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Kelley pulled back sharply—it was a lullaby that she had heard her aunt Emma sing once or twice when she’d been a very little girl. Emma had never sung it
to
her—only at times when she thought she’d been alone. And always she’d wept.

Sonny’s lullaby.

Chloe closed her eyes, her expression going slack with pleasure as she sang.

“Stop it,” Kelley said. “Stop!”

But the Siren was too far gone inside the music to hear her.

“Stop your damn singing!” Kelley demanded.

“Kelley!” Maddox turned on her.

“That song is Sonny’s, Maddox. She has no right to that memory!”

“I know. I know.” His voice was gentle, but firm. “I was there. Just remember, Kelley—he gave away that memory for you. He did it to help
you
.”

That might have been true, but he hadn’t
given
it away. Chloe had stolen it. Kelley bit down on her tongue to keep from hurling a curse at the Siren for that cruelty. And that intimacy.

“Tasted like wine, he did,” the Siren murmured, fingers to her lips. “So sweet, like wine and forest-green shadows . . .”

Kelley had to leave. If she didn’t, she was going to do something she would regret. She wrenched herself away from Maddox and moved blindly to the door.

“Take it back,” Chloe whispered.

They turned to see tears pouring down Chloe’s face. “Please . . . I don’t want it anymore. It hurts—it’s his. Not mine. I shouldn’t have it. . . .”

“What’s she talking about?”

“He needs it to hide. They’ll
hurt
him if they find him,” Chloe’s voice rasped urgently through the air.

The words froze Kelley in her tracks. “What did you say?”

“I don’t want him to be hurt. I’ll give it back. I promise. Please tell him. . . .”

Kelley drifted back to the bedside, confused.

“Once upon a time they killed the Old Green Man.” Chloe’s voice was singsong, her eyes unfocused, staring up into the darkness. “They’ll do it again. They’ll do it again . . .”

“What does that have to do with Sonny?” Kelley asked.

“He doesn’t
know,
” the Siren whispered. Her gaze was filled with regret and more than a little madness. “Just like
you
didn’t know . . .”

“This is stupid. She’s crazy, that’s all. I’m not going to stand here and—”

Suddenly the Siren’s eyes flew wide open and she lunged, grasping the sides of Kelley’s head with fingers that were ice cold. Pain, sharp and shocking, lanced through Kelley’s skull, and images flooded into her brain.

Sonny lay on the sidewalk. Blood flowed from holes in his chest, pooling on the sidewalk, transforming it into green, mossy ground. Streams and rivers flowed outward from where Sonny’s body lay unmoving, and saplings sprang up, reaching leafy fingers toward a sky that was somehow obscured by overhanging branches and vines. A blinding burst of green light ripped through her mind, and Kelley was thrown backward through space. She landed on top of Maddox on the floor of Sonny’s room, shaking convulsively.

When she could see again, she looked up to see Tyff rocking the shattered Siren in an embrace, trying to shush her keening wail.

Maddox led Kelley out into the living room and shut the door behind them.

“I guess I didn’t really make her feel any better, did I?” she said, a tremor in her voice.

“I guess not.”

“Sorry.”

“Not your fault. I should have known, I suppose. She’s pretty far gone.”

“Maddox . . . do you know what she was talking about?”

“I’m not sure. What did
you
see, Kelley?” He peered at her, frowning. “When she was in your head just now?”

“I don’t know. It was garbled stuff.” Kelley shook her head hard to dispel the image of Sonny lying bleeding on a New York sidewalk. Sonny was fine. He wasn’t even in the mortal realm. “Nonsense, really. Maybe Chloe just thinks she knows something and it’s just her own broken mind playing tricks on her.”

“Maybe.” Maddox rubbed a weary hand over his eyes. “All I know is she knew who
you
were when none of the rest of us did. Not even you.”

Kelley picked up her jacket and thrust an arm through the sleeve, moving toward the door.

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know, Maddox. I sort of need to clear my head. I think I’ll go do what my director told me to.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m going to go play in the rain.”

W
e are taking you to the mortal realm,” Sonny said, in answer to Auberon’s query.

“No.”

“We’re not asking your permission, lord. Mabh and Annis concur. Until we uncover the root of what ails you, you are not safe here. If you do not believe that, at least consider this—your condition will not remain a secret much longer if you stay within these walls.”

