by H. L. Burke
“It shall be done.”
Devin’s shoulders relaxed. Cool relief swept through him. He wasn’t dead—or a frog—yet. Looking up, he found the dark eyes of the servant girl burning into him. Something about her expression, ferocious, every muscle taut like a wildcat about to pounce, set him on edge, but not in fear or anxiety. No, it was anticipation. She was up to something, and he wanted to know what.
Before he could consider learning more, Olysa’s hand clamped down upon his shoulder. Her nose wrinkled.
“Come,” she ordered. “If you’re going to compete for the queen’s hand, you need to bathe.”
Chapter Two
The silver grate blocking the door rose at their approach. Outside a covered porch curved out of sight behind a sprawling palace. Before them stretched a garden with shapely trees, some simultaneously bearing springtime blossoms and summer fruit. A fountain spurted and babbled in the center of the lawn and groups of fairies—all notably female—lazed about listening to the faint strains of a harpist or playing some game with silver hoops.
Captain Olysa nudged Devin between the shoulders. He stepped out of the shade of the awning and every head snapped in his direction. Murmurs reached his ear.
“A man?”
“A human man?”
“Is he really going to compete?”
Olysa whistled. A deep, woeful baying answered her, and in a moment a series of long, graceful shadows swept over the garden. The watching fairies gasped and scattered into the shelter of the trees.
With the flapping of wings, a half-dozen, long, slender creatures alighted on the lawn before Devin. He resisted the urge to rub his eyes. Their coats glistened smooth and gray as weathered willow wood. Their long, lithe forms resembled greyhounds, but twice as high at the shoulder and with feathered wings folded over their backs. They circled Devin, nostrils flaring, sniffing at him with a disdainful air.
“Her majesty’s winged hounds. The finest trackers and most zealous guards in all of fairydom.” Olysa gave a smug smile. “You attempt to leave her majesty’s halls, and they’ll hunt you down and drag you back, maybe with all your extremities still intact, but I won’t make any promises.”
Devin chuckled. “Who’s leaving? Not me.” He hazarded a hand towards the nearest hound’s head. After all, a dog was a dog.
The creature snarled and snapped.
Devin recoiled. “Good boy.”
“This way.” Olysa jerked her head towards the path to the left which wound around an outcropping of flowering trees to disappear behind a hedge. The encircling dogs parted to allow their passing, then fell into step behind them as they walked.
The gardens of the fairy queen were undeniably beautiful. Everywhere Devin looked he found dripping flowers, fruit-bearing vines, tinkling fountains, and statues so artfully made as to be confused for living beings. Finally, they arrived at a small structure made of marble. It had a single entrance and a high-domed roof. Through the entrance, a series of steps led down into a bubbling pool. A skylight cast a beam of light in the center of the pool, dancing upon it like sparkling diamonds.
“Leave your filthy rags there.” Olysa pointed to a bench where a basket of folded cloths sat as well as a plate of small, rounded cakes in pastel shades which he assumed were soaps. “I will send appropriate garments as well as a razor for your face.” She eyed the scraggly beard that had overtaken his chin during his travels with contempt. “Fairy men are expected to be well-groomed. If you are to compete for our queen, you must look the part.” She nodded to the water. “I will leave you to your ablutions.”
Devin waited until her footsteps faded in the distance, then poked his head out the door. One of the winged hounds raised its head from between its paws and gave a warning growl. With a groan, Devin ducked inside again and quickly undressed.
Current situation aside, the bath itself was quite pleasant. The water was warm and gently perfumed with a light floral scent that somehow penetrated his muscles until he was certain he’d be sweating rose oil for days to come. The soap cut through the weeks of grime, leaving a film on top of the water, but a refreshing sensation all over his skin. He leaned against the edge of the tub and closed his eyes. He could use a nap, and a good meal, before he seriously turned his mind to escaping. As surprised as he was that it had worked, his promise to endure the trials had bought him some time. If the queen were gullible enough to believe his “change of heart,” how close a watch would she really keep him under?
