Inimical

by Genevieve Iseult Eldredge

  Glamma’s Grimmoire mentioned places like this.

  It’s a Faerie ring. Magic, protected, shifted in time and space. Super-rare and powerful. It’s like all the death I saw out in Fair Faerie doesn’t exist in here.

  Inside the hearthstone.

  Slowly, I get to my feet, brushing off my sleepy-pants and the hoodie I’d borrowed from Roue. Awe fills me up from head to toe.

  At the edge of the circle, the perfect circle of birches is broken by a shining grand chair shaped like waves and rays of sunshine.

  The Aureate Throne.

  And if the throne is here, the king must be, too.

  The king who is so not-my-father.

  I step toward the throne, moving beneath the golden canopy. “Hello?”

  In this odd place, the throne is different. It’s part of the grove, growing right out of the golden trees and cradled in the branches. A figure sits on the radiant chair. I level my Fae-sight, piercing another layer of Glamoury.

  The king.

  He’s all things regal in cloth of green and gold, a bright crown on his brow like liquid sunlight. But this version of him isn’t slumbering in Summer’s Rest.

  He’s very much awake. And whew! He’s so perfect and golden, what with his fair hair and brilliant eyes, he looks nothing like my dad, who has grey eyes like mine and strawberry-blond hair.

  “Syl.” The deep thrum of his voice shivers through the trees, casts ripples across the nearby brook. His power crashes over me, threatening to faestrike me. In a flash, I’m all dizzy and giddy like my head’s filled with fizzy soda.

  That’s his Glamoury, tricking my Fae-sight.

  Squinting, I step forward. The power radiating from him weighs me down. I give a deep bow, my head still spinning. “Your Majesty.”

  “You found me.” Every word thrums with power, as if his voice runs along cables through the very fabric of Fair Faerie. “Only a true fair Faerie princess can stone-step.”

  “Stone…?”

  “You’re inside the hearthstone.” He gestures at the Faerie ring. “Here, in the Somewhen.”

  “Yessss…” I drag the word out as I look around. “I’m somewhere, that’s for sure.”

  “Not somewhere.” His smile is dazzling, throwing another layer of Glamoury on the rest. “Somewhen.” The thrum of his voice reverberates in my chest. “The hearthstone holds all versions of Fair Faerie, from the beginning of time till the end.”

  Okay, now Fair Faerie physics have me completely baffled, but I’m not here to geek out over science. I cut to the chase. “I’m here to save you.” And get back to Roue as fast as I can. I can’t hear or feel her through the soul-bond, which means…she’s in Dark Faerie right now.

  And who knows what’s happening to her.

  Right. Show, meet road.

  But the king’s words throw a monkey wrench into the works.

  “Too much of my light has been lost.” Sorrow bends the king’s back, and his crown, shaped like a sun’s corona, seems to grow heavier. “You cannot save me, but you can save the hearthstone. You must take the throne.”

  Fury and frustration tighten my chest. I want so much to save my people, but it always comes down to me and Roue breaking up.

  Only, this time, they want us to murder each other.

  I refuse to believe that’s the only way. Plus, my Spidey Sense tells me there’s something the king’s holding back—some way around this whole murder/crown/ marry thing.

  And me? I’m tired of being jerked around by Faerie.

  I fold my arms across my chest in a power pose and let him have it. “I suppose you think I should soul-bond to Aldebaran so he can bind the hearthstone and rule as king?” Anger burns my cheeks. “Well, joke’s on you, Your Majestfulness, because if I did take the Aureate Throne, which would kill Roue, it’d only kill me, too. Because we’re already soul-bound, and that’s how soul-bonds work.”

  The fate of one is the fate of the other. Meaning, if one dies, the other isn’t far behind. They literally die of a broken heart.

  That’s the rule of soul-bonds.

  The king seems unfazed. “This is true—”

  “See? Told you so.” I can’t help being a little smug.

  “But not on Midsummer.” The king’s voice resonates like a royal decree.

  “Wait, what?” Now it’s the fair Fae king who’s changing the rules, and I don’t like it one bit. I squint an eye, trying to pierce his Glamoury, to see if his aura says he’s lying.

