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

by Catriona Murphy

  Now is as good a time as any, he thought. He took it from the chest and sat on the bed, crossbow propped on his knee.

  Jamel turned from supervising the door, eyebrows raised. ‘Is that necessary?’

  ‘Jamel, we’re barricading ourselves in my bedroom. How more desperate does our situation need to get for me to use a weapon?’

  Jamel let it drop. ‘Are you, erm, able to use it?’

  Seamus’s face reddened. ‘Blast it man! I may be old but my mind is still young enough. I can work a simple crossbow.’

  ‘Just ensuring the coherency of our king.’

  A vein nearly popped in Seamus’s temple.

  One of the guards sniggered. Amazing, despite being minutes from being slain by the undead or even becoming one of them, Jamel still got under his skin.

  Florin’s final words to Seamus ran around his head till he had to splash cold water on his face in a basin to drown out the demons that ravaged a shit storm in his brain.

  Floundering over his oversights, Cecile and his inaction at an invisible enemy that closed in too quickly for him to counter was no good now. For days, his mind had been ruined and tormented to the point of madness as each day brought more bad news, Seamus was trying to conduct order on a sinking ship. The foundation was lost and with it, all structure. Fingernail biting over each mistake he had made, spinning over other possibilities, other routes he could have taken. Each blind step had led him to the waste laid at his ashamed feet. The city had disintegrated into a broiling soup where one could glimpse an era before the unity of society; division, turmoil and scavenging. Water ran down his stubble, and glistened around his shadowed eyes.

  A sense of peace washed over him like a waterfall; at least now he was in a state of powerlessness, whatever happened here onwards was out of his control. For the first time in over half a century, he felt light and free. It tingled through his whole body, the most pleasant wash he had ever felt, almost since the days before Cecile.

  ‘Sir.’ One of his guard called urgently.

  Seamus looked up.

  They all heard it. The traps in the corridors were now being sprung, the muffled sounds of gurgling and that awful moaning came from somewhere far beyond. Regardless of the deathly clever designs of the palace walls, they were drawing nearer. Seamus readied his crossbow, his guard assembled around his bed. At least the deaths of the palace staff could not plague him now, he had made hasty arrangements for their departure through the tunnels. The palace was empty and everyone was either gone, missing or dead (or now undead).

  ‘It was a pleasure working with you your highness.’ Jamel started, he hesitated momentarily. ‘Many have doubted your proficiency in your rule. but you’re a good man. Many kings cannot claim such an honourable title.’

  Seamus, heartened, replied, ‘If we’re to be the last of our ruling party, then at least I can say proudly it was from those who committed to the bitter end.’ He took one hard look around his men, tears brimming in his filmy blue eyes. They stood in a loose formation around him in fighting stances, knees bent, swords drawn. ‘It may not mean much from me now that we’re at the death’s door, but I want to thank you all for your service, you’ve contributed more than you will ever know.’

  His men nodded. Jamel looked away.

  Scraping and something clunky being dragged on the carpeted floor could be heard and felt through the floorboards, the muted noises of the undead being decapitated and impaled by the concealed weapons in the walls. The heads rolled on the floor and stopped. Dead quiet.

  ‘Was that the final trap?’ Seamus whispered.

  Jamel let out a breath that seemed to last minutes instead of seconds. One of the guards shifted weight onto his right leg, another tightened his grip on the pommel of his sword. All eyes were on the barricaded doors, the curtain poles arranged into a protective ‘X’ seal. A robin sat at the frosted window, pecking on the glass.

  The doors burst open, shooting splinters in all directions. Seamus and the Kingsguard instinctively ducked, but held their ground.

  Standing at the door was a man with a black beard elegantly tapered down to his knees. His hair was combed back pristinely, streaks of grey shooting back from his hairline. The man was in full armour with his hands clasped casually behind his back. His diminutive smile stretched the pockmarks on his sallow cheeks and his opaque eyes engulfed all the white. They sucked in to appear like irises but they pulsated, beating like the rhythm of a heart.

  He took one booted step forward, his wispy beard moving.

