Bride of Fae (Tethers) (20 page)

“Oh, did Alice find him?”

He grinned. “Someone once told me after a hundred years that book would still be read. Humans haven’t lost their sense of wonder. There’s hope for them yet.”

It was me! I told you about Alice in Wonderland!
She wanted to pound his chest, make him look at her. Make him see her.

“Don’t move,” he said. He disappeared into the crowd. He was right about the white rabbit’s brownie. Its euphoric effects were turning to paranoia. It felt like Aubrey was still with her. His violet eyes were so mesmerizing. She could feel his breath on her neck.

“Hold this.” Dandelion had returned with a paper cup filled with lemonade. He sprinkled fairy dust on the drink from one of the leather pouches on his belt and stirred it with a straw. His shirt sleeves were still pushed up.

“This is one of my sister’s remedies. Drink it.”

The lemonade had a grassy taste, but it wasn’t unpleasant. With the first sip, the sense of Aubrey’s presence fell away. “I don’t know what Aubrey did to me.”

Dandelion chuckled. “His magic is strong, but you had a kick-start.”

“He was intense.” She took another sip of the lemonade. “Thank you for getting me away from him.”

“I was doing him a favor,” Dandelion said. “Idris let him come to Sarumos—London—for one reason: to keep an eye on me
. Definitely not to play with someone from Tintagos.”

Wrong response. She wanted him to say
I had to get him away from you. I don’t want anyone to touch you but me.

“Your camera looks real.” She had to find a safe topic. Something meaningless.
Something that wouldn’t end in her inviting him to the Dorchester to take a shower together. “Good costume. You make a convincing photographer.”

“Photojournalist,” he said. “It is real. This city has changed.” He snapped a picture of a passing double-decker bus then turned to shoot the statue above the fountain. “I’m glad the Anteros is still here.”

“Anteros?” Beverly said. “Isn’t that Eros, the god of desire?”
Stop. Desire is not a safe topic.

“Many
make that mistake,” he said. “Anteros is Eros’s twin. Eros represents desire. Anteros represents delight, mature love. Selfless love. The best kind, according to your people.”

“My people?” Beverly said. “At the Tragic Fall right now, my people are getting pissed and telling ghost stories. None would spend two minutes
together considering the difference between Eros and Anteros.”

Dandelion held out his hand. “Stand up. Let me take your picture.”

“Sure.” She set the paper cup down and stood up as he backed away. He squatted and said, “From this angle, Anteros is on your shoulder.” He smiled, and her heart swelled. All her cares fell away. She could spend a lifetime remembering that smile.

He clicked off a few shots and came back to her. “You’re protected by the best kind of love.”

She picked up the lemonade. He somehow brushed against the cup and managed to spill the rest of the liquid on himself.

“Ack!” He reached for his choker. “You’ve drenched it.”

“But I didn’t—” Before Beverly could say anything more, his warning look stopped her.

He pulled off the choker and slipped it into his smaller pou
ch while he surveyed the people on the steps and in the street nearby. “No tethers that I can see,” he said with a sigh of relief.

He took her into his arms and
pulled her close to his chest. His kiss drove away all thoughts and left but one emotion burning inside her—a raging desire most definitely inspired by the other kind of love.

T
HE MUSIC STOPPED AND
the kiss went on. The neon signs of Piccadilly Circus flickered and glowed, celebrating Dandelion’s warm and insistent kiss. For a moment, Beverly was in freefall again, the northern lights flashing all around. The world made sense.

“Goldy said you’d come,” Dandelion said softly, “but I didn’t let myself believe him.”

“What do you mean?”

Cleopatra
and Caesar finished packing up their things while Antony waved down a taxi. As Antony and the driver loaded their instruments, another bus drove by and Dandelion winced. “Let’s get out of here.”

They left the Circus on Regent and turned on Jermyn Street. A million thoughts raced through Beverly’s brain. The tethers, as Dandelion called them, signified fairies. But while he was wearing his, he didn’t know her—or pretended not to.

“It’s all happened just as you told us,” Dandelion said. “Goldy kept an eye on you while you grew up. He was there on the Ring, and he pulled you and your sister from the wreck.”

“But if he knew the accident was going to happen…”

“He couldn’t save your parents, Beverly. He could do no more and no less than you’d said he did or the time line would have been disturbed. It’s why I had to wait to see you until after your return to this time from Mudcastle.”

They stopped in front of St. James’s Church. Dandelion glanced up at the trees in its courtyard and relaxed somewhat.

“You don’t know how hard it was, knowing you were alive in the world and not being able to see you. I had to ensure you wouldn’t know me at Mudcastle. That had to be the first time we met because it was the first time we met. Otherwise, everything might have changed. You might never have come. The cup might never have left Faeview.”

“The cup.”
Of course. That’s what he really cared about.

Another cab drove by, and Dandelion grimaced again and leaned against her. “What’s wrong?” she said. “Something is hurting you.”

“I have to get off the street. Away from all this cold iron.” He held her close. The trees and the street blurred, and when the world came back into focus they were inside the church. One man sat with his back to them in the pews near the nave, and an old lady examined the wall plaques. Otherwise, the church was empty.

“I
sensed a square nearby, but I don’t think I could have made it,” Dandelion said.