  But I can’t tell. Dude’s Glamoury is rock-solid.

  The king rises, waves of heat wafting off him. Outside the hearthstone, he was a feeble, dying man, but here, he’s the brightest beacon eclipsing everything around him. “Midsummer,” he rumbles, “is a day of special mischief for Fae. Second only to Halloween, Midsummer has the power to break your soul-bond and leave one of you alive. Whichever one of you takes her rightful throne.”

  Dread sends a chill through me. I don’t like this. At all.

  His eyes bore into mine like twin golden suns. “On Midsummer, you must strike first. At sun’s height, you must kill your dark Fae princess.”

  With that, all my nightmare images rush back—me crowned in blazing summersteel, stabbing Rouen with a sunfire blade, killing her, shattering my heart.

  “No,” I whisper, drowning in horror as I press my hand to my mouth. “No! I’ll never hurt Roue. You can’t make me!” I sound like a four-year-old, but I don’t care.

  The king only watches me, his gaze steady.

  I take a deep breath, center myself. “You’re asking the impossible. There must be another way.”

  I won’t believe Roue and I can’t control our own destiny.

  The king’s sadness pours off him in golden waves. “There is so much more at stake than just your dark Fae princess. Your soul-bond has set the Great Convergence in motion. If you do not take the throne, Fair Faerie will be destroyed, utterly consumed by Dark Faerie.”

  Wait…what now?

  “Great Convergence? What’s that?” I press him for details, sensing another layer of crazy’s about to get tossed onto the already heaping pile of bananapants that makes up our Faerie problem.

  Whatever this Great Convergence is, it sounds like one of those riddle/prophecy things the Fae love.

  There’s always a way around those, Syl, I tell myself. You’ve just gotta be smart.

  The king’s sad sigh makes all the leaves shiver. “Once, long ago, Faerie was a singular realm, until a brutal conflict caused the Great Cleaving, splitting it into two opposing realms, Dark and Fair. Since that time, the two Courts, Winter and Summer, have waged bloody war, trying to gain dominance. Now that the Great Convergence is nigh, the easiest way is to crown a new Overking on Midsummer.”

  Yup, it’s a riddle/prophecy thing.

  Fine. I’ve accepted that part of being a Fae princess is you have to deal with wild stuff like prophecies being the real deal. “And to do that, the opposing realm has to die, is that it?”

  “It will be consumed.” The king nods soberly. “The Great Convergence has set Dark Faerie and Fair Faerie on an irreversible collision course. On Midsummer, the two realms will crash into each other, and only one will survive. If Fair Faerie is to survive, you must kill Rouen, soul-bond with Aldebaran, and become Overqueen.”

  “With Prince Jerkface being my Overking.” Even the thought makes me want to hurl.

  For the first time, the king seems uncomfortable, like he’s the dad and I’m the daughter who just asked him about the birds and the bees. “Yes.”

  “Nope, nope. All the nopes.” I shake my head so hard my red curls bob. “We’re just going to have to find a way around this Great Convergence prophecy thing.”

  “There is no way around it.” His shoulders slump, and the trees slump with him. Even the brook’s babbling sounds sad. “Only one realm can survive the Convergence. The princess who kills the other and seizes her throne first will save her realm and live.” He paces, the shadow
s of the golden boughs falling across his face. “You must choose, Syl. Will it be Rouen who is destroyed? Or will it be you?”

  My mind reels with fear. Kill Roue? No way. But… “Can’t Roue and I rule together? If we could somehow heal Faerie—”

  “Faerie cannot be healed. Some hurts can never be forgiven.” His gaze burns with fiery hatred, and he speaks in a tone that I’ve heard Mom use. It means, No more arguing, young lady.

  “Okay, so healing Faerie’s out.” I pace, racking my brain-meats as my heart pounds nervously in my chest. Come on, Syl. There’s no equation I can’t solve. “There’s got to be something…”

  For the first time, the king speaks gently, like he’s trying to spare my feelings. “Do you really think Rouen won’t do whatever it takes to save her people?” He takes a step closer to me and touches my shoulder like a coach at a sporting event. “Right now, she’s in Dark Faerie. Do you really think a cold-hearted dark Fae would ever choose love over power?”

