CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The vibrant colors of autumn gave way to the dull, solemn hues of winter. Days became shorter, and the hum of the cicadas was replaced by frost-edged, hollow gusts of wind.
The world had never felt so quiet. While the Unseelie Court fought over the throne like rabid dogs below, life on the surface was ordinary. Humankind went about their busy lives in the sun, and Fallenkind hid in the shadows as we always had. As we always would.
I’d gone back to working at the bar. It was strange to be doing something as mundane as waiting on tables after fighting the devil on a bloodstained battlefield, but there was also comfort in the familiarity.
Some things had changed, though. Bea no longer looked at me with fear in her eyes, and Gretchen protected my secret whenever I encountered someone dangerously perceptive, or a customer showed intense signs of interest.
Cyrus stood a little straighter in his kitchen, and he talked more than he used to. Once, I caught him manipulating the flame on one of his burners, the outline of scales brightening along his neck.
There hadn’t been the faintest hint of fear around him.
The rest of my family was healing, as well.
Damon and Danny began planning their wedding.
They asked Emma to officiate, and Matthew would be their ring bearer.
Watching them practice with him became the highlight of my evenings, and every night, the sound of scattered laughter floated through our warm loft.
When Damon requested that I stand as his best man, the outline of his face blurred a little as I told him I’d be honored.
Savannah continued her training at the Unseelie Court.
She had become so renowned in her reputation as a necromancer that she’d begun getting letters—people pleading for her to bring back their loved ones, or teach a new necromancer how to control their power.
But Savannah clung to her quiet life in the ground, emerging only to make the walk to our house, where she visited Matthew and caught up with everyone.
More often than not, she stayed for dinner and lingered long after Matthew had gone to bed.
Laurie, of course, had his reign at the Seelie Court. He’d gone back to keeping his distance, but he still stopped by now and then to flirt with Emma and ask for Collith’s advice on a variety of topics. He always made sure to smile at me, or kiss my forehead before he left.
Emma got approved for a bank loan to open a dispensary. Everyone drove into Denver for a celebratory dinner, and she listened to our toasts with shining eyes. At the end, we took a group picture with Emma in the middle holding up her paperwork.
The name across the top of her proposal had simply read, Fred’s Place.
Ariel officially moved in with Cyrus, and she commuted to Denver for a new marketing job.
She adapted to life as a human so efficiently that most days, I half-forgot she wasn’t one.
She remained as vibrant as ever, walking around with a smile stretched across her face, those dark curls bouncing with every step.
As for Lyari … Lyari had disappeared again.
I knew she was grieving for Thuridan, so I didn’t push her to come home.
We all dealt with that pain in our own way.
But I took a page from Collith’s book and sent messages now and then.
Not of passages or quotes, since neither of us were huge readers.
They were mostly pictures I took on my phone, along with texts that I hoped would make her smile.
The play of sunlight off a puddle in the parking lot. Contemplating whether or not I can drown myself in this. That’s how much I miss your stupid face.
A selfie of me and Gil at Adam’s garage. Better come and insult the vampire soon. He’s starting to develop some self-esteem.
The horizon over the trees, with Stanley a small shape in the foreground as he took a morning dump on the lawn. How I feel about you not being here. Everything is great, and it would be pretty close to perfect, except for that one pile of shit.
No reply ever came, but I remained gently relentless, just as Collith had been. Sometimes I found myself half-wishing something would attack me, like that night with the demon. Lyari had certainly come running then.
But there had been no more attacks, Fallen or otherwise. No one came to the house or the bar who wasn’t supposed to be there. Whatever enemies I still had in the world stayed away, and slowly, I stopped looking over my shoulder everywhere I went.
For the first time since my parents had died, I started looking forward to Sundays again.
Everyone in the family made sure to get that day off, no matter what.
Me. Cyrus and Ariel. Damon and Danny. Emma.
Seth and Gil. Savannah. Sometimes Adam came, or Bea and Gretchen, if they had enough staff at the bar.
With the sounds of a football game always drifting through the room, we filled the corners of the loft with warmth and light.
We ate, we drank, we talked, Hello usually curled in my lap and a fire burning beneath the mantle.
