The Palace of Impossible Dreams

by Jennifer Fallon

  “I’m sure it will be. And by the sound of it, Lukys has set himself up quite nicely down there. New palace. New everything, probably.”

  Pellys grinned. “The Palace of Impossible Dreams, that’s what Oritha called it.”

  Cayal nodded, thinking that wasn’t what Oritha had said at all, but if it made Pellys a little more cooperative, he’d happily go along with the name.

  “Sounds like a grand place for a visit, actually.”

  “Will you come too?”

  Cayal’s first instinct was to say no, but he thought better of it. There were any number of reasons why he should accompany Pellys and Oritha to Jelidia, not the least of which was that Oritha might not survive the trip otherwise. Pellys’s fascination for watching things die had not changed with his beheading. The only difference was that before he was decapitated, Pellys at least had some shred of conscience, which meant he usually confined his fascination to small animals and other creatures whose life could be counted as cheap. Pellys’s regenerated brain had lost its moral compass. He had no conscience any longer; no frame of reference for what might be good or evil.

  For Pellys the world just was and that’s all he seemed to know or care about.

  Besides, Lukys’s presence in Jelidia bothered Cayal greatly. The letter Lukys had left with Oritha for Cayal on his last visit had stated: “We need at least five of us to do this, Cayal, and we’re going to have to do it when the Tide peaks. I can convince the other two, but you are the only one on Amyrantha who can convince Elyssa to join us.”

  Does the five Tide Lords he mentioned include that psychotic bastard, Kentravyon?

  Kentravyon’s madness was so much worse than Pellys’s ingenuous savagery. Pellys was driven by childlike curiosity. Kentravyon, on the other hand, knew he was an evil bastard; worse, he positively revelled in it. That’s why—for once—when it came time to do something about him, they’d all agreed the world would be better off with Kentravyon immobile, powerless and tucked out of the way, somewhere safe and isolated. Like Jelidia.

  Except now Lukys was down there, possibly waking him up.

  Do I want to die so badly, Cayal wondered, that I’d inflict Kentravyon upon the rest of the world after I’m gone?

  Or was Lukys’s plan, more than just a way to help Cayal die, also a way for him to be rid of a few enemies? After all, if Lukys has the means to kill one immortal, why not kill a few more while you’re at it?

  “Well?” Pellys demanded, when Cayal didn’t answer him immediately. “Are you coming to Jelidia with us?”

  And if Lukys is preparing to take out a few other immortals in the process of helping me die, what does he have against poor Elyssa, that he’d be so insistent on her joining us?

  “Yes, Pellys,” he said, deciding this mystery needed to be cleared up before he allowed Lukys to manipulate him any more than he already had. “I’m coming to Jelidia with you.”

  Chapter 19

  “How are my babies doing today, Cecil?”

  Warlock approached the bed, carrying Elyssa’s tea. When he reached her side, he handed the cup to her with a subservient bow.

  He hated that she called them her babies. He hated fearing for every breath they took, wondering when she was going to come for them. He hated that Boots was barely speaking to him, she was so fearful for them. He hated the names Elyssa had given them. They’d softened them—Dezi for Despair, Tory for Torment and Missy, for Warlock’s pride and joy, his daughter Misery—but it didn’t lessen the horror of what the Immortal Maiden had done by naming them so cruelly.

  And as if to rub salt in the wound, Elyssa asked him the same question every day.

  Every day he answered the same way. “They’re doing fine, my lady.”

  “You tell Tabitha Belle, she’s to look after them well for me.”

  “I’ll make certain she does, my lady.”

  He handed her the tea, taking small comfort in watching the immortal suffer her own pain. Sunlight streamed into the bedroom, the lake visible in the distance through the windows leading onto the balcony. The view was spectacular, but he doubted Elyssa was aware of it. She seemed rather more interested in the young man in bed beside her, dark-haired, well-muscled and handsome. He was sprawled across the bed in a tangle of sheets, his neck twisted at an odd angle. His lips were tinged blue, his skin unnaturally pale, his chest unmoving. There was no telling how long he’d been dead. A few hours at least.