  His words send anger blazing through me like a four-alarm fire. I slap his hand away. “You don’t know anything about her.”

  Sadness softens the look in the king’s eyes. “Rouen is a dark Fae. Deep inside her is a darkness not even your light can touch. You need to see it before it’s too late, Syl.”

  “No.” I step away from him. I know Roue’s got a dark side, but I won’t believe she’d ever go full evil. “We’ll find a way to heal both our realms, take our crowns. Together.”

  I adopt another power pose. I’m ready to die on this hill.

  The king’s voice rings out sharp, and heat wilts the surrounding plant life. “You are her mortal enemy. You cannot be together. You cannot come to the throne tainted.”

  “Tainted?” I glare daggers at him. Inside me, the four-alarm fire ramps up into full-on nuclear firestorm, even though I totally blush at his implication. Like Roue touching me, kissing me could ever be a bad thing. “Roue loves me, and I love her. There’s nothing tainted about it.”

  “Syl—”

  My fury breaks loose in an angry tirade. “I can’t believe I came here to help you. You’re just as bad as Aldebaran!” I turn on my heel to leave—assuming I can leave—but he’s right in front of me.

  Whoa. King power is serious stuff. He didn’t even windwarp.

  “Syl.” The rumble in his voice is gentle, coaxing.

  “I don’t know if I want to listen to you anymore. Who’s to say you’re not lying your face off, too?”

  “Do you have something of hers?”

  The question is out so of left field it stops me cold. I touch the hoodie she let me borrow, the one that smells like autumn leaves, like her. “Yeah…so?”

  He holds out his hand for it. “Let me show you.”

  A shiver crawls down my spine, his words hanging in the air, part challenge, part threat. Swallowing hard, I pull off the hoodie. My phone’s still in it, so I take it out, shove it in my sweats pocket. I hand the hoodie to him.

  The king turns to the grand gold chair. “This is how the Aureate Throne reacts to dark Fae taint.”

  He tosses the hoodie on the seat.

  The howl that rips from the throne shudders the sky, rocks the earth beneath our feet. The entire chair shivers and shakes and blurs with heat.

  The very air warps.

  Then, dozens—no, hundreds—of vicious, jagged thorns slice up from the seat, spear in from the back, pierce up from the arms. They shred Roue’s hoodie into a tattered mess. Then the entire thing bursts into sunfire.

  I jerk back. Holy overkill, Batman.

  What’s left of the hoodie is blasted to black ash.

  “The Aureate Throne is death to any dark Fae.” He gazes at me all calm like that wasn’t over-the top violent. “Especially your princess.”

  I swallow hard, throat dry, my heart freaking out as I picture Rouen sitting on that golden throne, being attacked, shredded, murdered—

  “Wait.” I take a deep breath, calming my frayed nerves. “But I’d be the one sitting on the throne. Not Roue.”

  Got him. There’s no way he can refute that logic.

  “You are soul-bound, Syl, remember?” Gotta give him credit, he doesn’t seem to take any pleasure turning my words against me. “If you come to the Aureate Throne on the day of the Great Convergence tainted by that dark Fae, the magic of Midsummer will not protect you. It would see you as an enemy. It would kill you.”

  I get the unspoken words: And her. And both our realms.

  The hoodie’s ashes blow away on a summer wind. That could be Roue, me, all of Faerie.

  Fear ramps my heart rate way up into the danger zone. Breathe, Syl. Breathe… think… I’ve always been an A-student. I can figure this out.

  I will.

  Then, like a dork, I blurt out the one question that’s been nagging me ever since I got here. “Why did you bring me here?”

  The king smiles sadly. “Don’t you know?”

  “Would I have asked if I did?” Sheesh, why are fair Fae so roundabout?

  “You don’t know.”

  Gah! “No! I don’t. Why don’t you tell me?” Seriously, I am reaching critical mass. Explosion in T-minus five…four…three…two…

  “Syl, I am your father.”

  One.

  Mind blown. Earth shattered. Floored.

  I’m all these things as I stare at him, every part of me numb. I’d been half-dreading/half-wanting it to be true, and now that it is, I don’t know what to feel. “Drop your Glamoury.”

