Seelie Princess (The Crown of Tír na nÓg Book 1)

by Sarah Tanzmann

  Kayla took another look at her surroundings: the immaculate golden floor, the spotless window revealing a glowing landscape, the strange faces looking at her with expectation. She knew nothing about these people, and Ava had basically kidnapped her, making her anything but trustworthy.

  But then there was the acorn. The only clue to where her father was. These people—faeries—had recognized the message as one from their world, a world unknown to her. If Kayla wanted a real chance at finding her father, she’d have to take the risk.

  And risk losing her mother and brother…

  “You may consider my offer until sunrise,” Ophira said. “If you decide against it, we will return you to your world.”

  “Thank—That’s very generous of you, I mean.”

  “You may take your belongings with you.” Ophira flashed another tight-lipped smile. Her eyes appeared distant. “In the meantime, I entrust you to Princess Fay.” She turned to Ava. “She is your responsibility now.”

  “Yes, your Highness.” Ava—or Fay?—rose to her feet. She still didn’t meet Kayla’s gaze, and a pale flush colored her cheeks as she led the way from the throne room. Kayla followed, her head spinning with questions.

  As soon as they were back out in the corridor, Kayla whirled at Ava, or whatever her name was.

  “So, to lie is an offense, huh?” Kayla couldn’t keep the anger from her voice. “Well, it seems like you lied to me! Who are you? And this time I want the truth.”

  The other girl was unperturbed by Kayla’s little outburst. She met Kayla’s glare head-on. “It was no lie. A person can use more than one name,” she said. “But people here call me Fay.”

  “Okay, Fay…” Kayla hissed. She was aware of how loud she was talking and how close the knights guarding the door were, but she didn’t care. Inside the throne room, she’d felt small and intimidated by the queen. Out here, she was uninhibited.

  “Care to tell me why you kidnapped me?”

  Fay glanced at the two knights, then nodded down the hallway. “Follow me.”

  Teeth gritted, Kayla followed Fay into a spare room, which seemed to be used as a storage for golden dinnerware. Faint light filtered in through a tiny window, casting a glow on the small space. Kayla was forced to stand closer to Fay than she wanted. She hated how beautiful Fay looked with that floral crown.

  “I saved your life,” Fay said.

  Heat rose into Kayla’s cheeks. “I’d thank you for that, but that’s an offense too. What gave you the idea to kidnap me afterward?”

  “It was my obligation,” Fay said. “The boar had injured you and you needed help.”

  “If it hadn’t been for you, that boar would have never attacked me.”

  Fay frowned. “I had to talk to you. You were carrying around a faerie message, and from an unknown sender as well.”

  “So when you ran into me outside my house, you just decided to stalk me?” The thought of it tasted bitter in Kayla’s mouth. In the dim light, Kayla saw Fay’s jaw tense. “That’s why you danced with me, and took me for a walk… and into that alley…” It all made so much sense now. Fay hadn’t been interested in Kayla at all. She’d flirted with her just to lure her in.

  “This is nothing personal.” Fay spoke in an even, flat tone. “I did what I had to do. And I don’t get why you’re so upset about this. You want to find your father and I gave you an opportunity to do so.”

  “Oh, so now I should be thankful you kidnapped me?”

  Fay’s eyes narrowed. “Call it what you want. And you might want to remember who you’re talking to. Yes, I brought you here against your will, but I did so to keep you from dying and to ensure my people’s safety. I can’t have humans running around and meddling with faeries we don’t know.”

  “I’m not meddling—”

  “And the way I see it, you’re the one benefiting from this situation. You might not trust me, or the queen, but we don’t have a reason to trust you either. You carry that acorn, see through my Glamor, and wear a watch laced with cold iron—”

  “Cold… iron?” Kayla glanced down at her watch, which used to be her father’s.

  “Yes, it’s a rare iron that burns the skin of faeries,” Fay said. “As far as we know, you aren’t like most humans. And now that Queen Ophira has offered you help, all you do is make demands.”

