by Melissa Marr
I swear she sounded like she was laughing. No . . .? I replied. Is it a draugr thing?
After a long pause, she said, No.
Then I heard Beatrice and Eli come into my room, but I was still silent and motionless as he filled her in on my situation. I could not move or speak. My body had entered some sort of stasis.
“Paralysis,” she said, meeting my eyes. “She hears us. Sees us. The venom paralyzes as it starts to liquify her organs and muscles. It should have been painful before this stage.”
“It was.” Eli stroked my face. “Can you . . . is there something we can do? I’ll do anything. I’d really rather not have to kill her.”
At that, the old draugr looked appalled. “Why ever would you do that?”
“Her wishes.”
Beatrice shook her head. “If you stay this way, between living and dying, the dead will continue to gather. Do you understand me?”
Help. HELP. I wasn’t sure what I needed, but this, this weird vegetative state, wasn’t it. I’d rather die. Someone help me!
She looked at me. “Don’t yell, daughter. That’s why they are all gathered. If you stay like this, they will drain you. We could fix this, but the paralysis will last for days. If there are bones, you will find them.” She paused. “When you sleep, Geneviève, you will have no control. Would it not be better to be like me?”
No. Not ever. No. Please no.
“What if she went where there were no bones?” Eli’s tone scared me. I knew that one. It was mine, the one I had when I was about to embark on a terrible plan. “Would she heal?”
“If there was no venom left in her,” Beatrice said mildly.
“How?”
I drew in a sharp breath because I knew this answer, felt the inevitability of it before she parted her lips and said, “Well, I would remove it, of course.” She stared at me as she asked, “Do I have your consent to remove the venom from Geneviève?”
“It’s that or death?”
“Yes. Or this suspended state, summoning the bones of the dead to rebuild them, calling draugr to her until she expires.” Beatrice met my gaze. “What will it be?”
Not this. I couldn’t answer. Whatever was happening to me, I couldn’t reply with my magic—or she was ignoring me. I couldn’t tell.
She glanced at Eli.
“I don’t know if you’d choose this or death,” he said quietly. “I know you would not like to revive after death.” He glanced at Beatrice. “This won’t—”
“I am removing the venom, not adding to it,” she said in a voice that wouldn’t be out of place in a classroom.
“Save her,” he said. “You have my consent.”
Beatrice leaned closer, and in my paralysis, I could not pull away. I was helpless as something older than Shakespeare drove teeth into my arm, right over the injection. I felt her magic drawing the venom, separating it from blood and organ, calling it to her. My gums clenched. My stomach and kidneys did. My lungs. The places the venom had been already processed wanted to obey her summons, but in those cases, some venom was already absorbed.
Beatrice was a witch and a draugr. Like me. I had more questions than before, but I also had what I thought was an answer. She was the closest thing to what I was that I’d ever heard of. How long had she lived as the only one like her? Were there other witches that were again-walkers?
I couldn’t ask, but from the way she smiled at me with my blood on her lips, I had suspicions that she knew my questions.
“Rest,” she whispered as she stood and accepted a tissue Eli extended.
“In time she will wake and move, but until then, she’ll summon the dead. They’ll tear down the walls to reach her.” Beatrice brushed my hair back. “You will live, Geneviève. Not exactly as before, but not dead. Not wholly draugr.”
Then she motioned to the doorway. “May I escort you to the door?”
“To . . .?” Eli asked.
“Elphame,” Beatrice said quietly. “There is no other place without bones in the soil. I know who you are. I know where you take her. . . and the cost you will pay for doing so. I have heard whispers, Son of Stonecroft.”
What cost? Beatrice, answer me. Stop this!
Beatrice only met my eyes and smiled, and I knew then that she’d heard me—and that she was ignoring me.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I woke in a room with only two walls. In front of me—and likely behind me—was a meadow. I heard birds, a waterfall, trees dancing in the wind. That sound, more than the rest, was one I missed. The music of wind through nature was one of the things that was lacking in New Orleans. Rain fell. River rolled. Birds sang. Those were as present in the city as in the country, but the city didn’t give me the rustling of thousands of leaves as if they were instruments that the wind had called to song.
