Pixie-Led (Book 2 in the Twilight Court Series)

by Amy Sumida

  “What is it?” Uisdean asked stiffly. There was an enormous bed behind him, draped in dark silk and pale women. Baobhan-sith to be exact, four of them. I was kind of impressed.

  “The mirror moths have been here,” Keir said without preamble.

  “And?” Uisdean's irritation dispersed immediately.

  “Cailleach Bheur will lose her staff and a human will find it,” the stars in Keir's purple eyes were starting to shine, reflecting off the crystal.

  “Is that all?” Uisdean huffed. “She's lost the damn thing before. Why does it suddenly concern you?”

  “This time the human who finds it will bring about mass destruction,” Keir explained.

  “Really?” Uisdean perked up. “For the humans?”

  “Do you honestly think that kind of devastation won't spill over into Fairy?” Keir growled. “Not to mention the flora and fauna of the Human Realm. The beasts, trees, the plants, the oceans-”

  “Yes, I understand your concern now,” Uisdean interrupted. “But what do you want of me?”

  “Is Cailleach at court?” Keir asked, running a hand through his ombré purple hair in an obvious effort to regain some composure.

  “I believe so,” Uisdean grimaced. “I don't make it a habit to keep track of the hags.”

  “Well you'd better start,” I interrupted. “Because this hag is about to unleash hell on earth.”

  “Hasn't humanity already done that?” Uisdean lifted a perfectly arched brow at me as his image began to blur.

  The unfocused shapes dissolved into mist and then the mist vanished, leaving a clear crystal ball once more. Distorted reflections of our faces stretched over the polished surface.

  “Well, you have to hand it to him,” I shot an amused look at my father. “Uisdean knows how to make an exit.”

  “I fear that my brother will be of very little help in this matter,” Keir sighed. “We'd best handle this ourselves.”

  “How are we going to do that?” I asked.

  “We're going to see the Fairy Council,” Keir glanced at Tiernan and the two of them shared a look that made my stomach clench.

  Chapter Three

  The Human Council only had houses in the Human Realm but the Fairy Council had houses in each kingdom of Fairy and a High Council House located both in Fairy and the HR (the Human Realm). The HR High Fairy Council House was located in Ireland, as the High Human Council House was, and had been established mainly to function as a location where business between the councils could be conducted. This was where the laws of the truce had originally been decided, where they were now amended if necessary, where any issue between the races of human and fey could be handled, and where the High Court (a mix of human and fairy high council members) convened for criminal trials.

  A trial was a rare thing, normally the individual council houses handled any crime in their area, issuing execution warrants as they saw fit. But occasionally, there were matters too delicate or too heinous for the sub-houses to judge. Matters which required a verdict handed down by both fairies and humans together.

  Due to its function as a court of law, the High Fairy Council House in HR was also a type of sanctuary. Not that you could hide from punishment there but rather, if you felt you were wrongly accused of a crime and were able to make it all the way there before either the Wild Hunt or the Extinguishers carried out your execution warrant, then you could demand a fair trial by the High Court. I guess they figured if you were bad ass enough to evade trained assassins, you deserved to be heard.

  In Fairy, the second High Fairy Council House was connected to the one in Ireland by a rath, otherwise known as a fairy mound. This High Council House shared a small island with the Temple of Danu. There were several holy places where one could go to commune with the Goddess in Fairy but there was only one temple, one grand edifice where you could speak to Her and be assured that your words would be heard. No one manned this temple. There were no priests or priestesses polishing the crystal columns or tending the flowers. The temple took care of itself and it was eternal. Nothing could touch it; no weapon, no magic, not even time itself.

  The island was holy; sacrosanct. Located off the coast of the Seelie Kingdom, it was considered neutral territory. More neutral even than the Twilight Kingdom, as it owed allegiance to no court or race. This was where our Goddess and her brother had been born. Twins birthed by magic, they emerged as fully grown beings who were then separated; one to rule the Human Realm and one to rule Fairy.

