Ironside (Modern Faerie Tales 3)

"They have David. My brother. He didn't get on the train—he went to them instead. They'll kill him.”

"Ethine is the only thing keeping us safe," Corny said. "You can't trade away our safety.”

"I can't let them have him," Luis said. "He's my brother. I thought you'd understand. You said yourself that there was no safe for us.”

"Oh, come on. You thought I'd understand? That's why you're sneaking around in the dark. You seem real sure." His bare hand clenched in a fist just inches from Luis's throat. "Oh, I understand all right. I understand you'd sell us out.”

"That's not it—," Luis started. "Please." Corny could feel Luis's body tremble beneath him. "My brother is a fuckup—but I can't stop wanting to save him. He's my brother.”

Roiben's words came back to him. The more powerful you become, the more others will find ways to master you. They'll do it through those you love and through those you hate.

Corny hesitated, bare hand shaking. Love made him think of Janet, drowned after following a boy out onto the pier. It made him think of being under the hill, kneeling at the feet of a faerie Lord while his sister gulped lungfuls of ocean. It made him think of water closing over his head.

Whatever you loved, that was your weakness.

That didn't stop Corny from wishing he'd saved his own sister. He saw her sinking deeper and deeper, only this time as he reached out, her fingers rotted away in his hands.

If he'd had a chance, he hoped he'd have done whatever it took to save her. But he knew Luis would have. He looked down at the boy underneath him, at the scars and the piercings and the way his braids had started to fray. Luis was good in a way that Corny wasn't. He didn't have to force himself to be good. He just was.

Corny pushed himself off Luis, his cursed hand fraying the acrylic of the carpet. He felt cold all over, thinking what he'd almost done. What he'd become. "Go ahead. Take her. Make the trade.”

Luis remained wide-eyed, his breathing ragged. He stood hastily. "I'm sorry," he told Corny.

"It's what you have to do," Corny said.

The key caught what little light there was, gleaming like one of the steel rings piercing Luis's skin, as he uncuffed Ethine. She gasped, pushing herself up onto her knees and holding out her arms as if she expected to have to fight.

"Your people came for you," Luis told her.

She rubbed her wrist and said nothing. The shadows made her face look very young, although Corny knew she wasn't.

He bundled up her clothes with his glove-covered hand.

"I really am sorry," Luis whispered.

Corny nodded. He felt a hundred years old, tired and defeated.

They crept down the hallway, to the front door. It opened with a creak to reveal three creatures standing in the dirty snow, their faces grave. The foremost of them had the face of a fox and long fingers that tapered into claws.>Corny's mom nodded absently, then squinted her eyes at Ethine. "Her ears are . . ." She turned to Corny. "Where have you been?”

"A sci-fi convention. I'm so sorry, Mom." Corny opened the door to his bedroom and switched on the light, letting Luis and Ethine walk past him, inside. "Seriously, I don't know how I lost track of so much time.”

"A convention? Christmas con? I expect to hear a much more convincing story in the morning," she said, and went back into her own room.

A computer hummed on his desk, the screen fading between a series of screen shots from Farscape. A poster of two angels hung above his bed, one with black wings and one with white, their hands twined together by a cord of thorns, their blood the only color on the large glossy paper. Piles of books were stacked where he dropped them right before he fell asleep. Manga volumes sat on top of graphic novels and paperbacks. He kicked a few under the bed, embarrassed.

He had always thought of his room as an extension of his interests. Now, looking around the room, he thought it looked as dorky as the penguin on his lawn.

"You can sleep here," Corny told Ethine, nodding toward his bed. "The sheets are pretty clean.”

"Gallant," she said.

"Yeah, I know it is." He walked over to his dresser, where a white King and a black King stood side by side. He liked to signal his moods by which one was in front, but he'd stopped doing that after Janet died; there was no annoying sister to signal to. Opening the drawers, he pulled out a T-shirt and boxers and tossed them onto the bed. "You can wear these, if you want. To sleep in.”

Luis unlaced his boots. "Can I grab a shower?”

Corny nodded and rummaged for the shirt that had the least pathetic logo. He found a faded navy blue one that said, i can drink more coffee than you can. Looking up, ready to hand it to Luis, he froze as Ethine stripped off her dress with complete nonchalance. The blades of her shoulders were covered with what looked like the buds of wings, pink against the handkerchief white of her skin. As she slid his boxers up her thin legs, she looked over at him and her eyes were chilling in their emptiness.

"Thanks," Luis said too loudly, taking the cloth out of his hands. "I'm going to borrow jeans, if you don't mind.”