  Elyssa must have taken her pleasure from him—or her twisted version of it—sometime during the night.

  If she was lucky, in this wing of the palace nobody but the Crasii, who were compelled to obey her, would have heard anything amiss.

  This was not the first time Warlock had encountered a similar scene in the Immortal Maiden’s bedroom. There’d been hell to pay the last time. Until they’d secured the throne, Syrolee was adamant her children not do anything to expose their true identities, but with little Princess Nyah still missing, Elyssa was growing impatient. She had started taking young men to her bed and then punishing them for her suffering.

  Engarhod had delivered a severe dressing down to his stepdaughter over the last incident, which paled in comparison to the slapping about her mother gave her. It astonished Warlock to watch these immortals interacting. He would have thought that after thousands of years, Elyssa would have found the courage to defy her mother, particularly as it was Elyssa who could wield the Tide with impunity, not Syrolee. The Empress of the Five Realms could work a little magic, sure enough, but Elyssa and Tryan were full-blown Tide Lords. Why they continued to toe the line, going along with every scheme their mother concocted over the eons, remained an unsolved mystery that was almost as old as the Tarot which charted the story of these inexplicably complicated beings.

  But there was something new, and quite unexpected, that Warlock had learned about Elyssa. Something he suspected the Cabal didn’t know—and would never know unless they contacted him soon.

  The Immortal Maiden was more than just a title, more than just a name on a Tarot card.

  It was its own special curse.

  A virgin when she was made immortal, the curse of constant regeneration had an unexpected consequence for the young woman. Every time Elyssa made love, her hymen must be broken yet again. And then it would immediately begin to heal itself, an excruciatingly painful process in and of itself, without the added torment of being abraded by the thrusting urgency of a lover. Warlock had heard her screaming the night she’d killed the last young man she’d taken to her bed, just as he’d ignored her quiet sobbing while he and Speckles cleaned up the mess and removed the body before anybody discovered the handsome young baker’s assistant missing from the kitchens.

  This young man, Warlock didn’t know. But he’d suffered the same fate as the last one. Whether out of pain or rage, Elyssa had snapped the poor lad’s neck. Perhaps in the throes of passion, or maybe afterward, as she writhed tormentedly on the bed, her lover unable to comprehend her suffering or the reason for it, but finding himself blamed for it nonetheless.

  Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, which meant she’d only just finished weeping. She saw the direction of Warlock’s gaze and shrugged fatalistically. “Would you get rid of him for me, Cecil?”

  “To serve you is the reason I breathe, my lady.”

  She accepted the tea and sighed. “Mother’s going to be furious when she finds out.”

  “May I be so bold as to inquire where you . . . acquired him, my lady?”

  “In the city. In a tavern near the lake. I don’t remember his name.”

  “Did anybody see you with him, my lady? Anybody who might recognise you from the palace?”

  She shook her head, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “What are you suggesting, Cecil? That I say nothing about this?”

  Warlock hesitated before he spoke. He was treading on very dangerous ground here. But this was the rush Declan Hawkes spoke of—that feeling he got from knowing something everyone else doesn’t. Th
e way his heart pounded because of the danger. The way the hairs stood up on his back because he knew something that might make a real difference. “Your lady mother’s rage was a thing to behold the last time this happened, my lady. But Lord Tyrone showed us what to do, so Speckles and I could dispose of the last . . . problem . . . without discovery. Perhaps, in this case, we might be able to do the same to spare you any undue suffering?”

  The immortal studied him for a moment and then smiled. “I knew I did the right thing, insisting on keeping you. Will you say anything about this to my mother or my brother?”

  “If they ask me, my lady, I will have no choice. But if they have no reason to ask . . .”

  Elyssa nodded, smiling at him. “You’re a good boy, Cecil. I’ll see you’re rewarded for this.”

  “To serve you is the reason I breathe, my lady,” he replied, and then he bowed and backed out of the room, so he could go fetch Speckles and cover up a murder.