  The first fairy mound wasn't created by the fey, it was formed by Anu's passage into the Human Realm. Years later, the fey grew curious enough to explore the divine path. They discovered the Human Realm and they learned how to create more paths, more raths, all over Fairy. But this first rath was special and so it was guarded at both ends by the High Fairy Council. The Isle of Danu was the most sacred place in all of Fairy and as such, war or any type of violence was forbidden upon its soil. It was the only Fairy Council House where hunters weren't trained.

  There were hunters stationed in the High Council House however, both in HR and Fairy. I was told that if the Council House were ever threatened, the hunters would destroy the rath, by any means necessary, even if it meant their own deaths, just to ensure that the Holy Isle remain unmolested.

  When I'd first learned about the Fairy Realm, I'd been told that it was in an alternate dimension, connected to ours by pathways known as raths. We were aligned but separate. Then my father, King Keir, told me that Fairy was laid over the Human Realm like a veil over a bride's face. Our land masses were shaped differently but were you to chart the location of a fairy mound on Earth by latitude and longitude, the rath it connected to in Fairy would be at the same coordinates. I have since learned that both descriptions are correct and yet both are misleading.

  Fairy is in another location and it is laid directly over Earth. But it is not exactly an alternate dimension nor is it a part of Earth. It is its own planet. When you speak of the Fairy Realm, you are referring to the planet; Fairy. A planet twin to Earth, spinning in a twin universe, connected by magic in so many locations that the planets aligned.

  The birth of the twins; Anu and Danu, released a tidal wave of magic. When Anu made his journey to Earth, it formed the first and strongest connection between the planets. Then Danu's children went on to forge even more bonds, linking the realms irreversibly. So every time someone travels through a rath, they are crossing through space to another universe. Like traveling through a worm hole. Mind-blowing, yes, but what really sent my eyes into spasms was the thought of the In-Between; the darkness within the raths. Is it space itself? A magical dark matter? Human scientists had no idea what dark matter was and yet it was what most of outer space was comprised of. Maybe they couldn't figure it out because it was magic. When I asked Keir what it was, he'd smiled and said simply, “It is the Between.”

  So Fairy mounds were bridges crossing through the Between. There were raths which connected Fairy to the Human Realm and there were also fairy mounds which linked parts of Fairy to each other. We had used one such rath to reach the Twilight Fairy Council House. No, we hadn't gone to the High Council, though that had been discussed. In the end, Keir decided it would be best to start with our local house.

  I'd been confused at first since the only raths I knew of in Fairy were the ones linking the kingdoms and those linking us to Earth. It was explained to me that the fairy council houses were also the headquarters for the Wild Hunt, just as the human council houses were home to the Extinguishers. Hunters were trained on site and the training was evidently top secret and quite dangerous. In short, they didn't want people sneaking up on them. So the only way to reach the fairy council houses was through a fairy mound... and then only after requesting permission to approach.

  Being royalty gave us a slight advantage and being an ambassador seemed to help even more. Then there was the fact that we'd be attended by a Lord of the Wild Hunt. Suffice it to say, our request to visit the Twilight Council
House was met with immediate approval. Though council house may not be the correct word.

  I gaped at the formidable fortress as our carriage approached through dense forest. Loosely medieval looking, as a lot of fey structures were, it wasn't what I'd call a castle. Its form seemed more to do with function than beauty, an odd thing for fey architecture. Not to say that it wasn't beautiful but beauty wasn't its priority. Like a lethal warrior, the Twilight Council House possessed an attractiveness that was unaware and even uncaring of itself. It kind of reminded me of Tiernan.

  I glanced over at Tiernan, taking in his casual cotton pants and unadorned tunic, both in shades of sage. He had a soft wool cloak of deep cobalt over it all and matching boots that had seen better days. The most eye-catching element of his ensemble was his sword and yet even that was a simple design; a silver hilt inlaid with gold swirls. It was his working weapon, as opposed to the ornamental sword he wore to fairy functions.

