Grave Dance(103)

The passenger door popped open. “Get in the car, Alexis,” a crisp voice said.

I blinked in surprise, recognizing the voice. I hadn’t thought my father would come himself.

My father and I didn’t exactly get along. I’d like to say it was nothing personal, but that would have been a lie. It was very, very personal.

I’d spent most of my life believing he hated me because I’d been born a wyrd witch, and wyrd witches, especial y wyrd children, can’t hide what they are. I didn’t fit his image of the perfect norm family he’d built. Then a month ago I’d learned he was one of the Sleagh Maith, the nobles of Faerie, and it made me reevaluate everything I knew about him. The end result? I’d decided he was playing at something bigger and further stretching than I even wanted to know, and I wasn’t interested in being a pawn in his game. Continuing with the status quo of ignoring each other’s existence had seemed like a good plan. Until the fae forced me to go home crying “daddy.”

“I thought you’d just send someone,” I said as I slid into the plush leather seat and pul ed the door closed behind me.

me.

“Not for this.”

What’s that supposed to mean?

“How are you, Alexis?” he asked as he pul ed the car away from the curb.

I didn’t answer, but just sat studying his profile. My psyche was apparently now touching both a plane that accepted glamour and one that didn’t because I could see both the glamour that made him look like the clean-cut, just past fifty, respectable politician who walked around Nekros as governor and a leader in the Humans First Party and the face he hid under that glamour that appeared only a few years older than me and featured the striking bone structure of the ruling class of fae.

But from which court?

There weren’t many Sleagh Maiths in the mortal realm.

They were the royal blood of Faerie. Oh, they’d been front and center when the fae came out during the Magical Awakening, as they were humanlike and beautiful—at least by human standards—but of the openly fae, aside from some figureheads and some movie stars, it was rare to see Sleagh Maith. Unglamoured, at least. I guess there was no tel ing how many were in hiding. But now that I thought about it, I didn’t know any independent Sleagh Maith—

except, hopeful y, my father.

Okay, way to think myself nervous. “You are independent, aren’t you?”

My father looked over at me. “No.”

Crap. Why hadn’t I thought of asking him that before I asked for his help? I hadn’t been paying attention to where we were headed, but now that I glanced outside, I realized we weren’t going toward the mansion he cal ed a house.

“Let me out of this car.”

“Sit down, Alexis, before you dump that poor dog on the floorboard,” he said, and I noticed that the purse, with dog, in my lap was teetering. A lot. “I am not winter court, nor do I care what that impetuous and selfish queenling has to say.”

care what that impetuous and selfish queenling has to say.”

“Oh?” Tell me how you really feel, Dad. But he couldn’t lie, and there hadn’t been much wiggle room in that statement. I sank lower in my seat and clutched PC to my chest. “What court are you, then? And if you aren’t winter court but you are aligned, how are you here? I thought court fae had to move with their courts.”

“Typical y,” he said, but didn’t expound on the answer.

I frowned at his profile. I admittedly didn’t know enough about fae, but it real y irritated me that people kept breaking the rules I had heard. I noticed he also didn’t tel me which court he belonged to—which theoretical y, I also belonged

to. Except Faerie acknowledges me as

unaligned. I knew the fae inside Faerie were born into courts. They could change, but initial y they belonged to the same court as their parents. So did Faerie not realize I was his daughter? Is he that deep in hiding?

“Does your court know where you are?”

“Alexis, I do believe that is the most intel igent question you’ve asked al night.”

“I’l take that as a ‘no.’”

I was surprised when that statement earned a smile, and not the one he gave to voters, but a grin that made his hidden fae face look mischievous. “Very good, Alexis.”

Deep hiding it is. “So how do I hide what I am?” “Right now? You don’t. Your fae mien is undergoing a kind of metamorphosis.”

Great. I guess I should be happy I hadn’t woken as a cockroach.

“Tel me, Alexis, did you inherit in Faerie?”

The question switched gears so fast it caught me off guard. “Should I have?”