16. The Victor

Andrew's knees buckled as soon as he heard the word home, but Ingrid and Micah didn't let him fall. He slung his arms around their shoulders and limped along with them as the Redwood Folk watched them leave. They bore a range of expressions from reverence to disgust to disbelief. All remained still and silent as they passed. Flickering spring-green light sparked under Micah's bare feet. As they crossed the barrier back into the Hoh rainforest, Ingrid and Micah looked at each other over his head, hands outstretched.

Ingrid closed her fist on the shadows, Micah her mirror with but the slightest lag.

Folding the shadows was like running through thick and heavy curtains. Micah caught glimpses of the forest beyond; they startled a herd of elk, and sent birds flapping skyward, and almost collided with a cedar. Then past a curtain ahead of them in the dark was a little secluded campsite, and in the campsite sat Andrew's undisturbed beige Saturn, waiting for them.

Andrew let the rolling darkness carry him, stomach turning, and when it dropped him back out, his body wanted to keep going. He doubled over, patting Micah's arm in warning just before he vomited next to his feet. The quick gesture made pain shoot up and down his body. His head throbbed. He groaned, but Micah held him tight with both arms around his chest. He helped him straighten and rubbed his shoulder blades as he did.

"Look," said Ingrid.

A ring of enormous mushrooms colored white, violet, and scarlet had sprouted around the Saturn. Beyond its boundary lay the two red hounds, arrows lodged into their skulls, blood pooled under their maws.

On the roof of the Saturn, Chamomile knelt with an arrow nocked in her bow, the sharp point trained on the three of them as if in disbelief. "Are you free? Are you alone?"

"Yes," Ingrid answered, a jubilant note making her voice rise like a song.

Chamomile threw down her bow and arrow and dropped to the ground. "You're free!"

The cats scooted out from under the car, twining between her legs, their tails sticking up like flags that quivered at the tips. Ingrid stepped over the mushrooms and stooped to speak in hushed tones to Chamomile, whose eyes brightened and brightened until they almost glowed.

Through the window of the passenger side of the car, Julian was slumped forward in slumber, a sleeping bag draped over him and tucked behind his shoulders.

"Is—is he okay?" Micah asked.

Chamomile nodded. "He'll think this was all a dream, unless you tell him otherwise."

Micah carried Andrew past the ring of mushrooms. Within it, the air was quieter, a bit warmer, and the rain was repelled as if by an invisible umbrella. "You gave me a fucking heart attack, Chami," said Micah.

"Andrew gave me the—" She cut herself off, peering up at Andrew, grimacing. "Damn. That's a lot of blood."

Andrew groaned with his eyes slitted open, "That's a lot of sass." He grunted and flinched against Micah, his head drooping. "Sorry. I'm okay. Sorry."

"Now who apologizes too much?" Micah murmured with a smile, cupping Andrew's cheek in his hand.

"You, Your Grace," mumbled Andrew with a drunken grin, before his eyes rolled back as he collapsed.

Micah yelled and caught him under his armpits. Ingrid pulled open the door to the backseat of the car. Chamomile helped maneuver him by the hips as they laid him over the bench and set his head down on the seat. He grumbled, head lolling, clutching his bleeding waist. Ingrid crossed to the other side of the car and slid onto the seat, lifting his head and resting it on her thigh. Then she picked up her basket of herbs and began digging through them.

"Micah," said Chamomile firmly. "Move. We need to treat his wounds."

Yielding, Micah backed away and went to sit in the driver's seat. He reached over to Julian and touched his hand, and Julian sighed and murmured something incoherent. Micah inspected his face and chest and hands, but Julian seemed unharmed. So he really had been brought back to the Redwoods just to be intoxicated, just as bait to bring Micah and Ingrid back. Micah sighed, shaking his head, patting his dad's hand. Then he turned his attention back to Andrew, wet, bleeding, muddy, and barely conscious in the back of his Saturn.

Slipping through the open door, Chamomile climbed on top of Andrew's legs and straddled him.

"Oh," Micah intoned.

