CHAPTER 17. Once they take you and you taste the food you cannot come back

Once they take you and you taste the food…you cannot come back. You are changed…and live with them for ever.

—The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries by W. Y. Evans-Wentz (1911)

A half hour later Aislinn walked down Sixth Street, feeling more apprehensive with each step. Thinking about the faery coming into Seth's home didn't make matters any better. What if I hadn't been there? Would they hurt him? She hadn't wanted to leave Seth, or meet Keenan, or deal with the whole debacle, but she needed answers. Keenan had them.

He stood outside the entrance to the carnival, looking so normal that it was hard to remember that he was one of them, and not just court fey but a king. He reached out as if he'd embrace her. "Aislinn."

She stepped backward, easily dodging him.

"I'm so glad you came." Keenan looked terribly serious.

At a loss for what to say, she shrugged.

"Shall we?" He held out his arm, like they were at a formal dance or something.

"Sure." She ignored his arm—and his brief frown—as she followed him toward the maze of booths that had seemingly sprung up overnight.

People milled around, an impossibly large crowd. Families and couples played games on every side. Many of them had sweet-smelling drinks—some sort of golden slushy thing.

"You're just so"—he stared at her, smiling that inhuman smile—"I'm just so honored that you joined me."

Aislinn nodded, like he made sense. He didn't. This is ridiculous. His too-eager comments made her feel increasingly uncomfortable.

Beside her, a group of girls tried to throw tiny plastic balls onto glass platters. Overhead the lights of the Ferris wheel sparkled. People laughed and cuddled close to one another as they walked by.

Then Keenan took her hand, and suddenly her Sight was so clear that she gasped. Everywhere she looked, glamours faded. The workers running the booths, the concessions, the rides…They're all fey. All the carnies and quite a few of the guests were faeries. Oh my God. She'd never seen such a large crowd of faeries before.

Everywhere she looked, disguised faeries smiled back at her, friendly and happy.

Why are so many faeries wearing human faces?

Some real humans milled about, playing rigged games and riding rickety rides, but the faeries didn't stare at them. She was the one they all watched.

Keenan waved to a group of faeries who had called out to him. "Old friends. Do you want to meet them?"

"No." She bit down on her lip and looked around again, feeling her chest tighten.

He frowned.

"Not right now." She forced a smile, hoping he'd think her nervousness was just shyness.

Control. She took a deep breath and tried to sound friendly. "I thought we were going to get to know each other."

"Right." He smiled like she'd given him some rare and precious gift. "What can I tell you?"

"Umm, what about your family?" Aislinn stumbled, feet as unsteady as her breaking.

"I live with my uncles." he said as he led her forward, past a group of faeries that—until a moment ago—looked like they could go to Bishop O.C.

Several gestured toward her, but no one approached. In fact, the others moved out of Keenan's path as he led her toward a row of booths where the now-revealed faeries ran carnival games.

"Your uncles?" she repeated, feeling increasingly doubtful that coming was a wise idea. She pulled her hand free. "Right, the guys who were at school."

Faeries. Just like almost everyone here. She felt dizzy.

She tried again. "What about your parents?"

"My father died before I was born"—he paused, looking not sad, but angry—"but everything I am is his gift."

Did faeries die? She wasn't at all sure how to respond to his odd comment, so she simply said, "My mom is gone too. Childbirth."

"I'm sorry." He took her hand again, squeezed it affectionately, and intertwined his fingers with hers. "I'm sure she was a good woman. And she must've been lovely to be your mother."

"I'm not much like her." Aislinn swallowed hard. All she had was pictures. In the pictures Grams had around the house, her mother always looked haunted, like she couldn't quite handle the things she could see. Grams never spoke of her mother's last year, as if it hadn't existed.

"What about your father? Is he a good man?" He stopped, holding her hand while they stood there, surrounded by faeries, talking about their families.

If she hadn't been able to see the oddly shaped eyes and strange smiles on the faeries who listened, it might seem so very normal. It wasn't.

She started to walk away, going toward one of the concession stands where they were selling those sweet-smelling drinks.

"Aislinn?"

She shrugged, more comfortable talking about a father she knew nothing of than the mother who'd given her the Sight. "Who knows? Grams doesn't know who he is, and Mom's not here to tell us."

"At least you have your grandmother." He reached up with his free hand and stroked her cheek. "I'm glad you have had that, a loving caretaker."

She started to answer, but headed toward them were Pointy-Face and about six of the other faeries who liked to linger at Shooters, harassing the regulars, chasing her away from the pool hall with their very presence. She froze, unable to move, years of instinct overriding logic.

