“Faerie has no desires to conquer other worlds. She never did. Peace on Faerie will bring peace to all four of Faerie’s worlds. Your concern is for Faerie’s children scattered among the stars. She knows this. She sees…”
The water lady reached out a hand as though to touch my heart. I pulled back before her flitting fingers could touch me. I knew too well how a single touch could ruin a saru’s mind.
She pulled her hand back. “It all hinges on you, Messenger.”
Even with Talen, Kellee, and perhaps Sirius… I wasn’t sure we could do this. Perhaps if Talen were to take up the Nightshade mantle again, we could rally the dark and bring them back, but the wild things of Faerie were untamable, and Talen… I couldn’t ask him to become that thing again. I’d seen the fear in his eyes. He was not the Nightshade and didn’t want to be.
“You have more power than you realize.” She peered down at Eledan’s sleeping body, smiling like a mother might beside her child’s bed. “Fear not the Dark.” Lifting her head, she admired me once more. “Faerie loves you, saru, as she loves all her children. Your future is one of light and darkness. Embrace both and you will prevail.”
Her half smile was delicate on the normal side of her face, but a sneer on the other. I would be a fool to trust a fae who lured unsuspecting saru deep into her caverns and presented them with exactly what they were looking for, at a price.
Her attention drifted over my shoulder. “Enter, Guardian. You have listened long enough.”
I looked back at the cavern’s entrance to find Sirius climbing inside, his wounds healed, but his expression locked in his typical guardian glare. “I see you have met the water witch.” He bowed his head, and the water lady mirrored him.
“Did you hear enough to settle your rattling loyalties?” she asked, her voice softer, suggesting familiarity.
Sirius approached Eledan’s body, ignoring the witch’s question. After a few moments of assessment, he asked, “Where is his heart?”
The witch’s half-mouth twitched. “Not with the Wild Ones. We suspect Oberon guards the heart closely inside his crystal palace. He would not be so foolish as to abandon it when it holds so much potential, the same as he did not abandon the Messenger. You stole her from him.”
Sirius’s lips thinned, likely fighting a sneer. “Stole her? I did no such thing. I cannot seem to be rid of her.”
“You have lost your way, Guardian.”
“Easily done, Ailish, when the path is dark,” he countered, his tone dropping and garnering a musical accent similar to the witch’s. They knew each other well.
“Mylana will light your steps for you.”
Sirius’s glare flicked to me and then away again just as quickly. “She is a curse, and I do not need an insane water hag attempting to convince me otherwise.”
Well, gee, at least Sirius and I were on the same page in terms of expectations.
Ailish chuckled, a wet sound that made me thankful I couldn’t see her entire face. “This water hag sees more with one eye than you do with two. You are a fool, Sirius. You let the princeling use you, even as your colors dull and Autumn fades from power. You serve Faerie, no other. Oberon must pay his debts. Faerie must be made whole, just like this dreaming princeling will be.”
“This princeling will likely herald the end of Faerie, you wittering phantom.”
She laughed at his insult. “Faerie is already at its end. Fix the prince. Reunite the polestar. Free the dark. Bring the Legion home. And stop Oberon from making more mistakes. Change has already begun, but you must help bring it to fruition, Guardian, or there will be nothing left to guard and your existence will pass from time, as will all of Faerie’s. We will all be lost to time’s marching passage.”
When he looked at me again, he held my gaze as though challenging me to deny it. If he had heard all of Ailish’s words—her asking me for help, and her mention of justice and hope—he knew everything I did. But did he believe it?
“The heart is in the palace?” he asked again.
Ailish nodded. “Close to the king. We will bring the princelings body to the palace when the time is right, Guardian, but first, you must find the heart.”
“You cannot breach the palace wards—” he began.
Ailish’s sharp laugh cut him off. “See, lost his way… Foolish, Fire Lord. I once danced through those palace halls, when I had my entire face, of course. I’d like to dance there again. I’d like to dance on Oberon’s bones.” Again, her last word shivered through the cavern.
