'Twas the Darkest Night

by Sophie Avett

  “Goddamn it,” Astrid sighed heavily. “I’m good.”

  “Mwa-ha-ha! The hour of Christmas beckons and it brings with it…CANDY!” Gillian giggled. Throaty and light. The sound was a little…unhinged. Zap! Zap! Another puff of pink magic attacked Elsa’s dress. Zap! Zap! Zap! “Candy, candy, candy.”

  The Viking smacked his forehead and pulled a tube of antacids from his pocket. “She kills me.”

  The vampire witch holstered her hands on her hips and frowned at her significantly shorter sister. “Get a grip, Gill.”

  Gillian went taut, her big black eyes flitting from left to right. “Sorry.” She straightened, the crazed light in her gaze dimming as the wand vanished. Cheeks pink, she dusted imaginary specks of dust from her dress and offered Elsa a sheepish smile. “Finished. I’m all finished now.”

  Elsa mashed her lips between her teeth and sought Astrid for guidance.

  “Think pixie. Lots of emotion. Not a lotta room for more than one at a time.” She shrugged. “Makes her a little crazy-like sometimes.”

  “Shut up, shut up, shut uuuup,” Gillian hummed cheerily and plucked a pair of sparkling flutes from the tray. She extended one to Astrid, who wrinkled her nose unattractively and waved it away.

  “Weak.” Another tray with short tumblers of harsh, amber liquid passed by and she lowered her tea shades with the tip of her wand. “Why, hello, lova.”

  “Merry met, poppet.” Merlin, the druid from the print shop, appeared at the vampiric witch’s back. He was draped in flowing soft gray robes, silver and white geometric shapes embroidered around the hem licking at his simply sandaled feet. White braid sashed around his narrow waist. His finery was muted. Simple. Out of place amongst the others.

  His slate gray eyes met Marshall’s and flashed. First, black like a demon’s. Then, silver like an angel’s. White, like something ancient and all-knowing that predated the confines of Christianity. He struck the floor planks with a gnarled dark wood staff. Not wood—bone. Black dragon bone. Celtic magic pulsed from his being, so strong it turned a few heads.

  Astrid remained unimpressed. Her glossy mouth kissed the edge of the tumbler, and then she turned her cheek, addressing Gillian, who was still fiddling with the bow on the back of Elsa’s dress. “Make it black.”

  Gillian rolled her eyes. “You want to make everything black.”

  “Call me Black, sister.” She winked at Marshall. “I look good on everything.”

  “Criminy.” Marshall stiffened and then touched his hat brim politely. “Kindly excuse me from the crossfire, Miss…”

  Merlin’s neat beard dipped into a frown. “Mrs. Merlin,” he snapped.

  Gillian bumped Elsa’s shoulder playfully. “Doesn’t that sound like a supernatural beauty queen?” Her forehead creased with contemplation and she tapped her chin. “Or a porn star. Oh, a stripper! Ladies and gentlemen please put your tits and tips together for Miss Merlin…” She went taut as if she’d been jolted out of her musings. Her eyes widened and she chanced a look over her shoulder.

  Astrid quirked one manicured eyebrow and Gillian winced, pushing and shooing Elsa. “We’re going to get a drink…”

  “That’s right, honeybunches,” she sneered, sharp dainty fangs splitting her smile like razor butterfly wings. “Move along, ‘cause I promise, I ain't your kind of poison.”

  Marshall and the Viking both shamelessly took a step back as Gillian hurried Elsa to the refreshment table. Though Elsa, of course, refused to be hurried past stomping a fraction quicker than usual.

  “Oh, come on, poppet.” Merlin slipped his arm beneath Astrid’s and jiggled a bushel of dilapidated roses. “I’ve already apologized.”

  “I know.” She plucked a velvet red petal off her nose and flicked it to the wind. “I was there.”

  It seemed the druid was just as persistent as she was unapproachable. He abandoned the roses on a passing platter and produced a teddy bear from behind his back. He wiggled the plush animal and Astrid didn’t bat an eyelash. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  “And you’re a sore on my eyes, so why don’t you make like an insensitive asshole and vanish. You’re good at that.” She was suddenly very interested in a very tiny snowflake. “Leave the teddy bear.”

  Leaning over the edge of the basket, Alec laughed, Brenda giggling along with him. “See, I told you to bed her and be done with it!”

