by Karen Chance
“How?” I interrupted, because Rosier could talk on his favorite subject for hours.
“My attempts to have a child among my own kind had been futile. Our birth rate is so low it might have taken millennia to sire a child—if I ever did. I came to earth looking for a human mother, because their fertility is legendary. But my children were too strong; they overwhelmed the women before they could give birth. So I tried the fey, hoping their strength would do the trick. But they damn well never get pregnant! I finally realized that a cross between the two, part human to aid with fertility, and part fey for resilience, might be the perfect combination—”
“So you came here looking for a broodmare.”
“And I found one. I found the perfect one.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Igraine?”
“No, not Igraine! Do you read at all?”
“Who, then?”
“Who do all the legends say was Merlin’s great love?”
“Merlin? But you’re not— Wait. Wait. Merlin helped Uther at Tintagel Castle. Merlin was the one who cast that illusion. The stories all say so, but Pritkin wasn’t even born then—”
“No, but Myrddin was the name I was going by at the time, which was later Latinized to—”
“That’s why all the legends say he aged backward!” I stared at him. “There were two of you!”
“Well, of course there were.” Rosier sounded like that should have been obvious. “The stories became confused because I named him after me. I was too angry with his mother at the time to use the name she’d chosen, and—”
“And you look alike,” I said as things finally fell into place.
“He received his good looks from me,” Rosier agreed smugly. “Although I was hiding them somewhat at the time, to look less like a lusty rival and more like a valued counselor—”
“Rival for who? Rosier, who the hell did Uther promise you?”
He looked at me sardonically. “Who do you think? Who in the Arthurian legends is the only person to have the name le fey?”
Chapter Seventeen
“Morgana?”
“Igraine’s daughter with Gorlois,” Rosier agreed. “They had three, but she was the only one to inherit her mother’s abilities, hence the sobriquet.”
“But . . . Morgana?”
“Morgaine, in fact. Her name was also Latinized in the later—”
“But she was . . . she was some kind of evil sorceress! Or did the legends get that wrong, too?”
“No, they were pretty spot-on there.”
“But you . . . but she . . . and Pritkin—”
“Considering who your mother is, I don’t think throwing stones—”
“Morgana?”
“Stop saying it like that. It made sense at the time.”
“How? How on earth does marrying an evil fey sorceress—”
“Quarter fey. And we never actually got around to marriage—”
“I don’t want to hear this.”
“She was lovely, like her mother,” he said, ignoring me. “Only less cold, less distant. At least with everyone else. She didn’t seem too fond of me—”
“Imagine!”
“Which was a problem, since I was not Uther, and do not rape—”
“Of course not.”
“If I did, why spend all that time getting to know her?” he demanded. “Why teach her magic?”
“You taught her?”
“Who else? Genetics is an odd thing, and she’d ended up quite a bit more powerful than her mother. Naturally, it made her curious about her other relations—and their magic—but Igraine would never allow her to be taught. Afraid her daughter would run off to Faerie if she had the skill, and she wanted her on earth.”
“But Morgaine had other ideas.”
He nodded. “It was how I won her over in the end. I agreed to teach her magic as a seduction technique. It worked . . . in a manner of speaking.”
“What manner? It either works or it doesn’t.”
“Ah, to be young. No. It either works or she imprisons you in a tree using one of your own spells, then goes off to explore Faerie. Fortunately, by that time she was already pregnant with Emrys and, once she realized this, she returned to give birth on earth and give the child to me.”
“And you put him with a couple of guardians who thought he was some kind of freak!”
“Who told you— Oh, never mind.” Rosier scowled. “Well, what did you expect me to do? I couldn’t take him back with me, now, could I? What if he hadn’t received my power? How would he have fit in on earth after growing up in the demon realms? Not that he would have grown up there. That damn court—they attacked him when I finally brought him back with me, did you know? Almost killed him, and that was after he was an adult and able to defend himself. Can you imagine what they would have done to a child?”
“So you left him on earth.”
“It seemed the best way. I put him with a farmer’s family for a while, then arranged for him to go off with Taliesin when he was older to get a bit of experience. The bard, part fey, little teched.” Rosier tapped the side of his head. “But a good sort overall. Roamed about all over the place. Thought it would help with the transition to my realm if Emrys had seen more than a pigsty in this one.”
“Arranged? Then you didn’t visit him.” It wasn’t a question. The Pritkin of this time period and I had had a conversation about his childhood recently, and he’d never once mentioned his father.
He’d never mentioned him.
“It seemed the best way,” Rosier repeated.
“Why?” I could feel my face flushing. “Because if he didn’t get your abilities, he’d be useless to you? And you’d abandon him, like all those fey fathers did their unwanted children—”
“Don’t be absurd! I would have provided for him—”
“Physically. But he would never have known who he was, what he was—”
Rosier looked confused. “If he didn’t inherit my power, what would he have been?”
