The faeries all around them were giggling, uproarious, clutching at each other, and the thought that it was Emma's horror and confusion that was making them chuckle sent spikes of murderous rage through Cristina's veins.
It was one thing to study faeries. One thing to read about how their emotions were not like human emotions. How the Unseelie Court faeries were raised to find pleasure in the pain of others. To wrap you in a net of words and lies and watch smiling while you choked on their tricks.
It was another thing to see it.
There was a sudden commotion. The Unseelie King ran to the opposite edge of the pavilion; he was shouting orders, the knights in sudden disarray.
Julian, Cristina thought. And yes, she could see him, Julian holding Erec in front of him, at the foot of the King's pavilion. He had deliberately drawn the King away from Emma and Cristina.
"It will be easy enough to decide this," Cristina said. She took her balisong from her belt and held it out to the champion. "Take this," she said.
"Cristina, what are you doing--?" Emma said.
"It is cold iron," said Cristina. She took another two steps toward the champion. His face was changing even as she watched, less and less like Emma's, more and more like something else--something grotesque living under the skin. "He's a Shadowhunter. Cold iron shouldn't bother him."
She moved closer--and the champion who had looked like John Carstairs changed completely. His face rippled and his body flexed and changed, his skin growing mottled and gray-green. His lips pushed outward as his eyes sprang horrifyingly wide and yellow, his hair receding to show a slick, lumpy pate.
Where Emma's father had stood was a faerie knight with a squat body and the head of a toad. Emma stared, white-faced. Its wide mouth opened and it spoke in a croaking voice.
"At last, at last, free to slough the illusion of the disgusting Nephilim--"
It didn't finish its sentence. Emma had seized up Cortana and lunged forward, slamming the blade into the knight's throat.
It made a wet, squelching sound. Pus-colored blood sprayed from its wide mouth; it staggered back, but Emma followed, twisting the hilt of the knife. The stench of blood and the sound of wetly tearing flesh almost made Cristina vomit.
"Emma!" Cristina shouted. "Emma!"
Emma drew the sword back and stabbed again, and again, until Cristina grabbed her shoulders and yanked her back. The faerie knight sank to the ground, dead.
Emma was shaking, spattered with foul blood. She swayed on her feet.
"Come on." Cristina grabbed her friend's arm, started to pull her away from the pavilion. Just then the air exploded with a rustling, singing sound. Arrows. They were tipped with fire, lighting the clearing with an eerie, moving glow. Cristina automatically ducked, only to hear a loud clang a few inches from her head. Emma had whipped Cortana to the side and an arrow had struck the blade, crumbling instantly into pieces.
Cristina picked up her pace. "We have to get out of here--"
A flaming arrow shot by them and struck a banner dangling from the King's pavilion. The banner caught alight in crackling flames. It illuminated the princes running from the pavilion, dropping off the edges into shadow. The King still stood before his throne, though, staring down into emptiness. Where was Jules? Where had he and Erec gone?
As they neared the edge of the clearing, the faerie woman in the bone dress loomed up in front of them. Her eyes were fish-green, without pupils, shimmering like oil in the starlight. Cristina brought her foot down hard on the faerie woman's; her screams were drowned in the Court's howls as Cristina elbowed her aside. She crashed into the pavilion, small bones raining down from her gown like misshapen snow.
Emma's hand was in Cristina's. Her fingers felt like ice. Cristina tightened her grip. "Come on," she said, and they plunged back into the trees.
*
Mark didn't dare go far. Julian, Emma, and Cristina were still in the Court. He pulled Kieran behind a thick oak tree and drew him down to sit leaning against it.
"Are you all right? Are you in pain?" Mark demanded.
Kieran looked at him with clear exasperation. Before Mark could stop him, he reached back, grasped the arrow, and yanked it out. Blood came with it, a welter that soaked the back of his shirt.
"Christ, Kieran, what the hell--"
"What foreign gods do you call on now?" Kieran demanded. "I thought you said I wasn't dying."
"You weren't." Mark pulled off his linen vest, wadding up the material to press it to Kieran's back. "Except now I might kill you for being so stupid."
"Hunters heal fast," said Kieran with a gasp. "Mark. It really is you." His eyes were luminous. "I knew you would come for me."
