The Iron Traitor

I sighed, knowing it was useless to argue or try to convince her not to go. Tonight, anyway. “You are way too eager for this,” I told her, and she grinned cheekily. “It would be so much easier if you were one of those girls who ran away screaming.”

She laughed. “Sorry, tough guy. Looks like you got the abnormal girlfriend who talks to little green men and sees invisible things.” Her cool fingers slipped into my hair, and my stomach knotted. “But you know you can vent to me about any of this, right? You don’t have to face them all by yourself anymore.”

My voice came out kind of husky. “I know. I just... I want you to be safe.”

Her smile turned bittersweet. “I don’t have that kind of time.”

The porch light winked on, Mom’s way of letting me know she was still up, and I winced. “Come on,” I said, reluctantly drawing back. “I’ll take you home.”

After dropping Kenzie off at her house—and the stomach-curling good-night kiss in the driveway—I returned home to find Annwyl in the living room, hovering over my mom’s potted plants. The wilted houseplants looked better than they ever had under Mom’s not-so-green thumb, but having a faery wandering around my home made me nervous, even if it was Annwyl, and I steered her back into my room.

“Where would you like me to sleep?” she asked as I closed the door. Mom had finally gone to bed, but Dad might be home any minute and didn’t need to hear me talking to myself in the wee hours of the morning. Annwyl regarded me solemnly. “If you have charms placed around your house, I could go outside. I don’t think the Thin Man will come through the wards.”

But she sounded frightened, and I shook my head. “No, Annwyl, I’m not going to make you sleep outside, especially if something is after you.” I scrubbed a hand through my hair, not liking the other alternative but seeing no other choice. “You can stay here. Take the bed, in fact—I have a sleeping bag in the closet.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh no, that would be improper,” she protested, looking stunned. “Especially since I owe you so much. You are the Iron Queen’s brother. I cannot presume to sleep in the prince’s bed.”

“Annwyl, you’re not a servant anymore.” I opened the closet and hauled the sleeping bag and pillow from the top shelf. “That changed the second Titania banished you from the Nevernever. And I’m definitely not a prince.” I turned, tossing the sleeping bag on the floor, unrolling it with my foot. “You’re not with Titania or Leanansidhe now. You’re a guest here, and you don’t owe me anything.”

She gazed at me, still unsure, and my heartbeat picked up. I won’t lie; Annwyl was beautiful. Big green eyes, shining brown hair, her body soft and graceful beneath her dress. I was a guy, after all, and I wasn’t blind. But seeing her didn’t make my stomach twist with nerves or the corners of my mouth want to turn up in a smile like they did with Kenzie. Besides, Annwyl was someone else’s, someone whose insane protective streak ran even deeper than mine, and she was a faery on top of that. So that pretty much killed any tempting thoughts about having a beautiful girl spend the night in my room.

“Take the bed,” I told her again, pointing to the mattress. “I know this is a little awkward, but we’ll have to get through it until we can find Keirran. Hopefully it won’t be too long.”

After the Summer faery finally fell asleep on my mattress, I lay awake on the floor, thinking. About Keirran and his whereabouts, what he thought he was doing: hiding from everyone, dragging me into his problems. About Annwyl. She was Fading, dying, really, and the Iron Prince had to be frantic to save her, if there was a way at all. How the hell I would convince my parents that I needed to disappear again.

But mostly, I thought about Mackenzie and how I was going to protect her from the world she insisted on being a part of.

CHAPTER SIX

GURO’S ADVICE

School the next day was...interesting, to say the least.

Word had definitely spread, probably from the moment Kenzie and I had left the theater parking lot. People stared at me in the halls—not that they hadn’t before, but it was almost full-blown paparazzi-style now. Whispers and unsubtle glances followed me down the corridors, and I was sure I saw one or two camera phones aimed at me—or it could’ve been my paranoid imagination. I kept my head down and my usual ignore-everyone stance going until I reached my locker. Only to discover two girls were already there, and none of them was Kenzie.

“Hey, Ethan.” The tallest of the pair gave me a hesitant smile, flipping her blond hair over one shoulder. I’d seen this girl in class, though I’d never spoken to her and knew only that she was one of Kenzie’s friends. Christy? Chelsea? Something like that.

