He looked embarrassed. "I'm sorry, Merry, I was just so worried, and so glad to see you safe."
I gazed up into his eyes and found them just the same lovely green color. He didn't give as many clues as the rest of us did when his magic was upon him, but that kiss said better than any glowing eyes or shining skin that his magic was very close to the surface. If we'd been inside faerie there might have been flowers growing at his feet, but the asphalt driveway was untouched underneath us. Man-made technology was proof against so much of our magic.
There was a man's voice from inside. "Galen, something's boiling over. I don't know how to stop it!"
Galen turned grinning toward the house with me still in his arms. "Let's go rescue the kitchen before Amatheon and Adair set it on fire."
"You left them in charge of dinner?" I asked.
He nodded happily as he began to walk toward the still-open door. He carried me effortlessly, as if he could have walked with me in his arms forever and never tired. Maybe he could have.
Doyle and Frost fell into step on one side, and Rhys on the other. Doyle asked, "How did you get them to agree to help cook?"
Galen flashed that hail-fellow-well-met smile of his that made everyone want to smile back. Even Doyle was not immune to the charm, because he flashed white teeth in his dark face, responding to the sheer goodwill of Galen.
"I asked," he said.
"And they just agreed?" Frost asked.
He nodded.
"You should have seen Ivi peeling potatoes," Rhys said. "That was something the queen had to threaten torture to get him to do."
All of us but Galen glanced at him. "Are you saying that Galen simply asked them and they agreed?" Doyle said.
"Yes," Rhys said.
We all exchanged a look. I wondered if they were all thinking what I was thinking, that at least some of our magic was doing just fine outside faerie. In fact, Galen's seemed to be growing stronger. That was almost as interesting and surprising as anything that had happened today, because just as it was "impossible" for the fey to be killed in the manner that they seemed to have been killed, so sidhe magic growing stronger outside faerie was just as impossible. Two impossible things in one day, I would have said it was like being Alice in Wonderland, but her Wonderland was fairyland, and none of the impossibilities survived Alice's trip back to the "real" world. Our impossibilities were on the wrong end of the rabbit hole. Curiouser and curiouser, I thought, quoting the little girl who got to go to fairytale land twice, and come home in one piece. That's one of the biggest reasons that no one ever thought Alice's adventures were real. Fairyland doesn't give second chances. But maybe the outside world was a little more forgiving. Maybe you have to be somewhere that isn't full of too many immortal things to have the hope of second chances. But since Galen and I were the only two of the exiled sidhe who had never been worshipped in the human world, maybe it wasn't second chances, but a first chance. The question was, a chance to do what? because if he could convince fellow sidhe to do his bidding, humans wouldn't stand a chance.
Chapter Fifteen
The only light in the huge great room of the beach house was the glow of the roomy kitchen to one side, like a glowing cave in the growing dimness. Amatheon and Adair were in that glow panicking. They were both a little over six feet tall with broad shoulders, their bare arms in the modern T-shirts muscular from centuries of weapon practice. Adair's honey-brown hair was knotted and braided into a complicated club between his shoulder blades; unleashed, it hit his ankles. Amatheon's hair was a deep copper red, and curled enough so that the ponytail of knee-length hair was a foam of burnished red as he leaned down toward the chiming oven. They had kilts on instead of pants, but you just didn't see six feet-plus of immortal warrior panicking about anything often, but panicking in a kitchen with pots in their hands and the oven open while they peered inside in a puzzled manner was a very special and endearing type of panic.
Galen put me down gently but quickly, striding toward the kitchen to save the meal from their well-meaning but ineffectual ministrations. They weren't actually wringing their hands, but their body language said clearly that they'd run away if they could convince themselves it wouldn't be cowardly.
Galen entered the fray totally calm and in control. He liked to cook, and he'd taken well to modern conveniences, but then he'd visited the outside world often all his life. The other two men had only been outside faerie for a month. Galen took the pot out of Adair's hands and put it back on the stove on low heat. He got a towel, leaned in past Amatheon's waterfall of hair, and began taking pies out of the oven. In moments everything was under control.
Amatheon and Adair stood just outside the glow of the kitchen, looking crestfallen and relieved. "Please, never leave us in charge of a meal again," Adair said.
"I can cook over an open fire if I have to," Amatheon said, "but these modern contrivances are too different."
"Can either of you grill steaks?" Galen asked.
They looked at each other. "Do you mean over an open fire?" Amatheon asked.
"Yes, with a wire rack so the meat sits above the flames, but it's real fire and it's outside."
They both nodded. "We can do that." They sounded relieved. Adair added, "But Amatheon is the better cook of the two of us."
Galen got a platter out of the refrigerator, took plastic wrap off it, and handed it to Amatheon. "The steaks have been marinating. All you have to do is ask everyone how they like their steaks cooked."
"How they like them cooked?" he asked.