He seemed to be recovering quicker than most. Rising to one knee, and then to his feet, he strode across the grounds, which now appeared to be covered in grass. Elora’s followers had glamoured the space to look like a forest I’d never seen. Even the trees surrounding us had changed. No longer the tall and rigid pines, straight as the back of the Unseelie Queen, they curved out into flowered branches, sprouting pink blossoms on the ends. Not exactly the perfect site for a battle. But maybe the servants wanted some beauty in the impending bloodshed.
Impending. Encroaching. Inevitable. Yet, nothing happened right away. Even Naeve, who was scouring the grounds like a vampire desperate for a vein, hadn’t drawn a weapon yet.
“Where is she?” he snarled, climbing the stage that now looked like a grassy knoll. The kind of knoll you’d expect to find faeries in, the cute, tiny kind who danced to tinkling music. Nothing like this nightmare. Nothing like reality. Naeve’s golden eyes darted this way and that, searching the forest and the sky. His shiny black hair was matted on one side. The asshole probably spent time every morning getting those curls just right. I wanted to hold up a mirror. But this wasn’t a fairy tale, and Naeve wouldn’t dissolve into a pile of dust at the sight of his reflection.
Running a hand through his hair, he turned in a circle, showcasing those golden wings. The ones that cast shadows over the land. “Is this your army?” he called. From his position, he could only see the first wave of faeries. “My poor princess, it’s nearly as crippled as you are.” He let the comment hang as Elora’s silhouette appeared in the sky.
She rode on the back of a winged horse, in a long black dress with a high, regal collar. Kylie’s golden crown sat atop her fiery head.
A thrill went through me.
She’s going to trick him. It’s going to work. Yes.
Fifty feet above the camp, Elora came to a stop, her body framed by the light of the sun. Her hair flowed around her face as she stared at the faeries with compassion, like she loved each one of them, even those she aimed to destroy.
Her voice filtered down. “Those of you who wish to join us and live in a world without nobility, do so now, and you will be spared.” She waved a hand toward her troops. “Those of you who wish to fight … prepare to fall.”
The courtiers murmured, but none of them budged. Big surprise. They’d live in a world of hatred, or not at all.
Elora descended. She was so stunning, both vulnerable and powerful, as she lowered herself to the stage, that my heart squeezed, halting my breath. I wanted to cry, or kill; I wasn’t sure which. I decided, right then and there, that I would do anything to protect her, even if it meant my own horrific death. Cautiously, I inched toward the trunk of my tree, preparing to climb down. It would hurt, but not as bad as losing her would.
A hand landed on my shoulder, stopping me in my tracks. “Don’t be stupid, little boy.”
I spun around, to face Alexia. “Don’t talk like you’re one of them,” I warned. “You aren’t one of them.”
“I know what I am, and what I’m not,” she said. “But I’m starting to understand how they think.”
“That’s a mistake too.”
“Don’t lecture me on mistakes,” she hissed, leaning close to my ear, “when you’re about to ruin everything by trying to do something heroic. You can’t save her. She’s smarter than all of us.”
“I think I’ve known that from the start,” I confessed as Elora dismounted. “I always wanted to protect her, and I always worried that when the time came, I couldn’t.” I scowled. “I can barely lift a weapon.”
“Your mind is a weapon, if you use it right.” Alexia smoothed the dark brown tunic the faeries had given me, adjusting the opening in the back.
I winced. “It makes me crazy that I can’t help her.”
“You are helping her.” She slunk back into the shadows, behind me. “This is what she wants.”
I exhaled, my body shaking from exhaustion and relief. And I wondered: even if we did survive this, would Elora’s love be able to heal me? Or did that only work for faeries?
Down below, she walked toward Naeve with smooth, unflinching steps. I had the most terrible sense of déjà vu. Naeve waited, tapping his fingers against his leg in mock-impatience, his black cloak falling around him. The red powder of dried leaves decorated his ebony curls, and his eyes flashed, feral and bright.