“Can I help you?” I asked, reaching past her to open my locker.

“Um, well. I...we...wanted to know if you would sit with us this afternoon. We never see you at lunch, and now that you’re with Kenzie, the four of us should hang out sometime.”

“No, thanks.”

A pause, where the duo eyed each other nervously but didn’t back off. “Why not?” Christy/Chelsea demanded. “Kenzie always sits at our table. Aren’t you going to eat with your girlfriend?”

Well, the short answer was getting me nowhere. Clearly, I was going to have to step my Mean Asshole persona up a bit.

I slammed the locker door, making them both jump, and turned to stare them down. “What part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?” I said, forcing my voice to be hard and cold.

The girls shrank back and would’ve fled, but a soft hand suddenly traced my back, and Kenzie stepped around me to smile at them.

“Hey, guys.” If she felt the obvious tension between me and the other two girls, she didn’t comment on it. “I need to talk to Ethan for a second. Wait for me?”

The girls nodded and backed off, giving me dark, unfriendly looks, before hurrying around a corner. I swallowed and turned to face Kenzie, who was watching me with amused exasperation.

“Are you terrorizing my friends, tough guy?”

“They were stalking me,” I answered, gesturing in the direction the girls had gone. “What do you want me to do?”

My girlfriend shook her head. “You could try being nice,” she suggested. “I know it’s in there somewhere. I’ve seen it, at least twice.”

I lowered my voice, stepping close to her so that the passing crowd couldn’t eavesdrop. “You know that’s not an option for me. I have to be this way.”

“No, you don’t.” Kenzie’s voice was equally low; she reached out and took my hand, squeezing gently. “You can’t push the whole world away because of Them, Ethan. That’s...that’s kind of like letting Them win, you know?” I started to protest, but she overrode me. “They’re out there, and They hurt people—I understand that. But are you really going to close your eyes and hope They don’t see you? Or are you going to fight back? Let them know that They can’t screw around with you or your friends and get away with it.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“No?” Kenzie cocked her head, her brown eyes staring into mine. “It sounds pretty simple to me. They can control your life—what you do, how you act—or you can.”

I blinked. I’d never thought of it that way. I thought I was protecting people; if no one got close to me, the fey would leave them alone. But...I guess They were controlling my life in a way. I was so concerned about what They would do to others, I’d let myself become someone I hated. Someone I really didn’t want to be.

“Fine.” I put my head back in defeat before looking down at Kenzie again. “I’ll try to be nicer to your friends. No promises, though. Especially if Kingston decides to put my head through my locker. Then all bets are off.”

She grinned as the first bell rang. “You’re such a charmer, tough guy. Wanna walk me to my class?”

“Sure.”

“Without snarling at Zoe and Chelsea?”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ll try not to snarl.”

Her friends gaped at us when we found them around the corner, still waiting for Kenzie and probably hoping for gossip. They continued to glance at me as we walked down the hall, and even more so when Kenzie casually laced our fingers together, squeezing my hand while still chatting to all of us. I didn’t say much, though I did make an effort not to be gruff when one of the girls asked me a question about New York. It was a weird sensation; it had been years since I’d been in any kind of group, a long while since I’d spoken to a classmate without intending to drive them away. I ignored the stares we were getting from everyone and concentrated on getting Kenzie to class. This whole normal boyfriend thing was going to take some getting used to.

When we got to her classroom, Kenzie turned to me, waving the others through. Stepping close, she murmured, “Meet me in the library at lunch. I want to talk to you about something.”

I grinned at her, feeling suddenly evil. Everyone in school knew about me and Kenzie, it seemed. No use fighting it now. “Talk?” I leaned in. “Or talk? As in, the very back corner aisle?”

“Behave, you.” She wrinkled her nose at me. “Let’s not try to start more gossip. See you at lunch.”

I let her go and sneaked a glance at the wall clock before continuing to my class. Four hours till lunch suddenly seemed like a lifetime.

* * *

Wonder of wonders, Kingston actually left me alone, though he continued to shoot me Death Glares all through class and in the halls, hinting at future confrontations. I didn’t care, really. Kenzie wasn’t bothered by what others thought of her dating me, so I wasn’t going to dwell on it, either.