  Behind him was a tall man who stood like a grave digger, black trench coat and steel studded boots. He held a crossbow in one hand, scarred face glared out between strands of greasy black hair.

  A faerie stood on the other in a long gleaming blue dress made of vapour, curls of steam wisped away from like it was on fire. Her hands glowed a similar colour like two tear drops. Her cruel smile told Seamus she would be amused at the suffering of a hundred people.

  Flanking them were two Xingers.

  Memories began to reel like moving images and Seamus began to question all his decisions, times of when he could have promoted a promising minister but refrained as he doubted his wisdom. Another time when his mother had called on his presence at his dying father’s bedside and he would not go, could not face his father's disappointment in him in the days before being king. Flooding his vision nearly to the point of blackening, they swelled until his head was bursting. Seamus gripped his head traumatically.

  A chill had set into his bones like an icy x-ray, it permeated and pierced the very warmth of his soul that his body housed. Convinced he was, that at any moment she would surely freeze into a sculpture. Looking around, he could see his guards were struggling the same.

  His eyes flew accusingly to the central man. The master puppeteer.

  ‘Here is where I find you fitfully cowering in your chambers with men of honour willing to die on their swords to protect you. You never deserved the title of king, Seamus.’ He hushed.

  His voice was odd. When he spoke, Seamus thought he could hear other voices behind his own, hundreds of men’s and women's all speaking at once. They cried out the words as the man spoke as though forced, it was despairing, frantic and quaking. ‘I’ve waited and dreamed and dreamed and dreamed of this moment.’ The man calmly closed his eyes, giving Seamus a moment’s grace from the man’s fluctuating eyes. He lashed his tongue out like a snake. ‘I love the taste of it.’

  One his guards collapsed to the floor, crawling in disgrace. ‘I never meant to do it,’ He pleaded. ‘She wasn’t even conscious when I took her on the floor! She probably doesn’t even remember it! She was a whore anyway, I left her some money.’ The man wailed, grasping his head.

  Seamus turned away in shame, his stomach congealing sickeningly.

  The man calmly stepped past him, patting him on the shoulder.

  Jamel raised his sword, but even Seamus saw its wobbling. The further the man sauntered into the room, the colder it got. The fireplace dimmed, and the walls and ceiling strained to hold his presence, creaking achingly. Seamus’ breath puffed in front of him.

  The man inclined his head. ‘My name is Drake Evernst. I am pleased to make your majesty’s acquaintance.’

  Seamus’s words bubbled in his mouth, and it demanded all his courage to say them. ‘Who are you and what do you want?’

  The man bellowed with laughter. ‘I want your life.’

  ‘It’s yours if you leave my kingdom be.’

  ‘Your kingdom be?’ he asked incredulously, ‘your majesty, what a mess it is now! You haven’t the talent nor enough assets to clean it up.’

  ‘A mess you made, necromancer.’

  Drake’s grin widened. ‘You’re a perceptive one, a shame it didn’t serve you well enough.’

  ‘You raised the Xingers, how?’

  The furtive man blanched, his artful eyebrows raised. ‘Oh, that wasn’t me. Unlike yourself Seam
us, I know when to ask for help. I’m very good at making friends, isn’t that right, Shaerana?’

  ‘Correct,’ the faerie replied, and winked impishly at Seamus.

  ‘The Order of the Second Dawn?’ Seamus husked, his body rigid.

  ‘Nope. Though your constable was onto me but I took care of her easily.’ He snapped his fingers and constable Wolfe came around the corner into his chambers. Her face ashen with gashes that festered openly, her eyes jet black and devoid of humanity.

  ‘Florin’s agents were easily disposed of.’ He continued matter-of-factly. ‘The secret to starting an uprising is when you’ve convinced enough people who the real enemy is, and then you sit back and watch the magic unfold. If you press the right buttons, one could almost walk to the throne and take it with little effort. I should write a book on that, shouldn’t I?’

  ‘The Skinner?’ Between clenched teeth.

