The Treachery of Beautiful Things

by Ruth Long

  “Bringing up the rear,” Puck grunted as they passed through a courtyard.

  “Ready to be first out the gate as soon as there’s trouble,” Jack replied without humor.

  Not “if there’s trouble,” Jenny noticed. But she let it pass.

  It was for the best, he’d said. The best for whom?

  Not the best for her. Not the best for her parents. He couldn’t possibly mean it was best for Tom.

  Jenny closed her eyes a moment. It was exhausting, this pinwheel of doubts. She turned her thoughts away from Jack and traced her hand along the nearest wall, smooth and iridescent as mother-of-pearl. The castle bustled quietly with the life of an early morning. She could smell bread baking, and all around them, strangely silent servants, dressed in the muted gray of a dove, moved from place to place, carrying trays, pitchers, and whatever else the queen and her court wanted.

  They passed the stables where the long-legged white horses they had seen out hunting snorted and stamped. Jack skirted around the far side of the next courtyard. Close behind him, Jenny heard dogs snapping and snarling, and turned to stare at a group of stone buildings.

  “Kennels,” Jack told her without looking around.

  A series of dull-faced men carried buckets of raw meat inside and a shudder ran through her, remembering the hunt, the hounds, and the tracker they’d killed, remembering her confusion over Jack, her anger. She smiled, though it was bitter, and followed along in silence. Behind her, Puck spat on the ground and muttered charms for luck.

  It suddenly occurred to her that, for all the activity, the place was deadly silent. “No one is saying a thing,” she whispered as they passed more servants.

  “They have no will,” Jack said. “They’re caught in the dreams she weaves, happy to serve her.”

  “Are they fae?” she wondered, a sadness coming over her at the thought of them mindlessly toiling away day after day. She frowned, not having meant to speak aloud. But this time Jack didn’t answer.

  “Hardly,” said Puck. “They’re human. Some of them have been here for thousands of years, some only just arrived. And they’re all hers.”

  “Human?” Could that be true? But then, all those stories of men, women, and children stolen by the fairies, in every culture, every age—from changelings to abductions…“You mean…all of them?”

  Puck shrugged. “She wouldn’t have the same hold over one of us. But over your kind…well…She’s awfully good at that. She can stop them aging if she wants, hold them in her web, keep them for as long as they amuse her or are of use to her. She doesn’t need guards to stay them. They wouldn’t dream of leaving. They don’t even know they’re here. In their minds they’re the hero of their own fairy tale—killing giants, fêted as warriors, marrying the handsome prince, dancing at the ball. You see?”

  Jenny’s stomach sickened. Every story, all those tales she loved as a child, all her escapes…were they all twisted and changed to something dreadful here? And yet, wasn’t that where they came from, all the oldest tales, from blood and pain and misery? She pulled her hand back from another pearlescent wall.

  “Is everything a lie?” she asked quietly.

  To her surprise, Jack’s hand folded around hers, squeezing softly. He pulled her into him, held her there a moment, a small and unexpected comfort. More surprising was that she let him. She didn’t mean to, but even if she hated what he’d done, could she ever bring herself to truly hate him? It would be so much easier that way…

  Then she heard it. Music drifted on the air. A light and airy reel that trilled like a blackbird’s song. She pulled away, looked around, her heart beating fast.

  “That’s him,” she said. “That’s Tom.”

  Jack exchanged a glance with Puck. “Are you sure?”

  “I’d know his playing anywhere. Where’s it coming from?”

  Jack lifted his head as if smelling the air. “The rose garden, I think. Stay close, and…please, just remember, Jenny…he’s been here seven years. He’s changed, just as you have. And probably not for the better. Few do in the queen’s embrace.”

  Jenny shook her head, impatient. “But he tried to run away,” she said.

  “Maybe.” Jack didn’t look convinced. “Or maybe…” A shuffle of emotions slid over his face. He opened his mouth and paused, his gaze flicking warily over her expression as if to gauge her reaction, as if praying for something other than what he expected. “Maybe he ran for the Edge knowing he couldn’t cross. Maybe he was looking for someone to take his place.” He let a long, low breath out and studied her for another moment. She kept her face still.

