them anywhere," Pierce said. "They're a paltry seven-by-nine warrior without their wings. I opine, I mean, I think it's a slow, starving death they face. Living on one's own hook the way they do."
"I can't do anything right, can I?" We had reached the back living room, and I glanced at the new clock Ivy had put on the mantel, wondering if it had come from Piscary's. An hour after sunrise, and I'm still alive. How about that?
"It's not an issue of right or wrong," Pierce said as he reached to open the door. "I like that you create choices where none exist. I'm anxious to see how you make a fist of this, though."
"You're not going to help me, are you?" I asked, and he grinned.
"Sakes' alive, Rachel. Asking me to think is a powerful task."
My eyebrows rose, but I was in a much better mood when the sounds of the garden slipped around me. Taking a deep breath, I stepped out onto the small back porch.
The garden and graveyard beyond it weren't bad. From the vantage point atop the stairs, I could see a wide ring of burnt earth where the curse had begun to take hold at the edges, ribbons of wilting vegetation making random paths, like lightning, to it from where we had sheltered under Pierce's bubble. Imagining everything burnt made me sick. One of my neighbors was outside looking at the damage to his lawn, but he went in when he saw me. Wise choice.
Someone - Ivy, presumably - had turned the picnic table upright, and the fairies had been moved to it. They were in a circle, probably for their protection. A stash of cotton, medical tape, and antiseptic were in there with them. Two of the most able fairies were using their sharp teeth to cut the medical tape since their swords were currently being sported by Jenks's children. I'd always wondered where his kids got fairy steel. Now I knew.
The pixies hovering above them were not being nice. Pierce was right. This was bad. I couldn't ask Jenks to let them stay in the garden under his protection. He'd never forgive me, and it would probably kill the fairies. Death by pride.
Ivy looked up from dabbing an antibiotic cream on her arm as I schlumped down the stairs. Rising, she came over with a bandage, glancing back once at the fairies when Jenks's kids started shouting a vulgar song at them. "You okay?" she asked as she handed me the bandage and I pulled the tape off, fixing it in place over the tiny scratch and surrounding bruise.
"Not really." I crumpled up the tape and shoved it in a pocket. Behind me, Pierce eased over to the table, sitting down and forcing the pixies back with his presence. "How about you?"
She shrugged, and our attention went to Ceri, her back to us and her dress charmingly tied up around her knees as she knelt in the grass and helped three of Jenks's youngest kids prop up a bush that had gotten caught in the vanguard heat trails.
"Sorry for running off like that," I said. "Is Ceri still mad at me?"
Her eyes came back to me, a wide rim of brown around them in the sun. Nodding, she said, "Jenks caught a scout on his way to send word to the coven that the attack failed. Chased him down the block. We've got a small space before they send something else, I imagine, unless they're watching us."
I hope not, I thought, wondering if Vivian had seen it all. "Where's the scout?"
"Funny you should ask." She started back to the table, not answering my question.
Pierce looked up from a conversation with the fairy that Jenks had almost killed in front of me. I wondered what the fairy was saying - his thoughts I'd almost permanently silenced. Not ready to talk to him, I looked to Ceri. Pulling my shoulders up, I reluctantly went to her. The pixies with her scattered at her soft word, and I sighed.
"Don't talk to me," she said curtly as she tended the shrub. "I'm angry with you."
Her hands were busy with the plant, and I knelt beside her, my knees getting damp again. "I'm sorry," I said, thinking it was weird to apologize for not killing someone. "I couldn't do it."
Ceri pressed new dirt around the shrub. Her fair hair swung, but her motions were losing their sharpness. I handed her a twig to prop up a stem, and