One Salt Sea: An October Daye Novel

“Is this acceptable to Saltmist?” she asked.

“It is,” said Dianda.

I smiled. We’d already discussed my requirements for giving Dean the county. Marcia had to stay on as his Seneschal, and none of Lily’s people could be turned away. The bargain with the pixies and bogeys had to stand, since it was really their knowe, not mine. He’d agreed to every one of them before we left for the Queen’s Court, leaving Dean and Peter to return to Saltmist with Anceline and the others.

“Then I suppose there are no objections,” said the Queen. “You win. Again.”

“It’s not about winning. It’s about doing the right thing.”

“Call it what you like. Goldengreen will pass from you, and you can return to the servitude you so clearly desire.” She turned her attention to Sylvester. “I apologize for returning her to your care.”

“I can manage her,” said Sylvester mildly. “I’ve had a measure of practice.”

“I’m tired.” The Queen stood. “Court is done. You may all go.” Then she was gone, leaving a haze of rowan-scented smoke floating around the dais.

I let out a breath. “Well. That wasn’t so bad. I mean, beyond the attempted regicide and the part where I just pissed the Queen off again. Let’s get out of here. I need coffee in the worst way.” I needed coffee, and to cry until my chest stopped aching. Somehow, coffee seemed like the more achievable of those two goals.

“Why am I not surprised?” asked Sylvester. He clapped an arm around my shoulders, and we walked, all of us, out of the Queen’s Court and into the sweet embrace of the mortal night.





THIRTY-FIVE


THE NIGHTS TRICKLED BY, turning slowly but inevitably into weeks. After the first mad flurry of activity—explaining the situation to Marcia and the pixies, introducing them to Dean, whose awkward pleas for guidance did more to smooth over the situation than anything I could have said; waiting by the phone for Cliff to call and tell me Gillian was safely home, and the police were looking for her abductors—everything sort of went numb, fogging into an endless stream of people offering their condolences. They were so sorry. Everyone was so very, very sorry.

You know what “sorry” does? Sorry doesn’t do a damn thing. They called my phone and they showed up at my door, they sent pixies and rose goblins and a dozen other, stranger forms of messenger, they delivered casseroles and cakes—like calories were somehow the answer to the ills of mortality? Who the hell decided that made sense? And none of it did a thrice-cursed thing. Connor was still dead. Faerie could endure until the end of time. I could burn out enough of my mortality to watch the sun die. And Connor would still be dead.

I spent a week in my bedroom, emerging only to get more coffee and to clear another bevy of people out of my living room. To be fair, May handled most of the ones who decided they actually needed to show up rather than sending a pixie; my friends understood why she was screening my calls, and everybody else could go hang for all I cared.