The Damned

by Renee Ahdieh

  “Arjun is half fey and half human. A kind of immortal known as an ethereal.” He watched Celine as he said this. “The rest of us drink blood to live.”

  Celine grasped the key tightly. “Are you . . . dangerous to me?”

  “This entire world is dangerous to you, Celine. But I can make you this promise: my vampire nature is the last thing that should cause you concern.”

  Chewing the inside of her cheek, Celine pondered his words. Every so often she stared at Bastien as if he were a puzzle she had yet to solve. Twice she began to speak and stopped herself. If she possessed a modicum of self-preservation, she would throw him out like the lunatic he obviously was. Nothing he said made a whit of sense. None of this was possible.

  And yet she found herself . . . wanting to believe. As if the girl who’d loved the tales of the Brothers Grimm had finally found the answers to her most ridiculous questions.

  “Strangely,” Celine said, “it’s a comfort to know these things. You’ve—”

  “There’s more,” he interrupted softly.

  Her eyes went wide. “More than an enchanted world of deadly fairy-tale creatures?”

  For the first time this evening, Celine saw Bastien waver. He nodded once. “You . . . are a part of this world, as well. An ethereal, by birth.”

  Celine almost laughed. It was too ridiculous.

  He leaned forward, his movements liquid. Inhuman. “Your mother is an enchantress named Silla. The Lady of the Vale.”

  Incredulous laughter barreled from Celine’s lips. “That’s the most—” The color drained from her face as understanding gripped her chest. Is. Not was. Her mother is an enchantress.

  Bastien was too careful to make this kind of mistake.

  Celine shot to her feet, the brass key clattering to the carpeted floor. “My mother is alive?” Her knees shook beneath her skirts, awareness pricking at her skin.

  Bastien looked up at her. Nodded.

  “Have you . . . have you . . . ,” she stammered. “Have you seen her?”

  Again he nodded.

  Her right hand wrapped around the base of her neck. Her pulse raced through her veins like a spooked horse. “And does she”—Celine cleared her throat—“does she wish to see me?”

  Bastien stood. “It doesn’t matter if she wishes to see you. What matters to me is whether you wish to see her.”

  Celine nearly stumbled as she took a step back. Bastien moved to help her, but she raised a hand to stay his motions. Then sank into the plush chair behind her.

  “Why are you telling me this now?” she whispered, her fingers still closed around her throat, her palm brushing the lace along her collarbone.

  “Because I respect you. And I should not be the one making decisions for you, despite my feelings on the matter.” The intensity in his gaze made Celine want to avert her eyes. But she didn’t.

  “Your feelings on the matter?” she asked. “Do you wish you could make this decision for me?”

  His lips pushed forward. “I do. More than I care to admit.”

  “Then why have you given me the choice, against this inclination?”

  “Because I should not make your story about me.” The heat of his intensity unmoored her. Bastien seemed to come to life in the darkness, the lines of his body limned in smoke.

  There were many things Celine wished to say. Many questions she longed to have answered. It was the oddest thing, to feel so many opposing emotions at once. Sadness, joy, anger, uncertainty.

  If Celine’s mother was alive and wished to see her now, it meant she’d deliberately kept away for fourteen long years. When Celine was still a little girl, she’d often dreamed about her mother returning to their family, only to have her father insist that she resign herself to the truth. Her mother was lost to them. Forever.

  It appeared that both her mother and her father had lied to Celine. How long had so much of her life been hidden from her? Would she ever know the full extent of the truth?

  Her fingers dropped from her throat. “If my mother is an enchantress, do you think she could help restore my memory?”

  Grooves appeared between Bastien’s black brows. “Is that what most concerns you?”

  “It is.” She nodded, the motion cold. Almost detached. For the time being, perhaps it was better not to feel. Or else she would have to feel everything at once. “Pieces of my life have been stolen from me. And I want them back. I want them all back.”

  “I understand. I regret that loss more than you can know.”

