"No." As he said so, he saw Katharine step out of the forest in the distance, and she waved to everyone as she strode towards the hut. "None of this is real." He turned to Glastyn. "Are you real?"
"We are a motley of thoughts and memories and mannerisms of a thousand dead mortals, Tom. Have we ever been real?" Glastyn drained his glass and held it out for more. Tom blinked and it was full again. "This is your final moment, Tom. The thinnest slice of time, before you leave your body entirely and the fay consume you."
"So I’m imagining all of this?"
"Yes."
"And you?"
"Not entirely."
"I don’t understand."
"You’re not meant to."
"Why are you here?"
"Because you know you need advice."
"And I think you’re the person to give it to me?"
Glastyn just shrugged and took a leisurely sip of his wine. “The fay know things long lost to mortal memory. And you suspect I can be trusted after I recruited Melusine to keep Rose safe while she is in Faerie.”
Rose. Who he’d failed by dying. Tom’s chest grew tight and he dropped his head into his hands. “Is that what happened?” he asked, because it was better than thinking of how his daughter had been abandoned by a useless father.
"For all of our frivolity, Tom, we do have a certain degree of foresight.”
Foresight. It hadn’t prepared Tom for this. He straightened, took a deep breath, tried to push aside his failure and his pain. “So what is this place?” he asked. “My idea of paradise?”
Glastyn waved his glass in an expansive gesture. "There are worse to imagine."
Katharine and Elaine embraced like old friends. The children danced around them and begged for gifts from lands abroad. “I’m not sure what it says about me,” Tom said.
“Really? It seems clear to me.” Glastyn gave Tom a smile given to a daft but endearing pet. “The two women in your life, happy and cared for. Your duties fulfilled. It’s rather predictable.”
“I’m sorry if you find it dull.”
Glastyn waved the apology aside. “You can’t help it. But I wouldn’t be surprised if your dead friends were down there too. Ah.” As if on cue, more figures appeared from the treeline. Siomi, Ambrose, Kunnustenn, all smiling and laughing as if they were all great friends.
But it was a lie.
"As someone so intimately acquainted with the truth, we should think you know how true a lie can be."
It was tempting. Of course it was. He could walk down this hill and into the open arms of this strange, happy little family. "Could I stay here?"
"No. But it could feel like you did."
He could embrace them all, embrace the lie. But, “I couldn’t. I couldn’t be happy while Katharine and Rose needed me.”
“They’re down there, aren’t they?”
Fakes. Dreams. Lies. “Enough, Glastyn. I don’t want to be here."
"So where do you want to go?"
It was a good point. If it was a choice between this pleasant lie, or being consumed by the fay, then it wasn’t much choice at all.
"Why not go back?"
Go back. To Tir? "But I’m dead."
"And you can’t think of a way around that?” Glastyn’s gaze seemed to look right through him to rest on that little black stone within, cold and hard and dead.
Tom shook his head. "If Ambrose couldn’t use magic to heal himself, how could I?"
"Ambrose had nothing left."
"I don’t want to be like him."
"Why do you think he was like that?" Glastyn looked at his empty glass, sighed and tossed it over his shoulder, rising out of his chair. Both disappeared a moment later. "He knew it was better than the alternative."
Tom watched the figures at the bottom of the hill. Yes. If the alternative was leaving Katharine and Rose in Faerie, then he would burn himself up like Ambrose a hundred times over. “I need to get to Faerie," Tom said, rising out of his own chair. "I need to save my family."
Glastyn clapped him on both shoulders. “Then it’s time to go back."
To leave here. To go back to pain, and uncertainty, and failure. "I don’t know how to stop the fay," he admitted.
"That is less of a problem than you think it is.”
Tom forced a grin that he didn’t feel. ”You were never one for riddles, Glastyn."
The fay shrugged. "After what happened to Fenoderee, can you blame us?”
No. Perhaps not. Sudden honesty prompted Tom to say, “I’m scared, Glastyn.”
“Scared? If we were you, we would be petrified.” But the fay’s grin took the edge from his words. “Remember what Melusine told you: strength comes from unity.”
But Tom felt very alone on that hill.