Besides, I had plenty of other problems to dwell on. How to find Keirran. How to keep Annwyl from Fading. How to keep Mackenzie safe, again, while venturing into a goblin market full of taboo items and shady faeries.

And maybe the most pressing, how to convince my parents to let me go tromping off to New Orleans this weekend. I refused to just vanish on them again; not only would Mom have a nervous breakdown, I shuddered to think of the trouble I would be in when I came back. Not only with my parents this time, but with Kenzie’s.

And that was yet another problem. I hoped Kenzie had a good story to feed her dad; from our short meeting at the hospital, he didn’t seem like he was going to just “forget about her” again.

All that flew out of my head, though, when I walked into the library and found Kenzie alone in one of the aisles. Her head was bent, an open book in her hands, and I was reminded of our very first meeting, where a certain stubborn journalist had refused to leave me alone despite my attempts to drive her away.

Sliding up behind her, I put my hands on her waist and whispered “Whatcha reading?” in her ear. She jumped.

“Ethan! Geez, stop doing that!” She glared back at me. “I swear, I’m gonna tie a bell around your neck.” I chuckled, resting my chin on her shoulder, and wrapped my arms around her as she held up the book. Guide to New Orleans, the title read. I raised an eyebrow.

“You seem awfully confident that we’re going,” I said, resisting the urge to kiss her neck as her fingers slipped into my hair. “I haven’t even talked to my parents yet.”

“I have. My dad, anyway. That’s...what I wanted to talk to you about.”

She sounded hesitant, and her body tensed against mine. My nerves prickled, but I kept my voice calm. “What did he say? Did he forbid you to go?”

“Worse.” She lowered her arm and slid gently from my grasp, turning to face me in the narrow aisle. Her face crinkled with disgust as she said, “He’s coming with me.”

“You’re kidding.”

The disgusted look stayed firmly in place as she continued, “I told him I wanted to visit several places before I graduate,” she said. “That New York was just the first, and I had a long bucket list of cities and places I wanted to see before I...well, you know.”

A lump of ice settled in my stomach, and I nodded. “Go on,” I rasped.

She sighed. “I thought that he would do what he always does—warn me not to get arrested and to call if there’s an emergency. Surprise, surprise.” She threw up her hands in annoyance. “He was completely into it and thought that it would be a great idea to see New Orleans together, as a family. A ‘fun weekend trip.’ So now my stepmom and Alex are coming, too.”

“Your whole family?” I repeated in disbelief. Kenzie winced.

“Obnoxiously, yes. My disappearing act must’ve really shocked them. And now Dad won’t leave me alone. He thinks this will be a great way to ‘connect’ again.” She shook her head, her expression going dark. “I know what he’s trying to do, and it’s too late. He doesn’t get to be a dad after he’s forgotten I exist for so long.”

“That’s going to make things difficult,” I muttered. “Does your dad even know I’m coming?”

“Noooooo,” Kenzie said quickly. “He does not, and it’s probably better that way. I’d told him I wanted to go to New Orleans with a group of friends, but I think he may have suspected who my ‘friends’ were. Probably another reason he wants to come along—to make sure we don’t run off together and join a gang or something.” She shrugged. “Don’t worry. I’ll meet up with you when we get there. We just can’t let him see us.”

“And if we have to sneak out in the middle of the night to look for faeries in goblin markets?”

“Then we’ll have to do it quietly.”

I groaned, dragging both hands over my face. “Your dad is going to throw me in prison and lose the key.”

Kenzie’s arms slid around my neck as she leaned in, smiling up at me. “Well, if that happens, I’ll just bust you out with my mad ninja skills and we can vanish into the Nevernever.”

I was torn between telling her how unlikely that would be and kissing her, but at that moment the librarian strolled by with a cartful of books and we broke apart. “So, have you thought of what you’re going to say to your parents?” Kenzie asked, serious again. I shook my head.

“Not a clue. I’m still thinking about it.”

“Want me to come over after school to brainstorm?”

I would love nothing more than to have Kenzie in my room again, but... “I can’t tonight,” I told her. “I have kali.”

