30. Maeve

30

Maeve

T hey meandered through Lenox Hill toward Central Park. Rodan was awed at the buildings, the architecture, and said so. "I am gathering so many ideas from all of this."

Maeve pondered that. "You like building things?"

"Very much."

She nodded. "I do too, in my way, through writing. You could do more of it now, you know, with us having shared duties your load will be lighter." She thought of the derelict buildings around Realmsgate. "There sure is plenty of work to be done in that regard."

He agreed, his fingers tightening in hers, and they carried on.

Pike and Corra shadowed them, staying a good twenty feet back and acting as though they were father and daughter out for a stroll. As always, Pike seemed to have a way of blending into crowds. Even she had trouble picking him out sometimes when she glanced back for him. Elias strode before them, occasionally walking backward, casting them grins.

Corra was young and petite, though not quite so short as Jen, with curling red hair she tied back with a band, and a sprinkling of freckles over her pale face. Her eyes were a sea blue that could change depending on her mood. She had a striking figure, which she hid unsuccessfully behind somewhat baggy clothes.

Maeve turned back around and realized not for the first time she, Elias, and Rodan were all drawing attention. More so than she had ever experienced previously on Earth, at least in passing. When she were on stage? That was another matter entirely.

But here on the sidewalks, people kept doing double-takes. Staring. Some of them, their jaws dropped.

Why is everyone looking at us? She asked Rodan through the bond, which was the easier way to communicate anyway, with the noise of the city. Had Earth cities always been this loud?

Because we're Fae, he said back. Humans are drawn to us. It's one of the reasons we're so good at settling worlds. We draw other species to us.

Why?

Some kind of magical working, to my understanding, though I will confess I did not pay the best of attention in my school years. I believe it to be a part of our evolutionary history. A survival mechanism.

Moving ahead and hooking her arm with Elias's, she asked, "How much training did you go through?"

"None like you're thinking," Elias said, smiling and patting her hand. "My parents taught me privately, and there is more I have gleaned through my years visiting the Court, but otherwise I was never trained in the way Rodan was."

"There was a school, on the Court," Rodan provided. "Something like what I've considered for magical practitioners on the Realms."

She perked up at that. "You want to start a school?"

"More a college, I think, for those who come into magic on the Realms are often at their majority by the time it hits. But, yes. I think I would like very much to teach others how to utilize their skills."

She chewed on that for a moment, thinking of Jen and how there was definitely something more there. Something that Maeve knew would need training before it could be used properly.

Another human couple passed them, coming to a slow stop as the trio of Fae continued on, watching them all the while. Through the bond, Maeve said, the humans on the Realms don't stare at us this way.

Yes, they do. You may not notice it as well, but they also demonstrate it in different ways. Their trust of us, their acceptance. Not every human branch is the same in how they react in our presence. The Fae used to have intensive dealings with Earth, when this civilization was new, and there may be some residual history engrained within these people.

Maeve wanted to ask more, but Rodan was pointing at The Met. "What is that?"

She smiled, disentangling from Elias. "One of the best museums in the country. You want to check it out?"

Though Maeve did not have access to her cards at the moment, not yet having inquired with her last hotel if they still had her things, Lydia had loaded the digital wallet on her phone with enough to get them by. It was what Maeve would have made in a good month of royalties.

Maeve, Rodan, and the rest joined the short queue to get their admission tickets, paid, and started in the sculpture gallery. Pike and Corra peeled off again, keeping an eye on Rodan and Maeve, but not interfering, just as they had talked about. Maeve had given strict orders they were to relax. This was reconnaissance. Elias, true to his nature insofar as she had seen it, wandered between points of interest and her bubble with her bondmate.

She found out, while they were in line, that Elias was fairly well-traveled on the pathways. Not so much as Rodan, but enough that he was accustomed to blending in and learning about a new society all in one. He had opted for something similar to what Rodan wore, though in shades of cobalt and copper, his appearance one of a modern dandy. He drew more than a little attention from all walks of people.

He was well into discussion with an older gentleman, somehow on the topic of Vietnam and the anti-war movement that had been in New York during that era, when Maeve brought him his ticket. Elias waved them on when she would have waited for them, smiling. "I'm going to speak a little more with my new friend, here."

Things had changed since she had last been in the gallery, but she was more interested in watching Rodan. He was fascinated, taking in the placards on nearly every piece, until she sighed and said, "You know this is only the first room, right? We have a lot more to go, and there are several levels."

They went through at a little faster pace this time, but when they came upon the rooms that were recreations of famous bedrooms in palaces, or parts of famous mansions, Rodan stopped and stared for a long time. "This is incredible," he breathed. "The detail. How well-preserved it all is."

