“Evan is just doing his job.”

“And enjoying it, I’m sure.” Keenan was not very good at rejection of any sort; Aislinn had figured that out back when she was still mortal.

She switched the topic. “It seems odd that she’d be upset over Niall now or over us asking about Bananach.”

“Exactly. Once Niall calms down, his holding the Dark Court can be an asset to both of our courts. She’s—”

“No. I mean, she seemed calm enough when we left the other day. Not happy but not truly angry.” Aislinn hugged a pillow to her like a big stuffed toy. Talk of the intricacies of faery relationships and courts and of grudges between faeries with centuries of history made her feel so very young. Many of the faeries might look—and often act—like her classmates at school, but the whole longevity thing made life far more complicated. Brief relationships spanned decades; long friendships stretched over centuries; betrayals of yesterday and decades and centuries past all cut deeply. It was a challenge to navigate.

“Am I missing something?” she asked.

Keenan watched her with a pensive expression. “You know, Niall was like that. He helped me focus, went straight to the point….” His words drifted away as tiny clouds shifted in his eyes, a promise of rain as yet unfulfilled.

“You miss him.”

“I do. I’m sure he’s a great king…. I just wish it wasn’t of such a vile court. I handled things poorly,” he said.

“We both messed up there. I ignored things that I should’ve reacted to, and you—” Aislinn stopped herself. Rehashing Keenan’s deceits and the consequences for Leslie and for Niall yet again wasn’t going to help. “We both made mistakes.”

Leslie’s being caught in the heart of the Dark Court was Aislinn’s fault too. She’d failed one of her closest friends—and she’d failed Niall. Aislinn shared the weight of the responsibility for the actions of the Summer Court. It was why she was trying to work on a closer relationship with Keenan: they had joint responsibility, and if she was going to bear the guilt for his less palatable actions she needed to know what they were in advance.

And stop them if they’re awful.

“And they made bad choices. We aren’t the ones responsible for that.” Keenan couldn’t have said it if it was a lie, but it was an opinion. Opinions were shaky territory with the faeries-don’t-lie rule.

“We aren’t absolved either. You kept things from me…and they paid the consequences.” She had not entirely forgiven him for his using Leslie or Niall, but unlike Donia, Aislinn had no choice but to get along with the Summer King. Unless one of them died, they were bound together for eternity or until they no longer held the Summer Court—and faery rulers tended to hold their courts for centuries. That was pretty close to an eternity.

Eternity with Keenan. The thought terrified her still. He wasn’t particularly inclined toward an equal ruling status, and she wasn’t experienced at dealing with faeries. Prior to her transformation into a faery monarch, her primary method of “dealing” was avoidance. Now, she had to rule them. He had nine centuries ruling without his full power. It was hard to say that she should have an equal voice, but the alternative—responsibility for the consequences but not involvement in the decisions—wasn’t a solution.

And since she’d become their queen, the summer faeries had become important to her. Their welfare mattered; their happiness and safety were essential. It was as instinctual as the need to help Summer grow to strength, but that didn’t mean everyone else should be sacrificed for the progress of Summer. Keenan didn’t get that.

She shook her head. “We’re not going to agree on this, Keenan.”

“Maybe”—Keenan looked at her with such open affection that she could feel the sunbeams under her skin responding—“but at least you aren’t refusing to speak to me.”

Aislinn moved farther back into the corner of the sofa, her message implicit in the movement. “I don’t have a choice in the matter. Donia does.”

“You have a choice. You are just…”

“What?”

“More reasonable.” He didn’t hide the smile that came as soon as he said it.

The tension that had been growing inside of her dissipated at his easy smile. She laughed. “I’ve never been as unreasonable as I’ve been the past few months. The way I’ve changed…My teachers have commented. My friends, Grams, even Seth…My mood swings are awful.”

“Compared to me, you’re quite unflappable.” His eyes were sparkling: he knew how volatile she’d become. He’d been the target of her temper more than anyone else.

“I’m not sure it counts as being reasonable if you’re the measuring stick.” She relaxed again. During all the weirdness over the past few months, he’d found ways to make her lighten up. It was a big part of what had made it bearable to be the Summer Queen. His friendship and Seth’s love were her mainstays.

Keenan’s smile was still there, but the plea in his eyes was serious as he asked, “Maybe you could talk to Don? Maybe explain to her that I miss her. Maybe you could tell her that I am sad when I can’t see her. Tell her that I need her.”

“Shouldn’t you tell her?”

“How? She won’t even let me in the door.” He frowned. “I need her in my life. Without her…and without you being—I’m not good at things. I try, but I need her to believe in me. To not have either of—”

“Don’t.” Aislinn didn’t want him to follow that thought any further. The peace between the courts was new and tenuous. It was better if Donia and Keenan were at peace with each other, but talking to Donia alone made her anxious. They’d become friends of a sort, not as close as Aislinn had initially hoped, but close enough that they’d spent afternoons together at first. That had ended when spring began. When things with Keenan changed. They could avoid talking about it, but it took constant effort for her and Keenan not to touch each other.

“I can try, but if she’s upset with you, she might not be willing to talk to me either. Lately, she’s bailed every time I’ve tried to make plans with her,” Aislinn admitted.

Keenan poured them both glasses of water while he talked. “It’s because Summer is growing stronger, and Winter is weakening. Beira got surly every spring—and that was when I was still weak.”

Keenan held out a glass to her—and she froze.

It’s just water. And even if it were summer wine, it wouldn’t affect her like it had the first time. She pushed away the thoughts.

“Ash?”

She started, caught off guard by his uncommon usage of her shortened name. She pulled her attention from the glass and glanced at him. “Yeah?”

He ran a thumb over the outside of the glass as he held it up higher. The liquid was crystal clear. “It’s safe. My intentions are not to harm you. Ever. Even before, I didn’t wish you harm.”

She blushed and took the glass. “Sorry. I know that. Really.”

He shrugged, but he was so easily hurt by her moments of panic. She suspected he felt them sometimes, as if their sharing the court was creating a bond neither of them was prepared for. No one else in the court could see through the facades she erected—only Keenan.

Friends. We are friends. Not enemies. Or anything else.

“I’ll talk to Don,” she told him. “No promises. I’ll try, though. Maybe it’ll even be good for us…. She’s been so short-tempered with me the past few weeks. If it’s just a spring thing, maybe it’ll be good to talk.”

He took her hand and squeezed it gently. “You are good to tolerate the positions I put you in. I know that this is not yet easy for you.”

She didn’t let go of his hand, holding on to him with the strength she had gained when her mortality was replaced by this otherness. “I’ll only tolerate so much. If you keep another secret like you did with Leslie”—she let the sunlight that lived in her skin slip out, not a loss of temper but a show of her growing control over the element they shared—“it would be unwise, Keenan. Donia was what made freeing Leslie possible. You failed me. I don’t want that to happen again.”