by an expectant hush. Sylvester looked at us and faltered. Luna stepped forward, ready to catch him if he fell. He took her hand and cleared his throat again, steadier now. Sylvester never falls; he just teeters on the edge. I’ve never seen him refuse a helping hand. He’s one of the bravest men I know. He survives.
“In the beginning, we were given a promise,” he said. His voice was almost too soft to hear, and still loud enough to carry to every corner of the grove. I don’t know where he found the funeral rites; there have been no funerals in Faerie since the night- haunts were born. But part of me recognized his words—they were the right ones. He found the right words.
“We were told we would live forever,” he continued, looking straight at me. “That promise has been betrayed, and now Countess January ap Learianth, who lived among the mortals as January O’Leary, lies slain. She has crossed the line from which there is no coming back, and the promise we were given did not protect her.”
He turned and leaned over the pyre, kissing her forehead before looking over the crowd once more. “She was my sister’s daughter. She was my niece and the mother to my grandniece, and a thousand things to a thousand people, and she is gone. Mortality can strike even the immortal. Remember that, and keep the ones you love around you, and live each day as well as you can.” He glanced toward the edge of the crowd. I followed his gaze and saw Raysel standing there, arms folded, looking bored. Oh, Sylvester. It’s always the good ones that die.
“But there is hope.” He took a deep breath, and repeated, “There is hope. In a world where one promise can be broken, perhaps others can be kept. She may yet find peace . . . but she will find it without us.” He waved his hand and the pyre burst into flames. He straightened and stepped away. “Good-bye, my dear one,” he said, even more quietly.
Jan remained visible through the smoke for a brief moment; then it closed around her, and she was gone. She didn’t save Faerie—she didn’t even save herself. She lived and died and left us mourning for her, and for all the lost souls of ALH, both the living and the dead. None of us got out the way we went in.
Not one.
Watching the smoke curling against the amber sky, it was hard to believe anything could last forever. Maybe Jan was right; maybe Faerie was dying, and this was the last gasp of a world that was already on the way out . . . but there was still time. April would rule Tamed Lightning in Jan’s place. If there was a way to bring back the others—Barbara and Yui, Peter and Colin, even Terrie—she’d find it. Elliot and Alex would have time to rebuild their lives; Quentin would have time to heal; I’d have time to remember that not everything ends badly. We all had time, and a second chance to survive.
I would find my mother, and find out what was wrong with her. Why she’d broken; why, when she saw me crossing the grove, she’d chosen to run.
I put my arm around Quentin’s shoulders, keeping my eyes on the sky. Maybe Faerie is dying, and maybe nothing lasts forever, but I’m going to believe Sylvester. Something endures, no matter what happens.
Something lasts.
Coming in September 2010 The third October Daye novel from
SEANAN MCGUIRE
AN ARTIFICIAL NIGHT
Read on for a sneak preview.
LILY GRABBED MY WRISTS, and yanked me forward. There was time to yelp and catch my breath: then I was falling through a curtain of water, with Tybalt shouting in the distance. After that, I was just falling.
I hit the ground hip-first, rolling to a stop before I sat up. I was dry despite my fall through the water, and my hands didn’t hurt anymore. I looked at them and laughed as I saw that the skin was whole and smooth again. Well, I guess that’s one way to heal someone, assuming you go in for slapstick. “Lily, that wasn’t—” I stopped, blinking. “—funny?”
The knowe stretched out around me in an array of ponds and flatlands, all connected by narrow bridges. Lily, Tybalt, and Karen were gone. “Tybalt?” No one answered. I stood, automatically reaching up to shove my hair back, and stopped as my fingers encountered a tight interweave of knots and hairpins. I pulled one