A Fair Fight (9 page)

"Nothing so impolite. I have arranged a diplomatic meeting of sorts. Just not with you. However, the people who were invited can ask after the cauldron for you."

“
Who's invited?” Jack asked. “And what's your angle?”

The blankly shining eyes stared as the wisps answered. “We will get to my angle in a moment. Riocard's daughter and her friends were invited, and it's best they were along now.” She turned her shimmering face to Megan. “There's a lodestone circle less than one mile to the east. Ashling should show you the downward path. Keep following it until it seems like an unconscionably terrible plan. Then go twelve steps further.” The Gray Lady turned her attention to Jack. “I trust they'll be allowed to, so we can continue to talk business?”

The ogre nodded.

The Gray Lady looked at Megan, and for a moment, Megan thought she saw new waves of mother-of-pearl flowing over parts of the bean sidhe's face, lips that clasped more tightly, as if trying harder to stay silent.

“
Let's not wait for an escort, boys and girls,” Cassia said.

As they rose from their seats, nodded to their bloodthirsty hosts, and started walking, Megan couldn't help but notice one of the wisps was following them.

“
Seems we got an escort anyway,” she said.

“
Just keep walking,” Lani said.

“
Just keep walking,” the wisp echoed softly.

“
Going as fast as I can,” Megan said. “I've had a really bad day, and dealing with a lot of people I'd rather not.”

“
Hey, brightside,” Cassia said. “Our Lady of Perpetual Downers did save our hides.”

“
Yes. And now we owe her one,” Megan replied. “I know I've only known I'm Unseelie royalty since junior year, but I'm pretty sure we hate that.”

“
Just ask about the cauldron,” came the whisper. “Ask as non-threatening children and mortals. That will suffice.”

“
Okay. We'll ask,” said Megan. “And we can see the lodestones from here, and we're not going to double back to eavesdrop on your wacky dinner-party planning with the ogres, so you can ease off now.”

The wisp withdrew, and once more the group were walking over otherworldly rocks alone. The particular set of otherworldly rocks they were approaching formed a wide enough ring for everyone to enter at once.

“
Get right to the edge and close your eyes,” Ashling said. “The 'downward path' on this thing is … well, it's technically safe, but it's going to be a doozy. Just keep them closed. Cassia, make sure the cats understand.”

“
Have you been this way before?” Megan asked.

“
Nope,” said Ashling. “We're taking a road less travelled by, and unlike Frost's B.S.ing his grandkids, it probably will make some difference.”

“
The instructions were pretty ominous.”

“
Yeah, this is not going to be fun. Now step to the right with your hands on your hips.”

“
Is that part of the path,” Megan asked, “or yet another attempt to get us to do the time warp for no reason?”

“
Fine. Just keep your eyes closed, duck your head slightly, and step forward.”

As Megan did so, it was hard not to stumble. She felt something sink in the pit of her stomach. Then she felt Justin's arm around hers, providing something steady to lean on.

“
Eyes stay closed,” Ashling said. “Keep walking.”

“
I think this is a terrible plan,” Megan said.

“
But is it
unconscionably
terrible yet?” Cassia asked drily.

Megan started to feel dizzy. She wasn't sure if it was the after-effects of having just recovered from poison, but she did. She held Justin's arm a little tighter and took deep breaths, happy to be distracted by the sea-salt smell of Mrs. Kahale's homemade soap—yet another part of the hobby collection. Still, it seemed best to say, “It is now.”

Ashling apparently agreed, because she started counting their steps aloud. Before she'd reached twelve, the air had begun to feel stuffily damp.

Megan heard water nearby. She opened her eyes. At first, everything was pitch black, but within a few more steps, a faint greenish-yellow light gradually shone through. As they walked along, Megan managed to figure out there was something covering the stone walls that glowed.

In the hazy light, there were two pale sidhe with large spears.

“
Are you 'the wrong kind of elf'?” Megan asked before she could reconsider the diplomatic propriety of the question.

The two sidhe parted, and the sickly-white figure stepping between them looked down at her with a dark-eyed smile. “Auntie certainly thinks so.”

Chapter 13: Awkward

“
Tiernan, I'm guessing?”

“
Tiernan I am, but let's do this properly.” He then stared at Ashling as if he were waiting for something. Megan had no idea what.

Ashling frowned, but encouraged the Count to hover a little higher and straightened her own posture a little. She spoke louder than usual. “Tiernan, allow me to introduce Her Highness, Megan Bridget O'Reilly of Seattle, Washington—and the Unseelie court of An Teach Deiridh—also attended by Lani Kahale, of Seattle, Washington, affiliated with the Seelie court of An Teach Deiridh as the daughter of a kahuna of the menehune, and Sir Justin of Ludlow-via-Seattle, the Princess's Champion. You know Cassia. Her boys are Jude and Maxwell, and my associate is Counts-to-18.”

In the years she'd known her, Megan had never heard Ashling say the Count's full name truthfully. Tiernan's no-fun reputation had to be serious business.

“
Megan, this is Tiernan, formerly of the Seelie court of An Teach Deiridh, now Lord of a Handful of Exiles in the Middle of Freaking Nowhere, so please don't try to curtsey.” Well, one could only expect formality from Ashling for so long.

Tiernan frowned at the pixie. "I'd hardly say a handful." He glanced meaningfully to the spearmen to his sides.

"... of Exiles, in the Middle of Freaking Nowhere. You don't need to say it. I handled that part for you," the pixie answered.

Megan grimaced. They had been instructed to show up and be not-challenging and all, and that seemed to be blown out of the water. Megan tried to get the discussion past the insult, curtseying to Tiernan. "We're very sorry, Tiernan, sir. We heard you'd be expecting diplomats for something?"

