Mickey perched on the bed in the would-be prison room where they'd stashed Eric. The four of them made a strange group of conspirators. Gabriel, Mickey's long-lost godfather and undead man of the hour. Eric, the would-be prisoner who was currently in the corner taking down intel from Malachi's late men and ordering them around every which way. And Great-Aunt Greta, their best asset, who not only knew every secret passage in the whole mansion, but who also knew reams of the late Magdalena's secrets.
"So," Mickey said. "Given the schedule and attendance Michelle got us, it's going to be a while before enough family gets here to witness Lucía's so-called ceremony. We've got a little breathing room. We need to make use of it."
"You want this done before the family gets here," Gabriel assessed.
"She'll have invited mostly allies, with just enough other people in the mix to pass muster. If we have everything mopped up, we can persuade them. If we don't, they might just take her side."
Gabriel, grim. "Would bringing in former family help us on that front?"
Huh?
Aunt Greta shook her head. "We can bring them back into the fold later. They'll make good allies further down the road, but it might wreck your case to bring them in right now. They left. For a lot of them, there's nasty rumors around about why, and some of those are true. And they're mostly zombies, meaning people will assume any alliance with you is from necromancy."
Definitely something to note for later. Mickey would have to ask Auntie about that in private--and Rhett, for that matter, just to have two stories to compare.
Gabriel accepted Greta's assessment with a nod. "In that case, we'll want to strike fast, and break her apart from the allies she already has here."
"We also need to make sure we protect the students," Mickey said. "Not only is that Michelle's condition for her aid, it's also essential for keeping the family's alliances as intact as they can be after everything that's happened today."
"They're also our responsibility." Gabriel agreed, voice firm.
Interesting. Moral sensibilities. Not as common in the family these days--certainly not in the leadership. Mickey would need to get a sense for those. Potentially promising. Or threatening, but he did like to play the optimist.
Eric came out of his corner, carrying the radio with him as it hissed static. "The gardens are secure, and they think they kept Lucía's people from calling intel in."
Mickey shook his head. "Lucía's got scry spells far enough into the garden. She has to have seen it."
"She hasn't assigned anyone to take them over."
"Well, no, she likes to watch them herself, and she'd be especially paranoid--wait."
Aunt Greta must have had the same thought. "She's too busy to watch them, isn't she?"
Mickey gave a quick nod. "That schedule. When does she next have lull time?"
"Next big plan is the rehearsal speech," Eric said. "Not until after that, from what your student told us."
"Rehearsal's as good a time as any. But how do we keep the students out of the crossfire?"
Gabriel frowned. "Let's ask Rhett."
Finally, someone suggesting talking to their fae allies. Mickey'd been quietly itching to, but he was wary of coming off as compromised. Aunt Greta was probably in a similar position.
"What are you thinking?" Eric asked.
"There's some spells they use all the time over in Faerie that would help here. A lot of their magic breaks here in Human, but they might still have a few that work."
"Not a bad idea." Mickey made sure to keep his tone detached. "Worst-case, two more people who can see through wisplight would come in handy, if we need to get tricky. Especially now that we've locked down the gardens."
Mrs. Vernon came personally to pretend to surrender the gardens, saying she would give them up completely in exchange for an agreement from Dr. Morley not to destroy certain plants. Worded carefully--Mrs. Vernon was surrendering the garden to "the leader of the Morleys". She implied the wording was a petty excuse for delaying until after Dr. Morley's succession ceremony. So convincingly that if Michelle didn't know the real reason, she would have believed it.
Mrs. Vernon also gave a dismissive sniff on seeing the sword lilies decorating the succession podium, which the group had been cutting into single-flower bouquets for the loyalists to hold.
"What?" Dr. Morley demanded.
"Toxic flowers--ironically appropriate, don't you think?"
Dr. Morley glared at her. "What do you want?"
"Give me one more promise about the plants I can rescue from the garden before your ceremony, and I'll bring you ones that aren't toxic."
"Fine." They negotiated terms, sharp and quick.