“Clever girl,” he drawled as Elora stopped in front of him. “You’ve come to kill me with your repugnant stench. I can smell mortal filth all over you.” He lifted a hand toward her face. “Let me give you a bath. No slave of mine will wear the gown of human grime.”
Elora slapped him away. “No slave of yours hides here, little prince.”
Naeve chuckled as a bubble of rushing liquid encircled him. It was oily, and I thought of oil spills, of baby seals slick and drowning. “Save your tricks,” he warned, his voice resonating within the bubble. “My defenses can’t be penetrated by your pathetic spells.”
Elora laughed wildly, clutching her stomach as she bent over. “Save your challenges. I’ve no desire to penetrate anything of yours.” She paused, licking her lips. “So you learned one defensive spell.” She turned to the faeries below. “Who taught this dog a new trick?”
Laughter rippled throughout the crowd. Even the courtiers grinned.
Naeve didn’t like that. Circling Elora, he smirked at her back. “How darling, Elora, you’ve glamoured yourself some hideous wings to replace the ones you lost in battle.”
“The ‘battle’ where you used an iron sword against me?” she asked. “You and I define the word very differently.”
“Still, your costume pleases me.” He reached for the wings, but she jerked away. “You miss them, don’t you? How does it feel to be locked to the land, unable to fly of your own accord? Does it pain you?”
“After our last meeting, Naeve, little pains me.”
I narrowed my eyes. That sounded like a lie. Naeve noticed it too, because he said, “Liar.”
“Maybe I am.”
The Dark Prince shook his head. “You’ve always found ways around the truth. Look at you, sporting wings you no longer have. Look around you.” His arm swept through the air, all melodramatic. I wanted to punch him. “This landscape reeks of deceit. Are you afraid to show me where you’ve really taken me? Are we sitting in some hovel you now call home?”
Elora shrugged, and I felt a thrill of excitement. She was setting him up, twisting her words to manipulate him. “See for yourself. I’m sure you can remove the glamour if you really try.”
“Effortlessly,” Naeve replied. Still, he stood a minute in quiet concentration before lifting his arms to the sky. He didn’t know it, but the servants of the Unseelie Court must’ve been concentrating too. I realized there was a reason Elora hadn’t ordered them to attack.
She needed them for this.
When Naeve pulled down his arms, the glamour ripped away, revealing a strange world beneath. His laughter died in his throat. The bubble of protection crashed to the floor, and he gawked at the landscape with terrified eyes.
A city stared back at him, cement and iron and glass flashing in the sun. A squat, brick building rested under his feet; a skyscraper loomed at his back. Where a forest floor had been, thick strips of asphalt stretched out as far as the eye could see. Buildings shot up in the distance, and farther off, a great suspension bridge stretched over a murky, stagnant river. Cars sat parked on the outskirts of the courtyard, colorful and gleaming.
“Holy mother of mortals,” Alexia breathed at my back. I almost laughed. I felt the strangest sense of pride. Staring out at the city, and the park at the edge of the battlefield, I marveled at how life-like it all looked, and how familiar. But it was no wonder I recognized this landscape.
I’d drawn it.
A single, high-pitched tone rang out across the open space, in
forming the first wave to attack. Far below, another ringtone wailed in the distance, signaling the second and third waves to approach.
The moment was perfect. The courtiers were disoriented, slack-jawed and uncoordinated as they took in the sights all around them. They may have anticipated many things, but none of them expected this. Then, just as they’d started to gather their wits and shake off their hangover, that strange ringing attacked their ears, and for a few seconds they were frozen with confusion. Frozen with fear. And in those seconds, the revolutionaries attacked.
In the center of the grounds, the first wave of faerie servants poured over their captors like insects covering a corpse. Still, the courtiers pushed back. I saw Olorian shove a nymph against a signpost that was really a tree. The nymph’s lips opened slightly as she asked the tree to come to her aid. A second later the post bent down, encircling Olorian in its grip.
