Nothing and no one got him close enough to the Black Queen. And so, he’d finally gotten desperate and made the journey to the Golden Court and consulted King Oberon’s psychic. Known as the Oracle, the old man had been a mess. But what he’d said had changed all Ardan’s plans.
Forcing his suddenly damp hands to steady, he opened up the hinged lid. And stared, his heart thumping in wonder, at the small black needle gently turning end over end inside a ball of glass. He’d found it. The lodestone.
“So you think that’s the magic ticket that will get you the Queen’s head and earn you Kian’s gratitude?”
Ardan spun, box in his left hand, Gleam, in his right.
He had no idea how old the Lady Aoife was. She could be a thousand years old, or she could be three thousand. Her skin was soft with subtle wrinkles but it glowed with health, as she mocked him from across the gore-soaked dirt of the cave. Her white hair shone and her upright posture spoke of a rigid determination to never get old. She wore a deep blue cloak, embroidered with glittering stars. And in this place, deep under the earth filled with blood and guts and grime, her tunic, slacks, and even her boots, were a pristine white.
He bowed low. “My lady.”
At the court of Prince Kian, he’d thought she might be an ally. She’d saved him from prison with this quest, making sure he was outfitted with Gleam and a white fae steed, named Triton. But it hadn’t taken long to realize she only saw him as a weapon to hone and send out to find its target.
“Ten months and you’re no closer to finding her than those pitiful things are to attending the next royal wedding.” She gestured at the troll-kin dying on the floor, sweeping her cloak carefully away from the spreading pool of blood. “What makes you think this trinket will help you?”
The incredulity on her face made him squirm.
“What makes you think it won’t?” Ardan’s hand tightened on the box, the edges cutting into his skin. It had to work. He had nothing else.
“You’re missing the point.”
“I thought the point was to find and kill the Black Queen and earn my place in her son’s court.”
“For you, the point is to prove your loyalty and save your life. Running around like a dog after a scent is getting you nowhere. Certainly no closer to that bitch.” She shook her head at him, her eyes gleaming in the candlelight from the altar. “In fact, it’s getting you worse than nowhere. Bosco has the prince’s ear and he’s grinding away at him to get it over with and just kill you.”
Ardan’s jaw clenched.
Bosco.
Despite the fact that Bosco was the very reason Ardan now had his freedom, Ardan rued the day that the other man had returned to the Winter Court, attacking it and pushing Ardan into renouncing Queen Maeve.
Freedom was overrated. Belonging to a court, having a job, a role—that was where he wanted to be. Needed to be. These last few months, wandering on his own, had made that very clear. He was a knight. A soldier. He owed service to someone. And without that what was he?
Nothing. Just a man without a place.
He needed his place back. And this lodestone was going to help him find it.
As soon as he had the thought, the needle inside the ball stopped its lazy spinning. It shivered back and forth, finally centering on a direction.
He held it up. “See? It’s found her already. It doesn’t matter what Bosco says. With this, I’ll have her by the end of the year and I’ll bring her head to the prince. He’ll make me a part of the court and I’ll have my life back again.”
It wouldn’t be his old life, in service to the woman who’d taken him as a lover when he was little more than a child, and then discarded him once he was a man. The loss of her love, of everything he’d had in the Winter Court still burned inside him, pushed him. But it would be a new life. One with purpose. With meaning.
“Hah!” Aoife’s short laugh caught him by surprise. “You still believe you have two months left, don’t you?”
A sick feeling twisted in his stomach.
“The frost has just begun to creep over the ground. My year isn’t over until the week after the winter solstice.”
“Weren’t you listening to a word I said? Bosco has the ear of the prince. He’s convinced him to come after you if you don’t return by the next full moon.” She turned and opened up a portal.
He watched the grey mists trying to crawl out of the rectangular door of the portal, the curdling in his stomach becoming a heavy mass of pain.
“One month?” How could the prince have done this to him? How could Bosco still hate him this much?
A hand reached out of the mist, so gaunt it looked as if it were only leather stretched over bones. Seven long fingers grew claws that scraped at the edge of the gate.
“One month.” She stepped into the portal and raised her voice over the howling. “One month, and instead of being the hero you dream about, you’ll be hearing the baying of the Dark Huntsman and his hounds.”
The portal shut behind her leaving the cave empty of all but the death moans of the remaining troll-kin.
“Kill me.” The hoarse whisper dragged him from his reverie.
Ardan closed the distance between himself and the dying man. He leaned over. Ignoring the man’s stare of hatred he drew Gleam’s sharp edge across his throat, putting the fatally wounded troll-kin out of his misery.
The cave was finally quiet. He wiped his blade on the corpse’s trouser leg and sheathed it. In the half-light of the torches he looked at the lodestone, cradled in its nest of faded silk, its needle still pointing east. His mouth was dry.
One month left. Not two. One month and he stood to lose everything. Any chance at a position. Any chance at a life. One month, and if he didn’t deliver the head of the queen to her son’s court he’d become a wanted man with a price on his head. He closed the lid over the glass ball of the lodestone, tucked it safely away, and strode out of the cave.