He opened his eyes when the shuffle of feet alerted him to another presence. To his surprise a long-legged stork carrying a bundle in its beak walked in and deposited its burden upon the bench. It then lowered its head to its long yellow toes before marching back out. Devin whistled. At least they were considerate enough not to send a female servant in to deliver his garments, but did that mean there were really no men in this kingdom? Could the queen actually have put every living male through her trials? And had all of them died?
Dread chewed at the corners of his previous optimism, and he quickly rose from the water, dried himself on one of the soft cloths from the basket, and tore into the bundle to find a pair of loose but comfortable gray trousers and a lightweight, sage-green tunic.
As he slipped the tunic over his head, a scratching from above caused him to freeze. The noise continued, faint but clearly coming from the roof. Quickly dressing, he rummaged through his old clothes for any personal items the fairies had left to him. His pack and sword he’d immediately noticed were gone, but he kept a knife in his boot and a trinket from his mother—for divine protection, she’d said—in one pocket. The knife was gone. Not wanting to lose any more of his possessions, he slipped on the boots seeing as the fairies hadn’t provided him any footwear. If he got a chance to run, he didn’t wish to do it barefoot. Thankfully, the small crucifix on an iron chain still remained in his trouser pocket where he’d left it. He placed the chain around his neck and tucked the cross beneath his shirt.
A shadow fell across the skylight, and a moment later a rope uncoiled.
“I hope you’re decent, ’cause I’m coming down,” a voice called, unsurprisingly, he supposed, a feminine voice, though this one lacked the haughty tone and rarified accent he’d noted in both Olysa and the Queen’s speech. A petite figure in a brown dress skittered down the rope. She gazed at him with mischievous dark eyes.
The servant girl from earlier.
“What are you doing?” He frowned.
“Could you give me a hand?” Still clinging to the swaying rope with one arm and both legs wrapped about it, she extended her remaining hand towards him.
Catching her hand, he pulled her to the edge of the pool where she gained a foothold and released the rope.
She let out a long breath. “Climbing is natural to my people, but still, wasn’t looking forward to the splash at the end. Thanks for the help.”
“Don’t mention it.” He eyed the rope still dangling from the skylight. “May I ask why the unusual entrance?”
“Not a big fan of the winged hounds.” She straightened her skirts which had hitched up over her knees in her descent. “Or they of me, for that matter. Generally speaking, they don’t like it when I’m outside of the servants’ quarters, wandering about on my own.”
“I see.” Sitting on the bench, he took up a straight razor that had been left next to the spare soap. “Do you mind if I keep grooming myself? Apparently I don’t meet her majesty’s standards as is.” He snorted as he said the last words.
She shrugged. “Go ahead.”
As if by magic—actually probably very much by magic, considering where he was—the filmy surface of the bathing pool had already cleared to a mirror-like clarity. After working a healthy lather between his hands with a bar of soap that smelled strongly of mint and prickled pleasantly against his skin, he rubbed down his face before scraping away his scraggly beard.
The girl continued to hover over him as he worked. Finally she spoke. “Do you want to go thro
ugh with the trials?”
He smiled wryly. “No, but I want to spend my last moments as an earthworm even less.”
She dipped a bare toe into the water and stirred. “Well, if you do happen to win, you’ll be the prince-consort to a beautiful, powerful woman with hundreds of fairy servants who will deny you no request. A lot of men would consider that the ultimate happily ever after to their tale.”
He ran his hand over his left cheek, checking for spots he’d missed, before deciding it was good enough and focusing on the other side of his face. “I’ve never been a big believer in happily ever after. Staying in one place, servants and luxury notwithstanding, is my personal idea of hell.” He shook the last of the whisker-tainted froth off his razor and into the pool before splashing his face several times to get any he’d missed and standing, eyes closed. He fumbled for the bench, and her hand met his.