“We all agree, lord,” Bob said, reaching out a hand to help his ailing king to stand. “It’s far less likely that your . . . condition will be discovered there. And just possible that you may fare better away from this place. For the time being.”

“I do not like the idea of hiding.”

“Fair enough.” Mabh glared flatly at him. “How do you feel about the idea of
surviving
?”

The king returned her stare and, relenting, struggled to sit up higher in the bed.

“I thought as much.” The Autumn Queen gave Auberon a thin smile. “You’re lucky, my dear, that I hold the safety and balance of the Faerie realm in such high regard that I don’t treat
you
with the same courtesy that you have ever shown me. Otherwise I might just let you perish and pick up the pieces of your kingdom once you fall.” Her eyes glittered with mockery even as she fetched a heavy robe from the end of the bed and tenderly wrapped it around the ailing king’s shoulders.

As long as he lived, Sonny thought, he would never understand the mercurial Faerie mind. It was as though Faerie could love and hate all in the same breath and not think it the least bit strange.

“You.” Mabh gestured curtly without looking at Sonny. “Help him.”

“Where in the mortal realm are we taking him?” Sonny asked, as he and the boucca each got a shoulder under one of Auberon’s arms and helped the king to stand.

“The only place I can think of to keep him safe,” Bob said.

The palace chamber shimmered, wavering like a mirage all around them, as Mabh opened an elegant rift that drifted down to encompass the little band of travelers.

“No one will know we’re there.”

Darkness gave way to dim light—and silence to the sound of a thermos cup full of dark roast Colombian coffee splashing onto the floor.

“Oh. Hello, Jack,” said Bob. “Damn.”

“I was under the impression that there were no rehearsals scheduled for this week.” Bob chatted amicably as he and Sonny took Gentleman Jack by the shoulders and steered him into the wings, perching the stunned actor on the high stool at the stage manager’s station. “What on earth are you doing on your own here in the dark?”

“I was working my monologues . . .” Jack murmured. “I like the quiet. . . .”

“Now, Jack,” Bob admonished gently. “You know how Quentin feels about rehearsing without his magnificent guidance. And how’ve you been, by the way? You’re looking well. I like the beard.”

“Uh . . .” Jack was a little speechless.

Bob snapped his fingers in front of Jack’s eyes, trying to get his attention. “Jack? Over here, Jack.”

“Who
are
those people?”

“You sure you want the answer to that question?” Bob asked. “It might be better if you just left it alone, you know.”

“You . . . you all just appeared out of the air. Right out of
thin air
.”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Are you
sure
you want to know?” the boucca asked again, sternly.

“And you’re Kelley’s young man, aren’t you?” Jack turned to Sonny.

“Yes, sir.” Sonny nodded.

“And that woman . . .” Jack’s voice was thick with wonder. “I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful.”

“Gods, don’t let
her
hear you say that.” Bob glanced back to where Mabh was settling Auberon on the center riser in the middle of the stage. “Her ego doesn’t need the stroking. And if she takes a fancy to you, then you are in perishing trouble. Unless you have a fondness for drafty stone fortresses and boggy terrain.”

“What in hell are you talking about?” Jack blinked up at the creature he’d once known only as a fellow actor in a play. His dazed expression sharpening finally, Jack visibly attempted to get a hold of himself. “What’s going on here?”

“Are you
sure
—”

“Tell me, Bob!”

The boucca winced at the sound of his name.

“I want to know what’s really happening!”

Bob and Sonny exchanged a laden glance, and Sonny threw his hands in the air. If it had been up to him, he would have tried to construct some sort of plausible tale to tell the man. What on earth that could possibly be, he had no idea. But the old actor had asked the boucca. He’d called Bob by name and he’d insisted on knowing the truth. Under those circumstances, Bob was bound to
tell
him the truth—and so he did.

Sonny knew that Bob was tempering his words with a very subtle, noninvasive form of magick—almost like a mild tranquilizer—so that the truth of what he was saying would be slightly more palatable to the human mind. It probably also meant that the boucca meant to alter Jack’s memories at a later date.

All in all, Jack handled it pretty well.

Meaning he didn’t go instantly mad or fall into a faint.

Bob, in his fashion, was impressed. “I’ve seen it happen,” he murmured to Sonny. “The swooning and the crazy—even with that little bit of help. Mortals aren’t anywhere near as mentally hardy as they’d like to believe. Sometimes you lay a big sack of truth across their shoulders, and the weight of it breaks them straight in two.”

