Ironspark Read online

  While Gooding returned to his rectory above the church to tend to the minor issue of his bleeding eardrums, I headed home to the only house on Gosling Road.

  On this side of town, everything was within walking distance. Ten minutes from Postoak to the church, another ten to my house, twenty to the school if you power walked. Hell, if Dad didn’t work out at the oil site an hour away we might not even need a car. Of course, most of the town beyond our cheap patch was big and sprawling and spread out. It was almost like the thirty thousand residents who could afford to live away from the creepy, haunted woods did just that. Whatever. Gooding and I took care of the poor souls who had to live near the fairy-infested trees.

  The shadeling met me halfway up the hill to my house.

  “Missy,” it squeaked, popping out of a shadow like an impish jack-in-the-box, its wide, orange eyes shining in the dark. I spared it a glance and adopted my well-practiced annoyed face. In truth, every step away from the Barnett house left me feeling a little more drained, but the annoyed face tended to intimidate the little buggers, which meant less mess for me to handle.

  “I told you never to show yourself to other people,” I reminded the shadeling as it scampered next to me, looking like nothing so much as a wingless, two-foot-tall bat with wiry limbs. The sight was almost enough for me to go easy on the creature. Almost.

  The shadeling puffed out its ink-colored chest. “Never!”

  “I also told you not to show up while I was out with Gooding.”

  “But Missy—”

  “If Gooding saw you, he’d assume you were a pest,” I interrupted. “He’d have hit you with iron, you know. You’ve got to be more careful!”

  The shadeling stumbled in the grass, wringing its overlarge hands. “It was important!”

  I sighed and ground to a halt a few yards away from the wrought-iron gate that looped around the house. No sense in letting my dad or one of the boys hear me arguing with something they didn’t know lived in our house.

  “What was so important that—”

  “Fae!” the shadeling squeaked. “Fae kind, Missy. Unkind, unthinking, Unseelie Fae. They’ve come all the way here to the wild lands.”

  “Wait, wild lands?” I had to rub my temple. “You mean here? America?”

  “It’s only wild fairies here, Missy. No courts. No rules. But now they’ve come!”

  The poor thing had worked itself into a tizzy. I sighed and knelt down, not exactly eye to eye with the little imp but at least not towering over it anymore. “Look, if this is about the changeling, they pop up all over the world. Doesn’t mean the Unseelie court found us. Father Gooding keeps us safe from them. That’s why we came here, remember? To keep away from them.”

  The shadeling stomped its feet and grabbed its ears, its wide eyes shining in the darkness.

  “No! The old mistress told us to keep you safe!”

  “You do,” I said. “You guys do a good job, okay? And when I go to college, you’re going to listen to the boys. And the Fae aren’t going to find us. Not you, not me, not—”

  Pain exploded through my head and my chest as I hit the ground. For one bizarre moment, I thought, I’m being mugged. As if something as simple as a routine mugging ever happened to me. I blinked, sucking in a sharp breath when I saw it. Barely humanoid, stretched and bone white, too-large eyes boring into mine. This was my bogeyman. This was the monster under my bed. The horrible Faeish thing loomed above me like every nightmare I’d had since my family fled Wales nine years ago.

  Its white lips pulled up over its blackened teeth. Purplish foam frothed at the corners of its too-large mouth. When a glob of that murky saliva touched my cheek, I snapped back to reality. Court Fae!

  The creature swiped at me with its clawed hand. Without thinking, I blocked with my scratched arm as I ripped one of my necklaces free—my trusty iron nail.

  I thrust the nail up with everything I had. A jagged gash bloomed across its pale chest. It screeched as its skin sizzled into bulging, purple blisters. Good old iron.

  I rolled onto my knees and tried to scramble away. Gotta get home. Beyond the iron gate. Within the protection of the old rowan trees inside the perimeter. Just a few meters away—I could make it!

  The Fae threw itself on my legs, pinning me to the ground.

  “Agh!” I cried out and turned, slashing at it with my nail. With a wet gurgle, it grabbed my hand. Crap! I tried to pull back, but the creature ripped the nail from between my fingers. Its skin hissed as it popped and blistered. With a snarl, it tossed the nail away and leaned forward, bringing its jagged teeth centimeters from my nose. Its fetid breath stank of rotten meat.