“Here.” She eased a cloth into his fingers.
“Thanks.” He briskly rubbed his face then tossed the towel on his pile of dirty garments. “Why do you care what I want? It doesn’t seem anyone else here does?”
Her mouth twisted. Her pointed ears dipped back slightly then perked up, twitching as if listening for approaching footfalls. “Queen Agalea’s search for a mate has lasted for nearly five years now. At first men fought for the right to face the challenges.”
“Make sense. A lot of men I know are idiots where pretty women are concerned, to say nothing of pretty, rich, and powerful ones.”
“Yes, but even idiots tend to value their lives. I don’t think any of them anticipated the trials to be so hard or the queen so merciless to those who failed.” The girl shuddered. “After the first dozen or so deaths the flood of eager suitors dwindled to a trickle of the most foolhardy, but eventually even the fools discerned that to compete for the queen’s hand was to embrace certain death. Then things just stopped.”
“Not great for her majesty’s tender ego, I’m guessing.” Devin fingered his mother’s chain through his shirt. He’d never been a religious man, but now seemed like a good time to pray.
“No.” The girl settled onto the bench and crossed her arms over her chest. “The story goes that the first time her guards informed her that no suitor waited to fight and die for the right to wed her, she screamed until her snowy skin turned red and transformed the unlucky guards to stone pillars for daring to bring such foul news.”
“Sounds about right from the sampling I got of her personality.” Pushing aside the remaining soaps, Devin settled next to her on the bench. “My name’s Devin, by the way, Sir Devin Carlton, but Devin’s fine for the current company.” He offered her his hand. She blinked at his outstretched fingers before tentatively slipping her hand into his. He raised it to his lips, determined to use every bit of charm he had to secure himself an ally. A shiver cut through her, and she jerked away.
“Sevaine … Sevaine … nothing else really, I guess.”
“Pleased to make your acquaintance.” He winked. She really was quite pretty, in an exotic, pointy-eared way, and he could use every ally he could get if he were going to survive this. “So, no one has ever survived the tests?”
“Someone has survived the first one—once, because of my help. I’ve been studying the second trial, and I think I can get you past it, too. The third, no one has ever gotten that far, so I have no idea what it is or how to conquer it.” Her ears drooped, and her eyes stared past him into nothingness. “I wish I could promise that I can get you all the way through this, but I can’t. However, if you listen to me, if you do exactly what I say, you’ll survive at least the first two trials, which I promise is much further than you’ll get on your own.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. Was this some sort of trap? In his experience, people usually didn’t stick their neck out to help others if there wasn’t something in it for themselves. From her stealthy entrance, it was likely the girl didn’t want anyone to know what she was doing.
“Why are you helping me?” He frowned.
“When the queen no longer found volunteers for her trials, she started issuing ‘invitations’ to eligible men throughout the kingdom. Those who refused, they died. Those who accepted—well, they died, too. Some citizens saw the danger coming. Wealthy families smuggled their sons across her borders—she has no power outside her kingdom, which is why she now has to wait for folks to stray into it to conduct one of her trials, but she’s constantly hunting. You’re the first human she’s caught, but if something doesn’t change soon, you won’t be the last.” Her mouth hardened, her black eyes steely. “The constant, pointless death needs to end. The blood will continue to flow until someone makes it to the end of her challenges and she marries him.”
“And that poor sucker still has to sacrifice himself, only on the altar of matrimony this time.” Devin groaned. “So either way, I lose.”
“Well, like I said, if you can make it across the borders, you’ll be safe, but I see she’s already got her winged hounds watching you.” Sevaine eyed the door. “Also, when she got wise to the exodus of male fairies, she put powerful wards around her kingdom. She’ll know if you try to escape unless you have magic to mask your departure. Magic I’m assuming you don’t have.”