  “Why would you regret it?”

  “Those memories were taken from you at your request.”

  Celine froze where she sat, her breath catching. “Why would I ask to have my memories taken from me?”

  “Because of love,” Bastien replied. “You offered your memories in exchange for the life of someone you loved.”

  “And . . . did this person return my love?”

  Bastien exhaled. “He did.”

  “But he doesn’t anymore?” Her voice went soft, the last word almost brittle.

  “It would be wrong of him to continue loving you. You deserve better than a demon of the night like him. You deserve to live a life in the sunlight, safe and warm and loved.”

  Celine swallowed, her thoughts drifting toward Michael. That was precisely what life would be like with him. Sunlight. Warmth. Safety. But . . .

  “Is there any chance this person might change his mind?” she whispered.

  “No. There isn’t.”

  A knot gathered in Celine’s throat. She worked around it, refusing to allow Bastien to see how much his answers wounded her soul.

  “Celine,” Bastien said in a kind tone, “you asked me for the truth, even though I told you it would hurt you.”

  “I know.” She brushed her fingers beneath her eyes, trying to swipe away the hint of tears. It was ridiculous. Bastien had just told Celine her mother was alive. That should be a cause for happiness that far outweighed the pain of his gentle rejection.

  But Bastien . . . seemed so much more real to Celine. He was someone she could believe had loved her at one point in time. Her mother had left when she was a little girl, of her own volition. That particular rejection was not new. It was one she’d relived every day for the last fourteen years. Perhaps she was inured to it by now.

  Why would anyone desert their own child? What kind of person was Celine’s mother?

  “I want to meet her,” she said. “Will you take me to see my mother?”

  Bastien’s cheeks hollowed, his displeasure obvious. “It will be dangerous.”

  “I understand. You’ve already told me this world is dangerous. But if it is to be my world, then it is past time for me to face it. Will you take me?” she repeated.

  He inhaled through his nose. Leaned forward in his chair, the low flame in the gas lamp beside him flickering with the movement. “I’ll take you. If you make me a promise.”

  Celine waited to see what he wanted.

  Bastien continued. “Promise me that if I say we are in danger, you won’t put yourself at risk for anyone. That you will care first and foremost about your own safety.”

  “I’m not a complete idiot,” she snapped, her arms crossed. “Why would I protect you anyway? It appears I tried that once, and it didn’t exactly work out in my favor. Or yours, for that matter.”

  His grey eyes went wide. Then Bastien laughed. Its melody took Celine off guard. Warmed something around her heart.

  Celine coughed. Then stood. “I appreciate your candor, Monsieur Saint Germain. If you will make all the arrangements, I will inform those who might be concerned that I will be making a short journey to visit a distant relative in Atlanta.”

  He took to his feet in a ripple of grace. “As you wish, mademoiselle.”

  CELINE

  Her heart had not s
topped pounding for the last hour. The thundering in her blood made her hands shake and her breaths shallow. Nevertheless Celine held her head high, refusing to balk in the face of actual magic. Magic she had not believed existed only three days prior.

  This morning, she, Arjun, and Bastien had traveled through a mirror to a land halfway around the world. To a place Celine had never once thought she would see. Strange that this wasn’t the most interesting journey of the day. After winding through the streets of Jaipur, they dived into a fountain to be transported to another realm.

  At any moment, Celine expected to succumb to total madness. That was the only explanation for any of this. The only one that made a semblance of sense.

  Now they stood on a glittering beach, dripping wet, salt water lapping at their feet. All the colors around them appeared enhanced, as if they’d been painted by an overly imaginative child. The thing that struck Celine most—beyond the vivid hues and the unnatural glare of the sun—was the scent. It was what she’d imagined honey to smell like before she first tasted it as a child. Like drops of melted sunlight. A hint of citrus, along with the tang of hot metal.

