An Artificial Night

Thrumming with tension, I forced myself to stay where I was, watching Oleander like a mouse watches a snake. Not a bad comparison. Oleander de Merelands was half-Peri, half-Tuatha de Dannan, and all hazardous to your health. She was there when Simon Torquill turned me into a fish; she laughed. Even knowing the things they say about her—the rumors of assassinations, the fondness for poisons, the trafficking in dark magic and darker services—that’s the thing I can never seem to forget. She laughed. Where Oleander went, trouble followed.

She walked straight past us, not even glancing in our direction. I relaxed slightly. This was a dream; she couldn’t see what wasn’t really there. She proceeded down the path to the tower door, where she raised her hand and knocked, calmly as you please.

A minute or so later, the door opened, and my mother—Amandine of Faerie, greatest blood-worker of her generation—stepped out onto the tower steps. My breath caught again, for entirely different reasons. I haven’t seen my mother in years. Not really. She slipped away while I was in the pond, and I wasn’t prepared for the sight of Amandine in her prime.

Her elegantly braided hair was white gold, but unlike Karen’s, which looked faintly bleached, it was the simple, natural color of some unnamed precious metal. Her eyes were the same smoky gray-blue as morning fog. They widened slightly when she saw Oleander standing there, before narrowing in outrage.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded. “You are not welcome. I grant you no hospitalities, nor the warmth of my hearth.”

“Why, Amy, aren’t you the high-nosed bitch these days,” Oleander replied, her own voice thick with loathing. “He sent me. Someone thought he should know you’d come home again, and now he’s wondering after your welfare.”

Amandine pursed her lips, studying Oleander. Finally, dismissively, she asked, “Is this what you’re reduced to? Playing messenger-girl for the Daoine Sidhe? I thought you held yourself better than this.”

“At least I didn’t whore myself to the mortal world for a replacement,” Oleander spat. “Has he even seen her, Amy? Your little imitation? I can take her for a visit, if you still think you’re too good for social calls. Or are you afraid she’ll realize what she is? Are you afraid—”

I winced even before Amandine started to move. Oleander didn’t know her as well as I did, and didn’t recognize the sudden tension in her posture for what it was before it was too late. Amandine lunged, wrapping one hand around Oleander’s throat and the other around her wrist before the other woman had a chance to react.

I shouldn’t have been able to hear what came next. We were too far away, and she was speaking too softly. But this was a dream, and I was going to hear what Karen wanted me to hear.

“If you come near my daughter, if you touch her, if you look at her, I will know, and I will make you pay.” Amandine’s voice was tightly controlled. She would have sounded almost reasonable, if not for the fury in her expression . . . and the fear in Oleander’s. Oak and ash, one of the scariest women in Faerie was looking at my mother like she was the monster in the closet. “Do you understand me, Oleander? I will make you pay in ways you can barely comprehend. I will make it hurt, and the pain won’t stop just because I do. Do you understand?”

“Bitch,” hissed Oleander.

Amandine narrowed her eyes. The smell of her magic—blood and roses—suddenly filled the formerly scentless garden, and Oleander screamed, writhing in her grasp. Amandine didn’t move, but she must have been doing something, because Oleander kept screaming, a high, keening sound that wasn’t meant to come from any human-shaped throat.

The smell of blood and roses faded. Oleander slumped in Amandine’s hands. My mother looked down at her dispassionately, not letting go.

“How much of who you are is what you are?” Amandine asked. Her voice was still soft. That was possibly the worst part. “How much do you think it would change? Would you like to find out?”

“No,” whispered Oleander.

“I’m afraid I can’t hear you. What was that you said?”