"Neither did Moira." Grams did pause then. "She made a stupid choice, though. You...you're stronger than she was."

"Maybe I don't want to be strong."

Grams made a small noise that was almost a laugh. "You might not want to, but you'll do it anyhow. That's what strength is. We walk the path we're given. Moira gave up on living. She did some things that were...dangerous to herself. Slept with strangers. Did G.o.d-knows-what when she...Don't get me wrong. I got you out of her mistakes. And she obviously didn't do anything that made you born as an addict. She didn't end your life or give you to them either. She let me have you. Even at the end, she made some tough choices."

"But?"

"But she wasn't the woman you are."

"I'm just a girl.... I-"

"You're leading a faery court. You're dealing with their politics. I think you've earned the right to be called a woman." Grams' voice was stern. It was the one that she used when she talked about feminism and freedom and racial equality and all of those things that she'd held to like some folks hold to a religion.

"I don't feel ready."

"Honey, none of us ever does. I'm not ready to be an old lady. I wasn't ready to be a mother either time-to you or to Moira. And I surely wasn't ready to lose her."

"Or me."

"I'm not losing you. That's the only gift the faeries ever gave me. You'll be here, strong and alive long after I'm dust. You're never going to want for money or safety or health." Grams sounded fierce now. "Almost everything I could want for you they gave you, but only because you were strong enough to take it. I'm never going to like them, but the fact that my baby is going to be fine after I'm gone...It goes a long way to making me forgive them for all the rest."

"She didn't actually die in childbirth, did she?" Aislinn had never asked, but she knew the stories didn't add up. She'd heard Keenan and Grams talk last fall.

"No. She didn't."

"Why didn't you ever just tell me?"

Grams was silent for a few moments. Then she said, "You read a book when you were little, and you told me you knew why your mother left you. You were so sure that it wasn't her fault, that she was just not strong enough to be a mother. You said you were like the girls in the stories whose mothers died so they could live." Grams' smile was tentative. "What was I to do? It was a little bit true: she wasn't strong enough, just not the way you meant it. I couldn't tell you she chose to leave us because she was mostly faery when you were born. In your version, she was n.o.ble and heroic."

"Is that why I'm this? Because she wasn't human when I was born? Was I ever all the way mortal?"

This time, Grams was still so long that Aislinn wondered if they were going to have a repeat of the silences that always came when there was talk of Moira. Grams sat and stroked Aislinn's hair for several minutes. Finally, though, she said, "I've wondered, but I don't know how we'd know that. She was barely mortal when you were born. Add that to whatever makes us have the Sight...I don't know. Maybe."

"Maybe she was the queen he was looking for. Maybe you were too. Maybe it's why we have the Sight. Maybe it could've been anyone in our family. Maybe when Beira'd cursed him and hid the faery whatever-it-was that was to make someone the Summer Queen...it could have been any of us. If Moira had taken the test...I wonder if she'd have been the queen. I wonder if I would've still ended up a faery. If she wasn't really mortal when I was born-"

Grams interrupted Aislinn's increasingly fast flow of words. "Wondering about what-if doesn't help, Aislinn."

"I know. If she was a faery...I wouldn't be alone."

"If she had chosen to accept being a faery, I wouldn't have had you to raise either. She wouldn't have left you behind."

"She did leave me. She chose to die rather than be a faery. Rather than be what I am now."

"I'm sorry." Grams' tears fell into Aislinn's hair. "I wish you didn't know any of that."

And Aislinn didn't have a response. She just lay there, her head in Grams' lap, like she had so many times as a little girl. Her mother had chosen death over being a faery. It didn't leave much room to doubt what Moira would've thought of the choices Aislinn had made.

Chapter 8.

Seth wanted to be surprised when he saw Niall waiting inside the Crow's Nest the next day, but he wasn't. Their friendship was one of the things Niall held fast to, and Seth, for his part, wasn't objecting. It was like discovering that he had a brother-albeit a twisted and moody older brother-no one had bothered to tell him about.

Seth spun a chair around and straddled it. "Don't you have a job or something?"

The Dark King lifted a gla.s.s in greeting. A second gla.s.s sat on the table. He gestured toward it and said, "Poured not by my hand or of my cup."

"Relax. I trust you. Plus I'm already in your world"-Seth lifted the gla.s.s and took a drink-"and not planning on walking out of it anytime either."

Niall frowned. "Maybe you should trust less freely."

"Maybe." Seth leaned over and grabbed a clean ashtray from the next table and slid it to Niall. "Or maybe you should chill out."