East. The Black Queen lay to the east. For now. He only hoped she’d stay there long enough for him to find her and lop off her head. Or else, in about thirty days, he risked losing his own.
Chapter Three
Contrary to all her own rules, Aoife opened the portal directly into her own courtyard, scattering the sunning flower fairies, who shrieked and screamed and acted as if the world were at an end. Who cared if it was dangerous? Or if it might have opened in the fountain, instead of on the now flattened grassy area she’d targeted. She was angry and tired of waiting for results and it was her own house and home at risk anyway.
As soon as the portal snapped shut and the mists had disappeared, she was dive bombed by a cluster of fairies, clutching at her hair and her shoulders, looking for reassurance. She batted them away and made her way around the central fountain to the front door of her chateau. The late afternoon sun slanted through the trees outside of the courtyard wall and she stopped and gazed at the wide windows and white marble pillars.
This was her favorite time of day to look at her house. It was a lovely home. Large and well appointed, with acres of land. Gated and secure. The best money and power could provide. It wasn’t cold or damp, or anything else that a castle typically could be. But then again, it wasn’t a castle. It was a dowager’s home.
The taste of failure soured in her mouth.
Few remembered when she’d been queen. Fewer still remembered exactly how she’d lost her place as queen at the Golden King’s side. And no one but she knew the real reason why she was living here, shuttled off to a lovely suburb of the Golden Court, pretending to be merely your average, not so young, Tuathan Lady.
But she knew. She remembered. And she’d sworn vengeance so long ago it had become the only thing she valued. Vengeance against, Aeval, the Black Queen. The little bitch who’d stolen all of Aoife’s dreams.
Once she’d been a queen. A lonely, miserable, young queen with an abusive husband who went through women faster than he went through wine. But she’d had hope. She was the one destined to
have the heir.
It had been foretold that Oberon would have only one son, a golden boy with power and good looks who would rule multiple kingdoms. And it had been foretold that his queen would only have the one son as well and that together their powers would mingle into one of the finest kings the Tuathan had ever had.
But then the Black King had decided he wanted that power for himself. The evil man had glamoured his only daughter, stealing her powers and turning her human, then sending her as a present to Oberon. And that had been Aoife’s undoing.
The Princess Aeval had been just as young as this Thorn girl, when she’d come disguised as a human and entered Oberon’s bed as a sex slave. Aoife hadn’t needed to hear her screaming to know what he was doing. He was a twisted man, and the only thing that had saved her was her royal lineage and the fact that she was to bear his child. But that had never come to pass.
Humans were far more fertile than the fae and the Black King had used his powerful magic to steal the prophecy for his daughter. She became the queen who was to have the heir. The little human slave got secretly pregnant, the Black King had stolen her back, and no one had known for years why Aoife could not conceive.
Oberon had been furious. She was supposed to have his baby and when she didn’t Oberon grew crueler and crueler. He’d taken out his rage at his infertility on her. Finally she’d scraped together what self-esteem she’d had left and gone. He’d been furious. Even though he’d finally banned her from his bed and was determined to take on a newer younger queen it had still taken all of her family’s connections to get her out of the marriage alive, and with enough money and power to give her this estate.
She’d retired here, a scared and shamed barren woman. There were no titles for ex-queens, other than ‘Lady’. She’d faded from memory, and had come very close to fading out of existence all together.
Then one day, she’d visited the Oracle. And he’d given her the truth—her fertility and her future had been stolen from her. And it was all the fault of that raving maniac, Aeval, who had come out of Oberon’s bed a crazy woman with three personalities and a cruel streak of her own.
From that moment on it had become her mission to kill Aeval, like the Black Queen had killed Aoife’s dreams, her social standing, and her entire life. But it wasn’t that easy.
When the Black King had stolen her fertility and implanted it in his daughter, he’d also made sure that Aoife couldn’t kill the wench directly. Oh, the Black Queen could die, but Aoife was completely unable to raise her hand to the woman, a thing she had discovered the first time she’d tried to kill her, after her visit to the Oracle.
She’d stolen her only chance at motherhood. She’d stolen her life as the Golden Queen, and she’d even stolen her ability to wreck vengeance down on the perpetrator. And to this day, over two hundred years later, Aoife still could not forgive.
Nor did she forget.
If she’d been able to kill Aeval herself, it would have been done hundreds of years ago. But she couldn’t. Oh, no. Because of the stupid prophecy and the spell for fertility that had backfired on her years ago, she had to depend on morons like that Ardan. And once again, just when her revenge was almost in her grasp, she was about to explode in frustration.
The flower fairies clustered around her again, brushing her cheeks with their moth-like wings, their tiny ringing voices irritating her beyond belief.
“Go! Scat!” She waved her hand and sent a blast of wind blowing through the courtyard. Fairies flew high into the air, clinging to the branches of the majestic elm trees, fluttering their wings frantically in an effort not to be lost to the wind.
Aoife shook her head and went into the house. Silly things. If they weren’t such great alarm dogs, she’d send an exterminator after them and get back a peaceful front yard.
“Lena!” Inside, the house was quiet. “Where is that girl?”