  “I haaaave meeeessaaaage,” it croaked, digging its claws into my shoulder. I bit back a scream as fire shot down my arm. The creature cocked its head to the side, doglike, and twitched its lip. “My queeeen—”

  “Shadeling!” I shrieked, but the little imp was gone. Damn little coward!

  “—waaaantsss what waaaaas withheeeeld—”

  Well, this queen’s just going to have to suck it up.

  I ripped the silver ankh from around my neck and pressed it to the Fae’s purple wound. It shrieked and jumped back, clearly expecting a blistering pain that wouldn’t come. I scrambled out from underneath it and raced for the house. My heart threatened to burst out of my chest. My vision blurred at the edges. I just had to get inside the fence. Their kind couldn’t pass it. I’d be safe if I could just get inside.

  I jumped onto the iron grate and reached for the lowest hanging branch of the rowan tree. The second my fingers closed around it, my necklaces jerked back, tightening around my throat. The Fae howled with fury.

  “What waaaaas withheeeeeeld!”

  Crrrrack!

  The rowan branch splintered. I tumbled back. My wounded shoulder slammed into the ground just outside the fence. Stars danced in front of my eyes. The taste of copper filled my mouth. Red rowanberries littered the ground around me. I gripped the branch until my knuckles turned white, struggling to hold in my scream.

  Don’t let him hear. Don’t let him hear. Don’t let him know he’s winning.

  The Fae grabbed the front of my jacket and lifted me from the ground. Dark spots filled my vision as I stared down into its inky eyes.

  “Whennnnn the veeeeeeeil thinsssssssss,” it snarled, its discolored spittle dripping down its white jaw.

  I sucked in a sharp breath, gripped the branch with both hands, and swung.

  Crack!

  The Fae’s hands loosened on my coat as it staggered back, those dark eyes suddenly unfocused. I landed on my feet and before I even knew I had my footing, I swung with everything I had. Over and over the wood smashed its skull, purple blood spraying the ground around it. Finally, it crumpled and fell backward onto the hill.

  My arms shook as I swung again, with every ounce of strength I had, right at its head. With a final crunch, blood spread out like a wine spill along the ground. The Fae spasmed, its limbs going rigid. Then it didn’t move again.

  I stared down at the mess. There was that unnatural purple blood on my steel-toed boots. An acrid taste filled my mouth.

  I let the tree branch fall to the ground. The thud vibrated through my boots, but I didn’t hear it. Only a weird buzzing in my ears. The shadeling appeared at my side, nattering away in that squeaky little voice, but the words didn’t make any sense in that moment.

  The smell crept on me slowly, like a gas leak filling a room. Sharp, metallic, unnaturally sweet. Oh God.

  I caught myself on the iron fence as my stomach turned itself inside out. It burned up my nose as tears sprang to my eyes. With each hammer of my heart, the reality of the situation beat into my brain. That was a full-grown court Fae. Not a wild Fae, not a shadeling or a changeling or any of the garden-variety nuisances Gooding had taught me to fight. These things weren’t even supposed to exist in the United States.

  “Sh-shadeling!” I called, but I couldn’t see a body. The Fae hadn’t gone afte
r my shadeling. It was okay.

  “How did you find us?” I wheezed, but the Fae didn’t answer. I pressed my cheek to the cool, comforting, safe iron of the gate. Iron and rowan. It couldn’t get to me anymore. I breathed deeply until my jelly legs could move. The shadeling scuttled along beside me, wringing its spindly hands.

  “Missy, I was only trying to warn you. Never wanted—”

  “I know,” I muttered, pulling my keys out of my pocket. They jangled loudly in my shaking hand. I blinked, staring down at them, willing them to still, but they didn’t. Damn.

  “Missy—”

  “It’s fine.” Which was pathetic. I liked to consider myself a pretty good liar. Had to be. But I sounded about as fine as a fork in the garbage disposal.

  The house was quiet when I slipped in. More likely than not, the boys were up listening to music in their rooms, pretending to sleep. Dirty dishes caked with dry bits of a dozen different foods piled high in the sink. I didn’t even want to think about why two adolescent boys needed so many dishes or, for that matter, why they were conversely incapable of cleaning them up. Strangely, my hands stopped shaking when I took in the mess. This was normal. I understood this.