Andrew yelped and slurred, "What're you doing?" He lifted his head, shakily, and tapped her knees where they rested over his hips.

"Hush." Chamomile shoved Andrew's shirt up and wriggled it over his head.

Micah remarked dryly, "This is weird for me."

Taking the proffered bundles from Ingrid's hand, Chamomile bit off a mouthful, chewed for a long moment, and then spat them back into her hand.

"I don't think I'm hurt that bad," said Andrew hurriedly, holding up his hands. "Please don't spit on me."

She squished it between her fingers and then picked up his wrist, using the slurry to coat his wrist and hand where she'd cut him with her own arrows.

Andrew gagged and grumbled, "S'that pesto?"

She smeared it over his collarbone. He hissed through his teeth. When she touched the wound in his side, he let out a ragged cry that ended in a whimper. He covered his eyes as Micah reached back and held onto his shoulder.

"Yeah. The Queen meant to do damage here." Chamomile's fingers spent longer working the herbs into his side while Andrew saw white stars behind his eyelids and felt himself teetering toward unconsciousness.

Chamomile massaged each injury and her lips moved silently, eyes bright with concentration, brow furrowed. The sharp pain of the wounds dulled like they'd been numbed with a shot. Then the pain was nothing but a memory. Andrew's tight muscles relaxed; his head lolled back, and he realized with a start that he was draped over Ingrid's thigh. She blinked down at him, expressionless, but when their eyes met as his vision cleared, the severe curve of her lips relaxed.

Andrew let out a ragged breath and carefully lifted his neck, but it didn't force an ooze of blood out of his collarbone. He gazed woozily at Chamomile. "This is more contact than I've ever had with women."

Micah snorted, leaned over the console, and kissed Andrew's damp cheek.

"Now," said Chamomile sternly, "this doesn't mean you're not injured. It simply helps your body know how to heal. Don't do anything stupid for a week. Goblin's orders."

"That was amazing," Andrew told her.

"Yeah," Micah agreed, chin in his palm, "she's good."

Chamomile made a face at them both and then climbed out of the backseat. She lifted Andrew's knees onto the cushion and then slammed the door. "Get out of the driver's seat, Micah. I'm about to do some drag racing." She held up the keys to the Saturn.

Andrew blinked. "Those were in my pocket."

Chamomile shrugged. "I was in the area."

Micah made a choking sound. Despite himself, Andrew blushed.

"You're insatiable," sighed Ingrid. "I don't know if you should drive."

"It's fine," groaned Chamomile. "One time I drove someone's Maserati. That I did crash. It was awesome."

Andrew began to struggle upright. Ingrid pushed against his shoulder blades and helped him settle in the middle seat, as Micah climbed over the center console and gingerly settled with his hip against Andrew's, arm against arm. Ingrid and Micah effectively kept Andrew upright, as he grimaced and adjusted his feet to fit the cramped space better.

Fadil and Arwen were crouched behind his head next to the windshield. Arwen leaned over the headrest and sniffed Andrew's stringy hair, the Queen's blood across his cheek, and then his ear, where she planted a sandpaper kiss. Andrew reached back to stroke her cheeks, but she stretched past him to sniff at the salve on his wrist.

"Chami," began Ingrid as she leaned into the car window and hugged her arms over her chest, "how did you protect the car for that long when the Queen sent the hounds after you?"

As she turned over the engine, Chamomile grinned wickedly. "She didn't think I had the cats, who ambushed her hounds halfway back to the Saturn. From how it sounded, the cats very much did a number on them, cursed canines. They bought me the distance to make it back and set up a ward before the hounds reached me. The rest was obvious." She fumbled around the side of the car seat until she successfully scooted it as far forward as she could. Then she stuck her left leg under her so she could see over the dash.

Andrew said, "This's a promising start."

"Don't make me kill you," said Chamomile. The car lurched to a start, and everyone in the backseat jumped.

"The cats were the secret weapon," said Micah in awe. "And you brought them with us out of sheer stubbornness." Fadil padded over Ingrid and Andrew and curled up on Micah's lap. Arwen followed close behind and melted into the slim space between Andrew and Micah.

