“I didn’t know,” said Arden. “All the reports we had said ‘shaggy black canines,’ but they weren’t specific enough to let us figure out what kind of fae dog we were dealing with.”
“They’re good dogs,” said Madden. He turned to me. “They’ll come with me now. If that’s okay with you. I can call my brothers and sisters, and they’ll come to Muir Woods to get the Mauthe Doog that were here and take them back to the house before we come back and start looking for the rest. Any that are missing, we’ll find, once the pack trusts us.”
Cu Sidhe like to live in large family groups, almost like packs, but without the social posturing and structure that humans have tried to assign to the word. They just want to be with other dogs. I could understand that. It’s nice to be around people who understand you. “Sure, Madden,” I said. “Do you need us to help you carry them?”
“There’s only two who don’t feel like they can walk so good, and I can get them,” he said. “Arden, can you hold the door?”
“For you, the world,” she said, with a faint smile. Arden and Madden had been friends since long before she had come back to Faerie and allowed herself to become a Queen. Their relationship wasn’t romantic, and that was probably a good thing; she needed a friend more than she needed a lover. I knew what that was like. “Sir Daye, I’m going to need you and your people to come by the knowe to give me a full report. Shall I see you tonight?”
“As soon as we finish cleaning up here,” I said. None of us had physical magic, but we could kick away the footprints in the sand and bury the blood, making it look like the salt flats had been invaded by a bunch of kids playing soccer or something, not a group of heavily armed fae having a pitched battle with supernatural dogs. That, too, was part of my job. The human world and Faerie were separate for a reason, and I had to help hold that line.
“Can I come visit the doggies?” asked Danny, looking at Madden.
Madden smiled. “We will welcome you,” he said. He stooped to lift the second badly injured Mauthe Doog onto his shoulder, and then he stepped through the portal. The rest of the black dogs flowed through at his feet, vanishing from the salt flats and reappearing in the shadows of Muir Woods. Arden looked briefly nonplussed. Then the last dog was through, and she lowered her hand, closing the portal.
Danny, Quentin, Tybalt, and I stood alone on the sand in silence for a few moments. Two dead Mauthe Doog lay further down the beach, their necks broken, the blood running from their open mouths tinting the ground where they had fallen. The night-haunts would come for their bodies soon enough; we just needed to take care of the tracks.
Quentin spoke first. “So this was fun.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“We should do this every week,” he said.
“I will drown you in the ocean and send your parents a very nice card to tell them how sorry I am,” I said.
“Be sure you include a gift card for Tim Hortons,” he said. “That’s how we say ‘sorry for killing your firstborn son’ in Canada.”
I laughed. So did Quentin. Tybalt just snorted, while Danny looked confused. All in all, it was a pretty normal night for us, and the fact that we had to clean up our own mess just continued the theme.
“All right, boys, let’s kick some sand around before we go to visit the Queen,” I said, and sheathed my sword. A hero’s work was never done.
TWO
FAE TEND TO BE nocturnal by nature. That’s probably the only thing that’s really protecting us from being discovered—or rather, rediscovered—by humanity. We used to show ourselves a lot more, which explains all those fairy tales and folk stories and popular ballads about the merry, merry greenwood ho. We also used to steal livestock and “borrow” human women to raise our children. And we used to find ourselves burnt and stabbed and killed with iron on a regular basis, because while our worlds may have been meant to coexist, they were never intended to do it peacefully.
So yes, not being chased by angry mobs is a benefit of the nocturnal lifestyle. The other nice thing about it is the people, or rather, the lack thereof. We didn’t bother spinning human disguises for ourselves before we got in the car: there was no one around to see us. The normally ninety-minute drive from Marin to Muir Woods only took about an hour. Quentin spent the whole time complaining about the fact that I wouldn’t let him change the radio, while Tybalt spent it staring through the windshield, fingers clenched white-knuckled against the dash. It should probably have been reassuring that there was something that scared him, apart from my tendency to rush headlong into certain doom. Instead, Tybalt’s reaction to cars just reminded me of how much older he was than me, and left me feeling uneasy and off-balance.
Danny had left us in the parking lot in Marin where I’d stowed my car and he’d stowed his cab. “It’s not that I don’t like the new Queen an’ all, but every time I go with you to visit royalty, somebody winds up dead or exiled or whatever,” he’d said, with disturbingly accurate logic. “I figure if I just go on home, you won’t have to worry about it.”
“I’ll call you later,” I’d promised, and endured his clumsily patting me on the shoulder before he turned and lumbered back to his cab. Bridge Trolls can’t be physically demonstrative with most denizens of Faerie. There’s too much of a chance that they’ll accidentally break us.
There were no cars visible in the parking lot at Muir Woods when we arrived. There could have been anything from junkers to horse-drawn carriages hidden under illusions and complicated don’t-look-here spells, but since most of those also come with mild aversions and “please don’t park on top of me” suggestions, I didn’t worry overly much as I steered my car into a parking space and killed the engine.
“All right, everybody out,” I said.
Tybalt didn’t have to be told twice. He practically kicked his door open, retreating to the edge of the parking lot while he waited for me and Quentin to follow him. Quentin snickered, but there was no malice in the sound. He was just amused, and he knew he was safe enough that he could get away with expressing it. It felt good to know he was that relaxed. Not many Crown Princes get to grow up feeling like they’re allowed to be happy. Not in Faerie, anyway.
The thought reminded me of something. I glanced at Quentin as we got out of the car and walked toward Tybalt. “Hey,” I said. “Don’t you have a birthday coming up?”
“I’ll be eighteen on Lughnasa,” he said.
“Is there anything you wanted to do for your birthday this year? Eighteen’s a pretty big deal. We could have a party. May loves parties.”
“Eighteen’s a big deal for humans, maybe,” said Quentin. He grinned, the light from the lamps around the parking lot throwing gold highlights off his dark bronze hair. He’d looked like a dandelion when we first met, all pale yellow fluff with no real substance. Now he was taller than I was, and finally starting to fill out. It was unnerving. My squire wasn’t supposed to grow up. “Ask me again when I come of age.”
“So we hold off on the grand bacchanal until you turn thirty. Got it.” I looked back to Tybalt, allowing my face to relax into a wide, only slightly mocking smile. “You know, you’re going to have to get used to riding in cars eventually. I’m never going to learn how to teleport, and that means I’m going to keep driving everywhere.”
“Must you taunt me so cruelly?” Tybalt asked.
“Yes, I must,” I said, and offered him my hand. He took it, tucking it gently into the crook of his arm. It was an old-fashioned way to walk, but it made him happy, and I was all in favor of things that made Tybalt happy. He shook his head, still feigning offense at my comments about the car, and started walking toward the woods. Quentin followed close behind us, for once not ranging wildly ahead. Fighting a bunch of disoriented fae dogs and cleaning up the signs of the struggle had tired him out, at least for the moment. Knowing Quentin, he would bounce back soon. In the meantime, I got to keep everyone where I could see them.