Page 87 of The Unseelie War
A thought occurred to her as she looked up at the house, and she let out a laugh that slowly devolved into a sad, wistful sigh. “Shit...” She was going to start crying.
“What is wrong, Ava?” Serrik frowned at her.
“I never got to finish my degree. I wanted to be an architect.” She gestured at the house, blinking away the tears that were threatening to form. “My mom, I…I always wanted her to see something I got to make, and she never did, before she died, and…I finally got to make a house, and…” Shit. There were the waterworks. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”
He pulled her into his arms in an gentle embrace. “When I entered your memories, I saw plain how much she loved you. How proud she was of you. And I know, if she could see you now, how proud she would still be.”
Shutting her eyes, she rested her head on his chest, letting out a long breath. “Thanks.”
“Even if you did make it far too large for just the two of us.”
She chuckled. “Who said it’s just for us?”
“I…excuse me?”
The horror in his voice made her burst out laughing. “That’s not what I meant! I mean. Maybe. But I don’t know.” She kept laughing. “Holy shit, man.” Taking a step back, she took his hand in hers and led him up toward the door. “I meant—oh, never mind. Just come and see.”
The befuddled fear on his features was making her laugh every time she glanced at him. He had clearly assumed she meantotherkinds of residents. But when she opened the front door, it was a different kind of scream of excitement that greeted them.
“You’re both okay!”
Bitty launched herself out of the front door, smashing into Ava, hugging her.
Ava laughed, hugging the little creature as tight as she could. “We’re all right.”
Standing in the foyer was everyone else. Ibin, Nos, & Lysander.
It was terribly hard to kill a dream, after all.
Stepping inside, she smiled back at Serrik, who was still standing on the front porch, confused and now staring at her and the others as if he wasn’t quite sure he belonged with them.
She held out her hand. “C’mon, spider. We have a long eternity ahead of us. And if you think the fae have stopped fucking with humanity just because Mom and Dad are on a long summer vacation…?”
His lips twitched. “Someone will need to ensure they are kept in line.”
“Exactly.” She grinned. “And I need your help.”
He took her hand, stepping into the home.
She looked around at all of them—her impossible family of dreams and nightmares and ancient creatures who had learned to love. “Welcome to our new beginning.”
Outside, the ordinary world continued its ordinary business, blissfully unaware that reality itself was being watched over by a college dropout and her seven-legged boyfriend.
In the Web, two forces of nature could finally simplybetogether, perhaps.
In Tir n'Aill, chaos reigned under the benevolent tyranny of Robin Goodfellow, while a snake and his wife rebuilt their lives in a world forever changed.
And in a Victorian mansion that existed in the spaces between what was and what could be, Ava Cole—former art student, current Weaver of reality—closed the door on one story and opened another.
After all, every ending was just another beginning in disguise.
Puck satdown on what was once the throne of Tir n’Aill.
Not the gaudy silver and gold nonsense that everyone had used for so long.
No, this one was far older.
This one was the original.
