Reign of the Stone Queen

by Jayne Faith

I suspected his defiance was partly due to the fact that it was Jasper who was asking me to take the risk. But Oliver’s point wasn’t completely invalid. It also wasn’t a good enough reason to put off the errand.

  “No, we don’t know,” I said quietly. “It could be a hundred years, or it could be tomorrow. Either way, it would be unwise to assume we have the luxury of time.”

  Oliver’s eyes narrowed, and I knew he took offense to my implication that he was being unwise in his advice. Perhaps if we’d been alone he would have continued arguing. But he let go of my arm and took a half step back.

  “I’ll go with you,” he said.

  I shook my head. “You’re too recognizable. The two of us there together will attract too much—”

  “I’m going,” he barked, cutting me off.

  I glared at him, annoyed as hell that he’d spoken to me that way, especially in front of Jasper. I brushed past Oliver and went to my bedroom, where I yanked off my clothes with irritated, sharp movements. I changed into slim-fitting olive cargo pants, a navy long-sleeved Henley, and tall boots. I swept my long brown hair back into a low ponytail. Last, I grabbed a dark gray cape-style cloak. I didn’t normally wear such loose-fitting clothes, but Aurora on my back would give me away at a glance. So instead of my usual back scabbard, I transferred the sword to a belt sheath, which I could throw the cloak over to conceal.

  I took a deep breath as my fleeting wish to spend the morning finalizing Maxen’s new position as Carraig Sidhe head of state slipped away. Getting information on the location of the Chalice was more important than my desire to hand off my royal responsibilities.

  When I returned to the formal living room, Jasper was alone.

  “He went to change, too,” he said. “He’s going to meet us back here.”

  “Sorry about that,” I grumbled. “Oliver can be a surly bastard.”

  “He’s just watching out for you. You’re the light of his life, Petra, that much is clear.”

  I snorted, but the center of my chest warmed a bit at Jasper’s words.

  I sidled up to him. “Too bad we only have a minute or two alone.” I slipped my arms around his neck and planted my mouth on his.

  “Aye, it’s an absolute crying shame.” He breathed when we finally had to come up for air.

  There was a rap at the door, and I reluctantly let go of Jasper’s neck. Nothing like the arrival of a grouchy father to kill the mood.

  I patted Jasper’s cheek. “Later, perhaps.” I pulled away and turned to grasp the doorknob, but not before I saw the heat in his golden eyes.

  Oliver stood waiting outside my quarters. He’d changed into garb common in the Duergar realm—loose linen trousers, a slim-fitting green button-down shirt, and a leather vest. A short-billed woolen cap covered his cropped hair that had distinctive stripes shaved into the sides.

  “Come with me.” He lowered his voice. “We’ll make an inconspicuous exit out of the fortress.”

  Oliver wordlessly handed Jasper a long dark brown traveling cloak similar to mine.

  As my father led us through the fortress, taking lesser-used hallways and staircases, I tried to shake off the drained feeling that pulled at me. The previous day had been long and difficult, leaving me weary even after a hard night’s sleep.

  Oliver took us into an office he had to unlock with his palm, indicating it was magically sealed and would only open for specific individuals. Through the back of the office was another room, what looked like a generic conference room. But it had an arch designed into the stonework mosaic on the far wall.

  Ha! I knew there were secret doorways.

  I stepped up to it and poised my finger in the air, ready to draw the sigils that would take us to the doorway in the Aberdeen Inn.

  “Hope this place doesn’t implode while we’re gone,” I muttered with a furtive backward glance. I reached back and pulled the deep hood of my cloak forward so my face would be hidden. Jasper did the same.

  Oliver and Jasper each placed a hand on my shoulder, and I traced the sigils and whispered the words. Together, we stepped forward and into the abyss of the netherwhere.

  We emerged in a roped-off corner of Morven’s pub, the stale smell of fried food undercutting the stronger scent of hoppy ale with urine undertones wafting from the nearby hallway that led to the restrooms. Several Aberdeen patrons looked up to see who the new arrivals were. Fortunately for us, the lighting was terrible and particularly bad in the corner where we’d entered.