I was beginning to like her.
“Stop smiling, calla,” Sirius growled. “You’ll encourage her.” But his gaze held a softness for the water witch.
Ailish shooed us away with a flutter of her hand. “Now go, both of you. Time works against you. And Guardian…” She stopped us halfway to the passage entrance. “We were all wild and free, once. Or have you forgotten that too?”
He left the cavern, ignoring her question and assuming I’d follow. I felt Ailish’s gaze on me long after we’d left the cavern.
We walked through the dusk-lit forest along old, disused paths, with the wisps buzzing around high in the canopy, lighting the branches on fire with their glittering light. As Autumnlands was in favor, golden leaves fluttered and sunbaked grass swayed, crisp and warm to the touch. Sirius blended in so well I might have blinked and lost him among the golden browns.
After going over the witch’s words, I studied the guardian’s figure a few strides ahead. His messy hair fell to his stern jaw and over his eyes. Occasionally, he was forced to use his tek hand to sweep his hair back. Broad shoulders spoke of a body built for swordplay and strength. He was more warrior than courtly, but with Ailish’s words still ringing in my ears, I noticed elements about him that were indeed more wild than refined. And I noticed, too, more recent changes. When I’d seen him on Hapters for the first time in years, I’d noticed his colors had dulled and his clothes had frayed. Now, back on Faerie and beneath the orange hues of Autumn, his layers of guardian attire had mended themselves. It was subtle, almost indiscernible, but as I’d learned to look and admire without repercussions, I saw the change in him. The tek arm wasn’t stopping him from reclaiming his former glory, whatever glory that may be. He served Faerie. Ailish had said she was a wild one too…
“What does it mean to be wild fae?”
He stalked on, deaf to my question. I’d thought Kellee a master of the brooding silence, but Sirius had it down to an art.
“The more you ignore me, the more annoying I’ll become.”
“Impossible,” he said with his usual gravelly snarl.
Wisps dallied above. I smiled at their delicate dance and watched their light sweep across the thick foliage. “Ailish says we are all Faerie’s children, yet saru know hardly anything of fae history. You tell us pretty tales, but they are all smartly dressed lies to romanticize yourselves and make us fawn over you some more.”
“There is too much to tell. You would meet your natural mortal end before I told you half our past.”
“So you don’t bother telling us anything.”
“You don’t need to know the past to serve us.”
I stopped. He marched on for a few strides before realizing I wasn’t following. He turned and frowned as though I were a troublesome child.
“Are you really that shortsighted?” He blinked at my question. I shook my head. How could he think so little of saru? “I don’t understand you.”
“You’re saru. Your limited mind cannot comprehend my existence.”
I almost believed it, but in the past few days, I’d learned he had a softer side, one he kept hidden from me. What else had he been keeping from me? I’d learned Talen’s secrets and Kellee’s too. But Sirius was a closed book. “You say I am saru when it suits you. You work so hard to make me hate you. Why is that?” When he didn’t answer, I added, “You hate me, but some things you say and do make me wonder if that hatred is hiding something else.”
His scowl
was darkening, and the questions shriveled on my tongue.
“And what is it I hide from you?”
Reminding him of what he had said in the tower, about hearing my screams long after I’d left, seemed wrong to speak aloud, like it would reveal a truth neither of us was ready to hear. “You hate me. I hate you. We agree on that at least. You were listening to Ailish explain events to me. She said I can help Faerie. Doesn’t that put us on the same side?”
“I wish it did, but you are the Wraithmaker, and many have succumbed to your lies. You scheme to free your champion. You scheme to free the Dreamweaver—to what end, I do not know for certain, but it is not for the good of Faerie. Ailish sees only the light in you. I have seen the dark. You will take any weapon and turn it against Faerie. We are enemies, you and I. Nothing can change that.” That hatred again blazed in his eyes.
