The Iron Daughter characters

Appears from the start

Oberon's half-human daughter, sixteen and out of her depth. She is living in the Winter Court as Queen Mab's hostage, honouring the bargain she struck to get her brother back, cut off from her family, watched constantly, and safe only for as long as the queen finds her useful. Whatever passed between her and Ash on the road to Tir Na Nog, he now behaves as though it never happened.

Appears from the start

The youngest son of Mab, the Winter prince who brought Meghan to Tir Na Nog under the terms of their bargain. Inside his mother's court he treats Meghan with public indifference sliding into open coldness, and he will not explain himself. What that performance costs him, if anything, is not something Meghan can see.

Appears from the start

Queen of the Winter Court, ruling the Unseelie fey from Tir Na Nog. She holds Meghan under the terms of Ash's bargain and makes it clear that a Summer half-blood in her court exists on sufferance. She is elegant, absolute, and entirely uninterested in Meghan except as leverage against Oberon.

Appears from the start

One of Mab's older sons, handsome and mocking, who takes obvious pleasure in Meghan's discomfort at court and in needling his youngest brother wherever it will do the most damage.

Appears from the start

Another of Mab's sons, older than Ash and steadier than Rowan. He is courteous to Meghan in a distant way and carries the duties of a Winter prince without the cruelty his brother brings to them.

Also known as Robin Goodfellow, Robbie Goodfell

Appears from the start

The trickster who spent years disguised as Meghan's schoolfriend Robbie and then took her across the Nevernever to recover her brother. He serves Oberon, jokes his way through anything lethal, and his old feud with Ash has never been settled. Meghan left him behind when she went to Winter, and she does not know where he is.

Appears from the start

The cait sith who guided Meghan through the Nevernever on her search for Ethan. He talks, vanishes at will, knows more than he says, and never gives anything away without agreeing a favour first, then collects it whenever it suits him.

Appears from the start

Meghan's young half brother, taken by the Iron fey and recovered from Machina's realm. He is home in Louisiana with their mother and stepfather, with no clear memory of where he was, and Meghan's family has no idea what she did to get him back.

Appears from the start

The Erlking, ruler of the Summer Court and Meghan's father. He acknowledged her as his daughter but has never treated that as an obligation to protect her, and he did not intervene when she bargained herself away to Winter.

First appears in chapter 12

The Exile Queen: a powerful fey thrown out of the Nevernever who now rules the exiles, half-breeds and strays living in the mortal world, from a mansion reached through the thorned wildland of the Briars. She keeps human musicians and artists in her house and feeds on their talent, deals in favours and information, and is generous in a way that always turns out to have terms attached.

Also known as Charles

First appears in chapter 13

A quiet pianist among the humans kept in Leanansidhe's mansion, known to the household as Charles. He has no memory of his own name or of how long he has been there. He is Paul Chase, Meghan's father, taken out of the mortal world on the day he disappeared eleven years ago.

First appears in chapter 15

The huge black iron horse who once hunted Meghan across the Nevernever for Machina. With his king dead he comes to her not as an enemy but as a petitioner, holding that the Iron crown passed to Meghan when she destroyed Machina and that whoever wears it now is a usurper. He is loud, literal-minded and immovably loyal to a claim Meghan wants nothing to do with.

First appears in chapter 16

An Iron fey serving the new claimant to the Iron throne, unhurried and precise, whose particular talent is infecting other fey with something that leaves them obedient and hollowed out. She treats the fey she takes as equipment rather than as enemies.