Chamomile shrugged a small gold-green shoulder. "Stubbornness, or foresight? We'll never know."

"The will of cats and wild girls," mumbled Andrew, and then he dropped off to sleep.

Andrew could never sleep through nausea. He blinked his eyes open and swallowed the extra saliva that had pooled on his tongue, groaning softly. He gingerly straightened in the center seat, legs splayed awkwardly between Micah and Ingrid – who was also as leggy and cramped as him. The herbal paste dried against Andrew's skin thick and stiff, which in addition to his cramped muscles made him basically immobile.

Micah had fallen asleep with his cheek against the window, legs tucked up against the seat in front of him, arms crossed over his muddy green shirt. His circlet was askew on his brow, so the bobcat hung over his eyes like a toothy hood.

Beyond them, in the dim predawn light, flat fields sloped away from the car until they faded into the gray-blue of the sky. Short puffs of trees dotted the horizon. Occasionally, they zoomed past a farmstead, with barbed wire fences around grazing cattle.

He looked through the front windshield, puzzled, but the view remained the same. The prairie had never looked so…startling. "Where are we?"

Andrew tried to estimate when they'd left the Redwoods and the time it would take to drive clear through Montana and Idaho and back to North Dakota. The effort made his forehead pound.

"No idea," said Chamomile.

"This…is…slightly concerning. I mean—" He looked in the front seat where Julian still snored softly. "How long is Mr. Stillwater going to be asleep? What happens when he wakes up, and we're lost?"

Chamomile scoffed, "Stop being a paranoid baby. We'll be home within two hours."

"How? You can't tell me Micah and I were sleeping for...twelve hours or something."

Chamomile ignored him.

"She folded some shadows a bit," supplied Ingrid, curled up against the window next to Andrew. She was wearing Micah's purple shirt over the provocative dress they'd put her in at the Redwoods. When he noticed, she smoothed the hem down with a dismissive eyebrow raise. With her other hand, she was fidgeting with the vial of blood Micah had turned into a pendant. She must have taken it off his neck when he'd been unconscious.

Andrew felt a brief thrill of fear, but yet some certainty that the ground had shifted between him and his haunt.

She twirled it between her slender fingers and held it up so the light glinted on the fluid inside, turning it crimson. "I think this might have acted like a boon. Not to say you don't have any fighting skills, but my mother could have slain you in two minutes."

"Mm." He leaned back and slitted his eyes at her.

"She's a thousand-year-old faerie queen fighting on her own turf." She raised her slender brows and made a face back at him. "You're a thirty-year-old mortal."

Andrew huffed out a breath through his nostrils. He wanted to tell her he was actually thirty-two, but he was afraid that would prove her point. Ingrid held out the vial, and Andrew took it back and looped it onto the cord around his neck.

"I think Micah's blood protected you." She peered past him and her expression softened as she looked where Micah slumbered by the window. "Even more so because of his affection for you."

Micah woke with an inelegant snort. "What'd I do?"

Nodding faintly, Andrew touched the wound under his collarbone. The scab was still soft. "Yeah. That sounds about right."

As Micah stretched and yawned, Andrew strung his arms around his waist and nuzzled into the nape of his neck.

When they arrived back in Saint Paul under a cloudless afternoon sky, Chamomile managed to park them mostly on the curb outside Micah's brownstone on Saint Claire. She got a bit close to the trunk of one of the linden trees with the front bumper, a wheel riding the curb, but otherwise everyone was intact. She was the first around the front of the car to help Julian to his feet, who blinked blearily and slurred his words, leaning heavily on the small goblin and patting her head. Tossing his house keys at Chamomile, Micah gingerly helped Andrew out of the car.

Ingrid leapt out of the backseat with obvious delight. She stretched out like a long white sunbeam, smiling heavenward. She slid out of Micah's purple shirt and set it on the boot of the car. Without it, in the setting of a busy modern street with the smell of restaurants and garbage once again in the air, she looked like a celebrity preparing for a red-carpet event.

