The Unkindest Tide (October Daye #13) - Seanan McGuire Page 0,178

was born a Prince of Cats. That’s what I am. It’s what I have to be, whether I like it or not—and I do like it, Helen. I really, really do. I’m powerful and I’m well-taught and I’m going to keep my people safe from monsters like the one who hurt us. I love you. I love my people, too. I’m not going to turn my back on them because I’d rather be with you.”

“That’s what your Uncle’s doing,” she snapped, and everything suddenly made sense.

“Helen . . .” I stopped, catching myself before I said anything I wouldn’t be able to take back. When I tried again, I kept my voice softer, kept my eyes steady on hers. “My uncle has been King of Cats in San Francisco for more than a hundred years. He’s earned a break. He’s earned a chance to heal from everything that’s been done to him. I don’t want to be King yet. I want to be a teenager. I want to kiss you and tell you you’re beautiful, and let things go wrong without feeling like I have to take care of them. But I can’t do that if it means forcing my uncle to stay and become a bad King.”

“He’s losing his throne because he loves Toby,” said Helen.

I nodded.

“You’ll leave me because you have to put your people over me.”

I hesitated before I nodded again. “If I have to. I don’t want to. Helen, I want to stay with you more than anything. But I think . . . I think you need someone to talk to. Someone who isn’t me or your father. You’re not getting better. You’re still scared all the time. That’s not good for you. It’s not healthy.”

She laughed unsteadily. “Who do you want me to talk to? I can’t exactly go down to the local urgent care and ask for a therapist with experience dealing with fae issues.”

“Why not?”

She blinked at me. “Did you hit your head against that car? You know why not.”

“I really mean it. Why not?” I stood, still holding her hands. “Your Queen in the Mists lived in the human world for like, a hundred years, and her Chatelaine’s a changeling, and my regent used to be a changeling. Toby knows all the halfbloods and thin-bloods and everybody. I bet someone out there knows a fae therapist. Someone you could talk to without betraying any secrets, because they already know them!”

Helen scoffed, turning her face away. “Therapy is for humans.”

“Therapy is for people who need to talk about their problems so they can get better. I mean, honestly, most of the purebloods I know would really benefit from some professional help. They get so messed up, and then they never talk about it, until one day they wander off into the nearest forest, or go evil and try to kill everyone, or decide they’d be better off as monsters. Can you imagine how much easier everything would be if people made better choices? Or at least choices that involved less knives?”

There was a long, long silence before Helen asked, in a small voice, “Do you really think there’s someone out there who helps people like us? Who’d be willing to talk to me? I’m just a changeling.”

The urge to scratch everyone who’d ever made her feel that way—including, at times, myself—rose in my breast, the way it always did when she talked about herself that way. Like she didn’t matter. “If there’s one thing I can be absolutely sure of after spending the last several years following October around, it’s that there’s no such thing as ‘just’ a changeling. Everyone’s different. Everyone’s important. You matter so much, and it . . . it scares me sometimes, thinking about the way you’re shutting yourself away in here. I won’t always be able to come make sure the world hasn’t forgotten about you.”

She looked back to me, eyes abruptly distant. “You’re going to break up with me, aren’t you? As soon as you become King, you’re going to break up with me.”

“Maybe.” I didn’t see the point in lying to her now, not when she was already upset. It would just make things worse later. “I might have to. I don’t know. Or maybe I won’t have to. Uncle Tybalt was dating October for a while before anyone started talking about abdication. She gets into a lot more trouble than you do. We could probably be a couple for a long time before you