The Scarecrow Queen

by Melinda Salisbury

  Even this far from the action, we come across the dead and injured, killed while fleeing or pursuing. I feel horribly grateful when I don’t recognize any of them.

  “Tell me what happened at the caves,” I say as Stuan jogs, and I stumble, toward the spectre of Lormere castle above us. “Who was lost?”

  “Breena,” he says softly. “Trey. Serge. Linion.”

  I think of the soft-eyed woman who could hit a target every time with an arrow and the loyal men who camped for moons in the mountains to keep watch over the children of Lortune. Linion, whose nephews were there.

  “It would have been more, if not for you.”

  “What?”

  “You calling Merek back meant he was behind us all. While he was catching up, he caught sight of more men on their way to join those at the caves. He realized it was an ambush and raced to warn us, so we lay in wait for the reinforcements at the mere, and dropped down on them. They didn’t know we were coming.”

  “And the children?”

  “They’re safe. We took them to the rendezvous point.”

  “What about Lief?”

  “What about him?” Stuan asks.

  I shake my head, still not wholly sure of my thoughts. “Never mind. Let’s go.”

  When we get to the main gates of Lormere castle, they’re unlocked, and unmanned, the first time I have ever seen them thus, and it sends a chill through me. Beyond the path leading to the main keep, the castle is in darkness, silent and still. This far from the town, the sounds of the fighting have faded, and the night feels as though it’s waiting. Wanting.

  Stuan and I exchange a glance and begin to creep forward.

  Almost instantly, three of the golems loom out of the night, no clubs in their hands, but vicious axes. They attack at once, their lack of eyes no hindrance as they swing the blades so fast the air whistles in their wake.

  “Run,” Stuan bellows, darting around them. “I’ll hold them.”

  “Don’t be stupid.” I run, too, sliding through the legs of the nearest one, wincing when the ax of another smashes into those same legs seconds after I’m clear. The damaged golem falls to the ground, a huge chunk of clay missing from both legs, but that doesn’t stop it as it grips the earth and pulls itself after me, eyeless face pointed at me as though smelling me.

  “Go,” Stuan screams. “I’ve got this.” He does as I’ve done, drawing the attention of the golem closest before doing as I did and dashing around the third. When the ax strikes it, I do as he says and move toward the castle as fast as I can. Behind me I can hear the sound of turf being pulled up as the broken golem tries to pursue me, but I don’t look back.

  I enter Lormere castle alone, armed with a knife, and the last vial of Opus Mortem.

  Inside, the corridors are colder, somehow, than it was outside, and horribly quiet. The carpets, laid so long ago for Helewys, are dusty, small clouds blooming under my feet as I walk. There are icicles hanging from the window ledges and the unlit candelabras; the walls are bare, and blackened from smoke. The castle feels as though it’s been abandoned for centuries.

  At the end of the passageway, I stand still, trying to choose which way to go. To my left, the passage to the ruined north tower is a black maw, and I shiver as I look down it. It seems unlikely that Aurek will have gone there. Where, then?

  He’s taken Errin to control me, I know that. He’ll want Silas with him, too. But Silas wasn’t down in the dungeon—Lief said so, and I believe him. Where would Aurek have imprisoned Silas after the fire?

  My feet start to move before I understand where it is they’re taking me.

  * * *

  The door to the west tower is open, and I slip through it, my heart beating hard behind my broken ribs. I move like a ghost, silent as the grave as I climb the stairs toward my former prison. I pause outside the old guards’ room, listening, but when I hear nothing, I keep going.

  As I round the spiral staircase, I see a faint glow coming from my old room, and then Aurek’s voice, demanding that someone hurry up.

  I draw a deep breath, clutching the vial in my hand, and take the final three steps.

  Aurek turns at once, though I’ve made no sound, and moves faster than anyone should be able to, grabbing Errin by the throat and ripping her away from the bed, where she was tending Silas.

  Silas lies prone, and the first thing I notice is his feet, the skin black and dead-looking. The Nigredo. His eyes are closed in his waxen face, and his breathing is shallow.