  A fly buzzed over a smear of jam, only to be caught by a dark, grimy fist. I started back, my heart hammering all over again.

  “Want us to clean it up, Missy?”

  My hand flew to my throat, but I couldn’t find my nail. It was out on the hill, hidden in the grass. A soft, snuffling sound and a squeal of joy rose from the kitchen table as a mossy-green, bright-eyed shadeling found a forgotten crust of bread on the floor. Just a shadeling. I took a deep breath, willing my heart to still. I was home. These were just the shadelings.

  They were probably the closest I’d ever come to having sidekicks. I liked to remind myself of that anytime I developed the unhelpful desire to bring something cute and fluffy into the house. More likely than not, the little imps would try to put a saddle on it. Or try to eat it. We had a certain arrangement in the house. Apparently, Mum asked them to stick around the family back when we lived in Wales. Help out around the house. Act as watchdogs. In return, I kept them fed and safe. They were mine. They were safe. There was nothing to be afraid of.

  Six pairs of glowing eyes gazed expectantly up at me. That was six shadelings who had kept out of danger, more and more crawling out of the shadows. The fat one teetering on the counter even had a quivering lip. It sort of made me want to deny them right then and there, but my temples were starting to throb and the jam would only be that much more difficult to deal with in the morning.

  “Yeah, th—” I had to cut myself off. First thing the shadelings had told me when they revealed themselves to me. They didn’t like to be thanked. Some sort of weird shadeling rule. I sighed. “Just the jam, okay? And the crumbs. Do not touch the utensils. Do not touch the dishes. If I find out one of you so much as looked at the fridge funny … Look, just don’t. Okay?”

  The fat one scowled and scuffed one grimy toe against the seat of the chair.

  “Missy’s mother would have let us eat the scrumptious dish food,” he grumbled.

  “Well she’s not here,” I snapped. Crap. The things you wished you could unsay. I needed to be nice to them, but my nerves were a ragged electrical wire, ready to spark at any second. I took a deep breath, counted to three, then let it out. “Sorry. All right. I want half of you cleaning up the counters. The rest of you…” I took another breath. One. Two. Three. Let it out. This had to be done. “Th-there’s a bit of a mess outside. Take care of it.”

  The shadelings blinked up at me. Maybe they’d heard something in my voice that set them on edge.

  “What sort of mess, Missy?”

  I swallowed. My hands started trembling again. Tucking them under my armpits, I clenched my jaw. “It won’t hurt you. I made sure of it.” My words came out too soft, too ragged. I needed to go. “And you can eat it if you want.”

  The shadelings needed no further instruction. Like an ant hill disturbed, they burst out, six, then ten, then thirteen of them, lapping up every semi-edible scrap in the kitchen or else bounding outside to what was sure to be a nasty surprise.

  “Quiet!” I hissed, my heart jumping up into my throat. I sucked in a sharp breath, curling my hands into fists. I just had to keep it together a little longer. Just until I wasn’t being watched.

  The shadelings on the counter shot me a baleful look before they returned to their gorging, slurping loudly all the while. For all that they called me their mistress, we all knew full well that I really wasn’t unless I was holding a fire poker, and even then I didn’t do more than wave it for emphasis. Just this once, I didn’t grab it.

  It started with the tremble in my hands worsening, like my body was trying to warn me of what was coming. I had about thirty seconds until the meltdown.

  “I’m going to bed,” I wheezed, my heart hammering. “Don’t wake anyone up. Don’t let anyone see you.”

  There was a chorus of grumbles at that. Not one of the shadelings appreciated being kept secret since technically they were here for the whole family. But it was my room they first appeared in ten years ago, and I was the closest thing to a matriarch the family had.

  “Good night, Missy,” a couple of shadelings chorused glumly. Well, that was progress. I’d civilize them yet. One of these days I might even coax them into a bathtub.

  I dragged myself down the hall. With each step, every bruise and cut ached a little worse. That horrible metallic smell burned in my nose, making my stomach turn. My head pounded. Two of the shadelings scampered down the hall after me.