Mark said nothing. He was concentrating on holding the cloth against Kieran's wound, but a sense of anxiety pressed against the inside of his rib cage. He and Kieran had hardly ended things on good terms. Why would Kieran think Mark would come for him, when Mark very nearly hadn't?
"Kier," he said. He moved the vest away; Kieran was right about the healing. The blood had slowed to a sluggish trickle. Mark dropped the blood-wet linen and touched the side of Kieran's face. It was furnace hot. "You're burning up." He reached up to sling the elf-bolt necklace back around Kieran's throat, but the other boy stopped him.
"Why do I have your necklace?" he said, frowning. "It should be yours."
"I gave it back to you," Mark said.
Kieran gave a hoarse laugh. "I would remember that." His eyes went wide then. "I don't remember killing Iarlath," he said. "I know that I did. They told me that much. And I believe it; he was a bastard. But I don't remember it. I don't remember anything after I saw you through the window of the Institute, in the kitchen, talking to that girl. Cristina."
Mark went cold all over. Automatically, he slung the elf-bolt necklace over his head, feeling it thump against his chest. Kieran didn't remember?
That meant he didn't remember betraying Mark, telling the Wild Hunt that Mark had shared faerie secrets with Nephilim. He didn't remember the punishment, the whippings Julian and Emma had borne.
He didn't remember that Mark had broken things off between them. Given him his necklace back.
No wonder he'd thought Mark would come for him.
"That girl Cristina is right here," said a voice above them. Cristina had joined them in the shadows. She looked disheveled, though not nearly as much as Emma, who was splattered with faerie blood and bleeding from a long scratch on her cheek. Mark sprang up.
"What's going on? Are either of you hurt?"
"I--I think we're all right," Emma said. She sounded bewildered and worryingly blank.
"Emma killed the King's champion," said Cristina, and then closed her mouth. Mark sensed there was more to it, but didn't press.
Emma blinked, slowly focusing on Mark and Kieran. "Oh, it's you," she said to Kieran, sounding more like her old self. "Weasel Face. Committed any acts of monstrous personal betrayal lately?"
Kieran looked stunned. People didn't usually talk to Unseelie princes that way, and besides, Mark thought, Kieran no longer remembered why Emma might be angry with him or accuse him of betrayal. "You brought her here with you to rescue me?" he said to Mark.
"We all came to rescue you." It was Julian, only partly visible behind Erec, who he was shoving ahead of him. Emma exhaled, an audible sound of relief. Julian looked over at her quickly, and they shared a glance. It was what Mark had always thought of as the parabatai glance: the quick once-over to make sure the other person was all right, that they were beside you, safe and living. Though now that he knew of Julian's true feelings for Emma, he couldn't help but wonder if there was a layer more to what they shared.
Erec's throat was bleeding where the dagger had likely slipped; he was glaring out from beneath black brows, his face contorted into a snarl.
"Blood traitor," he said to Kieran. He spat past the knife. "Kin-slayer."
"Iarlath was no kin of mine," said Kieran, in an exhausted voice.
"He w
as more your kin than these monsters," said Erec, glaring around at the Shadowhunters surrounding him. "Even now, you betray us for them."
"As you betrayed me to the King our father?" said Kieran. He was huddled among the tree roots, looking surprisingly small, but when he tipped his face back to look at Erec, his eyes were hard as gems. "You think I do not know who told the King I killed Iarlath? You think I do not know at whose feet I can lay the blame for my exile to the Hunt?"
"Arrogant," said Erec. "You have always been arrogant, whelp, thinking you belonged in the Court with the rest of us. I am the King's favorite, not you. You earned no special place in his heart or the hearts of the Court."
"Yet they liked me better," Kieran said quietly. "Before--"
"Enough," Julian said. "The Court is on fire. Knights will be coming after us as soon as the chaos dies down. It's madness to stay here and gossip."
"Important Court business is not gossip," snarled Erec.
"It is to me." Julian peered through the woods. "There must be a quick way out of here, toward Seelie Lands. Can you lead us?"
Erec was silent.
