The queen laughed, swept the old woman into a hug, and whirled her around. “You may stop calling me ‘Your Majesty’, sister.” She tweaked Anweena’s nose. “You and I both know you never mean it, anyway.”
Anweena chuckled while I tried to parse that bit of news. She was the queen’s sister? How was that possible? My head couldn’t handle the information overload and the new-found family dynamics.
I focused on the fact most immediate for me. “Are we related?” I gently asked the boy, whom Grainne had called “Twist.” I wondered if the name was due to his ungainly walk—it seemed as if he’d had an illness or possibly even a prosthetic limb—and it made me angry to think he was mocked for it.
He, however, was beaming as he nodded. Up close, he looked very young, but with fae, you never knew. But that was less important than … “Do you know my mother?” I asked, needing denial or confirmation of my fears.
Puck and Anweena scoffed, while Twist and Queen Grainne laughed.
“Of course, silly,” he said.
“I’m right here,” said the queen.
Kemire and his guards wore identical expressions of astonishment and dismay. “How can that be?” he yelled, recovering.
His spoken question echoed my silent one but, by the slow, chilling way my ‘mother’ turned to gag him, I was glad I hadn’t asked.
Without taking her gaze from his face, she raised a hand toward the vaulted ceiling and clicked her nails together, making a sound like the skittering of insects. A tiny flicker of light drifted toward her fingers, growing larger as it got nearer.
Kemire’s eyes never left hers, though I could tell he wanted to. He appeared to be caught in her gaze, bespelled. When the glimmer of light reached the queen’s palm, it coalesced into a spider, which grew into the size of a pumpkin. She tossed it lazily onto Kemire’s face, where it attached, its long legs wrapping over his head while its body covered his mouth and nose, and those multi-faceted eyes stared into his. Awful, smothered screams came from behind his gruesome mask and he seemed unable to move. None of his troops came forward to help.
As if nothing more than a slight interruption had happened, Grainne turned her attention back to our little group.
“I suppose you must have many questions, child,” she said to me. “Let us take a walk in the gardens and I will be happy to answer.”
She took my arm, and Twist, who had moved from hugging me from the front to hugging me from the side, relinquished his hold, and I had no choice but to follow her on shaking legs. I peered over my shoulder as I was taken away. Puck gave me a slight nod of encouragement though his brow furrowed. Anweena wore a similar gaze of concern, but she was staring at Twist who was watching us go.
“What will happen to Puck?” I blurted. As soon as the words were out, I prayed no royal arachnids would be heading my way, but she merely looked puzzled.
“Who, dear?”
“Puck … the one who brought me here ....” I tried to look back again but her brilliant gaze was so focused on my face I couldn’t turn my eyes away.
“You call Dame Anweena, ‘Puck’?”
“No, I meant …”
Right.
“Maybe he’s called ‘Nonagon’? Kemire brought him,” I explained.
“Oh,” she laughed. The sound tinkled through the mirrored hall we were passing through, and I could have sworn the mirrors shivered.
“You call him Puck? I do say the name suits him, but whatever made you call him that?”
Annoyance tightened my lips. I gave a mumbled explanation of how he’d not given me his name but had told me to choose one. My foster mother at the time was a Shakespeare buff, so I called him Puck.
She grinned widely throughout the tale; a genuine smile which transformed her tired prettiness into breathtaking, youthful beauty. “That’s adorable, child. His name is not Puck, though. Neither is it Nonagon, but that’s not important at the moment. All that matters is my lovely daughter is home again, where she belongs.”
Once more, I had the sensation of the mirrors reacting to her words. If a mirror’s shine could have an expression, theirs varied from shock to curiosity, to sly considering which sent ice down my spine. I was glad when we reached the end of the hall and passed through large, multi-paned glass doors into a courtyard.
The garden was a bit warmer than any area I’d seen in the castle so far, and a few neglected flowers still grew amid the unkempt bramble and mildewing statuary.