"We believe we sang a song for you when we parted in the Heel."
"You did."
"Then we shall do so again." The fay opened his arms and, before Tom knew what was happening, pulled him into an embrace. "Fare you well, Thomas Rymour."
It was oddly comforting. The fay was warm, his robes soft, smelling faintly of lavender. It had been too long since he’d been embraced like this. "Fare you well, Glastyn."
The fay stepped back, drew breath, then stopped and cocked his head. "We almost forgot."
"Yes?" Tom asked, ashamed to be glad for the delay.
"You died, Tom."
"I know."
"A Faerie gift does not extend beyond death." And before Tom could ask, the fay drew a great breath and began to sing, his voice surprisingly soft and gentle. "The tunnel was long and his nerves were sore tested, for a knight with no blade will fear to be tested."
Tom’s audience, it seemed, was over. He reached for his body, and was frightened at how quickly his flesh grasped at him.
“To Malvis’ door the tunnel did wend, and by Malvis’ hand would be the knight’s end."
Chapter 26
Everything hurt.
The pain went deeper than muscles and joints, deeper even than his bones. His entire body felt wrong. As if someone had crept in while he was away and reordered everything. It made him want to flee back to the comforting lie.
But he knew he couldn’t. As Glastyn said, this was better than the alternative. So he allowed the scrabbling tendrils of his body to pull him under.
There was something foul in his flesh. It festered in his shoulder, where Rimestenn had bitten him, and lurked in his very blood. And his body was already beginning to come apart, like the different parts of him had forgotten their neighbours and just let go.
First things first. Balance the elements. He reached into his body and found it. There was too much fire, the infection burning his body. So he pulled at it. Out. Get out. And his blood began to move. It crawled around his body, pushing the corruption around and around until it passed the wound in his neck. And there Tom pushed it out. Over and over, until the final traces were gone, and his body was clean again.
He’d thought he’d have to make his body remember itself. But he realised he’d been holding himself back for some time. As the elements had balanced, the grip his body had on him had grown stronger and stronger. So he simply let go.
And now he realised his lungs were burning and without thinking he drew breath, a ragged, jagged breath. He opened his eyes, blinked away sand. The pain was unreal. And something stank. But he was alive.
And the stone inside him had become a boulder.
A voice. Then more. And hands touching him, tugging at him, faces staring into his eyes. Emyr’s bones he was tired. And hungry.
He tried to speak, but nothing came out but a hoarse squeak. Someone put water to his lips and he drank until it was taken from him again.
The voices and the faces were beginning to take form. He remembered how to move his eyes, focus them. There. Emyr, cradling his head. What was that expression on his face? Shock? Fear? Relief? He pulled Tom into an embrace.
"My boy, my boy," he said. "My boy."
Tom felt his finge
rs twitch, flex. How did he make his arms move to embrace him in return?
"How?" Jarnstenn asked. "He’s been dead and cold for hours."
Hours. Was that all? He tried to speak again, but he couldn’t remember the words. Even breathing was something he had to work at, as if he would forget to do it if he didn’t concentrate.
"How touching."
He knew that voice. Knew to expect a knot of fear and dread and wariness at the sound of it. But those waters lapped against the dark boulder and fell still. He couldn’t remember how to dread Melwas.
Well. Perhaps that was for the best.
Emyr said, "What do you want?" and spat venom and bile with those words.
"It’s time for little Tom to fulfill his end of the bargain." Melwas’ words dripped with anticipation. "We promised to keep his woman and his child. In return, he promised to fight us.”
“Yes,” Emyr said. “And if loses, he bends the knee.”
“Yes,” Melwas echoed. “And if he bests us, he wins our queen’s hand for himself. This is the bargain we struck.”
Emyr grew very still. It was like being held by a stone. "Is this true?" he whispered.
Tom tried to speak, but his lips still struggled to form the words. He had promised to challenge Melwas, yes. But not to win Maev’s hand. He growled his frustration and shook his head. Pushed himself away from the old king and crawled across sand, forced himself to sit up.
