Melissa Marr - Fragile Eternity

“Fine. I’ll go see him.”

She followed him into the study. The room was one of the two that were Keenan’s domain. The other—his bedroom—wasn’t one she ever entered, but the study was where they usually went when it was just the two of them. She felt weird going in there without him. The Summer Girls sometimes curled up on the sofa with a book, but they had no interest in keeping boundaries with Keenan. Aislinn did. The closer summer crept, the more she felt a pull toward him—which she didn’t want.

Aislinn stood just inside the doorway, trying not to feel ill at ease about being in his space. He kept telling her that the loft was hers as much as his, that everything was hers now. Her name was on store accounts, credit cards, bank cards. She ignored them, so he went for more subtle gestures, things that he thought would make her feel at home in the loft. Little threads to tie me. It wasn’t obvious at first glance that he’d changed the study again, but if she looked around the somber room, small things would be different. She didn’t live there, but she spent enough time at the loft that it was a second— third —home these days. Her nights were divided among home, Seth’s, and the loft. She kept clothes and toiletries in all three places. Her real home, the apartment she shared with Grams, was the only place where she was treated like she was normal. At home she wasn’t a faery queen; she was just a girl who needed to do a bit better in calculus.

While she stood tentatively at the door, Keenan sat at one end of a dark brown leather sofa. Someone had set out a pitcher of ice water; condensation was rolling down the sides of it in little rivulets. It puddled on the surface of the slab of agate that served as a coffee table. He tossed away one of the newest pillows, an oversized deep green thing without any ostentatious decorations. “Donia won’t see me.”

Aislinn closed the door behind her. “What for this time?”

“Maybe over asking about Bananach. Maybe still over this business with Niall. Maybe something…else—” Keenan broke off midthought and scowled.

“Did she talk to you at all?” Briefly, Aislinn rested her hand on his forearm before going to the other end of the sofa. She kept her distance by habit, breaking it only for etiquette or gestures of friendship, but every day it grew more difficult to keep that distance.

“No. I was stopped at the door again , refused admittance to the house. ‘Unless it is official business,’ Evan said. For three days, she’s been unavailable and now this.”

“Evan is just doing his job.”

“And enjoying it, I’m sure.” Keenan was not very good at rejection of any sort; Aislinn had figured that out back when she was still mortal.

She switched the topic. “It seems odd that she’d be upset over Niall now or over us asking about Bananach.”

“Exactly. Once Niall calms down, his holding the Dark Court can be an asset to both of our courts. She’s—”

“No. I mean, she seemed calm enough when we left the other day. Not happy but not truly angry.” Aislinn hugged a pillow to her like a big stuffed toy. Talk of the intricacies of faery relationships and courts and of grudges between faeries with centuries of history made her feel so very young. Many of the faeries might look—and often act—like her classmates at school, but the whole longevity thing made life far more complicated. Brief relationships spanned decades; long friendships stretched over centuries; betrayals of yesterday and decades and centuries past all cut deeply. It was a challenge to navigate.

“Am I missing something?” she asked.

Keenan watched her with a pensive expression. “You know, Niall was like that. He helped me focus, went straight to the point….” His words drifted away as tiny clouds shifted in his eyes, a promise of rain as yet unfulfilled.

“You miss him.”

“I do. I’m sure he’s a great king…. I just wish it wasn’t of such a vile court. I handled things poorly,” he said.

“We both messed up there. I ignored things that I should’ve reacted to, and you—” Aislinn stopped herself. Rehashing Keenan’s deceits and the consequences for Leslie and for Niall yet again wasn’t going to help. “We both made mistakes.”

Leslie’s being caught in the heart of the Dark Court was Aislinn’s fault too. She’d failed one of her closest friends—and she’d failed Niall. Aislinn shared the weight of the responsibility for the actions of the Summer Court. It was why she was trying to work on a closer relationship with Keenan: they had joint responsibility, and if she was going to bear the guilt for his less palatable actions she needed to know what they were in advance.

And stop them if they’re awful.

“And they made bad choices. We aren’t the ones responsible for that.” Keenan couldn’t have said it if it was a lie, but it was an opinion. Opinions were shaky territory with the faeries-don’t-lie rule.

“We aren’t absolved either. You kept things from me…and they paid the consequences.” She had not entirely forgiven him for his using Leslie or Niall, but unlike Donia, Aislinn had no choice but to get along with the Summer King. Unless one of them died, they were bound together for eternity or until they no longer held the Summer Court—and faery rulers tended to hold their courts for centuries. That was pretty close to an eternity.

Eternity with Keenan. The thought terrified her still. He wasn’t particularly inclined toward an equal ruling status, and she wasn’t experienced at dealing with faeries. Prior to her transformation into a faery monarch, her primary method of “dealing” was avoidance. Now, she had to rule them. He had nine centuries ruling without his full power. It was hard to say that she should have an equal voice, but the alternative—responsibility for the consequences but not involvement in the decisions—wasn’t a solution.

And since she’d become their queen, the summer faeries had become important to her. Their welfare mattered; their happiness and safety were essential. It was as instinctual as the need to help Summer grow to strength, but that didn’t mean everyone else should be sacrificed for the progress of Summer. Keenan didn’t get that.

She shook her head. “We’re not going to agree on this, Keenan.”

“Maybe”—Keenan looked at her with such open affection that she could feel the sunbeams under her skin responding—“but at least you aren’t refusing to speak to me.”

Aislinn moved farther back into the corner of the sofa, her message implicit in the movement. “I don’t have a choice in the matter. Donia does.”

“You have a choice. You are just…”

“What?”

“More reasonable.” He didn’t hide the smile that came as soon as he said it.

The tension that had been growing inside of her dissipated at his easy smile. She laughed. “I’ve never been as un reasonable as I’ve been the past few months. The way I’ve changed…My teachers have commented. My friends, Grams, even Seth…My mood swings are awful.”

“Compared to me, you’re quite unflappable.” His eyes were sparkling: he knew how volatile she’d become. He’d been the target of her temper more than anyone else.

“I’m not sure it counts as being reasonable if you’re the measuring stick.” She relaxed again. During all the weirdness over the past few months, he’d found ways to make her lighten up. It was a big part of what had made it bearable to be the Summer Queen. His friendship and Seth’s love were her mainstays.

Keenan’s smile was still there, but the plea in his eyes was serious as he asked, “Maybe you could talk to Don? Maybe explain to her that I miss her. Maybe you could tell her that I am sad when I can’t see her. Tell her that I need her.”