Return of the Starchild (The Divine Inheritance Series Book 1)

by Catriona Murphy

  The man wailed in agony as they tore at him.

  Seamus started forward but his guard held him fast, there was no way they’d allow the king to break their seal of protection.

  ‘Anyways, that’s my cue to leave. I wanted to tell you that you were beaten, Seamus, because I wanted to see your face one last time.’

  ‘I’m still king. Apparently, I haven’t been beaten yet.’

  The Queen smirked. ‘Apparently.’ She strolled toward the ice plated floor from where she had emerged. ‘Get your affairs in order Mr. King. Your days are over.’

  She leapt and disappeared into the floor as if she had dropped down into a manhole. The ice retracted itself rapidly, splintering and breaking backwards until nothing was left.

  The sprites whooped victoriously and smashed the windows, over spilling into the night like a contagion. They took flight into the winter night, and soared like a flock of birds against the two moons.

  After they were gone, and the arctic wind blew in through the broken windows, Seamus pushed past his guards and stood over the gruesome remains of his only suspect.

  ‘Your highness,’ Detective Wolfe said softly from behind. ‘We must prepare for whatever is to come.’

  Seamus stared down at the rotting corpse, he felt so full of death lately he was convinced he stank of it. The Queen’s words playing on his foreboding mind, and the shadows danced on the walls.

  Iliana’s departure from the Steppes began with Clio waiting outside the manse one morning, somehow knowing her decision.

  She walked out barefooted to meet him.

  He stood tall and at ease, his chest a great mass of fur swaying. Iliana fancied he looked like a proud rooster, chest protruding. Clio was both relaxed and tense, as if he were ready to take flight at any second.

  You are leaving. The voice was rough and gruff, with all the sharp edges of a razor wheel that echoed in Iliana’s mind like she was in a cave.

  She jolted back, astonished. ‘Yes.’

  He padded forward in the long grass, and a few birds scattered from nearby trees, their chirps erratic and panicked as they re-grouped and settled at a further distance.

  ‘H-how do I hear you? In my head?’ she asked out loud.

  I understand the language of people, they never understood me. Until now.

  His nose nudged her head affectionately.

  You have given me what I never thought to receive from such a puny girl. His voice was exotically accented, like Arabic was his native tongue.

  ‘I’m not puny.’

  Iliana heard the door behind her open and close.

  ‘Well, it seems we have another guest’. Branson folded his arms in amusement on the front porch. ‘Was wondering when that big bastard was going to arrive.’

  ‘I’m leaving today.’ Iliana told him, as Clio nuzzled her shoulder.

  He flicked his cowboy hat. ‘Indeed, you are.’

  Iliana’s uniform lay on her bed. Splotches of mud and dirt from her reckless escape from the slavers splashed across the cotton jumper and skirt. She thought of school and the exams she was missing, her GCSEs and her shouting parents that kept her awake at night. Now she realised with a twinge of bitterness and first-hand experience, there were worse things that could befall a person. Death of a loved one. Kidnapping.

  School in hindsight was a place she painstakingly realised she took for granted. She had always hated her uniform, the colours were drab and it was frumpy to wear, but she never thought she would miss school.

  She ran her fingertips lightly over the static cotton, feeling the fibre strands stand up electrifyingly to meet with her skin. It was her only possession that linked her back to her home, back to Walkers Fall where it was safe and normal.

  She had now swapped that uniform for fur lined snow boots and thick cotton trousers.

  A new backpack sat propped up against her dresser. Zoe had sown it herself and told her it was robust, she took her old bag from her early days as a travelling campaigner and interweaved it with stronger fabric. It was potato brown, with tartan coloured patches sown in. Iliana would certainly have no problem locating it if she ever lost it.

  When Iliana told her that Clio had spoken to her in her head, she frowned and simply replied, ‘I don’t know if that is part of having a Familiar. There are no books to my knowledge in my library on such things, you will need find someone who can give you answers.’

  Iliana had sighed. So many questions, so little answers.