“Your son!”
Damn it, just when I began to think Rosier might have some redeeming qualities, he pulled something like this. And he wasn’t lying; it was all over his face. He would have left a powerless child on earth, alone, with no explanation for his existence or further contact. He’d have written him off and moved on to the next experiment, and God knew Pritkin might have been better off if he had! But I knew what it was like to grow up questioning. To search out any clues to who you were and where you came from. To always wonder—what had they been like? Had they loved you at all? Had they—
Damn it!
“Did you even take him to see her grave?” I asked, after a moment.
“Whose?”
“Morgana’s. Morgaine’s.”
“What?”
“His mother’s grave. When you came back to claim him, did you—” I cut off. Because Rosier was suddenly looking . . . blank. Extremely blank. The kind of blank used by Vegas cardsharps and secretive vamps, which was a little odd on the face of someone whose coin in trade was emotion. “You didn’t, did you?”
“I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“Her grave isn’t on earth.”
“Where is it, then?”
“I assume it’s in Faerie.”
“You assume? You didn’t bury her?”
Rosier found an expression. It was crabby. “No.”
“Who did?”
“I have no idea.”
“You have no idea? She gave you this wonderful gift, the son you’d been wanting for centuries, and when she died, you didn’t even—”
I cut off.
“She . . . did die . . . right?” I asked slowly.
“Of course.”
“You saw the body?”
“Not
. . . exactly.”
“What do you mean, not exactly? You told Pritkin his mother was dead.”
“She is.”
“How do you know that if you didn’t see her?”
“I was told she would almost certainly—”
“You were told? By who?”
“By Nimue, if you must know. Showed up with a whole cadre of fey. Wouldn’t even let me speak to her. Said they had to rush her off to die in Faerie, where her spirit could be absorbed and reborn—or whatever their bizarre religion is, I don’t know.”
“No, you don’t,” I said, quietly furious. “But you told him she was dead.”
“Because she is.”
“Because you wanted him with you! You made him think there was nothing for him in Faerie!”
“There isn’t!”
“His mother—”
“Is dead. And if she isn’t, she never came back to see her darling boy, did she?” Rosier asked spitefully. “He’s better off—”
“That’s not for you to decide! I don’t see—”
Anything, because everything abruptly went dark.
“Got her!” a strange voice said, just as strong arms went around me from behind. I stared around, processing the fact that somebody had just dropped a bag over my head.
“And look what I’ve got,” another voice said, laughter threading through it. “Oh, ho, yes. We are about to be paid.”
“Hang on. Let’s get a look at her first.” The bag, or whatever it was, was abruptly pulled up, and a grinning fey peered in at me. One blue and one black eye surveyed my face for a moment, and the grin widened. “Oh yes, she’ll do. She’ll do quite well.” He looked up at his companion. “Told you I smelled something.”
And then the world winked out.
* * *
I woke up to the cadence of a man’s long strides, the ache of a sore stomach pressed against someone’s shoulder, and the light of a flickering torch as seen through wool. And the eerie tramp, tramp, tramp of what it took my brain a moment to recognize as the army I’d seen earlier. The one that sounded like it was all around us now.
“What’s this?” someone asked, and my ride stopped abruptly.
“Runaway. From the earlier attack.”
The bag was pulled up, and another fey peered in. A soldier, judging by the helmet, and by the lack of emotion on the coldly handsome face. At least what I could see of it before a torch was thrust into my eyes.
But I guess I didn’t look like much of a threat, because the perusal didn’t take long. “All right. Let this one through.”
We started moving again, but the fey had neglected to pull the wool back over my eyes, giving me a view of a bunch of equally impassive faces in tight formation, closing up behind us. And what appeared to be some kind of checkpoint, composed of hastily felled trees, which we’d just passed through. And of my captor, who put me down a little distance away, for a rest.
It gave me my first good look at him, and what a sight it was. Bifurcated hair, ebony dark on one side and silver bright on the other, fell around a face with a noticeable pigmentation change right down the middle: half swarthy, and half pale as milk. It fit the mismatched eyes, leaving him looking like two people had been stitched together to make one. And they were both staring at me in annoyance.
“You’re heavier than you look!”
“Then don’t . . . carry me,” I gasped. “I can walk—”
“And have you break for the tree line at the first opportunity? No.”
“I promise . . . I won’t do that—”
“Not to mention that if I set you down for too long, you’re anyone’s prize.” He glanced suspiciously around at the surrounding troops, then reached for me again.
I held out a hand. “Wait.”
“Cargo doesn’t talk,” he informed me. “Much less give orders.”
“I’m not cargo!”
“One more word and I put you back to sleep.”
“But—”
“And that’s the word.”
* * *
I woke a second time to noise—a lot of it. The bag was over my face again, but my hands were bound in front of me, allowing me to flip it up. From my vantage point, I mostly saw the fey’s ass, which was thick with muscle and shapelier than I’d have expected for one of them. And a clanging peddler’s cart behind us, laden with pots and pans and swinging chains, that was responsible for some of the racket.