“Can you stand? Speak? Sit?” Eli’s voice came from my left.
I turned my head toward him. “What have you done?”
“Brought you to safety.” He motioned around the room. “To my other home.”
My gaze slid over the walls; natural rock with trickling water to one side and what appeared to be tightly woven trees on the other. The roots extended into the living space and formed the frames of chairs, a table, and a lounging sofa. It was more magical than I’d expected, but it was as welcoming as Eli’s home in New Orleans. I felt peace here, but I felt like a part of me was missing.
I sent out a pulse of magic. I felt dizzy with how easily the energy flowed outward, but there were no gaps in the canvas. Nothing dead. My own essence wanted to follow the magic, see where it would lead, but I clung to my physical form. I was afraid to project. It was only a thing I’d done during my near-death.
“The bones of the dead aren’t here,” Eli said softly. He moved to sit next to me on the bed of soil where I was resting.
I was in soil, and it took no magic to know where it was from. I felt home through the dirt and rocks. I slid my fingers through it. “How?”
Eli offered that half-shrug, as if to dismiss the inexplicable feat of gathering so much earth for me in Elphame. “I called in favors, and it was brought to me. You were ill, and I was . . . determined.” He cleared his throat. “Jesse helped.”
I couldn’t decide whether to be more stunned that Jesse and Eli worked together or that there was soil-of-my-home here for me. I started to reach into his mind for answers, but stopped myself. Leaving him with a migraine because I was trying to rummage around in his mind was wrong.
“You can look at my memories, Geneviève.”
“What?” I stared at him.
“I know you can do it.” He smiled at me in that vaguely amused way. “I felt you a few times.”
“It wasn’t on purpose,” I blurted. “I mean, just now was, but—"
“I tried to project,” he interrupted. “Images of us, naked. Of me, thinking of you in my home. Of—”
“I missed most of that.”
He nodded. “It was worth a try. Go ahead and look. We couldn’t stay where we were.”
“It hurts if I do it on purpose,” I warned him.
He shrugged.
I wasn’t entirely sure I knew how to glance into a mind without harm, but with an invitation, maybe the walls that protected the mind were lowered—or maybe it was because he wasn’t human. My rooting around in the treasure troves of someone’s consciousness was allowed—and safe for him—because he’d invited me.
The dead were gathered like a soil-caked army. As Eli carried my unconscious body in his arms, bridal-style, the mass of semi-healed corpses surged. It was as if ripples slid over them.
“Do not pause,” Beatrice ordered. “I can give you a few meters of space at best, so you need to keep moving.”
I could see the wave of animated corpses, clad in magically-restored clothes from eras past, older than I ought to be able to call from graves. They moved around us as if they were a ghastly escort. Lights from windows in the buildings we passed illuminated terrified faces.
“To me,” Beatrice murmured.
Draugr pushed through the walking dead, clustering between us and the revived corpses. They were clawed and battered, shoved and trampled. They were Beatrice’s to command, and she was clearly commanding them to aid her in her protection of Eli and me.
“Near?” she asked, voice strained.
“Yes.”
And then we were in Elphame where we were greeted by guards with silver swords. A man stepped forward—
I was thrust out of Eli’s memory.
“If we had stayed in the city, they’d have torn you limb from limb in their eagerness to be near you, Geneviève.”
“You could’ve beheaded me.”
He gave me a look of utter heartbreak. “If you had died, I would’ve. If you’d changed into a draugr. . . I would’ve. I agreed to your request.” He took my hand in his. “You are alive, Geneviève, and I would pay near anything to have it so.”
“What will it cost you? I heard Beatrice. Who was that man? Why—”
“I will pay the cost if I must.” Eli stared at me, as if this was a declaration, and maybe it was. I had no idea because he wouldn’t tell me anything substantive.