His attention shifted from the pixie to Megan, and his expression spoke volumes. Where Ashling had been disrespectful, at least he had enough regard for her to argue her point. Megan, he almost made a point of looking down on, as if she was a thing that didn't belong. He stared for several long seconds, as if expecting her to apologize further for speaking out of turn. Megan, in turn, decided she'd apologized once for the disrespect, but wasn't about to do so further. She rose, straightening up even more than usual, and looked back, waiting on his answer.

"What you're here for remains to be seen. Please come along.” He gestured to what proved, as torches were lit, to be a boat alongside a riverbank. It was a very long boat, enough to fit everyone, even the cats. Tiernan offered a hand to help Megan in, but Justin quickly stepped in and beat him to it. Tiernan and the other sidhe seemed to be proceeding as if Megan had decided to get in by herself, as if they didn't see the young knight at all. The pixie was apparently annoying, the half-human negligible, and the human invisible.

Well, this is certainly creepy,
Megan thought. She wondered what exactly the technically-silent, tarnished-silver woman had gotten them into. “Nice place you've got here.”

“
Thank you. We like it.”

They like it?
“You were part of the Seelie court?”

“
There can be order in the darkness. Especially when the sunlight is blinding itself to the truth.”

“
Guess so.” Megan stared at the water in the hazy glow. She listened to it lap against the side of the boat, sometimes getting pretty high. “If we get splashed on, is it going to harden our skin or mess with our memories?”

“
No,” Tiernan said. “Those properties are not in this water.”

“
What is in it?”

“
Fish. Some carbonic acid.”

“
Acid?” Megan kept her arms more carefully in the boat. “What does that do?”

Lani sighed. “All cave water has carbonic acid. It makes sinkholes and stalactites, mostly. Nothing dangerous.”

“
I wouldn't say nothing dangerous,” Tiernan commented quietly. “Give it a few centuries.”

There was silence again, except for the lapping of the waves, the movement of the oars, and the fidgeting of the cats.

Ashling suddenly spoke up. “Speaking of centuries, how's it been going having to handle your own clothes since powdered wigs were in? They're not anymore, by the way, just in case you think your hair would fit in outside an emo concert. Did you even manage to drag any leprechauns down with you, or do you have to fix your own shoes?”

Tiernan glared. “It is incredible that you were the single faerie sent.”

“
Single? Well, I am trying to stay available for the reincarnation of Errol Flynn, but...”

Megan cleared her throat. “What we're here for—well, one of the things we're here for is to ask about the Dagda's cauldron.”

“
The Dagda's cauldron?” Tiernan echoed. “I certainly don't have it.”

“
Well, we got the impression that you know who does.”

Silence again, aside from the water, the boat, nearly ten people breathing, and the Count's apparent attempt to get something out of his feathers.

Finally, Tiernan muttered. “Clever of her... to be expected of the Unseelie. And at least a bean sidhe is still sidhe. How did your father ever manage to replace her?”

“
Um, he hasn't,” Megan said. Nearly two years in, it was starting to get embarrassing how much her dad hated doing without his creepy ex-seneschal. “So...do you know where it is?”

“
I suppose I do. I wouldn't recommend trying for it.”

“
Who's got it?”

“
The dokkalfar.”

Megan searched her memory. “That's one of the Scandinavian evils, right?”

“
Indeed. And Scandinavian evils are Scandinavian business. As ours should be ours.”

“
General Inwar's accomplished a lot for An Teach Deiridh.” Even as the words were out of her mouth, Megan realized they were probably a bad idea.

And there it was: another long pause. Megan watched the lights in the distance of an underground village, with a variety of buildings partly outlined with the pale greenish glow of bioluminescent fungi. A few of the high windows and a few points about the streets were lit by flickering lantern light, but most of the village was left dark.

Tiernan finally answered after they'd drifted closer. “He's fought real battles, with real casualties, not just the Faerie games so many of us danced the centuries through. I'll give the Northman that. But his 'accomplishments' wouldn't have been needed if sidhe had done the job properly themselves, if Orlaith hadn't decided to depend on a foreigner.”

“
Okay,” Cassia said. “Instead of retreading old ground, why don't we just turn the boat around? We asked the question we came here to ask. The dokkalfar have the cauldron. Now we know. Job done. We'll get out of your isolation-bleached hair.”

“
No," Megan said. "Let's stay a while. I want to talk about other stuff."

Cassia frowned. "Why would we want to stay past the bare minimum?" She whispered, but she didn't put much effort into not being heard.

"I just do, okay?" Megan whispered back. She was thinking, oddly enough, of the Tooth Mouse—but she wasn't thinking about being properly cordial. She looked to Tiernan. "I'm not your aunt's biggest fan," she said.

The boat was almost to the dock.

Tiernan glanced at her, narrowing his eyes. "Yes, after what happened, I would imagine not.” Another pause. “What bothered you the most?”

“
Well, it's a tough call...” Megan began. He was asking her opinion. In an open-ended question. And the silence was sitting like a vacuum, waiting for her to fill up with words. She decided to be careful which words she gave him. “Probably that real civilized way she can lie to everyone's face to get what she wants without actually saying anything technically inaccurate.”
And I need to get the hang of that.

“
Ah,” Tiernan said, looking unsatisfied but not suspicious. “Well, you may grow out of that, child.”

Chapter 14: Diplomacy by Other Means

Justin was up on the dock almost as quickly as Tiernan's men were, offering Megan a hand. She ignored theirs and took Justin's, making sure both her feet ended up firmly on the dock.