Which is how they ended up taking delivery of entire bundles of hybrid "catsets", or however Marco pronounced it. Like the sword lilies, they had flowers going along a stem, but one that trailed down instead of standing up. Others took care of the catsets for the podium, while Michelle, Jenna and Marco spent the rest of the preparations alongside the other students, carefully tying the catsets to dowels to hold them up, one per loyalist. They didn't have enough dowels, though, so Marco grabbed candycanes, lollipops and sticks of rock candy from the kitchens to use for the student ones.
He and Michelle covered for each other, whenever one of them slipped in their acting. By the end, everything was ready, and nobody seemed to suspect a thing.
Lucía's damn speech was ready and practiced, the family members were called and scheduled to arrive as soon as they could, and all of the fucking sword lilies had been replaced with Vernon's last-minute droopy garlands. Nobody seemed the worse for wear for handling the toxic sword lilies, but Lucía did make sure loyalists escorted off the person responsible for deciding on them. There would be an interrogation later.
Everything was as perfect as it was going to be given the absolute chaotic mess this day had made for. Lucía's lab destroyed. Her succession research burnt to a crisp. Herself scarred. Malachi, Mickey and Magdalena, all dead. Alanna a disguised fae. And now the sword lilies.
But Lucía had overcome and made use of all of it. Had potion-guaranteed loyalists from her family and other influential families filling this room. Here it was. The last preparation before she could finally officially announce her triumph.
Her moment was come.
She held herself as tall as if this rehearsal were the official event they would soon hold. Looked out among the people bound in loyalty to her. Brought the words of her speech to mind, and readied her wand against her throat, to cast the voice augmentation.
A cloud of flame shot into the air from the middle of the crowd, bathing the ceiling in fire.
Movement flickered out of the corner of Jenna's eye, heat and light like a wall slamming into her senses. She threw her bouquet to the ground to cast her wards before her brain even caught up with what was happening, bubbling herself and Michelle in safety.
The person who'd thrown the fire was--Marco?
"Michelle, grab Marco with your shadows, I'll--"
Jenna couldn't move.
"...Michelle, what are you doing?"
Water from the sprinklers cascaded into the room. "Find who did it," Lucía snapped out, immediate orders. "Bring them to me." She held her wand at the ready to fight, reached into her blazer for the emergency potions she'd snagged from Magdalena's room. All the while scanning the crowd, trying to find... there. Jenna holding a ward up to cover her and Michelle, wand pointed to Marco, who'd fallen to the floor. His own wand was leaking forth a trail of smoke.
Lucía turned to order an assistant to grab him, only to find them fallen, too. Had Jenna done this?
No. Everyone had fallen.
Observe. As fast as she could. Yellow powder on the ground, on everyone's skin except for Jenna's and Michelle's, on the flower petals. Pollen? Jenna's and Michelle's flowers had fallen outside the ward, and their clothes looked dry. Therefore, the ward had gone up right after the flame. Therefore, the water had activated something about the flowers--had done this. Hadn't Vernon promised the flowers weren't toxic? Maybe she'd put something on nontoxic flowers, as a loophole? Or maybe she didn't consider this effect to be toxicity. It was a good thing Lucía had built herself an immunity to everything her body could stand.
Before Lucía could figure out a next step, a voice sang out from the largest display of the flowers, the one that had needed a wheelbarrow to bring it in. A voice Lucía recognized with a sharp and rending ache.
Alanna.
Within five seconds, Alanna had completed a song with all the terrifying swiftness and power of an unBurnt fae voice. So quickly that Lucía didn't even process the lyrics until Alanna had finished singing them.
"Handy-pandy
Jack-a-Dandy
Loves plum cake and sugar candy
He bought some in a grocer's shop
And out he came, hop, hop, hop!"
The flowers Alanna's voice had emerged from collapsed. Alanna was gone. And so were--so were the students. All of the students, except for Jenna and Michelle, still beneath Jenna's ward.
Jenna watched what happened to everyone, even as Michelle kept hold on the shadows.
Jenna couldn't move to save them.
Only once everyone was gone did Michelle let go of the shadows. No longer binding Jenna, they stretched out against the walls of the ward, as if they were trying to form a second layer of protection. To keep her safe, or to keep her in? Or just to keep her from seeing what was happening outside?
