The Iron Traitor

All that flew out of my head, though, when I walked into the library and found Kenzie alone in one of the aisles. Her head was bent, an open book in her hands, and I was reminded of our very first meeting, where a certain stubborn journalist had refused to leave me alone despite my attempts to drive her away.

Sliding up behind her, I put my hands on her waist and whispered “Whatcha reading?” in her ear. She jumped.

“Ethan! Geez, stop doing that!” She glared back at me. “I swear, I’m gonna tie a bell around your neck.” I chuckled, resting my chin on her shoulder, and wrapped my arms around her as she held up the book. Guide to New Orleans, the title read. I raised an eyebrow.

“You seem awfully confident that we’re going,” I said, resisting the urge to kiss her neck as her fingers slipped into my hair. “I haven’t even talked to my parents yet.”

“I have. My dad, anyway. That’s...what I wanted to talk to you about.”

She sounded hesitant, and her body tensed against mine. My nerves prickled, but I kept my voice calm. “What did he say? Did he forbid you to go?”

“Worse.” She lowered her arm and slid gently from my grasp, turning to face me in the narrow aisle. Her face crinkled with disgust as she said, “He’s coming with me.”

“You’re kidding.”

The disgusted look stayed firmly in place as she continued, “I told him I wanted to visit several places before I graduate,” she said. “That New York was just the first, and I had a long bucket list of cities and places I wanted to see before I...well, you know.”

A lump of ice settled in my stomach, and I nodded. “Go on,” I rasped.

She sighed. “I thought that he would do what he always does—warn me not to get arrested and to call if there’s an emergency. Surprise, surprise.” She threw up her hands in annoyance. “He was completely into it and thought that it would be a great idea to see New Orleans together, as a family. A ‘fun weekend trip.’ So now my stepmom and Alex are coming, too.”

“Your whole family?” I repeated in disbelief. Kenzie winced.

“Obnoxiously, yes. My disappearing act must’ve really shocked them. And now Dad won’t leave me alone. He thinks this will be a great way to ‘connect’ again.” She shook her head, her expression going dark. “I know what he’s trying to do, and it’s too late. He doesn’t get to be a dad after he’s forgotten I exist for so long.”

“That’s going to make things difficult,” I muttered. “Does your dad even know I’m coming?”

“Noooooo,” Kenzie said quickly. “He does not, and it’s probably better that way. I’d told him I wanted to go to New Orleans with a group of friends, but I think he may have suspected who my ‘friends’ were. Probably another reason he wants to come along—to make sure we don’t run off together and join a gang or something.” She shrugged. “Don’t worry. I’ll meet up with you when we get there. We just can’t let him see us.”

“And if we have to sneak out in the middle of the night to look for faeries in goblin markets?”

“Then we’ll have to do it quietly.”

I groaned, dragging both hands over my face. “Your dad is going to throw me in prison and lose the key.”

Kenzie’s arms slid around my neck as she leaned in, smiling up at me. “Well, if that happens, I’ll just bust you out with my mad ninja skills and we can vanish into the Nevernever.”

I was torn between telling her how unlikely that would be and kissing her, but at that moment the librarian strolled by with a cartful of books and we broke apart. “So, have you thought of what you’re going to say to your parents?” Kenzie asked, serious again. I shook my head.

“Not a clue. I’m still thinking about it.”

“Want me to come over after school to brainstorm?”

I would love nothing more than to have Kenzie in my room again, but... “I can’t tonight,” I told her. “I have kali.”

Kali was the Filipino martial art I’d been taking for over five years. It taught you how to defend yourself with swords, sticks and knives, as well as empty hands, which was the main reason I was drawn to it; I wanted to learn to use weapons when protecting myself from the fey. My Guro—my instructor—believed in the spirit world and hadn’t questioned my sanity when I’d told him invisible things were after me. He’d even helped us when we were looking for Todd, when I had nowhere else to go. The double, razor-edged swords he’d gifted me when I went to see him sat in an honorary spot in my room, and I knew Kenzie still wore his protection amulet beneath her shirt.

I hadn’t see Guro since I got back home, and I wanted to talk to him, to thank him for his help and to fill him in on everything that had happened. I owed him that.

I thought Kenzie might protest, insist that we come up with a plan together, but she only nodded. “Say hi to Guro for me” was all she said.

