Read Online Ironside by Holly Black - Free Book Online

on.
    Moments later, Kaye’s mother was bent over, raking the strings of her guitar. Kaye watched in rapt fascination, the pools of her eyes wet as she chewed on a plastic stirrer.
    The music was okay—candy punk with some messed-up lyrics. Kaye’s mom didn’t look like the faded middle-aged woman Corny had seen a couple of hours ago, though. This Ellen looked fierce, like she might lean out and eat up all of the little girls and boys gathered around the stage. Even though it made no sense, as she screeched through the first song, Corny thought he could see a lot of Kaye in her.
    Watching her transformation made him uncomfortable, especially because his fingers were still stained with black dye from his own. He looked around the room.
    His gaze ran over the beautiful boys and the insect-slender girls, but it stopped on a tall man leaning against the far wall, a messenger bag slung over his shoulders. Just looking at him made gooseflesh bloom on Corny’s arms. His features were far too perfect to belong to a human.
    Looking at that stiff, arrogant posture, Corny thought it was a glamoured Roiben come to beg Kaye’s indulgence. But the hair was the color of butter, not salt, and the tilt of the jaw was not like Roiben’s at all.
    The man stared at Kaye, so fixedly that when a girl in pigtails stopped in front of him, he moved to the left to continue watching.
    Corny stood up without really meaning to. “Be right back,” he said to Kaye’s questioning look.
    Now that he was walking in the man’s direction, Corny was no longer sure what to do. His heart beat against his rib cage like a ricocheting rubber ball until he thought he might choke. Still, as he got closer, more details added to Corny’s suspicions. The man’s jaw was as hairless as a girl’s. His eyes were the color of bluebells. He was the most poorly disguised faery Corny had ever seen.
    Onstage, Ellen bellowed into the mike, and the drummer went into a solo.
    “You’re doing a crap-ass job of blending in, you know that?” Corny shouted over the rhythmic pounding.
    The faery narrowed his eyes. Corny looked down at his borrowed sneakers, suddenly remembering that he could be charmed.
    “Whatever do you mean?” The man’s voice was soft. It showed none of the anger that had been in his face.
    Corny ground his teeth together, ignoring his longing to look into those lovely eyes again. “You don’t look human. You don’t even talk human.”
    A smooth, warm hand touched Corny’s cheek, and Corny jumped. “I feel human,” the faery man said.
    Without meaning to, Corny leaned into the touch. Desire flared in him, so sharp it was almost pain. But as his eyes drifted closed, he saw his sister’s face disappearing under briny water, saw her screaming great gulps of sea as a beautiful kelpie-turned-boy dragged her down. He saw himself crawling through the dirt to bring a pulpy fruit to drop at a laughing faerie knight’s feet.
    His eyes snapped open. He was so furious his hands shook. “Don’t flirt,” Corny said. He wasn’t going to be weak again. He could do this.
    The faery watched him with arched eyebrows and a smile filled with mockery.
    “I’ll bet you want Kaye,” Corny said. “I can get her for you.”
    The faery frowned. “And you would betray another of your kind so easily?”
    “You know she’s not my kind.” Corny took him by the elbow. “Come on. She might see us. We can talk in the bathroom.”
    “I beg your pardon.”
    “Keep begging,” Corny said, grabbing the faery’s arm and leading him through the crowd. A glance back told him that Kaye was preoccupied with the performance onstage. Adrenaline flooded him, narrowing his focus, making rage and desire seem suddenly indistinguishable. He swept into the bathroom. The single stall and two urinals were empty. On a dark purple wall, beside a hand-lettered sign promising decapitation to employees failing to wash their hands, hung a shelf piled with toilet paper and cleaning