Jenna whirled to face Michelle. Wand in her hand, trying to figure out--what should she do, she couldn't just attack her best friend, but--
"Why did you stop me? Now everyone's--" her voice caught on the next word. Were they all dead? Kidnapped? Maybe Ms. Abercorn had taken them to Faerie for enslavement. "How could you?"
"I had to." Michelle's voice trembled, sending a ripple through the bubble of shadow. "They got sent to somewhere safe. That's all I can tell you."
"Safe from what?"
Lucía knelt next to the nearest downed lab assistant, a bottle of Magdalena's most caustic potion in hand, ready to throw. Scanning as fast as she could for symptoms, to figure out what this pollen had done.
Skin warm, pulse--
The ballroom doors burst open, and in walked guards.
"Good, you're here," she said. "I need you to--"
But then, a voice came forth from behind them. A voice that ought belong to a dead man.
"Lucía, darling." That cocksure fucking baritone. "We need to talk."
The retinue of guards parted, and there Mickey was. Toying with the cane-sword she had seen bloodied and being dragged along with his corpse. Looking far too self-satisfied.
Lucía slipped the caustic back into her blazer, grasped a smooth vial of grace in its place. Enough life magic in it to burn through a zombie. And he had to be one. Alanna had been right to worry.
Lucía's hand shot out, the vial shattering against the flat of his blade, raised to parry. It splashed over his bare hand.
And did nothing.
"How the hell--"
A cold hand reached around her throat from behind. She jabbed her elbow back to stun, grabbed for the edge of those fingers, but found no purchase. No way to escape the grip of the hand's unseen owner, who reeked of tobacco and death.
And she'd used up her only vial of grace on Mickey.
She reached for her evocation, but that implacable hand squeezed her throat, brimming with the skin-crawling touch of necromantic magic. The threat clear.
"This is Lucía?" a rusty growl of a voice asked. The sound of footsteps coming from the servant's entrance behind the podium. The clack of shoes on marble.
A stocky, young man stepped into view. Just enough signs of death to catch her eye--discolored skin, abnormal breathing, dilated pupils. When he came to a halt before her, his whole body stilled. Even his pupils, boring into hers with such steady immobility that she could feel the movements of her own eyes like some kind of rising panic.
Why did he look so damn familiar?
"It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Lucía," the man said. "My name is Gabriel Morley. I am your godfather."
"I don't have a godfather."
"You do. You just didn't know. I was born as Magdalena Morley, and then the faeries stole me and replaced me with that changeling you've trussed up in a funeral bier."
"You don't even look like her." For all he did look so terribly familiar.
"That changeling lost track of what my face ought to look like when it murdered me, the first time I tried to take the family back."
What the hell should she do? She needed to be in control of the Morleys. Not this corpse who would like as not hold a grip on power until she died of old age. Who was allied, obviously, with Mickey.
But she was surrounded, held by her throat, her allies unconscious or disappeared. What few lab assistants had begun to wake--some had built their own immunities--were falling zap by zap to Greta Holloway's lightning, as the old woman silently paced the room.
"I'm disappointed in you, Lucía," Gabriel said. "You've enslaved people to your will. Like the faeries do. Even family members."
Overwhelming fear clapped Jenna's own hands to her ears. Like if she listened one more second, it would be like looking under the bed to see the monster, or something, she didn't know. She was so scared all of a sudden and she didn't understand.
God, it was so hard to think lately. Feelings like this kept coming up over and over. At first she'd been curious, but every time she tried to look at it, it felt like her mind was made out of jagged pieces that didn't match up, and the more she looked, the more she felt it, and she couldn't... She couldn't.
She looked up to see Michelle watching her. Michelle, who looked so sad.
"Is it true?" Jenna's voice desperate. Her hands still over her ears, still blocking out the conversation on the other side of the room.
Michelle nodded, solemn.
Jenna found herself huddled on the ground, her own sobs echoing through her bones, hot tears streaking down her arms. She still had her hands pressed over her ears, like she was holding the contents of her skull together by force.