Kali was the Filipino martial art I’d been taking for over five years. It taught you how to defend yourself with swords, sticks and knives, as well as empty hands, which was the main reason I was drawn to it; I wanted to learn to use weapons when protecting myself from the fey. My Guro—my instructor—believed in the spirit world and hadn’t questioned my sanity when I’d told him invisible things were after me. He’d even helped us when we were looking for Todd, when I had nowhere else to go. The double, razor-edged swords he’d gifted me when I went to see him sat in an honorary spot in my room, and I knew Kenzie still wore his protection amulet beneath her shirt.

I hadn’t see Guro since I got back home, and I wanted to talk to him, to thank him for his help and to fill him in on everything that had happened. I owed him that.

I thought Kenzie might protest, insist that we come up with a plan together, but she only nodded. “Say hi to Guro for me” was all she said.

* * *

I was nervous when I walked onto the mats, wondering what Guro would say when he saw me. The room was full of people; the kempo and jujitsu classes that shared the dojo with us were just wrapping up, students in white gis and colored belts shuffling off the floor, laughing and talking with each other. Our class was smaller, just a handful of people in normal workout clothes, a rattan stick in each hand. They had already staked out the far corner of the mats, and I hurried over to join.

Guro spotted me the second I walked into the room. He looked the same as he always did, a small, sinewy man with close-cropped black hair and dark, piercing eyes. He didn’t say anything as I approached, just nodded for me to take my place in line. A few of the other students stared at me; either they’d heard the rumors or they’d seen my face on the news, as one of the teens involved in a suspected kidnapping. But Guro started the class as per normal, and soon I was too busy blocking bamboo sticks to the head and dodging rubber knives to think of anything else.

After class, however, he gestured for me to follow, and I trailed him down the hall into the office. Suddenly nervous and tongue-tied, I waited as he closed the door and motioned toward a couple chairs in the corner.

We both sat. I stared at my hands, feeling Guro’s eyes appraising me. He didn’t speak right away, and I wondered what he was thinking, what he thought of me now.

“How are your parents?” Guro asked at last.

“Fine,” I replied, knowing exactly what he meant. “A little freaked-out, but okay otherwise. They took it a lot better than I thought they would.”

“Good.” Guro nodded, still watching me intently. I waited, knowing this wasn’t over yet. Leaning forward, Guro folded his hands and fixed me with a piercing stare. “Now,” he continued, in a voice that made my heart start to pound, “you don’t have to tell me everything, Ethan, but tell me as much as you can. What happened after you and your friends left my home that morning? Did you find what you were looking for?”

I took a deep breath.

And ended up telling him everything.

I didn’t intend to, but as I spoke, words just kept pouring out, and at one point I was horrified to feel my eyes stinging. I told him about Meghan, the Nevernever and how I’d been taken by the fey when I was four. I told him about Kenzie, Todd, Annwyl and the Forgotten; who they were, what had happened to them. I confessed my hatred of the fey, my anger at Meghan for abandoning us, my mom’s worry and fear that I might vanish into the Nevernever, too. And I told him about Keirran, his relation to me and what I was planning to do that weekend.

When the words finally stopped, I felt exhausted, drained. But also strangely liberated, as if some huge weight had been taken from me. I’d never told anyone my whole story before, not even Kenzie. It was a relief to finally get it out. To tell someone who understood, who believed.

Through the whole thing, Guro hadn’t said much, just quiet encouragements for me to go on when I faltered. He still wore his same calm, serious expression, as if he hadn’t just spent an hour listening to a teenager ramble about invisible creatures that only he could see, that he’d been to a magical place called the Nevernever, that he was related to a faery queen.

“I know it sounds crazy,” I finished, now wondering what had possessed me to spill my guts. “I know I sound like a raving lunatic, but I swear everything I’ve told you is real. I wish there was a way I could make people see Them without gaining the Sight, but once They know you can see, They’ll just torment you forever. So, I guess it’s better that way.”

“I can see Them,” Guro said very softly.

I jerked up, staring at him, my jaw hanging a little slack. He gave me a tight smile. “Not like you,” he went on in a calm voice. “I’ve never seen Them clearly. It’s more a brief glimpse of something in the mirror, a reflection or a shadow on the ground that doesn’t match anything visible. But I know They’re there. My grandfather had this talent, also,” he continued as I still gaped at him. “But he was very in tune with the spirit world and things that no one else could see. Our family has always been sensitive to magic and the creatures no one else believes in. So I understand how difficult it is.”

