All That Burns

by Ryan Graudin

  There’s no way the skeletal creature before me could be her. Pendragon’s bride.

  “Is it true?” I look back at Titania. “Did you know?”

  “It’s her. By the Greater Spirit.” The queen’s face is paler than a Faery light: shocked and ghost white. “There’s some spell keeping her from death. Mab must have kept her alive all these years . . .”

  “But why?”

  “Mab loved Arthur,” Titania reminds me. “The Pendragon chose Guinevere instead, and ended up dead because of her betrayal. Mab never was one to forget things. Nor forgive.”

  She’s right, I realize as I read the magic shimmering around Guinevere. The spell reeks of the old Faery queen. It’s looped, which explains why it didn’t fall alongside Mab’s wards. Guinevere’s life is knotted up just like Lord Winfred’s Faery lights. Cursed to go on and on.

  “The queen had her brought here after King Arthur’s passing,” Alistair tells us. “We thought it strange that a mortal should be sent to this place. It took us years to realize who she was.”

  The choke of these walls grows. Crushes. Guinevere clutches her prison bars with ratted nails.

  “The circling sea will swallow us whole. Drowning kingdom! I flipped wrong.” Her words howl. They make the sick inside me stretch and swallow.

  “The dark has eaten her mind,” Kieran says at my back. “She doesn’t have magic to protect herself, like the others.”

  “Magic?!” Guinevere’s shriek sounds like a Banshee’s. Bone-white fingers choke the bars. “I dream!”

  There’s no way of knowing where her clouded irises are staring. I feel her gaze nonetheless. It peels at my skin, excavates my bones. “They know not the secrets of sleep, sister. My only escape. Worlds which once were. Are. Will be. These eyes are blind but I still see. Have you found them yet? The dreams?”

  My mouth is too dry to answer. The tips of my fingers shake, but my lungs refuse to move. I can’t breathe.

  “Let me show you!” The creature that was Guinevere lunges toward me. Her body lands against the bars, but her hand keeps reaching. Those ragged nails wrap around my bicep and sink through my skin.

  I don’t even have time to feel pain, the burn of those nails anchored into my muscle. Kieran’s arm hooks around my waist, pulls me back from the cell. Alistair glides to the bars, a spell pulling like caramel from his slow lips. The magic itself is viper fast, tossing Guinevere back. It snaps her against the cell’s far wall like a broken doll.

  There’s red on my arm, weeping from five crimson moons. Guinevere slouches against the stones, wailing. The sound pierces every part of this corridor. Floods its dark with feeling and loss.

  “We’ve seen enough here.” Even Queen Titania appears shaken; she has to yell to make herself heard.

  Alistair turns and starts to drift back into the tunnels. We follow his scar-light away from the screams of Arthur’s queen. Yet no matter how many lengths of carved-out earth we put between us, I can still hear her.

  Kieran’s arm stays around my waist, guiding me. Every one of my steps shakes. Colors burst into my vision. I shut my eyes but they’re still there. Along with the milky white of Guinevere’s pupils.

  Once the earth surrounding us would have fed me. Made me stronger. Now all I want is to crawl out. Breathe sunlight and sea breeze.

  “Air,” I gasp. “I need air.”

  “Kieran.” Titania speaks past me. “Take Lady Emrys aboveground. I’ll be up to consult with her in a moment. I must talk with Alistair a bit longer.”

  The Ad-hene pulls me away from the queen and Alistair’s murmurings. Step by step we rise. Up the tangled maze.

  As soon as my steps grow firm again I stop, let his arm slide from me. It feels strange and unsettling to be touching someone who isn’t Richard. Now that I’m so close, I see the markings just under the powder white of Kieran’s skin. They swirl like the filigree on my ring—silver currents. The muscles beneath are cut and sloping.

  I’m staring at them too close, too long. I realize this and my cheeks start to burn. For the first time I’m grateful for the darkness.

  “What’s wrong?” he asks.

  I look away. My fingers find my ring, turn it over and over on my finger. “I—I can walk myself.”

  “Can you?”

  “Of course.” I sidestep him, grateful that my feet are as steady as I claimed they were. “I may be a faagailagh, but I’m not helpless.”