  He waves a hand, and in a shimmer of heat, the illusion leaves him. Now, an ordinary man stands before me, handsome and strong and appropriately fatherly. I take in his reddish-gold hair like mine, his grey eyes like mine, his jaw, his nose… The freckles.

  Dread, excitement, anticipation, fear, loss, anger, helplessness—a million different emotions slam into me. “Dad?” I choke on all my emotions, the ache inside me tearing me apart now like it tore me apart when he left us.

  And it’s like the hearthstone knows.

  Everything eclipses, clouds passing over the sun. I know with crystal clarity: my time here is over. The pull yanks on me now, the gravity of OverHill reversing to push me out of the Somewhen.

  The king, my father, is saying something, but it’s lost as the summer breezes pick up into howling hot winds.

  “Dad!” My cry echoes across the Faerie ring. I reach for him.

  But the gravity only grows heavier and heavier, dragging at me. I touch his fingers, but I’m ripped away. Sunlight blinds me, a wall of heat shoves me like a strong hand, and I’m catapulted back through the hearthstone.

  All those facets flash bright in my eyes, and I’m torn away.

  Torn away from my father. Only, this time, it’s Fair Faerie that’s tearing us apart.

  Just like it wants to tear me and Roue apart.

  6

  ROUEN

  When the life goes out

  Of this world

  Who will I blame

  You or me?

  “Knockma,” Euphoria

  * * *

  Dark Faerie is dying, and everything I pass reminds me that it’s my fault. The dark forests are choked with ice, hedges of snow-blooming black roses wilt and sag, the heavy gothic arches and arbors that delineate the frozen gardens are crumbling.

  I want to stride confidently into the castle and tell my father our plan to heal him, so I can make amends for my mistake.

  Instead, I’m being marched to him under guard.

  Like a weakling. Or a villain answering for her crimes.

  Fury and shame crash over me, but I’m surrounded. Ebon Knights flanking me, Adamant Guard ahead and behind.

  There’s no escape.

  Even now, Stavrin’s wintersteel glaive pokes me in the back, a rude shove from that sends me staggering toward the ice-choked back side of dark Castle Knockma. “Keep moving, princess.”

  Fury whirls inside me, cold and threatening. I have to grit my fangs to keep from blasting t
he annoying Knight out of his boots.

  You’re here to talk, remember? But logic does nothing to calm me. Syl, I remind myself. What would Syl do?

  She’d look on the bright side.

  Stavrin prods me with his glaive again. Gah! Bright side, bright side, bright—

  A-ha! Here’s a thing: at least I’m not barefoot and half-naked anymore. Thanks to some prankster púca way back when, it’s against dark Fae custom to appear before the king in any state of undress. So, Alystin, my other staunchest supporter (before she was infected with Father’s crimson circuits), windwarped to my chambers and got me some boots, leather breeches, a proper Fae blouson with flowy sleeves.

  I don’t look half bad—for a girl who got dragged from her bed into Dark Faerie.

  Looks aren’t everything, though.

  I eye the glowing red circuitry spliced into Alystin’s and all the Adamant Guard’s flesh. I’ve never seen that type of Moribund before, but the way it controls them is terrifying. Even when I was first infected with black Moribund circuitry, Agravaine had to have a Contract of Blood and Bone to force my obedience.

  My dark self chuckles. Looks like Father cut straight to the chase.

  No. I shake my head to scatter those thoughts. I can reach him. I can free him of his darkness. This time, the right way.

  Still, it wouldn’t hurt to know more. I crane my neck to catch Stavrin’s eye. Maybe if I goad him, he’ll monologue like a good little minion. “What’s with the circuits?”

  He pokes me with the glaive. “Silence!”

  “Wow. Someone’s touchy.” My breath plumes out in the crisp, cold air. Like it or not, it looks like I’ll have to wait until I’m brought before my father. The Winter Council should be there, too. Vanya Visya, the rakshasi council leader and one of our most powerful arch-Eld elders, will take my side.

  She’ll tell me what I need to know, and then we can get to work fixing this.

  The Ebon Knights march me around the dark castle, heading toward the main entrance. Here, the land opens up, rose hedges giving way to blackthorn along the banks of the icy river that feeds the moat.