Widdershins (64 page)

Galfreya

Galfreya could only shake her head
in admiration as, from the safety of Tatiana’s conference room, she and the other council members watched Christiana work the war chief of the buffalo. After her first meeting with the shadow back in the mall, Galfreya’d had Edgan find out what he could about her. So she knew Christiana was physically capable of carrying out the threats she’d made to the queen’s guard earlier. Now she realized that the shadow was smarter than most would give her credit for—at least those who didn’t see past her brash and cocky manner.

“How did she do that?” Tatiana asked as the buffalo army dispersed. “Minisino wasn’t going to listen to any of them. Not Anwatan’s father or Joe. Not Raven. Not even Ayabe—and when was the last time anyone saw
him?
But she just waltzed in there and the next thing I see is Minisino standing alone on that plain and the threat gone.”

Galfreya shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“She’s a shadow,” Granny Cross, the other seer said. “They’re both more and less than the rest of us.”

Tatiana turned to her. “How so? I can see how there might be more to them, but in what way are they less?”

“Consider their origin,” Granny Cross replied. “Born from what another has cast off, they carry inside them the conviction that they were never meant to be, and that what they are will always be of less worth than their twin. It’s why so many of them fade away like the Eadar, except what they need to sustain them is a belief in themselves, rather than the belief of others.”

Tatiana nodded, her gaze going back to the scene playing in the between.

“That one will never fade,” she said.

Granny Cross made no reply, but Galfreya could see in her eyes that she wasn’t as certain herself. Unless Granny Cross’s seer vision had shown her something the rest of them couldn’t see, Galfreya tended to agree with the queen. This shadow was so sure of herself that it would take a battalion of self-doubt battering away at her night and day for a year, and even then she would probably prevail.

As Galfreya returned her own attention to the between, she was just in time to see Christiana’s approach. A moment later the shadow appeared back in the fairies’ conference room as suddenly as she’d left. She stood on the middle of the table once again, her arms spread wide and grinned at how every one of Tatiana’s guardsmen had either a sword or crossbow pointed at her.

“What?” she asked. “No parade? No ‘All hail the returning hero!’?”

The guardsmen didn’t lower their weapons until Tatiana made a dismissive movement with her hand.

“How did you do that?” she asked Christiana. “How did you get the army to disperse?”

Christiana shrugged, which was no answer at all, then got straight to the point.

“I delivered what I promised I would,” she said. “More, really. So now it’s your turn to deliver. Where’s Geordie? And if you can’t give him to me, then where do I find these bogans?”

“I didn’t say we had either,” Tatiana replied. “Only that we would help you find them.”

“That’s not good enough.”

“It’s all we can offer because we don’t
know.”

“Fine,” Christiana said, though it was obvious she was anything but appeased.

Galfreya understood. Throughout the drama of what had unfolded in the between with the buffalo soldiers, her own mind kept returning again and again to worry at the mystery of Geordie’s disappearance. If he’d been killed, they should at least have been able to sense his spirit slipping out of his body. But he was just
gone.

“Get those seers of yours to start working on it,” the shadow went on, as though she were the queen of this court, not Tatiana. “Get your gruagaghs and seekers and finders and whatever it takes. I made your problem go away without the loss of a single fairy life—or even your pride. Now you’d better make my problem go away.”

Tatiana sat straighter, her eyes flashing.

“We are not servants,” she said stiffly, “to jump at your beck and call. I have said we will do all we can to help, and so we will.”

Christiana glared right back at her. “Then what’s the hold up? If you think I’m just going to—”

She broke off before she could finish her threat and lifted her head. Everything about her changed. The anger drained away from her features and she grinned. It was such an abrupt and startling transformation. A moment earlier and one only wanted to slap some manners into her. Now her good humour filled the hearts of everyone in the room with an echo of her joy.

Though the others were puzzled at her sudden change of demeanour, Galfreya understood it immediately. Because she felt it, too.

Geordie was back.

She didn’t know exactly where he was, but that wouldn’t be hard to figure out. What mattered was that he was back.

“You,” Christiana said, pointing at Galfreya. “Can you call up an image of where he is? Something sharp and clear—none of your murky fairy riddles. I can’t cross over to someplace I haven’t been before unless I have a clear picture of it.”

“Here,” Granny Cross said, before Galfreya could consult her own scrying bowl. “I have it.”

As Christiana walked across the table to where the other seer was sitting, Galfreya rose from her own chair.

“Fm coming with you,” she said.

The shadow turned to look at her. “You? Why would you want to come?”

“Because I love him, too.”

“Right. With spells and enchantments to keep him at your side.”

“You
know
why I laid those.”

“So what are you going to do?” Christiana asked. “If you don’t use spells, do you think you can actually hold him? It means going out into the world, you know. It means making a commitment to living, instead of holing up in that mall you’ve made into a fairy court for yourself.”

“I know.”

“And what makes you even think he’ll listen to you? He knows what you did.”

“It doesn’t matter. I still need to see him. To talk to him. I need to tell him how I feel.”

Christiana cocked her head. “You really do care, don’t you?”

Galfreya bit back the sharp retort that sprang to her lips. What was it about this woman that made her constantly want to slap her?