  ‘Ah! Yes - voila!’ Drake gestured grandly to the man with the greasy hair. He cracked a crooked smile of rotten teeth with a Frankenstein groan.

  ‘He doesn’t talk very much, poor man had his tongue cut out. Not the best for socialising, but very useful for setting the stage just the way it needs to be.’ Drake was looking beyond now, into the distance. ‘You need a catalyst, an impetus if you will, in inciting a revolution. A feeling of divorce, poverty and unfairness, enough for the masses to throw down their tools and rebel. And my goodness did they rebel! You’re not exactly the best monarch this city has had, are you?’

  Seamus opened his mouth.

  ‘Although there have been many others.’ He chatted, walking around his faltering guard. ‘But you were a little erm, weak willed? No matter, I can take over from here. I raised the dead so you could all witness my capabilities and I’ve made my point. You’re all to be taken to the palace prisons.’ He grinned.

  He snapped his fingers again and the Xingers ghosted into the room. ‘What was the reign of King Seamus has now ended. The monarchy that has ruled this city in the shadow of its power has been laid to rest. Now is the dawning of a new age. The Otherworld needs a strong ruler whose power is undisputed, yet possesses an unparalleled intelligence to rule those that cry out to be ruled justly, and firmly.’

  Guards who could manoeuvre themselves enough under Drake’s chilling curse lunged forward at the Xingers. The fight was over in a minute. His guards lay strewn on the floor. The Xingers discarded them and turned; their obsidian oval mannequin heads reflected the firelight, emotionless, fathomless, bottomless. Seamus loosened his arrows one after another and they shot cleanly through them to bury into the walls behind with a clunk.

  Jamel advanced with the remaining number, some were too incapacitated by the Questioning to move, their eyes moving wildly unseen, lost in visions from times long gone. A few whimpered childishly.

  A Xinger lashed their tentacles and a guard was knocked unconscious. Jamel jumped over it and lobbed off one of its tentacles and threw a throwing dagger at its head where it lodged like a bad hair accessory. The other guards fell in bursts of blood but Jamel continued on, ducking and diving proficiently, stabbing out when the opportunity arose. Seamus picked up a sword from one of his fallen guards and he fought alongside the head of his guard.

  The king’s fallen defenders rose sluggishly and turned in zombie unison towards the two men. Seamus found himself back to back with Jamel, looking into the callous faces of men he once called his guard, their unseeing black eyes twitched.

  Wolfe shuffled forward to join. Their stare was from a dull altered mind but the eyes crawled on Seamus’s skin, dissecting and disjoining his flesh.

  He looked beyond the closing circle of his previous allies to the Xingers, and then to Drake. The shadows that only appeared when he was alone rose up to perform a tribal dance of mockery on the walls, playing off the dying firelight that gave the shadows more effect. They spun, somersaulted and leapt like feral animals. They danced to the tune of his death.

  Seamus’ heart squeezed as the city he had sacrificed his life for lay in ruins.

  He pictured the people, more desolate than they were before, the survivors of the undead that had swallowed the city in its rotting gut. He wanted to get on his horse and gallop gallantly past the palace gate and have the satisfaction of dying in an effort to save them. Even it if meant only he alone would do it.

  Fate had instead dealt him a new set of dice; snake eyes saw that he would instead be spending the rest of his days squaloring in the dungeons. Alone with his guilt, regrets and only cold memories to keep him company.

  A single tear escaped his eye.

  Iliana departed from Faerie HQ before dawn. She had packed her supplies into her backpack and strapped them onto Clio before climbing onto his back. For a moment in the glacial breeze, she watched down from atop the tower into the courtyard. Where torches burned in sconces. Faerie guards on the night shift leaned on their spears and spoke to each other lowly.

  Let’s go.

  Clio coiled his muscles into a crouch and sprung off the rooftop, the towers of Faerie HQ were lost behind them, and the early morning clouds rushed in to embrace them.

  They stopped near the Plinth river, so Iliana could cook breakfast and consult the map of Zoe had given her. She needed to ensure they could orientate their course correctly. The Temple of Stars lay beyond the faerie forest, and Iliana was cautious to fly over it.