Michelle knelt down beside her. Her arms wrapping hesitant around Jenna's shoulders--then firmer, when Jenna nodded, leaned against her. Her palm running over Jenna's hair, as she held her close.
Lucía bridled at Gabriel's accusation. "Mickey's the one who's been plotting with a faerie this whole time," she snapped back. How dare he have the gall? "I've just been protecting myself."
"Far as I understand it, that fae's been protecting him from you."
"That's obvious bullshit. I haven't done a thing to Mickey." Not successfully, anyway. "Meanwhile, he's been trying to corrupt my potions research. He tried to murder me. My lab is a smoking crater, and he's playing innocent?"
"Mickey? Is this true?"
"I did try to stop her from developing the loyalty potion, sure," Mickey answered. "But no murder attempts."
"Rhett," Gabriel said. Out from behind the guards emerged the faerie's slight frame. "You've been here on my behalf for a while. They didn't leave you locked in a room like Eric. What's the truth?"
Rhett looked over at Lucía, and in its red eyes she could still see the terror it had held when she'd brought the chainmail veil for Alanna to use.
Rhett answered. "Lucía's lab exploded while Mickey was rescuing me from a serpent that had venom laced with one of Lucía's poisons."
"Thank you." Gabriel acknowledged it with a solemn nod.
Lucía had a million arguments to hand, but none sprang forth. Her mouth dry as she watched Gabriel reach out his hand to take Mickey's sword.
"Now," Gabriel said. "We don't need to lose any more family."
The zombie holding Lucía shifted, grip still too firm to escape.
"What we need to do," Gabriel continued, adjusting his hold on the sword, taking aim, "is give second chances."
Piercing pain.
Darkness.
When the mind magic finally broke, Jenna felt like she was waking up from a dream. The need to hold all the disparate things together just... vanished. The last weeks, the last few hours, suddenly distant, as if she hadn't been the person experiencing them.
But Michelle was still holding her. And that was real.
"I'm okay now," Jenna said, through the gunk and mucus of all the crying she'd been doing.
"Are you sure?" Michelle asked.
"I think she's... dead, or they undid the curse, or something. Have you heard anything?"
"I've been paying attention to you."
A single, weak laugh. "I think Mr. Morley would get onto you about that."
"I bet he would."
Michelle began to pull her shadows away, and a spike of fear hit Jenna as the light pierced in.
"Wait," Jenna said.
"What?"
"Just in case... just in case I'm wrong. Could you tangle me up with your shadows again?"
"Okay."
It felt like a comfort this time, instead of a betrayal. Woven like vines all around her. Cleared away, now, from the walls of her ward. Letting them look out on a ballroom with sleeping bodies being carefully bound, dead ones being dragged away, all under Mrs. Holloway's watchful, bi-colored eyes. Mr. Morley and some stranger were standing by Magdalena's funeral bier, talking. And Dr. Morley...
Jenna's stomach twisted, and she couldn't look anymore.
Lucía's limp corpse lay out on a tablecloth next to Magdalena's bier, the impaling wound that had killed her still oozing blood. Fitting. Awful.
Mickey tried to sound nonchalant. "Second chances, you said."
"We'll offer her a new lease on life," Gabriel said. "And see if she doesn't do something better with her afterlife."
"Like you've done with Malachi's people?"
A grim nod.
"You didn't seem to like mind control when you killed her for it." Had to prod, had to know. Was it better to stab Gabriel in the back now, to prevent a reign of terror, or was he going to be less-awful-than-Lucía enough to deal with while Mickey arranged a sociopolitical solution?
"We'll give her--and Malachi's people--some choices, once this fight is settled. Keep just enough control that they can't come slit our throats."
Eric snorted in derision. "Too generous. Just kill them all, that's what they would have done to us." Said in front of Malachi's former people. Mickey couldn't tell if it was stupid or brilliant. It sure as hell drew a bright line, between how much Gabriel was going to do, and how much he could do, if he wanted.
Gabriel shook his head. "We give people a new lease on life, not take it from them. Not when we've got a choice."
Mickey, unable to resist the cynicism. "You do realize this is a mob you want to head up?"
"Don't have to go on a killing spree to protect what's ours. Don't have to enslave them, either. Shit like that, leaders like those, it's why the family's turned on each other, isn't it?"