  Fay’s voice had risen and with every word she’d crept an inch closer to Kayla. The wide skirt of Fay’s dress forced Kayla to retreat until her back was pressed up against the closed door. Kayla gazed up into Fay’s face, her frown both daunting and appealing, and she felt an unfamiliar tug in her stomach.

  For a moment, they locked eyes, the air around them crackling with tension. A part of Kayla wanted to bolt; another wanted to draw Fay even closer and taste her lips.

  She did neither. She stood perfectly still until Fay averted her gaze and pulled back.

  “It’s your decision,” Fay said, her voice icy. “I won’t apologize for bringing you here. And if you want to leave, you’re free to do so. But it seems like you’ve been looking for this place for a long time and there’s no harm in staying a little while.”

  Kayla exhaled a breath she didn’t know she was holding and her shoulders relaxed. She thought of her father and all the stories he used to tell her, now nothing but a memory tainted by all the years that had passed. But one thing she’d always remember: the look on her dad’s face when he told those stories. He’d glowed, his eyes wide, constantly smiling.

  Afterward, Kayla had often heard subdued voices from the living room. Her mother arguing with her dad. Her mom always hated the stories, but that didn’t stop her dad from telling them to Kayla. She remembered that one night she’d asked him why he kept telling those stories and he’d said, “These stories have always been important to me. And you should know them too.”

  He’d wanted Kayla to believe, and so she did. She couldn’t turn her back on him now that she had proof his stories had been real all along. Now that she had hope her father hadn’t died that night, like everyone said.

  She had a chance to find him. To make her life whole again.

  When Kayla looked back at Fay, she was surprised to find her face had softened. Her green eyes were resting on Kayla’s with a new sense of calm, and Kayla thought she even saw the corner of Fay’s mouth ease into a brief smile.

  “This doesn’t mean I trust you,” Kayla said. “And if you try something like that thing with the flower again… I’ll kick you real hard, princess or not.”

  “Deal.” Fay was smiling, though a bit restrained. “Now, let’s get out of here.”

  7

  THE SEELIE COURT

  Since Kayla’s dress from the night before wasn’t considered proper attire in the world of faeries, Fay sent Kayla back to the bedroom that would be hers for now, where Deirdre was waiting.

  But before Deirdre could say a word, Kayla unzipped her beaded bag and peered inside. The bag was so tiny that all she could fit was her phone, her keys, some spare change, and the acorn. That was all she had taken with her into this foreign world. She pulled the phone out, unlocked the screen, and had already begun typing a message when she noticed something.

  There was no reception.

  “Of course there isn’t,” she said. She locked the screen on her phone again, then turned to Deirdre. “I guess there aren’t any payphones here?”

  “What are phones?”

  Kayla sighed and shoved the phone back into the bag.

  “I picked out a dress for you. And I am also drawing you a bath, if you wish to take it,” Deirdre said with a covert glance at Kayla.

  Blood shot up into Kayla’s cheeks. She hadn’t had time to shower the day before, and after a night out, her skin was sticky with sweat and her hair matted and tangled.

  “That would be great,” Kayla said.

  “Follow me, then.”

  They stepped through the second door leading from the room, and two things hit Kayla at once: the warmth of steamin
g water and the alluring scent of rose petals. The bathroom was like the bedroom, with a golden-tiled floor polished to perfection and a breathtaking view over the green hills and gray glistening mountains. In the middle stood a bathtub that melded with the floor. Water was flowing from a tap, steam circling up into the air like a whirlwind.

  “I have some towels and clothes ready here,” Deirdre said, pointing them out on a small stool. “I will wait in your room.”

  Once the door had closed behind Deirdre, Kayla shrugged out of the dress, stepped into the tub, and sank into the soothing water. She let out a deep sigh. For a few blissful seconds, she let go of the tension in her shoulders and drowned out any thoughts of the faeries. Her gaze wandered toward the expansive window, and she gripped the smooth edge of the bathtub.