"Aislinn? What's wrong?" He moved in front of her, blocking her view of everyone and everything but him. "Have I offended you?"

"No. I'm just"—she offered him what she hoped was a convincing smile and lied—"chilly."

He shrugged off his jacket and draped it over her shoulders, gently. "How's that?"

"Better." And it was. If he were what he pretended to be—kind and considerate—she might've felt bad that she was here on false pretenses.

But he wasn't. He wasn't real at all.

"Come on. Let's walk. There's always some interesting games here." He took her hand again, bringing her Sight back in full force.

Beside them, a woman stood in a child's wading pool calling, "Three darts for a prize."

A thick braid dangled like a rope past her knees. Her face was like one of those angels in old paintings, innocent with a spark of danger in her eyes. Aside from the goats' legs that peeked out of her long skirt, she was gorgeous, but no one approached her.

At the next tent a steady line of faeries and humans waited. Faces Aislinn had glimpsed around the city mingled with faeries she could never have imagined—wings and thorn-crusted skin and all manners of dress. It was too much to process.

Aislinn paused, overwhelmed by the sheer number and variety of faeries around her.

"The fortune-tellers here always put on a good show." Keenan pulled the flap of the tent back farther so she could look inside. There were three women with rheumy white eyes. Behind them stood a row of statues—like gargoyles without wings. They were freakishly muscular. And alive. Their gazes flitted around the tent, as if they were trying to find someone to answer unspoken questions.

The faeries all stepped aside, and Keenan led her to the front of the tent.

She stepped closer to one of the statues. It looked wide-eyed, almost afraid as she reached out her hand.

One of the women reached out and snatched Aislinn's still uplifted hand. "No."

The women spoke all at once, not to her or to Keenan, but softly—as if to themselves—in a sibilant whisper. "He's ours. Fair exchange. Not yours to interfere."

The one gripping her hand winked at Aislinn. "Well, then, sisters? What say we?"

Aislinn tugged backward; the woman held tight.

"So you're the young one's"—the fortune-teller looked at Keenan with her seemingly blind eyes—"new ladylove."

Behind them, faeries pushed closer, scuffling and chattering.

The old woman gave Keenan a searing look—her white eyes shining—and said, "She's different than the others, dear. Special."

"I already knew that, mothers." Keenan wrapped an arm around Aislinn's waist, half hugging her, like he had a right to pull her closer.

He doesn't.

Aislinn stepped away as far as she could with the woman holding her hand.

All three women sighed, simultaneously. "Fierce, isn't she?"

The one still holding Aislinn's hand asked Keenan, "Shall I tell you just how different she is? How special this one will be?"

Every faery there suddenly stopped talking. They were all watching openly, transfixed and gleeful, as if a horrible accident were happening in front of them.

"No." Aislinn pulled her hand free and grabbed Keenan's arm.

He didn't move.

"As special as I've dreamed?" Keenan asked the blind women, his voice carrying clearly to the faeries who pushed forward.

"There are none you will meet so rare as she." The three women all nodded, eerily in sync with one another, like three bodies with one mind.

Grinning, Keenan tossed a handful of unfamiliar bronze coins to the women, who unerringly snatched them out of the air, their hands moving in precisely the same arcs at exactly the same moment.

I need out of here. Now.

But she couldn't run. If not for the Sight, she wouldn't have reason to react so strongly: the women weren't any stranger than most carnies.

Don't expose yourself. Remember the rules.

She couldn't panic. Her heart still beat madly. Her chest felt tight, like she couldn't breathe. Hold it together. Focus. She needed to get out of there, get away from them, back to Seth. She shouldn't have come. It felt like she'd walked into a trap.

She stepped away from the women and pulled on Keenan's arm. "Let's get a drink. Come on."

He pulled her closer to him and went with her to the door, past the crowd of murmuring faeries.

"She is the one."

"Did you hear?"

"Send the message."

"Beira will be furious."

As the evening wore on, faeries he hadn't seen in years arrived at the carnival. It's a good turnout—even with the hags here to spy for Beira. Emissaries from the other fey courts came, some for the first time in centuries. They know.

"Keenan?" One of the guards from Donia's house came toward him and bowed.

Keenan shook his head. He spun Aislinn to him in a loose embrace, far from graceful, but effective nonetheless. She glimmered faintly in the dark, the sunlight of her changing body already filling her. Sometimes it was like that; the change came on so quickly that the mortal girls grew suspicious. It made sense that his queen—for surely she could be none other—would change even quicker.

