The Wood Queen Read online

  “Anyway,” her aunt continued, “you missed the doctor.”

  Crap. “What did she say?”

  “They need to do more tests.” Paige gave her a rare, wry smile. “Isn’t that what doctors always say?”

  Donna almost smiled in return, but just managed to stop herself in time. “So Mom’s unconscious? Sleeping?”

  “I’m afraid they suspect she could have sunk into some kind of coma.”

  “What?! Why didn’t you tell me that in the first place? I have to speak to the doctor for myself.”

  Paige shook her head. “Donna, let them do their jobs and stop bothering them, for goodness sake. Rachel is stable—all her vitals are completely normal, that’s why they’re so mystified by all this. I wouldn’t be surprised if that Doctor Gupta was secretly hoping to get some kind of paper out of this …”

  Trust Aunt Paige to think of something like that. “I want to see Mom again.”

  Her aunt stopped, coat half on, impatience darkening her face. “We need to get back to the estate so that the hearing can resume. Everybody is waiting for us. There’s nothing we can do for her at the moment; she’s in the best possible place, you know that.”

  Do I? Donna tried to keep her expression neutral. “Please, Aunt Paige. It was so awful to see her like that. I really want to see her before we go—when she’s not having a full-blown fit. Please?”

  Paige pressed her lips together but nodded, shrugging back out of her smart wool coat and sitting down again. “I’ll wait for you here.”

  “Thank you,” Donna breathed, practically running back to her mother’s room before Aunt Paige changed her mind.

  The room seemed larger this time, though that was probably due to the fact that there was no longer a whole group of people crammed in there trying to get Mom sedated. She couldn’t help feeling curious about the second bed, though. This was a private hospital wing, and the rooms were meant to be for one patient only.

  Nurse Valderrama walked briskly through the door, offering her a tentative smile as she followed Donna’s gaze. “That bed’s for family, in case they want to stay the night.”

  “Oh.” Donna ran her gloved hand over the pristine sheets. “I didn’t know you could do that.”

  The nurse turned to what looked like a heart monitor and wrote some unintelligible figures onto a chart that she tossed back into the wire tray at the foot of the bed. “It’s not normal hospital policy. But then, this isn’t a ‘normal’ part of the hospital.” She gave Donna an unreadable look, nodded, and left the room before she could get tagged with any more questions.

  Donna pulled the only chair up to the edge of Mom’s bed, laying her coat carefully over the back first. She felt nervous, as if Rachel might sit up and start babbling nonsense any minute. Like when she’d looked right at Aunt Paige in that accusing but terrified way. Had Mom even been seeing her sister-in-law? Her eyes had seemed very far away.

  Now, Rachel’s face was a smooth mask. Her skin was so white it was almost translucent, and it looked thin and stretched across her prominent cheekbones. There were tubes coming out from her body, under the covers, and leading to various machines and plastic bags.

  Donna thought her mother looked dead. An image flashed into her exhausted mind: Dad lying cold and still on the ground of Ironwood Forest after he’d saved her from the Skriker.

  The Wood Monster is dead, she reminded herself fiercely. I killed it.

  But that fleeting memory of her father … was it even real? She wasn’t sure—she could never be entirely certain of the things that had happened to her ten years ago. She honestly didn’t know what to believe anymore, especially when it came to her own memories. The only person she felt she could trust to tell her the complete truth was right here in front of her, in a coma state that was anything but normal. If Donna could be sure of anything, she could be sure of that.

  She shivered and pushed away the morbid thoughts. Mom was not going to die. She wouldn’t allow it. Now wasn’t the time to go chasing nightmares. Instead, she tried to focus on her mother’s face, searching for signs of life—any glimmer of hope. She remembered reading that coma patients sometimes responded to the voice of loved ones. Anything’s worth a try, right?

  Feeling vaguely self-conscious, she cleared her throat. “Mom, it’s me … Donna. I don’t know if you can hear me, but I just wanted you to know that I’m here and I won’t give up on you. I never have, and I promise you that I never will.”