  “I never thought you were.” Kieran turns, his coal-black curls still perfectly set as he moves past. Every one of his strides is wide and fast. I struggle to keep up. “I remember you, you know. From the Guard transport. You were very powerful for one so young. Queen Mab’s favorite. Her pet. They say you killed her. Before you gave up your magic.”

  I don’t answer. My fingers spin the jade and silver around and around, into a raw circle.

  “You intrigue me.” Kieran’s eyes glitter: dark through dark. “You were a maelstrom. Now you’re a fire without flame. I don’t understand why you would ever put it out.”

  “Power isn’t everything,” I tell him.

  “And love is?”

  A light springs up ahead. The soft touch of morning. We round a final bend and autumn air curls into the tunnels, cleans out my head. I breathe it in and focus on the day which unfolds before me. Blue sky, bold sea. These keep the terrible pictures of a rotting Guinevere and the empty cell at bay.

  I’d been hoping that when we reached the ledge, Kieran would turn and leave me. But he stays. His eyes squint under the daylight. He crouches like before, glares out over the misting waves.

  “None of the others understood either,” I tell him. “I did not understand.”

  The etchings of his arm catch the sun. They gleam like chain mail. He almost looks as if he’s part machine.

  “Do you really think the mortals will let you into their world? That you can become one of them just by giving up some spells?” He says this and all I can see is the scorn on Elaine Forsythe’s face. Tables full of poisonous flowers. Flashing paparazzi lights.

  “I’m trying.” I stare down at my bare toes, still sore.

  “It must be a mighty thing. This love. If you’re putting yourself through such misery for it.”

  Kieran tilts his head to the side as he looks at me. Those eyes cut like the edge of a spearhead. His pale skin catches shadows so easily, highlighting the angles of his muscles and bones. The shine of morning light against his black hair makes him all contrasts. Like a charcoal sketch.

  I’m staring too long. Again.

  “I’m not miserable,” I protest.

  Kieran keeps staring back—his gray eyes wash over me.

  I clutch my ring so tight I’m afraid my finger might break.

  “My mistake,” he says. His stare travels down my arm, where the blood is drying in smears. “Would you like me to heal that?”

  The punctures still throb and sting. I know that one word from the Ad-hene’s mouth could erase the pain. But the idea of his spell seeping into my skin—all smolder and sulfuric power—reminding me of the maelstrom I used to be . . .

  I don’t need Kieran’s magic. I’m mortal now. And mortals’ wounds must heal on their own.

  Before I can answer Titania emerges from the tunnel, Alistair behind her. The leader of the Ad-hene is almost unbearable to look at in the light; the bright white of his hair and skin is searing. The sterling tracings on his left arm loop and swirl like mixed-up fish scales.

  “How long has this prisoner has been gone?” Titania asks.

  “We last checked the wings over a fortnight ago. The break could have occurred at any time since then.”

  “Two weeks . . .” The Faery queen’s voice drops off.

  A fierce wave dashes against our cliff, spraying frigid mist over our skin. One of Mab’s most dangerous prisoners is loose in a world of defenseless mortals. This thought alone is enough to freeze my blood.

  Alistair echoes my fears. “The prisoner will be
on the mainland by now. My guards searched but found no traces of an aura on the island.”

  “I’ll coordinate scouts,” Titania says, more for my sake than Alistair’s. “Start a tracking and retrieval process as soon as I find a way to replace the wards. Hopefully we can find the prisoner before any harm is done.”

  “I offer the service of my Ad-hene.” The whitewashed spirit bows. I notice that his hair, like Kieran’s, doesn’t move against the breeze. As if he’s not actually a living thing, but a statue which moves and talks.

  “That won’t be necessary.” Titania’s words are as stretched as her lips. “Your place is here. With the rest of the prisoners.”

  Alistair’s all harshness now, face-to-face with the Faery queen. “You’ll need the Ad-hene. They’re far more familiar with the prisoner’s aura. We’ve lived side by side with these creatures for years. Your kind has forgotten them altogether.”

  He’s right. Titania knows this. But I can tell by the way her lips thin even more that she’s thinking of the markings on the Ad-henes’ arms. How they’re the only way out of the Labyrinth.