Interesting. "Certainly part of it."
"I'm not saying we need to go out of business. But we need to change what we're doing, how we're doing it, or we'll eat each other alive before we prosper."
"Sounds good to me." It really did, if Mickey could figure out what Gabriel meant by any of it. What exactly was it they were in for, when Gabriel took power? Mickey wished he'd asked Rhett more questions about how the Wingless worked, what they were like. All Mickey knew was they'd been taking territory off the Morleys, selling magical artifacts in markets the Morleys had already claimed for their own and undercutting them on the price. Not knowledge enough by a mile.
"Speaking of changes." Gabriel turned. "Rhett."
The faerie straightened, meeting his eye, and something silent passed between them. Fear and anger and regret. And, underneath it all, something bruised and tender.
"Thank you," Gabriel said. "And I'm sorry." His voice blunt, and in it buried so very many things Mickey could not possibly read, not without knowing everything. "You went above and beyond in our bargain. I'll pay the agreed price--you're free to go, even knowing what you know--but I also owe you."
Rhett's eyes fixed on a point away from Gabriel's face, and he swallowed, fists clenched. "Thank you. I can't regret my actions, but I am sorry they hurt you." A long breath. "Is Alanna--what are you going to do with Alanna?"
"Far as I know, they were here protecting my godson and exposing my doppleganger. They don't owe me anything, and they're not a captive. No need to burn your favor on them."
Rhett gave a nod. "I'll go tell her."
With that, he left, his pace quick, his wings shaking.
Mickey wondered if he'd get the chance to ask, what had happened between them before all this.
"So, Godpop," Mickey said. "While we're cleaning up and waiting for the rest of the family to get here, how will you run things?"
But Gabriel wasn't listening anymore. He was instead looking at the photographs pinned up next to Magdalena's funeral display. His face held a lost, pained look he didn't bother at all to mask. Old times, old initiations. Dead relatives.
"Which one was this?" Gabriel asked Mickey, showing him a picture of two women and a man, arms around each other's shoulders, grinning into the camera.
"They're Holloways. That's Greta, of course. And that's Ava, she's my grandmother. She's our Sighted for further down the coast. And..." and this was the one Mickey had never met, but he knew the name, anyway. "...that's Dorian. He had the Sight, too, but he... well, it's always been a rumor that a Lynwood killed him. He got sick, a long time before I was born. Grandma and Aunt Greta don't talk about him."
"What about you?" Gabriel asked Mickey. "You have the Sight?"
"Nah. Never got it." No need to tell him about the touch. Mickey only had so much of a grasp on that yet, and telling Gabriel now wouldn't give him any new advantages. Better to keep it up his sleeve.
"Got healing, though, that's good. It'll be useful. We need this family to heal."
"And here I thought healing wasn't manly enough." The house doctor was a man, sure, but that wasn't the stereotype. That stereotype had driven Lucía crazy, which was probably why she never did design healing potions.
"Anything's manly, if it's a man that's got it." There was a tension there, in Gabriel's voice.
Ah. Mickey had forgotten. "Suppose so." Was it manly, if Mickey had it? Part of him wanted to tell Gabriel, say something... but they certainly weren't in private, and even if they were, Mickey wasn't nearly done sussing the man out. Just look at how Gabriel had treated Rhett, before Rhett had become useful.
Being the way Mickey was and being fae weren't the same, but to all the wizards Mickey knew, they had been the same for a long time. Anything like the fae had to come from the fae, made you suspicious. It wasn't like it could ever come from us, if it was a them thing. Hell, how well would Gabriel have had it, if he'd grown up here? At least he'd settled on one. And if Gabriel took power, he sure as hell wasn't going to put up with anyone side-eying him about it. Besides, being the real human in a changeling swap was like invincibility potion for accusations of being too fae.
Gabriel was still looking around the display, still bearing that expression, joy and sorrow. "All these photographs... the changeling lived my whole life for me. And all of it was the life I wanted, and none of it was the way I wanted to live it." He turned to Mickey. "Thank you. For this second chance."
God, he was making it hard to want to backstab him. "Any time."