“Did that hurt? Letting me in?” I asked. He seemed fine, but I needed to know.
“Not at all,” he said.
I nodded, relieved. “How long have I been out?”
“A month, but—”
“A month?” I shoved to my feet, somehow transitioning from prone to standing far faster than I’d intended. “Have you contacted my friends? Tres?”
“Geneviève. . .”
“They all probably think I died.” I was pacing, seeking boots and weapons, noticing that I appeared to be wearing some sort of vaguely medieval-looking nightdress. “What about Alice’s crime? How many more people are dead?”
“Geneviève!”
I paused and glanced at him. “Where are my weapons?”
“In their world, it’s been three hours.”
“Oh.” I stood in his home in this fairy tale place and simply stared at him. I suspected I was panicking. It was easier to focus on my friends, my clients, and the safe things than to ask myself about the changes I could feel in my body.
I ran my tongue over my teeth. The fangs were gone, or at least, retracted. I could feel the hard edges of my new unwanted teeth under the skin. I wondered if they’d retracted permanently or—
Fangs slid out, extending into my mouth.
Eli, uncharacteristically, approached and wrapped his arms around me. “They retract and extend, bonbon.”
“How . . .?”
“You make faces when your teeth extend,” he said with that small shrug of his.
“Do you owe Beatrice?” I stood there, staring at him with the gorgeous meadow just outside the missing wall of the building. “Do I?”
“No.”
A chime echoed through the house. Eli’s expression shifted to the restrained one that I often thought of as his fae face. Sometimes I forgot how much he revealed to me until that expression appeared.
“Gun? Sword?” I asked quietly.
Eli shook his head. “Not that kind of threat, cupcake.”
There before us was the same man from Eli’s memory. He was handsome in the way of feral animals, sharp lines and prominent muscles. If not for the grandeur of his fur-lined cloak and wealth of jewels glittering on his hands and wrists, I’d suspect him to be a warrior. He did not look any older than Eli, but determining age with the fae was a skill few possessed.
“Your majesty,” Eli said with a brief bow.
“I see the girl is awake,” he said with a cursory glance at me.
“Woman,” I corrected. “Witch if you prefer.”
The apparent king of Elphame stared at us. He did not address me, but instead spoke to Eli. “You entered the land of your grandfather with death at your side.”
“Geneviève is not death,” Eli said mildly. “She is a witch. A human.”
“She smells of death,” the king said.
I sniffed. “I smell just fine. Maybe a little flowery, but—”
“Your blood.” The king gave me a sad look. “I know the scent of death.”
“I told you she was injected,” Eli began.
“And I offer my condolences,” the king said, meeting my eyes briefly. He shook his head then. “Now that she is awake, however, we must address the things left unresolved as she healed. She cannot be here as your guest, son of my brother, prince of my throne.”
My head swiveled to Eli. “What did he say?”
Eli sighed and stepped between me and his uncle, the king. He glanced over his shoulder and whispered, “I am sorry, sugar cream.”
Eli had effectively blocked the king from my view. That did nothing to muffle the roar of laughter.
When the king’s laughter subsided, he said, “You didn’t tell her?” He motioned to Eli. “He fled from home when it was time to choose his bride. He’s been in your world for years, hiding from his duty. The prince knew that when he returned home, he would be staying here permanently. You, dead witch, can return to your world of steel and violence. The heir to my throne will be right here where he belongs. Finally.”
I stared at Eli’s uncle with a mix of rage and fear. I was fairly sure that attacking the king of Elphame was a terrible idea. Even if he wasn’t Eli’s uncle, he was a powerful creature, and I was in his domain—and unarmed. I felt a ball of fury squirming in my gut. Magic drew together, urged me to strike.
Apparently, my temper was not improved by my increase in draugr nature.
