Jenna Black: Sirensong

Kimber sighed. “Sorry. That came out wrong. He wouldn’t send us with you if we didn’t want to go. And remember, theoretically at least, there’s no reason you or anyone with you should be in danger during this trip.”

I wished I could believe that. “All right. If you guys can convince my dad and yours to let you come along, you can come.”

“Gee, thanks,” Kimber said with a droll look. “Your enthusiasm’s overwhelming.”

I opened my mouth to protest that it wasn’t lack of enthusiasm, it was fear for their safety, but Kimber didn’t give me a chance.

“Now, let’s show Madame the dress you’ve chosen and we can start picking fabrics.”

I would have argued that I hadn’t actually chosen anything, but Kimber was already waving Madame over.

In the end, we spent almost three hours at the dressmaker’s shop. If I never see a bolt of cloth again it’ll be too soon. Kimber, of course, loved every minute of it. I tried my best to keep the dress as simple as possible, but Kimber would have none of it and Madame always agreed with her. Two against one just wasn’t fair!

The bodice was going to be white silk with gold embroidery, with a red taffeta train about a mile long. The train, too, would be decorated with gold embroidery. I absolutely put my foot down about the big gold bow they wanted to put at the back. The dress was outrageously girly and froufrou enough already. Kimber and Madame finally backed down, but I put the odds at about fifty/fifty that when the dress was ready, there’d be a honkin’ shiny bow on it after all.

There was an uncomfortable moment when Madame wanted me to undress so she could take precise measurements. To keep from having to reveal the Erlking’s mark, I pretended to be painfully modest, stammering and looking pathetic. Madame took pity on me and agreed the fit would be close enough if I kept my clothes on while she measured.

I couldn’t imagine how Madame could create a dress that ornate in time, but she didn’t seem concerned, and I suspected there’d be copious amounts of magic involved. I didn’t even want to think about how much the dress was going to cost. When I’d lived with my mom, we’d always had to pinch pennies, because alcoholics aren’t the best at getting and holding high-paying jobs. But my dad was loaded, and he’d arranged for Madame to put everything on his tab with no spending limit. Too bad the dress wasn’t for Kimber—she’d have appreciated it a lot more than I did.

Kimber wanted to do some more shopping afterward, telling me I needed a fancier wardrobe to travel in Faerie. Only for the presentation at Court—the ceremony during which I would be formally introduced to the Queen—would I need to dress like a native, but Kimber was certain I wanted a whole new wardrobe, just because hey, what girl wouldn’t?

I was saved from the ordeal of being bullied by my personal fashion consultant when my cell phone rang. Unfortunately, an even bigger ordeal was in store for me: my mother had just found out I was going to Faerie.

When my mom had come to Avalon looking for me, my dad had tricked her into handing over custody of me. (Tricked her because she’d been too drunk at the time to pay attention to the papers she was signing. Yep, she was a paragon of parental responsibility all right.)

Aside from losing legal custody of me, she’d also been declared legally incompetent, which involved my dad using either his influence or his money to manipulate the courts of Avalon into giving him what he wanted. That meant she was also in my dad’s custody. To make me happy, Dad had promised that as long as she was in his custody—living in something resembling house arrest—he would make sure she had no access to alcohol. The weeks I’d been in Avalon were by far the longest stretch of time my mom had been sober in my memory.

The phone call I’d gotten was from my dad. He’d broken the news to my mom that we were leaving for Faerie the day after tomorrow, and she’d gone ballistic. There was a hint of what sounded like desperation in his voice when he asked me to come over and talk to her. Unlike me, he didn’t have sixteen years of experience dealing with her fits of hysteria, and I could tell he was in completely over his head.

Strange how I could move all the way to Avalon, find out I was a Faeriewalker, have people trying to kill me, and yet some parts of my life remained exactly the same. I’d hoped that once my mom stopped drinking, she’d also stop being a drama queen, but that was obviously asking too much. It also occurred to me, as Finn and I hurried through the streets of Avalon to my dad’s house, that with both me and my dad going off to Avalon, my mom’s house arrest was about to come to an end.

The thought made my stomach tie itself in knots. No house arrest meant no way to stop her from drinking. No way to stop her from drinking meant that when I came back from Faerie (assuming, of course, that I made it out alive), Mom the Drunk would be here waiting for me.

Once upon a time, I’d let myself believe that if she would just sober up for a little while, my mom would come to her senses and decide she was staying off the booze forever. Dad tried to explain to me that we couldn’t cure her alcoholism by force, but I hadn’t wanted to believe him. The fact that she still wouldn’t admit she had a drinking problem made my dad’s point of view more convincing.

My head wasn’t in a good place when I arrived at my dad’s house, and I wanted to talk to my mom about as much as I wanted to stick my head in the toilet. I’d halfway decided to tell my dad to just deal with it, but when he opened the door and I saw the glassy look in his eyes, I swallowed my words. I didn’t like it, but I was far better equipped to handle my mom than he was.

“She’s in her room,” my dad said as he led the way up the spiral staircase from the garage to the first floor, which was where his living room, kitchen, and dining room were located.

As soon as I set foot in the living room, I smelled the distinctive scent of tea in the air, although I saw no sign of any mugs. Then I saw the dark, wet stain against the wall beside the plasma TV.

“Let me guess,” I said with a sigh, “she threw her tea at you?”

Dad crossed his arms and nodded. “I’ve never seen her like this before.” He looked completely mystified, and if I weren’t caught in the middle of the mess, I might have found it amusing.

“I have,” I grumbled. I looked back and forth between Dad and Finn. “You guys stay down here no matter what, okay? She’s not going to throw deadly weapons at me, but you’re a different story.”

Finn was giving me a look of pity I could have done without, but I think Dad was just glad he didn’t have to face Mom again in the near future. With a sigh of resignation, I trudged to the door to the stairway and climbed to the third floor.

Mom’s door was closed, and I braced myself for battle before I knocked on it.

“Mom?” I asked. “Can I come in?”

The door opened almost before I got the last word out, and before I knew what was happening, I was wrapped in a smothering hug, Mom’s arms so tight around me I could hardly breathe.

“Dana,” she said, then started to sob, holding me and rocking me like she’d just found out I had a terminal disease.

I let her hug me for as long as I could stand it, then wriggled out of her grasp. She looked terrible, her eyes all swollen and puffy, her nose red, her hair disheveled. But at least she’s sober, I reminded myself. For now.

I invited myself into my mom’s room and sat on her bed. Sniffling, she reached for a tissue and scrubbed at her eyes.