  Ignoring his brother-in-law's advice, Merlin pressed the teddy bear into his wife's hands and lowered his mouth to her ear. He whispered. The words were lost even to Marshall’s sensitive ears, though he and the Viking frowned and leaned forward as if that might help. Astrid appeared unmoved until the very end. Her sleek eyebrow arched and she accepted the plush animal, holding it while Merlin produced a small square of paper from his pocket. By then, Marshall and the Viking had crept forward. Gillian and Elsa edging in from behind.

  The druid went still and frowned at the rest of his family. Of course, everyone dispersed. Snowflakes and drinks suddenly very, very interesting—positively bursting with intrigue and phenomenal cosmic powers.

  Merlin muttered under his breath and presented his wife with the page. “I went to the print shop and I tried to find the perfect card, but I couldn’t quite find one that summed up my feelings. So I drew a picture of me riding a seal. Don’t worry, I’m not naked this time. Nor am I wearing a tiny purple hat. It’s just me—killing a seal.” He offered her the drawing. “For you.”

  Several mouths opened to ask just what the fuck—but Marshall was the vampire who spoke first. “A baby seal? Have you no principles, man?”

  Astrid was visibly stunned, and then she wheeled around, throwing her arms around her husband’s neck. “Oh, it’s beautiful!”

  Yes, Miss Astrid. Splendid. Marshall rolled his eyes. Oh, how the twinkly-eyed fucks corrupt the innocent…

  After that, introductions were quickly exchanged. Brenda and Alec even climbed down from their perch, deferred to by everything with fur, heads bowing, and whining noises of submission. It was a response not only to the circlets upon their brows, but the awesome power of an alpha-mated couple. Alpha and Omega, they probably lorded over some province of New Gotham’s cursed forest.

  Commencement of the festivities was announced by a pixie with a wicked, harsh grin, and a feather in her magenta pirate hat. An army of pixies—pirates and thieves, all of them—circled the massive steering wheel. They were the power behind the tiny captain hovering above the helm. “Everyone!” She hollered and her chest puffed in her smart navy blue doublet. “Put a cork in it!” She directed the crowd to the stand at the balcony in order to… “Get a good view of the magic!”

  “Come, witch. We leave.” Sinking to his haunches, Alec clung to Brenda’s hips and nuzzled her pelvis. He nibbled at the silver chain drawn tight down the middle of her abdominal muscles as if he could sample her flesh through the lace. “I long to hear your screams.”

  The pixie went rigid. Her mischievous grin turned bloodthirsty and Brenda lifted her eyebrows and swatted his nose like a pup. “Hush, Alec.”

  “Ah, Tinker Hell,” Marshall chuckled, drawing Elsa under his arm. She looked at him over her shoulder. They’d painted her face. Her fresh, harsh Scandinavian features softened by a hint of blush. Shimmery gold eye shadow and black eyeliner highlighting eyes that were bright with joy. It was a look very similar to the joy that had touched her face during their Winter Wonderland bout of riddles. “You know, she”—he gestured to the pixie with his glass—“slapped me earlier today.”

  Candy red lipstick peeled into a whole smile. “Did you deserve it?”

  Those front teeth—damn, those bunny rabbit teeth. Bells jingled and mingled with laughter. Wholesome winter fun. As much as it warmed him to see her so happy, he couldn’t help but wonder at the way she’d accused Christmas of having the ability to change.

  It had seemed like such a naïve statement back then. It was still a naïve statement. All that had changed was whether he was willing to belie
ve in something as self-crippling as hope was. And it was crippling. A crutch. Like faith of any kind, religious or otherwise, hope was something the unfortunate used to lull their fears into submission. A way to dull the bleak present and look toward the possibility of a future. It was optimism. And he was a bloody realist. Truth be told, he was two steps from kicking in pessimism’s damned door.

  Thick blue magic rolled over the entire ship like sudden, running murky fog. Wind and shouts billowed. Sails flapped. Gunshots. The crowd went taut. Silent. Ready for a renegade monster attack from the Silverhand. And yet, he couldn’t detect the presence of an unusually large company of humans. No scents. No pulse beats. Nothing out of the ordinary. Or so it seemed.

  Screams shattered the air. Yells. Curses and war cries. Clatter and clamor of sword meeting steel and wood. A cannonball whistle. An explosion. The eerie blanket lifted, revealing a spectral mob of ghosts. Angry spirits. Colonial settlers locked in battle against sailors on the lower decks.