She smoothed the dress, fixed her hair, and then nodded to Andrew and clapped her hands on Micah's shoulders. "Perilous circumstances aside," she began, "I greatly appreciated this journey with you." She looked over and met Andrew's eyes. "And you as well. Truly."

Andrew held out his hand toward her. She frowned at it for a moment, and then set her fingers in his. He swept her hand up and kissed her knuckles. "Lady of the Bluffs."

Ingrid grinned in a meek, almost girlish way. Her cheeks even turned a bit rosy. It was so far from the expression she'd used to haunt him that it was hard to believe she was the same. She tugged on her curls and said cautiously to Micah, "I have a hope that…things will be different now. That maybe you might come to enjoy being in Lilydale with me."

Micah's breath hitched. He looked past the corner of his brownstone where the trees opposite the river marked the beginning of the bluffs. Slowly, he started to smile, and he nodded. "How about I come up and visit tomorrow night?"

"Yes. I'll prepare you a feast. Of ordinary food. Nothing Fae-spelled. Do you still like those chicken wings with the sauce?"

Brow furrowing, Micah looked confused. Self-consciously, he pushed the circlet up on his forehead. "Uh, a feast? Why?"

Ingrid shook her head fondly and tapped the bobcat skull on his brow. "You vanquished the Redwood Queen, Nightshade Boy."

"Oh." Micah looked vaguely away.

Ingrid went on, "We will sing songs of it and weave tapestries. Of you and your brave knight."

Micah released a noisy breath and blinked a few times. "Right."

Andrew slung his arms around Micah's shoulders and kissed his cheekbone. "I'm honored to serve you as your awkward, not super talented knight."

"Stop," Micah flapped his hands at Andrew until he laughed and withdrew. "I—I think you're greatly exagger—"

"No," interrupted Ingrid. "I'm not exaggerating." She stared down at her young half-brother, her face still fine with faerie cosmetics, her hair turned frizzy as it dried. "Do not sell yourself short of this, Micah."

"O—okay," he murmured.

"I am eager to get back to the bluffs," said Ingrid. She nodded to Andrew, and then smiled tenderly at Micah and nudged his chin with her knuckle. "See you soon."

In flannel pants and bare-chested, Micah sat on the edge of Julian's bed as his dad finished a microwave dinner. Cinnamon, Arwen, and Fadil all sat and stared at him as he took a bite with shaking fingers. Julian's face was haggard, the lines deeper than before, with purple bags under his downcast eyes.

"Just remember to take it easy," Micah told him. "I'm ordering you on bedrest for a week, okay? The cats will tattle on you."

Julian gave a grumbling sigh. After he swallowed, he asked, "Was I in the hospital?" He rubbed his temple. "It's all so fuzzy."

Micah hesitated, his blood pounding in his ears. Then he said after a moment, "It was a bad spell, Dad." He reached out and squeezed his forearm. "But I think things are going to be better now." Then he took the empty meal tray and his fork and started to get up.

Julian looked up and scrutinized Micah with his sharp amber eyes. His gaze always made Micah squirm, like Julian could see through his attempts to protect him. Then Julian smiled faintly and nodded. "I believe you."

Shutting off the bedroom lights, Micah left and padded down the stairs. It was dusk, and everything in the living room was tinged purple. Andrew stood by the coffee table, freshly showered with his hair unbound and still damp. He unloaded white Chinese takeout boxes from noisy plastic bags. He'd changed into a plain black tee and a pair of maroon sweats with the golden logo for the U of M near the thigh.

When Micah came down the final stairs, Andrew looked up. His foxlike face lit up with sunshine as if Micah parted the clouds in his eyes. "Come, feast with me." Andrew's eyes sparkled in the faint light as he tugged Micah onto the cushion next to him. He held out disposable chopsticks in a red paper sleeve.

As he took them, Micah switched on a table lamp next to them that looked like an old Edison bulb. The light glinted off Andrew's hair like flecks of gold. Micah swallowed and asked cautiously, "Will you come with me tomorrow? To Lilydale."

