The tall man entered, stepping sideways, leaving the door wide and placing the wall behind him. His manner was professional and he carried an expression of faint amusement, as if he were aware of a private joke he was unable to share. His hair was short and his ears stuck out slightly. In his hand was a dark wooden stave, about as tall as his shoulder. The top was ornamented with a decorative silver cap and the base was shod with steel. It slid downwards through his hand, tapping sharply as the tip struck the tiles beside his feet. It was an easy movement showing long familiarity.
"You are Niall Petersen and Blackbird of the Fey'ree." It wasn't a question. "I am Warder Garvin. I bring you the felicitations of the Lords and Ladies of the Seven Courts and request that you stand before them before sunset today. "
"A request?" I asked him.
"It's a formality," Blackbird said. Her stance said that she knew this fellow. "They want to see us today."
"Will you come?" I looked at Blackbird.
"Where?" she asked.
"There's an address in Soho Square on this slip of paper." He untucked a scrap of paper from his pocket and leaned forward to place it on the bed. "Be there an hour after noon. We'll take you the rest of the way. "
"We?" I asked.
"I brought reinforcements, in case there was trouble. Tate?" He smiled, tipping his head towards the door without taking his eyes from us.
The doorway darkened and in it stood a huge bear of a man. The way he filled the doorway reminded me of how Gramawl had filled the tunnel below Covent Garden. He had the same bulk, as if he had to lean down to pass through the limited opening. His long hair was gathered back in a clasp and he had a grizzled beard. Grey eyes regarded us from beneath bushy eyebrows. He also wore the dark uniform.
"Trouble?" he asked. His voice was resonant and low, rich like chocolate and not in the least bit perturbed. If there was trouble, he wasn't concerned.
Garvin glanced over at us and then shook his head.
"No. We'll see you in Soho Square."
"What if we're held up?" I asked.
"Don't be late. Or we'll have to come and fetch you." He turned, the bulk of Tate retreating before him, and they walked away back down the corridor, the rhythmic tap of the staff on the tiles sounding their retreat. "Who were they?" I asked Blackbird.
"We're being summoned to stand before the Council of Seven Courts, the full council of the lords and ladies who rule all the Courts of the Feyre."
"Seven courts? I thought you said the Seventh Court wasn't part of that anymore."
"Their place is held open for them should they ever decide to return. The Council is where the rulers of the courts meet together to discuss matters affecting them all. "
"So why are we being summoned?"
"I don't know. The Council usually acts to defend the independence and authority of each individual court. They resolve disputes between courts."
"So why do they want to see either of us?"
"I don't know, but you can't refuse. You have to go. "
"What will happen if we don't?"
"They would send those two to bring us before the court and, believe me, it would be far better to go willingly. Or we could be ruled in contempt, just like a human court except the punishments are more visceral."
"There are only two of them," I pointed out.
"The Warders of the Seven Courts are a cross between court officials, bodyguards and court enforcers. They carry out the will of the courts, in blood if necessary. And there are six of them, one for each court. "
"So they'll try to bring us before the court. We can stand up for ourselves, I think we've proved that much at least."
"The Untainted are bad enough to deal with but the Warders are different. If the Seven Courts decree an execution then these are the people who carry it out. They're specially trained to go up against the worst of Feyre society. They are the ultimate sanction of the courts. They work as a team and they make Raffmir and Solandre look like amateurs. "
"They didn't look so bad."
"Delivering messages is one of their more pleasant duties. They probably regard it as a day off."
"Do you think we should go with them, then? Couldn't we run away, go somewhere remote? "
"You may be able to run, but I can't. "
"Why not?"
"Niall, I am bound to the courts. When I am summoned I must go. I receive the court's protection, but I am also bound by its decisions. I don't have a choice. They'll always find me and, anyway, it's not really an option in my condition."
"You're definitely pregnant then? "
"You'll be a father again."
"Oh wow. That's incredible, really. I'm delighted." I drew her to me, intending to kiss her, but she resisted.
"I've never done this before. I confess I'm a little scared."
"I'll stay with you. It'll be OK. We can go to ante-natal classes together. I did it with Katherine."
"I can't go to ante-natal classes, Niall." She looked troubled.
"Why not? It's easy. It's just exercises and stuff. You'll be good at it."
"You forget, the baby is only partly human. Fey mothers carry their children for almost a year, not nine months. Don't you think people are going to be suspicious if it takes that long? It might not even come out looking human. I can't have a scan or let anyone see it, can I? I have to keep it secret."
