“Does your range of travel extend so far as Briarholme?”
The hesitation this time was much, much longer before he said, “I’ve made the jump before. It isn’t the easiest thing to do, or the most pleasant, but it isn’t outside my capabilities.”
“Excellent. Could you please go and inform the Countess January that Duchess Li Qin Zhou would like to see her and, assuming she consents, bring her back to Dreamer’s Glass?”
“And what do I get for performing this complicated and difficult task on your behalf, changeling?”
The word, while emphasized, was neither as sharp or as cruel as it could have been. I wondered, for an instant, when I’d started hearing the difference. “You mentioned a daughter before. You seemed to think I could help you with something regarding her. I can’t promise I’ll be able to help you. If you will do this for me, I can promise to hear you out.”
“Tell whomever you have called that I will cover for you as necessary, if help is possible,” said Li Qin.
“The Duchess Zhou has offered to cover for me, so if I am able to aid you, we won’t need to worry as much about getting caught.”
Silence answered me, and for a moment, I was afraid I’d pushed the matter too far, that he’d decided it was too dangerous to listen to me. Then, in a voice gone distant and cold, he said, “I will be there, with the Countess, as quickly as I can.”
The line went dead.
I lowered the phone to find Li Qin and April both watching me expectantly.
“Who was that?” asked Li Qin.
“Sir Etienne of Shadowed Hills,” I said. “He’s Tuatha de Dannan. He brought me here, and was enjoined to collect me again when I was finished. The phone was provided to make it possible for me to contact him. Shadowed Hills is a very modern Duchy, really.”
Expectancy turned into flat disbelief. I decided to ignore it as I put the phone back in my pocket.
“He’s going to travel to Briarholme to see whether he can convince Countess January to come here,” I said.
“And his daughter?” asked Li Qin.
“I have no idea. He’s never married, and to the best of my understanding he has no children in the mortal world. But he asked me about a daughter before, and it seemed like a reasonable way to convince him to do as I had asked.”
“Even traveling as the Tuatha do, it will be some time before he can return,” said Li Qin. “April, are you able to move around the knowe?”
“At home, we had installed signal boosters to guarantee I could move at will throughout the knowe and certain areas outside,” said April. “Without those, my range is limited, but I can travel perhaps two hundred yards from this point.”
“That encompasses the kitchens,” said Li Qin. “Do you eat?”
“I can, although it does little to sustain me,” said April. Then, almost shyly: “I like carrots.”
“Very well, then. I think Avebury made carrot cake last night, and there should still be some remaining.” She offered April her hand. April took it, clinging like she’d just found some sort of impossible lifeline, and Li Qin beckoned for me to follow them.
She led April back through the room of junk and salvage, me tagging along behind, and we emerged into the room where I had first arrived. From there, we proceeded along a hallway, passing several closed doors, to an open doorway through which the sounds of kitchen work in progress drifted.
Li Qin flashed me an encouraging smile and stepped into the kitchen. I followed.
It was a smaller room than its equivalent at Shadowed Hills but substantially more modern, with gleaming glass and silver surfaces in place of stone. A Barrow Wight stood by a long silver table, kneading bread dough, while a Gwragen changeling stirred a pot of something rich and aromatic-smelling.
The Barrow Wight looked up at our entrance, grinning a gap-toothed grin at Li Qin. “Duchess!” she said, brightly. “Dinner’s not for several hours yet, if you were hungry. It’s saag paneer tonight, and I’m about done preparing the dough for naan, but if you wanted feeding, it’s sandwiches and last night’s scampi for the moment, I’m afraid.”
Her speaking so bluntly and familiarly to her liege stopped my tongue. I gaped, astonished by the audacity. Li Qin, however . . .
Li Qin laughed. “Oh, I would never dream of trying to get my supper early, and a few hours is more than fine. This mite, however”—she indicated April—“has just shown up on our doorstep, and requires a slice of last night’s fine carrot cake, if there’s any yet remaining.”
“October as well,” said April. She lifted her chin, stubbornly. “She rarely eats enough.”
“October?” asked the Barrow Wight—Avebury, I assumed—as she looked to me.
“Duke Torquill’s niece,” affirmed Li Qin.
“A pleasure to host you in our house,” said Avebury, leaving the dough as she bustled around the table, pausing only to grab a cloth and wipe the flour from her hands. “Of course there’s cake for the having, if there’s company to be having it. Would you like tea as well?”
“We would,” said Li Qin. “If it wouldn’t delay dinner too upsettingly, could you bring it to us in the library?”
“In a twinkling,” said Avebury, smiling as she moved to begin gathering plates.
Li Qin led us out of the kitchen again. I must have been looking at her oddly, because she raised an eyebrow and asked, “Is there a problem, Miss Torquill?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know,” I said. “The way she spoke to you . . .”
“Avebury is as pureblooded as I am, if that’s what’s concerning you,” said Li Qin. “Her sister, Minna, came here from . . .” Her face clouded for a moment. “I don’t remember where Minna came from, but she brought Avebury with her, and once Avebury was well settled in my household, Minna returned home. She’s never come to visit, either. Isn’t that odd?”
“Not if their original place of residence was outside the three Kingdoms I have named,” said April.
“Fair enough. I can’t think of anyone who’s traveled outside those three Kingdoms,” said Li Qin. “It’s like there’s a wall between us and the rest of Faerie.”
“Because there is,” said April.
“It’s . . . the way she spoke to you, yes, as if she had the authority to do so,” I said. “Uncle Sylvester tolerates what Mother says is a shameful amount of backtalk from his servants, but none of them would dream to tell him his dinner wasn’t ready if he deigned to appear in the kitchens asking for it. It was . . . unseemly.”
“Ah,” said Li Qin. “I always forget how much closer Shadowed Hills is to the Queen’s knowe. They have to follow courtly manners much more rigidly than we do here. I promise you, October, when you’re not watching, there’s plenty of backtalk and sass in your uncle’s halls.”
The thought was unsettling. I focused instead on the room Li Qin had led us to, which had a green carpet and walls painted in climbing roses, so it was almost as if we were sitting in a small outdoor garden. A circular table sat at the middle of the room, flanked by comfortable chairs. Li Qin settled in one. I took another. April, apparently loath to be parted from the mother who didn’t know her, perched on the arm of Li Qin’s chair.