not know what I thought.” Soft and measured, as if each word was not a knife to her heart. “I taught him the names of the stars. And she…”
The Armormaster shifted, uncomfortably. “He was dead the moment he was taken. All of us were.”
Is that what you think? “It would be a relief if that were true.”
“Maybe.” Then, the question she had been dreading. “Is it true? Daisy Snowe. Daisy Elaine.”
She blinked. It’s a common name. All common names. Just like mine was before I chose the truer ones.
“She had a mole.” He touched the underside of his jaw, on the left side. “Here. And her toes—the second and third were the same length. She sang gospel while she was in the shower, and her favorite flowers were—”
“Dandelions,” Robin whispered. “We had a song about them, when we were little. I used to hum it to her when…” When they were fighting. Or when Daddy Snowe was yelling and Mama sobbing. Daisy in her arms, a heavy weight, she rocked her sister while the noise battered their flimsy bedroom door.
You’re so warm, Rob.
Just as she’d rocked Sean, kissing the top of his head where the smell of Seelie, salt dust, and mortal child concentrated in his tumbled hair. Running through the orchard with Robin at his side, fleet of foot and laughing while she watched for pitfalls.
Gallow sagged against the cracked purple vinyl of the booth. He’d gone quite alarmingly pale. Robin returned to herself with a jolt, staring at him. Was it even possible?
I have me a man, Daisy had said, and I want the rest of it. Please, Rob.
Robin studied Gallow afresh. Yes, Daisy would like him. Strong-jawed, those pale eyes, and the broad shoulders. He was the very antithesis of short, pretty-faced Daddy Snowe. You had to look harder at Gallow to find the sidhe on him, behind the scornful mortal dross he wore like a cloak.
It didn’t seem to be a glamour. Everything about him simply denied comfort with a vengeance.
“Was she happy?” She curled her fingers around the mug, soaking in the warmth. “Did you… Were you kind to her?”
“Kind?” His laughter was as bitter as hers, as if he had a mouthful of rot. “I would have died for her. I would have given her anything she wanted. I tried. But maybe I wasn’t kind.” A muscle in his cheek flicked. His stubble was coming in, a charcoal brushing. “I’m not mortal enough for kindness.” One corner of his mouth tilted up, just slightly. “Neither are you, it seems.”
How would you know? It shouldn’t have stung, but it did. She dropped her gaze back into the coffee-sludge. “She wants the vials.”
“What vials?”
“The plague.” Robin wet her lips nervously. “There is… a cure. An inoculation. Summer snared a mortal of science to make one. He sent word that he had succeeded. I was sent to fetch it from the one who told her of its existence. That’s where…” No, Robin. Be careful. Don’t allow Puck further into this game than he already is. “Unwinter’s knight almost caught me. Then… you.”
“Ah.” He didn’t ask if the Unseelie had somehow loosed the plague in the first place. It was the obvious question, and no sidhe would wish to be too obvious. “And you bargained with her?”
“I told her I wouldn’t bring the ampoules back until she released Sean and guaranteed his family, with no ill effects…” Abruptly, she was aware of how childish it sounded. Had she thought she could outfox a creature so old? The very Queen of Seelie herself?
“Stupid.” He drummed callused fingers on the tabletop. The place was slowly filling, mortals straggling in to eat whatever passed for food here. Hissing in the kitchens, almost the same as Peleaster the Cook’s steaming hell—but not quite. She had explored the Court kitchens more than once. It had never sounded like this.
This inimical.
Robin was used to hating the mortal world. Now, she realized, she hated Summer, too. Would she find a home in Unwinter, then? You could not trust an Unseelie to honor a bargain, the Summer sidhe said, and their King was darkness itself. His pride had caused the Sundering, ’twas said, but before that he had been Summer’s Consort, a match for her indeed.
Robin had only glimpsed Unwinter’s cheerless country once or twice, and had no desire to ever see its cinder-rain and crimson spatters again.
A shudder worked through her. There would be no place to rest, not for a long while. The man