"Don't the Feyre have midwives or something? Surely if they're so keen to have children they have something?"
"Kareesh will look after me when the time comes, but in the meantime I need somewhere quiet, somewhere safe for the baby to grow." She was looking more and more concerned.
"It'll be OK," I reassured her, "After all we've been through, we can deal with this. I'll think of something. "
"There's more. I'm going to lose my power. "
"What do you mean?"
"I'm going to lose my ability to use magic. It's already fading. Pregnant Fey can't use magic. It would be dangerous for the baby and my body won't let me. It'll close down for the duration. That's how I know I'm pregnant. What I did in the tunnels, I couldn't do any more. It's the way it should be, but… "
"But what? "
"Niall, I feel so helpless."
I opened my arms and she leaned forward and rested her head on my chest while I hugged her to me. She was trembling so I simply held her until the trembling eased.
After a while she lifted herself up and looked into my eyes.
"Tell me that it will be OK?"
"It'll be fine," I told her. "I promise." She rested her head back on my chest and we lay there for some time while the hospital murmured around us. "I need help," I told her, after a while. "What kind of help?" she asked.
"I need Claire, today, now. Can you bring her to me? "
"Here? Yes. What for?"
"We need Claire to help us. I'll explain it to you both when she gets here. But hurry."
"She's going to want to know why, Niall."
"Tell her I want her to be our insurance policy."
Blackbird and I reached Soho Square shortly before one and found the early afternoon drinkers were already established in the pub on the corner. The garden in the centre of the square was arrayed with office workers eating lunch. We found the address easily, an anonymous entrance in a row of doors. We were ten minutes early. "They're not here yet," I remarked.
"Of course they are," Blackbird contradicted.
"I don't see anyone."
"You won't."
She looked around nervously, then ascended the short flight of steps and pressed the brass doorbell mounted by the door. No one came to the door. She waited a moment and then descended back to the pavement. "They will know we're here now. "
"I thought you said they already knew. "
"Don't be picky."
We waited on the pavement in full view while people walked through the square on their way to meet friends, lovers or colleagues. We scanned each face for signs of our earlier visitors, but didn't see them approach. They appeared out of the random movements of passers-by. One moment there were a number of unrecognised people strolling through the square and the next they were there.
With them was a young woman with short, dark hair, wearing a pale grey silk shirt and trousers. Her eyes were as hard as glass. She had walked past Blackbird and then doubled back, cutting off the retreat. We knew she was one of them from the sword swinging from her hip which hadn't been there a moment before. The black lacquered scabbard gleamed with the dull sheen of constant handling. She watched us, and Garvin and Tate watched the square. Tate swung a long-bearded axe gently from one hand. It looked like a toy against his enormous frame.
"You're on time." Garvin's smile was noncommittal, as if it was all the same to him. "Tate you know. This is Amber. You will not call power unless it is directly requested, understand? Use power without permission and we will kill you without hesitation."
He moved down the pavement, staff tapping on the paving, away from the door where Blackbird had rung the bell. Tate and Amber moved in to flank us. "Aren't we going inside?" Blackbird asked, gesturing towards the door where she'd rung the bell. He shook his head. "There's no one in there. I checked."
He went down the row to another similar door, as anonymous as the first, and trotted up the steps. The door opened as he reached it and a fourth member of the team was waiting, wearing the same charcoal uniform. On his belt were two long knives, one on each hip. Like every other weapon they looked worn by frequent handling. He was shorter in build with a broad nose, a bull neck and shoulders that gave him the impression of being roughly square. His hair was ginger and he reminded me of someone I had seen recently. I was trying to recall who it was as we were shepherded inside. Then I remembered. He had the same broad flat nose and protruding eyes as Marshdock. "Are they ready for us?"
"They're assembled," he said to Garvin. "But they have some other business to discuss. Fee is with them. She'll let you know."
Tate and Amber followed us inside. We were led through the house, past closed internal doors to what could only be described as a scullery at the back of the house. It had a range cooker that looked like it hadn't been used in decades and a large rectangular table in scuffed bare wood, scored with generations of service. A window looked out onto the back, but it was too shadowed between the buildings to see what was outside. Garvin didn't pause. He went straight to a side door at the back of the room and opened it. "Down here," he said.
"What is it," I asked Blackbird as she descended the stairs behind Garvin, "about the Feyre and basements? "
"It's closer to the earth," she said, as if that should explain it.