  Inside her backpack were rations with cooking appliances, books, a map, a stone imbued with magickal properties for staying warm, and her compass along with some clothes and coins. One new addition that made her wary was a sword given to her by Branson, along with some hairy lessons so that by the end of it, all she knew was that she had to insert it into another body to maim or kill it.

  She fastened the cloak Zelda gave her when they crossed through the arch and left, leaving behind the scared girl who had been caught up in something beyond her comprehension. Leaving behind the girl that lived in Walkers Fall. She didn’t admit it to anyone, but she felt older since Zelda’s death, in a way that couldn’t be seen on the outside. Grief had a way of doing that.

  Funny, she didn’t feel sad about the feeling but free, like she had been living under a cloak that dulled her senses, and it had been ripped off.

  Zoe and Branson were dressed in full riding gear at the front of the manse, holding the reins to their steeds.

  Iliana frowned as she approached. ‘You’re coming with us?’

  ‘To the border only,’ replied Branson, glancing warily at Clio who stood a little ways off so as not to startle their horses. He watched Iliana patiently and she smiled at him. As she strapped her backpack onto Clio using a long leather strap that went around his entire body, Zoe spoke in a rushed tone.

  ‘A note of warning. Beware of the faerie forest, girl. DO NOT under any circumstances enter there. Not even if King Seamus himself and his cavalry are galloping you down, you do not go in there.’

  ‘What is in the forest?’ she asked.

  ‘There are people who go in there and emerge 50 years later, confused as they claimed to have spent merely an hour inside. Some don’t emerge at all. It is a land that does not behave as it should, there are rumours it simply vanishes into another world and comes back, with...other kinds of life teeming in it. Flowers glow at night, the trees talk to each other and the streams run red constantly in some parts.’

  ‘That ain’t right,’ Branson grunted, as he heaved up onto his saddle.

  ‘Are you saying that it simply transports itself onto another planet, and then comes back as if it just popped down to the shop?’ Iliana asked sceptically.

  ‘Take it from someone who’s been in there. Don’t enter. Ignore any strange noises you hear from that cursed place if you venture near, and don’t follow the lights. The Mad Queen, universe forbid she ever found out about you, may see you as a threat and kill you. She has been known to end the lives of those magickally strong, and I think you’re beyond even that category. You’re something else entirely.’

  Iliana’s face was screwed up in thought, wanting to know what she meant. So many potential enemies and she hadn’t even done anything.

  ‘It’s not you they hate or mistrust,’ Zoe said, reading her mind, and throwing a blanket over Clio. She used her magick so it flew much higher than she could throw, it settled over the lion cleanly. ‘It’s what you can do. Don’t ever forget that.’

  She’s right, you know, said Clio.

  ‘I know,’ Iliana replied.

  Clio crouched and Iliana climbed on, she realised it was a manoeuvre she would quickly have to get used to.

  ‘You will continue to practice your meditation,’ Zoe said, ‘you do not trust anyone who crosses your path and keep your head down. You will need to change your accent as well, practice one that’s most comfortable for you to use, change anything about yourself that
stands out too much.’

  Iliana took in a long breath, trying to calm herself, knowing now what could potentially be ahead of her.

  ‘This will always be a place for you to seek solace, no matter how many enemies you make. You remember how to source water underground and draw it up?’

  Iliana nodded, it was one of the few survival tricks Zoe had shown her.

  Zoe took one large step back.

  In one swoop, Clio was off the ground and they flew skyward. Iliana’s stomach clenched at the vertigo sensation of leaving the ground. She gripped tufts of Clio’s fur.

  When they reached the border just after nightfall, she could perceive perfectly where the border line exactly was. It cut out perfectly as if someone had drawn a squiggly line on a map and as clear to see when the sun shines behind the outline of a cloud and the effect can be seen on the ground. The land of snow versus the land of grass and springtime.

  ‘Do you do that? Keep out the snow?’