  “Twylla,” Errin gasps, drawing my attention back to Aurek inching slowly toward me. There is a small clay doll in his hands.

  Beside him Errin stands, pressing a knife against her own heart.

  Aurek looks down at his hands, and then at mine, where I clutch the vial.

  “Trade?” he asks, a smile curving his lips.

  I say nothing, trying to think of what I can do to get Errin out of here.

  “Give me the vial in your hands, or I’ll make her kill herself.” Aurek’s voice is level and pleasant as he comes to a halt by the bureau.

  “Don’t,” Errin says. “Don’t.”

  I look at Aurek, his head dipped as he watches me from under white lashes.

  “You have to die, Twylla,” he says. “You know that. But Errin doesn’t. There’s a piece of parchment on this simulacrum. It instructs her to hold the knife to her breast, and to plunge it into herself at my word. Give me the vial and I’ll remove the instruction.”

  “Don’t listen to him. He’ll kill me anyway,” Errin sobs.

  Aurek lashes out, backhanding Errin. Her head flies back, hitting the wall with a sickening crack, but she doesn’t fall. To my horror, she stays on her feet, snapping back into position, the knife never moving from its place over her heart.

  “Harder,” Aurek commands.

  She whimpers as she pushes the knife into her dress; I see the material gather, then tear, and see the edges darken with blood as it pierces her skin. Droplets from her nose start to join it, and when I look at her, I see the despair in her eyes.

  “You heard what I said out there,” Aurek says, his voice crooning now, his eyes fixed on me. “What you are. What you’ve always been.”

  “A scarecrow queen,” I reply.

  “Just so. A puppet with no real power. An effigy.”

  “What are you, then?” I ask. “A relic. A throwback to a bygone era. An echo from a long-dead world.”

  His mouth loses its soft smile as the corners turn down, marring his otherwise perfect face.

  “Lief betrayed you,” I say, watching from the corner of my eye as Errin’s mouth falls open, the blade in her hand temporarily forgotten by Aurek.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Aurek says even as his brows knit together, contradicting his words. “It was always just going to be you and me in the end.”

  He looks at Errin. “Stab yourself. In the heart,” he adds, and it’s almost an afterthought.

  “No!” I scream as she draws the knife back.

  I fly at her, knocking her to the floor, sending the knife skidding under the bed. She throws me off to go after it, crawling across the floor, and then his hand is in my hair, tearing it from my head. I reach instinctively to make him stop, and he uses his other hand to pry the vial from my hands before throwing me down.

  I look up as Aurek holds the vial to the light. “Mine,” he says.

  Then there is a rushing sound, and an arrow appears through his lower arm as if by magic.

  He drops the vial and I lurch forward to catch it, just as in the commune with Errin.

  Aurek howls, his shrieking filling the room as he turns to see who shot him.

  Merek stands in the doorway.

  “That’s my crown,” he says.

  Aurek gapes at him. “You.”

  Then I move.

  I fly to my feet and slam the vial, glass and all, into his open mouth.

  Using all of my weight, I shove him backward, pushing my palm under his chin and forci
ng his teeth together. I hear the crunch of the glass, and he tries to open his mouth, clawing at my hair and eyes, blood bubbling from the corners of his mouth.

  I hear the sound of a struggle behind me, Merek forcing Errin to the ground perhaps; of metal hitting the floor, and then something else, but I can’t see. Aurek struggles, pushing into me, so I allow him a little way before I use his momentum to slam him back into the wall.

  His eyes fill with disbelief and he renews his struggles, but he’s getting weaker, even as he claws my face and tries to kick me. I can feel the cuts left behind but I don’t let go, pinning him, holding his mouth and nose until he swallows.

  At once he stiffens, his eyes rolling back in his head, and he slumps forward, sending me staggering back under his weight. He lands on top of me and I shove him off with a pained grunt, the crown falling from his head and rolling under the bed.

  He lands with a thud, his eyes closed, his face still.

  I look up at Errin to see her still struggling to get free of Merek.

  As I approach, her body goes wild, trying to get to me, but I avoid her grasp and slip the sword out of the sheath at Merek’s waist.

