable, or anything else, really, though we generally don’t say so in polite company.”

“
Piss off,” Richard returned without real heat. “The little book had its title stamped in gold:
Argus
.”

“
It wasn’t in his apartment. He must have taken it with him. Is it Pope?”

“
I don’t know. You’re the educated gentleman. Is it in your tome?”

“
No. All I have here is his
Essay on Man
. And it’s putting me to sleep.

“
Do you think it means something?” Aine asked. “This
Argus
?”

Richard smiled at Aine.
“I don’t know. Couldn’t hurt to take a look, though, if we’re out of other ideas. Luckily our fine city is brimming with libraries far more cheerful and extensive than Win’s. Try and get some sleep. In the morning we’ll go hunting for Pope.”

“
You will go hunting for cable,” said Winter. He shut the tome in his lap. “Aine and I will go to the public library.”

Richard only smiled wider.

“
Drink it down,” Winter said cheerfully. “Every last drop.”

Aine regarded the fizzing liquid in the glass Winter passed her and then the more placid brew in his own china cup.

“Yours is different.”

“
Mine is Earl Grey.
That
is a
draíochta
. I’m sure you’ve encountered many a protective potion before? They’re common as ticks in springtime.”

“
A tick is a bug,” Aine remembered out loud. The drink looked loathsome. Dark brown and bubbly, it popped in the glass. “Gloriana dislikes ugly things.”

“
Not all bugs are ugly.” Richard leaned against the kitchen table. He watched Aine with a faintly puzzled frown. “Some of them are quite astoundingly beautiful, in fact.”

“
Spiders, mayhap,” allowed Aine. “Mother used to speak of mountain spiders and the silken tapestries they wove.” She sniffed at the drink. “Protection from what?”

“
Iron,” Winter replied, nose buried in his breakfast tea. “Today we’re taking the train. And we can’t have you folding up and vomiting all over the seats. Or worse, yet, copping a faint like the Bride of Frankenstein.”

Aine was horrified.
“I’ll not go near one of your iron snakes.”

“
So while you spent the remnants of last night snoring on Lolo’s mattress,” Winter continued as if he hadn’t heard. “I brewed you something to make the transition a wee bit easier.”

“
You brewed it?” Aine closed her fingers hard around the potion. “What skill have you with magic?”

“
Some.” Winter spoke calmly, but his lips had gone white in the lamp light. “If you want our help with Smith, I’m afraid you’ll have to trust me. Drink it. Before it stops fizzing.”

Aine turned her back on the table to hide her nerves. There was nothing to stare at but worn tapestry. Her heart was pounding in her ears. She worried she might indeed be sick.

She also thought she might prefer being bloody and naked and trapped in rock to being in the stomach of one of the speeding monsters.

“
It’ll be all right.” Richard set his hand on Aine’s shoulder. He squeezed gently. “Really. They’re harmless. And if Winter says he can protect you from the iron, he can. Besides, this is the best way.”

“
Quickest and probably safest,” Winter agreed. “It’s unlikely Smith will be looking for you on the Metro, don’t you think?”

Richard turned Aine from the tapestries. He’d washed since the early hours, and looked clean and presentable in black trousers and a sweater. His feet were bare. His lack of boots and
his damp hair made him look young and sleepy.

His lopsided grin almost made her feel safe.

“You won’t be alone,” he pointed out. “We’ll be with you. Which is something, if only a small something.”

“
Speak for yourself,” the grey-eyed boy said. “Nine out of ten people polled agree I’m a very big something.”

Aine looked under Richard’s elbow at Winter. He met her gaze without flinching.

She thought his particular grin was as reassuring as a wolf over fresh meat.

“
Gulp it down,” he said. “Trust me.”

The
draíochta
tasted sweet and sticky. Minuscule bubbles popped against Aine’s lips as she swallowed. She wanted to plug her nose, as though it were a herbal to help with a fever, but she refused to look foolish in front of Richard and Winter.

She coughed a little when the glass was empty.

“Excellent.” Richard took the tumbler from her hand. He set it in the wash basin. “Now we can go. The trains will be running, and the Southeast Branch opens in half an hour.”

“
But I haven’t finished my healing tea,” said Winter, mournful. Even so he slid off his stool, and stuck his arms into the sleeves of the worn leather coat he seemed to prefer. “What do you think, princess? Is it helping?”

Aine couldn’t prevent herself. She studied the blisters on his face. Most had broken, flaking away to raw patches of pink. She thought his right ear had taken the worst of the damage. Around the yellow gem Winter’s lobe remained inflamed and red.

Although it was possible some of the bald patches on his skull looked less like mange than they had a day before, she shook her head.