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CHAPTER NINE

C arys did dance with Lachlan, and she did think about Duncan most of the time. From the sour look on Lachlan’s face, he knew it too. She also danced with Godrik, though there was little conversation, and she danced with her uncle twice.

Laura appeared to be the belle of the ball, and Cadell was forced to be patient as every lord and a few ladies of Anglia took the opportunity to dance with the interesting foreigner from across the ocean who was visiting the Anglian court.

Carys loved to see her friend being celebrated. Back home, Laura was the responsible eldest sister, backbone of her family and tribe and mainstay at every community function. Here, she was a carefree diplomat of sorts and a fascinating visitor from another continent.

“Your friend is rather pretty, isn’t she?”

Carys smiled. “She’s more than pretty, don’t you…” Her smile fell when she turned to the right and saw the familiar face of the Crow Mother, who was sitting at her table. “What are you doing here?”

She looked around, but no one seemed to notice the dark-haired woman dressed in black save for a lone fae woman on the other side of the room who stared at the Crow Mother with ice-blue eyes.

“What are you doing here?” she asked again. Meanwhile in her mind, she was shouting for her dragon. Cadell, where are you?

Nothing.

It was as if a fog had wrapped around her mind.

“No use calling for the beast,” the Crow Mother said. “My magic is far older than his.” She looked at the head table. “There’s so much magic and feasting in this garden, it’s the perfect time to act.” She narrowed her eyes on Orla. “The queen will bring me her offering, and then everything will fall into place.”

“What offering?” She had to be speaking about Orla. There was only one queen on the dais since Harold wasn’t married.

“I take offerings of all kinds,” the Crow Mother said. “Magic. Blood. Babies.”

Carys barely managed to stop the shiver. “What do you want from me?”

“What you’ve promised, Carys Morgan, daughter of two worlds. Passage to the Brightlands so I can…” She smiled. “…see the sun. Among other things.”

There was no way Carys could go back on her promise now; she’d struck a bargain. “I’ll meet you in the morning at the Night Bridge then.”

“No need.” Branwen stood. “We’ll go now.”

“I can’t.” She looked around. “I’m a guest here and—” It was as if a hand reached up and covered her mouth.

Carys panicked.

“No need to be afraid, dear one. You’re going to give me what was promised, and then you’ll return safely to the Shadowlands.” Branwen stood, reached her hand down, and took Carys’s in her own.

Carys had no choice but to follow her, mute and manageable. She shouted for Cadell in her mind, but the Crow Mother’s power was too great. Fog crept around them, just as it had in the park and on Branwen’s mountain fortress in Alba.

Without any recourse and compelled by magic, Carys lifted her skirt and followed Branwen into the trees.

“Harold thinks his wards are powerful.” Branwen spoke to Carys as if they were friends. “But the wolf mages have earthly magic. More brutish than elegant.” She glanced over her shoulder when Carys didn’t speak. “Oh, forgive me.” She waved a hand, and Carys felt her lips loosen.

“How are we going?” She was already plotting her escape. “You have to know we’re miles from the Night Bridge. And that’s the only gate that knows me in this area, so how?—”

“Have a care, Carys.” The Crow Mother interrupted. “You think I haven’t thought of these things?” Branwen led them through the forest bordering the castle gardens, and moments after they entered the trees, Carys saw a dark carriage emerge from the shadows. “If it were only me, I would simply fly with my crows.” She turned and patted Carys on the cheek. “But you need more… terrestrial accommodations.”

As they approached the carriage, a black door swung open and the shadows loomed in front of her. Nothing appeared to be pulling the carriage, but even so, the box jolted ahead as if invisible beasts were ready to move.

Carys didn’t feel fear. Not exactly. The Crow Mother needed her to open the gate, which meant that—at least for now—she was safe. Then after they passed through the gate and into the Brightlands, the old fae would lose her magic.

Which would leave Carys in Brightlands London with no way back to the Shadowlands and Laura and Duncan unless the gate decided that she was familiar enough to welcome. In theory, she should be able to find her way back.

In theory.

“Up you go.” The Crow Mother boosted Carys into the carriage, and the door slammed behind her.

“Wait, aren’t you going to?—”

“Ar aghaidh linn!”

There was a creaking sound, and the coach jolted forward, Carys locked in the black box with a single window to watch the dark woods roll past.

If Carys did find her way back to Shadowlands London, she’d land in the troll market in the middle of the night, when all the security in the city was focused on Harold’s palace.

One problem at a time, Carys.

Cadell would realize she was gone. Soon the dragon was going to realize she was gone, and once the Crow Mother’s fog lifted, Cadell would find her.

Her dragon could always find her.