On the other side of the space, the Lady Claremondes fought furiously with three ogres, cackling as she slithered between their feet. The first fell, unbalanced and confused, and the others looked as if they were going to go hurtling to the ground as well. The Lady shrieked, thinking she’d won, when a dozen minuscule arrows whizzed across the battlefield, piercing her neck. A group of brownies shouted in triumph.
They’re winning, I thought, my hand subconsciously threading an arrow through my bow. It hurt like hell, but it was better than being useless.
We’re winning.
Then, just as suddenly, a terrible feeling bloomed in the pit of my stomach as I watched Elora stare down Naeve.
I crept to the edge of my branch.
“Taylor,” Alexia said.
I shook my head. It made me dizzy, but what didn’t, at this point? “This whole thing is a sham.”
“What?” Kylie hissed, looking up.
“Our place in the trees. Playing ‘defense.’ It doesn’t mean anything.” I gestured to the stage. “If he grabs her, none of us is a good-enough shot to take him out, without risking … ”
Alexia opened her mouth, but she didn’t say anything.
That told me everything I needed to know. “We’re just pawns. Even she’s a pawn in her own game. She’ll do whatever it takes to distract him, to keep him busy until … ” I slid my arrow into its quiver. “I’m not playing anymore.”
“Taylor,” Alexia said softly. “Every part of this has been planned—”
“You can’t plan for everything! That’s the point.” And then I was gone, slipping down the trunk of the tree. Kylie watched me as I hit the ground, but she didn’t try to stop me.
Up on the stage, Naeve was drawing a sword from his cloak. “After an impressive, surprising day, you choose such a pathetically uninspired end?”
Elora said nothing. She made no move to defend herself.
I started to run.
Naeve took a step forward. “So typical of you to sacrifice yourself for the good of your kind. Elora the valiant. Elora the fool.”
“Bravery always did elude you,” she said, absently adjusting her crown as I pushed between two trolls.
“Such an insolent tongue,” Naeve snapped, his gaze drifting to her head, where her hand had lingered. “Yet I still believe, with the proper training, you will make a suitable servant to the Unseelie Prince.”
“Ha.” Elora scoffed and spat in his face.
Naeve twirled his sword. “All I need is one little sign of subservience.” His golden eyes flashed. “Give me your crown.”
Elora frowned, like she’d forgotten she’d put on the crown in the first place. “No.”
“What?” Naeve asked, pleased by her somber reaction. “A faerie who willfully relinquishes nobility is undeserving of such ornamentation.”
“No,” Elora murmured again, touching the crown with her fingers. “It was a gift.”
Naeve’s face flushed, instantly angry. “Then you will watch the blood drain from everyone you love.” He slashed the blade across her face.
Elora gasped, cupping her cheek. Down below, I’d reached the bottom of the stage. For a second, our eyes met, and something in Elora’s eyes changed.
“All right,” she said, taking the crown from her head. Blood dripped through her fingers onto the jewels. “You can have it. Just don’t hurt my friends.”
Naeve grinned. “All I ever wanted,” he said as Elora stepped toward him with the crown, “was to see you kneeling at my feet. You’d be much more appealing from that angle.”
“You have no idea,” Elora said in a sultry voice, lifting the crown to his head. “Too bad you never will.”
She shoved the iron spikes into his flesh.
Naeve stumbled forward, his eyes rolling dizzily. The sword clattered from his hand. I watched him from below, my arms screaming as I tried to pull myself onto the stage. When he drew something out of his boot, I cried out in vain.
Elora lifted a shimmering sword from the folds of her dress as Naeve rose to his knees. She swung the sword in a way that was so familiar, it made my chest hurt. She lifted her blade. He lifted something too.
Isn’t it funny, the difference a second makes?
Just as she brought the blade down, Naeve flung his dagger into her throat. Red blossomed over the white.
“You lose,” Naeve said.