  How could he say something like that? Jack didn’t understand this, any of it. He wasn’t human, didn’t have brothers or sisters, couldn’t possibly fathom all he’d put her through for the last seven years. She needed to find Tom, to take him home, to make amends—for her family, for her brother, for herself.

  A new emotion—disappointment?—dragged Jack’s gaze toward the ground. “Just stay wary, Jenny. And please…please just know, I’m sorry.”

  Jack bent his head toward her and with a stray thought, she wondered if he would kiss her again, not sure what to do if he tried. She didn’t want him to. Still, her mouth parted, her breath catching in her throat. Jack stopped, just looking at her like he was trying to imprint her on his memory.

  “Let’s go,” he said, and turned sharply away.

  Baffled, Jenny fell in step behind him. She cast a glance behind her at Puck and raised her eyebrows. The hobgoblin just shrugged. Great. Really helpful. Such a comfort. Her chest tightened, shortening her breath, but she kept her face smooth.

  I will not cry, she told her body as it threatened to betray her.

  They followed the music through a gate wound about with roses. The thorns gleamed and the petals’ luster was red as blood. As Jenny and Jack passed through, the gate swung closed. Jenny glanced back. Puck was gone.

  “He never stays where there’s danger,” Jack muttered, without bothering to look around. “I’d say we’re lucky he came this far.”

  Jenny barely heard him. The music of the flute grew louder. If Tom had been good before, he was a master now. It was like birdsong in the morning, like soft rain after a drought, like the sound of dreams made real.

  But then again, she thought, he should have improved after seven years. He’d be twenty-one now, a man and not a boy. Would he even recognize her? The Woodsman and his wife had seen a resemblance, or so they said…if anything they said could be trusted. Would she still be able to see her brother in this person, this piper? No one seemed to hold him in very high regard. He served the queen, and no one seemed to care for her at all. From their brief encounter, Jenny could understand why. She was more an addiction than an object of affection.

  Leaving the courtyards behind them, they passed by immaculately manicured lawns edged with sparkling granite curbs.

  They followed the path through an arched gateway into a walled garden crammed full of rosebushes, where blossoms of every color tumbled over each other, fighting for the sun. The path wound like a snake through the sea of bright, heavy blossoms, and the music drew them on. Gravel crunched beneath their feet and that was the only other sound. That and the music.

  There, on a low stone bench in the center of the garden, sat Tom, dressed in the splendid jewel-colored clothes of the royal court, his hair still light but darker than it had been, curling against his neck, and his eyes closed, the better to concentrate on his music. The breeze lifted her hair, played on her skin. The petals of the roses seemed to whisper to each other. The flute was silver, and not just in color, Jenny thought. His fingers danced over the instrument and the silvered sound rose like a spell.

  A spell she promptly broke.

  “Tom?”

  His music faltered, ending on a bum note. He swore with a violence that was shocking after the sublime music, and turned around, quick as a wasp, to face her.

  For a moment there was nothing, and then his e
yes widened, his pupils dilating and shrinking in an instant. “Jenny?”

  Relief swept her forward. Jenny tore past Jack and flung her arms around her brother. “Tom! I heard you in the forest. I came to get you—to take you home. I’ve—”

  He was stiff in her arms, awkward and unresponsive. He heaved in a breath and she pulled back, lifting her face to see him. His eyes burned, and when he spoke, his voice was appalled.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Jenny’s arms slipped to her sides. She stepped back. “I…I came to take you home, to—”

  “This is my home.” He frowned, his mouth a tight line. Then he swallowed hard and shook his head, studying her.

  “What are you talking about? Our home. To our family. How could— Have you forgotten?”

  “Jenny…” Tom shook his head, and his eyes slid away from her face. When he looked back, his features were filled with confusion. “You have no place here.”

  “I came for you, Tom. To take you home.”

  Tom stared at her, his mouth parting, his eyes dazed. He looked like a child in that moment, like the boy she had known and remembered, the boy in all those photos at home. But he had never looked so confused, or so scared. He had always been the fearless one, never afraid of anything. Except for the night he was taken, except for that one night, when the trees had wrapped him in branches and roots and vines and dragged him away from her.