  I look down at the Sleeping Prince, sleeping once more, and for a moment I wonder if I could leave him like that. Have him sent far away.

  But one glance at the unconscious man on the bed, and the sound of my friend sobbing in Merek’s arms as she tries to carry out his last instruction, is all I need.

  I raise the sword high over my head, my ribs screaming at me.

  Then I bring it down, severing the Sleeping Prince’s head from his body in a single stroke far easier than it ought to have been. The wound doesn’t bleed; the cut is clean, as though he were one of his own golems. As though he died a long time ago. Even as I watch, he starts to collapse in on himself, his skin beginning to look papery and thin.

  Errin goes limp in Merek’s arms, and I drop the sword to the floor, holding out my arms to her. She flies into them the moment Merek releases her, and we sink down next to the Sleeping Prince’s corpse. Errin squeezes me and I gasp.

  “Are you injured?” she asks, pulling back to look at me.

  “Broken ribs,” I say. “You?” I look down at her chest.

  “Flesh wound.”

  Then she remembers Silas. She moves from me to him at once, sitting beside him and stroking his white hair.

  Merek’s hand appears before me and he pulls me up, placing an arm around me and helping me limp to the bed.

  “I can take care of him,” Errin says, looking at us through eyes that brim with tears. “I don’t mind. I took care of Mama for so long. I can care for them both if I have to.”

  “No,” Silas whispers from the bed.

  “You’re awake.” Errin’s voice quavers, and I watch as she swallows, pressing her lips together before speaking. “Now, there’s no point in arguing, because I’ve decided. It’s all going to be fine.”

  He opens his golden eyes, and I’m astonished to see how pale they are, drained of brightness. “Please, Errin. Please just kill me.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “I can’t live like this,” he says.

  “And I can’t lose you, too.”

  He tries to lift a hand to reach for hers but can’t make it an inch off the bed before it falls limply back and he sighs. Errin’s face crumples, and she collapses, pressing her face into his chest. Silas turns his gaze on us.

  Please, he mouths.

  Beside me, Merek slips his hand into mine, and I stare into Silas’s eyes.

  Can there really be no way, no antidote for this …

  Errin’s shoulders are shaking silently as her hand reaches for Silas’s, her white fingers twining with his black ones. It doesn’t seem fair, that he should have to suffer so much to create something that stops others suffering. But as Errin said, everything has an opposite and—

  “Wait—”

  Everyone looks at me.

  “The Opus Mortem is the reverse of the Opus Magnum, yes?”

  Merek nods, and then his eyebrows draw together.

  “Adding my blood to the Opus Mortem is what made it so deadly to Aurek.”

  Errin stares at me with an unreadable expression on her face. Then she nods.

  “So the blood—my blood—is the opposite of a philtersmith’s blood, yes? They cancel each other out?”

  Errin sits up, all of her attention fixed on me.

  “What would happen if I added my blood to the Opus Magnum?”

  Merek stiffens beside me.

  On the bed, Silas opens his eyes wider. “I thought you looked different,” he says. “You’re cursed.”

  I nod.

  “Well, if that’s the case, adding your blood to the Opus Magnum will curse you further.” He lowers his gaze to his feet, then back to me, as if to demonstrate his point.

  I ignore him and turn to Errin. “Help me make sense of this. My blood, plus the Opus Mortem, is enough to counter the Elixir. And therefore the opposite would be my blood, plus the Opus Magnum, to make a new kind of Elixir.” I look at Silas. “One that might work on you.”

  “You don’t know that,” Merek says.

  “She’s right,” Errin disagrees.

  “I know you want her to be,” Merek replies.

  “It’s not worth it,” Silas says. He stares at me, at my hair and eyes. “You don’t know where it will strike next.”

  “It’ll only be the once,” I say.

  “Once is enough.”

  “Listen to him,” Merek implores, turning me to look at him and taking my shoulders in his hands. “I know you want to help, but—”

  “Do you have the vial of Opus Magnum you made?” I ask him.

  His face becomes pinched and he shakes his head.

  I shrug him off my shoulders and hold out my hand.

