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“Instinct is a wonderful thing. It doesn’t care about the lies our parents told us, or the ones we tell ourselves.”
“Did you know?” The words were strangely fragile when exposed to the light like that. Tybalt blinked. “Did I know?” he echoed. “Did you know Simon and my mother were married? Have you been keeping this from me? Have you been doing the same thing everyone else has been doing, and protecting me?” I spat the words at him like a mouthful of snakes, all twisting and venomous. “I need to know the truth, and I need to know it now.” “No,”
Don't lie to Toby
“I love you. Lying to you would be a mistreatment of what that love means.” I laughed, a cold, jagged sound. “None of the other people who say they love me seem to feel that way.” “Then they are not very good at loving,”
“Are you that angry with me?” “Right now? Yes. You’ve been keeping secrets from me. Things I needed to know.” Like maybe before he’d sent me running after Simon, before I’d been turned into a fish and left stranded in a watery jail for fourteen years. “I love you. I always will. But right now, I’m pretty pissed at you.
“What else aren’t you telling me?” He started to protest. I shook my head, stopping him before he could get a word out. “No. Maeve’s teeth, Sylvester, I’m mad at you for keeping secrets, and you’re still doing it. Why the hell would you do a thing like that? You know you’re on thin ice right now.” “My dear, I’ve been on thin ice for a very long time, especially where your family is concerned.”
Even knowing he is keeping Toby in the dark and knowing how she hates being lied too, Sylvester continues to do so.
“Okay. So you don’t know anything that can help us find Simon, and some old promise to my mother matters more to you than I do. Good to know where I stand.” “October—” “We’re leaving.”
Summed up succinctly
“I would never allow anyone or anything to harm you. If you believe nothing else, I need you to believe that.” Except that he was harming me; he had been harming me every time he kept the things I needed to know secret from me. He just couldn’t see it.
“I speak to you now as a King to a Duke, and with the utmost respect,” said Tybalt, in a tone that made it clear he could care less if Sylvester took offense. “If October is hurt because you kept a promise to her mother rather than upholding your duty to one who is your sworn vassal, believe me when I say that I will return here on my own, and I will make you sorry you ever allowed harm to come to her.”
I looked back at him, trying to make him see how desperate I was. “If there’s anything I can do . . . she’s been threatening to kill me since the day we met, and she’s been saving me the whole time. I can be with you because of her. I’m here because of her. I have to try.”
It hurt as badly as anything I had ever done to myself, and that was exactly right, because this should hurt, this should cost. If it didn’t, I would be lost.
“For Maeve’s sake, live. What are mothers with no daughters left to live for?”
“Welcome back to the land of the living.” The Luidaeg raised her head, focusing on me. Her eyes were a clear, simple driftglass green. “What did you do?” she asked.
Dean stood at the front of the motley little group, a trident in his shaking hands, aimed at the person in front of him. Marcia was to his right, holding a butcher knife. Her hands weren’t shaking at all. She looked perfectly calm, and like she was ready for whatever was going to happen next.
More Marcia weirdness
To my surprise, she simply turned, flicking out her hands like she was trying to dry them off. Dean wobbled. Then, without fanfare, he and all his subjects—except, inexplicably, for Marcia—fell backward, into the water. Marcia cried out, dropping to her knees and trying to lift her liege’s head out of the water.
More Marcia weirdness
It was like it had all happened in backstory, and now the story had actually started.” “That’s a really weird way of putting it,” I said. “I know,” said Quentin, sounding frustrated. “That’s the problem. It’s like I always knew how strange it was for me to be a blind royal foster placed in a Duchy that was in the process of recovering from horrible tragedy.
“I dislike the dead returning to life,” said Etienne, his shoulders slumping again. “It’s untidy and inappropriate.”
“And that’s Etienne in a nutshell,” I said blithely. “Anything inappropriate should cease immediately, because otherwise it might disrupt the natural order in the course of killing us all.”
“Growing up often comes at the cost of our heroes,” he said. I glanced in his direction, even though it was dark enough that all I could really see was the outline of his body. “So what does that say about my relationship with Quentin? I’m a hero of the realm now, remember?” “You’re his hero, but also his friend, and he idolizes you less than he used to,” said Tybalt, with patient thoughtfulness.
But you removed yourself from any pedestals he could build as fast as he assembled them. I don’t think you’ll break his heart. Not in that manner, anyway.”
“You came back to warn Sylvester. You’ll always come back to warn him, no matter how much danger it could put you in, no matter what it costs you, because he cared for you when you thought you were nothing. You were never nothing. That didn’t matter. Perception is everything in this world.”
“I don’t think he wants me to look like him. I don’t think he ever wanted me. You were the only daughter he needed.” “That’s not true, Raysel. Your father loves you. He always has.
Rayseline has no self confidence
He just doesn’t know how to help you, and he’s a hero. He doesn’t deal well with not being able to fix things.”
“Our mothers can betray us, and we can betray them, but they’ll always be our mothers. Nothing takes that away.”
My mother . . . she took what vengeance she could. Do not ask me what it was. I can’t tell you yet.”
I wonder what it is..
“Can you promise me that you will keep October safe?” Her expression softened a bit. “As safe as I can. We both know that absolute safety and October are never going to cross paths.” He snorted. “True enough.
Facts
“Love is love. It’s rarer in Faerie than it used to be—rarer than it should be, if you ask me. If you can find it, you should cling to it, and never let anything interfere.
“Mother, if you can hear me, I’ve been very good,” said the Luidaeg. “I haven’t killed anyone who didn’t deserve it, not even my sister, who should probably have been killed a hundred times over by now. I haven’t stolen any hearts or broken any vows, and I’m only calling on you now because I need you more than I’ve ever needed you before. Mother, I am your oldest living child. I am your eternity made flesh. Now please, hark to me, heed me here, and open the door before we die a horrible and lingering death in the darkness.”
Invoking the disembodied Mother
“Who are my mother’s parents?” Much to my surprise, the Luidaeg smiled like I had just asked the five hundred dollar question on an afternoon game show. She leaned forward and tapped my chin with her thumb as she said, “Oberon’s her father, making her the youngest of my siblings, but her mother is not my mother, nor my father’s other bride. Who her mother is I can’t say, but if you go looking, you might find some interesting truths hidden under some equally interesting lies.”
“Opening roads is difficult,” she said. “I’ve done it for you before, but never without cost. Why would I do this for you now? I owe you nothing.” “You owe me nothing but your life,” I corrected harshly. “When I saved you from the salt poisoning—you remember the assassination attempt that your daughter thought was a good idea—I didn’t ask for any reward, because Sylvester is my liege and it was the right thing to do. Well, that assumed that everyone was playing fair. Turns out no one here was playing fair but me. I saved your life, Luna Torquill, and more, I killed your father. I set you free.
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I was building something better. I was building something real.