  Maybe the old ways are shifting, waking while the mortals trim back electricity and plant new trees. Changing things. Maybe the prisoner stumbled upon a crack in the Labyrinth’s ancient, tangled spells. Maybe the island’s maze truly did swallow the escaped spirit whole.

  Or maybe the Ad-hene let it out.

  “The Ad-hene’s place is here,” Titania says again. Her voice is needle sharp, jabbed straight at Alistair. “Is that understood?”

  The weight of the moment between words is heavy. Alistair’s great age and Titania’s crown crowd the cliff. Each too big for the other.

  “The Ad-hene are loyal.” Alistair’s words are wizened-oak and weary. “We will do as the queen asks.”

  “What does this mean?” I look to the queen. “What must we do?”

  One of Titania’s silver eyebrows rises at the word we. “This is no longer your battle, Lady Emrys. I brought you here only to see if you recognized the magic, not to strategize. You will go back to London and focus on being a good liaison. The Frithemaeg will handle this.”

  Her words jar. Remind me of the unspoken rift between us. She has magic and I do not. I’m the one who’s powerless here. “And what will you do?”

  “I’ll send an order to the Guard to be put on high alert. Besides that and the scouts, there’s nothing I can do.”

  “What should I tell Richard?”

  “Tell him nothing,” Titania says firmly. “There’s no need to worry the king with this. Not until we know more. It could be that this prisoner just wants to be free. That it will disappear altogether.”

  Wind licks the cliffside, stealing the last of Titania’s words and tossing them into the waters like they’re nothing. They are. Nothing. All of us felt the stains of anger on those prison walls. The kind of rage which never fades away. The kind of rage which demands revenge.

  The Labyrinth’s black shadows have spilled into the world, calling for blood. Both Alistair and Kieran are staring at the vastness of the sea. It’s almost as if they can see the doom on the other shore. Pieces of it dance behind their eyes.

  Kieran finally tears his gaze away. It lands straight on me. My stomach tightens and my skin prickles. He has the darkness of the Labyrinth behind each and every word when he speaks.

  “I wouldn’t count on it.”

  Four

  Every muscle in my body is cramped from those hours on the Kelpie. Even without heels on, my feet wobble like dangerously placed dominos. I’ve been in this mortal form for two months, yet it still amazes me that only forty sleepless hours can weaken me so completely.

  I shuffle into the sitting room and Richard is there: curled on a settee, asleep. His cheek is smudged against its embroidered cushion, hands bunched in front of his face. He’s still wearing his tuxedo—wrinkled black and stark white. He must have stayed up all night. Waiting for me.

  The coffee table supports my theory. Its surface is cluttered with signs of Richard’s sleepless night. His laptop is perched there, covered with papers and illegible ink notes. A tray of tea and untouched biscuits sits beside it. And next to that is a newspaper, splayed wide. There are the usual headlines: UNDERGROUND TRAINS MALFUNCTIONING ON THE CIRCLE LINE and THE SECOND LIGHTS-DOWN: ARE YOU READY?

  And then there’s me.

  I’m all over the front page. Pictured mid-leap. Loose hair flares like fire around my shoulders. The flowers and frills of my dress parachute, showing a good deal of leg.

  Probably not what Anabelle meant when she told me to impress the press.

  Richard’s face is on the edge of the photograph, its expression made of agony. His hand grasps at empty space. Reaching for someone already gone.

  TURMOIL ON THE THAMES

  One of the year’s most anticipated social events was crashed by an unwelcome guest on Friday evening. Lord and Lady Winfred’s guests were being wined and dined to perfection when a monster appeared in the water.

  “It was shiny and black!” said one eyewitness, Doris Hapsley, a waitress at the Winfreds’ gala. “It kept ramming into the boat, trying to sink us. I thought for sure I was going to die.”

  The most notable attendees of the evening—King Richard and his escort, Lady Emrys Léoflic—were predictably in the middle of the fray. Britain’s fledgling king and the former Fae were spotted in a heated argument just moments before the redhead threw herself over the side.

