“Galleytrot,” Kitto said. He was right, it was known as a ghost dog, something that chased travelers on lonely roads and haunted lonely places. As the Cu Sith was the bright, high court of faerie, so the galleytrot was the scary story told around the winter fire, and a warning to stay in groups, because alone, things that weren’t human could find you and steal you away. When the wild magic had come, the only other galleytrot had come to the hands of the goblin twins, Holly and Ash. There was no way for them to be Gwenwyfar’s fathers; they had come to my bed too late. Galleytrots weren’t exclusive to the goblins, but they were certainly more Unseelie than Seelie Court. Gwenwyfar might look perfectly Seelie, but her true heritage showed in the white dog at her side, as Bryluen’s showed in her green dog. If theGalleytrot had come to Bryluen, I’d have wondered more if her possible goblin heritage might come from the twins.
Kitto said, “There’s no dog for Alastair.”
The door opened, and it was Doyle with another black dog at his side. The dog went to Alastair’s crib, and Frost lowered it for him. I took his hand in mine again, and Doyle took his other one, so that Frost stood in the middle of us as the black dog sniffed the baby. Alastair stared into the big face like Bryluen had, and then the dog touched his face, gently. Alastair made a soft sound and then the fur ran with colors, but something was different with this one, because it wasn’t just the fur that changed, but the dog began to shrink, as if the big black body were being erased, or condensing down.
“What is it?” Kitto asked.Doyle bent down and picked it up, ruffling its long ears. “A puppy,” he said.
“But a puppy what?” Kitto asked.
I touched the long, trailing ears; they were silky. “Hound of some kind,” I said.
The puppy began to whine and wriggle. Doyle put it on the floor, but it began to whimper and cry. Alastair started to cry, too.
Doyle frowned for a moment, then picked the puppy up and set it in the crib. It licked Alastair’s face, and the crying stopped. It walked around him and settled on the other side, its white and red puppy body stretched the length of his, Alastair’s hand touching its back.
“He’s too little to have reached out for the puppy,” I said.
“Perhaps,” Doyle said.
“We can’t leave the puppy in with him, it’s not housebroken,” I said.
“It’s his puppy, Merry.”
“Do you know what kind of dog it is?”
“As you said, a hound.”
“The other two dogs are guard dogs; what can a puppy do?” Frost asked.
The puppy gave a contented sigh, and Alastair made a similar happy sound. “Maybe every boy needs a dog,” Doyle said.
“Did you have one when you were little?” I asked.
He smiled. “I did.”
I frowned at him. “What kind of dog?”
He shook his head. “Let’s say it was a present from one of my aunts.”
Since two of his aunts had been hellhounds, with no human form, I had to ask, “Are you saying that one of your cousins was your puppy?”
He smiled. “Dog was my other form; think of it as more a best friend than a boy’s dog.”
I looked down at our son and the “puppy.” “Are you saying that Alastair will be able to shapeshift?”
“I do not know, but let him keep the puppy, and we’ll see. It was once one of my symbols.” I knew he was referring to the fact that once he had been the god Nodens, a healing deity known for having dogs at his sanctuary that could lick a wound and heal it, among other things.
“Magical dogs; I assumed the dog was you, but you’re saying …”
“I was not the only dog in my temples,” he said.
We looked back down at our son and the puppy. The Cu Sith had lain down in front of Bryluen’s crib, and the galleytrot had done the same to Gwenwyfar’s.
My hounds bumped me and I stroked their silky heads. Spike put his head into the crib and sniffed both the baby and the puppy. It opened sleepy eyes and licked his nose. Spike rose back up and “smiled” at us, tongue out, so that he lost all his dignity and looked like the big, goofy hound he could be at times.
“Spike approves,” I said.
“He does,” Doyle said, smiling.
“He’s your son,” Frost said, sounding pleased.
Doyle took his hand in his and said, “Our son.”
Frost’s whole face lit up with the happiness of that shared phrase. “Our son,” he said.