He examined her. “What about you? You have fairy magic, right? I don’t suppose you could loan me some?”
She grimaced. “I’m not a fairy. How could you think I’m a fairy? I look nothing like a fairy.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to offend.” He held up his hands. “If you aren’t a fae, what are you?” He gazed pointedly at her furry ears. “You’re not human.”
“I’m a fae, just not a fairy. There’s more than one sort of fae you know.” She touched the tufts of her ears. “I’m a felys, which I suppose you might consider a sort of elf. We have a little magic, but not the flashy fairy kind. Ours allows us greater balance and agility which is useful when you live mainly in trees. We can see well in poor lighting, which makes us more than fair hunters ... and well, obviously we have slightly different ears.”
“Huh.” He chewed his bottom lip. “Agile, good at climbing and hunting, can see well in the dark, and have fur-tipped, pointy ears.” A smirk spread over his face. “You’re a cat-elf.”
Her ears flattened. “I am not a cat-elf!”
“Yeah, you kind of are.”
Her lips curled back revealing sharp but small and rather non-threatening fangs.
“You gonna scratch me, or just hiss?” He snickered.
She clamped her mouth shut and let out a disdainful breath through her nose. “Look, do you want my help or not?”
“Sorry.” He exhaled. After all, this was serious. “I’d be an idiot not to accept what help I can get. Still, you’re saying dozens of men have failed in this.”
“More like two hundred. I stopped counting at around one-hundred-fifteen. It was getting depressing.”
His heart sank. “If that many fairy men have failed, what makes you think I have a chance at this? I’m just a human.”
“Two things.” She sat a little straighter. “One, you’re willing to listen to me. You’re not the first man I have offered to help, but most fairies won’t listen to a felys slave girl, even if it might save their lives.”
A jolt cut through Devin, but he kept his expression stony. Somehow he’d assumed servant without ever considering the possibility of slave.
“Fairies see my people as a lesser race. We don’t have real magic, so we have nothing to offer. The one man who got to the second trial? That was because he was the first—and only—one to ever accept my help. Now that I’ve seen the second trial, I am confident I can at least get you past that.”
“Makes sense, and those other men were idiots. One thing I’ve learned on my journeys, if someone offers you a hand while you’re drowning, you don’t stop to ask them if they washed under their nails first.”
“Thanks … I think.” Her nose wrinkled.
“You said two things, though,” he added. “What�
�s the second?”
“It’s something I didn’t realize until I saw how you talked your way out of wormhood in the throne room.” Her lips quirked into a sly smile. “You can lie.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Can’t everyone?”
“Fae can’t. Most of them don’t even have a concept of it, which is why Queen Agalea assumed you were being fickle, not quickly changing your story to cover your backside. The idea that you might say something untrue never occurred to her because I doubt she’s ever bothered to speak to a mortal.”
“Fae don’t know how to lie?” Devin blinked a few times. It seemed a part of—well, he supposed human nature didn’t apply to fae—but still, how could one go through life without ever breathing at least a little white lie now and then?
“It’s not so much about knowledge as about ability. Fae are magical beings, and magic and falsehood don’t mix.”
He scoffed. “I don’t know about that. I may not know much about fae, but I’ve met my share of human wizards and witches, and they can definitely lie.”
“Human magicians use magic like a tool, something they can touch but that’s separate from their beings.” Sevaine rolled her eyes. “Fae breathe it. It’s in our very blood. Fairies are the most magical of us all, which means not only can they not state a lie, they can’t think one, or really comprehend the concept.” She snorted. “Most can’t even understand basic sarcasm, which you should be very thankful for, considering if Agalea knew the true meaning behind half of what you said during your audience, she’d probably feed you certain of your own body parts before turning you into a steer and roasting you for her dinner.”
He cringed. “Lucky me. So you think I can lie my way out of this?”
“Maybe? Honestly, I’ve never had a liar to work with before, but I’ll take whatever advantage I can get.”