I swallowed hard to clear my throat. “I wish everyone did.”

Guro didn’t say anything to that. “Have you told your parents?” he asked instead. “About what you plan to do this weekend?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I haven’t come up with a good enough excuse, and anything I say is going to freak them out, especially Mom. But I have to go.” I crossed my arms, frowning. “I just don’t know what I’m going to tell them.”

“Sometimes, the simplest answers are the hardest to see.”

I gave him a puzzled look, before I got it. “You want me to tell them the truth,” I said. Just the thought made my stomach tighten.

“That’s your call, Ethan.” Guro rose, and I stood, too, ready to follow him out. “But let me ask you this. Do you think this is the last time you’ll have to deal with Them?”

I slumped. “No,” I muttered. “I’ll never shake Them. They’ll never leave me alone. There will always be something I’m dragged into, especially now.”

Guro nodded slowly. “Be careful in New Orleans,” he said, opening the office door. “Do you still have the protection amulet I gave you?”

Technically, I’d given it to Kenzie, but... “Yes.”

“Keep it close,” Guro warned. “Other than your kali skills, that’s the best protection I can give you. If you or your friends need anything, magical or otherwise, please come to me. I cannot go with you into the hidden world, but I can make it so it is not quite so dangerous. Remember that, if you are ever in need of help.”

“I will, Guro. Thanks.”

He nodded solemnly, and I left the gym feeling a little lighter but still dreading what I had to do that night.

When I got home, things were normal. Annwyl was nowhere to be seen. Mom was putting the dinner plates in the dishwasher, and Dad was getting ready for work. I paused in the kitchen, watching Mom over the counter, and took a deep breath, preparing myself for the hardest conversation I would ever have.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE TRUTH

“Absolutely not.”

We were all three in the kitchen, me sitting on one of the bar stools, my parents facing me across the counter. Both of them wore looks of horror, anger and disbelief.

“No,” Dad said, as if that was the end of it. “Not after the stunt you pulled last week. You think we’re going to let you go to New Orleans alone? No, Ethan. Out of the question.”

A stunt? I tried to hold on to my anger, remembering that Dad wasn’t sensitive to the faery world. He tended to truly forget about it, like most normal humans did. Unlike me and Mom, who knew it was out there but tried to avoid it. We didn’t talk about it.

Well, that ended today. “What do you think I was doing last week?” I asked, startling him and causing Mom to straighten in alarm. “I wasn’t in New York to sightsee. It wasn’t some stupid ploy to get attention. I got pulled into the Nevernever because of the fey, because it was either disappear into Faery or get torn to shreds in the real world.”

Mom flinched. Dad stared at me like I was crazy...until he remembered that faeries were real, and we’d dealt with them before.

“I went into the Nevernever,” I went on, determined not to stop. Finally, all this would come out; it was no use trying to ignore it. I refused to ignore it anymore. “And I met Meghan. She’s the Queen of the Iron Realm and lives in this huge palace with thousands of faeries. Everything she told us was true. And now They all know about me.” I wanted to mention Keirran, but I’d promised Meghan I wouldn’t, and besides, this conversation was awkward and stressful enough without bringing my nephew—their unknown grandchild—into this.

“Ethan,” Mom began, but I cut her off.

“No, Mom, I’m not going to pretend any longer.” I gave her a half angry, half apologetic look. “I’ve tried ignoring Them, avoiding Them, trying not to See Them, and it doesn’t work. I’m just as much involved in Their world as Meghan was, and no matter what I do, that won’t change or go away.” Mom bit her lip, looking like she might cry, and I softened my voice. “I’m not normal, and we both know that. We have to accept that, every once in a while, They’re going to come for me, and I’m going to have to disappear for a bit. This is one of those times.”

“Why?” she whispered, on the verge of tears now. Dad had gone quiet, recognizing, I think, the fact that this was out of his control, that this world was one he had no part in. “Why can’t They leave us alone? I’ve already lost Meghan...why do They have to take you, too?”

“They’re not taking me anywhere,” I assured her. “Never again. Mom, I promise, I’m coming home. I have no intention of staying in Faery.”