I moved so that I could wrap my arms around both their waists, and we hugged my two men and me. There were other men in my life, and I loved them, but these were the two who made my heart sing the most. If I’d been human enough, I might have felt guilty about that, but I wasn’t, and I didn’t; it was just the truth of my heart.
Kitto petted the puppy and kissed the baby, then put the side of the crib back up. “Good night, little prince.”
We left the babies to sleep content with their new protectors, and new best friends, because Doyle was right; every child needs a dog.
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
TWO MORNINGS LATER I woke to magic breathing and prickling along my skin. I had a moment of staring into the darkened bedroom and then Frost had me around the waist and was lifting me out of the bed, holding me one-armed behind him, while he pointed a sword at the other side of the bed. I gripped his arm where he held me, but I couldn’t see the threat around his body, and where was Doyle? Why wasn’t he with us?
Frost said, “Doyle, Doyle, it’s me, it’s your Killing Frost, and our Merry.”
A low, deep growl came from the other side of the room. It was a sound to raise the hair on your neck and tighten your body, ready for fight or flight.
“Doyle, do you know me? I am your lieutenant, your right hand, your Frost, do you not know me?” Frost’s voice got lower as he spoke, a gentling voice.
The deep, bass growl came again, and I knew in that moment that Doyle was in the room with us. He was just in his dog form, a black dog the size of a small pony.
“Doyle,” I said, softly, hesitantly.
He growled again.
Frost leaned ever so slightly so my feet could touch the floor and he could turn himself full toward the threat that was our dearest love. He spoke very carefully as if he were afraid to even move his mouth too much. “Very slowly, we back to the door. When we reach the door, turn the knob carefully, and open the door slowly.”
“No sudden movement,” I whispered.
“Yes,” he said.
The door started opening behind us, and I hissed, “Stop.”
It was Usna’s voice that said, “What is that?”
“Doyle,” I whispered, because I knew that he would hear me. Usna’s mother had been cursed into cat form, and it had left him with a lot of very feline traits, including calico-colored hair and skin and extremely good hearing, especially for higher-pitched noises, like women’s voices.
“Why is he threatening you?”
“Hush. Usna, when I say so, open the door and grab Merry through,” Frost said carefully as he backed us closer to the now partially opened door. He changed our angle slightly to take advantage of the crack in the door.
“What about you?” I asked.
“I will come with you, but your safety is all.”
I wasn’t sure I agreed with that, but if Frost was actually going to have to fight Doyle in his hellhound/phouka form I wasn’t sure I could bear to watch. Why was Doyle still stalking us, growling? It was like a nightmare, and then I had an idea.
“He’s dreaming,” I said.
“What?” Frost asked, moving us agonizingly slowly closer to the door.
“Doyle is dreaming. He’s not awake.”
From the other side of the door, Usna said, “You mean he’s sleepwalking?”“Yes.”
“He has never done that before,” Frost said, and that meant in centuries of friendship Doyle had never done such a thing, so why now?
“The king trapped me in dream,” I said. We were almost to the side of the opening. I touched Frost’s bare back gently, changing our angle slightly to leave room for Usna to open the door wide enough for us both to escape.
“You escaped,” Frost whispered.
“I had to fight, and my father’s sword came to me.”
“And we had to prevent you from attacking us with it,” he said, slowly.
“Shit,” Usna said.
“Yes,” Frost said.
That evil, frightening growl echoed along my spine, much closer this time. We had to wake Doyle, but how? What had brought me back to myself?
“You and Doyle touching me brought me back.”
“If you’re close enough to touch,” Usna said, “you’ll be too close.”
I agreed, but … I peeked around Frost’s body to see the great black dog. It took a moment for my eyes to distinguish it from the darkness of the room, and then it moved, and I could see the shape of the great beast like a piece of the night formed into something of muscle and skin and fur, and a slow, thundering growl. It stepped one paw closer, and the light from the door fell on it. The paw was bigger than my hand. Its lips curled back and teeth gleamed in the light from the hallway behind us.
I moved slightly out from behind Frost, and said, “Doyle, it’s me, your Merry.”
“Do not …” Frost began, and then the dog rushed toward us from less than four feet away, and there was no time for words.