Jenna and Michelle ended up in the gardens, after a while, once word came in that the place was safe and Mrs. Vernon needed help cleaning up. Maybe they should rest instead, but it felt like the perfect excuse to go somewhere outside the death-tainted building, maybe even have a chance to spend some time away from people.
When they got to the gardens, Michelle released the protective tangle her shadows had formed around Jenna's arms and legs. The air hit Jenna's skin, and she felt... exposed. She reached out with her magic to the shadows, clung to them, and Michelle didn't pull back all the way. No longer forming restraints, but... their shadows on the ground were merged together. It was a small thing, but it felt nice.
Mrs. Vernon put the two of them on replanting duty. They mostly stayed close as they worked, but when they had to separate, Michelle left their shadows linked. Leaving Jenna with the constant, reassuring feeling of Michelle's presence. And somewhere between coaxing the walking onions into putting their legs back in the soil and balming the Merry-Go-Roundup's injured vines, Jenna started to feel a little less wrong.
"I'm glad you're okay," came Michelle's voice, quiet, after a while.
"Me, too." Thinking of how very not okay she'd been just a little while ago felt so jarring. "Thank you for... I don't know what you did, but I guess you were part of the plan?"
Michelle nodded. "I passed information back to Mr. Morley, and I got him and the others to agree... the other students have been shit to both of us, but I don't want them hurt. So they figured out a spell to evacuate them. Marco and I helped set it up."
Jenna was curious about the magic, which felt so irrepressibly herself that she couldn't help but like it. She quashed it down for now. "But I didn't let you evacuate me."
"No." Michelle focused on the plant in front of her, gently patting the soil down around its newly-buried roots. "You didn't."
"How did you know I wasn't going to hurt you? You bound me up to protect Marco, but when we were alone, you just... dropped the shadows and talked to me."
"I don't know, I..." Michelle shook her head. "Why didn't you hurt me? To try and save Dr. Morley?"
"Because you're--" my friend, and it was right, but it was incompletely right. "Because I care about you."
The twisting in Michelle's shadow--which Jenna could feel now, not just see--smoothed out. "Then I guess that's my answer, too. I care about you."
"Well. Good." Jenna crouched down next to her, reaching out her hands to take Michelle's.
Michelle accepted the touch, leaned her head against Jenna's shoulder. It felt so, so right. But also, weirdly, like Jenna was lying. Because I care about you was right, too, but it was still incompletely right. But was now a good time? Except the school was probably about to fall apart completely, so would there ever be a good time?
"Do you, um," Jenna started. Pushing against a normal amount of panic and nerves, instead of the magic kind that broke her brain. For all she was the kind of person to ask anyone anything, this question seemed so small and so big all at once. "Do you watch that one show, with the magical girls? I mean, I know we're a little old for it..."
"That hang out at the arcade?"
"Yeah."
"I, um, I do."
"Okay. Um. So." This was such a silly way to do it. But it made her less nervous than just coming out with it. "You know the reason they're delaying the next season, right?"
Michelle's shadow flickered, was that a good sign? "Um. Yeah. Because those two girls are a couple, right?"
"Yeah. My dad says wizards don't care, but my mom says they shouldn't be allowed to show it."
"That's stupid."
"Exactly!"
"So, um." Michelle's shadow was flickering again. It tickled. "Is this your way of asking me out?"
Jenna buried her face in Michelle's hair and nodded.
"Yeah," Michelle said. "I--I'd like to." And then she turned to press her cheek against Jenna's temple, her shadow tickling around Jenna's ankles like some small and affectionate creature.
Jenna luxuriated in it, let go of Michelle's hands to hold her close. To enjoy the easy contact that had nothing to do with soothing pain and everything to do with soft joy.
Once things were moving along smoothly in the ballroom, Mickey escorted Rhett out into the hall, to find Thairn and make sure the kids were waking up okay. Thairn was magically waking them, and Marco was keeping them calm as they woke, explaining what had happened. Mickey joined in, using his healing to help Thairn check the kids for injuries.
"Thank you," Thairn said, and Mickey suddenly knew what it felt like to not be allowed to hear affection from her voice.
