by Alexia Purdy
“How is this happening?” I asked Corb as he twirled me around. “This feels so real.”
“That’s because it is real, Shade. Enjoy it with me. This was the last party I threw at my castle, the eve before I became an Ancient. I, like you, was chosen to take over my position and forced to transform. At this moment, I didn’t expect my life would change so much.”
“Where is your queen?” I blushed as I asked, but I wanted to know more about this faery named Corb.
“She’s there, sitting next to me. See?” He nodded toward the dais, where a beautiful woman sat next to him, very pregnant yet looking stunning in her red dress.
“She’s gorgeous,” I said. “Did you ever see your child?”
Corb’s face darkened slightly, and I immediately regretted asking him.
“No. After I became an Ancient, my wife died in childbirth. Our child was stillborn. The whole kingdom suspected we were cursed. I disappeared, and my wife died from a broken heart, taking our child with her. I don’t blame her. Not one bit.”
“I’m so sorry.” I leaned into his chest; he was tall enough that my cheek pressed to the breast of his coat. “That’s awful.”
“No more awful than losing your husbands and twins,” Corb whispered, his chin brushing the top of my head. “Taking this position as an Ancient saves many people, keeping the magic of Faerie alive, but it takes everything from us. We sacrifice everything we love for the love of this realm. It’s okay to mourn our losses.”
“It’s so unfair.”
“But necessary.”
I thought about what he’d said. Though it was upsetting, I understood. “I—I can’t do this. Take me out of here.”
He nodded, and as he twirled me one more time, we appeared in another place. Another time? I let go of him and looked around, feeling lost.
“What is this place?”
“This is the first time I met Kilara. I was still a faery king. She chose me as the new Ice King long before I ever knew her plans for me. I loved her the moment I met her but resisted her as much as possible because I was married.”
“I guess she always got what she wanted, right?” I sighed sadly.
“Yes. As we all do. Ancients are hard to resist.”
I looked into his eyes again, and they flashed blue once more. “How is it that you can change your eyes like that?”
“You gave me that gift, Shade. You helped me find my old, mortal self. I’d buried it inside for centuries. You’re the one who did that.”
“But I drained your powers.”
“It helped.”
I blew out a breath. I was feeling euphoric and couldn’t help but enjoy it. I turned to watch a very much alive Corb meet Kilara in another kingdom, far from his home in the Santiran lands. She approached him, holding a goblet of honey wine out to him as she sipped her own.
“I take it you’ve never been far from home.”
“Is it obvious?”
“Homesickness is always obvious.” She sat down next to him on the grass. The late afternoon party wore on as people laughed and listened to music while the string quartet played cheerfully in the warm sun.
“My wife… I miss her.” Corb sipped the wine nervously. He looked young. Maybe even years younger than he’d been when he’d been turned into an Ancient. How long had Kilara stalked him?
“That’s too bad for her. It’s quite beautiful out here.” Kilara giggled like a schoolgirl. Corb couldn’t help but to stare at her, enthralled by her beauty and magic. I could tell he’d been a goner from the get-go, but he fought his desire with tooth and nail.
“Yes, it is quite stunning.” He sipped his wine and cleared his throat.
She leaned forward. “You don’t need her, you know. You could always come with me. I could show you the world. You should see more of it.”
“I am quite happy where I am. We’re newly married and hoping to conceive an heir soon.”
Only for a minute, anger flashed across Kilara’s face, but young Corb failed to notice because he was placing his goblet on the ground.
“Oh, Corb.” I hooked my arm around his and groaned. “You didn’t know what hit you, did you?”
He shook his head as he continued to watch Kilara chatting with his young self. For a moment, Kilara glanced our way, and I was sure she could see us.
“Can she—?” I asked.
“No, but it’s time to move on.” He pressed his hand around my waist, and the scenery changed once more. Now we were in the icy kingdom belonging to Corb, called the Great Divide. But like before, the walls, ever changing, made it look different than the prison I had dwelled in with my husband Dylan.
My heart seized just a little, but I tried to brush it off. “Why are we here?”
“We’re here so I can show you how to draw out your magic. Today, we start with the ice magic, then we’ll work on your other elemental powers. It can bring your humanity back.”
“I thought it was gone.”
He grinned and shook his head. “No, it’s only suppressed. Are you ready?”
I watched him for what felt like minutes until I reached out and placed my hand into his once more.
“I’m ready.”
Chapter Eight
Benton
The wait was killing me, but Ilarial finally slid into the room where Anna clung to life by a thread.
“Finally,” I breathed out while Isolde eyed me with a warning. I didn’t care if I sounded entitled, but it was my little sister lying in the bed, dying before my eyes. I couldn’t sit still anymore. “You have to save her. Tell me you can do something.”
I watched Ilarial give me a subtle nod as she approached Anna’s bedside and scooped up her frail hand. It looked paper thin and fragile, as though she would tear if touched. I held my breath, hoping the oracle who’d helped my older sister during her transition to life in Faerie, who’d showed her how to master her magic, could now help another sister of mine. What if she couldn’t? Anna was different than Shade; she was purely human. Though full of elemental fire magic, she, James, and I were not of this world. We were anomalies and didn’t belong in this place. Maybe that was what was poisoning Anna.