Andrew paused, his chopsticks floating in front of his mouth with a tangle of noodles on the end. He lowered it and glanced over. "Yeah. Of course. If you want."

"As my date," Micah told him hurriedly, touching his arm. "To a banquet. Not as a knight."

"Yeah." Andrew shot him a tremulous smile. "It'll be weird."

"You're telling me." Micah helped himself to some beef and broccoli, using one of the ceramic bowls Andrew had grabbed from the kitchen. When he had a bowlful and had taken a few bites, he noticed Andrew had gauze around his hand and a big square bandage taped over his collarbone. "Who wrapped you up? Sam?"

"Ah, yes." Andrew rubbed his wrist as he took a swig of soda. "He insisted. I think it was helping him cope."

With a sigh, Micah said, "I wish I could have brought you home without a scratch."

"He'll be all right. I told him he can move into my extra bedroom. Keep a better eye on me. I think he forgave me then."

"Oh. Neat. He can hang out over here too whenever he wants. My dad would love the company."

Andrew's lips twitched faintly. He picked at grains of fried rice with his chopsticks, blinking a few times.

"What's wrong?"

Twirling his chopsticks between his fingertips, Andrew said quietly, "Nothing. That would make me really happy."

Suddenly confused, suddenly paranoid, Micah blurted, "But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself."

Andrew's head snapped up. A crease appeared between his brows.

Micah stammered, "I…I just—I don't want to assume. We've skipped like…a lot of relationship steps. Not that I know anything about typical relationships. You're my first human partner. So I'm in the—I'm—I'm rambling. Anyway, yeah, we've had an unusual go of things with all the, um…Folksy stuff."

"What?" Andrew blinked and gave him a sideways smile. "I mean, yeah. For sure. And that makes you…less sure about things?"

"No, no!" Micah waved his hands and then slapped his forehead. "Oh, god, that's not it at all. Words. I struggle. Andrew, I—" He grasped his knee. "I would do literally anything to make you happy. Like, I turned my mom into a tree. Cuz I was like, oh. That bitch is gonna kill my boyfriend and that won't do."

Andrew's smile broadened into a grin. "So you…you really killed your mum for me."

"My mom, yes."

Andrew rolled his eyes toward the ceiling.

"I mean…yes, and she—just took and took and took. My dad, and me, and Ingrid, and she was ready to take Chami. She corrupted everything like a moldy fucking piece of bread."

"Ah. Gross."

"But the craziest part is that now that we're home, and we're alive, and you're sitting in my living room and you bought us Chinese food and…" Micah set aside his bowl, turned to him on the couch, and continued emphatically, "I want to do all of it with you. I want to buy you increasingly expensive gifts the longer we're together."

"I've always wanted a big crock pot," remarked Andrew.

The two of them burst into giggles that stole their breath for some time.

Then finally Micah wiped his eyes and he continued more seriously, "I want us to go to dinner and see movies we don't want to see. I want to wake up with you in my bed until we get sick of each other, and then miss you as soon as you're gone, and, and…" Micah trailed off, staring at the rug under the coffee table. "You've let me live the future I was always too scared to imagine. Like if I daydreamed about this, it would snuff out the tiny little flame of hope I had that it could ever really happen." He looked up, tentative. "And that's why I'm afraid I'm getting ahead of myself."

Andrew sat back in the corner of the couch, a silly smile on his face and tears dotting the corners of his eyes. He sniffed and started to laugh again.

Micah stiffened. "Hey, there's no need—"

Cutting him off, Andrew used his spindly limbs to capture Micah and pull him against his chest, arms wrapped tightly around his neck. Flooded with relief and joy, Micah let himself be effectively strangled for a moment before he got his knees under him so he could pivot to kiss him.

Andrew didn't feel the pull of his wounds as they kissed. He just felt the way the vibration of this half-human matched the frequency of his own. The flames of their hope, and their fear, and their faith in one another, burned perfectly in time. Everything else but their kindling affections disappeared, as they clung to each other on their way out of a nightmare and into a dream.