Piper Prince

by Amber Argyle

  And then it was over. Larkin wasn’t even sure who’d won—not until Garrot stepped onto the dais. He paced the length of it, looking at the druids, his gaze wild, his body soaked in blood. Larkin was once again at his mercy.

  Fenwick had gambled on the rest of the Black Druids rushing to his defense, on the sheer number of them overpowering the wraith blades. His gamble had failed. She looked for Fenwick but couldn’t find him among the scores of dead and dying.

  He was a monster, but he was also the master. Someone must remain loyal to him, someone who could help her.

  She rammed her shoulder into Sideburns. “Let me go to Fenwick. Please.”

  Sideburns studied her. His gaze swung to the locked doors. He must have decided she had nowhere to run and no one who would help her. He released her, staying a step behind as she rushed through the bodies.

  “Years ago”—Garrot’s voice carried through the room—“my brother and I went into the forest after my own betrothed. Imagine my disbelief when I tracked not some beast, but a man. I found that man. He killed my brother and left me for dead. And when night came, so came the wraiths. But they did not try to harm me. No. The Wraith King took me to his home—a place of magic twisted to darkness. His servants bound my wounds, brought me food and water.

  “It was there I learned the truth. Ramass was a man cursed long ago by the pipers, as was his home and all his people. If he could just reach the source of the pipers’ magic, he could use the last of that magic to break the curse.”

  Larkin found Fenwick, his black robes soaked through, blood streaming from his mouth, which opened and closed soundlessly. She knelt beside him. “Is there anyone I can trust?”

  His gaze fixed on her. “Fawna. Run. Her brother.”

  Larkin instantly understood. Fawna must run to her brother for safety. She nodded, though she was in no position to help him or his wife. “Can you help me?”

  He shook his head, tears streaming from his eyes—whether from pain or fear or regret she couldn’t guess. He would die the same way he’d condemned Iniya’s family to die—by treachery and blood. She had no pity for the man before her, save for the man he could have been had he made better choices. Now it was too late.

  Still, she didn’t let go of his hand until his eyes slipped closed. He stopped breathing, gasped, and didn’t breathe again.

  “Brothers,” Garrot said. “Can you not see? With the gifts bestowed by the wraiths, we are more than a match for the pipers. No more weeping parents. No more hollow-eyed children. No more lovers stolen in the night. With the weapons of the wraiths, we are our own masters. We will defeat the pipers and the curse at once!”

  The druids murmured. A few cheered.

  “You are a fool and worse,” Larkin said, her voice trembling. She felt the attention of the room swivel to her as she pushed to her feet. Fenwick’s blood ran down her shins. “The wraiths will turn on you and kill you all! They—”

  Sideburns took hold of her arm and shook her. “Stop talking.”

  “Take her back to the pit,” Garrot said in disgust.

  Sideburns shoved her toward the door, through Black Druids who murmured uneasily. The word wraiths sliding through dozens of lips like a curse.

  “When they are finished with you,” she shouted, “you will all become mulgars—as will anyone else touched by the wraiths’ dark magic.”

  A druid stepped before her. Sour Face. He backhanded her. She staggered, fell to a knee, and spat blood, her teeth throbbing and her ears ringing.

  “You killed my friend,” Sour Face said.

  Her eye rapidly swelling shut, she looked up at the man. “You’re all going to wish you were dead.”

  “You first.” He drew back his foot to kick her.

  Sideburns drew his sword and stood over her, his gaze deadly.

  “She is still useful to us, Met.” Garrot’s voice drew closer with each word until he stood beside her.

  Met pointed at her. “She deserves to die for what she’s done.”

  “Hold her, West.”

  Warily watching Met, Sideburns—whom Garrot called West—held her by the arm. Garrot hauled out his knife. This could not be how she died—in a room full of death and hatred. She struggled against West.

  “Easy,” he murmured in her ear.