  Celine’s fingers balled into fists at her sides. More than anything, she wanted to look to Bastien for reassurance. But it would be a mistake, for more than one reason. That night at her shop three evenings ago, Bastien had made it abundantly clear that, while he’d once cared for her, she was to have no expectations of him. There could be no future between the daughter of a fairy enchantress and a demon of the night. Beings at odds with each other for millennia.

  It was why Celine had gone to Michael yesterday. Why she told him she wanted to build a future together once she returned from Atlanta. Still she could feel the warmth of his arms enveloping her. The way his breath had washed across her forehead just before they kissed.

  Celine had made her decision. The safety of love over the thrill of the unknown.

  Inhaling with care, Celine stole a glance in Bastien’s direction. His eyes found hers in less than an instant. Heat washed across her skin. Not the warmth of safety but the flash of utter awareness. A spark threatening to burst into flame. She shuttered her gaze, her nails digging into her palms.

  A mistake. One she could no longer afford to make.

  It mattered too much. To both of them.

  From behind the grove of palm trees with blue fronds and copper bark, several cloaked figures approached, their alabaster spears glinting in the over-bright sun. Celine took a step back, her green eyes wide. Almost wild. Even from a distance, she could tell they were not entirely human. Their ears were pointed, their features angular. Sharp. Similar to a rendering of elves she’d once seen in a book. All but one of them stood taller than most men and women. Though they remained expressionless, an air of danger lurked about them. A suggestion of menace.

  The smallest of their ranks stepped forward, her grey cloak falling from her head onto her shoulders, revealing a slight young woman who appeared similar in age to Celine, with eyes and hair the color of ebony and skin a sun-kissed bronze.

  To Celine’s right, Arjun breathed a sigh of relief. As if he had been expecting someone else and was grateful to see this young woman instead.

  “Marceline Rousseau,” the grey-cloaked warrior said, her voice like a wind chime.

  Celine took a tentative step forward.

  “You will come with us,” the girl in grey continued.

  Again Celine looked toward Bastien. “Do you trust them?”

  “No,” he replied without turning her way, his eyes glittering.

  The fey warrior snorted. “If you don’t trust me, Marceline Rousseau, then trust that the blood drinker will die the final death before he allows any harm to befall you.”

  “Beyond my trust in others, I trust myself.” Celine moved closer to the leader of the assembled warriors. “And I will not take kindly to anyone who attempts to deceive me.”

  Something shifted in the warrior’s cold gaze. A glint of approval. She nodded and pivoted in place, those at her back waiting for her to pass.

  Celine steeled herself before she followed, Arjun and Bastien flanking her. She almost stumbled when a vine wrapped around one of the long copper tree trunks burst into bloom, the centers of the flowers beaming a warm light, casting hazy shadows around them. As if rays of sun had been dipped in molten gold.

  They trudged through the first grove of tall palm trees. The sand before them soon gave way to moss, which muffled their footsteps and brought the sounds of the burgeoning forest to life. Notes of fresh-tilled earth mixed with the citrus and metal in the air.

  A member of the grey-cloaked warriors turned to ensure their progress, the tip of his alabaster spear brushing against a low-hanging branch. The leaves rustled, the sound crisp and clear. High above, the drone of winged insects hummed in Celine’s ears. When one of the creatures flew lower, Celine gasped. It was larger than her head, its wings like hammered silver, its eyes iridescent green. Startled by the wasplike thing, Celine’s foot slid in a pile of loam, the hem of her salmon-colored skirts kicking up pearlescent dust.

  They arrived before a curtain of shimmering vines, which parted as the leader of the grey-cloaked warriors drew near. While they made their way through a long tunnel of curling leaves, Celine glanced to either side and saw branches ripple and pulse as if they were part of a beating heart. Once, she could swear she saw a satyr caught in their embrace, a muffled scream on its lips. But before she could blink, the image was swallowed once more by the burrow of shifting vines.

  Celine coughed to ward away a fresh wave of panic. She could not seem to clear the sudden tightness from her throat. The feeling intensified with each step. She attempted to take a deep breath. Failed. Terror took hold of her heart when she realized she was struggling for air.

