her fingers when her attention slipped—when he coughed, or moved in the darkened bedroom. It was like working while Daddy Snowe was sleeping, except without the guilty start every time a car door slammed or a mortal voice called.
Cold iron in his jacket pocket interfered with the mending, so she drew it out. And there was something else.
The Polaroid was ancient, and there on the third step of Mama’s trailer were Daisy and Robin. That day had been hot and dusty, she remembered, and the rent was late. But Mama said smile, so they did, Robin’s arm around Daisy, who had been promised an ice cream stolen from the corner store if she was good and didn’t cry because there was no dinner. The trailer was dark, too, because the power company didn’t like it when you didn’t pay.
They both knew Mama would let Daddy Snowe come back in when he showed up. Because at least he’d pay the bills, even if his fists flew and Mama could only do things right some of the time. That day, though, it had been just them, and Daisy’s sweet warmth nestling beside her.
She heard him moving. The needle-chantment was finished, so she laid the coat gently on the back of the couch and was settled with the Polaroid clasped in her hand when Gallow appeared, moving stiffly as an old man.
His jeans were unbuttoned, dark hair reaching up his chest. A silver medallion winked among the forest, the Horn’s camouflage. Muscle moved under his skin, and along his side the angry red scar of Unwinter’s poisoned blade. She had done all she could.
It didn’t feel like enough. Nothing, in fact, ever did.
He blinked, rubbing at his green eyes. Robin’s chest ached, and her throat was full.
When he braced himself against the wall and regarded her again, she was ready. She laid the photograph aside, with one last long, lingering look.
Robin-mama. And all the stars of Summer’s dusk. Now dead, dry fires. You’re so warm, Rob.
Not warm enough to keep mortal death at bay.
“I saw her that day,” Robin heard herself say dully. “She… she had come to me. She wanted… to conceive.” Trouble with her lady parts. Who should we blame for that, I wonder? Curse or just bad luck? “We argued a little, she called it root magic but she wanted it anyhow. I went and bargained for a chantment. That nonsense, just like Mama called it. She thought I was maybe deluded, but it was worth a try.” Was her mouth twisting down bitterly? Maybe. “That night… She… she asked me if I’d stand godmother, if she… I said I would, and I left her. I wish I hadn’t. I wish…” She licked her dry lips. “Once I had it, I waited where we usually met, but she didn’t come.”
He said nothing. So Robin continued. “She said she had a man, and a fine one, and she wanted the rest of it, too. She was… happy. I know she was. You made her happy.”
“Robin…” As if he’d been punched.
“When I could leave Summer again I found her buried, and I… I am sorry, Gallow. The chantment… maybe someone saw me speak to her. Maybe…”
“Car accident.” He swallowed audibly. He was pale. “A ditch, a tree… It wasn’t your fault.”
She closed her eyes briefly, sagging. The relief threatened to break a fragile wall between her and more useless weeping.
I will never weep again. When she could, she stood, slowly. Stood in the middle of his mortal trailer, his mortal life.
Sister a-broken, Puck sneered inside her head. Yet another account to balance. She braced herself. “You went into Summer. You took her the cure.”
“I had to. She would have killed you when you returned, one way or another—”
“Why do you care? Because I look like her?”
“She looked like you.” Fiercely now. He pushed himself away from the wall and tacked out across the living room. The floor creaked a little. “Robin, I’m not kind, and I’m not asking for—”
“I am not Daisy.” Each word a knife. “I will never be your mortal love, Gallow. We are at quits, and I’ll not darken your door again.”
“Robin.” He dug in his jeans pocket, and when he drew the locket out it was barely a surprise. It swung from his fingers, a traitor because it yearned toward him. “I would go with you. I would ask you to stay. I would also give this back to you.”
She was a traitor, too, if only with craving.