I marched forward. “Everything I have done, every life I have stolen, every lie was necessary to survive Faerie. You and your kind made me this way, and you dare blame me for your mistakes? No, I’m not listening to your karushit any longer. You made me a killer. The king tortured me and turned me into his tek-whispering experiment, and all my life I’ve bowed to you, fought for you, bled for you, and killed for you, and I will do nothing else for you or Faerie. The Wraithmaker is dead. She finally died when Oberon stabbed me in the chest. I am the Messenger now, and I will fight you and anyone else who stands in my way. I will fight for what is right. I will fight for the people who cannot fight because their will isn’t their own.”
“And what is right, in your eyes, Messenger?”
“Freedom for the people, for all the people, for saru and namu, for all of Halow and Sol. Valand had no one to save it. The fae destroyed it. That fate will not befall Halow or Sol. Those systems have a savior. They have someone who can stop this war.”
“And that savior is you?”
“Yes.”
“And what of the fae who stand in your way?”
“I will stop them.”
“Kill them?”
“If I must.” Every single one, including him. They had made me into this creature, and by Faerie, I would bring vengeance down upon them like a bloody storm.
“The Game of Lies was just the beginning of your campaign against the fae?”
“Yes.”
“And you will do all this, calla… alone?”
Not alone. At least, I hoped I wasn’t alone. Somewhere, Kellee and Talen were alive, and even if they didn’t trust me, they would be fighting for hope, for freedom, and for the people the fae would otherwise exterminate. My silver fae and my unseelie monster: Talen and Kellee, with their army of Valand’s undead. The Messenger survived in them, in us, and she was everything.
“If you think I’m alone, you haven’t been paying attention.”
I expected him to laugh his sudden and alarming laughter, but instead, he blinked curiously down at me. I didn’t look like much in my torn and stained saru clothing. Without my whip and coat I was less of a mythical messenger and more of a single saru woman with insane plans to overthrow her Faerie overlords. It would have been ridiculous if not for my light, which we had both witnessed. If not for the weight of my past. If not for the proof in my crimes.
“I do not believe I am by your side by chance. I serve Faerie, and as it is becoming clear that Oberon does not rule by Faerie’s wish, then I am here, beside you”—he almost choked on his next words—“by the will of Faerie Herself. But whether I am here to protect you or stop you? That is not yet clear.” He turned and trudged on through the brush.
Well, he had better decide soon, or I’d make the call for him. If he wasn’t my ally, then he was in my way. Like Sjora had been in my way, and Devere, and a thousand fae who had thought themselves immortal against my wrath until an army of wardrones cut them down.
“If only Faerie could talk…” I muttered, following Sirius.
“She can,” he answered, startling me. “Listening to Her, however, is more difficult.”
“Does She talk to you?”
He glanced over his shoulder, one russet eyebrow raised in an expression I had no hope of deciphering, and then he continued forward as though that glance had been answer enough.
“Is that why your colors are returning?” I did not understand the fae’s relationship with Faerie, but Ailish seemed convinced that Sirius losing his color was connected to him losing his path. And now his colors were returning. “Because you’re coming around to the idea that I might be helpful?”
“Helpful is not the word I would use to describe you.”
I pushed glittering branches aside and grinned at his back. “Do enlighten me.”
“Disrespectful, dishonorable, disloyal, manipulative, shallow, unworthy. Wretched. Volatile. Shall I go on?”
Well, he certainly wasn’t shy about expressing his feelings.
“You are the worst kind of creature,” he went on anyway. “You remind me of the roses used to contain palace prisoners. Pretty to look at but their thorns are sharp. They’re also emotional leeches. They cause pain in anyone who gets too close and they feed off that pain. That is you.”
I could have chosen to let his words hurt, but I knew exactly what Sirius thought of me and exactly how to annoy him. “You think I’m pretty?”
His stride tripped and he grunted a fae word I didn’t catch but was likely derogatory. My guardian was too easy to tease.