"He can," said Kieran, rising unsteadily to his feet. "He can't lie and say it's not possible; that's why he's not talking."
Emma raised an eyebrow at Kieran. "Weasel Face, you're surprisingly helpful when you want to be."
"I wish you would not be so familiar," Kieran said disapprovingly.
Erec made a grunting noise--Julian was digging the knife into his neck. There was a slight tremble to Julian's hand, his grip on the blade. Mark imagined it must be a physical strain to keep Erec contained, but he suspected there was more to it than that. Julian did not have a torturer's nature, for all that he could and would be ruthless in protecting those he loved.
"I will kill you if you don't take us in the right direction," he said now. "I will do it slowly."
"You promised my father--"
"I am not a faerie," said Julian. "I can lie."
Erec looked darkly furious, in a way that alarmed Mark. Faeries could hold grudges for a very long time. He began to walk, though, and the others followed him, leaving behind the orange light glowing from the clearing.
They headed into the dark fastness of the forest. The trees grew close together, and there were thick roots snaking up through the dark soil. Clusters of flowers in deep colors, blood-reds and poison-greens, clustered around the low boughs of the trees. They passed a giggling tree faerie who sat in the fork of a branch, naked except for an elaborate net of silvery wires, and winked at Mark as he went by. Kieran was leaning heavily against his shoulder; Mark kept a hand splayed in the small of Kieran's back. Were the others puzzled or wondering what was going on between them? He saw Cristina glance back toward him, but couldn't read her expression.
Emma and Cristina walked close together. Julian was in front, letting Erec guide them. Mark still felt uneasiness. It seemed as if they had gotten away too easily. For the King of the Unseelie Court to have let them go, and to have them take his favorite son . . .
"Where are the others?" Erec asked as the trees thinned out and the sky, multicolored in all its glory, became visible. "Your friends?"
"Friends?" Mark said, in a puzzled tone.
"The archers," said Erec. "Those flaming arrows in the Court--clever, I'll grant you. We wondered how you would cope with weapons once we took your angel powers away."
"How did you do that?" Mark asked. "Did you unhallow all this land?"
"That wouldn't make a difference," said Emma. "Runes work even in demon realms. This is something stranger."
"And the blight," said Mark. "What is the meaning of the blighted land? It is everywhere in the Unseelie Lands, like cancer in a sick body."
"As if I would speak of it," snapped Erec. "And it is no use threatening me--it would be worth my life to tell you."
"Believe me, I'm tired of threatening you myself," said Julian.
"Then let me go," said Erec. "How long do you plan to keep me? Forever? For that is how long you'd have to use me for protection to keep my father and his knights from finding you and cutting your throats."
"I said I was tired of threatening you, not that I was going to stop doing it," said Jules, tapping the knife blade. They'd come to the edge of the forest, where the trees ended and fields began. "Now, which way?"
Erec set off into the field, and they followed. Kieran was leaning more heavily on Mark. His face was very pale in the moonlight. The stars picked out the blue and green in his hair--his mother had been an ocean faerie, and a little of the shimmering loveliness of water remained in the colors of Kieran's hair and eyes.
Mark's arm curved around him unconsciously. He was angry at Kieran, yes, but here in Faerie, under the brilliant polychromatic stars, it was hard not to remember the past, not to think of all the times he'd clung to Kieran for warmth and companionship. How it had been just them, and he had thought perhaps it always would be. How he'd thought himself lucky that someone like Kieran, a prince, and beautiful, would ever look at him.
Kieran's whisper was a light caress against Mark's neck. "Windspear."
Windspear was Kieran's horse, or had been. He had come with him from the Court when Kieran had joined the Hunt.
"What about him? Where is he?"
"With the Hunt," said Kieran, and coughed, hard. "He was a gift from Adaon, when I was very young."
Mark had never before met Kieran's half brothers, the dozens of princes by different mothers who vied for the Unseelie Throne. Adaon, he knew from Kieran's tales, was one of the kinder ones. Erec was the opposite. He had been brutal to Kieran for most of his life. Kieran rarely spoke of him without anger.
"I thought I heard his hoofbeats," Kieran said. "I hear them still."