  The tight knot of tension in her chest eased a little. Maybe this whole theory of talking to people in comas was more for the benefit of the family left behind; but either way, just telling her mother how she felt seemed to help. She didn’t want Mom to feel alone—that suddenly seemed very important.

  Rachel Underwood had spent the best part of a decade fighting. Something awful was tormenting her; something the hospital staff and the doctors at the Institute could have no hope of truly understanding. She was slipping further into madness, and there didn’t seem to be a damn thing anyone could do about it. Donna swallowed. Not yet, anyway.

  Even though Rachel Underwood wasn’t exactly “well” at the best of times, it had always been a manageable condition, an unspecified form of mental illness that nobody could really diagnose but treated as something like a combination of schizophrenia and early onset dementia. Very early onset. Her mother wasn’t yet forty, so the alchemists had quietly installed her at the Institute just a couple miles from Ironbridge General. Traditional doctors were stumped, and the Order didn’t want questions asked. Money had been donated to the Special Care Unit at the hospital, and her mother had been smoothly admitted to the permanent residential Institute with the minimum of red tape.

  Donna had a sudden thought and removed the glove from her left hand so she could reach the charm bracelet tucked down inside it, against her tattooed wrist. She’d been wearing it ever since Simon had found and returned it to her with a knowing smile. Mom had given it to her just a couple of weeks ago in a rare, half-lucid moment at the Institute, and Donna was sure that there was some significance to the delicate silver bracelet beyond its six magically warded charms. Maker had soldered the dagger charm back onto it for her and confirmed that there was protective magic on the bracelet—alchemical protection, which had faded since the wards were first placed on it many years ago.

  Donna quickly unclasped the bracelet and wrapped it around her mother’s thin wrist, then tucked her motionless arm back underneath the covers. She didn’t know what good it would do—if any—but just knowing it was there made her feel a little better.

  She pulled her glove back on and whispered, “I’ll stay with you for as long as you need me to, okay?”

  Not really expecting a reply—but sighing when there wasn’t one, anyway—she shuffled her chair closer to the edge of the bed, crossed her arms next to her mother’s still body, and rested her head for a moment. The scratchy velvet of her gloves was warm against her cheek. The gloves looked like splashes of blood against the white blanket.

  She stifled a yawn and wondered how long it would be before the nurse returned to find her fast asleep.

  Four

  Donna’s eyes had just begun to drift closed when the sound of angry voices reached her through the gray mist of emotional exhaustion. Xan. She immediately stood up and ran for the door. Her hand was already on the door handle before she stopped and caught her breath, listening to her aunt’s raised voice, suspicion radiating neon-bright from every word.

  “How did you know she was here? You need to leave now, young man.”

  Xan’s measured tones replied, but Donna knew his anger was bubbling, barely held in check out of reluctant respect for her aunt. Well, more like out of consideration for Donna, but either way he was doing a pretty good job of keeping his cool.

  “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t speak to me as though I was still a child, Ms. Underwood,” she heard him say in that haughty, cut-glass voice he could mimic. He was good at that, when he want
ed to put it on—his adoptive mother was British and currently living back home in England.

  “You’re a teenager,” Aunt Paige said.

  “I’m nineteen. I’m responsible for myself and have been for a long time. Please do me the courtesy of showing me the same respect I’m giving you.”

  Holy crap, score one for Xan! Donna thought, with a highly inappropriate level of glee.

  She thought about the owner of that voice for a moment, allowing herself to remember his warmth and the touch of his lips against hers. Admittedly, finding Xan had been pretty tough to handle at first, but only because in her worldview—the worldview she’d been raised with as a trainee alchemist—the half-human children of solitary fey were assumed to be easily hidden in society. She’d been taught that they had no real power or deep magic—certainly nothing that would mark them as different in a physical sense.

  The fact that Alexander Grayson had been born with fledgling wings—wings that were ripped from his back in a beyond-cruel gesture of hatred by the wood elves, who had captured him as a baby—made Donna realize that a lot of things weren’t quite as she’d been brought up to believe.

