She pulled it out, blood dripping all around her and studied the rock. It was odd. A brilliant white, tiny sharp ends on one side. Her hands trembled. It wasn’t a rock. It was a human tooth. Val dropped it and scrambled onto the island, her feet sliding in the mud.
Why would there be a tooth on the bottom of the water? What else had she stepped on? All those hard sharp things, which she’d assumed were sticks…what if they were bones? Her toe had slipped inside a shell and she’d ignored it, but…what if it had been a skull? What if the thing she’d stepped on that had cracked had been a jaw bone?
She wanted to throw up, felt bile rise in her throat as she thought about the slippery things that had touched her. Not seaweed. She had an image of skins, wet and slick sliding past her in the water.
Who had died in this water? No, that wasn’t the right question. How many had died in that water?
Her stomach heaved and she gagged, but her stomach was empty, dry spasms wracking her body. She almost wished she had eaten something, just to blunt her body’s clenching as it tried harder and harder to purge itself of nothing.
She collapsed on the ground, hugging her knees and looking out at the brown water. Brown and bloody. The only way out was back. Through that clinging stew of water, the bottom filled with jagged bones and a muddy layer of death. She couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t.
There is no other way.
She looked at the shore and Cerdewellyn who stood there, watching her.
Waiting for her. He stood proud and tall, his hands clasped behind his back as though he were patient. A gentleman with all the time in the world. But there was more to it than that. An intensity and a focus was in his gaze that made her hesitate. He didn’t gesture to her or call out, but she expected him to urge her on, or ask her why she was waiting, even tilt his head in inquiry, but he remained motionless.
Pick the flower and get back to shore. This can all be over in a moment.
Val picked the flower, the bloom detaching easily. The stalk shriveled and died, like a salted snail, decaying before her eyes.
Her heart sped up. She turned back to the water and waded in a few feet. I don’t want to go back in there.
She was being ridiculous. It wasn’t a human tooth. She had no reason to think that. There was nothing at the bottom of that pond except sticks and mud.
But her body was clammy with revulsion. She had goose bumps on her skin and dreaded each step in the cold, dark water. It swirled around her waist and she dove in, swimming as fast as she could to shore, lunging forward before she could think better of it and change her mind.
If you hesitate, you shall never go in.
Water licked at her lips, went into her nose and her eyes. She wanted to scream and give in to the horror but if she could just keep it together for a little longer—five, four, three more strokes she’d be there.
Her foot touched down on the bottom, standing and wading to shore.
Run. Her feet touched and scraped things, some of them warm, a few of them viscous and one terrible thing that was round and small. When her weight shifted forward it exploded.
It wasn’t an eye.
She emerged from the water on the verge of panic. Cerdewellyn’s hand was extended, waiting for her to put the flower in to his waiting palm.
It was bright and beautiful, a perfect juxtaposition to what she had just swum through. She looked at his outstretched hand. Elegant fingers, smooth palms that looked like he’d never done a day’s worth of manual labor.
Too perfect. She blinked. A feeling of tightness surrounded her, like she was in a summer storm, the ozone heavy. The breeze caught her hair, lifting strands towards him, reminding her of snakes writhing.
“Just take it,” she said on a hunch, her hand poised above his.
He shook his head. “I cannot. You must give it to me.”
“And then what? What do I collect next?”
“Nothing. This is the final piece. I ask nothing else of you.” There was a smile on his face. Gentle, and yet for some reason she thought of little red riding hood. She suspected that with the outdated outfit he was rocking, making a joke about sharp teeth or big eyes would be lost on him.
“But you must give it to me.” The words were not forceful, nor were they begging but there was a hint of urgency in them. As though he wasn’t sure he could convey how important it was— and didn’t know if he wanted to.
“What will happen? When you have it?”
“I do not know. I have things I would like to do, but am unsure if I have the means to accomplish them.”
She nodded, the reason somehow good enough and put the flower in his hand, the tips of her fingers touching his warm palm. The sky went dark and the wind picked up upon contact. Val had a desperate urge to take the flower back.
Too late.
Bits of leaves and twigs began to swirl around her, pelting her, like she was close to the center of a tornado but had just missed the calm center.
His dark hair blew in the breeze, an eager smile making fine lines appear at the corner of each eye. His response reminded her of Lucas. He knew things, didn’t plan on telling her anything and had a stock reaction—a smile. It was unreadable and she had no idea if it was sincere or not.
Cerdewellyn wore the smile like armor.
But Lucas didn’t smile. His response to surprises, bad information, or questions was a perfect blankness. Impenetrable because she never knew what was important and what was trivial. Everything got the same response.
But they both had reactions they’d cultivated over the centuries.
They are both so damned old.
He looked at her palm, tilting his head to the side a little, brows furrowed. “The bloom harmed your fair skin.” She looked at her hand, at the blood dripping to the ground.
The sky turned black, so dark that it was like an eclipse was slicing through the land. He took a step closer, his hand cupping her face, and he tilted her face up so she looked into his grave-dark eyes.