The stairs had a bend in them and were quite difficult to negotiate, so that I wondered how Tate was going to get down them. They opened out at the bottom into two cellar rooms accessed through an open doorway. There was a faint musty smell and I noticed a tray left out on a chest with a number of wizened apples on it. They didn't look like this year's harvest.
Garvin strolled into the second cellar and waited for the rest to follow. Amber came down after us, followed by a scraping sound as Tate eased himself down the stairway and into the room.
"The courts are down here?" I asked Garvin. He shook his head. "Follow."
He walked to the centre of the room, turned to face the back wall and stepped forward. There was a twist in the air, he shimmered and vanished.
"It's one of the Ways, is that it?" I asked Blackbird. "There isn't a Way here," she said. "It doesn't go anywhere."
"Yes it does," rumbled Tate. "You next." He nodded towards Blackbird.
She stepped forward to the place where Garvin had been, orientating herself as he had done.
"Interesting," she said, then stepped forward and vanished. "Now you." He nodded towards the spot.
I walked forward, remembering the last time I had tried this. I had become lost and had nearly broken my neck getting out again. Nervously, I turned to face the wall and then felt down below my feet. The sensation was different. When we had used the Ways before I had felt the flow of power beneath my feet like a raging torrent. This was more like a stream or a tributary, the same in nature but much less powerful. I looked at Tate, but he just nodded. Amber dropped her hand to her sword hilt for emphasis.
I reached down and felt for the connection. The Way swelled beneath me and rose. I stepped forward and felt it pick me up and rush me away. Unlike the wild ride of the other ways, this one had only echoes of the vast emptiness I had felt before and lasted mere moments. Then I was stepping into a brightly lit room which smelled neither damp nor musty. Blackbird was there with Garvin and I walked forward out of the Way across the stone tiles to allow the others to follow me. I turned around, noticing there were no windows, and realising there was someone behind me. The figure stood behind me was the size of a man. His pelt was brown like warm chestnut and his arms and legs were long under the dark grey cotton of his loose clothing. The long fur on his head fell forward over his face and there was the bright glint of dark eyes under the stringy fringe. He smiled, baring rows of sharp pointed teeth in a grin far too wide to be human. He was holding a short spear with a long, double-edged blade, held so the point angled down towards the floor. The blade looked clean and sharp and he was poised, like a dancer.
"This is Slimgrin. He's here to make sure only invited guests arrive this way."
"Where are we?" I asked Garvin.
"Somewhere else," he said offhandedly. He turned to Slimgrin. "When the others come through, tell Amber and Tate to follow us upstairs and have Fellstamp help you here. Close the gate as soon as they've arrived." Slimgrin nodded. The way they used names was arrogant, as if it didn't matter that we knew them. Garvin turned and walked towards the bottom of a stairway, gesturing us to follow.
The stairs were wider than those we had descended and doubled back on themselves to rise to an open doorway. At the top was a grand hallway of the type that might have graced a small country mansion or an upmarket townhouse. The tall ceilings gave the building a Georgian feel, as if ladies dressed in bustles and panniers would appear at any moment. There was an open door into a sitting room with armchairs loosely arrayed around a large stone fireplace. The curtains had been drawn across the large windows and a couple of Regency-style standard lamps were left on, providing a soft and unobtrusive light. The fire had been set, but was unlit. Garvin escorted us into the room.
"Sit here for a moment until they're ready for you. It shouldn't be long."
Blackbird went to an armchair and sat on the armrest. I walked to the fireplace and turned to face the room. I was too nervous to sit. Garvin stood next to the doorway, not blocking the exit exactly but making it clear that we were to stay.
Amber and Tate appeared together. Tate went to the chair opposite Blackbird, the wood frame of the chair making protesting creaking noises as he eased himself into it. He rested his head on the back of the chair, placed the axe across the arms and looked at ease. Amber stood inside the door leaning back against the wall, the sword in her hand resting against the side of her leg. She watched me like a cat watches a mouse-hole. We waited in complete silence for ten minutes. I found myself listening to Blackbird breathe. The tiny sounds of the overburdened chair under Tate overlaid the faint nameless noises from the rest of the house. If I listened carefully I could hear my own blood pumping in my ears.