The rest was coming from a crowd of people schlepping along the road or camped on the side. Dogs were barking, goats were bleating, a group of men were clustered around a fire, belting out a drinking song, and a crowd of fey and humans were yelling bets around a makeshift ring. Where two black-haired fey were wrestling, their shirts off, their bodies covered only in muddy loincloths.
At least they were until they got too close to a group of raucous women, who appeared to have had too much to drink. And who snatched one poor guy’s butt covering, laughing uproariously as the fey looked around in confusion, his two pale moons shining in the firelight. For a second—until his opponent took the opportunity to toss him in the mud.
“Cheating! What do you call that? It’s cheating!” a man started yelling as the crowd laughed and jeered and threw money at the victor, who started parading around with arms held high, like a boxer who’d just won a bout.
At least, he did until his opponent jumped up and smashed him in the face. And then lunged after the woman who’d cost him the match, who scrambled up, still laughing. And took off at a run, purloined loincloth held high over her head and waving like a banner.
I just stared.
The Light Fey I’d encountered so far had been . . . different. Violent and deadly, but unlike all the other people who kept trying to kill me, they hadn’t seemed to get too worked up about it. As in, a Vulcan would have shown more emotion, a robot more personality.
Of course, my experience had been brief, and composed of disciplined soldier types, which I was guessing these weren’t. In fact, I wasn’t even sure that they were fey, not entirely. And that went for most of the spectators, too.
We waded through the crowd around the ring while I stared at slightly pointy ears on human heads, at a red-haired boy with dimples and freckles and bright silver eyes, at perfectly formed fey but of human height, and at a sweet-faced girl with needle-sharp teeth, more pointed than vamp fangs, and a mouth that was midnight blue inside. The only ones who appeared to be purebred were some of the merchants, who seemed to be human, and the guards scattered here and there, in dull pewter armor, who looked to be fey. But the rest were clearly mixed.
Like the guy I was plopped down in front of a moment later, near a large tent in the middle of camp.
He was dressed in a brown velvet tunic and leggings and was seated at a small table, scratching on a tablet with a stylus. Which was more impressive than it sounds, considering that his hands were even more webbed than Rosier’s. He looked up. “What’s this?”
“Payment.”
The man’s large, rather florid face got a little redder. “You lose ten slaves and you bring me one in return?”
“Ah, but this one’s special.”
“That’s what you always say!”
“But this time, it’s true.” My captor tossed my backpack on the ground, spilling Rosier out into the dirt.
The merchant did not look impressed. “What in Odin’s name is that?”
“He’s mine.” I grabbed Rosier, jerking him over to me. He was slimy and muddy, and now also straw-covered, and the heart visible between his semitransparent ribs was almost beating out of his chest. I wasn’t sure why, maybe adrenaline, or maybe dying again when you haven’t fully formed yet was a very bad thing.
He didn’t appear to be in favor of it, especially when the merchant pulled out a knife.
“He’s mine,” I
repeated. “I need him!”
“For what?” The man looked revolted, which was pretty rich for a guy with gills in his neck.
“He’s her familiar,” my captor said, causing both me and the merchant to look at him in surprise.
“Her what?”
The fey grinned, rocking back on his heels. “She’s a witch.”
The merchant scowled. “I have too many of those already.”
“But witches are worth more—”
“And human women are less trouble! She escapes before my buyer arrives, and I don’t get paid at all, do I?”
“But he’ll be here tomorrow. And to point out the obvious: pretty face, blond hair, magic.” The fey rubbed his fingers together. “Coin.”
The merchant did not look convinced.
“And big tits,” the fey added, jerking up my tee. And looking smug, like he’d just made the sale.
The merchant looked sourly at my sports bra, which tended to flatten things out somewhat.
The fey’s eyes followed, and he frowned, like he’d expected something different. “Be that as it may, she’s worth at least . . . six of the ones I lost.”
“Six of the ones you let those bitches steal, you mean, and not by half. Two.”
“Five. None of the others were magical—”
“As far as I can tell, neither is she!”
“What do you call that thing?” The fey pointed at Rosier.
“I don’t know what you call that thing, but I don’t deal in that thing. I deal in women, and it ain’t one!”
“Four, then. My final offer, or I go elsewhere. I could even try to sell her myself—”
“Good luck wi’ that. There’s such a glut tonight, you won’t make half the price of the three I’ll give ye—”
“Then it’s true. Half the slaves in Britain are here tonight.”
“Aye, Lady’s orders. Wanted ’em all in one place.”
“For what?”
“Why don’t you go ask her?” the merchant said, exasperated. “Now, do we have a deal or not?”
The fey sighed. “Three it is.” He leaned over to cut my bonds. “Don’t worry, lovely one. You’re going to a better place.”