  This simple attire merely made Tiernan's beauty all the more evident. Like a sparkling jewel laid on dull, dark velvet, you were forced to stare at his magnificence. His gleaming hair was braided back, showcasing the clean lines of his face; the sharp cheekbones, the razor's edge of his jaw, and the long slope of his nose. His full lower lip seemed to pout in defiance of his masculine features, bringing just a hint of softness, but it was his startling silver eyes that always drew me. His eyes and that delicate scar beneath them.

  I tore my own eyes away from his to look at the comparable grace of the Twilight Council House. Smooth, gray stone walls soared up past the tree tops. There were no windows, no carvings or other embellishments. Just like Tiernan, the fortress wore only one lethal adornment; a line of downward pointing steel spikes halfway up the curtain wall. I assume they were meant to impede the progress of any intruder but honestly, who would try and invade the home of the Wild Hunt? That would be nearly as insane as attacking the Sluagh.

  Our carriage and company of guards passed beneath a looming portcullis as shiny as the spikes along the walls. The width of the wall revealed itself as we clattered through a long passage, maybe twenty feet of arching stone, before we came out into a colossal courtyard. It was sectioned off into training zones, with all manner of contraptions set out for use. As I watched, an arrow went straight into the center of one of the odd gadgets and the rectangular device spun to present a new target to the archer.

  Mingling among the training areas were squat, square buildings made of the same gray stone as the outer walls. They were so nondescript, they would have looked more at home in the Human Realm than Fairy. In fact, the striking fairies striding among them looked a bit out of place; like a soccer mom at a rave.

  We followed a curving stone path through the plain structures and it brought us to a central building. This building was a little more ornate than the others, with a columned veranda stretching before its main entrance and a wide set of steps leading up to it. It was built of white stone, startling amongst all the gray, and it went up several floors. Each level boasted arched windows and the flat roof was enclosed by a crenelations like a castle wall. There was a winged fairy up there, leaning against one of the crenelations, watching our approach, but I lost sight of him when we pulled up to the main steps. A guard was standing at attention at the base of the stairs and he immediately came forward to open our carriage door and help me out.

  Not so long ago, I probably would have balked at the thought of a man helping me from any conveyance. But now I'm a fairy princess and fairy princesses didn't touch carriage doors. Gasp, perish the thought! Opening a door for myself in public would be a terrible breach of etiquette that would both humiliate my father and the luckless fairy whose job it would have been to open said door. Humiliating myself was one thing but doing so to my dad and some poor dude who was just trying to do his job, was not cool. So I went along with it and the long list of other idiocies that I had to put up with for fey society's sake.

  “Welcome, Princess Seren,” the door opener said formally. “King Keir,” he nodded to my father. “Lord Tiernan,” another nod. He gave a long blink when Cat jumped out but he didn't say anything, just preceded us up the steps so that he could open the door for us there... big surprise.

  The guards that had accompanied us, a selection of fairies from both my personal guard and my father's, gathered their horses off to the side of our carriage and dismounted. There was a collection of water troughs before one of the barracks and this was where they led their horses to. I guess they didn't feel the need to accompany us into a council house. Or maybe they weren't welcome. Honestly, I had no idea and I made a mental note to ask Keir about it later.

  “Thank you,” I turned my attention back to the fairy who'd greeted us. He looked sweet actually, with pale yellow skin and bright green hair. His eyes were large and brown like a deer's.

  “My pleasure, Your Highness,” he closed the door behind us and began to lead the way down the hall. “The council awaits you in the reception hall.”

  “They have a reception hall?” I looked to Tiernan, who was walking on my left.

  “It's like a throne room except they can't call it a throne room since none of them are royals,” Tiernan smirked. “It's where they conduct most of their business.”

  “Lord Tiernan,” a sharp voice drew my head to the right, where a winged seelie sidhe was leaning against a wall.

  Deep tan skin covered a lean body. His features were sharp and almost bird-like, matching the claws he had instead of hands. Feathered wings rustled in irritation behind him, their tawny feathers looking almost golden against the backdrop of white wall. I knew that winged warrior, and not just from the glance I'd had of him outside. We'd met at the same time I'd met Tiernan. And it hadn't been a pleasant introduction.