“What is it? What’s making you sick?”

“The cold iron. The motorcars are full of it. It depletes my magic and makes my bones ache.”

He pressed his forehead against the wood pew in front of him and gripped it with both hands.
Did fairies pray? If so, was it to the god of the priests and vicars or to the high gods? This lovely church was as beautiful as human hands could fashion. Not intimidating. Homey and comforting. Just the sort of place fairies she’d think fairies would feel welcome.

Please help him,
Beverly prayed to any god who would listen. She didn’t think Brother Sun and Sister Moon would mind.

“Wood, brick, marble.” Dandelion inhaled and exhaled with renewed vigor. “
Much better.”

He laid his choker over his knee
, with the bright cut jewel facing away.

“That’s what these
do” Beverly touched the black cord. It was soft like satin. “Protect you from the iron.”

“Yes.”

Dandelion covered her hand with his. She was aware of its strength on the back of her hand, and his thigh under her palm.

“The jewel is goblin-made, cut from Dumnos iron,” he said. “When it touches a pulse point, it creates an instant portal to the faewood.”

“Then your banishment is over,” Beverly said. “You’re back in the faewood.”

“No, I'm at Mudcastle. I won’t
return, not while Idris rules the Dumnos fae.” He traced the tether until his fingers met hers. “I came to London through a series of portals, and I’ll go back the same way. The tether is Idris’s doing. He let me leave Mudcastle on the condition I wear it while I’m in the city.”

“Why? That makes no sense.”

“He told Cissa it was for my safety.”

“And you don’t believe that.”

“It’s so he can keep track of me,” Dandelion said. “Idris has a unique glimmer glass in which he can see anyone wearing a tether. He thinks no one knows.”

“
That’s why you didn’t wear them at Mudcastle.”

“Morning Glory created the portal so she and
the others wouldn’t need tethers to visit. Idris had become so paranoid, always watching.”

It wasn’t much different in the human realm, Beverly thought.
Just last season, CCTV was put in for all soccer matches.

“Dandelion, how did Goldy know I’d be here today, here in London?”

“Because he suggested it. He and Dumnos have become close, if you know what I mean.”

“Suggested what, exactly?”

“He encouraged Dumnos to loan the cup to the museum for the centennial. And…” Dandelion’s face went blank and he turned away. His voice flattened. “And that Dumnos make you his bride.”

His words hit like
a blow to the gut. “You
want
me to marry Lord Dumnos.”

“I want you to wear silk and satin and flowers in your hair. I want you to be free of worry. I don’t want you serving ale to the descendants of the Sarumen.”

He checked the other two humans in the church to make sure they weren’t watching and stood up. “At the moment, I want to fix this.” He tossed fairy dust over her.

As the dust settled, Cissa’s go-go girl costume disappeared, replaced by a sleeveless, low-cut black satin cocktail dress and a white and gold velvet burnout bolero. Beverly’s hair was piled on her head. She reached up
and felt live flowers tucked into an intricate pattern of braids.

She ran her hands over the
dress’s smooth satin and stood up. “Ouch!” Her toes felt like they were breaking. She was wearing glass slippers. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“
Joking.” Dandelion changed her shoes to soft red pumps with spiked heels. “You’re beautiful.” He kissed her forehead. “Perfect to attend the opening of the fairy exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum, featuring
Bausiney’s Abundance
.”

It occurred to Beverly she had a conflict of interest here. Dandelion intended to take the cup, and she wished him success. It rightfully belonged to the Dumnos fae, not to Faeview. On the other hand, it would devastate the earl.
Lord Dumnos had been so good to her and Marion. She owed him some degree of loyalty.

At the church door, Dandelion smoothed the furrow between her eyebrows
. “You won’t be implicated. Lord Dumnos will have no quarrel with you.” He glanced from her dress to his leather vest and pants and frowned. “This won’t do.”

The next moment, he was dressed in a black tux.

It was night, but Jermyn Street was bright with shop lights made hazy by the light fog that gave the air a chill. “We’ll never find a taxi,” Beverly said.

A black cab pulled over in front of them. Dandelion
opened the door for her and winked. “You can pay.” He put on his tether. “I hear you’re loaded with the ready.”

“You sound like a swell out of Trollope,” she said.

“Those were the days,” he said.

“It seems like only yesterday.”

The driver had a Van Morrison eight-track playing at full blast, halfway through
Moondance
when they got in. She hummed along with the tune and admired the London architecture on the way to the V&A. She was happy.

Another Van Morrison song came on,
I Want To Roo You.
This time Dandelion joined in. “I want to roo you,” he sang with the Irish singer. “Woo you tonight.”

“Nice voice.”

“Disco sucks.” He quoted the t-shirt from Piccadilly Circus. “But Van Morrison can stay.”

He kissed her lightly, teasing her lips with his tongue
. With a sudden anguished groan, he held her closer and kissed her hard. Heat charged through her body. The world wouldn’t stop spinning.

He
closed his eyes and kissed her palm. His thick lashes were the same dark chestnut as his hair, and the silver hair picks reflected lights from the street. He really was like a prince in an old fairy tale, banished from his homeland and tricked out of his inheritance by an evil enemy.