  Morven—resembling a large, muscular Santa Claus with his bulging shoulders, white beard, and reddened cheeks and nose—was in his usual position behind the bar. His dark gaze darted our way as he topped off a frosty mug from one of the taps.

  A shiver shimmied down my spine, leaving a wake of spreading goosebumps. Morven and I had always been on decent terms, but there was something deeply unsettling, almost predatory, about the way he looked at people. Especially at those who had very strong or unique magic.

  He pushed the mug across the bar to the waiting hand of a man still in his Duergar guard uniform. Even though the man was facing away from me, I bowed my head, hiding my face in the shadow of my cloak’s hood.

  Morven flicked his fingers at me in a subtle wave but wisely didn’t otherwise acknowledge me. He gave a tiny tilt of his head toward the stairway that led up to the loft that housed his living quarters. Head down, I quickly crossed the short distance to the steep, narrow staircase.

  No one really knew how old Morven was, but he’d been running the Aberdeen Inn for as long as anyone could remember. There was a wide, shiny line in the wooden walls on either side of the stairs where his broad shoulders had brushed past countless times.

  Oliver and Jasper both followed me up, though I knew Morven wouldn’t allow them to stay during our transaction. I went to the straight-backed chair where I’d sat a handful of times before. Looking around at the dingy loft with its low peaked ceiling, I did my best to tamp down on the claustrophobia that was gathering into a little knot of nausea in the pit of my stomach.

  My father was peering around with narrow-eyed suspicion. When Morven appeared at the top of the stairs, Oliver’s chest puffed out a little. I wasn’t sure if Morven had any fighting skills—probably not, considering he spent all of his time behind the bar of the Aberdeen—but if he did, he and Oliver might have been a good match. Both of them were muscled and massive.

  “You must wait down there,” Morven said in an accent that was certainly Old World, but from so far in the past the specific region was unidentifiable to my ear. He pointed a thick forefinger back down the stairs.

  “It’s okay,” I said quietly to Jasper and Oliver.

  They turned and left, both looking equally pissed about it. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. I’d survived Morven several times on my own just fine.

  The Ghillie Dubh came to the larger chair set up at a ninety-degree angle to mine, settling on one hip with one long leg awkwardly stretched out, as if he weren’t accustomed to sitting on furniture. He eyed me silently for a few seconds.

  “You possess . . . something new, Petra Maguire,” he said in his gravelly voice.

  I shivered again. “Yes. Some new ability has apparently been unlocked within me and the other stone bloods.”

  He nodded gravely. “I heard the rumors.”

  “I don’t know what it is, exactly.”

  “That’s okay,” he said, his dark eyes gleaming with barely checked eagerness. He wanted some of it, whatever the supposed god power was that flowed through my veins.

  Morven could have gotten some of the god-blood magic, if that’s what it was, from Jasper, but for whatever reason, the innkeeper wanted it from me.

  “You came here seeking the location of the Chalice of Dagda?” he asked.

  “That’s right.”

  I could have explained to him why we so desperately wanted the Chalice, but I figured Morven didn’t really care. In spite of running a lively pub that was legendary throughout Faerie
, he somehow seemed to remain apart from the affairs of the realm. People came in for a beer, or they came for information. The ones who wanted the former left only coin behind, but those who sought the latter left a bit of themselves—their magic—with Morven. He collected it in some way no one really understood. All I knew was that the process was extremely unpleasant.

  “Well, I presume you remember how this works,” he said with a smile that was almost jolly if it didn’t give me a case of the creeps.

  I nodded, acutely aware of the bucket next to my chair. I’d never puked after, but apparently most did.

  His eyelids began to drift down, and I tried to loosen the tension that held me so rigid. But I couldn’t kid myself. There was no relaxing when I knew what was coming.

  “Wait,” I blurted.

  His eyes popped open. He didn’t look happy I’d interrupted.

  “The new power, it comes from the Fomoire, I’ve been told,” I said. “Do you know anything of it?”

  He peered at me, his face reddening even more than his natural coloring, and for a breath I thought he was angry. But he cocked his head.