  A thousand questions whirled inside her head. She wanted to meet more faeries, see what the court was like. And she had a big decision to make. For years, people, especially her mother, had told her to accept that her father had died. They wouldn’t listen to the stories about faeries, who whisked her dad away to their land. But now Kayla was here, in the land of the faeries, and her dad had reached out to her, letting her know that he was, in fact, still alive.

  She wasn’t afraid of not returning to Chicago, at least not for herself. Abby would be sad, but she would understand once Kayla returned with her dad. Her mother and brother would forgive her too once she’d made their family whole again. But if Kayla didn’t find her father, she’d be stuck in this world forever.

  It was worth the risk if the Seelie Queen was telling the truth about wanting to help Kayla. But how could she trust someone who claims to be unable to lie? What if that was a lie too?

  There was only one way to find out.

  After soaking in the hot water for a while, she scrubbed her body and hair, washing away all the dirt and sweat of last night. Once she’d dried off with the towel, she slipped into her new dress. It was lavender, with spaghetti straps, and tight around her torso to enhance the little cleavage she had. From her waist down it fell in a breezy skirt to her knees.

  She ran her hands down her side, smoothing out the dress. Its soft, featherlight material couldn’t be compared to her otherwise synthetic or woolen clothes. Abby would have loved it.

  What worried Kayla most wasn’t Abby’s reaction to her being gone, but that Kayla had left without a word. If it were the other way around and Abby had vanished without a trace, Kayla would move heaven and earth to find her best friend again. She’d have to reach out to Abby somehow. The Seelie Queen never said that she couldn’t talk to her best friend anymore.

  After running a comb that she found next to the bathtub through her hair, Kayla returned to her room. She glanced at her bare feet. “No shoes?” she asked Deirdre.

  “This way we can stay connected with nature and all that surrounds us,” Deirdre said, beaming. “How do you like your dress?”

  “It’s wonderful!” Kayla spun around, the hem of the dress brushing her knees, to find Fay in the doorway.

  Kayla stumbled, knocking into the drawer. As she straightened, she saw Fay avert her gaze, her cheeks flushed. “I’m all good,” Kayla said. “Should we go? Great!” With a glance back at a snickering Deirdre, she hurried from the room.

  Kayla and Fay left the maze of the Citadel behind and stepped outside into the blinding sunlight. It turned out that the Citadel stood atop a hill overlooking a cluster of tiny wooden huts. Fay led the way down a trodden path, into the chaos of the Seelie Court.

  Up close, Kayla saw that the wooden houses had vines and ivy climbing up their walls. Narrow windows were cut out of the wooden structures, but the glass was missing from them. Instead, some were overgrown with more greenery, their view partly obscured by flowers blooming in vivid colors.

  It was as though nature had accepted the houses as its own, growing around and into them. The faeries had accepted nature too. A girl was watering the flowers around her house with water from a dented jug. Her glossy black hair flowed down her back, exposing her pointed ears.

  Kayla gazed around, watching a group of five pass them. The women were all dressed in simple yet beautifully colored dresses, their hair woven with flowers, and the men wore nothing but shorts, their lean and muscled chests bare. None of them were wearing shoes.

  “It’s breathtaking,” Kayla said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.” She took another step forward. The grass was pleasant under her bare feet and the sun prickled on her cool skin.

  For a second, she thought she’d fallen into a dream where everything was calm. It sounded nothing like the city she had grown up in. All she could hear were birds, laughter, and wind rustling through the trees. It was in every way like her father had described it in his stories, and yet it was completely different.

  Kayla followed Fay, craning her neck to take in the scenery. Rows after rows of scattered houses stretched on into the distance, up rolling hills. And there were so many flowers.

  Kayla turned back around to look at the Citadel they’d left behind. Two tall towers rose high into the sky, their glass-like surface sparkling like diamonds in the sunlight. The main part of the building had a domed roof that ended in a spire and was made from the same mysterious material. It was as clear as any glass window Kayla had ever seen, yet it wasn’t transparent at all. The clear glass front reflected its surroundings, the hills and houses of the Seelie Court, and the vast mountain range in the distance.

  “This is…” Kayla struggled for the right words.