  “Ryvel,” Tiernan's voice was tight, tense.

  “Well if it isn't Death-on-Silent-Wings Guy,” I smirked. “You never did come back for our delicious meeting. Or is this it? Cause I'd still love to make your wings into a piece of wall art.”

  “Seren,” Keir gaped at me.

  “What? They're pretty wings, don't you think?” I blinked innocently. “He doesn't deserve them.”

  “If you didn't have a crown to hide behind, I'd challenge you, Princess,” he snarled the last bit.

  “You'd best back away and you best do it in haste, Ryvel,” Tiernan stepped aggressively toward the bird-man.

  “I'd heard you'd taken up with the half-breed but I didn't believe it until just now,” Ryvel sneered at Tiernan. “Where's your pride? You're a Count of the Seelie!”

  “And you'll be a dead man, if you insult my daughter one more time,” Keir slid up beside Tiernan.

  “Your Majesty,” Ryvel gave a mocking bow and stomped away.

  “Would one of you care to tell me what that was all about?” Keir looked from Tiernan to me.

  “He was a member of my hunting squad,” Tiernan sighed.

  “And we kind of rubbed each other the wrong way when we first met,” I shrugged. “He threatened to come back for me in the dead of night and bring death on silent wings,” I chuckled. “You gotta love fey eloquence.”

  “Not that particular eloquence,” Tiernan was still staring in the direction Ryvel had left.

  “You know, I've always wondered why it is that some sidhe have so many un-sidhe attributes.” I looked to Keir.

  “The same way there are sidhe with Asian attributes,” Keir said in his poetic way.

  “So they bred with non-sidhe,” I nodded and our escort choked and then tried to turn it into a cough. I ignored him. “Why aren't they considered half-breeds then?”

  “The sidhe blood is deemed to be more dominant,” Tiernan took over. “If you have enough to pass for sidhe, then most will accept you as such.”

  “So I should be accepted as a full sidhe,” I blinked in surprise.

  “If it weren't that the other half of you was human,” Tiernan said gently, casting a glance at my father.

  “So, Ryvel gets
to call me a half-breed, even though he's technically one himself?” I huffed.

  “He doesn't get to call you anything of the sort,” Keir said in a low, dangerous tone and then looked to our escort. “I want that fairy transferred to a different council house. It's for his own safety, I assure you.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” the man bowed, his doe eyes growing larger. “I will make sure of it personally. We don't tolerate that kind of behavior in our hunters.”

  “I'm glad to hear it,” Keir waved a hand. “Please proceed.”

  “This way, Your Majesty,” the fairy hurried forward, leading us once more.

  “Are you alright?” I whispered to Tiernan, who kept looking back over his shoulder.

  “I don't like Ryvel being here,” Tiernan admitted. “He's a tenacious predator. Once he gets a target in sight, he doesn't stop hunting until it's dead.”

  “Fantastic,” I rolled my eyes. “That's just what I needed, another villain for my story. We don't want the play to get boring.”

  “I beg your pardon?” He finally focused on me.

  “All the world's a stage?” I lifted eyebrows. “Shakespeare. Ever heard of him? He was kinda a big deal.”

  “Yes, I know Shakespeare,” he rolled his eyes. “But if that were true, I wouldn't worry about Ryvel doing you harm,” Tiernan shared a look of commiseration with my father. “Unfortunately, this is all very real and Ryvel poses a threat which I refuse to underestimate.”

  “I approve wholeheartedly,” Keir thumped Tiernan's back. “Kill him if he ever approaches Seren again.”

  “Absolutely, Your Majesty,” Tiernan nodded.

  “Oh please,” I grimaced as I looked over the chest-puffing males before me. “I can handle Mr. Silent Wings. Cat could handle him,” I gestured to the puka walking beside me and she gave a woof of agreement. “See?” I smiled at the men. “She may be more dog than cat but I think she'd like to chase that bird.”

  “She may enjoy the chase but I'm not so sure that she'd catch him,” Tiernan set his mouth into a ominous line.