"Thinking of starting something similar in the Realms?" she asked, half-teasing.

"Maybe," he replied. "I'd have to look into how to do it properly. I do not agree with some of your acquisition methods."

"Don't ‘your' me," she said, bumping him with her hip. "I'm not one of them, remember?"

Elias chuckled a laugh, but he seemed just as enamored of the room recreations as Rodan was. He had caught up to them a few galleries ago, beaming and fingering a personal card with his ‘new friends' information on it. "This place truly is spectacular. How you have made it to where you can walk back in history."

"Or at least imagine it," Maeve agreed.

When they came to the galleries containing Mesoamerican art, she noticed a guard do more than a double-take. She stared at the two of them outright, until Maeve cleared her throat. Pike slid up behind her, no longer acting the part of separate entity.

"Can I help you?"

The guard blinked and folded her hands in front of her, staring straight ahead. She was a lean but tall black woman, her hair cropped short and tipped with pink. "Apologies, I just thought I recognized you from somewhere."

Maeve lifted an eyebrow, wondering if?—

The guard turned back to her, brow furrowed. "You're not Maeve Almeida… are you? The author?"

She smiled, and waved back a grumbling Pike. "Guilty."

The woman relaxed a little, smiling broadly. "I love your books," she gushed. "I've re-read them a few times." Her gaze flickered to Rodan and stuck. "You're—not the guy from the video, are you?"

Maeve tilted her head and looked between them. "What video?"

"Oh," she glanced around as though checking none of her colleagues were nearby, then fished a phone in a military-grade case out of her back pocket. She spent a couple moments tapping away on the screen, then twisted it to face Maeve and Rodan.

There was a shaky vertical angle of someone at the Los Angeles convention several months previous, taking a long shot of the crowd before stopping and zooming in on the first interaction Maeve and Rodan had experienced in decades. She saw her own face pale, looking up at him, and heard her tinny screech through the phone speakers when Jen came up behind her, putting a hand on her shoulder. Rodan came through the crowds toward the person with the camera, and they got a good look at his face, and the thin smile across his features.

Well, that's interesting , she said through the bond. Aloud, she asked, "This didn't go viral or anything, did it?"

"Well, kind of," the woman admitted, pulling the phone back and swiping up before showing the video stats. Low six figure views. "You've been missing for months. You've skipped several showings you were supposed to make, and your usual agent is gone, too. The one in the video."

Maeve looked closer at the guard. "You seem to know a lot."

She flushed a deeper shade of red, making her positively glow. She murmured, "I've been a fan for a while. I'm active in some of the online community."

"Ah," Maeve said, adjusting her assessment of the woman. She had rarely met her super fans. "What's your name?"

"Gladys," she said shyly, then in a whisper, "I really shouldn't be talking to you like this. It's against protocol."

"Well, we'll be here for a while. Are you going on break anytime soon?"

Gladys brightened. "I'm off in twenty minutes."

Maeve smiled back. "Come find us. I have a few questions, if you don't mind, and then we can talk about anything you want for a bit."

"That would be awesome," Gladys breathed.

Rodan took her arm, and they moved out of the room, despite barely having looked around. "Why are you trusting her?" he asked softly once they were out of earshot.

Pike, Elias, and Corra convened with them, and they clustered in the Native Alaskan room, which was almost entirely empty. "I want to know the same," Pike growled, his gaze still tracking any potential threat. He had put up less of a fuss today about wearing an eye patch. This one was a brilliant blue with black polka-dots. It matched his tie.

"I'm not, exactly," Maeve said. "But relationships with readers are… fickle. I know this isn't my home any longer, but a part of me wants to keep this relationship going. I miss them."

Rodan blinked, then looped their arms so their fingers intertwined. "I find it strange. It is like they know you, but you are an utter stranger to them. They know your life as fiction, instead of fact."

"You should be more careful," Pike grumbled, halfheartedly.

Elias was gazing at her. "You truly wrote about your previous time on the Realms? As a piece of fiction?"

"I did," Maeve said. "You should ask Rodan if he'll let you borrow his copies sometime when we're not trying to avert an apocalypse."

More than forty minutes went by and they were a floor below where they had met when Gladys showed up again. Instead of wearing the black button-down collared shirt, heavy belt, and black slacks with polished shoes, she looked more like a flower child. She wore a flowing quilted skirt in multicolored fabric, a midriff crochet top, and bangles halfway up her forearms. Grinning at them both, she skidded on roller sneakers, drawing the attention of the other patron in the room for a moment.

"Hey," she breathed, looking between them and getting stuck on Rodan again. "You are the guy from the video, aren't you? You have to be."

Rodan smiled a little. "You'd be correct."