In one corner, the band was doing their sound check. Damali, one of Seth's semi-regular partners before-Aislinn, waved. Her copper-tinted dreads were midway down her back when he'd seen her last. They weren't much longer, but they were dyed magenta now. Seth nodded and turned his attention back to Niall. "So, you feeling the need for a lecture or being overprotective?"

"Yes."

"Talkative and maudlin today. Lucky me."

Niall glared at him. "Most people are intimidated by me these days. I'm the master of the monsters that Faerie fears."

Seth arched a brow. "Hmmm."

"What?"

"This whole 'fear me' thing doesn't work for you. Better stick to the brooding." Seth took another drink and looked around the Crow's Nest. "You and I both know you could order all of their deaths, but I know you wouldn't do it."

"I would if I needed to."

Seth didn't have an answer to that-it wasn't a point of argument-so he switched topics: "Are you going to be gloomy all afternoon?"

"No." Niall glanced at the far corner. This early, there was an open dartboard. "Come."

"Woof," Seth said, but he stood even as he said it, relieved to move on to doing something.

"Now, why don't my real Hounds obey so quickly?" Niall had apparently decided to try to lighten up. He smiled, weakly, but still it was a smile.

Seth went over and pulled the darts out of the board. He wasn't serious enough about the game to carry his own. Niall, however, did carry his own. He had been a faery-but-not-king for too long. As a king, he wasn't p.r.o.ne to reacting to steel, but that was a very recent change. A lifetime habit didn't let go so easily. He opened his case; inside were bone-tipped darts.

While Seth selected the straightest of the steel-tipped darts for himself, Niall watched with a bemused expression. "It's not toxic anymore, but I still would rather it not touch my skin."

"Cigarettes aren't toxic to you either, but you certainly don't hesitate there."

"Point. The darts shouldn't bother me," Niall agreed, but he still made no move to touch the darts in Seth's hand.

With a comfort he rarely felt around the denizens of the Summer Court, Seth turned his back to the King of Nightmares and eyed the board. Home. Safe. The fact that Niall's presence in his home of sorts only added to his sense of security was not lost on him.

"Cricket?"

"Sure." Seth didn't see the benefit in pretending he was up to playing something more serious. He wasn't good enough to give Niall any challenge on his best days, but that wasn't what throwing darts was about anyhow. It was a way to pa.s.s the time, a task for focus.

They played three games in almost complete silence, and even though he was obviously distracted, Niall won them all with his usual ease. When Niall had aimed and thrown his third and final dart, he said, "I hope you forgive better than you shoot."

"What's up?" Seth couldn't stop the wave of worry that rose at the Dark King's carefully neutral tone.

Niall spared him a glance as he retrieved his darts. "Unfinished business. Trust me."

"I don't want trouble."

"I'm the Dark King, Seth, what trouble could there possibly be?" Niall grinned, finally looking almost happy. "They're here."

And for a heartbeat, Seth didn't want to turn. He knew he'd see them-his girlfriend and his compet.i.tion for her affection-when he turned. He didn't like to see them together, but his self-control was short-lived. Even though it meant seeing her with Keenan, Seth couldn't resist looking at her. He never could, even when she was mortal. Aislinn was smiling up at Keenan; she had a hand resting lightly in the crook of his arm. She'd begun to adopt more of the faeries' formal mannerisms in public.

Niall spoke in a low undertone: "Don't ever think he can be trusted. He counts the days until you are out of his way, and he has time on his side. I know you love our-the-Summer Queen, but yours is a losing battle, especially as you're not fighting. Cut your losses before they destroy you, or fight back."

"I don't want to give up." Seth looked at Ash. He'd thought the same thing more than a couple times lately. "But I don't want to fight anyone."

"Fighting is..." Niall started.

Seth didn't hear the rest of the words: Aislinn had looked up and caught Seth's gaze. She left Keenan and started across the room.

Casually, Keenan turned to talk to one of his guards as if her absence wasn't painful. It is though. Seth knew that; he had studied the Summer King's reactions, watched them change as winter ended. Keenan would keep Aislinn nearer him always if he could.

Just like I would.

Niall gave Seth a pitying look as Aislinn approached them. "You're not listening at all, are you?"

All the air in Seth's lungs seemed to vanish.

Is it her or what she is? He'd wondered that more and more. He'd never really done the relationship thing before Aislinn, so trying to figure out what was normal was a challenge. Was the escalation of fascination normal? Or was it because he was in love with someone who wasn't human anymore? He'd done enough reading of old folk stories the past months to know that humans could rarely resist a faery's allure.

