Chapter Twenty-Eight
Zyr
His bond. He was Robin’s bond. His, not only now, but always.
They had to survive their current circumstances, first.
Before Zyr could order his thoughts, which sang and raged in turn, Robin’s soul reached again for his own. It had been long, since Zyr last felt that outside pull at his magic. He welcomed it. Let himself become the lightning that ran under Robin’s skin, the synapse fire of him.
A burst of white light, and with it, a deafening clap of thunder. A mist of cool, salt-heavy rain. Zyr’s power, turned against the ward. Tearing down that which dared to stand between them.
He had not lived so long by being weak.
“I’m returned to you,” Zyr said, remaining as he was. “And glad of it.”
On his knees, but that didn’t keep him from reaching, his tail stopping its furious barbed assault on the stone to curl, quiescent, around Robin’s ankle. Immediately, Robin stepped forward, stepped in, his hands finding Zyr’s horns.
Everything settled with that touch. Fear and anger replaced by relief. Chill sea spray. Coffee rich with cream. Linen cord, pleasantly rough on scales and skin.
Robin.
A bond between them, a rope around his soul instead of his wrists, all clever knots tied by a clever bird.
Zyr could think of no binding he would less like to be freed from.
He wanted only this, to lose himself in the endlessness of Robin, to study every volume of him, every page, and know there was always more to reach for.
He would never be lost. Not with Robin at his center.
“Me too.” Robin tugged Zyr in until his chin rested on the human’s stomach. “You gave me a scare, beithir. Everything else was well done. Fuck, Zyr.”
This wasn’t a moment they could linger in. If Faerie starved around them, choked and airless, he would die having only glimpsed the surface of what they might have. Worse, Robin would stubbornly follow. It was unforgivable, to allow Kesk and Veroni’s idiocy to damage so rare a treasure.
“Fuck, indeed,” he agreed, eyes raised to Robin’s. “I regret the trouble I put you to. And I–” But he wasn’t sorry for the bond. Even if Robin hadn’t wished for one. “We need to get the Gate away before Faerie fully accepts its new monarchs.”
“You may regret the fact I promised no retaliation against Taibe in return for the rescue mission more.” Robin’s thumbs ran over his horns, soothing even here. “Successful. Awe. Stand and we’ll-”
“Who are you eating?” Dinam’s voice, mystified, broke the moment. “That isn’t a Monarch’s heart.”
“For fucks sake,” Robin muttered, glaring over his shoulder.
Zyr rose to his feet, getting a clearer look at the returning pair.
The redcap, indeed, held the remains of a heart in their hand, lips smeared with some palace worker’s blood.
He was, despite himself, coming to like Robin’s “murdertwins.” It was so very clear that the world that the Monarchs–past Monarchs–had worked to build excluded them.
They were the very worst of bad fairies, haunting the dark. And they gloried in it.
“Gate’s gone. Skittish-like, all nerves.
Think he took a peeksie at the pretty bits earlier.
Abrhail offered him a snack, all generous, and he did something with his eyes when you …
did whatever the fuckin’ shitfire you did.
Then poof.” The redcap paused to tear a fresh strip of muscle and swallow it down.
“Plus side, no one’s gonna go poking about for us that works here.
All the hidey-holes are locked down. Frosty thinks they’re avoidin’ the new batshit bugfucks in charge while the two’re still wrapped up in themselves. ”
“Did the Gate say where he was going?” Zyr asked, trying not to watch the giggling redcap eat with too much interest. He, too, was a predator, and he hadn’t eaten in some time.
“Nah.” The manticore spoke between licks of their red-painted fingers. “Think he believed us when we said Mommy and Daddy were going to be laying him out on an altar next, though. Doubt he ran to them.”
Fae. Always so ready to betray the next generation under the guise of protecting the future. Zyr spared a second of sympathy for the Gate, then tapped Robin’s wrist with his tail.
“May I?” he asked.
“You may.”
The contact, scales to skin, settled the world into place. And now, Zyr could feel Robin’s pleasure as well. Could feel, too, his queasy unease when he glanced over to where the redcap was systematically searching the Monarchs’ bodies, while their bond stood guard.
“I doubt they have much of value on their persons,” Zyr said, shifting to at least partly obscure the pair. “Owning all of Faerie made trinkets of little importance.”
“You never know,” the manticore said. “We find all sorts of fun things.”
Before Zyr could question the way they smiled, he saw what they removed from the pouch at their side. His books.
“Might not matter so much anymore,” they said. “But the ice princess pointed them out. Wasn’t so difficult, to fishhook them out from behind the wards. Built to stop people. Not me and Teddai’s toys.”