"No problem." Casual.
They'd been having an open affair before, but if they continued that now, he couldn't claim it was all a plot to stop Magdalena and Lucía. They had to be allies. And only allies.
Once the medical checks and wakeups were done, Mickey shooed her over towards Rhett. At least they could have something.
She took Rhett into a joyful embrace that held everything she hadn't been able to show in public since his capture. It was good for them, though it felt like something sour on Mickey's tongue, not being able to be in that embrace. He could feel the urge to touch her like a restlessness under his skin. They'd been so free with it before. Now he had to pretend like it didn't matter.
Aunt Greta made for a welcome distraction, coming over to check on him and help with the students. She set her hand against his back like she was making sure he hadn't suddenly grown faerie wings, her finger finding the bump of a scar he hadn't yet finished healing, where the suborned guards had stabbed him in the back.
They passed a wordless gaze. And, after a moment, she dipped her head in acceptance.
Once the family had arrived--with Mickey making some calls to better balance out the guest list--Godpapa Gabriel put on a hell of a display. He sliced the wings off of Magdalena's corpse, one by one, the burnt-in glamour finally breaking once they were severed. And let Eric run a knife right down his back, to prove he had no wings. He used the photograph of his corpse trussed up like a dead faerie to prove he really was himself, first by his unchanged face, then by opening his shirt and pulling down the collar of his binder to show the scar from the steel pin.
Mickey, meanwhile, painted himself as a mastermind, working together with Alanna to thwart Magdalena and Lucía both. Everything (except what bits of it he didn't want to take responsibility for) was all part of his plan, down to the tiniest coincidence, even his near-death. His relationship with Alanna, too, just a master plan, secret conspiracy, nothing really there.
Dara Lynwood was surprisingly helpful with wrangling Lucía's surviving lab assistants. Some rumors from when Lucía's lab had burned soon crossed Mickey's ear, and it wasn't long before he found a quiet space to ask her about how she'd foiled the loyalty potion and how to make sure the victims stayed free of further effects. He barely even threatened her--just cut a deal to help her to the top of the Lynwoods. Someone had to keep the family in business. With her help, what would have been a civil war instead became a small bump in the road.
The school was in all the chaos Thairn had planned to provide it. Conspiracies were still flying about secret faeries, students loyal to one teacher or another were squaring off against their fellows, and quite a lot of them simply left, not here for any of this deadly nonsense. They were down most of the teachers, too, once several of them quit.
And then it was goodbye.
Xavier drove Mickey, Thairn and Rhett to a Widdershins point in a limo, Luke accompanying. In private, Mickey and the faeries exchanged some ways to get in contact with each other, drop points for secret letters. They still couldn't show affection, not in front of Luke and Xavier, since Mickey had them going on the "master plan" line.
What the hell could he say to them? Rhett, that was easy enough.
"Thank you for saving my life."
"Thank you for saving mine."
"Life-saving buddies?"
"Sure."
But Thairn, that was... "You were a good fake lover." Jokes Mickey would have made, if it were true.
"Oh, I'm the best, you know. You need to get better at faking it."
"Oh?"
"Need to put your heart into it."
That caught a champagne sparkle of laughter from him, and he poured them all another drink. Ambrosia. Like he'd promised. Thairn accepted it from him, the first drink he'd seen her accept from anyone, and so did Rhett.
"Well," Mickey said. "I'd better get started on crafting my fluffy puppy cabal."
"Then I'll have to start building mansion cottages. Did you ever figure it out, by the way?"
"Well, I faked my death, so probably Juliet."
"I suppose Lucía did try to make me quaff some poison, so I could be your Romeo."
"I'd set a dagger to my breast, but I think I've had enough of being stabbed for the week."
"I wonder why." She raised her glass to toast. "False Juliet."
"Dear Fauxmeo. And red-eyed Rosaline." Mickey tinked his glass to both, and drank. He would need a lot to drink, soon. He let the ambrosia settle warm, leaned back and enjoyed the moment. The golden sunlight shining off her wings, those looks she gave him when Luke wasn't watching.
Even if you give it back right now, you'll still take my heart with you when you go.
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