  He looks past me at Errin, his face thunderous. Then it softens, and he bows his head, reaching into a pouch at his waist and pulling out a vial. He hands it to me silently.

  I look around for something to cut myself with, my eyes landing first on the sword I beheaded Aurek with. I inhale sharply when I see Aurek’s body is missing; for a moment I wonder if he’s risen again. Then I see the outline of dust; at some point Aurek’s corpse has quietly desiccated, becoming the dust it should have become over five hundred years ago. I turn away and spot the knife Errin had, in the corner of the room.

  “Wait,” Silas says as I pick it up. “You don’t have to do this.”

  “I know.”

  He nods. Then he looks over at Errin. “If this doesn’t work, I don’t want to live. Please, I know I’m asking a lot, but I don’t want this to be my life. I don’t want …” He pauses. “For the last few moons, I’ve been here, in this bed, with him bleeding me, as and when he saw fit. No control. No choice. If it were just being weak, then … it would be different; I could live without the use of my legs. But I can’t live wondering what happens if someone else finds me like this, and takes me for their own use. I don’t want to be used again. I don’t want to live a life where it’s possible, and where my body isn’t my own.” He looks me in the eye. “You know what I mean. Promise me.”

  “I promise,” I say.

  I uncork the vial, cut my left thumb, and add the drop of blood to the Opus Magnum. It turns bright red, at the same moment Merek whistles. Errin and Silas stare at me.

  I look down at myself. “What did it do this time?” I turn to find the mirror, and catch sight of something bloodred out of the corner of my eye. “Oh,” I breathe, pulling my hair forward. It’s red. Not the auburn of before, but an unnatural, deep crimson.

  I look at Merek and he smiles, a soft, full smile. “Your eyes are red, too.”

  “How?”

  He shrugs. “How on earth would I know?”

  I look at Silas and Errin.

  Errin’s eyes are so wide, and so full of hope. She looks at the vial in my hand. I exhale slowly, and pass it to her. Gently, she cradles Sila
s’s head and lifts it so he can swallow the liquid. He drinks it down, and all three of us stare at him, scrutinizing him for any sign of an effect.

  As we watch, the deadness in his skin begins to fade.

  Errin starts to cry, huge, heaving sobs that sound agonized. Again she buries her face in his chest, clinging to him. And when Silas lifts a perfectly healthy hand and places it on her head, she lets out a sound akin to a howl and launches herself on him.

  He struggles to sit up, and then they’re kissing with absolute recklessness. She pins him to the bed, her legs around his waist, and he wraps his arms around her, kissing her as though he’s drowning. When she moans softly, I feel my own skin heat, and I look down.

  I’m surprised to see my hand in Merek’s, unaware it had happened. He squeezes lightly and then bends, picking up the crown—his crown. Then he pulls me out of the room, and I close the door behind us.

  We walk down the stairs in silence, then through the corridors, dim now that dusk is falling. How has a whole day passed? Has it really been just one day?

  When footsteps rush toward us, Merek pulls me back behind him. His expression is panicked, but then it clears as Hope, Kirin, Stuan, and Nia, hand in hand with the white-haired woman I remember from the Conclave, come rushing toward us. Kata, alive and free.

  “Her ribs are broken,” Merek shouts as they descend on us, causing them all to halt so suddenly I let out a giggle, and then a yelp as my ribs jar.

  “The Sleeping Prince?” Hope asks.

  “Very dead and gone,” I say.

  Hope beams, a full smile, and reaches out to cup my face. “Well done, child. Well done.”

  “Is Errin all right?” Nia asks.

  “She’s fine. She’s with Silas. In the west tower.”

  Hope lowers her hand and makes as if to go, but Merek stops her.

  “I’d give them some time to reunite,” he says tactfully, and Hope’s mouth falls open. Nia and Kata snicker behind her.

  “You found the alchemists, then?” I say to Nia.

  “We’d all but won when the last of the golems fell,” she replies. “We made one of the guards tell us where the alchemists here were being kept, and went to free them.” She beams at her wife, who smiles back. “There are still those held by the Lormerian nobles …” Nia adds with a frown.