  Looking at her now, he seemed as terrified as he had then.

  Jenny reached out her hand to—what? Touch him, comfort him, to assure him that this time everything was going to be all right? She wasn’t totally sure she believed it herself anymore.

  His mouth twisted abruptly and a hardness filled his gaze, as if a different person had slipped beneath his skin. He jerked back from her, folding his hands around his flute. “Jennifer, I live in a palace. My lover is the queen. Not just any queen, the Queen of the Realm. Why would I want to go back?”

  She stepped away from him, her heart beating so hard she couldn’t be hearing him right. “What? Tom, I—”

  He pushed himself to his feet, towering over her, a man, not a boy. Jenny took another step back as he filled the space before her.

  “Why would I want a life striving to create music in a world that doesn’t value it? Play in some second-rate orchestra? Do a turn in the Christmas show in the village hall? Get married to some second violinist and squeeze out a few kids we can’t afford to keep on a musician’s pay? Why? Why? When here”—he swept his arm in a circle, taking in the garden, the palace before them, the woods beyond—“I’m a prince.”

  Jenny stared at him, this stranger. She realized her hands were up near her shoulders, as if to ward him off. She made them fall to her sides. She wouldn’t be bullied, not by Tom of all people. But before she could gather together a reply, another voice answered.

  “Here, you’re a fool,” said Jack. “You know what happens to mortals who belong to her. You aren’t a drone. You couldn’t create music for her if you were trapped in one of her dreams. But you aren’t exactly free either, are you, piper?”

  Tom stiffened his shoulders like a dog about to fight. “That’s none of your business, Jack.” He said the name like a slur. “I wouldn’t have thought you capable of doing Titania’s will so well, yet here you are. And with the promised payment in tow. Did her bed, her threats, or her empty promises tempt you more?”

  Jack stepped forward, his shoulder sliding in front of Jenny. She stared at her brother. What was Tom implying? Tempt Jack to what? Panic filled her mouth with a metallic tang.

  “Where were you trying to run to the other day?” Jack asked. “Why were you at the Edge?”

  These were Jenny’s questions to ask, but the words wouldn’t come. She’d dreamed about Tom for so long, remembering only the good, and now he was nothing like her memories of him. She stood there, her body betraying her just like everything and everyone else. She had to get control. She imagined two strong hands pressing down on her shoulders, stilling them, and took a deep breath.

  Tom shoved the flute into a loop at his belt. It dangled there, gleaming against the embroidered blue velvet. “That’s none of your business.”

  “But it’s mine,” said Jenny, stepping around Jack. He jerked after her, trying to stop her. “You’re my brother, Tom.” She frowned. “I love you. What’s happened?”

  “You have no idea what you’re doing here, Jenny,” he snarled, the expression so foreign on his face. “She’s bored with me, and seven years are up. I’m going to be tithed to hell, handed over as part of the pact. The Realm must be protected, and this is the only way. Blood must be paid, the debt, the tithe. And now, it’s me. So”—he shrugged—“I had to find someone else, someone to take my place. And who better than you?” He looked at her, eyes wide, challenging. “The forest wanted you to begin with. He’s the one who turned it on me instead.” Tom pointed at Jack, his finger shaking wildly. “It’s his fault I’m here. And now he’s brought you instead, as he should have years ago. It should have been you.” Tom shook his head, glancing at her with raised eyebrows as if to see what she’d do next.

  Guilt fell over her, his malice almost sweeping her feet out from under her. She staggered back, her eyes burning. She’d thought it so many times over the years, wished it even as she blamed herself, but to hear him say it—

  “No,” she said. He was lying, he didn’t know what he was saying. She shook off her uncertainty and started forward again. Jack’s hand brushed her shoulder, but he didn’t stop her. Jack, at least, understood this.

  Tom smiled, a gleeful, vindictive expression that made him look like one of them, like one of the Sidhe. Jenny’s feet slowed to a faltering stop. Disdain blossomed in his face like an infection, his mouth turning down to mock her. Tom was gone. Only the piper remained. The realization shivered through her. In this man who had been the boy she’d searched for, Jenny saw at best blank disregard; at worst, contempt.