  “You hid the body for her?” Boots exclaimed when Warlock told her about the incident later that night in the chilly privacy of their bare cell.

  He nodded unhappily, not sure if she could see his expression in the darkness. “We weighted him down with rocks and tossed him into the Lower Oran.”

  Her eyes were shining in the darkness, wide and horrified. “Are you mad?” she hissed.

  “Quite the opposite, Boots. Elyssa now believes I am totally her creature. This has made things much safer for all of us.” He looked down, smiling at Dezi and Tory who were sleeping off their latest feed. The males were curled up in the small, warm hollow under the blanket, between their parents. Missy was suckling contentedly at Boots’s breast, cradled in her mother’s arms.

  “You helped a suzerain commit murder,” Boots said. “You needn’t sound so proud about it. Or try to make it my fault.”

  “I’m not proud,” he told her. “I’m sick to my stomach over it. But Elyssa has to believe I’m hers, Boots, body and soul. If she ever tires of me, she’ll let Tryan have us both and if Tryan ever got a hold of the pups . . .” He didn’t have to say more. Boots knew as well as he did that Elyssa’s particular fetish for murdering her lovers like a spider killing its mate was nothing compared to the stories of how much pleasure Tryan took from feeding Crasii pups to his hunting dogs when he was training them to tear apart a kill.

  “Have you told the Cabal about this?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t even know who they are. Hawkes said someone would make contact with me, but nobody has.”

  Boots snorted with contempt. “Typical. They make all these great plans to get intelligence so they can halt the rise of the Tide Lords, and then forget to figure out a way to get the information out.” She changed Missy to the other breast and once she was sucking contentedly, added, “Not that you’ve much to tell them. Other than where the bodies are hidden.”

  “I’ve more than that to tell them. With the little princess still missing, Syrolee is moving to have her declared dead.”

  “No princess, no wedding,” Boots said with a shrug. “No wedding, no taking the throne. What’s the problem?”

  “I was there when they were discussing the problem yesterday. Tryan has suggested the queen bear another daughter to inherit her crown.”

  “Well, that buys us nine months at the very least.”

  “You don’t understand,” he said, keeping his voice low. Although they were alone in their cell and the walls were several feet thick, he didn’t want this conversation to be overheard. “Tryan has proposed to the queen and with the succession so doubtful, and the Privy Council so nervous about the future, I fear she’s going to accept him.”

  “Then more fool her . . .”

  “No, you still don’t understand, Boots. Tryan doesn’t need to father a child on the queen. He just needs to be her husband. After that, for all intents and purposes, the throne is his for the taking.”

  “We should never have come here,” she said, stroking Missy’s forehead. “I don’t know why we let those fools from Hidden Valley talk us into it.”

  “Because you hate the suzerain as much as I do,” he reminded her. “You wanted to help bring them down.”

  “And yet here I am, with my pups given the worst names imaginable by the Immortal Maiden and my mate hiding bodies for her. Things aren’t really going as we’d planned, I have to say.”

  “I’m so sorry, Boots,” he said, reaching out to stroke her. “I’d do anything to roll back time and tell Declan Hawkes where he could shove his Cabal and their grand plans to save the world.”

  Boots nodded in agreement, and for once she didn’t shirk from his touch. “Well, how about you find a way to save your family, Farm Dog. The flanking Cabal of the Tarot can take care of itself.”

  Chapter 20

  Elvere was still recovering from an unseasonable storm that had caused serious damage to much of the city, when Declan arrived. The wharf where his ship was docked had been hastily repaired and many of the buildings were still unroofed, the gaping holes covered in tarpaulins that snapped in the sharp breeze coming off the harbour.

  Declan made his way into the city, hoping to establish contact with a member of the Cabal who had a shop in the clothing district. A tailor of some note, the man served a broad clientele in the city, and was able to pass messages to foreigners without being remarked upon. When Declan found the shop, however, it was a wreck. The building had obviously been flooded and on the footpath outside the shop was a gelatinous stinking pile that might have once been bolts of material Pollo the Tailor kept in his shop.