On those nights, I didn’t mind taking a sleeping pill—reality was better than anything I could conjure up. What need did I have for dreams?
But despite all the joy, despite the hard-won peace that we’d fought and died for, I couldn’t ignore another feeling deep inside me.
A niggling sense there was still something missing.
Not Finn, Viessa, or Oliver, though I missed them every day.
This was something else. I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
Shouldn’t I be happy now? Wasn’t this what a happy ending looked like?
The answers evaded me, and the questions only got louder.
One Sunday, two months after our battle at the Flint Hills, Emma entered the loft with a box in her arms. “I stopped at a garage sale on the way home,” she declared.
Gil was sitting with me on the couch, and Danny and Damon were on the floor with Matthew.
When my nephew saw the box Emma was carrying, the little boy made a sound of intrigue.
Damon imitated it and bent to hold my nephew’s hand as they walked toward her together.
Danny stayed behind to pick up the game they’d been playing.
Damon and Matthew were about to reach the table when Emma yanked her arms out of the box, revealing a squirt gun in each hand.
“Admit that I am Queen of the Loft, or get soaked to within an inch of your life!” she declared.
Damon’s hands shot up, his wide eyes darting from Emma’s face to the neon green toy she held. After a moment, he looked down at Matthew. My nephew’s eyes were wide with delight. Damon looked back at Emma and raised his chin defiantly. “Never,” he swore.
“Big mistake,” Emma replied. Then she tipped her head back and made a high, unintelligible noise that was probably supposed to be a battlecry.
Her fingers closed on the plastic triggers, and streams of water shot toward her targets.
Emma ran at the boys, shooting relentlessly.
Damon cried out in exaggerated terror and swept my nephew up in his arms.
“I’ll save you!” he shouted, cupping Matthew’s silken head to shield it from the water. They ran through the loft, Matthew’s squeals bouncing off the walls.
Grinning, Danny went over to the box and took out two more squirt guns.
He threw one to Gil. I smiled in a wordless thanks but shook my head—I wanted to watch.
Gil launched at Damon, and while the vampire’s back was turned, Danny completely soaked him.
Emma gently touched my arm just as I heard a British voice cry out, “Traitor!”
While the threats and screaming went on around us, I let Emma lead me into the hall. “I got a text,” she said. “Apparently you’re not so good at checking your phone, honey. There’s someone here to see you.”
I opened my mouth to ask Emma who was waiting, but at the same moment, Gil found us and aimed his squirt gun, shouting from the end of the hall.
Emma screeched and ran past him, holding her hands up to protect her newly dyed hair.
Gil went after her, a trail of water forming behind them as he pumped the toy gun.
Matthew’s giggles filled the air as he toddled after the vampire.
Damon wasn’t far behind, his arms extended toward his son, ready at any moment to catch him if he fell.
That was how I left them.
I walked outside expecting to find Collith or Laurie standing there. Maybe even Gwyn or Dracula. But it was someone else.
Standing on the other side of the driveway, Lyari Paynore turned at the sound of my approach.
She looked so different, and I struggled not to stare as I drew to a slow halt.
My friend’s hair had been cut short, and her face was narrower, making the ridges over her eyebrows even more pronounced.
She wore modern clothes again, and the hilt of her sword rose up behind her.
I liked it, I thought silently. I’d never seen this version of Lyari, but somehow, it was the one that suited her the best.
We faced each other across the narrow strip of gravel. For a few seconds, the only sound in the world was a lone, forlorn wind. At last Lyari said, her tone as dry as the leaves littering the ground, “Did you call me a pile of shit in your last text message?”
Startled, I felt my lips twitch. “No. Well, sort of. But you’re my pile of shit, you know?”
Lyari shook her head, and there was a slight tilt to her mouth, too. “You are so strange, Fortuna Sworn. Have I ever told you that?”
I shrugged. I was smiling freely now. “Maybe once or twice.”
Neither of us moved, but the tension between us had eased.
There was so much I wanted to say … and so much I knew I couldn’t.
Lyari was still in the throes of her grief.
I could see it as plainly as she’d seen mine, that night in the shower.
The night she’d been there for me, helping me through my pain while her own must’ve been excruciating.