  Bastien reached for her from behind, his fingers closing on her forearm. For a moment, Celine resisted the urge to lean back against him, her chest rising and falling at a rapid pace.

  Arjun stepped closer. “She can’t breathe.” He yelled for the grey-cloaked leader.

  “What are you doing to her?” Bastien demanded in a low voice, his tone resonating with menace.

  “The feeling shall pass soon,” the leader of the fey warriors said. “The air here is much thinner than it is in the mortal realm. It will improve once we emerge in Lady Silla’s court. Not to worry; this is simply a deterrent. If an unwanted mortal wished to sneak into the court of the Vale, such a thing would stop them from crossing our borders.”

  Celine almost choked. It appeared the summer fey were rather inhospitable.

  A minute later, the sensation began to fade. Once they reached the end of the tunnel, Arjun bent toward her ear as if he wished to tell her a secret. He said nothing. He placed one hand on Bastien’s shoulder and the other on Celine’s. Though the wordless exchange lasted no more than the blink of an eye, Celine understood his warning.

  They were treading into a world of danger. The world of Celine’s mother.

  They could not afford to be separated.

  As they emerged from the tunnel of leaves, the blaring white sun sliced down on Celine’s skin. Beside her, Bastien recoiled on instinct, his left hand—the one with the gold signet ring—clenched tightly.

  The grove of trees before them formed an immense circle, the branches above like a bower of knitted leaves, creating a vaulted canopy a hundred feet high. It reminded Celine of a cathedral, both in appearance and in feeling. Colorful songbirds flitted to and fro. A narrow carpet of emerald clovers paved the path, leading to a throne made of bleached birch wood. A sunburst rested in its center, carved from a block of solid gold.

  Celine’s steps faltered when the slender woman seated upon the throne stood in a lithe motion. Even from a distance, Celine felt her immense power. She reached for Bastien’s hand. He threaded his fingers through hers.

  A soft murmur began to
ripple through the gathered crowd. Celine glanced about, uncertainty tripping in her chest. Everywhere she looked, she was confronted by sights that challenged her sense of reason. Tall, willowy figures dressed in gossamer silk, with sashes of hammered gold and hair in an array of colorful hues flowing down their backs. Pointed ears. Cold affects. Cutting cheekbones. Bejeweled fingers and immense goblets. Occasionally she noticed creatures with horns or green skin or transparent wings.

  When one of the horned creatures growled at Bastien, its fangs bared in warning, Bastien loosened his grip on Celine’s hand. She realized then that most of this courtly assemblage disliked the sight of her linked with the tall blood drinker at her side.

  For that reason alone, Celine tightened her grip on Bastien’s fingers. Lifted her chin.

  The slim figure standing before the throne took a single step down from her marble dais. Then she smiled at Celine, her expression one of unabashed warmth. The beauty radiating from her face caused Celine to stop short.

  The woman’s hair was black and long, not unlike her own. It had been arranged in a loose braid over one shoulder, wound with thin vines of tiny glowing leaves. Atop her brow was a pearl coronet. Her gown was liquid silver, her shoulders trimmed in white fox fur. An artist had enhanced her pale skin with gleaming powder and stained her lips a vibrant red, similar to the color of fresh blood.

  When the woman stepped closer, her arms outstretched, Celine gasped, distant memories sharpening in her mind.

  This was the Lady of the Vale. Celine’s mother.

  “Welcome, my daughter,” the woman said, her voice like a lilting melody. The birds overhead warbled in response, the sunlight glittering brightly. “You don’t know how much I’ve longed to see you.”

  Celine stood rigid on the carpet of emerald clovers, Bastien at her side. A low hum of awareness began to gather in the air about her. Her vision started to distort. She struggled to find a point of reason. Something that made sense in this world of searing sunlight.

  What she found was . . . anger. A raw, seething kind of anger, masking a hollow pain.