Approaching footsteps warned us of the arrival at the door before she appeared. In contrast to Amber, she wore a mid-length shift dress, in charcoal grey like everyone else, but it was short enough to show off her bare legs and clung to her curves. She was tall and pretty and moved with a lithe grace that said she knew it. Her hair was blond and fell in long curling ringlets around her shoulders. Strangely, her curls appeared to move on their own, even when she was standing still, giving her an unearthly quality at odds with her pretty girl image. In her hand was a short baton, thicker and shorter than Garvin's staff and polished with a glossy black lacquer.
She nodded to Garvin and smiled at us. "Hello, I'm Fionh. Blackbird, they will see you now." She stepped back from the doorway and waited for Blackbird to rise. I stepped forward to go with Blackbird, but Tate lifted one hand. "Just the girl," he rumbled.
Blackbird came to me, turning her face up to accept a chaste kiss. "Good fortune," she whispered.
She turned and walked through the door, Fionh and Amber falling in behind, the footsteps fading as they went deeper into the house. There was creak as Tate shifted in his chair. Garvin didn't move.
I went to the armchair Blackbird had vacated and slumped into it. Her warmth lingered in the arm where my hand rested. I had hoped we would be able to see them together, to face them as we had faced other adversaries. We weren't being given that option. Still, Blackbird knew what to say if it came to it. We had no way of knowing why the council wanted to see us. It could be good news. They might want to reward us for the service we had performed, though somehow I doubted that. I had been summoned to numerous board meetings in the past and it was never to give you a pat on the back and tell you what a good boy you'd been. I pushed my mind away from worrying about Blackbird to thoughts of my work colleagues and what they would say when I resigned. Would they let me resign or would I already have been let go? If I was lucky then there would be a settlement package waiting to tide me over until Blackbird and I had our lives sorted out. That was assuming we still had our lives.
The footsteps in the corridor brought me to my feet.
Tate stayed in the chair until the last possible moment, only levering himself up after Fionh appeared in the doorway.
"They will see you now," she said.
"Where's Blackbird?" I asked her.
"She is being cared for, don't worry."
"If she is harmed…" I told them.
Garvin interrupted. "She won't be harmed while she's pregnant."
"How did you know about that?" I asked him.
He shrugged, a seismic movement. "I make it my business to know about the people I have to deal with." Fionh led the way while Garvin and Tate fell in behind. We went back into the house, which was clearly a substantial property. We passed room after room, some with dust covers over the furniture as if they hadn't been used in years. We came at the end to a set of double doors facing us. Fionh opened one of the doors toward her, stepping to the side to allow me to enter. "Garvin will go in with you," she said.
Inside, the room was dimly lit. I stepped through the doorway into a room buzzing with power. Outside there had been no trace of it, but within the room it was like walking through a cloud of static.
There was a large domed ceiling with a mural painted on it, like the ones you see in churches, except the angels had far too many teeth and the wrong sort of wings. The room could originally have been a ballroom. There was a gallery at the far end where the musicians might have sat. In the centre of the floor was a pool of light within which there was a huge seven-pointed star. "Come forward, Alshirian, called Dogstar, also called Niall Petersen, so that we may see you."
Arrayed in a semi-circle around the star were seven chairs, large enough to be called thrones and set back so they were in shadow. Six of the chairs were occupied, illuminated dimly by some unseen light source. The empty chair was dark.
Whether it was some distortion caused by the power in the room or a quality of the light, the figures in the chairs were isolated, picked out against the dark. Some of the occupants had features I recognised. The strikingly beautiful blue-eyed lady wrapped in the deep blue cloak had hair that wound around the finials on the top of her chair of its own volition and was just as disturbing as Fionh's had been. The short fellow with the broad nose and the grumpy expression reminded me of Marshdock and Fellstamp. They shared common features in the way a son inherits his father's ears. A delicate figure with finely boned limbs ending in long spindly fingers sat to my right. Her skin was pale as moonlight and her ears came sharply to a point. She had a small pert nose and a mouth wider than a human mouth would be. Her eyes were slightly elongated and shone green in the dark as she turned a yellow gold band on her left wrist. Next to her was a huge woman, her face broad and flat, her forearms the size of hams. Ivory teeth protruded from her bottom jaw, reminding me of Gramawl, but she was largely hairless and as pale skinned as her neighbour. Heavy silver rings dangled from each ear and she had a broad leather belt around her waist, pulled over a loose shirt with a great silver ram's-head buckle.