  “Aye, I may know something.” He stared me down and seconds ticked by. “I’ll give you that for free, Petra Maguire. I’ll even give it to you before I do the taking, so you know I’m genuine.”

  My brows shot up, and my spine went rigid. Free? Morven never gave information for free. Never.

  “Okay?” I said uncertainly, trying to think if there was a catch I was missing.

  “The answers you seek lie within one of the caves,” he said. “The fair-haired stone blood prince will know what I mean.”

  I squinted at him. Caves? And he had to mean Maxen. If Morven said Maxen would know, he would. Morven was always good to his word, and the information he gave was never wrong.

  His lids fluttered and sagged again. A moment later, the air seemed to disappear from the room, and magic like brown smoke began to leak from his nose, parted lips, and ears. It crept toward me, and I grasped the armrests of my chair in a white-knuckled grip. In what seemed like excruciatingly slow fashion, the brown magic seeped into my body until every cell seemed to scream for relief.

  It was a deep agony of a million pinpricks that was most intense in the center of my chest. I choked, tears springing to my eyes as it felt like my heart was being slowly pierced with a thousand tiny needles.

  And then suddenly, the torture disappeared, leaving a horrible wave of nausea in its wake. I hunched and swallowed hard against the bile rising up my throat. I slapped my hand over my mouth as my stomach tried to reject what little food I’d had that day. When the gagging stopped, I lowered my hand, wiped away the tears that’d leaked from my lower lids, and took a shaking breath. Every muscle in my body trembled with weakness.

  “And now you get what you paid for,” Morven said, all twinkly-eyed. I kind of wanted to punch him. That’d been the worst “payment” I’d ever experienced. Morven spent the next two or three minutes describing the location of the Chalice.

  I nodded, unable to open my mouth yet.

  “There is additional information that I can give you,” he said. “That I must give you.”

  My entire body tightened, but I tried not to show my alarm. Why was Morven in such a giving mood?

  “What is it?”

  “You must leave the quest for the Chalice for later.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you and the Glasgow man must go after Finvarra. And you must do it right now. If you don’t go now, you won’t have another chance. Do you hear me? You must go now.”

  He leaned forward for emphasis, and the back of my head knocked against the chair as I drew back in alarm. A chill swept through me as I remembered Eldon’s warning, that I had to accompany Jasper to kill Finvarra, or Jasper wouldn’t come out of it alive.

  “Do you understand?” Morven demanded, uncharacteristically irate.

  I nodded. “I have to go with Jasper after Finvarra.”

  “Now!”

  “Yes. Now. Immediately. We’ll go as soon as we can.”

  He gave me a hard, unblinking stare. “Good.”

  Knowing I’d need a minute or two before I could stand, Morven rose and went toward the staircase. He always gave me some privacy to recover. At the top of the stairs, he stopped and turned to me. Pulling something from his pocket, he palmed whatever it was and then tossed it to me. It winked at me, reflecting the light of the bare bulb over the stairs. I caught it in one hand and peered down at the object. It was a coin—brass, maybe—and unlike anything I’d ever seen. It was about the size of an Earthly quarter, with a hole in the center.

  “When the gods come, call me with that,” Morven said.

  I peered at him through the gloom of the loft. “How?” I croaked.

  “Toss it in a body of water and speak my name,” he said.

  We locked eyes, and he gave me a nod.

  “I will,” I said. I tucked the coin into a pouch on my belt.

  He left, and I remained in my chair for nearly ten minutes, deep-breathing with the sole focus of not vomiting, before I dared try to stand. My knees only wobbled a little as I descended the stairs. Dizziness forced me to keep a hand on the wall as I rejoined Jasper and my father.

  “I’m fine,” I said, before they could express any worry. Leaning into them, I lowered my voice to a whisper. “He told me where it is.”

  “Let’s wait until we have more privacy,” Oliver said. He began guiding me toward the roped-off corner with the doorway. “We should get out of here before anyone notices us.”

  “I agree.” I pointed to a curled piece of paper with a broken wax seal in Jasper’s hand. “Someone send you a message here?”