“They matter to me,” Zyr said, as the manticore pressed them into his hands. All his treasures, returned to him. Robin at his side. “There’s a debt between us.”
“Still got royal throats to slit,” the manticore whispered, grinning dangerously. “Just different throats. We want our share of the fun. You see to that, we’re square.”
“If Faerie lasts that long,” Zyr promised. “The Gate…”
Where would a Gate hide? He could be anywhere. Literally.
“What about the new House head?” Robin asked. “The Monarchs don’t hold Houses. Someone else is going to be in charge of Linden.”
Zyr’s bond was the very cleverest man in all of Faerie. Clever and cruel and generous, still standing close, letting Zyr hold onto him.
“Hyacinth, Kesk’s younger brother, inherits House Linden.
Especially as Kesk and Veroni never officially took charge.
They’ve not the authority to name another heir.
” He tapped the very tip of his tail against Robin’s pulse, thinking.
“Hyacinth calls the Gate his brother. The boy might have gone to him. Regardless, we’ll wish to inform him.
He and Kesk are never on the same side of anything. ”
“Hyacinth, like Declan's friend?” Robin asked.
“Perhaps? It isn’t a common name. He’s a sidhe. And…” Zyr hesitated, considering how best to label their relationship. “I find him tolerable.”
“Good enough. We’ll talk to him. We also need to tell my brother.
Everil.” Robin rubbed at his face with his free hand, shoving his glasses up into his hair to press a thumb lightly to the bridge of his nose.
“But first, we need to get out of here. I don't trust Kesk and Veroni to stay down the entire transition period.”
“Frosty the Snowpriss has the doors open,” the redcap said, while wrist deep in the sphinx’s gut. “Just gotta scoot, quick like a sharp-toothed bunny. Don't blink out, they'll getcha.”
“Hyacinth, then my brother, let them tell everyone else.” Robin’s fingers brushed over Zyr’s tail as he spoke. “You have any objections, say so now.”
“Hyacinth, then your House. And then I would like us both behind wards as strong as I know how to make them.”
Hyacinth meant he was unlikely to lose his allotment. Though Kesk and Veroni on the throne meant he was significantly more likely to lose his life.
Not today. They had survived today. Tomorrow would be tomorrow.
“They know something has happened,” Zyr murmured to Robin.
They stood together on the steps of one of the many brick houses on Hyacinth’s faux-street. Stunted trees in autumn colors shivered in the wind, and Hyacinth’s people rushed past them, in and out of the narrow house.
“Good,” Robin muttered in reply. “It means we’re less likely to sound out of our minds.”
He could have warded their conversation, but that would have been rude even in a House not on high alert. With the way everyone was watching them just now, it would be just this side of suicidal.
He’d had enough of life-threatening peril for one day. Especially with Robin involved. Robin, his bond, who stood beside him, allowing Zyr to hold his wrist. Who had tracked him down, tricked Veroni’s wards, and saved all of Faerie in the bargain.
Zyr wanted to spell his name in lightning, burn it into the sky. He wanted to ask to kiss him, and see if he might be permitted.
He wanted, mostly, for them to be alone, so he might ask what Robin wanted, whether this was acceptable. Bonds could be broken, though the very idea made him sick.
Zyr didn’t let go easily. But he would, for Robin.
The gargoyle who finally came to lead them to Hyacinth was known to him. Stone skinned and chatty, though at least she’d long stopped attempting to flirt with Zyr. Not, unfortunately, attempting to talk to him.
Hyacinth’s home was all blunt luxury. Plush chairs and large windows. Everything in rich, jewel tones. The carpet was thick underfoot, and the air smelled distantly of expensive spices and fine alcohol. Though, with his senses filled with the coffee and salt of Robin, Zyr barely noted it.
He’d not seen the sidhe’s rooms before, and he highly doubted they were usually in this much disarray. Hyacinth had things tossed everywhere, and his usually immaculate wings were equally disordered, feathers in need of grooming.
His smile was as smooth and confident as ever.
“Robin,” he said, in his usual silken tones. “Wish we were meeting under better circumstances. Zyr, what the fuck.”
“Well put,” Zyr replied.
“You’ve got about twenty hours, max, before the new monarchs have the time they need for proper post-coup Faerie integration,” Robin said, wasting no time on pleasantries.
“If they’re even a fraction competent, they’ll get started on damage control, which gives you another few hours.
Maybe. They’re going to be on the hunt for a Gate without oathsworn guardians.
And same. Better circumstances, all that. ”