  Instead of plunging the knife into her chest, Garrot nicked her shirt at both shoulders and ripped the sleeves off, baring her sigils for all to see. He gripped her arm, pulling her tight against him, and said in her ear, “You’re part of my plan, Larkin. I need you alive, but I don’t need you healthy. I don’t need your piper friend at all. So keep your mouth shut, or I’ll make you wish you had.”

  Plan? Oh, ancestors, what plan?

  He hauled her up the steps and pushed her to the center of the stage. “A child of Idelmarch, bearing the magic of the pipers—the magic they could have freely given us but refused to share.”

  Larkin wanted to scream the truth, but she’d sworn to defend Tam’s life with her own. Right now, she thought that might be easier than keeping her mouth shut.

  Garrot tore open his own shirt, baring his chest, which was covered in black markings in the shape of twisted thorns—the antithesis of her sigils. The longer she stared at them … they seemed to move. Writhe. She wanted to look away, ached to look away, but they sucked her in, much like the wraiths’ poisoned gaze.

  “Yes, brothers. The Black Tree has endowed me with magic. As well as my men. It will endow you as well.”

  He turned from her, breaking the spell. She staggered back, blinking and gasping—she hadn’t realized she’d been holding her breath. To her astonishment, no one else seemed mesmerized by Garrot’s sigils. She didn’t know what that meant, but it made her afraid.

  As if on command, another druid approached the dais with a tray covered in glittering black thorns. “Come, brothers, take what is ours by birthright—the ancient magic of our own people. The power to defeat the pipers, to defeat the curse.”

  No. Even the druids understood evil. Surely they wouldn’t embrace it.

  A man came forward. Sour Face, or Met. Garrot slid a thorn into his skin. Larkin stared at the bulge as blood painted a garish line down his arm.

  More and more men lined up, their gazes eager. More and more received their thorns.

  The pipers were stretched to the limit defending against mulgars and wraiths. Would their sacred blades stand up to magical ones? If the Idelmarchians joined the wraiths’ side … She bit her fist to keep from screaming.

  “Make note of the ones who come last,” Garrot said under his breath to Met, who nodded. “End any who refuse.”

  “You are all going to die for this,” Larkin said.

  Garrot started as if he’d forgotten she was there. “Lock her back in the pit and make sure she stays there until the army is ready to march.”

  Larkin stumbled to the edge of the dark nothingness of the pit, her cheek hot and throbbing from where Met had hit her. “How long do I have?”

  The guards shifted.

  “We depart in four days,” West said.

  Her eyes slipped closed. “Have you ever seen a”—her mouth refused to form the word wraith—“shadow, West?”

  “You need to go down the ladder.”

  “I have,” she whispered. “I have smelled their foulness—the mineral rot of the grave. I have felt their touch—all screaming shadows. Heard their inhuman voices.” She turned to face him. His eyes reflected the lantern light. The three men with him had their hands on their clubs. “I would die before I let the shadows defile me.”

  She charged him. He’d clearly been anticipating it. But instead of drawing his club, he wrestled her to the ground and held her tight. “Prick her.”

  The druids had gilgad venom. The wraiths’ doing, surely. The dart’s sting was familiar, as was the pepper-tasting antidote that halted the poison from spreading to her lungs and killing her.

  “My name is Larkin. I am the daughter of Pennice and the
wife of Denan. I will not be taken by the shadow.”

  As the gilgad venom robbed her ability to move, her eyes grew heavy.

  “My name is Larkin,” she slurred. “I am the daughter of Pennice and the wife of Denan. I will not be taken by the shadow. I will not …”

  She woke in the pit. Her head throbbed nearly as hard as her teeth. West sat on a boulder beside her, one hand holding his opposite wrist. He pointed to the rim of the pit, where a man stood with a blow gun and dart.

  “Say my name, West,” she murmured.

  He pointed to a tureen of soup and some soft bread. “Any more trouble and we’ll dart and drug you. Do you understand?”

  “Did you dart and drug Tam?”

  “I didn’t.”