“I thought you said he loved this other woman,” Tatiana said.

Galfreya nodded. “Jilly.”

“So then . . .”

“They circle and dance around each other,” Galfreya said, “neither able or willing to commit. But I am ready. I can give him what she can’t.”

“And being this immortal seer in skater gear?” Christiana asked. “How does that play into a normal relationship?”

“I would give it up for him.”

Galfreya ignored the shocked response of Tatiana and the rest of the court.

“Wow,” Christiana said, then she smiled and nodded. “Cool. And you know what? If you’re on the level, I’ll even make sure he hears you out.”

Galfreya blinked in surprise. The shadow was going to
help
her? What sort of game was she playing now?

But Christiana’s eyes were guileless. She reached out a hand to Galfreya.

“Come on,” she said. “Time’s a-wasting.”

With her hand still proffered, she turned back to Granny Cross and her scrying bowl.

“Show me that picture you’ve got.” She put on a pretty smile to make it sound less like a command and added, “If you please.”

Galfreya shook her head, but she walked over to where Christiana was waiting for her, red curls falling in her face as she bent over the image in the bowl.

Tatiana caught Galfreya’s arm as she walked by her.

“I have to do this,” Galfreya said. “I should have done it a long time ago.”

“But to give up your heritage . . .”

“We’ll see. Maybe it will need to come to that, maybe it won’t. But I’m determined that this time, I’ll do it properly. That we will share our lives. If he’ll have me. If he’ll listen to me.”

“Oh, he’ll listen to you,” Christiana said. “Unless you keep lollygagging, because then I’m just going to leave you behind.”

Tatiana dropped her hand from Galfreya’s arm.

“Good luck,” she said.

“I don’t need luck,” Galfreya said, her gaze going to where the shadow waited impatiently for her by the bowl. “I’ve got her with me, don’t I?”

Grey

There’s a long uncomfortable silence
after the red-haired girl leaves, neither cousins nor humans quite sure what’s coming next. I figure the situation’s under control now, and we can just go and get on with the rest of our business, but I’m taking my cues from Jack and he shows no sign of leaving. He winks at me and lights a cigarette, then lifts his eyebrows and offers it to me. I shake my head and look back at where the buffalo war chief is standing.

Minisino seems unrepentant, a tall, formidable figure, even without his army at his back. He has one hand on his hip, the other around the handle of a weighted club that’s stuck in his belt.

“Is it over?” I hear one of the humans ask, pitching her voice low.

You’d think it would be, but something’s still going on. Whatever it is, it’s all under the surface where I can’t access it.

I glance over to see that it was Lizzie’s cousin who spoke, her arm still in a sling. She’s leaning close to Cassie who, in her bright yellow T-shirt and even brighter pink baggy cotton pants, is pretty much the only splash of colour in this place.

I don’t know what Siobhan and the other members from Lizzie’s band are doing out here on the plain with us, what they thought they could possibly do against the buffalo army, but I have to admire them for taking a stand like this. If the red-haired girl hadn’t come through the way she did, it would probably have meant their deaths. You don’t see that kind of commitment much anymore—the realization that the world is everybody’s responsibility, so we’ve all got to do our part, no matter how tough that might be sometimes.

Oh, who am I kidding? Hardly anyone’s ready to stand up and be counted anymore, not cousin or human. But here these humans are, nevertheless. Siobhan with only one arm that’s of any use and the other two: the guitarist and the accordion player. Musicians, not fighters.

I feel like I owe Lizzie an apology. I guess I owe her a lot of things. If I hadn’t been so brusque with her at first, if I’d stayed around and kept watch against the bogans, none of these friends of hers would be here. Hell, I probably wouldn’t be here.

But this apology would be for being so dismissive of the music she and her band play. If they’ve got enough heart to be here when it matters, in a fight that’s not even really their own, then there’s got to be more to that diddle-dee-dee music I’ve heard them play. I guess it comes from the heart, too, but I just wasn’t listening. I’d already made up my mind as to what both it and they were like.

Anyway, because it’s so quiet, everybody heard Siobhan’s question, and she looks embarrassed at the sudden attention directed her way. Before Cassie can answer her, Minisino stomps a hoof on the dirt and opens his big mouth.

“No,” he says. He points at Joe. “This one and I—we have unfinished business.”

I don’t
believe
this.

But Joe sighs, then stands straighter, shoulders going back.

“You think?” he says.

Minisino’s only response is his fixed glare.

Joe gives another sigh. “I suppose we do. You know, I was hoping I wasn’t going to have to whup your sorry ass, but you’re not leaving me a whole lot of choice here.”

“You’ve already stolen all my choices,” Minisino says. “Why should I leave you with any?”

Joe shrugs. “I don’t know. For the sake of common sense? Maybe for the fact that this is over, and we both know it, but you still figure you need to hit something?”

Minisino responds by letting his hands fall to his sides and assuming a combat-ready stance.

“Don’t play into his game,” Cassie pipes up. “You don’t need to do this anymore.”

Listen to her, I think.

But, “Yeah, I do,” Joe says without turning to look at her. “You know how it goes. If we don’t finish this now, we’re just going to have to go through it all over again another time. And maybe the next time it won’t end so pretty.”