  There was no sign of her brother at all.

  Tom dodged toward her, as if to attack, but he didn’t. She flinched and he laughed into her face.

  Behind her, Jack’s sword hissed as he drew it.

  Tom went very still, just for a second, and his face transformed, a nasty sort of triumph flickering over his features. Then he moved in a blur worthy of one of the fae. He lifted not a weapon, but his flute, pressed it to his mouth, and sounded three sharp notes that shot through Jenny like blades.

  There was a muffled grunt behind her. She turned to see Jack pinioned against the garden wall, his feet kicking in the dirt. Cords of roses entwined his limbs and torso, squeezing, snaking around his face to gag him. When he struggled, thorns tore into his cheeks, his hands. The stems turned slick with blood. It slid down the length of his sword to drip into the soil below his thrashing feet. Jack’s mismatched eyes stared at Tom, wide with surprise and sharp with rage.

  chapter twenty

  Jenny ran toward Jack, but a tendril lashed out, a barbed whip, striking her face and drawing a line of blood. Jack bellowed, straining against his bonds. They tightened still further. Strands of ivy slithered across his skin to bind him more securely. They wound around his throat and squeezed. Crushed beneath them, his skin torn by the thorns, he was forced to fall still, gasping for breath.

  “Jacks shouldn’t stray here,” said Jenny’s brother, or what little remained of him. “They aren’t at all welcome. Though I’m glad you brought my replacement.” He had lowered the flute. It was back on his belt, seemingly innocuous.

  Jenny whirled on her brother. “Stop it,” she hissed. “Let him go.”

  “Or what?” asked Tom. “He’s just a Jack, Jenny. It’s not like he’s of any value. There are hundreds, even thousands, in Oberon’s service. He isn’t human, if that’s what you think—” He broke off suddenly. “Oh,” he said, giving her a pitying look. “You thought he was? Best not to get too attached, Jenny. He isn’t good for much more than firewood. A puppet with invisibl
e strings, made only to obey Oberon. But, interestingly…” Here the piper cast his eyes over Jack. “Interestingly, not this time. This time he obeyed my queen, Titania.” His gaze slid back to Jenny. “He brought you here just as she asked.”

  Jenny narrowed her eyes at him. He was lying, clearly. She studied his pale, sculpted features, the courtly clothes and the silken curls of his hair. His face was soulless. This wasn’t her Tom, her brother, her friend. This was one of Titania’s thralls, a shadow that happened to resemble the boy she had known.

  “Let him go,” she repeated, her decision made. She lifted her chin. Imperious, she thought vaguely. He might respond to that. How did a queen command a servant? Only she wasn’t a queen. Just a little sister. “Let him go, and I’ll do whatever you want.”

  His eyes came alight with a hunger that chilled her.

  “Without a fight?”

  “Yes.” She glanced back at Jack and saw the panic in his face. Whether caused by his predicament or her words, she couldn’t tell, but it didn’t matter. Something in her heart gave a little twist of pain. “All right. Yes. I’ll do what you say. Just let him go.”

  Tom lifted the pipe again and blew three shrill notes. The ivy and roses snapped back and Jack dropped onto his feet, off balance, and fell. He landed on his hands and knees, wheezing and coughing. He pulled the sword into his hand.

  “Don’t,” he managed, shaking the dark hair from his eyes. “Please, Jenny Wren. Don’t trust him.”

  “Like she trusted you, Kobold?” Tom asked. “At least I’m honest about what I want her for, Jack o’ the Forest. At least I want her for myself.”

  “I thought so,” Jack wheezed. “That’s why you ran from the queen—not to escape, but to draw another in. To bring someone over the Edge.” Jack struggled to pull himself up, dropped his sword, but finally stood, his eyes hard.

  To Jenny’s surprise, Tom’s face crumpled. “It wasn’t like that,” he protested. “It wasn’t meant to be her!” His voice shook and he tightened his fists until his knuckles turned white. It lasted only a moment. When he looked at her again, his expression was cool once more. “But since it is—”