  “I know,” Fay said. “The Citadel has been here long before the first of our people arrived. Some think it’s Tír na nÓg’s gift to us.”

  “And what do you think?”

  “I think Tír na nÓg itself is a gift.”

  Kayla watched Fay as she tipped back her head, her gaze wandering up the Citadel. With her floral crown and sweeping green dress, she looked like an entirely different person than the one Kayla had met in Chicago.

  Fay turned back at Kayla with a smile. “It makes us strong and keeps us young and healthy.”

  “Does this mean you’re immortal?” Kayla blurted.

  “Not really, no,” Fay said. “We live very long compared to humans, but we can and will die. It’s just that there’s no physical evidence of age.”

  Kayla pondered over that for a second. “My dad used to tell me that faeries are stronger and faster than humans. He said that they could also hear my footsteps from a distance. Is that true?”

  “Your father is a clever man.”

  Kayla grinned, her chest swelling with pride. “He also said that faeries can do magic.”

  “Magic?” Fay laughed. “Using a Glamor is some kind of magic, I guess. We can change our appearance or that of objects around us, so they look different to mortal eyes.”

  Kayla frowned. “So this isn’t the real you?”

  “Glamors don’t work on you, remember? There are some mortals who have the Adder. The ability to see through Glamors and speak the language of faeries.”

  “But we’re speaking English.”

  “No, we’re not,” Fay said. “At least I’m not.” Kayla’s eyes widened as she tried to puzzle out how that would work. She decided not to question it.

  They resumed their walk through the Seelie Court, following paths that wound between the homes of the faeries, while the sun shone down at them from a clear blue sky. Another pleasant breeze of saltwater air tickled Kayla’s nose. There had to be a beach nearby.

  “I’ve got more questions,” Kayla said. When she noticed Fay’s pinched expression, she added, “Well, I’m here now so I might as well learn more about this world. What else is there?”

  “Where?”

  Kayla stopped, opening her arms. “This. Tír na nÓg. My dad always said that the land of faeries was beautiful and wild… and endless.”

  “I don’t know about that last part.” Fay shrugged and then continued walking. “But yes, there is more to it than the Seelie Court. In that d
irection,” she said, pointing straight ahead, “lies the Rhiannon Sea. It also encloses everything to our right. At our left, in the north, you can see the peaks of the Glistening Rocks. Beyond that is more land, North Hillside, the Dark Forest, the Giant’s Mound…”

  “And in the west?”

  “There are the Whispering Woods. I’d advise you to stay away from them. They aren’t safe.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Kayla said. “And there are faeries living in all those places?”

  “The Fair Folk is so much more than faeries.”

  Kayla raised an eyebrow at Fay. “Who else is there?”

  “Pookas, faoladhs, merrows, kelpies.” Fay droned on like someone teaching a lesson to a child. She continued her little lecture before Kayla could ask any questions. “You won’t find many of them in the Seelie Court. Perhaps a few half-bloods, but in here, everyone is at least part Seelie faerie.”

  “Every faerie that exists is living here? In this court?” Plenty of tiny huts stood in clusters around them, but surely this place had a limit.

  “There are several clans of Wild Fae,” Fay said. “Faeries who share our Seelie blood but have decided to live away from their court. Or who have been banished for a crime they committed.”

  She stepped aside to let two children pass. They were carrying piles of fruits in their arms and dropped some of them as they ran down the path. Then they disappeared between the houses, giggling and shrieking.

  “How am I going to find my dad in this place?” Kayla said. She closed a hand around her dad’s watch on her wrist, feeling the crack in the glass. “He could be anywhere…”

  Fay stopped to pick up a round red fruit the children had dropped. “You won’t find him. The queen will.”

  “But what am I supposed to—”

  Kayla staggered aside as somebody bolted past them, screaming and flinging their arms. “I’m not doing it, Mother!”

  The girl spun back around, her long green hair flying. Her eyes narrowed on Kayla and Fay, glimmering like amber gemstones. Then she returned her attention to the woman who came running after her. She had the same seaweed-green hair as the girl, but it was much shorter.