  “It was very clear they were upset with each other,” Elaine Forsythe, the new wife of rising-star politician Julian Forsythe, told us. “He grabbed her arm and she tore away.”

  Both Lady Emrys and the creature disappeared moments after. No sign of Lady Emrys has been seen since.

  Officer Eric Black of the king’s Protection Command also reports that the gala’s table centerpieces were composed of the poisonous flower birdsfoot trefoil. One of these deadly bouquets was placed at the center of King Richard’s table. Whether an assassination attempt or a bungling florist, Black and the other officers have declined to comment.

  Both incidents are ill-timed for the king and his pro-Fae supporters, who will be celebrating their second Lights-down this weekend. They call into question the safety of immortal integration, as well as the general public’s support. For some, including M.A.F. leader Julian Forsythe, even the holy grail of self-sustaining energy is not enough to assuage his fear of the magical. “These creatures aren’t pixies or Cinderella godmothers. They’re monsters. My wife and I might have died tonight. I think it’s high time King Richard’s motives be called into question. Is he truly doing what’s best for the kingdom? Or is he listening to the siren lure of a certain ginger?”

  The article goes on, but I’ve already crumpled the paper between my fingers.

  Escort? Heated argument? Monsters? Siren lure?

  I toss it aside and collapse into the nearest chair, the muddy remains of my tulle gown puffing out around me. There’s a pounding in my head and an ache in my back, jabbing reminders that I’m coming apart at the seams.

  Immortals do not sleep. They cannot give themselves to dreams. These are things only mortals know.

  The first time I ever fell asleep—after I surrendered my magic to Herne—I was terrified. Nothingness slipped into my mind, as vast and dark as the black around stars. My thoughts became watery, warped. I couldn’t grab them. Couldn’t hold on.

  Then came the dreams. Life which was not life. Conversations, emotions, love and loss, all playing like a movie inside my head. It wasn’t until I woke up and took in the crumpled sheets of my bed that I realized it wasn’t real.

  I know I’m dreaming now because I see Breena—my lifelong friend undone by one of Mab’s final spells, months dead now. We’re on a solitary hill. All around is cloud. Thick and white—like the inside of a seer’s crystal ball. Breena stares into it. Her back is to me, hair an unreal gold against the clouds.

  “Bree?”

  My friend tu
rns. “Remember, Emrys. You have to remember.”

  “What? What do I have to remember?”

  Breena grips my arm, pulls me back to where she was standing. She points into the mist, her eyes keen, focused on something I’m unable to see.

  “Remember.” Breena’s fingers dig into my skin.

  “Bree.” I try not to sound exasperated as I look into the fog. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Remember! Remember!” More voices join: a rough, croaking chant coming from my feet. The ground is black with ravens, their eyes glittering like tiny beetles, their sharp beaks clacking out the same syllables. “Remember! Remember!”

  Breena isn’t talking anymore. She’s just staring. As if she’s trying to tell me something, but can’t.

  And then the mist falls away, crumples like an invisible giant drawing back a curtain. We’re standing over a valley, looking down on death. What was once green is mud— churned and mixed with the blood of a thousand men. Full of flailing horses, snapped spears, and knights carving each other to pieces with crude metal. Just below us—on the long low ridge of our hill—a castle burns.

  It’s been years upon years. So long that the mortals have forgotten it. But I know this fortress even in the thick of sleep. This exact image has lived in my mind for centuries: turrets and stones wreathed high with fire.

  Breena and I stand on the hill, watching as Camelot falls apart. Knight by knight. Flame by searing flame.

  “Remember,” Breena says again.

  “I do.” I feel King Arthur’s fall, tumbling around in my chest: the broken blood magic, the ruined castle, the sink of Mordred’s black blade through Arthur’s armor.

  “No!” Breena’s scream is sharp, a needle jammed into my eardrum. “Remember!!”

  My neck whips around and I’m ready to yell at her. But Breena is gone. The fingers around my arms belong to Guinevere. Those ratted, yellow nails dig into my skin again. Her eyes are as white as the mists—sucking me in.

  I want to tear away from her. But all I can do is stare as her shrieks fall down like rain. “I will show you ruin! Kingdom’s fall! I flipped wrong and the world burned.”