Next to her was a man who I would have not looked twice at if I had met him elsewhere. Dressed in a red silk shirt, he had a feral look about him that spoke of something predatory. He regarded me with cold malice. For a moment, I thought the figure next to him was Slimgrin, the warder who had been waiting in the room downstairs, but the fur on his head had been caught into a topknot and he had a groomed, more cultured look about him. He also had a heavy silver chain around his neck that sat bright against the dark lustre of his fur. They were clearly waiting for me, so I stepped forward into the circle of light and stood at the centre of the star. Garvin moved in behind me. The light caught the bright edge of a bare blade in his hand. His staff had transformed into a long slim blade and scabbard. I hadn't heard him draw it. "Is that necessary?" I asked him. "Not my decision." He shrugged lightly.
I turned back to the dimly lit figures in the seats.
"Is that it? Have you brought me here to slaughter me?"
I was greeted with silence. The power in the room was making my ears buzz. "If not for that, then why am I here?"
"That's a better question," said the lady in the blue cloak in a light contralto voice. "I am Kimlesh. I speak for the Nymphine Court, the undines and the greyne. That's one of the things we are here to consider. Why you are here. "
"You summoned me."
"I meant why you, a wraith, un-bound of the Seventh Court and part-human, are here."
"That, I don't know," I said honestly.
"Blackbird has told you, I'm sure, that the Seventh Court are not known for associating with humans. "
"The fact I'm here means someone has been playing away from home, though, doesn't it? "
"Not necessarily. "
"How else do you explain it?"
"There was a time, long ago, when the Feyre were not as you see us today. Each of us here holds a strand of that thread. Teoth, there, holds the office of High Maker, held only by the luchorpan and the nixies. Mellion is the Hordemaster, ruler of all the goblins and gnolls of the Goblin Court. These boundaries were made, though. They did not appear by accident. "
"What does that have to do with me?"
"We, in this room, made a decision some time ago, to allow our bloodlines to mix with those of humanity and repair the damage that was done. We allowed, and in some cases even encouraged, a liaison between the races."
"I know. That's why the Seventh Court rebelled."
"The Feyre has become more and more specialised as certain traits only manifest themselves inside a single court. It has made us fragile."
"You don't appear fragile to me."
"I don't mean fragile as individuals. I mean as a race. We have lost the ability to reproduce because parts of our make-up have become unstable. "
"But breeding with humans fixes that?"
"We took a calculated risk. We have known for a long time that the union between Feyre and Human was fertile and had the potential to restore the fertility lost to us. Humans spread like moss on a damp tree. If we could acquire some of their fecundity then we would be restored. That was a prize worth the taking. Human blood has the missing pieces, as far as we are concerned. You are a demonstration of that. You already have a daughter and there's another child on the way. "
"Blackbird told you?"
"We already knew. The prospect of a birth is important news amongst the courts of the Feyre. "
"Then you asked me here to congratulate me?"
The answer was not a warm one. "The nature of the babe is uncertain."
"You mean it could turn out like me, wraithkin, rather than like Blackbird."
"It's more complicated than that. When we mixed our bloodlines with humanity, the capacity to have children was not the only thing altered. It was the risk we took when we allowed it. "
"What else changed?"
"The Feyre are defined by physical form. Fey'ree are small and delicate like Yonna here," she gestured to the pale, slim figure with the green eyes, "whereas ogres like Barthia are much larger and stronger." She gestured to the huge woman, who accepted the compliment with a nod.
I looked back at Yonna. I could see now the resemblance from when Blackbird had transformed herself in the room above the inn, when we were in Shropshire. The pale skin and the way the eyes were elongated. "I am Fey'ree," she'd told me. "A creature of Fire and Air." Kimlesh continued. "Humans, though, do not inherit the full form of the Feyre. They can acquire aspects of it, of course, and some are more Fey than others, but none are quite like us. "
"Is that a problem?"
"It makes it much harder to determine what gifts they have inherited, especially as human blood adds its own twist, bringing forth gifts that were formerly dormant. "
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that your Fey forebear could have come from any court, not just that of Altair, our missing brother. Your human blood threw the dice and you are the result. Just because you are wraithkin and Blackbird is Fey'ree does not mean your child will be one or the other. Human heredity has thrown us back into the hands of fortune. Your daughter, Alexandra, could take after any of us. As could your unborn son. "
"My son? It's a boy?"
"Did Kareesh not tell you? Yes, if Blackbird survives to deliver him, you will have a son. Be warned, though, birth among the Feyre is a hazardous business. Blackbird must be careful. "
"I'll look after her."
"You?" It was the first time the feral man in the red shirt had spoken. "You're not leaving this room."