“Oh, this won’t do. Not for your homecoming.” Grainne waved her arm and the star-strewn, purple-blue sky lightened to a sunny cerulean, dotted with fluffy white clouds. Weeds shriveled, and lush, sweet-smelling blooms rose to take their place. The crumbling, dirty bits of the statues dissolved in the wind and brilliant white, pink, and black marble gleamed beneath. The straggly, browning weeping willow bristled and fluffed its transformed, heavy green branches. The sound of songbirds came alive, and butterflies flitted amidst the roses which had sprung up over a trellis near the newly sparkling fountain.
“Come sit with me.” Grainne motioned toward a pretty, pink marble bench under the rose trellis. Once we sat, she took my cold hands into her own. “How have you been, child? Did the mortal world treat you well?”
I couldn’t speak. The cat that had my tongue was an angry mountain lion. How could she sit there so calmly and act as if I’d just been away for a school semester? Each time I tried to say something, only a huff of disbelief left my mouth. How had I been? Since when? Yesterday? The past twenty-eight years of my miserable life?
She cocked her head in a way that was so inhuman, fear overlaid my outrage but was soon followed by reluctant acceptance. She wasn’t human. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—understand.
I sighed, deeply. “What do you want to know? And are you really my mother?”
“I suppose I should verify it. Perhaps I am just too hopeful.” She smiled, gently, and retrieved the hand which I had pulled from hers when she’d asked how I’d been.
A quick swipe of her sharp thumbnail drew a line of blood across my palm.
My cry changed from “Ouch” to “Eww” when she licked the cut. “What are you doing?”
She closed her eyes and smiled. When she opened them again, she chuckled. “Just making certain. You are, indeed, my daughter. I taste the bloodline strong within you. Including your father’s.”
“Who was he?” I asked quickly.
Her gaze shuttered. “A story for another time. For now, tell me how it is that you are so old?”
“Excuse me?” I mean, I was two blocks from thirty, and she looked younger than I did when she smiled, but still … “I’m twenty-eight.”
Her face turned stormy. “You should have been brought home ten years before that. What happened?”
“How should I know? Ask Puck, or Nonagon, or whatever his name is.” I gave vent to my frustration and anger.
“Are you giving me an order?” she asked in a low voice.
The danger was palpable. I’d read you should never give fae orders, particularly royalty, but I’d bossed Puck-whomever numerous times without consequence. Well, sort of. But with her, I had to tread carefully.
“No, no. It was just a suggestion. He is the one who could answer that question since I don’t know how.”
She perked up again and stroked my hair. I tried not to pull away.
We were silent for a few moments before I finally ventured to ask another question. “How is that boy … Twist?”—she nodded—“how is he my brother? Did you have another child with the king while I was away?”
I feared I may have been a little unpolitic with that last question, but she laughed.
“Twist is your changeling, as Anweena was mine. We sometimes refer to them as siblings since they served in our stead. Of course, they haven’t the same ranking, and not all fae treat them as well as I have.”
I didn’t know how to absorb that. That boy was the human brought here—kidnapped—to take my place? Guilt eroded the l
ining of my stomach. And Anweena? The Queen’s changeling counterpart? What the holy hellions? And that crafty old crone had left out that little detail, as well. It blew my mind to consider how old she must really be. Though she hadn’t aged nearly as well as her ‘sister.’ Hah! Must suck for her….
But what else had she said? I struggled to remember. I had been a bit preoccupied with my own drama at the time, but still had a sense of Anweena not having been so happy with her lot in life as a young woman. I left that alone to return to my original line of questioning.
“So, Twist has lived here, in the palace, with you and your … husband? King Boran?”
That tinkling laughter again. “Of course not. Boran had kept the child in the dungeon to torture him for my indiscretion.”
“Torture?!”
“A bit.” She waved a hand. “Not so much that he died.”
A bit? “Is … is that why he has trouble walking?”