Behind Aislinn's back, a rowan-man in a mortal glamour intercepted Donia's guard.

"What?" Aislinn started, staring up at Keenan, eyes wide, lips parted as if she waited for a kiss.

Too soon for that. But he did move closer to her, holding her in his arms as if they were at a ball. And we shall have one, show her the splendor of our court. As soon as she ascends to the throne.

Glancing past Aislinn's shoulder to where the rowan-man had stopped Donia's guard, Keenan said, "I don't want anything to spoil tonight. Should the world end tonight, I wouldn't want to know."

And it was true. He had his queen in his arms; after centuries of searching, she was finally in his arms. The Eolas had all but said it.

He tilted her head up and whispered, "Dance with me."

She shook her head, something very close to fear in her eyes. "There's no room, no music."

He spun her, wishing she had on proper skirts, missing the sway of silk and rustle of petticoats. "Of course there is."

No one strayed into their path. No one jostled them. Instead the crowd moved around them, parting to clear a space so he could have his first dance with her, his queen.

At the very edge of the river, he saw his summer faeries—our faeries now—fade from view, shed their glamours, and join the dance. Soon, with Aislinn beside him, he'd be able to protect them, take care of them as a true King of Summer should.

"Can you truly not hear the music?" He led her past a crowd of bog faeries, who hadn't bothered to shed their glamours, but were dancing all the same. Their luminous brown skin sparkled with light that lay trapped just under the surface, looking like long-lost cousins to the selchies. Several of the Summer Girls had begun to swirl in place, waif-thin dervishes of blurring vine and skirt and hair.

With one hand on the small of Aislinn's back and the other holding her tiny hand, he led her through the swirling crowds of invisible fey. Mouth against her ear, he singsonged, "Laughter, the roll of the water, the soft whir of traffic, the hum of insects. Can't you hear it, Aislinn? Just listen."

"I need to leave." Her hair flung across his face as he spun her away and back, closer still this time. She sounded terrified when she said, "Let go."

He stopped. "Dance with me, Aislinn. I hear enough music for both of us."

"Why?" She was still and stiff in his arms, looking around them, staring into faces hidden under mortal masks. "Tell me why. What do you want?"

"You. I've spent my life waiting for you." He paused, looking at the joy on the faces of the summer creatures, those who'd suffered under Beira's reign for so long. "Give me this dance, this night. If it's in my power, I'll give you whatever you ask in return."

"Whatever I ask?" she repeated incredulously. After all the worries, the research, the panic, he offered her an out in exchange for a simple dance.

Could it be that easy? One dance and she could leave, get out of here, away from all of them. But if there was truth in any of the stories, faeries only offered exchanges that would benefit them.

"Give me your vow." She stepped several paces back so she could look him in the eye—an impossible task from up close.

He smiled that earthshaking smile, and her words caught in her throat.

She shivered, but she didn't back down.

"Swear it in front of all these witnesses." She gestured at the waiting crowd. They were mostly faeries, but a few humans stood by watching, not knowing what the spectacle was about, but watching all the same.

The faeries—those invisible and those wearing glamours—gasped and murmured.

"She's a clever one …"

"…getting a king's vow without knowing what he is, who he is."

"Will he?"

"She'll make a wonderful queen."

Then Keenan raised his voice so everyone could hear him, "In front of all before us, I give you my vow of honor, Aislinn: anything you ask of me that I can offer is yours." He dropped to one knee and added, "And from this day forward, your wishes shall be as my own as often as I am able."

The faeries' murmurs rose, tumbling together, like discordant songs, "What if she's not the one? How could he be so foolish…? But the Eolas said …"

Still kneeling, Keenan bowed his head to her, hand outstretched. His eyes twinkled dangerously as he looked up and asked, "Will you dance with me now? Just take my hand, Aislinn."

All she had to do was dance with him—join the faery revelry for this one night—and she could ask him to leave her alone. It was a small price for such a reward. He'd never even have to know she knew what he was, never know about the Sight.

"I will." She slipped her hand into his, almost giddy with relief. Soon it would all be over.

The throng cheered and laughed, raising such a din that she laughed too. Maybe they weren't cheering for the same reason, but it didn't matter: they echoed her rejoicing.

One of the smiling girls with vines around her arms held out plastic cups filled with the sweet golden drink that most everyone seemed to be drinking. "A drink to celebrate."

Aislinn took one and sipped. It was amazing, a heady mix of things that shouldn't have a flavor—bottled sunlight and spun sugar, lazy afternoons and melting sunsets, hot breezes and dangerous promises. She downed it all.