Faerie had already stolen one of my sisters. Would it take another?
Ilarial’s face screwed up in concentration as she closed her eyes. She pressed her fingers against Anna’s for several minutes. The room seemed to hold its collective breath as we waited for her diagnosis. I, for one, felt like I was dying inside with each second that passed.
“Ilarial?” I finally demanded, unable to bear the silence any longer. “Is she dying?”
“She will if she stays in Faerie.”
My eyes widened. “What?”
“She’s sick, yes, but she can be healed. Not by magic or anything here in Faerie. Her human side is what is threatening her life. She needs surgery to repair her heart. Something is wrong with it, but magic can do nothing for her here.”
“What do we do?” Isolde stepped up because I’d been left speechless. My sister was dying because she was human? What sort of crap was this?
“She must be taken to the human realm, to a hospital. There, they’ll find what’s wrong with her heart and heal her. It’s not something I can fix.”
She let go of Anna and approached me. “Benton. You must take her there. Quickly, or she’ll die.”
“Will she be able to return afterward?”
“I do not know.”
My chest tightened. Her non-answers were too much for me. I wanted to scream or fight, I wasn’t sure which. Either would be of no help, though.
“I—I… how do I get her back home? I can’t teleport.”
“I brought Camulus with me. He can help.”
I lifted an eyebrow. The guy wasn’t on my favorite’s list, but his help was definitely better than nothing. It was this or… I shook my head. I didn’t want to think about what might happen if we didn’t get Anna back to a hospital immediately.
“No? You don�
�t want his help?” Ilarial was taken aback.
“No… I mean yes, I’d like his help very much. I was just thinking of the worst-case scenario. Where is he? We need to leave now.”
She nodded and motioned toward the servant standing at the door, peering around the corner. It was one of her own apprentices. I knew she took them on once in a while. Apparently, right now, she had one. The girl looked young. She was as thin as a skeleton but had a healthy glow. She nodded in Ilarial’s direction and disappeared for a moment. It appeared they communicated telepathically for she’d been too far away to hear anything going on in the room. It was interesting to see Ilarial in her element as a healer. I had never gotten to know her very well.
“Benton, you’ll have to carry Anna.” Isolde stepped up and reached for the blanket covering my sister’s thin body. She had shrunk in the couple of days that she’d been ill and was now bonier than ever. I nodded and waited as she wrapped Anna in a sheet to keep the cold off her. My sister moaned in her sleep, muttering under breath. Her lips were cracking, and the magic glamour from being in the Land of Faerie seemed to fade away before my eyes. Her skin was not porcelain, nor was it perfect. I could see the mask of humanity beneath, a young woman of eighteen sick and near death. She looked like a skeleton as well. I wanted to see her how she used to be.
Not like this. Don’t go, Anna. Hold on just a bit longer.
Isolde placed my sister, light as a feather, right into my arms. Holding her thin frame made me shiver. She was burning hot, but her fingers reaching up to unconsciously touch my chin felt as cold as ice, as though she were already a corpse. She seemed like an angel of death in my arms, and I choked back a sob.
“Camulus.” I nodded at the green faery standing solemnly before us. The guy never smiled anymore. He used to joke around with Shade a lot and flirt shamelessly, from the stories she’d told me. I’d never known that version of Camulus. The guy I knew was always punishing himself, stoic and cold. He bowed at my request and reached out to hold on to my arm as Isolde hooked on to the other side of me and then held hands with Camulus.
“Let’s go.”
Chapter Nine
Dylan
“Here, hold the reins like this.” I held out the leather straps to James, who was seated in the saddle of Shade’s black kelpie horse. He’d initially refused to ride it to the archives, but when I told him how much Shade had loved it and that it needed someone like her or it would revert back to its evil nature, he agreed to try. The horse seemed happy to have a rider again and snorted as I told it to be nice before James got on.
Luckily, it listened. It stood calmly, its red eyes friendly and looking excited for the journey to come. James had let it sniff his hands before attempting to jump on to the saddle, and it had appeared delighted. James probably smelled like Shade. They did share the same mother.
The thought of Shade always choked me up, and I cleared my throat and began the task of tightening all the supplies on my own horse before mounting the saddle. I wasn’t sure about this trip. I was only sure that staying at the Scren with our minds on everything else was not good for either of us.
“Ready?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hey, James? Call me Dylan.”
He nodded and tried to give me a smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. I breathed in slowly, hoping this wasn’t going to be a mistake. I would have to just wait and see. I’d chosen to ride out to the archives instead of any other method because, frankly, it was better than walking. I wasn’t going recall Camulus when he’d been sent to aid Ilarial with Anna. Besides, getting some fresh air by taking the long way to the archives seemed to be a good idea.
“When we get there, you’ll be riding the boat to the island. You’ll love it. It seems scary at first, but it’ll be smooth sailing. Only people who know about the island can call for the boat to cross the small patch of sea between the mainland and Rock Island. Isn’t that cool?”