  She heard what he wasn’t saying—someone else did. Ancestors. Why did she think she could ever make the pipers and Idelmarchians work together? She never should have left Denan’s side.

  “Say my name.” She didn’t know why it was so important. Then she did. She wanted him to see her as a person. Not a traitor. A person. With a name.

  He pushed to his feet and left without a word. She waited until he and the other man were gone, until only the lantern kept her company. Then she wept.

  Four days passed slower and faster than she could have ever imagined. Four days in which the ghosts of the dead and her dread for the future haunted her.

  Garrot’s words echoed through her. “You’re part of my plan, Larkin. I need you alive, but I don’t need you healthy.”

  Ancestors, he was aligned with the wraiths. Eiryss’s words from the journal came to her mind.

  Consumed by evil, agents of night,

  Seek the nestling, barred from flight.

  Wraith Queen. Maisy had said they were searching for their Wraith Queen.

  Garrot was taking her to the wraiths. They were going to make her one of them. She felt Ramass’s burning cold, evil embrace, the oily corruption seeping into her soul.

  Larkin would die first.

  She pierced herself over and over again with her amulet until her arm grew infected and she made herself stop. And all she had to show for it was the same vision over and over again, until she had memorized Eiryss’s and Dray’s every movement. She read the lullabies until she knew them word for word. She became so wrapped up in Eiryss’s and Dray’s past that it began to feel more real than her own.

  All that kept her sane was Denan’s promise. He would come for her.

  Or she would escape and go to him.

  She practiced the moves Tam, Talox, and Denan had taught her until her muscles screamed for her to halt. West brought her another bucket of water and change of clothes. She barely recognized her reflection in the bucket’s still water. Her cheek was swollen and black, a dark wedge of bruising had settled in a line along her jaw. Blood splattered her skin. She probed her teeth, which didn’t feel as loose as they had before.

  She washed blood from the creases of her skin, throwing the ruined dress into the shadowed recesses of the pit, and dressed in another simple skirt and shirt. She wished for the soft trousers of the pipers—it would be much easier to fight her way free in pants.

  Every day, West brought her soup and some tea for the pain. Knowing she needed her strength, she ate hungrily, careful to chew with only the left side of her mouth—her teeth were still sore—and downed all her water. When she saw the light coming for her, she paced, shook out her limbs to loosen them, and practiced a few kicks and lunges.

  Her body was not responding as she liked, sluggish from so many days spent underground with such monotonous food. Plus, she was still healing from her injuries. Her braid was still damp from her bath when West appeared with two other men, a stretcher between them.

  He looked at her in disappointment.

  She didn’t understand his expression but didn’t care. She flared her shield and sword. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to come get me this time.”

  He leaned against the wall. “We’ll wait.”

  She huffed. “You’re going to have to wait a long time, Druid. I know where you’re taking me. And I will not go willingly.”

  “I’m not a druid,” West said. “I’m a soldier of the Idelmarch.”

  She eyed his companions, who wavered. She blinked to clear her eyes. They didn’t look like soldiers, but servants. Insulting. “I’m not going to the shadows.”

  West only watched her. She shrugged her shoulders to loosen them. Losing her balance, she stumbled to the side and struggled to remain upright. She froze and looked at him in horror. The soup. “You drugged me.”

  Whatever they’d given her worked faster and faster. She sat down hard, her magic snuffing out. She would be at their mercy in moments. And afterward … “Everything the shadows say is poison. As soon as they no longer need you, they will betray you.”

  “I’m just a soldier,” West said. “I have no more say in the matter than you.”

  “Is that what you tell yourself?” Her body tipped forward. She caught herself, pushed herself back upright. “Help me. Free me. I swear, my husband will reward you.”

  West didn’t answer.

  She tipped forward again. This time, her hands didn’t have the strength to hold her up. She collapsed, her face mashed against the rocks, her bruises throbbing.

  She came around to pain on her arm. West scratched her with a dart—like what had happened to Maisy. She’d retain some of her ability to move and speak. They bound her hands and rolled her onto the stretcher. Pinching herself, she fought a wave of exhaustion as they carried her to the side of the pit. West tied her legs to the poles while the servants tied two dangling ropes. So that was how they meant to haul her up.