  He shook his head. “It was delivered to Oliver. It’s from Maxen.”

  I turned to my father. “You told Maxen where we went?”

  “I did. No harm in it.”

  “What does the note say?” I asked, looking back and forth between them and trying to decipher the tension that hung around both men.

  Jasper leaned down until his lips were next to my ear. “He believes he knows where Finvarra is,” he whispered.

  Chapter 17

  MY BREATH CAUGHT in my throat, but I didn’t have time to demand more information because Jasper and Oliver were pulling me through the Aberdeen’s doorway.

  Maxen was there in the secret doorway room of the fortress when we stepped from the void. He looked up when we appeared, and I guessed he’d been pacing in anticipation of our arrival.

  “It went well at the Aberdeen?” he asked, his face tense.

  I gave a curt nod. “We got what we were looking for. But if you know where Finvarra is, we need to go after him full force. The Chalice of Dagda will have to wait.”

  “Yes,” Maxen said. His gaze shifted to Jasper. “You’re up for the trip, I presume?”

  “Aye,” Jasper said, patting a sheath on his belt. “I’ve got a blade with Finvarra’s name on it.”

  I’d nearly forgotten about Gae Buide, the lethal yellow knife Oberon had loaned to Jasper. It was a magical weapon that killed if a wound was inflicted with it, even just a nick. But it couldn’t harm the wielder, as long as he kept a hand on it.

  Adrenaline began to cut through the drain of paying Morven for his information. “Where is Finvarra?” I asked.

  I was practically salivating at the prospect of an opportunity to draw my sword. It’d been too long since my last decent battle. It would do me good to fight a real enemy. Maybe it would help wash away some of the bitter taste of my recent struggles in the fortress.

  “The Daoine realm,” Maxen said.

  Oliver’s hands flexed into loose fists. “How sure are you?”

  “I don’t have eyes on him, but based on what his former companion told us, I would bet all I own that he’s there.” Maxen gave a short laugh. “We’ll have to think of an appropriate way to reward Eunice.”

  “We will, if we get him,” I said. “We need to gath
er a hunting party.”

  “Agreed,” Maxen said. “Any ideas, besides Jasper?”

  “I’m going,” I said quickly. I shot a look at my father. “Don’t try to talk me out of it. I’m not sitting here polishing the crown while others are out doing the real work.”

  Oliver’s face tightened, but he didn’t try to dissuade me. “I’ll go.”

  If it were anything less important, I would have insisted he stay in the fortress, but we needed our best to go up against Finvarra.

  “We need someone who knows the Daoine Sidhe realm very well,” I said. “And if he or she can wield a sword or some other weapon, all the better.”

  “I propose two additions to our team,” Jasper said.

  We all turned to him with curiosity.

  “Bryna Marcourt. And Drifte, one of my mentors. You met him.” Jasper’s eyes found mine.

  “The raven shifter who took us into the cave?” I asked. Recalling the strange man with the solid jet-black eyes, I suppressed a shiver.

  Jasper nodded. “He won’t wield a sword or any other weapon, but we’ll do well to take him along. He knows Daoine ways, and he knows the realm.”

  “He won’t have a problem betraying the Daoine or being part of a mission to kill the Unseelie High King?” Maxen asked.

  “Drifte is Daoine in blood only,” Jasper said. “He answers to no king or queen.”

  “And you want to take Bryna? As in my half-sister?” I gave him a doubtful look.

  An amused smile ghosted over Jasper’s lips. “Aye, that very Bryna.”

  “For the love of the gods, why?”

  “There’s more to her than meets the eye,” Jasper said. “She knows her way around most realms, and she’s incredibly resourceful.”

  “We can’t afford to have anyone along who needs protecting.” I was trying not to sound whiny, but the thought of having Bryna along considerably dampened my eagerness for the mission.

  “You don’t need to worry about her,” he said. “She was trained in knife wielding by a Sylph blademaster.”

  That shut me up for a second or two. I inclined my head in acquiescence. I trusted Jasper’s judgment. “Okay. Drifte and Bryna are in, if they’re willing.”