"That's so cool. Who are you? There's been nothing but rumor and speculation online, and you got to know they get wild . Some people even say you're really him." Gladys winked. She had put in a daith piercing Maeve had not realized she had since coming off work. It glinted in the soft white light. "That can't be true though, right?"

"Gladys," Maeve said, pronouncing the name slowly. "Do you live in the city?"

She nodded. "My whole life."

Good. She wanted someone who had native instincts. She gave a laugh and took Rodan's arm. "I'm afraid we came here woefully unprepared. Other than The Met, I don't know much about the city." That was a lie, but she needed a convenient story. "Would you happen to be free? I would love a local's view, and you can fill me in on what's been going on. I can pay you for your time."

Gladys grinned, bouncing on her heels. Maeve lowered her estimation of the woman's age by a handful of years. Mid-twenties? Somewhere in there. "I'd be happy to, but you don't need to pay me. Let me text some of my people to let them know what I'm up to. I'll meet you by the back exit? Fifteen minutes?"

Maeve nodded, and Gladys skipped off, her gate just shy of the pace that would get her yelled at by one of her on-duty colleagues.

Why are you enlisting her help? Rodan asked through the bond.

A moment later, Pike's voice made her jump. "You're taking unnecessary risks."

Elias wandered closer, keeping tabs on the conversation.

"We need someone that's just… Earth." Maeve said. "Even Lydia isn't truly from here." She kept her voice canted low, even though the other patrons were human and had poor hearing. "And Jen is acting odd."

There was something else, too. Something she was struggling to put her finger on, but there was a sense of rightness to this. She needed a mind in tune with the frequencies of Earth. The planet was far more likely to reveal its secrets with someone like her on Maeve's side. She just knew it.

Plus, she liked Gladys immediately.

Corra cleared her throat. "Ma'am."

Maeve frowned. "Don't call me that. Maeve, please, while we're here." She hesitated. "And, in general, not ma'am. It makes me feel old."

The guardswoman's mouth quirked up in a smile. She wore an almost exact match to Nath, and Maeve wondered if they had coordinated privately. "I only wanted to say, I think she's harmless. Most of these people are."

Pike assessed Corra more openly. "I always thought I liked you," he grunted.

She nodded her head. "Thank you, sir."

Maeve laughed as Pike choked over the honorific, grumbling about using his blasted name instead, and they all made their way to the exit. They no longer made a show of separating, and Gladys's eyes widened when she saw them at the base of the wide marble steps. "Who're your friends?"

"This is Elias, Pike, and Corra," Maeve introduced, motioning to each of them in turn.

Gladys startled when she said Pike's name, and could not seem to keep her eyes from the scrapper for a moment. "Pike like in the books?"

"Aye," he growled.

She gave a hesitant smile. "Pike in the book had both eyes, I thought."

"Not anymore," he said, not taking his gaze from the human.

Gesturing for them to walk towards the park the museum was situated on, Maeve kept her focus on their new companion. Gladys peeled off the banister she had been leaning against, a small backpack on her back with one of those water tubes coming out the top to sling over her shoulder.

They did not have long before the crowds thinned enough Maeve felt comfortable speaking again. Walking between Gladys and Rodan, she said, "I'm sure you're wondering why so many book characters seem to be surrounding me."

"I am getting a little nervous about that, yeah," she said with a slight chuckle, eyeing the pair of them. "But, what, you're saying that's King Rodan?"

"I am no longer a king," he said, on cue. "But that is my name."

Gladys stopped in her tracks. Maeve had been ready for it, and she and her company formed a half-circle around the human. She looked between each of them, then settled on Maeve. "So the books are true." Her words were flat, and though there was a question it was not in the inflection.

Maeve nodded. "Mostly. I know the rumors."

"Those are ridiculous speculation," Gladys scoffed. "From magical thinkers. They have no basis in reali…" she trailed off mid-word, blinking, then fell heavily onto one of the many long iron benches set against the walkways through the park. Her backpack thunked to the ground, and she did not bother picking it up, her gaze unsteady. "You were orphaned," she said.

"Yes," Maeve agreed, though there was more to it now, she knew. Her senses picked up on something and she asked, gently, "Were you?"

Gladys sniffed and then sat up abruptly, looking between all of them. Maeve, Elias, and Rodan were the closest, while Pike and Corra were doing their job and had spread to point on either side, keeping the conversation private. "Those two look like your bodyguards," she said.

"They are," Rodan said with a rumble. "They are protecting the Queen."

"What the hell," Gladys whispered. "You went back? But… does that mean you married Sebastian?"

The very thought made her stomach twist, and Maeve shook her head violently. Elias was chuckling. "No. Never." She sighed, and settled into the space next to Gladys. "I have to ask something of you, Gladys, but first—let me tell you what really happened."