Jack heard the last part and raised a slow, sardonic eyebrow. “It’s a hard thing to deny what I saw with my own two eyes, Bob,” he said, standing.

The boucca twitched violently. “Please, Jack. I’d appreciate it if you just called me Puck.”

“You’re kidding.”
That
bit of information did seem to shake the actor’s composure. He sat back down on the stool.

“I’m really not,” Bob said. “And I’d consider it a personal favor.”

Jack took a deep breath. “All right. Well, let me tell you then, er, Puck . . . I’ve spent a lifetime making observations. Honing my powers of perception so that I could bring some realism to my roles on the stage. I
know
what I saw. Only a fool would deny it.”

Sonny looked at the old actor with respect. “I think I know why Kelley holds you in such high regard.”

“She almost told me, you know. But she said I wouldn’t believe her if she told me what was going on in her life. I should have known she wasn’t exaggerating.” Jack’s gaze drifted back over to Auberon and Mabh. “So . . .
those
are . . . her folks?”

“Yes.”

“I wish I’d known about the fur cloak when I was playing Oberon. I would have asked wardrobe to come up with something. . . .” Jack’s voice drifted away as the significance of his newfound knowledge hammered home. He was silent for a long moment. Then he shook himself a little. “Poor man. He doesn’t look like someone who’s used to being sickly.”

“That he is not.”

Jack stood. He tugged his shirt straight and smoothed a hand over the hair at the sides of his head. Then he walked over to the table that held an assortment of props that would be used in
Romeo and Juliet
and reached for the coffee thermos he’d left sitting there. He plucked up an ornate glass goblet and filled it half full with steaming brew.

Sonny watched as the actor crossed the stage to where Auberon sat and, bowing elegantly from the waist, said, “Your Majesty. Welcome to the Avalon Grande. I thought you might like something warm to drink.”

Auberon pulled himself up and, with gracious solemnity, took the offered goblet. “I thank you, mortal man. What is your name?”

“My name is Jack Savage, sir. Around here they call me Gentleman Jack.”

The shadow of a smile lifted the corner of the king’s mouth and he nodded. Then he took a sip of the coffee and his eyes widened in surprise. “Extraordinary,” he murmured. “I sometimes forget how extraordinary mortals can be.”

“I think it might be best if you left this place, sir,” Sonny said quietly to the older actor once they had helped move the ailing Winter King into the actors’ lounge backstage—the so-called greenroom.

“You’re entitled to think whatever you like—what’s your name, young man?”

“Sonny. Sonny Flannery.”

“Well, Sonny Flannery, you’re entitled to think whatever you like.” Jack smiled. “And I appreciate the concern. I really do. But I’m not going anywhere.”

Sonny sighed. He’d had a feeling that Gentleman Jack would say something like that. Crossing his arms over his chest, he silently appraised the other man. “Can you fight, Jack?”

“I used to box, some. When I was younger.” Jack gave him a skeptical look.

“How about weapons?”

At that, Jack straightened up and said with a degree of pride, “Hell, I’m a certified actor combatant! I’ve been doing the fight choreography for this company for fifteen years.”

Sonny grinned. “That’s good.”

“Well, now—hold on a second.” Jack faltered a little, upon rapid reflection. “I might know which end of a sword is which, but there’s a mighty big difference between swinging one in a choreographed stage sequence where you’re trying
not
to kill your opponent, and an honest-to-god fight where you
are
.”

Sonny slapped the older man on the shoulder. “If it comes to that, I’ll take what I can get.”

“You think there’s trouble brewing?”

“I do. Mabh brought us here to be safe. But if there’s even a chance that Auberon’s affliction is not a natural one—if someone is willing to go so far as to poison the King of the Unseelie—then I say that, in all likelihood, there is no safe place. Not in either world. I just want to be prepared. And, if you stay here—a course of action I don’t particularly recommend—then I want you to be prepared, too.”

“You talk like a regular army field commander, young man. What, exactly, is it you do for a living?”

The question gave Sonny pause. He thought about Kelley and how she had called him ruthless during their argument. Because of what he “did for a living.”

He turned away from Jack, so that he would not have to see the old actor’s reaction as he said, “I kill Faerie.”