  “Are you … hurt?” one squeaked, then yelped as the other yanked on its large, batlike ear.

  “Of course Missy is hurt. The nasty big courties hurt everyone.”

  “Want a cup of tea?”

  “I notice you have a brand-new bottle of lavender lotion, which is almost completely still there. Would you maybe like a foot rub?”

  I heaved a short sigh and chose, very diplomatically, in my opinion, not to ask why my brand-new bottle of lavender lotion was only “almost completely still there.” Or if shadelings even knew how to give foot rubs. It was just trying to be nice. I needed to be nice back. But the air around me was thinning. The shaking spread up my arms until it reached my spine and turned into shivers. I needed to go. I needed away from all of them.

  “No. I’m all right. Just make sure that thing out front is gone by morning.” I darted into my room and shut the door behind me before either shadeling could follow. I was alone in my own little sanctuary.

  I peeled off my boots and grimy socks and ruined jacket, dropping them all on the floor amidst my school books and knitting supplies. The smell was still in my nose. That awful too-sweet metallic stench. I snatched a box of matches from my desk and broke two as I tried to light a sage candle. My throat clogged up. Black spots danced before my eyes. Oh God, they’d found me. They’d found me. We were an ocean away and they knew we were here. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe.

  My knees buckled and I crashed to the floor, sobbing and hiccuping and struggling to suck in a single breath of air, but all I smelled was that monster’s blood and all I felt was where its blood and saliva touched me. I knew it was all in my mind, but it burned like acid on my cheek and my arms and that only made me sob harder. I grabbed a bunched-up hoodie off the floor and buried my face in it to muffle the sound.

  My brain kicked in and I remembered what Gooding had told me three years ago, after our first job together. It had been a goblin tucked in the church basement, snarling and snapping at us. I’d almost bolted until Gooding had grabbed my shoulders and locked eyes with me.

  “Focus on right now, Bryn,” he’d said, and at the time I’d been so grateful that he was so calm and priestly. “I want you to focus on where we are. Engage all your senses. Where are you now?”

  I sucked in a sharp breath and tried to do that. Where was I? My room. My room. My safe haven in the storm. How
did it look? Organized, mostly, except for the school books and dirty clothes on the floor. Half-finished college applications I’d been so excited to fill out. Purple sheets. Glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to the ceiling. How did it sound? Quiet, except for my own sniffling. Even the shadelings managed to keep quiet as they went about their work. How did I feel? Cold. Snotty. I wiped my face on the hoodie. What did I smell? Sage. The candle wax had finally started melting, chasing away the reek of the Fae’s blood. What did I taste? My stomach churned. Probably a bad idea to focus on that one.

  The tears weren’t exactly gone, but I could breathe now. Which meant I could think.

  A court Fae had arrived in the flesh. This wasn’t a changeling or other mischief sent from afar. This one came for us … but it wasn’t like the last time. This wasn’t a courtier. Those things were beautiful, quite literally enchanting. The Fae outside had been anything but. Clearly it wasn’t the sort that usually went out and messed with humans.

  “What waaaaas withheeeeeeld!”

  I buried my face in my bunched-up hoodie. It wanted something for its queen, whoever she was. Something it hadn’t gotten before. My heart started to pound at the thought. I squeezed my eyes shut. Sight: the dark of my eyelids. Sound: the throb of my heart. Feel: sore muscles. Smell: sage candle. Taste: something awful. But I’d be all right. I just needed to get some sleep. In the morning, everything would make more sense. I’d have to talk to my dad, probably, which was going to be about as fun as clearing out the disposal. Gooding, too. But he would know what was happening. He had to.

  I pushed myself to my feet. Sleep. I needed sleep.

  I stumbled forward and collapsed on the bed. Somewhere between one breath and the next, the dark behind my lids got darker, and a shrill voice whispered, “Good night, Missy.”

  Three

  My bare feet rested on the mossy forest floor. Dappled sunlight shone down between the trees, dancing over my skin in a strange, mottled pattern that made me feel otherworldly. I knew these woods, right down to the sprites that hid inside the yew and the hawthorns. This was the Before. Before the United States. Before we lost Mum. Before the Fae.