  West straightened and pointed to one of the servants, a handsome boy about her own age. “Keep her steady.”

  They climbed the ladder out of the pit and disappeared over the edge. The servant knelt beside her. His hand cupped between her legs. “You know what we do with traitorous whores, little princess?”

  She managed a terrified groan as his hand slipped up her skirt. He covered her mouth. “Oh, shh. None of that. Might interrupt our fun.”

  She moaned again.

  “What are you doing?” West shouted from above.

  The servant jumped back. “Nothing, sir. Just arranging the ropes.”

  West dropped down the ladder so fast he nearly fell. “Were you manhandling the prisoner?”

  The servant backed away. “Of course not, sir.”

  West eyed her mussed skirts. She managed a trembling nod. He lunged, his fist flying into the servant’s face.

  The man hunched over, his hands cupping his shattered nose. “You broke it! The forest take you, you filthy—”

  West’s foot jammed between the servant’s legs. The man’s face went white, and he fell to his knees. West knelt next to her and rearranged her dress.

  “That won’t happen again. I swear it.”

  She gripped the sleeve of his shirt. “Not the first time,” she stumbled slowly through the words, “one of you has groped me.” She closed her eyes as Blue Eye’s face flashed in her mind, his hands gripping her bottom.

  West’s mouth hardened. “It won’t happen again, Larkin.”

  Her name. He’d said her name.

  She collapsed, her mind wandering and her body boneless as they hauled her up. Like that first night with Denan. She’d been drugged against the pain and carried over his shoulder into the boughs. The wraiths had come that night, their oily evil coating her one stroke at a time.

  Days of preparation in the pit, of planning and determination—all undone. She was helpless. The druids would make sure she stayed that way. She had to face the fact that she might not have a chance to escape. If that were the case, she still had her weapons. She could turn them on herself.

  She gasped on a hard sob. She did not want to die. Did not want to leave the people she loved. Did not want them to suffer because of her. But better safely dead than twisted into somethi
ng evil that would hunger for their destruction.

  She dozed then, unable to fight anymore, and woke in fits and starts as they wedged her onto the bed of straw in a wagon already packed with crates of food. West perched on one of the crates beside her and glared at the druids who leered at her over the edge of the wagon. One hocked through his nose and made to spit on her.

  West stood, his sword scraping free of its scabbard. “I’ve been charged with making sure no one molests her. And I mean to do my job.”

  The man turned and spat onto the ground. He glared at West, motioned to his friends, and moved off.

  West watched them for a while, then he crouched down beside her. “Would you rather be completely covered so they can’t stare at you? It might be hot.”

  West wasn’t a bad man. Just a soldier doing his job, and he had enough kindness in him to let her keep her dignity. A kind, honest man wouldn’t agree to work with the wraiths—not if he really understood them. She could use that to her advantage. Plant the seeds of truth and wait for them to take root. And maybe, just maybe, West would help her escape.

  She managed to nod. He dug around in a bag and produced a large blanket. He laid it over her, mused for a bit, pulled it off again, and arranged the blanket to create a sort of canopy over her. He nodded in approval and hopped down. From the direction of her feet came a pair of clopping hooves.

  “How is the mandala root working in conjunction with the gilgad venom?” Garrot asked.

  Mandala. That made sense. Her mother gave it to sleepless mothers who suffered from melancholy after the births of their babies. It was dangerous though. Too much led to death.

  “She’s groggy and limp, but aware,” West said.

  “Good.” The saddle creaked, and the horses made a few steps as if it was leaving.

  “Master Druid,” West said.

  Master Druid. Of course they’d made Garrot the master. Of course they had. At least she needn’t worry about seeking revenge. There wouldn’t be much of the druids left to pay for what they’d done to her—not after the wraiths were finished with them. But then again, there wouldn’t be much left of her either.