“Do you want to see?” he asked her.
“Yes.”
She’d always been too curious for her own good.
Chapter 31
Valerie changed, felt like she evolved and lost corporeal form. She was above the land and part of everything. From the trees to the air. From the twigs flying around to the water in the pond.
Her consciousness flew upwards as though she was watching a movie play out below her. She was no longer part of the earth but as insubstantial, and uninvolved with the world below as the clouds that surrounded her.
Cerdwellyn was beneath her, walking through the meadow filled only with perfect blooms. But the color was gone and the flowers were black. The grass chrome gray. Darkness was everywhere, roiling towards him, the ground buckling upwards.
The end of the world.
Thunder boomed, lightning slashing through the sky as far as she could see. Twenty, thirty strikes at a time. Veins of fiery illumination brightening the sudden gloom.
There was a breath, as though everything in nature was expectant and ready for this moment. Pressure. The energy from the lightning and the sound from the thunder built. The sky lit up, bright lightning slamming to the earth, twelve huge bolts of it across the land that sizzled and flared, leaving fire in their wake.
This is hell.
The places where lightning struck continued to glow and burn. The vortex descended upon Cerdwellyn, consuming him, As if the world had devoured him.
Lightning struck, slamming into the vacant space Cerdewellyn had left behind. Then the storm was gone. The fires died and there was nothing but charred earth.
Slowly, the darkness wandered away like fog before a rising sun.
Cerdewellyn was back.
Cer was pleased that she looked at him without fear. As though he resembled himself. He still had enough glamour to trick a half-mortal. If she saw him as he really was, she would run away screaming, perhaps even die from fright. He looked down at his nude form a
nd the pieces of himself that he had been able to force together.
She had brought him his arms and his legs, his torso, his head, even his manhood. A dozen pieces the Queen had cut him into. This mortal had picked them all up, believing them to be flowers and returning them to him without hesitation.
He knew he looked akin to a ghoul. One of the misshapen creatures who had previously walked the earth and been under his dominion. Blood leaked from his wounds, all the pieces stacked on top of each other, held together by will alone.
One more piece. His heart. Then he would be whole. Able to fuse himself back together and start the long process of regaining his strength.
She swam back to shore and he wanted to scream at her to hurry but he waited. Regal dignity. Unending patience. A vendetta that could keep a moment longer.
She came out of the water, water and blood streaming down her form. She still believed it to be an ordinary pond—good. He did not want to deal with the theatrics she would have if she knew just what things clung to her hair and dripped from her skin.
The pond was a graveyard for creatures both fantastical and common. All of them moldering away in the deep.
His heart at the very center of it all.
Give it to me, he wanted to shout at her. So he smiled, instead. Patience. It meant he knew every contingency of his revenge. After all, he had plotted it out for centuries. This woman held his heart in her hands and gave it to him gladly. Her own hand was bleeding and he was pleased with the way her blood joined with his, absorbing the essence of her vitality like a midnight fiend.
As soon as she handed him his heart, he began to heal. Power rushed to him, flowing from the land, through the air and the water, coalescing inside him and remaking him.
Whole.
Free.
Virginia.
Cerdewellyn knew, knew, she was dead. That he’d been away for a small eternity and that she was lost to him. But he had to look for her. Couldn’t help himself. He ran towards the water, where her body had been discarded so cruelly and waded into it, looking for her. He screamed her name and dove under the water. And all the time he wondered why he did it.
To help him grieve?
Because he had imagined doing it, even as he lay in a dreamlike comatose state, for so long that he could not imagine doing anything else?
He didn’t know how long he looked for her but when he’d awakened the sun had been high and now there were long shadows everywhere. The sky was pink and orange with the setting sun and it was time to go.
Virginia was gone. Slaughtered. And for what purpose? What did his Queen think she could accomplish with him out of the way? He was King. He was what mattered. She had been nothing but a glorified brood mare. All her power and glory had been a gift he had bestowed upon her. She was nothing.
And to try to kill him?
His castle was in the distance and he walked towards it, his boots squishing with pond water and his breeches cold and soaked. He pushed his black hair back from his eyes and walked up the hill, using a touch of power to force the water from him, feeling the muck and water slide away, leaving a dark trail behind him. He was dry within steps.
He would kill her. The faux-Queen bitch. Walk up to her, put a hand upon her chest and take all the life he had given her back into himself. Put an end to her and whoever defended her. Every guard and subject who had been loyal.
Even his people. If they were not happy to see him he would take them too. Nothing but blathering apology after apology would assuage his murderous rage. Then he would fix things—if he could.
Virginia Dare was dead. The girl they had all needed. The one who held the magic. Let him see what his witch thought could be done this time. He could not fathom a solution.
The main castle was on top of a hill. There were others spread throughout the land. Holdings several weeks away by horseback, but this was his home and where the court had always been.
He passed cottages and workshops, finding them abandoned. As if they had been empty forever. Once upon a time there had been tens of thousands of Fey. Ones that appeared human. Ones that looked like monsters. Some were impish. Some were small and yet others were large. As many varieties of Fey as one could imagine.