  Zoe pulled her horse alongside Clio, who landed on a small rise. ‘We need to maintain a certain climate for our animals to thrive.’

  ‘Can a lot of people do that in the Otherworld?’ she asked, suspicious to know the answer.

  ‘No,’ Zoe replied, after a long moment of silence.

  The wind here was colder, carrying the kiss of winter at the border.

  I go back to winter now, she thought.

  Zoe patted her horse, her strands of steely grey hair played on the wind’s call.

  ‘Follow the river, it will bring you close enough to Faerie HQ. If you come across Morgan’s Pass, turn westward.’

  Iliana nodded.

  She leaned to the side and took Iliana’s wrist and for some time was quiet. Eyes closed.

  She looked questioningly at Branson who watched from a ways off on horseback. He just shrugged.

  Iliana felt a rush of heat surge up from below like vapour in suction, and filter through her entire body. Her cheeks flushed from the immense pressure, as though she had spent an hour sitting in a sauna.

  Zoe slowly opened her eyes. ‘Something that may come of use,’ she said coyly, and tapped her nose.

  ‘What did you do?’ Iliana asked.

  ‘Nothing much, it may or may not come in handy.’

  Iliana took her hands back, suddenly feeling the urge to rip off her fur coat.

  ‘It’ll pass,’ Zoe said. ‘Go now.’

  Iliana glanced back at Branson who tipped his hat at her. ‘Good luck to you, and you, you big bastard.’

  Zoe tutted and rolled her eyes.

  Clio roared in response. The horses neighed, teetering away from him. He crouched as a spring coils up before it pops, and leapt into the air with a pounce.

  Zoe and Branson became two distant specks as Clio meandered through the arctic air, wings outspread and soaring, taking Iliana south. Eventually, they were both sucked into the clouds.

  After a few days of flying, camp fires and silent nights under the stars, Iliana saw the familiar dark outline of a grim statue.

  We turn right here.

  Clio veered widely to the right. Farmers and villagers below looked up and pointed.

  Clio roared down at them. They dispersed like insects into their tiny homes.

  Was that necessary? Iliana asked sourly.

  Yes. Iliana sensed smugness laced into his words.

  After a few hours, Iliana saw several towers rise into the sky like a cluster of skyscrapers, materialising through the vaporous clouds. Below her were swarming bodies sardined together like an ant farm.

  From her vantage point, Iliana could see a bustling laneway knife through the land to lead to the towers. Piles of sandbags and looped barbed wire stood in staggered formation and systemised checkpoints were stationed at regular intervals. At the end of the laneway was a nest of lights so intense it almost looked like an entire city twinkling in the icy darkness.

  The towers loomed ahead of them, like the city’s signature buildings.

  The laneway was bordered by high walls and intersected with various checkpoints were filled with a giant host of hissing sprites that clamoured together to make the long driveway look like sewer of roiling blackness. At the end of the laneway were two enormous lizards that looked transparent and glass-like doing battle with the sprites, as green faeries fled from their living quarters to the towers.

  The sounds of high squeaking and squealing rose in a discordant chorus that lanced straight to Iliana’s stomach, making it tight. Made even tighter when she spotted the Xinger, it's humanoid shape and alien oval head was easily visible amongst the melee. It towered over the sprites that assaulted the barrier anchored at the end of the laneway.

  From aerial view, it was clear it was the access point into the residential area and beyond that, the fortress of towers.

  It’s a massacre down there.

  I see the Xinger. Iliana could see Clio flipping through her memories of the dark creature.

  She said, ‘It is bigger. How did it know I would be here?’

  It expected you to be here. It knows your every step.

  It must have been searching for me for months though! Christ, this thing doesn’t give up.

  Iliana sensed his confusion. What is Christ?

  Uh, nothing. How is it that it just happens to be here though, just as I arrive?

  It knew you were coming. It knew you would see this.

  Iliana wanted to argue, but all she could do was shake her head in bewilderment.

  Snow feathered down from the bleak sky overhead as Clio soared above the driveway, and wheeled around the towers.