Is that what's happening to me?

But Aislinn was slipping into his arms then. When she brought her lips to his, he couldn't care less about why he was fascinated by her, or if Niall's warnings were true, or what Keenan intended. All that mattered was that he and Aislinn were together. Sunlight soaked into his skin as she wrapped her arms around him.

He held on to her tighter than he would've before-when she was human. He couldn't grasp her tightly enough to ever hurt her, not now that she was faery.

Her hands slid up his spine, and she let a trickle of sunlight into her skin as she touched him. Such boldness in public was uncharacteristic.

He broke their kiss. "Ash?"

She pulled back a little more, and he shivered at the loss.

Like the sun being taken away.

"Sorry." A light blush colored her cheeks.

He didn't have any faith in his ability to formulate a sentence yet.

"I love you," she whispered against his lips.

"You too." Seth promised. Always.

She nestled into his arms with a little sigh. She wasn't a queen, wasn't a faery, wasn't anyone but his Aislinn then.

"You okay?"

"I am now."

Not a minute later, though, she tensed. Although Aislinn couldn't see Keenan, she obviously knew that he stood behind her. Whatever connection they had was growing stronger, and it wasn't making life any easier.

For his part, Keenan's expression hinted at confusions he wouldn't voice. Aislinn's residual humanity, her ability to switch from ruler to just a girl, seemed to baffle Keenan. Seth had watched him try to make sense of Aislinn's refusal to distance herself from the human world. It was a strength: the people she saw benefiting from her dedication to rebuilding Summer's strength inspired her to do more. But it was also a weakness: time with mortals reminded her of the unpleasant differences between mortal and fey and kept her aloof from her faeries. That distance was the source of a rift in the court, a vulnerability that caused more than a little rumbling.

Added to that were tensions from Aislinn's refusal to be a "proper queen" and Keenan's ongoing relationship with Donia; the court was stronger, but it was not healed.

Seth knew it would change with time-especially as the mortals Aislinn loved aged and died-but Keenan was openly dissatisfied by any weaknesses that could endanger Aislinn. The strengthening faeries' frustrations with their monarchs' choices made Keenan worry about what would happen as those faeries grew bolder. That worry for Aislinn was one of the few things that Seth appreciated about the Summer King. Keenan did treasure Aislinn. He wanted to keep her safe and happy.

He also wants to keep her to himself.

"You ought to step away, Keenan. I see what you're doing. I've watched you play these games for centuries." Niall's voice was suddenly smoke and shadows. "Try thinking about what others need for a change."

"I don't believe what I do now is any of your business." Keenan maneuvered so that he was farther from Aislinn and facing Niall. In doing so, the Summer King had put his back to the brick wall-a.s.suring that no one could come up behind him.

"If you hurt Seth"-Niall shot a smile at Seth-"it will be."

"He isn't of your court."

Derision dripping from his voice, the Dark King said, "Only an a.s.s would think that matters. Leslie is lost to me. Your queen's friend, and you let her be corrupted-"

"By the Dark Court, your court, Niall." Keenan glanced at Aislinn, at Seth, at the various mortals in the room. In the dim alcove where they stood, the conflict wasn't attracting any attention yet.

"It is my court, and with all I've learned from the two twisted kings I've loved and lived for, it won't ever bow to yours. Don't try me, Keenan." Niall stalked toward Keenan, closing the distance, menace clinging to his skin. "Hurt Seth and you will answer to me."

Keenan didn't speak.

"Tell me you hold no ill will toward him, Keenan." Niall's voice had dropped to a low growl that Seth hadn't known resided in his friend. Beside the Dark King, the abyss maidens took form and swayed; their bodies were tongues of black flame, twisting and undulating. Seth knew they were capable of devastation if let loose, but he wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing. In a part of himself he tried to keep hidden, there was rage at Keenan and excitement at the thought that Niall would slap Keenan down. Which isn't cool. Seth kept those urges in check these days. He'd worked hard at becoming the person he was now. He didn't indulge in fights or one-night stands; he didn't get stupidly drunk or set out to try things just because they were forbidden. He was calm-even when it wasn't his instinctual reaction.

"Niall?" Seth let go of Aislinn and stepped around the abyss dancers. "Chill."

"He doesn't speak, does he, Seth?" Niall had curled his hands into fists.

"I know where I stand." Seth knew Keenan had mixed feelings. He hadn't acted to injure Seth, but it would be a surprise if he hadn't considered it. At length. Probably with Tavish advising him on the risks. Seth wasn't going there, though; it didn't help things. "I don't need to hear his answer."