  ‘It would be best,’ she said to Clio, her finger tracing the line of the border of the forest, if we flew with the forest to our west, keeping it in sight, but not going near. It can be our guide north, when the trees disappear, we’ll turn westward to the temple.’

  Clio nodded, while gulping down a struggling fish. If you are certain, then that’s what we’ll do.

  While Iliana sat by the fire, the trout frying by the lick of the flames, she saw something emerge from beyond a hill crest a mile north.

  She stood. ‘Do you see that?’

  Clio was already on his giant paws, growling threateningly.

  Out of the morning mist, appeared ten Xingers speeding towards her without touching the ground, like a swarm of jellyfish.

  Iliana threw her bread to the side and scrambled to her feet. Closing her eyes, she summoned a power from far below into the earth, too deep for many to ever magickally extend their will so far. Creating a pipeline opening, she channelled the energy up into her body and in one move, thrusted her palm forward to face the Xingers. Their advancement was immediately crushed as they collided with an invisible wall. Recovering quickly, they circled the new obstacle, looking for an opening, and Iliana’s palm followed their course.

  ‘Clio’ she whispered, as she began to slowly walk backwards. ‘I’m going to—’

  A tentacle shot over Iliana’s barrier, grabbed her wrist and pulled. She was thrown forward but it was enough for the wall to dissipate.

  Clio roared, throwing three Xingers back more than fifty feet, and he fought furiously as several tentacles rocketed towards him, entangling him like a thicket of vines. Soon enough, he wasn’t visible at all to Iliana, as she tried to the use the damn sword Branson had given her. She managed to hack off three tentacles before they overcame her. Despite her struggling, she was soon encased in greasy tentacles that slipped and slid over her skin, dripping of a stinking residue that turned her stomach. She hated how they smelled. The morning sun was blotted out, like the first shovel of dirt dropped on a coffin.

  Iliana was carried like a hearse from the river to some low grasslands by the Xingers. They passed a man on a boat lolling with his rod, who shot up at the sight of them, causing his boat to rock and splashed into the water.

  Several times she had tried to conjure her power but she felt spent, like she had used too much energy in summoning the wall.

  Eventually, through gaps in the tentacles, she saw they were approaching a large dome shaped tent that was lit dimly from within. Her heart quickened and the more she struggled amidst the tentacles th
at held her fast, the more they tightened. She kept thinking of Clio, and hoping he was alright.

  The Xingers laid her down when they reached the tent that sat on the crest of a little hill.

  Behind her, she could still see the outskirts of the faerie forest, orbs danced and whizzed interchangeably beyond the treeline. She brooded on how she could best the Xingers and could go back for Clio, weighing up her chances.

  But before she could make her mind up, she was hustled impatiently towards the open flap by a collection of dripping tentacles, dispersing her thoughts like the dancing lights. Whoever was beyond the flap was the adversary who had been hounding her, an elusive yet consistent tracker.

  She perceived something odd about the tent. It didn’t flutter in the wind but seemed solid and stoic, like a turtle’s shell. Streams of code glowed electronically, and flowed in columned directions all over its surface like a matrix. Beside the flap was a keypad that beamed with symbols.

  Dread filtered into her and she reluctantly ducked into a brightly lit interior, leaving the glacial cold and the Otherworld behind. She stepped into a new world of clinical white and forensic blue lights. Various technological devices hummed and hovered a few feet above the luminescent ground, their surfaces aqueous and fluent. Iliana touched one inquisitively and it quivered like still water. Multiple clear tubes stemmed out from them and fed into a massive robot that floated in the centre of the room, it mirrored the machines trait of liquified steel. It had the muscular shape of a human with no face, simply a single webcam dot marked its forehead and was twenty feet long.

  Symbols pulsated cryptically on a pane of glass and they trembled and radiated when she put her fingers near.

  The robot’s hand twitched and Iliana jumped back.

  ‘Do you like it?’

  Iliana gawked at a small thin man standing beside a computer, she hadn’t noticed him watching with a mixture of hope and quiet politeness.