  Iliana looked up at the twin moons through the twirling flakes that fluttered on the cold night breeze. The stillness in the air could almost trick her into believing nothing was happening below, so far above she was of the trivias of death in that moment.

  Clio easily rounded the arrows that speared towards them. The missiles flew harmlessly by. In a state of emergency, Iliana got the message that there would be no discrimination of who was an enemy and who wasn’t by the faeries.

  She swallowed as she got nearer.

  The Xinger crushed the barrier and sprites collided with faeries. It’s tentacles lashed, strangled and snapped at the faeries as it glided towards a closed portcullis. It led into the main courtyard of the fortress, where the towers rose.

  Within it, soldiers and families were crushed together as archers stood ready near the entrance, crossbows drawn and fixed on the portcullis.

  You are not alone this time. Clio said, sensing Iliana’s nervousness.

  Iliana squeezed Clio’s fur in appreciation.

  The inner courtyard was in total pandemonium, and the roar of squealing faeries could be heard like moaning pigs before a mass slaughter.

  The stench of fear is strong here, Clio said, in his lilting accent.

  Behave yourself, Iliana replied jokingly, trying humour to calm her nerves.

  Clio began to circle above the howling crowds, and when they looked up, all Iliana saw was a sea of ashen faces filled with terror.

  ‘It’s here for me, and there are more innocent faeries dying for me,’ she said aloud.

  They do not die at your hands, but at your enemy’s hands.

  I’m ending this - now.

  Iliana’s heart pounded in the way it did before she had to spar an opponent, in a life that felt was a million miles away. Perhaps it was. Perhaps it was even more.

  Clio flattened his wings against his body and dove expertly, with an agility and suddenness that made the already panicked faeries below scream in terror.

  Iliana pressed her body against Clio’s, tense all over like she was at the part of the rollercoaster when it released its breaks and plummeted. More arrows came at them from soldiers who weren’t preoccupied with the portcullis and Clio roared, it echoed like a sonic boom and they were instantly flung against the interior walls of the towers, their weapons clat
tered harmlessly to the ground.

  Faerie clawed over faerie to get out of the great lion’s way, and his wings sprung out at the last second to land gently on his paws.

  The faeries behaved like animals trapped between two kinds of terrors now. On one side was the great portcullis and the giant humanoid creature beyond it, and on the other a white-haired girl mounted on a Roarax.

  Iliana didn’t wait for him to crouch, but sprung off cat-like, landing gently on her feet. She silently thanked her karate training for that.

  The pandemonium spurred on. The noise level was higher in volume in the midst of HQ’s courtyard, which was awash with tremulous families, wailing children, lieutenants screaming and soldiers shoving their way towards the closed portcullis. It was so loud in the courtyard, she could scarcely hear any commands being mouthed by furious lieutenants, veins sticking out of the sides of their green necks. Being taller than most gave her a decent view of the whole place.

  Some foot soldiers were struggling to get the lizards they were mounted upon under control, their amber eyes were sliding everywhere in their scaled sockets, razor teeth snapping at their reins. Their forked tongues tasting the fear in the air, making them wild.

  A mother cradled the lifeless body of her faerie child, his green face was a still-life image of pure innocence. ‘I didn’t know where he’d gone’, her voice shaky, ‘I just turned and he was gone. Gone, gone...’ Her glazed lavender eyes stared into nothing.

  Iliana tore her gaze away, feeling her throat tighten.

  Perhaps there would be no killing needed by the time the Xinger broke through, the faeries seemed capable enough of killing each other amidst the scent of their own fear, that hung over the roaring crowd like a saturated, grey cloud that would explode into torrential downpour at any moment. Iliana could sense it everywhere. Like horses that caught the scent of a wolf and were tied to a tree; they knew they were trapped.

  She remembered hearing something before about a psychological phenomenon called Mass Hysteria, where imaginary threats were believed to be real and could spread by verbal confirmation like a disease, and more dangerously, be believed.