  The skeletons and ghoulish servants who operated the Palatine Light lined the deck like statues, watching the fight unfold. Eyes waxed and sightless.

  A girlish scream pierced the air. Familiar. Marshall narrowed his eyes on a thin wench scratching and scrambling at a colonial settler. She…was familiar. She smacked her attacker, he hit back, splitting her cheek with the hilt of his gun. Ah, yes. Lady ghoul from the reception desk. It seemed that whatever had happened aboard this ship so many years ago, it had somehow bound all the spirits together.

  In the midst of all of this stood a woman at the pointed jib of the ship. Long, black hair whipping wildly. Clad in a sumptuous red dress—elegant and stylish for the time, she ignored the clatter and clamor.

  An eerie green light winked in the darkness ahead. A spectral lighthouse casting light where its ruins now stood. She yelled to the crew behind her. “The light ahead is false hope! We will wreck and we will be plundered! That is our fate! Abandon ship!”

  A lumbering Moor decapitated a ginger, kicking him over the side of the ship. “And you, Princess Augusta! What about you?”

  Fury and hellfire burned the depths of her Polynesian eyes. “Abandon ship!”

  None listened. Not one. Her expression went slack, tears rippling down her cheeks. She alone was not spectral. She alone stood a woman, watching her crew fall and die protecting her. Reaching overhead, she rang a bell and still the fight for their mistress continued. When she ripped a lantern from the hull, raising it like a gauntlet—still they stayed.

  It was a battle they’d never had any hope of winning. Specters fought and died. Their faces turned up in frozen horror, though they no longer felt hunger or pain. When the final crew member fell, Princess Augusta threw her head back to the heavens and roared, “I am Princess Augusta and I curse you! I curse all of you!”

  She broke the lantern over her chest. Oil and silk. She was immediately doused in a roaring fire. Her screams shattered the air.

  He would never forget them.

  There was even less doubt they could be heard on shore, staining history books and foddering lore and legends. And then, they changed. Her screams became a song. A lilting little lullaby, punctuated with the occasional throaty, crazed giggle that seemed to echo everywhere at once. “Sweet dreams are made of screams. We wander the earth and sail Triton’s seas. Every monster seeks for something…”

  Elsa’s breath hitched, and he tugged her closer. The ropes and sails caught fire and it spread across the ship. Flames licking along the balcony and Marshall’s legs. Burning without burning. Embers sparked. So real, he swore he could hear the wood crack and split. Magic. Ghostly, damned, and tragic magic.

  Chill pebbled goosebumps down Marshall’s arm as he watched Princes Augusta’s burning body floating up from the deck like a flame atronach.

  The wind and her song carried higher and higher, her body floating on the current. She began to twirl. Faster. And faster. Snowflakes and magic spraying from the spiral, and then she exploded into a ghost. Astral, but beautiful. Her dress, her lush raven hair—all of it restored to perfection. The ocean lifted and banked across the ship, spraying the crowd and she laughed, opening her arms as a horde of spirits broke from the center of the hall, rising to hover at her back.

  “Merry met!” Princess Augusta thundered and lifted her hands, silencing the ballad of animal cries.

  Tension stretched over the monsters. That is, until a tiny pixie waving a needle launched herself into the sky. “Well, come on, out with it, sister!”

  “Welcome!” Princess Augusta boomed, “And a fair Season’s Greetings to all!”

  Fireworks whistled into the sky. Blasting with white, blue, and green stars across the black horizon. Howls, merry yells, and laughter.

  Marshall pressed a kiss to Elsa’s cheek. “Are you having a good time?”

  She snuggled into his hold and touched her nose to his. “Yes, Marshall.” She hardly ever said his name. “Are you?”

  “Yes, Mistress,” he whispered, suddenly breathless.

  Elsa kissed his temple. “I told you Christmas could change.”

  Maybe. Just maybe, she was right.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The black and white Christmas ball was to take place in the atrium. The hovering platform of musicians from the Frozenhearth had found their way to the heart of the ship, lining the ice staircase with a crystal orchestra. Monsters, servants, and holiday cheer churned in a vat of activity beneath frosted boughs decked with holly. Many danced in the shimmering red and green fog marking the dance floor, led by the fey dancers. The Vietnamese waltz. A soldier’s dance. Very similar to the slow waltz that had eventually ended in Marshall and Elsa’s first kiss.