They were on a beach. Beautiful clear waters stretched away to the horizon. Dunes rolled across the base of the mountains, the sand soft and fine. Strange trees offered shade, grass grew in little patches where it could. And Melwas stood amongst the tranquility, fully armoured in his guise as Malvis, the Black Knight. The enemy of all, so the poem named him. He carried the two sister swords, Caledyr and Emyllt, both bronze blades shining in the bright sunlight. Tom couldn’t see the fay’s expression beneath his horned helm, but somehow he knew the Faerie King was smiling.
Tom forced words past numb lips and a befuddled tongue. "Time to fight?"
Melwas’ laugh echoed in his helm. "Oh yes, little Tom."
Tom’s legs shook like a newborn calf. "He can barely stand," Six said.
“That isn’t our concern,” Melwas replied. "No-one asked him to die.”
Emyr stood, stepped forward. Ignored Tom’s mumbled, "No," and stood before Melwas. "Face me instead," the old king demanded.
"We are not here for you."
"I deserve a chance to regain my honour."
"Your cries of honour and morality are like the buzzing of a gnat." Melwas tossed his head, like a great beast. "We bested you centuries past.”
"You’re not done with me yet."
Emyr was unarmed. Melwas could cut him down again in an instant. Tom took a shaky step. And another. He was growing stronger. His body was remembering what to do. But it was taking too long. His knee buckled and he tumbled to the ground.
But Dank hooked an arm under his and helped him to his feet. "I am not done with you either, Faerie King,” Dank said.
“Ah. The traitor." Melwas turned his gaze onto the man who had once been his puppet. "You are so much bolder than when we last saw you. Tell me, did you enjoy cracking open the sorcerer’s skull like an egg?"
"I am not your slave anymore."
"You are all slaves." Melwas’ satisfied sigh seemed to leak from every plate and joint in his armour. "You dance to our tune."
"Well I’m certainly not doing much dancing these days." Six had pulled himself to the sled and propped himself up beside it. His grin was a baring of his teeth.
Melwas grunted his amusement and hefted his blades, taking them all in with a sweep of his swords. "So you refuse to face us alone, little Tom? You let braver mortals fight your battles for you?"
Tom’s lips were more certain, his words clearer when he said, "We’ll face you together." Though he had no plan. No idea how to win this fight. "I will stand with my friends. They will stand with me.” Or he hoped they would. Because it would be the only way he’d win this fight.
Melwas lifted Emyllt to point at Dank. "That one belongs to us. He won’t stand with you, will you, Dank?"
Tom looked at the other man. Watched him quail, watched the rage boil beneath the surface of icy terror. “Look at yourself,” Tom told him. “You’re free of them.”
"Come and kneel before us, Dank, and all will be forgiven." Melwas’ voice was deep with assurance and trust. "You have provided much diversion and amusement. We thank you for that."
The terror didn’t subside. Not at all. But the rage found a crack in the ice. Dank stood a little straighter, and when he spoke his voice didn’t quaver. "The armour is a part of him," he said, loud and clear. "Cut it, and you’ll hurt him."
Melwas lowered his sword and growled. "You betray us."
Dank shook his head. "I stand with my friends.” And when Draig offered him an iron sword, he accepted it without flinching. “I stand with you, Sir Tom.”
Tom couldn’t help but smile. ”And I with you, Dank." Tom took a blade too, hefted it. It was short, far shorter than Emyllt. But perhaps a sword was less important than who you bore it with. Draig stood on his other side, blade in hand. Jarnstenn stood with them too, hefting Rimestenn’s hammer. And Mennvinn too, with iron knives in both hands.
"You will all suffer our eternal wrath!"
Tom turned to face Melwas. So imposing in his black armour, but it was just another show. Just another ruse, a trick, a diversion. An entertainment. "You came to us bearing arms," Tom pointed out. "You threaten us."
"We do.” Melwas reached up and removed his helm so Tom could see the vicious glee in his eyes. "Your women will suffer, little Tom, twice as much as you will."
Tom imagined Katharine stretched out on a rack, Puck turning the handles, Mab laughing and clapping over the sound of cracking and popping joints. Rose held over a fire. Rose thrown into ice water. Rose cut and sliced and divided, unable to die, unable to escape the pain. "You swore they would go unharmed," he growled.
