Queen of Air and Darkness
Page 164

“Cameron!” Dru hurried toward them, pulling Tavvy with her. “Are you okay?”
Cameron gave Dru a half wave. “Vanessa stabbed me. Some kind of demon stuff on the blade.” He winced.
“Your cousin stabbed you?” Dru said. She’d known the Ashdowns were split politically, but family was family in her view.
“Holiday dinners will be very awkward from now on,” said Jaime. He gave the other boy a pat on the back as a Silent Brother swooped down on Cameron and bore him away to the Basilias.
Jaime wiped a dirty hand across his forehead. “You two should get farther away from the battle,” he said. “Has no one told you not to stand in the gates?”
“If we don’t stand in the gates, we can’t see anything,” Dru pointed out. “Is that—on the field—is that really Jules and Emma?”
Jaime nodded. Dru’s heart sank. Some part of her had been hoping it was a terrible illusion.
“I don’t understand what’s happening?” Her voice rose. “Is this a plan of Julian’s? Do you know about it?”
“I do not think it is a plan,” Jaime said. “They seem entirely out of control.”
“Can they be stopped?”
Jaime spoke reluctantly. “They killed the Riders of Mannan. Now soldiers are trying to form a wall of bodies to protect the city from them. All the children are here.” He indicated Alicante. Dru thought of Max and Rafe with Maryse. Her heart skipped a beat. “I don’t know what will happen.” Jaime looked from her to Tavvy. “Come with me,” he said abruptly. “I can get you into the woods.”
Dru hesitated.
“We can’t go away from them. We have to go to Jules and Emma,” Tavvy said firmly.
“It’s dangerous—” Jaime began.
“Tavvy’s right. We have to go.” Dru looked down at the incomplete rune that sprawled across her forearm. She remembered Julian putting it there yesterday; it felt forever ago. “You don’t have to help.”
Jaime sighed and drew his crossbow from the holder on his back. “I’ll cover you.”
Dru was about to follow Jaime out of the gates when Tavvy poked her in the side. She turned to see he was holding out her stele. “Don’t forget,” he said.
She exhaled—she nearly had forgotten. Dru put the tip of the stele to her arm and began to complete the Familias rune.
* * *
Kieran was surrounded by the Unseelie army, thirty faeries deep. This was bad enough, because he could see neither Mark nor Cristina over the churning mass of his people, but he could barely control Windspear, who was rearing and whinnying beneath him. Windspear liked neither crowds nor giants, and at the moment both were far too close.
Winter was at Kieran’s side. He had stuck to him like glue through the battle, which Kieran found both admirable and startling. He was not used to such loyalty.
“The people have come to you, liege lord,” said Winter. “What are your orders for them?”
Orders for them? Kieran thought frantically. He had no idea what they should do. This was why he had wanted Adaon to be King, but Adaon was prisoner in the Seelie Court. What would Adaon say about an army of faeries trapped on a field with rampaging part-angel giants?
“Why aren’t they all running for the forest?” Kieran demanded. The forest was a place Fair Folk felt at home, full of natural things, water and trees. There had long been faeries in Brocelind Forest.
“Sadly, the woods are full of vampires,” said Winter glumly.
“The vampires are our allies!” shouted Kieran, grasping Windspear’s mane as the horse reared.
“No one really believes that,” said Winter.
By all the Gods of Dark and Light. Kieran wanted to yell and break something. Windspear reared again, and this time, Kieran caught sight of a familiar figure. Mark. He would know him anywhere—and Cristina beside him. He said a silent thanks. What would they tell me to do? He thought of Mark’s generosity, Cristina’s kindness. They would think of the Unseelie soldiers first.
“We need to get our people off this field,” said Kieran. “They cannot battle angels. No one can. How did you all arrive here?”
“Oban made a door,” said Winter. “You can do the same, liege. Open a door to Faerie. As King you can do it. Reach out to your Land and it will reach back to you.”
If bloody drunk Oban did it, I can do it, Kieran thought. But that wasn’t all that helpful. He had to reach out to his Land, a place he had long cursed, and hope it would reach back to him.
He slid from Windspear’s back as the horse stilled beneath him. He remembered Mark saying: I will not forget the beauty of Faerie and neither will you. But it will not come to that.
And he thought of what he himself had said, had remembered, when he had thought Faerie was threatened.
The way the water tumbles blue as ice over Branwen’s Falls. The taste of music and the sound of wine. The honey hair of mermaids in the streams, the glittering of will-o’-the-wisps in the shadows of the deep forests.
Kieran took a deep breath. Let me through, he thought. Let me through, my Land, for I belong to you: I will give unto you as the Kings of Faerie long have, and you will flourish when I flourish. I will bring no blight to your shores, nor blood to wither your flowers in the fields, but only peace and a kind road that rises to green hills.
“My liege,” said Winter.
Kieran opened his eyes and saw that the low hillock before him had begun to split apart. Through the gap he could see the great tower of Unseelie rising in the distance and the peaceful fields before it.
Several of the closer fey sent up a cheer. They began to run through the gap even as it widened. Kieran could see them emerging on the other side, some even falling on their knees with gratitude and relief.
“Winter,” he said in an unsteady voice. “Winter, get everyone through the door. Get them to safety.”
“All the fey?” said Winter.
“Everyone,” said Kieran, looking at his first in command sternly. “Shadowhunters. Warlocks. Everyone who seeks sanctuary.”
“And you, my liege?” said Winter.
“I must go to Mark and Cristina.”
For the first time, Winter looked mutinous. “You must leave your mortal friends, lord.”
Winter was a redcap, sworn in blood to protect the King and the royal line. Kieran could not be angry with him, and yet he must make him understand. He searched for the right words. “You are my loyal guard, Winter. But as you guard me, so must you guard what I love best, and Mark Blackthorn and Cristina Rosales are what I love best in this world and all others.”
“But your life,” said Winter.
“Winter,” Kieran said flatly. “I know they cannot be my consorts. But I die without them.”
More and more faeries were flooding through the door to the Undying Lands. There were others with them now—a few warlocks, even a band of lycanthropes.
Winter set his jaw. “Then I will guard your back.”
* * *
Helen felt as if she were caught in the middle of a river going two ways at once.
Faeries were running in one direction, toward a hilly rise at the eastern end of the field. Shadowhunters were racing in the other, toward the city of Alicante, presumably to hide behind its walls. Aline had darted off to investigate, promising to be back momentarily.
Some still milled around the center of the field—the Cohort seemed to be shrieking and running in circles, willing to join neither the exodus of faeries nor fellow Shadowhunters. Helen had stayed near to where the others she knew had gathered—Kadir and Jia were helping wounded from the field, Simon and Isabelle were in conference with Hypatia Vex and Kwasi Bediako, and Jace and Clary had gone with a group of others, including Rayan and Divya, to put themselves between Emma and Julian and the Cohort prisoners.
“Helen!” Aline was jogging toward her across the grass. “They’re not running away.”
“What do you mean?” Helen said.
“The Shadowhunters. They’re going to protect the city, in case the giants—in case Emma and Julian make a move toward it. It’s full of kids and old people. And besides,” she added, “Shadowhunters protect Alicante. It’s what we do.”