  Marshall lifted a drink, eyeing Elsa over the brim. She and the other witches had become part of a growing knot of women hovering near the refreshment banquet. A witch with blonde hair long enough to rightfully be mistaken for Rapunzel, Astrid, and Gillian seemed to be engrossed in an argument. Elsa and Brenda followed along with similar iron frowns of confusion.

  “It appears the witches-who-stitch stole your bride.” Alec winked, lounging against the grisly ice sculpture at his back.

  A heavy pat on Marshall’s back nearly sent his scotch splashing. Quirking a brow of annoyance, he plucked a handkerchief from his breast pocket. “Indeed, they have, Your Lordship.”

  The Russian wrinkled his nose. “Meh. Alec is fine.”

  “Oh, give it up, man. You’re a prince now, whether you like it or not.” Merlin declined a drink from a very comely waitress and braced his arms behind his back. “Don’t mind him, Marshall. Has a wee bit of a Robin Hood complex, that one does.” Astrid’s sharp laugh rang out over the crowd and the druid’s eyes warmed. “They do seem to be enjoying themselves, don’t they?”

  Gillian giggled and covered a blush with her dainty hands. The Viking folded himself into the seat, resting his wrists on the elegant arms as if the weathered wingback chair were as fit a throne as any. “Lovely as they are fierce, eh, gentlemen?”

  Brenda snatched up a small mouse skittering across the table, crunched it in her bare hand, and tossed it over her shoulder. Alec winced and rubbed the back of his disheveled hair, skewing the circlet on his brow. “Fierce is a word for it.”

  Elsa threw her head back and loosed a true witch’s rusty cackle. Ignoring the heat sinking beneath his starched Victorian collar, Marshall set his drink on a passing tray and braced his hands behind his back. “Wildly intelligent.”

  The Rapunzel witch’s wide mouth dipped into a frown, her cheeks red with ire. She snapped something haughty and pivoted on her heel. Her long mane of blonde hair swatted Elsa and Gillian on the cheeks. The starlet’s face went pink, her hands twitching like claws. Elsa just barely managed to catch her wrists. As soon as Rapunzel took a step, Brenda stomped on the girl’s train, ripping her stardusted dress down the back.

  Ass. Thong. Hair. Everything flushed red with embarrassment as the poor girl fled the ballroom. Gillian barked a
nd snapped, still rabid. Elsa’s growing amusement lit her face in a smile. Astrid and Brenda pounded fists and went back to their drinks.

  The men watched all of this in collective, stunned, and somewhat horrified silence. Watching women interact was like watching the ocean break against the sand. If a man watched a gaggle of women long enough, he began to understand the intricacies of the cosmos. It was moving. Mind-bending, even. And terribly, terribly disturbing.

  Merlin leaned and whispered, “Savage little beasts, aren’t they?” He patted the vampire on the head like a wayward child. “Fear not, only mine bites.”

  The Russian frowned. “Is lie.”

  “Isn’t it a wonder the ship's still standing?” Their manly collective study was ruined by the sweet, ripe notes of a lounge singer. Billie Holiday and Janis Joplin rolled into swampy Southern Creole tones. “Evening, gentlemen.”

  Madame Mari. The woman gliding into the testosterone foray had to be Madame Mari. Spider Shine’s Muse. Oakmoss, white pepper, rosewood, and Spanish jasmine. Sugary notes of spectral magic wafted from her. And yet, the nearer she came, the hotter Marshall grew under his collar.

  Suddenly, the air was sweet. Musky. Heavy and sticky like a summer on the bayou. Two large viceroy butterfly wings fluttered at her back, dwarfing the men in a graceful shadow. Pinched, elfish high cheekbones. Pastel green, milky like cream skin. She wore no glamour. None whatsoever. Allowing monster and man alike to gaze upon the elegant perfection of true Court.

  The trinity found their black hair and their sharp little chins from their mother. Everything else they took from their fathers. And yet, there was no mistake that she was the queen of the hive. The mother of their coven. Sinewy graying silk licked down her shoulder like hundreds of tiny serpents as she lifted a painfully slender wrist and offered Ragnar a warm smile. “Merry Christmas, Mr. Butcher.”