Keenan took the cup from her hand. "May I have my dance?"

She licked the last taste from her lips—like warm candy—and smiled. She was strangely unsteady on her feet. "With pleasure."

Then he led her through the crowd, spinning her in dances old and new, from a stylized waltz to modern moves without any choreography at all.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew that something was wrong, but as he twirled her through the dance, she couldn't remember what. They laughed, and drank, and danced until Aislinn no longer cared why she'd been worried.

Finally she put her hand on Keenan's wrist and gasped, "Enough. I need to stop."

He scooped her up in his arms and—holding her aloft— he sat back on a tall chair carved with sunbursts and vines. "Never stop. Only pause."

Where did the chair come from? All around them, faeries danced and laughed.

I should go. The humans had all gone home. Even the bone girls—Scrimshaw Sisters—danced. Groups of Summer Girls spun by, swirling far too fast to ever be mistaken for humans.

"I need another drink." Sitting on his lap, Aislinn leaned her head on Keenan's shoulder, breathing hard. The more she tried to make sense of her flashes of unease, the less clear they were.

"More summer wine!" Keenan called, laughing as several young lion-boys tumbled over themselves to bring tall goblets to them as she sat in his lap. "My lady wants wine, and wine she shall have."

She took hold of one of the etched goblets, spinning it in her hand. Delicate scrollwork traced the surface, surrounding an image of a dancing couple under a bright sun. The colors in the wine spiraled and shifted like a tiny sunrise burned inside the cup. "Where'd the plastic cups go?"

He kissed her hair and laughed. "Beautiful things for a beautiful lady."

"Whatever." She shrugged and took another long drink.

With an arm securely around her waist and a hand between her shoulder blades, Keenan dipped her backward. "Once more around the faire?"

Her hair fell onto the dew-damp grass as she looked up at him—the faery king who held her in his arms—and wondered that she was having so much fun.

He swung her back up and whispered, "Dance with me, Aislinn, my love."

Her legs ached; her head spun. She hadn't had so much fun since…ever. "Definitely."

On every side, faeries laughed—dancing in ways that were graceful, wild, and sometimes shocking. Earlier they'd seemed sedate, like couples in old black-and-white movies, but as the night wore on, it had changed. When only the fey remained.

Keenan swung her up into his embrace and kissed her neck. "I could spend eternity doing this."

"No"—she pushed him away—"no kissing, no…"

Then they were moving again. The world spun by, a blur of strange faces lost in a cloud of music. The sawdust-covered paths of the carnival were hidden under shadows; the lights of the rides were darkened.

But dawn was coming, light spilling out over the sky. How long have we danced?

"I need to sit down. Seriously."

"Whatever my lady wants." Keenan lifted her into his arms again. His doing so had stopped seeming strange several drinks ago.

One of the men with skin like bark spread out a blanket by the water. Another brought over a picnic basket. "Good morrow, Keenan. My lady."

Then, with a bow, they left.

Keenan opened the basket and pulled out another bottle of wine, as well as cheese and strange little fruit. "Our first breakfast."

Definitely not carnival food. Oops, faire food. She giggled. Then she looked up—behind him the carnival was gone. As if they'd never been there, all the faeries had left. It was just the two of them. "Where did they all go?"

Keenan held out the goblet again, filled with the same liquid sunrise. "It's just us here. Later, after you've rested, well talk. Then we can dance every night if you will it. Travel. It'll all be different now."

She didn't even see the invisible faeries that always lingered at the river. They were truly alone. "Can I ask a question?"

"Of course." He held a piece of fruit up to her lips. "Bite."

Aislinn leaned in—almost toppling over as she did—but she didn't bite the strange fruit. Instead she whispered, "Why don't all the other faeries glow like you do?"

Keenan lowered his hand. "All the other what?"

"Faeries." She gestured around them, but it was as empty of faeries as it was of humans. She closed her eyes to try to stop the world from spinning so madly and whispered, "You know, fey things, like the ones dancing with us all night, like you and Donia."

"Fey things?" he murmured. His copper hair glittered in the light that was creeping over the sky.

"Yeah." She laid down on the ground. "Like you."

It sounded like he said, "And soon, like you…" But she wasn't sure. Everything was blurry.

He bent over her where she lay on the ground. His lips brushed hers, tasting like sunshine and sugar. His hair fell onto her face.

It's soft, not like metal at all.

She meant to say stop, to tell him she was dizzy, but before she could speak, everything went dark.