“Isn’t that where some weird creature attacked you guys and the old archivist was killed by Rowan?”
I pressed my lips together. James had hung on to every story we’d ever told around the dinner table. Why, oh why, did he hold on to the morbid parts? How would Shade handle this?
I exhaled. “Well, yes, but that was Rowan’s creature. She’s been forewarned to chain it up since we’re going there. I think she’s trying to be a bit more forthcoming toward the other courts now. The more she’s awake, the more reasonable she becomes.”
“Until they’re awake too long and lose their minds, right?” James asked. He blinked over at me with the greatest of curiosity in his big brown eyes.
The young man didn’t miss a thing. He probably had every story, fight, and injury branded onto his brain. Now I regretted ignoring him while we talked over the many journeys we’d taken. Shade had cautioned everyone to keep the conversation age-appropriate for James, but things always slipped out no matter what, especially when he’d stayed up past his bedtime.
I was regretting all that now.
Jade would probably be rolling over in her grave at all this.
“Uh, well….” I scratched the back of my head. No one had said this was going to be easy, but being a father was way harder than I’d ever thought. I was already missing my baby twins. “Some could, yeah. Some, like Corb, are fine. He did his own amount of misdeeds with the Unseelie, but I think it’s all got more to do with boredom than anything else.”
“Do you think Shade will get bored and want to come back someday?”
I wanted out of this conversation, and we hadn’t even left the Southern Realm yet.
“I don’t really know, James.”
“I hope she does. When she comes back, things will go back to how they should be.”
“I hope so.” I didn’t have the heart to tell him that Shade was probably never coming back. I couldn’t believe I was telling myself that. I had to believe she was coming back one day. Maybe she would get bored and just come around to toy with us. Maybe we wouldn’t see her for years, and the twins would be much older. What then?
I didn’t want to think about it. I just wanted to enjoy the scenery and the ride. I couldn’t let my runaway thoughts deflate me when we had barely left the palace.
Stay positive, I thought. This too shall pass.
“You’re the worst travel companion ever. Did you know that?”
I turned to find Soap riding up beside us on his horse, Killer. That’s what he had named the damned thing. I held back a groan as we moved on in silence, James watching the tree line and hypnotized by the passing woods.
“Go away,” I mumbled, hoping James wouldn’t hear me. I pressed my heels into my horse, Rocky, the one I had used since my last horse had died about a year ago. It used to belong to queen Ariana when she’d ruled here. I wasn’t sure why she would have given him such a human-type name. I didn’t care to rename him or even get to know him that well. He was tame and did what he was told, just like a soldier. I liked soldiers. I was one as well.
“Ah, now, don’t be rude. Killer here needs air too. He’s probably wondering what happened to me and why he’s stuck in the stable day after day after day.”
“I make sure he gets ridden all the time, taken out into the pastures, and groomed. He’s spoiled rotten.”
I couldn’t believe I was talking to a hallucination again. I glanced at James, who was now sticking earbuds into his ears and sifting through his music collection. Shade had bespelled the device so it could work in Faerie. I wondered how long her spells would last now that she was gone. Good thing most spells were not completely dependent on their casters to maintain themselves. At least he was paying me no mind as I talked to a ghost.
“Yeah, but Killer misses me. I miss heading out into the realms. The weather is amazing this year! All spring and no winter. The Ice King must be distracted to keep winter away so long.”
I gritted my teeth. “What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, you know. Corb is an Ancient
. Shade’s an Ancient as well. She took Kilara’s place in her bloodline. Seems like Corb has a soft spot for the Summer Ancient.”
“Shut up. Shade would never like Corb that way.”
“Yeah, she’s not like that. Of course, it’s just that Kilara’s memories are hers now. Do you think it might stir something up?”
“No. It won’t. Shade wouldn’t. I don’t care to talk about this anymore, and I seriously do not want to talk to you anymore either.”
“What?” James’s voice had me whipping my head around to find him with one earbud pulled out as he scrunched his nose up at me. “Did you say something?”
“No! No, I was just talking to myself. Sorry.”
“Oh, okay.” He stuffed the bud back into his ear and began bobbing his head to the music. I sighed, slumping in my saddle. I turned to find Soap gone, and I didn’t know if I felt more relieved or disappointed.
Those two feelings seemed to go hand in hand lately.
Chapter Ten
Shade
Inside the Great Divide, the ice overhead groaned and shifted, glimmering as it froze and causing the ground to rumble. I looked at the large sheets of ice, wondering if I should leave instead of lingering within the walls of Corb’s palace. I’d never liked it here. It brought back memories of being kidnapped and mind wiped. I never thought I’d return here, ever, yet here I was once more, except this time it wasn’t against my will.
“What are we doing here?” I turned to look at Corb, who was standing in the middle of his throne room with eyes closed, arms stretched out. He didn’t answer or look at me. The silence was broken only by the groaning of the ice moving and reforming, as it always did here. It never stayed the same but continually rotated around the throne room, constantly changing its walls and passageways, shifting to keep anyone who walked through this place confused and imprisoned. There was nowhere to go without Corb’s permission, though I was sure I could leave if I wanted to do so, even without his magic allowing it.