* * *

I was nervous when I walked onto the mats, wondering what Guro would say when he saw me. The room was full of people; the kempo and jujitsu classes that shared the dojo with us were just wrapping up, students in white gis and colored belts shuffling off the floor, laughing and talking with each other. Our class was smaller, just a handful of people in normal workout clothes, a rattan stick in each hand. They had already staked out the far corner of the mats, and I hurried over to join.

Guro spotted me the second I walked into the room. He looked the same as he always did, a small, sinewy man with close-cropped black hair and dark, piercing eyes. He didn’t say anything as I approached, just nodded for me to take my place in line. A few of the other students stared at me; either they’d heard the rumors or they’d seen my face on the news, as one of the teens involved in a suspected kidnapping. But Guro started the class as per normal, and soon I was too busy blocking bamboo sticks to the head and dodging rubber knives to think of anything else.

After class, however, he gestured for me to follow, and I trailed him down the hall into the office. Suddenly nervous and tongue-tied, I waited as he closed the door and motioned toward a couple chairs in the corner.

We both sat. I stared at my hands, feeling Guro’s eyes appraising me. He didn’t speak right away, and I wondered what he was thinking, what he thought of me now.

“How are your parents?” Guro asked at last.

“Fine,” I replied, knowing exactly what he meant. “A little freaked-out, but okay otherwise. They took it a lot better than I thought they would.”

“Good.” Guro nodded, still watching me intently. I waited, knowing this wasn’t over yet. Leaning forward, Guro folded his hands and fixed me with a piercing stare. “Now,” he continued, in a voice that made my heart start to pound, “you don’t have to tell me everything, Ethan, but tell me as much as you can. What happened after you and your friends left my home that morning? Did you find what you were looking for?”

I took a deep breath.

And ended up telling him everything.

I didn’t intend to, but as I spoke, words just kept pouring out, and at one point I was horrified to feel my eyes stinging. I told him about Meghan, the Nevernever and how I’d been taken by the fey when I was four. I told him about Kenzie, Todd, Annwyl and the Forgotten; who they were, what had happened to them. I confessed my hatred of the fey, my anger at Meghan for abandoning us, my mom’s worry and fear that I might vanish into the Nevernever, too. And I told him about Keirran, his relation to me and what I was planning to do that weekend.

When the words finally stopped, I felt exhausted, drained. But also strangely liberated, as if some huge weight had been taken from me. I’d never told anyone my whole story before, not even Kenzie. It was a relief to finally get it out. To tell someone who understood, who believed.

Through the whole thing, Guro hadn’t said much, just quiet encouragements for me to go on when I faltered. He still wore his same calm, serious expression, as if he hadn’t just spent an hour listening to a teenager ramble about invisible creatures that only he could see, that he’d been to a magical place called the Nevernever, that he was related to a faery queen.

“I know it sounds crazy,” I finished, now wondering what had possessed me to spill my guts. “I know I sound like a raving lunatic, but I swear everything I’ve told you is real. I wish there was a way I could make people see Them without gaining the Sight, but once They know you can see, They’ll just torment you forever. So, I guess it’s better that way.”

“I can see Them,” Guro said very softly.

I jerked up, staring at him, my jaw hanging a little slack. He gave me a tight smile. “Not like you,” he went on in a calm voice. “I’ve never seen Them clearly. It’s more a brief glimpse of something in the mirror, a reflection or a shadow on the ground that doesn’t match anything visible. But I know They’re there. My grandfather had this talent, also,” he continued as I still gaped at him. “But he was very in tune with the spirit world and things that no one else could see. Our family has always been sensitive to magic and the creatures no one else believes in. So I understand how difficult it is.”

I swallowed hard to clear my throat. “I wish everyone did.”

Guro didn’t say anything to that. “Have you told your parents?” he asked instead. “About what you plan to do this weekend?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I haven’t come up with a good enough excuse, and anything I say is going to freak them out, especially Mom. But I have to go.” I crossed my arms, frowning. “I just don’t know what I’m going to tell them.”

“Sometimes, the simplest answers are the hardest to see.”

I gave him a puzzled look, before I got it. “You want me to tell them the truth,” I said. Just the thought made my stomach tighten.

“That’s your call, Ethan.” Guro rose, and I stood, too, ready to follow him out. “But let me ask you this. Do you think this is the last time you’ll have to deal with Them?”

I slumped. “No,” I muttered. “I’ll never shake Them. They’ll never leave me alone. There will always be something I’m dragged into, especially now.”

Guro nodded slowly. “Be careful in New Orleans,” he said, opening the office door. “Do you still have the protection amulet I gave you?”