The glass was darkened, but Carys knew immediately when they arrived at the night market. There were torches lit along the river, and blue lights floated over the water in the distance. Raucous laughter pierced the fae fog, and eerie music competed with the sounds of merriment for space in the night sky.

It seemed that all of London was celebrating, whether it was in a fancy palace garden or under an old stone bridge.

The laughs fell to whispers as they passed through the market, and when Carys peeked through the smoked glass, she saw wide eyes of all shapes and sizes watching them.

Trolls of every shape and element stared as they passed. Rocky-skinned vendors; pale, watery-faced artisans; and ethereal passersby.

Also in the shadows, she could see humans and smaller magical creatures trudging in the background. Some were standing behind tables, and others carried crates on their shoulders.

All of them looked as if they were wearing some kind of charm, because their faces were obscured. From one moment to the next, Carys could see an eye clearly, then a mouth. But never the entire face at once.

What magic was happening to these enchanted humans?

The coach stopped at the mouth of an alley, and the door creaked open.

Carys waited for Branwen to appear before her.

“Well?” the fae woman asked. “Are you getting out, or do I need to compel you?”

“ Can you compel me?” Carys was wondering just why she’d been so quick to follow the old fae into the forest, but she had a vague recollection of something in her belly pulling her into the woods.

“Hmm.” The Crow Mother eyed her. “Not as easily as I should.” She waved. “Come now. Fulfill your half of the bargain, and our deal will be complete.”

“That’s it?” Carys wanted assurances. “I walk you through the gate into the Brightlands and my debt to you is complete?”

She smiled. “When you say it like that, it makes me think you owe me more.”

“Nope.” Carys put mental shutters on either side of her face and pointed it toward the familiar alley where Dru had guided them only two nights before. She wasn’t seeing the humans in thrall to the trolls. She wasn’t seeing the chains or the ropes or the magic that bound them.

Not that night.

Not until it was finished.

“Let me see.” Carys slowed her steps as she walked across the damp cobblestones. “I need to feel for it.”

She was dragging her feet—she knew exactly where the gate was. She could see the blue will-o’-the-wisps flying up and down the narrow passageway, darting this way and that as they flew toward the gate.

Carys ran her fingers along the dirty stone wall, anchoring herself to the solid reality of the buildings as the darkness pressed in.

Other than the fae gate behind her house in California, she’d never walked through a gate on her own before, much less guided a magical creature through the passageway.

Grit and moss gathered under her fingertips as she walked, and Carys absorbed everything her senses could detect.

The sound of her boots slapping on damp stone.

The press of dark shadows on either side of the narrow alley.

The smell of the river and roasting meat from the market.

What kind of meat? She didn’t want to guess.

Her fingers dragged over a gritty line of brick; then cold fingers grabbed her wrist.

Carys jumped back, yanking her arm away from whatever creature had grabbed it, but she wasn’t able to get away from the shadows, and instead, she dragged a tall, thin figure covered in wool rags.

The Crow Mother uttered a breathy curse and snarled, “What are you doing here?”

The creature lifted its head, pushed back the dark cowl around his wild hair, and Dru stepped into a beam of light coming from a second-story window.

“What trouble are you about this night, mother?” The corner of the fae’s mouth turned up. “And what trouble have you dragged my friend into?”

“None but what she bargained for, Diarmuid.”

Carys was a little bit shocked that Dru considered her a friend, but in the company of the Crow Mother, she’d take it. Cadell still couldn’t hear her, and she didn’t have any kind of weapon secreted in her ball gown.

That was a lesson learned.

“Hey, Dru.” She let out a slow breath. “Kind of surprised to see you here.”

Was he following her? Following the Crow Mother?

Or did Dru have his own schemes that had nothing to do with either of them?

Dru hooked his thumbs in the band of leather around his waist, lifting his chin and pushing his shoulders back. He was the canny bartender again, not the Green Man, the woodland prince, or the beggar in rags.

“This woman made that bargain not knowing your true nature,” he said.

“But she made it nonetheless.”

Carys whispered, “I did make a bargain, Dru.”

Dru nodded. “And so you’ll pay the old one.” His eyes narrowed. “I do wonder what you’re about.”

Branwen cackled. “You’ll find out in time, and it’s no trouble for you or your kind.” She leaned closer to Dru. “In fact, it might just be to your benefit.”

A muscle in Dru’s cheek jumped, and a glimmer of light ran along the sigil at his right temple. “I’ll go along then. I see that Carys’s dragon is absent from her company this night. I’ll be happy to be her guide.”

“I tried calling him,” Carys said. “But I couldn’t seem to connect.”

“Not necessary,” the Crow Mother said.