  The door opened, forcing her to take a couple of shuffling steps back, and a harried-looking Nurse Valderrama appeared. “Excuse me, Miss Underwood? There’s another visitor for your mother out here.” She spoke briskly, but she looked over her shoulder and then gave Donna a conspiratorial wink. “I thought you’d like to know, before your aunt succeeds in getting him thrown out.”

  The young nurse tucked a strand of shiny black hair behind her ear and left, ninja-style, on silent-soled shoes.

  Donna had no choice but to follow, heading down the corridor to the waiting room. Her pace increased, almost of its own accord, as Xan’s voice grew closer. Despite the crappy reason for them all being here in the first place, her stomach was still filled with a fluttering sensation of anticipation.

  Rounding the corner, her eyes fixed on the achingly familiar young man in the long black coat. He seemed even taller than she remembered, and his amber hair shone under the ugly bright lights—making it look for a bizarre moment as though there was a halo around his head.

  But his eyes were the same striking forest green that made her heart beat faster, and his unseasonably tanned face broke into a smile at the sight of her running toward him. Screw being cool; she was so happy to see him that she didn’t care if she was acting like an over-eager puppy.

  “Donna!” He swept her into a hug, lifting her off the ground and squeezing her tightly enough to make her ribs ache.

  Not that she minded. In that moment, reunited with the one person who seemed to understand everything about her and her crazy life, nothing else mattered at all. Not her furious aunt. Not the half-smiling nurses and orderlies in the corridor. And not even her mother lying pale and still, back in the room that felt too much like a mausoleum.

  She breathed in his familiar scent of tobacco and pears—along with the gum he’d obviously been chewing in a poor attempt at hiding the fact that he’d been smoking again. But even that couldn’t spoil her pleasure at being held by him once more.

  He set her down gently and held her at arms length to study her. “It’s so good to see you. I really fucking missed you, Donna.”

  The simple sincerity of his words made her heart soar, and her mind flashed back to their first date—when they’d been ambushed by a wood elf on Ironbridge Common who had taken on the form of a wiry homeless guy. Xan had been badly bitten, and that was the night they each recognized the other for what they truly were: soul mates. Not soul mates in an icky romantic sense, but in the sense of the powerful connection they felt due to shared history and painful knowledge. The terrible injuries they’d both suffered at the hands of the fey bound them closer and more quickly than mere physical attraction ever could.

  Although, by most general measures of such things, Xan was pretty hot. Donna tried to tell herself that this was simply a bonus.

  “Xan,” she breathed, glancing over his shoulder and wishing that Aunt Paige would just disappear. Like I’d ever get that lucky, she thought nastily.

  Her aunt stalked toward them, businesslike heels clicking on the floor. “I won’t ask you again, young—” She stopped and corrected herself. “Alexander. This is a private area. I don’t even know how you got in here.”

  As if on cue, Nurse Valderrama volunteered her neck for the noose. “That would be my fault, Ms. Underwood. I apologize. I thought he was a member of the family.”

  Aunt Paige raised perfectly plucked brows, two bright spots of color appearing on her pale cheeks. “And whatever gave you the idea that we are related to … him?”

  Donna felt anger burn inside her as she realized that her aunt had been about to say “that” instead of “him.” How dare she?

  She spoke quickly. “Aunt Paige, Xan is my friend and I asked him to be here.”

  Paige turned away from Nurse Valderrama—who looked relieved to have an opportunity to escape—and blasted Donna with almost palpable vibes of hot disapproval. “You had no right to invite yet another outsider into our lives.”

  Her aunt had met Xan only once before, when she, Xan, Navin, and Maker had returned from the Ironwood in his car. The expression “the shit hit the fan” had been invented for moments like that.