  “He’s gone to his mother’s house.”

  Declan turned to find a young boy tugging on his sleeve. He seemed to be no more than eight or nine years old.

  “What?”

  “The tailor. Mister Pollo. He’s gone to his mother’s house.”

  “How do you know?”

  “ ’Cause he told me he did,” the boy replied. “For a copper bit, I’ll tell ya how to get there.”

  Declan smiled at the enterprising lad. “Is that right?”

  “For a silver bit, I’ll take you myself.”

  Declan fished around in his pocket for a silver fenet and offered it to the lad, snatching it out of reach as the boy tried to grab it from his hand. “You get this after we’ve found Master Pollo’s mother’s house.”

  The boy glared at him for a moment and then shrugged. Clearly, his plan had been to take the money and run. “Come on, then,” he said with a heavy sigh. “It’s this way.”

  Almost an hour later, the lad stopped in front of a tidy house in a narrow street lined by identical tidy houses, all joined together in a row. Only the different coloured front doors and the occasional window box differentiated the houses. The house the boy led Declan to, had a blue front door with a brass knocker on it. Declan banged the knocker as the boy tugged at his sleeve. “You can pay me now.”

  “When I’m sure this really is Pollo’s house.”

  A few moments later a swarthy woman, who looked so much like the tailor Declan was looking for that he didn’t even need to ask, opened the door. He flipped the silver coin to the lad, who caught it, bit into it to ascertain its authenticity, and then disappeared down the street at a run.

  “Can I help you?” the woman asked.

  “I’d like to see your son, madam. Pollo the Tailor.”

  She frowned at him. “If you’re after a refund, you’re wasting your time. The shop is ruined. Everything is gone. He has nothing left to give anybody.”

  “On the contrary, madam. I’m here to pay him money I owe him. Is he home?”

  She glared at Declan suspiciously, debating the issue, and then nodded, standing back to let him enter. The hall of the house proved to be small, dark and cluttered with what Declan guessed must be all Pollo had been able to rescue from his ruined shop.

  The woman led him into the kitchen out back, where Pollo was sitting at the table, nursing a mug of steaming tea. Slender, swarthy and normally dr
essed to perfection, the tailor was unshaved and bedraggled, his shoulders slumped in defeat. He looked up morosely as Declan entered the room, his eyes widening in surprise as he realised who his visitor was.

  “Tides! I never expected to see you again!” he exclaimed, jumping to his feet. “I heard you were dead.”

  “A vicious rumour put about by my enemies,” Declan replied with a smile, as he accepted the tailor’s handshake. “I saw your shop. What happened?”

  “Terrible storm, it was,” Pollo’s mother said before her son could answer. “Went on for days. Ruined half the folk with shops near the seafront.”

  Pollo nodded in agreement. “It was worse than a hurricane. They, at least, move on. This one just sat over the city for days. Like it had a score to settle.”

  “A hurricane? At this time of year?”

  Pollo turned to his mother. “Could you leave us for a few minutes, mother? This gentleman and I have some business to discuss.”

  Pollo’s mother eyed Declan speculatively before she answered. “Says he owes you money. Make sure he pays up before he leaves.” With that, she gathered up her skirts and left them alone.

  Pollo shut the door behind her and then turned to look at Declan. “Sorry about mother. Tea?”

  Declan shook his head. “No, thanks. Tell me about this storm.”

  “It wasn’t natural,” Pollo said, resuming his seat at the scrubbed wooden table, indicating with a wave of his hand that Declan should do the same. “And it stopped almost as unexpectedly as it started.”

  “Who was it?” There was no need to explain anything further. Pollo was a member of the Cabal of the Tarot. He knew as well as Declan did that unexplained hurricanes when the Tide was on the way back were likely to have more than one cause.

  “Hard to say,” Pollo said with a shrug. “I doubt it was Brynden. He doesn’t usually mess with the weather like that.”

  Declan wasn’t so sure. “The last cataclysm happened because he threw a meteor into the ocean,” he reminded the tailor. “He’s more than capable of it.”