“You cannot demand that he stay, punish him because he was being a decent person.” I reached for the sword that was not there and fisted my hand in irritation. No hilt. No gun butt, either. My hands had only air to grasp—or the absurd nightdress I was wearing. I was not a skirt person and definitely not a medieval nightdress person. I was jeans and steel swords, boots and bullets. I could go with barefoot or even naked. Unarmed always seemed stupid.
At least I wasn’t truly defenseless, thanks to my magic, but I would rather have my gun or sword. Sometimes the threat of violence was enough. I would love to be able to make a few threats and leave. I didn’t think the consequences of attacking the king would be great.
“The half-dead and the dead are not welcome in Elphame,” the king pronounced. “You must leave.”
“Pulse. I have one,” I said mildly, my hand touching my throat. I may have been injected with venom from the draugr, but I was, in fact, alive.
“My nephew has returned due to your murder, but you must go back to your world, Geneviève of Crowe.” The king smiled as if he was being kind. “And Eli must take the next step in his journey.”
“So, I go, and he stays?”
“Yes.”
“You’re going to punish him for saving my life?” I asked in an increasingly agitated voice.
“Being in Elphame, in your view, is a punishment?” The king gave me a look of disdain. “No unnatural creatures, save you. No need to work. A devoted, beautiful wife to fulfill his every need. How is this a punishment?”
Despite everything, the king of Elphame sounded genuinely confused. He motioned to the glorious landscape outside the house. “Our land is fertile, healthy, free of invaders.”
“Uncle. . . the world there suits me. Our land is beautiful, but I want to know my mother’s world as well.”
I reached out and squeezed Eli’s hand.
The king’s gaze dropped to our clasped hands. “I see.”
“Uncle . . .”
The king pivoted and left with no ceremony, no further word, and I felt like I’d just fucked up. I tried to pull my hand away from Eli, but he stopped me. He laced his fingers with mine. “I knew the price, Geneviève. I could not endure losing you to death.”
“You don’t need to stay here,” I whispered. “What will they do?”
“Burn my ancestry from the land. I will not do that to my mother or father,
” Eli said as he folded me into his embrace. “My father’s soul rests in my hands. My mother was human, one of those humans my people once stole. Traditionally, when we saw a mortal we wanted, we left a bag of twigs and rocks behind as a ‘changeling.’ My mother was such a stolen mortal. My father’s memory, his honors, will be vanished. Never spoken. My family’s tree will be razed.”
“Oh.” I felt awed that he was telling me such things and horrified that he carried such a weight.
“My grandfather went to your world and chose a bride. My father did, too.” Eli continued to explain as he led me out of his house and into the meadow beyond. “They found their true loves, and they stole them.”
“So you would? You’d steal someone? I’m sorry. Never mind.” I squirmed away, as much for asking as for the look he gave me.
Eli’s expression was implacable. That never boded well.
“Geneviève, in fae-human marriage, the human is bound to the fae lifespan. My mother lived much, much longer than any human could, but when my father died, she expired simultaneously.” He stared at me as if there were layers of meaning I ought to understand, but all I could think was that I was grateful that my mother outlived my bio father—although technically he was already dead prior to conception.
“What if they aren’t married?” I plopped down on the ground. My parents weren’t wed, and I was grateful for it. “What happens to the kids? Do they stay here no matter what?”
“Any child of such union, carries the fae ancestry almost entirely. A fae child is fae.”
“So, the quarter-fae in our world—”
“Lying,” Eli said coldly, as if lying were the most heinous crime ever. “You are fae, or you are not-fae.”
Flowers seemed to surge toward me. My magic was life-affirming. That was why I called the dead so easily. A carpet of wildflowers surrounded me, and in my glee, fangs extended. I felt weirdly like some sort of fanged fairy tale maiden—neither sleeping beauty nor the wall of briars, neither the hungry wolf nor the hooded maiden. I was always stuck between two options.
My voice was lisping because of the fangs as I asked, “What if they’re just . . . burning through a bit of tension? Are they doomed to togetherness because of an oops baby?”