But the decline had started thousands of years ago. The rise of other gods had taken its toll, left him weaker and weaker as fewer people believed in the fierce dreadedness of Him.
By the time Lucas had come along, his own world looked as though it had been struck by the plague. People abandoned their homes to move closer to his court. Fields were empty, forests deserted.
The drawbridge was down. Cer frowned, looked up at the portcullis and was shocked to see that no one was present. Was there a feast? Would he take them all unawares? The most peculiar thought went through him—what if they knew he was back and were all here to curse his name? Awaiting him in order to ambush him, again?
Try. Let them. He did not cower and would not retreat. Not again.
He had fled Lucas.
He had been patient with Virginia.
He had allowed his Queen to live out of sentimentality.
And in the end he had learned a terrible and priceless lesson— Kindness is a fatal mistake. He should have been ruthless.
He was King.
He was a God.
And he was vengeful.
He walked up the drawbridge and the the silence heavy. Despair was thick and cloying in the air. It clung to everything. The keep was dark. No torches to light his way. Not that he needed the light. He walked confidently into the pitch black castle, knowing every step and uneven stone.
To him, even the castle had a pulse. At least it had. Once upon a time. Now he felt disconnected. As though everything around him was a vision he had seen a hundred times before but had never experienced in reality. Cer went into the great hall.
And stopped dead.
The table was set with crystal and gold plates. Food was on the table, and his people were seated, ready to partake of a meal that had never begun. In the dark he could see them covered in gray dust. His Queen sat at the head, her bright blond hair and elfin features—so beautiful that mortals had gasped in adoration when she appeared—were shriveled and old.
Her hair looked like someone had shaken flour over it, no luster but brittle and pale. She was slumped back in her seat, lips open, eyes wide and sunken, dried up in the sockets like plums. Fifty of his followers sat at the table. The velvet and satin of their clothes decaying upon their halted forms.
He walked around the table, heard his boots echo on the floor, saw the wolves transformed in front of the fire—as though they were idle and waiting for their master to come home. They were still as death.
Were they dead? He went up to his Queen, peering at her, feeling slightly anxious. As if she might lean forward suddenly and scream at him. A nightmare fairytale come to life.
Was he scared of her? No. But he could not allow himself to touch her or he would kill her in his fury. Cerdewellyn backed away. He went to the other end of the table and touched Verica, one of his lovers, instead.
A spark of life was still there. It was as though they had all sat down for a meal and then, for some reason, they had never gotten up again. Cer laughed miserably. There was only him. Trapped in a world of his making. Alone in an empty realm.
But not for long.
Chapter 32
Valerie awoke with a gasp. She jerked up, taking a deep breath and looking around her. Jack, Rachel and Lucas were standing. Lucas threw the gun he’d taken from Jack back to him. Jack caught it, looking confused. Lucas pointed at the front door and said harshly, “That is more dangerous than me. You must be armed to defend yourself and Valerie.”
There was a terrible howling sound outside and it was growing louder, closer. So sinister that it raised every hair on her body and made her throat go dry. “I feel like I’m in the Blair Witch Project. What the hell is that?” Val asked.
“It is the Wild Hunt,” Lucas said co
olly.
“And that means what? Christ, just tell us the damned information,” Jack said angrily, taking a step towards Lucas.
“Legend says that when the Wild Hunt rides by, all must be in their beds, must close their eyes tight, for even to catch a glimpse of the Fey as they pass by is to put oneself in the greatest peril. One must not draw their attention.”
“Are they looking for us?” Jack asked.
Lucas said nothing for a moment. “I have seen no one else to look for, but we shall know soon enough.”
“Stay inside,” Lucas said and picked up his sword, going to the door.
“Wait! Why are you going outside? You said we were supposed to stay hidden,” Val said, reaching out to him.
He looked at her, an almost fond look on his face. “No, I said it was legend that one would be harmed. I did not say it was fact. This is nothing but a parlor trick, simple Fey Glamour. I’ll meet them, discuss terms and then, when I tell you, you may come out.”
He turned away from her, took a step towards the door and stopped. There was only silence outside. She strained to listen and heard nothing. “Maybe it’s gone,” Val whispered.
“No. It is here. He has come to us,” Lucas said.
And then there was a knock at the door.
Chapter 33
The door swung open, the hinges squeaking from rust and sounding ominous—just like it always did in the horror movies. Crap. The man from her dream stood at the threshold. Beyond him was sunshine and, in the quiet, she could hear the dripping sound of melting snow splashing onto the ground.
“Cerdewellyn. Well met,” Lucas said gravely.
Cerdewellyn’s gaze slid over Lucas briefly and then beyond him, to Valerie. “And there is the woman who set me free. You have done me a great service.” He looked back at Lucas. “I intend to return the favor.”
Lucas stepped in front of her, blocking Cer’s view. “She is under my protection. We sought you of our own volition and wish to put the past behind us.”
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