The Unkindest Tide (October Daye #13) - Seanan McGuire Page 0,58
been when they’d come to visit us on the land. This was their home. This was where they belonged.
Quentin looked over and saw us, waving somewhat laconically. So he was annoyed, but willing to swallow it for the sake of his boyfriend’s parents. Good to know. “The delegation from Saltmist has arrived,” he called. “In case you missed it while you were running off and leaving me behind.”
Okay, maybe not so much with the swallowing it. “I see that,” I said. “Is Dianda actually trying to kill her eldest son, or is this how Merrow say hello?”
“Mostly the latter,” said the Luidaeg. “I once attended a Merrow wedding that was three days of the wedding party punching each other. It might have gone on longer, but the guests felt left out and staged a siege.”
“Who won?” I asked.
She grinned toothily. “They were all so busy punching each other that they forgot to guard the cake. So, really, I did.”
I shook my head. “Right.”
Dean embraced his mother, still laughing. I took that as a sign that it was safe to approach: Dianda probably wouldn’t have let him get that close if she’d been considering the virtues of a second assault.
Patrick didn’t seem to notice our arrival. He kept staring at Poppy, and as I got closer, I saw the tears running down his cheeks—and hers. Poppy’s tears glowed with a pale orange light, much like her body used to, back when she’d been a true pixie and not one of the Aes Sidhe. Patrick’s tears were just tears, saltwater shed and returning to the ocean, where all such things belong.
Dianda released Dean and whirled on me, reaching out to initiate another hug. Then she froze, eyes going to a point behind me, and I swallowed a sigh. She’d seen the Luidaeg. Of course she had.
“We’re here because the Luidaeg called a Convocation,” I said patiently. “I think it makes sense that she’d be here.”
“Right,” said Dianda. The playful violence she’d been displaying when we arrived was gone. Her voice was faint; she looked like she was considering the virtues of passing out.
Under any other circumstances, it might have been amusing to see the normally brash Merrow rendered silent and on the edge of shaking. Maybe. I don’t necessarily enjoy seeing my friends and allies suffer. Sure, they don’t always extend the same courtesy to me, but part of being a hero is learning how to rise above.
“What’s with Patrick?” If I could distract her, she might stop staring past me with that mixture of longing and dismay in her eyes, like she wanted nothing more than to reach for the Luidaeg, knowing with absolute certainty that if she did, she’d pay for her impertinence.
Dianda glanced at her husband and some of the dismay left her face, replaced by fondness. She really did love him. They’d been married for more than a hundred years, and she still looked at him like he was the greatest treasure in all of Faerie. I hoped I’d still look at Tybalt like that after we’d been together for a century.
“The tall orange woman, whose name is ‘Poppy,’ apparently used to be a pixie,” she said. “Did you know pixies could turn into full-sized people? Because I didn’t.”
“I didn’t either, until Poppy did it,” I said, all too aware of Tybalt and the Luidaeg at my back. Neither of them had said anything. I was surprisingly grateful for that. “She’s Aes Sidhe now. She gave up whatever it is that makes a pixie a pixie willingly, to save Simon Torquill.”
Patrick jerked a little, his hands tightening on Poppy’s until she grimaced. He loosened his grip. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” she said, and smiled radiantly through her tears. “You’re here and alive and looking at me and I can talk to you, and that’s about the better part of everything. I can go back to the swarm and tell Lilac I saw you.”
His eyes widened, and the rest of us were forgotten again. “Lilac? She’s alive?”
“Alive and thriving and still flying sure and strong.”
Patrick’s laugh was small and choked. He turned to Dianda. “Lilac is the pixie whose wing I repaired, back when we were first courting. The little girl, the one who’d been injured by someone looking to collect lights for a garden party.”
“I remember.” She turned to Poppy, bowing her head in respectful acknowledgment. “It’s very nice to finally meet you. I’m sorry to have stolen Patrick away.”