  Donna shuddered as she remembered the chaos, the raised voices and accusations, the dawn phone call to the Frost Estate to inform Quentin of Donna’s actions. But through all of it, Paige had barely looked at Xan, almost as though to do so might soil her in some way. Xan had extended his hand and introduced himself, but her aunt had actually taken a step back. Paige Underwood, the professional woman who worked a day job as the Mayor of Ironbridge’s Personal Assistant, was unable to keep up a polite mask when faced with a child of Faerie. Well, he was only half fey, but perhaps to her aunt it was all the same.

  Donna was learning more and more about the way things worked within the Order, and with each new discovery she became more certain than ever that she wanted out. Like, as soon as freaking possible.

  Trying not to think about the things she couldn’t change—at least, not quite yet—Donna curved her arm through Xan’s in a blatant show of defiance that made her feel a little better. Yeah, it was petty, but she couldn’t help herself. Xan, meanwhile, was still trying to keep his temper and treat Aunt Paige as though she wasn’t a bigoted relic from another world.

  “Ms. Underwood, I know this is a family matter, but when Donna called I didn’t have any choice.” He glanced down at her, warmth in his eyes, before returning his gaze to Paige’s rigid expression. “As you know, I went with her into the Ironwood.” He took a step forward, forcing Donna to step with him, and lowered his voice. “I faced down the queen and helped rescue Navin and Maker. You may not give a crap about the human boy, but Maker is one of your own.”

  Paige’s face was frozen somewhere between disgust and fury. “We thanked you for your aid, but it was not our request that took you into the Ironwood.”

  “Still, I went. And Maker is safe, in part because of me.” Xan narrowed his eyes until only slits of green fire showed. “You owe me. The Order owes me.”

  Donna was shocked at the conviction in Xan’s voice. She hadn’t expected this. Was Xan just playing Aunt Paige, trying to manipulate her sympathy, or did he truly want to use his role in the rescue mission as a bargaining chip? She turned to him, questions on the tip of her tongue, but his hand reached down for hers and gave it a gentle squeeze.

  She bit her lip and resolved to keep her mouth shut. For now. Her questions could wait—especially considering why she’d asked him to come in the first place—but perhaps she and Alexander Grayson needed to have a talk about why, exactly, he’d been so willing to charge into the Elflands with her to save two people he didn’t even know. Sure, she believed he genuinely had feelings for her (whatever the hell that even meant), but she also knew he’d taken one look at her iron tattoos—magically crafted by Maker—and
had immediately started wondering whether the talented alchemist could do anything to help him with the loss of his wings. She liked Xan; maybe she even liked him a lot. But she wasn’t an idiot.

  Xan turned and gazed at her, the intense green eyes that marked him as “other” unblinking. “So, take me to your mom.”

  Donna flicked a nervous glance at Aunt Paige, but what could she really do to them? In front of all the hospital staff? Her aunt’s position as assistant to a high-profile public figure might actually work in their favor here.

  “Come on, it’s this way,” she told Xan.

  Aunt Paige followed them. “If you do this, I will never forgive you.”

  Donna stopped, putting a gentle hand on Xan’s arm to signal that he wait a moment. She took a shaking breath and gathered herself, feeling something inside her loosen. It was the strangest sensation, almost as though a tight belt had been moved to a slightly more comfortable setting. She could breathe more easily than she’d been able to in weeks.

  “Aunt Paige, I appreciate everything you’ve done for me in my life—and I’m grateful that you brought me here to see Mom—but I asked Xan to help me for a reason, and I’m not going to let you stop me.”

  Then she turned away and walked on trembling legs toward her mother’s room, not even bothering to check whether Xan was following her.

  Donna closed the door on the corridor outside and leaned against it. They couldn’t risk someone coming in while Xan did what she’d asked him here for in the first place. Or at least, while he attempted to do it.

  As usual, he was trying to tell her how weak and unpracticed his damaged magical abilities were, but this time Donna was having none of it. She believed he must have his reasons for hiding things, even from her, and that would normally be good enough for her. But now wasn’t the time to tread gently around his trust issues; she needed him to figure out if her mother’s current state was elf-induced and, if so, what they could do to help her.