She didn’t need a large staff. She rarely entertained and the magic of the house kept it running smoothly and efficiently, but there were some things better done by hand. Preparing food, for instance. One never knew when a spell set on auto would go haywire, and she liked her tea prepared just so. But some days she wished she didn’t have any staff at all.
“Lena!”
The girl raced in from the door under the stairs. “Yes, my lady.” She slid to a halt on the highly polished marble floor and bobbed up and down.
“Straighten your hair. And you have a smudge on your apron.” Aoife took off her star-covered cloak and handed it to the girl. “I want tea in the living room in ten minutes.”
The girl took too long to go, seeming to struggle under the weight of the cloak. “Well, come on then. Ten minutes.”
“Yes, my lady.” She scurried off.
Aoife caught sight of herself in the large hall mirror. Her lovely aged face shimmered and the glamour dropped. Small lines and wrinkles disappeared, her hair gained its innate golden glow. She smiled at the violet eyes in her reflection, checking as always for any signs of aging. Gone was the stately Lady Aoife, gently aged and due respect. Now you could see, she’d hit her stride. A thousand years old, and she was still stunningly beautiful. Not that beauty had ever done her any good.
She sniffed at her reflection and went upstairs to change into yoga pants and t-shirt. By the time she’d made it into the living room, furnished with a well-balanced mix of modern comfortable seating, and antiques she’d collected over the years, tea was waiting. She settled into a low-backed sofa and tucked her slippered feet up under her, staring out the back window at the rolling grass in the back garden.
What a disaster Ardan had turned out to be.
Why was it every time she sent some man to do the job of killing the Black Queen, they failed? For the first few hundred years she’d been unable to pierce the safeguards surrounding the Black Court. The young queen had guarded herself well. But now Aeval had been betrayed by her own man and was wandering the countryside with no one to protect her. She should have been dead already.
How hard could it be to kill one woman?
If only she could do the deed herself. But thanks to her own stupidity years ago with that infertility spell, she couldn’t. Now she had to resort to fools, like this one.
Aoife’s fingers curled and her nails dug into her palms. She forced them open, took a deep restorative breath, and poured a steaming cup of green tea.
She might not be able to kill the Black Queen, but someone should be able to. The prophecy that the Oracle had given her so long ago was supposed to be the key. He’d sworn it would destroy Aeval.
One like ivy shall entwine
An elven prince wilt then be bind
This downfall then the queen’s shall be
Enacted by the MacElvy
She’d done everything she could to set it into motion, even two hundred years ago getting a niece of hers pregnant by some grubby gypsy, all to get a line of MacElvy witches with strong enough magic to take down a Tuathan queen.
She’d tracked them. Protected the last of them from the Black Queen when Aeval had found out about the prophecy and sworn to destroy all the MacElvys.
But it didn’t matter. All of it had failed.
The prince and his little MacElvy bride, her great-great-great-grandniece, had gotten together and fought the queen and won. But Aeval had regrouped. Eventually, the prince and his armies had broken into the Summer Palace and everyone had seen the Black Queen die.
But had she?
Aoife had hoped. She’d wished. She’d celebrated with everyone else, ding-dong, the queen is dead. But then the stories had come trickling in via her web of spies. Stories of a woman with black hair and black eyes sparking with purple lights. Stories of spells, and havoc, and torture.
And Aoife had known—the bitch had survived.
Now, she’d set Ardan on her. He should have been the perfect choice. His anger and resentment at Maeve, the Winter Queen—the woman who had taken him in as a young boy and tossed him away as a gro
wn man—should have made him the perfect weapon.
He was desperate. Desperate to belong. Desperate to survive. She’d set him up with a quest: bring back the head of the Black Queen and win your life, and possibly a place in Prince Kian’s court.
He should have been amply motivated.
But he’d frittered away his year, spent half of it searching for that damn lodestone. Lodestones were tricky things. It might take him to the queen, or it might send him on a wild goose chase. Goddess knew the Oracle had given her enough faulty prophecies, from the one predicting Aeval’s death, to the one predicting the birth of the Golden King’s son. Her son. Or the one that should have been her son but instead had been stolen by that traitorous little bitch Aeval.
It was her own fault. She should have kept better tabs on Ardan in the beginning. He wasn’t used to being out on his own. He needed a strong woman to tell him what to do. Now, she had no choice but to make sure he succeeded. She wasn’t going to let him fail her again. She’d follow him closely. And when he finally found Aeval, she’d make sure he did the deed.
Chapter Four
Aeval—at least she thought that was her name, lately she didn’t always remember—twirled in circles. Her bright red curls spun out behind her as she laughed at the pair of tiny fairies hanging on to her hands.
“Enough!” She let them go.
Their bright lights flew up into the air between the tops of the trees and she fell down in a heap, soft chiffon skirts poufing up around her like sinking into piles of sweet meringues.
She had no idea how long she’d been here, dancing and playing with the lesser fae in this hazy dream of a party, but she didn’t care. Nothing mattered here in the glen where the haze of the party spun on and on. Even the edges of the wooded glade were foggy with mist and the light never changed.
Bespelled: A Fae Fantasy Romance (Fae Magic Book 5) Page 2