Mark listened. At first he heard nothing. His hearing was not as sharp as Kieran's or any true faerie's, at least not when his runes weren't working. He had to strain his ears to finally hear the sound. It was hoofbeats, but not Windspear's. Not any one horse's. This was a thunder of hoofbeats, dozens of them, coming from the forest.
"Julian!" he cried.
There was no keeping the panic from his voice; Jules heard it and turned, fast, his grip on Erec loosening. Erec tore away, exploding into motion. He streaked across the field, his black cloak flying behind him, and plunged into the forest.
"And he was such awesome company, too," Emma muttered. "All that 'Nephilim, you will die in a welter of your own blood' stuff was really refreshing." She paused. She had heard the horses. "What's that--?"
Cortana seemed to fly into her hand. Julian was still holding his dagger; Cristina had reached for her balisong.
"The King's cavalry," said Kieran, with surprising calm. "You cannot fight them."
"We must run," Mark said. "Now."
No one argued. They ran.
They tore through the field, leaped a stone wall on the far side, Mark half-carrying Kieran over. The ground had begun to tremble by then with the force of distant hoofbeats. Julian was swearing, a low steady stream of curses. Mark guessed he didn't get to swear all that much back at the Institute.
They were moving fast, but not fast enough, unless they could find more woods, some kind of cover. But nothing was visible in the distance, and looking up at the stars told Mark little. He was exhausted enough that they dizzied him. Half his strength felt as if it were going to Kieran: not just dragging him along but willing him upright.
They reached another wall, not high enough to stop faerie horses but high enough to be annoying. Emma leaped it; Julian sprang after her, his fingers lightly brushing the top of the wall as he sailed over.
Kieran shook his head. "I cannot do it," he said.
"Kier--" Mark began angrily, but Kieran had his head down, like a beaten dog. His hair fell, sweat-tangled, into his face, and his shirt and the waist of his breeches were soaked in blood. "You're bleeding again. I thought you said you were healing."
"I thought I was," Kieran said softly. "Mark, leave me here--"
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A hand touched Mark's shoulder. Cristina. She had put her knife away. She looked at him levelly. "I'll help you get him over the wall."
"Thanks," Mark said. Kieran didn't seem to even have the energy to look at her angrily. She scrambled to the wall's top and reached her hands down; together she and Mark hauled Kieran up over the barrier. They jumped down, into the grass beside Emma and Julian, who were waiting, looking worried. Kieran landed beside them and collapsed to the ground.
"He can't keep running," said Mark.
Julian glanced over the wall. The hoofbeats were loud now, like thunder overhead. The leading edge of the Unseelie cavalry was in view, a dark and moving line. "He has to," he said. "They'll kill us."
"Leave me here," said Kieran. "Let them kill me."
Julian dropped to one knee. He put a hand under Kieran's chin, forcing the prince's face up so their eyes met. "You called me ruthless," he said, his fingers pale against Kieran's bloodied skin. "I have no pity for you, Kieran. You brought this on yourself. But if you think we came all the way here to save your life just to let you lie down and die, you're more foolish than I thought." His hand fell from Kieran's face to his arm, hauling him upright. "Help me, Mark."
Together they lifted Kieran between them and started forward. It was a blindingly hard task. Panic and the strain of holding up Kieran threw off Mark's hunting senses; they stumbled over rocks and roots, plunged into a thick copse of trees, its branches reaching down to tear at their skin and gear. Halfway through the copse, Kieran went limp. He had finally fainted.
"If he dies--" Mark began.
"He won't die," Julian said grimly.
"We could hide him here, come back to get him--"
"He's not a spare pair of shoes. We can't just leave him somewhere and expect him to be there when we get back," Julian hissed.
"Would you two stop--" Emma began, and then broke off with a gasp. "Oh!"
They had burst out of the small patch of trees. In front of them rose a hill, green and smooth. They could climb it, but it would demand digging in with hands and feet, scrambling over the top. It would be impossible to do and keep Kieran with them.
Even Julian stopped dead. Kieran's arm had been looped around Julian's neck; now it swung free, dangling at his side. Mark had the distant horrible feeling he was already dead. He wanted to lay Kieran down in the grass, check for his heartbeat, hold him as a Hunter should be held in his last moments.
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