Dru’s voice crackled with power. “Try to stop me, old woman.”

Carys put a hand on his arm. “I would appreciate having company on the way back.”

“Very well.” She cocked her head. “The elf prince is correct. I cannot stop him from following us.”

“Let’s get on with it.” Dru glanced over his shoulder. “There’s a dragon in the air.”

The black shadows of the fae gate were just as dense as Carys remembered, and Branwen clutched her hand as they walked, hissing in surprise a few times but never releasing her.

It could have been minutes. It might have been an hour.

Carys followed the narrow corridor and the blue lights of the wisps where they led her, ducking around corners and stepping over obstacles that seemed to reach up from the ground below.

She felt a tugging in her belly, a pull of knowing in her gut as the pressure in the air eased and the whispering in the shadows eased away. When Carys saw a low light gleaming from the end of the passageway under the shop on Knightsbridge Road, she blinked in surprise.

Not only had she led the Crow Mother to the Brightlands, but the sun was shining in London.

Branwen was whispering under her breath, and her fingers dug into Carys’s wrist. “We’re there. We’re nearly there now.”

The rabid excitement in her voice made Carys want to wrest her arm away and run back to the Shadowlands, but she couldn’t get away from the old fae if she tried.

This is your promise.

Do this and you’ll be free.

The wisps pressed around her, high and hissing voices that sighed and tickled her ears. They were speaking in hushed tones so fast that the mass of their voices crowded into Carys’s mind, and she felt the beginnings of a headache starting to grow in her temples.

Under her feet, she felt the change from smooth earth to wooden floor, and moments later, her toe hit the first low step.

“Ouch!” she whispered. “I don’t know why I’m whispering.” Carys turned and started up the stairs but turned when she didn’t hear anyone behind her. “Are you there?”

“Am I welcome then?” The Crow Mother looked up, and her eyes were luminous. “Am I welcome in the light?”

“Come on.” Carys gave her a hurry-up gesture and kept climbing. “This is what you traded for, remember?”

“Not far now.” Dru kept his voice mild. “Up you go, old mother, into the land that’s forgotten who you are.”

The Crow Mother sang, “But they’ll remember me again.”

Carys glanced over her shoulder to see the woman’s dark eyes had faded to the color of a winter sky, and her cheeks were pink. She looked… surprisingly human. Her magic was draining, and she was becoming mundane.

They climbed a half flight of stairs, and Carys pushed open the leather-padded red door that swung into…

A bustling restaurant with a crush of early-morning diners. Silver carts sped by, laden with stacked trays of dim sum as servers shouted orders across the room.

Branwen blinked, and then a huge smile spread across her face. “Children of light.”

Someone rushed toward them, speaking in rapid Chinese, and Dru answered them in kind as the Crow Mother dragged Carys toward the door.

They burst through the glass-fronted door and onto a bustling street crowded with cars, pedestrians, scooters, and bikes.

“What is this wonder?” The Crow Mother spun in place, turning her face up to the morning sun as she spread her arms and whispered something under her breath. “This decay and this dirt?”

Decay and dirt? Well, that was one way to look at the human world.

“Okay.” Carys watched her carefully, but in the morning sunshine, the Crow Mother looked like a completely ordinary human woman even if she was preternaturally pale and more than a little morbid. “Well, here you are. The sun is beautiful, right?”

It was gorgeous, and so bright Carys wanted to strip off her wool tunic and bathe in the light. She took a deep breath of air that… Well, it wasn’t fresh. But it also didn’t smell of magic or trolls or river monsters, so there was that.

Dru walked onto the sidewalk behind them, dodging a green scooter that sped by. “There you are, old mother. Is the sun as you remember it, or are you waiting for the moon?”

The Crow Mother’s head swung back and forth so quickly, Carys worried it was going to twist off completely.

Dru snapped, “Badb.”

The Crow Mother turned her pale grey eyes toward Dru, and the corner of her mouth turned up in the hint of a smile. “I’ll be going now, Mo Diarmuid. I trust you won’t tell anyone what’s happened here.”

“That’s a ridiculous request that I have no intention of keeping,” Dru said. “And neither does Carys. We’re not your confidantes.” He nodded at the street. “Go. Cause your little mischiefs, whatever they might be.” Dru took Carys’s hand and drew her away from Branwen. “We’ll be off.”

As Dru pulled Carys back from the sidewalk and into the restaurant, she kept her eyes on the black-haired woman until she melted into the passing foot traffic along Knightsbridge Road.

She looked up at Dru. “What’s the rush?”

“There’s trouble on the other side of the gate,” Dru said, his voice grim. “The dragon is not pleased.”