She seemed surprised by the question. “I don’t know. I hadn’t thought to ask since I brought him up from the dungeon after Boran died. I’ll send for him.”
“That’s not necessary,” I said quickly, not wanting to subject the poor child to an interrogation that would undoubtedly be painful and, likely, traumatic.
Her eyes narrowed on me again, and I blurted, “Not an order, no. Just saying I don’t have an urgent need to know right now. I’d rather hear about what has happened since … since I’ve been gone, if you are willing.”
Her rapid mood swings, her displays of temper, and the wild look in her eyes left me afraid of how she might react if I expressed how I really felt – angry, betrayed, horrified, and sad.
“Of course, darling one. Now that you are safe from Boran’s jealousy, you will have free reign to explore the castle and your birthright. I would imagine you must have many questions about the court, and I will be happy to fill you in on all the machinations.”
I did have some of those questions, and more, but was unable to form any coherent thoughts. My feelings were in such a tangled mess, I could barely find threads to hold onto. And the ones I could, would likely get me into trouble. For several minutes, I examined my hands, my feet, and the garden, wondering what to talk about that might be safe.
“This is boring,” Grainne declared, shocking me from my contemplation. “Have you nothing interesting to say?”
Her expression was petulant, and my own annoyance rose. I wanted to ask, “How could you?” but that didn’t come out. The first thing that left my mouth surprised us both.
“Why did you choose Puck to look after me?”
Her brows rose before a sly smile creased her lips. “He’s quite handsome, isn’t he?”
Ugh. “That’s why you chose him?”
An elegant shrug. “Among other things.” Her face began to change from amused remembrance to less than happy recollection. “Besides, he had to pay for offending us.”
“Us?”
She motioned between us. “He could have been your father.”
“What?!” Oh my God, no. Just no. The cherry pastry I’d eaten was about to make its reappearance in my throat.
She nodded. “But he chose not to.”
My head kept shaking. Did that mean he was my dad but denied it? Or was he her lover, but refused to sire a child? But if he was my father ….
His propositions and flirting played rapid-fire across my mind and I swallowed back cherry-laced bile.
“So … you were lovers?” I was hesitant to ask, even more so to hear the response, but I needed to know.
The sky darkened and some of the flowers shriveled in the icy wind that blew through us.
“No. We were not.”
I couldn’t hold back the sigh of relief and her sharpened gaze speared me. “Do you find me unworthy as well?” she asked.
“What? No! I’m just glad he isn’t my father, that’s all. And you deserve better than him, anyway.” And so did I.
The wind died and a ray of sun peeked through the clouds. “You are correct.” She smiled then her lips pulled down again. “Though some might say mating with a changeling rather than a king or a prince was lowering, I do not regret my decision.”
Color me confused again. “Mating with a changeling? Puck was a changeling? Or were you talking about Boran?”
“Do not insult royalty,” she snapped.
“I wasn’t trying to. I’m just confused. I thought King Boran was your mate?”
Her face cleared. “Oh, yes, he was. But that doesn’t give you the right to insult him, or me.” She glared to make her point and I gulped. She was one touchy lady … erm, fae. Queen.
I nodded and apologized again, noting the scary sheen in her eyes and high color that brushed her cheeks.
She rose and reached for me to join her. I didn’t dare refuse. Linking arms, she walked us around a cobbled path bordered by violets the size of plums. “Your father was not as human as Boran and Puck had assumed. I let them think it. Neither of them was worthy of me, so why not show how little they meant by preferring a human in my bed?”
“Of course.” The weakness of my mumbling hid the sarcasm.
“I suppose that is why King Boran chose to keep the boy to torture, rather than kill him outright,” she mused lightly.
In a swift move that made me flinch, she pulled me into a bone-crushing hug. “I’m so glad I sent you away. There’s no telling what that monster might have done to you.”
Just as quickly as she’d grabbed me, she let go and shrugged. “Then again, since you were a girl, he might have slit your throat and been done with it.”