A scream ripped from my lips. Then Elora was falling, sliding into a puddle on the ground. I tried to catch her eye, to tell her I loved her one last time. Kiss her cheek. Stroke her hair. But a funny thing happened then. Elora looked out at the grounds, and grinned. As I followed her gaze across the battlefield, I saw faeries slumped in the dirt, both servant and courtier. But of those standing, there were hardly any courtiers left.
“I win,” Elora said. I thought she did, but something about the voice made me loosen my grip. The voice wasn’t Elora’s.
The building slipped from my hands.
Everything will be an illusion.
The voice was Keegan’s.
38
ElorA
I arrived to find the battle in full swing. So perhaps my people did not need me after all. Or perhaps everything had been plotted so perfectly, my presence was less important than all the arrangements I’d made. I’d gathered the servants of the Unseelie Court. I’d made certain my mother was absent, so more faeries would survive.
I did that, I told myself as I reached the top of the mountain.
I set this up, I thought as the body hit the ground. My body, or so it seemed, but looking down at my hands, I knew what was mine and what wasn’t.
Still, I had one quiet moment of denial where I forgot everything that had led to this eventuality. I told myself it couldn’t be my fault. I told myself I couldn’t have prevented it. Then reality hit me like a knife to the gut.
A knife to the throat.
“No! ” A voice screamed, as the glamour bled away from Keegan’s body. Looking to my left, I saw a figure on horseback traveling along the outskirts of the grounds, trying to reach the place where Keegan had fallen.
Where her brother had fallen.
“Oh, Darkness,” I breathed, wishing for wings that could lift me into the sky. Wishing for someone to carry me. Wishing for magic that wouldn’t come. Then, as beings often do in times of trauma, I remembered the parts of me that did work. The parts that were magic, whether anyone realized it or not.
I picked up my feet. I curled my fingers into fists.
And I ran.
Into the fray I went, past centaurs trampling nymphs with their hooves. Past nymphs choking pixies with vines. Blood streaked my arms, and I hadn’t even done anything yet. Brambles nipped at my ankles, taking away my skin in little bites.
When I reached the center of the battle, I sought out the key players. I already knew where Naeve was, but where were his favored courtiers? And where were Taylor and Alexia? As an arrow buzzed past me,
landing at Naeve’s feet, I found one question answered.
But what of the others?
My heart began to race. Really, it was an amazing muscle, withstanding torture, witnessing sacrifice, and still managing to be surprised by such a scene. Brother fighting brother. Sister fighting sister. All of us, so righteous in our indignation. And oh, we’d have our equality!
Death makes equals of us all.
I stumbled over the bodies of fallen faeries. I searched for green eyes and golden hair. I was flinging my darkness haphazardly, inky webs shooting out of my fingers, binding but not suffocating. I needed to find him, to make sure he was all right.
It was foolish, and I focused on it anyway. Love can kill us or save our lives, depending on the minute.
That minute, I chose love over self-preservation, and ran smack-dab into my third greatest enemy. The Lady Claremondes, in all her hideous glory. Even more hideous since Naeve had wrenched her tongue out in the graveyard and used it against me. First I’d been poisoned with her venom, then with iron. Another kind of girl might’ve been irritated at the injustice. But all’s fair in love and war, and I was about to rain fairness all over this wretch.
“Ooh, hoo, hoo!” the Lady crowed, that stump of a tongue making me feel sick. I took a step back, a wave of nausea washing over me. “If it isn’t the broken princess.”
“You aren’t exactly the belle of the ball.”
“You’re speaking like them,” the Lady Claremondes said, twirling her sugar-white dreadlocks. Her skin was so pale, she might as well have been a ghost. And she would be when all was said and done. A doomed spirit, haunting this land. Unable to grab. Unable to poison.
Yes.
Come closer, I thought, and beckoned with my hand.
She grinned. “You think you can best me? You cannot even fly.”
“Then I guess I will have to kick your face in.”
“Have at it,” she said, slithering backward. It was easy for her, as her bottom half trailed behind her like a snake, more vapor than substance.
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