Page 4 of Practical Boots

Genuine shock tightened his features. "You wouldn't."

"Oh, I definitely would."

"You would destroy a child? Your ownsibling? Before giving it up to its rightful parent?"

"Absofuckinglutely. There's only one reason I can think of you'd want a half-Torn child and there is no way, no way atall, that I'm letting that happen. Hopefully the poor woman who's waiting for this has other eggs, but even if she doesn't, I guarantee she doesn't want this kid to grow upyours. Don't," she said, her voice sharpening with warning as her father's muscles tensed. "Don't. You can't knock the gun out of my hand faster than I can pull the trigger, Dad. And we both know if you could physically control me with magic you would have a long, long time ago, so don't imagine you can magic up a way out of this. You're going to let me go, and we're going to pretend this never happened."

Spots of scarlet shone in his cheeks, and cords stood out in his throat. Cat tested the bubble they were in. He couldn't hold them there forever, but he might be able to hold them long enough to make the embryo not-viable anymore. She had no idea, really. It wasn't like she'd ever paid attention to how things like that worked.

"I will never let that child go," her father said after a long, long time. "I will cross the Waste and search the World and leave a sickly changeling in its place so I might bring it home to the Torn. Is it not better for the mother to lose it now, before it's real to her, than as a living creature she's come to love?"

"Nope. Not gonna happen." Cat's finger ached on the trigger. She didn't want to pull it. Shereallydidn't want to give the embryo to her father. She searched for a memory, one that barely existed, and pulled it together into words of warning. "I swear on the blood of my birth, Dad. On the blood of my line, and on the blood of my loins, that this kid will never be yours."

She'd shocked him before, but a quietude came over him now. Shock could carry disbelief; that was gone now. No one swore oaths like that outside of stories, because oaths like that heldpower. The only sound was that of her own heartbeat, her own breathing, and the creak of muscles that could be heard in utter silence. Her father, she thought, had stopped breathing. Stopped everything, while he took in the weight of her promise, turning it, examining it, seeing if there were any gaps he might slither through.

"You do not wish to end its existence," he said finally.

"I'd rather not, but I will if I have to."

His eyes glittered. "And you will give up your own to protect it."

"My own existence?" Cat's gut clenched. "Yeah, I guess so. But I'll leave behind a hex, old man. One so powerful you'll never get the kid anyway." She didn't know if she could. She knew she would have to.

"I propose an alternative."

Cat's eyebrows shot up. Her father's thin smile touched his lips but not his eyes. "Swear your fealty to me, and I will leave the child to its mundane, Worldly life."

The air rushed from Cat's lungs, leaving her speechless. Her father's smile sharpened. "Do this, child of mine, or I will swear toyouthat by the blood ofmybirth, the blood ofmyline, and the blood of my blade, that I will fight you for this unborn infant every moment of your life, every hour of its life, every day of the endless summer and every month of the eternal winter, every year of—"

"Yes." The word tore like ice shards in her throat. "Yes. So long as you do not in any way interfere, approach, or interact with this child, for the duration of my life or its, I swear my fealty to you. My powers are yours to command and my skills are at your service. My liege lord."

"So much, for someone who doesn't even exist yet," he breathed. "Why?"

"Because what kind of asshole would I be if I let this kid deal with all your shit when I could prevent it?" She might as well have spoken another language. "Because I'm a better freaking person than you are, Dad, that's why. Because I can't let you spend its whole life making it miserable. Because whatever you want from it, I can probably already do and I'm not a child being raised to do whatever you want out of adoration. That kid—potential kid—is an innocent. I'm an adult who's making the choice." A lousy choice, sure, but from her father's expression, Cat didn't think he'd manipulated her into it. She'd made plenty of vows before, all of which ended in his messy death, and he had no particular reason to disbelieve those ones.

She still meant those older vows, too. It would just take a little longer. And in the meantime, the baby in the frozen box she was carrying would have a chance at a much more normal life than she'd had. "Do you accept my terms?"

He tilted his head slowly, still staring at her, then spoke clearly. "On my word, I will not interfere with the child you carry with you now, and on the strength of that pledge, accept your oath of fealty for the length of your life or its. Now." His will flexed and the walls of the Torn bubble thinned a little. "I have work for you."

Cat lifted her eyebrows and the backpack simultaneously. "Not until I've delivered this."

"A vow of fealty supersedes any human commitments you may have, daughter."

"You swore not to interfere with the child I'm carrying. Hauling me back to the Torn to do some bullshit Artificer job before I've brought it where it's supposed to be is absolutely interfering."

Fury slashed her father's face. The walls surrounding them came down, and Cat finallystepped.

* * *

The World seemed very loud and terrible when Cat returned to it, and if she hadn't had somewhere to be, she would have flopped down in the midst of it all and reveled in it. The Torn was pastorally quiet; the Waste, oppressively so. The World's noise and smell and vibrancy were so much better. Especially in Los Angeles, where she'd stepped to: the huge dome of blue sky had recently been washed by rain, and mountains were visible far beyond the reach of busy streets filled with hurrying people and so very many cars.

She'd left New York's grey skies spitting a pathetic attempt at snow less than twenty minutes ago, according to the chunky watch on her wrist. Her father's machinations hadn't delayed her much, in the scope of five hours being the usual shortest transit time between the coasts. Her phone's map app oriented her and she jogged the half block to her destination, showed her ID at the security-laden door, and was sent up to a posh, nice-smelling clinic about thirty-eight floors above the ground.

The equally posh, nice-smelling white lady behind the front desk looked like she wanted to call security as Cat stomped in, all leather, bad hair, and boots. She relaxed very slightly as Cat said, "Cat Sharp Courier Service," briskly. "Got a delivery for one Grace Law, care of you guys."

"Oh." The woman's eyes widened. "I'm sorry. We didn't expect you until tomorrow. Wasn't that delivery just put in a couple of hours ago? From New York?"

"Yep."

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