Wicked Hungry

“Gilroy?” she asks.

Then Nye enters, carrying the Seelie queen.

“But Neiran,” she gasps. “The queen? How cou

ld you? That is an act of aggression. You could start a war!”

Blaine is behind her now.

He takes a moment to take in the scene.

“How did you get here?” he asks.

“We’ll tell you in a moment,” I say. “But we need to put down our burdens, and Nye’s been hurt.”

Morgaine ushers us over to her bed and some couches. We lay down Meredith and Carolina. And then the queen.

Max leaps down to stand by my feet.

“But the queen?” Blaine says. “How could you take the queen?”

“She was imprisoned in a drugged sleep,” Nye says. “I could not leave her there.”

“You had no allegiance to her,” Morgaine says bitterly. “Only to your own queen, and to me, if you spoke true before.”

“Eleanor is my queen’s sister. I couldn’t leave her thus.”

“But how did you get here?” Blaine asks us.

It takes just a moment to explain to him about the stairs, and how they took us out of the blocked gateway and into the queen’s chambers, then back to his house.

“You expect us to believe that?”

“You have a better explanation for what happened to us, Whelan?” Connor asks.

Blaine shakes his head. “I’d heard of the stairs, but I thought they were lost to us forever.”

“Lost they were,” says Nye. “But not, apparently, forever. Stanley here found them.”

“Karen helped me,” I say.

She shakes her head, weakly. “It was you, Stanley.”

But she doesn’t mention the golden key, and I’m grateful. I don’t really want to hand it over right now, although maybe it really isn’t mine. I mean, finders keepers, losers weepers, but maybe it belongs to Blaine.

Suddenly, Nye groans.

“You’re injured, Neiran,” Morgaine says. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“But I did,” I say. “I just told you. A crossbow dart.”

Nye’s face has grown even paler; I wouldn’t have thought that was possible. He staggers and falls down into a chair, squeezing his wound.

“We thought perhaps you could heal him, Morgaine,” Connor says.

“Of course,” she says. “If it’s not too late. We’ll let the others sleep now.” But then she catches sight of Karen holding her arm.

“But he is not the only wounded. Hail, Sister of the Night.”