A wisp buzzed between us and spiraled higher in the air. Another zoomed in, joining its partner, and then a third and fourth until the pathway glittered with prancing specks of light. I stopped, not wanting to push through them. More rained down from the canopy, flooding the path with light. One skipped in the air toward my face. I backed up. They were pretty, but I’d never seen so many this close before. The wisp dipped and settled delicately on my shoulder, where its tiny wings slowed enough for me to see how their transparent membranes glowed from the inside. A tickle on my hand. I lifted it to find a wisp clinging to my finger. Down and down, hundreds sailed through the air. Their combined brightness was almost blinding. I lifted my hand to shield my eyes, and those that had landed on me fluttered off, flying in formation like flocks of silvery stars.
I turned, feeling a soft warmth unfurl inside. Wisps were thought of as pests. I’d barely given them a second thought in the past. But their dance around me was coordinated, not random. They danced in a cloud of light with me at their center.
Sirius’s green-eyed glare cut through them. Fury twisted my guardian’s handsome face. I laughed, refusing to let his moods spoil mine, and lifted my arms, twirling inside the light. The wisps twirled with me in a merry dance, and all the while, Sirius fumed on the sidelines like a storm about to roll in and ruin the fun.
“Enough!” he roared.
I jumped, and the wisps exploded away, fleeing to the enormous trees, their light fading with them.
His eyes flashed with fire. He just had to frighten them, didn’t he? Because I liked them. I approached, and when he didn’t move from my path, I shoved him, moving him out of my path.
“Maybe Faerie speaks to you but you’re not listening, Guardian.”
He followed. “Faerie would not pick a saru as Her savior.”
It seemed to me, Faerie knew exactly what She was doing. Her children had failed Her. She was dying and desperate. A piece of the polestar had been hidden in a saru bloodline and passed down through the generations to me. What choice did She have?
“You’re her guardian, one of her first children. Your colors were fading, and now that you’re with me, you’re getting those colors—those powers back. These are not lies, and you know it. You need to take a long hard look at yourself. I’m not the disloyal one here, you are.”
A flash of heat warmed my back. I turned to find Sirius standing on the path, bathed in flame. The fire danced over his tek arm too, lighting it up at his side. His hands were clenched into fists. He was a marvel to behold, the perfect sidhe lord, a product of Faeri
e. But he’d been blinded by his own prowess, just like the rest of them. He didn’t like me because I wasn’t like the others. I didn’t only reflect the things he wanted to see. I reflected his ugly aspects, and no seelie fae liked to think of themselves as ugly.
I remembered something I’d told Kellee. “The truth hurts, Guardian. That’s how you know it’s real.”
Turning away, I continued down the path, his heat fading behind me. When I looked back, he was following, eyes downcast until he looked up and held my gaze, not with hatred but with the same raw honesty I’d glimpsed in the past. It had to hurt when a dumb saru mortal girl showed you your own ugly truths.
I might never win Sirius over, but hopefully, when we freed Eledan and reunited the polestar pieces, Sirius would stand by my side. If not, I would be forced to deal with him the same way I’d dealt with the cu sith, and despite our differences, the thought of killing him didn’t sit well with me.
Thick trees gave way to open sky and an open road, and in the distance, climbing the hills above the coast, the crystal palace shone purple in the twilight. Inside its shimmering walls, the king awaited my return, and Arran counted the minutes until his death.
Sirius lifted his head, looking back toward the forest where the stars were pulling the thick black quilt of night across all of Faerie.
“Night approaches,” he said. “We have hours, not days.”
And in those hours, all I had to do was find and steal the king’s most prized possession—his brother’s heart.
“Can I count on you to help me stop Oberon?” I asked him.
Sirius gazed ahead at the palace and then down at his healed tek hand. After everything he had seen, how could he deny there was so much more happening here than a king’s stubborn obsession with a nothing girl and the death of a gladiator for crimes he hadn’t committed?
He folded his tek fingers into his palm and clenched his jaw. “I serve Faerie.”
And Faerie needed its polestar. Me.
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