"We swore such an oath," Melwas agreed with a slow, smug, perfect grin. "But eternity is time enough to learn ways to inflict suffering without causing harm."
A Faerie boon. Always binding, always cutting the hand that shook on it.
Tom’s gut tightened, but a strange calm settled over him even as terror made his limbs shake. "They aren’t safe, are they? No matter what I do?"
Melwas dipped his head in the smallest of bows. "You are slow to learn, little Tom. But learn you do.” And the Faerie King grinned with unbridled joy. He stood in his black armour, with Caledyr in his hand and a grip around the most important people in Tom’s world. For a moment, it felt like all Tom could do was surrender. But that wouldn’t keep Katharine and Rose safe. There was only one thing to do in the face of a monster like Melwas, and Tom didn’t need Caledyr to tell him what it was: fight.
The arrow whistled past Tom’s ear, embedded itself in Melwas’ eye, and the fay clapped a hand to his face and let out an almighty roar.
Six lifted his bow in salute. "Together," he said.
Tom touched his sword to his forehead. "Together," he agreed.
Those that could charged.
But if Tom had held any secret hope they could win, it died in the first moment. He wasn’t just tired; his body felt wrong. His sword was heavy, his step was leaden, his swings were slow and his mind was dull. And Melwas was strong, powered by a royal rage, faster with one eye than any mortal was with two. He seemed to dodge and parry every blow with ease, and Caledyr and Emyllt nicked and notched Tom’s sword into a misshapen mess, and the Faerie King laughed as he lopped off the tip with a flourish.
Then Jarnstenn swung Rimestenn’s hammer and landed a crushing blow on Melwas’ knee.
The fay roared, his leg bent in a way it shouldn’t be, he lashed out, cutting a nasty gash across Jarnstenn’s face and the dwarf fell.
But Melwas was wounded; his knee wasn’t healing, and now he was struggling to do
dge blows, and Dank sliced away a piece of armour, Emyr stabbed at Melwas’ face, Draig’s blade cut armour from the fay’s arm, and Tom drove his ruined iron blade towards the Faerie King’s chest.
“Enough,” Melwas growled, dropped Caledyr and caught Tom’s blow in his hand. The iron blade buried itself into his palm, all the way to the hilt but no further. Tom looked up into Melwas’ grinning eyes before the fay delivered a back-handed blow that send him down onto his back.
Tom blinked, shook his head. A moment later he felt warmth on his lip, his cheeks. He rolled onto his elbows, dumbly watched blood drip from his nose onto the sand.
Melwas pulled Tom’s sword free of his palm, twisted his grip on Emyllt and flicked the tip of the blade across Draig’s leg, splitting flesh and dropping the elf to the ground. Dank and Emyr fought side by side. But they were no match for Melwas. None of them were.
"Tom!"
It was Six. Crawling across the sand towards him, with the bow over his shoulder and a few arrows in his hands. Tom waved him away. “Get back," he told the elf. His voice sounded muffled, as if he was holding his nose. “It isn’t safe.” But where was? He shook his head and struggled to get to his hands and knees. He had to get back to the fight. But he was so tired. And he couldn’t win. He wasn’t a fighter. He wasn’t a warrior. He wasn’t a Knight of Tir.
“The hammer.” Six was pointing, excited, urgent. “Rimestenn’s hammer. Look what it did to Melwas’ knee.” There was grim satisfaction in the elf’s voice. “That’s how we beat him.”
The Faerie King’s leg was still bent at an awkward angle; the hammer had delivered a grievous wound. But it had fallen at the fay’s feet. There was no reaching it. Tom felt a wave of despair threaten to break over him, only for it to be sucked in and swallowed by the dark boulder he’d burned by healing himself.
“Magic,” he muttered. Spat blood on the sand and reached into his pocket.
The shard of Ambrose’s old stone prison was still there. Still threatened to tug Tom’s thoughts elsewhere. But either Tom was too tired to be distracted, or he had learnt to resist the stone’s efforts. He pulled it from his pocket and held it out for Six to see.
The Realm Rift Saga Box Set Page 109