“So, why a boy changeling?” Not that I would have wished for some poor baby girl to have died in my place. I was sick that the boy had been here.
To my dismay, she laughed. “Just to mess with him. Boran was so tedious when he heard the babe I carried wasn’t his, I wanted to tweak his nose by showing I had a son by another. Honestly, he could have just claimed either child as his own, but his pride was too great to bear the rumors.”
Every hope I’d ever had for family died. If my many foster parents had been uncaring and neglectful, what ‘Twist” had faced was a hundred times worse. At least, I hadn’t had to deal with homicidal egomaniacs.
“What happens now?” I only wanted to get out of there. Return to the human realm and forget all that had happened, and maybe try to take my ‘brother’ back with me.
“I suppose we shall have a feast to mark your return. Very few have ever known of your existence, and even fewer know what happened to you after birth.
“How many? Who knew?” In the fae realm, my life was in danger every second that passed. If only a few knew of me, perhaps I could make it out of there and disappear into my old life. Or, even better, start a new one elsewhere.
“Does it matter?”
I nodded.
“My former handmaiden knew, that bitch.” Her eyes hardened briefly then she smiled. “But she’s dead now, so it’s fine.”
I blinked, and a second later, she stopped smiling and said, “As is Boran, who also knew.” After a moment of silence, she spoke again. “And of course, Anweena and German, but only German and I knew what happened after. I believe Anweena suspected, though she never commented.”
German? Who was …? Puck!
“So, Puck’s real name is German?”
“Djeeermund,” she stressed the pronunciation.
“How do you spell that?”
“You can write our language?” she asked in delighted surprise.
“Oh, probably not,” I confessed.
“Ah. Well, your father knew since he was a halfling.” She quickly spelled the name for me in English—JIARMAND—while I processed the latest bit of information.
“My father was half-fae? One of those sometimes used as changelings?” I recalled what Anweena had said about the differences in changelings, humans and halflings.
“And one of the most handsome I’d ever met.” She smiled and tousled my hair. “C
urls like yours.”
So that’s where it came from. I figured it must, since she was white blonde like Puck … nee Jiarmand. And sometimes a.k.a. Nonagon. The next time we met, he was going to have a lot of ’splaining to do.
“I do have a weakness for the autumn locks,” she sighed.
Autumn locks. I kind of liked that. Better than carrot top, or even worse, fire crotch.
“I suppose that was what had initially attracted me to Jiarmand,” she mused. “Hair and face like old Aengus Og. That, and his wicked sense of humor. And his reputation as a bed mate.”
“Please stop.” I put my fingers in my ears and she drew back, glaring.
Oh, crap. Another order.
I hurried to explain. “I meant, well, I’m sorry, but it’s just uncomfortable for me to hear you speak of lovers.”
“Are you a prude?” she gasped. “I will have to punish Jiarmand for leaving you with the humans too long. It seems you have taken on some of their unseemly ways.”
I had unseemly ways? She was the one waxing on about her lovers to her daughter. Yet despite being super grossed out, and confused, and angry, I was still concerned about … “What’s going to happen to Puck?”
I would probably never get used to calling him anything else.
She clicked her fingers as if an idea had occurred to her. “I’ll let you decide his fate at your homecoming ball. Would you like that, dear?”
Not really.
Maybe.
Chapter Thirteen
B efore the queen left to prepare for the ball I didn’t want, she asked Twist to give me a castle tour. My curiosity was dimmed by guilt for what he’d been through, even though he seemed remarkably well-adjusted for one who’d suffered so much, so young. I wondered if he’d been spelled to appear docile, but I couldn’t ask. Maybe Anweena could tell me once we had a chance to speak again. She’d been conscripted to help Grainne with party planning, while Kemire had been released from his frightening muzzle and sent to his room, and Puck—Jiarmand—was sent back to the dungeons for the time being.
“Come, I want to show you something,” Twist said as he took a sudden turn through an opening in a hedgerow.
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