‘I know,’ I said, releasing my own. ‘But I don’t want to make any more mistakes.’
The season’s evadezone was clear from the sky—a wooded area shaped to the landscape and roughly the size of two Olympic pools, a twinkling river winding throughout. Long ribbons waved in the treetops—orange and purple, separating the two territories and marking the neutral zone between them.
I smiled at my brother as we alighted. He wore a uniform of green tights and his blond hair was tied in a knot atop his head. He looked like an elf. As he began his inspection of the evadezone, my twin launched into an explanation of the game invented as a training tool for the guard. What it came down to was this: two teams, each with eight foragers, four catchers and two minders. Lysander was a forager—his job, to sneak into enemy territory and evade capture while he searched for the other team’s tokens— stretchy bracelets with reflective stones like miniature beacons. The catcher’s job was to try and net the foragers—or at least try and stop them from getting the tokens home.
We reached the river and Lysander scanned it, looking for possible places to stash tokens. Teams could plant them anywhere, the only condition, they couldn’t be covered.
‘What do the minders do?’ I asked as I followed him along the embankment, passing other players.
He made a grab for me as I started to slide on a patch of dry leaves. ‘Make sure the other team’s catchers aren’t sneaking into their territory, try and stop the netted faeries from escaping—stuff like that.’ He laughed. ‘And avoid being hit by perriweb,’ he said, referring to the sticky blue goo collected from some of the strangest flowers I’d ever seen.
It made me happy to hear him laugh. ‘You really love this game, don’t you?’
‘Why wouldn’t I? Up till now I’ve spent my whole life stuck inside.’ There was a hard edge to his voice.
‘Not anymore.’
‘No thanks to the psycho King.’
King Telophy could have kept my brother out of the kingdom— maybe even out of Faera. But of course I didn’t mention that.
Lysander flopped down and leaned against a tree trunk, his good mood gone like a puff of smoke on the wind. ‘Everything should be different,’ he said as I sat down beside him. ‘Our parents should be here to watch my first game.’
‘Leander will be here, and Asher. Faun and Melody too.’
He turned and caught my eyes. ‘Do you even care?’
‘Of course I care.’
He picked up a stick, snapped it in half and threw away the pieces. ‘It’s different for you.’
I didn’t deny it. When I was young, I’d always thought I was missing out. There was so much I couldn’t do—I couldn’t have the chocolate bar, the eye shadow, the sweet-smelling perfume. I could barely go outside without coming home with some strange new rash—or worse. But looking at my twin, I knew I hadn’t missed out at all. My parents had catered to my every need. My sister and friends had defended and protected me. ‘I know that, Lysander.’
‘I thought I’d die too when Mum did. I thought I’d burn and itch to death.’ He tipped his head back against the tree and sighed. ‘I have to find our parents, Marla. I have to have them back.’
‘I’ll speak to the King—just as soon as I see an opportunity. But promise me you won’t go back to Dark Faera.’
He looked at me, one eyebrow lifted. ‘Do you think I’m an idiot? I know I can’t just take our mother from Rual.’
‘That’s not the same as a promise.’
He stood and held out a hand to me. ‘I promise I won’t do anything stupid.’
‘But—’
‘And yes, I do love this game—everything about it. It’s exciting and fun and challenging. It’s like nothing I’ve ever done before, and it helps me forget.’
There was a shiver of anticipation in the air when we flew back to neutral territory, the two teams gathered together and standing well apart. The facilitator rushed from the podium as our feet touched the ground. ‘Princess, such an honour to have you,’ he said when he’d straightened from a bow. ‘He held a hand to the sky. ‘I’m sure the spectators agree.’
I followed his hand with my eyes. A ring of faeries hovered around the perimeter of the evadezone. Though the number was much smaller, it reminded me of my welcoming ceremony, the thousands upon thousands of faeries gathered to see their Princess-to-be.
And just like that, the knot in my mind from my earlier conversation with Lysander came undone, making me gasp out loud. My welcoming ceremony. When I’d placed my signature with Leif’s in the Book of Generations, I’d noticed something strange on the page next to ours. How had it slipped my mind so completely?
I felt my arm nudged and looked up to see Lysander watching me. ‘What’s the matter?’ he whispered.
‘I’ll tell you later.’
My brother frowned but at that moment the facilitator called upon me to start the first game. Faeries both on the ground and in the sky cheered, falling silent when both team captains came forward.
I looked from one captain to the other, their bodies tensed and ready, then wishing them good luck, I released my wings and took to the sky. To the sounds of cheering, I threw the starting token as far as I could. The captains shoved at each other to get to it first, the thud of their bodies hitting the ground making me wince. Grinning, the winner held the token up. More roars as the winning faery returned to the podium and chose territory purple.
Quickly the players tied packs of perriweb around their hips before grabbing handfuls of their team’s tokens. They were barely done when the first horn sounded. Immediately they were off, planting the tokens inside their territory. I wove among the spectators till I found Jack and Ameyah in the arms of a pair of guards, Claudette hovering beside them. I was glad to see Linden with them. ‘Princess,’ he said, bowing.
I’d given up on telling him to call me Marla. ‘Lysander told me you’d be here. He said you’ve been going to practice with him.’
‘I’m thinking of joining a team again.’
I smiled at that, then asked him where Heath was.
Linden pointed through the trees to the market, packing up now the game was underway. ‘With his mother’s parents— choosing bells to ring and sweets to eat. He grows happier every day … I have you to thank for it.’
The second horn sounded and I lost my chance to reply in the flurry of spectators racing for the ground. I followed, stunned at how quickly they were swept into the action.
I peered among the trees, glimpsing a struggling orange forager being dropped into the purple team’s net. A second sprung from the canopy nearby, tokens glimmering on his wrist as he reached for another tucked in the centre of a fern. He ducked just in time, a spectator squealing as strings of sticky blue collided with her. The forager bolted, the purple catcher turning back and slinging goo into the trees above. Another forager fell to the ground, wings a tangled knot. She was up in a flash and running for the river, the catcher grabbing an arm and wrenching the tokens from her wrist. That’s when I saw Lysander sneaking up. He reached into his pack and scooped goo into a gloved hand. Someone cried, ‘Look out!’ And as the catcher turned, Lysander hurled the perriweb. Legs glued, the catcher stumbled, the forager slipping from his grip. She leapt into the river, the perriweb fizzing from her wings. Lysander snatched the tokens out of the catcher’s hand before scarpering to the sounds of cheering.
Both teams’ nets piled up fast and with just a shade of red left in the daystones till the end of the game, Lysander was only one of two unnetted foragers on his team. The rest were a wriggling, complaining mess of blue-stained wings and limbs. My brother was creeping back behind enemy lines when his luck ran out. A rustle of branches from above, simultaneous shots of perriweb from all sides and my twin’s legs and wings were stuck fast. The catchers dove, one snatching Lysander up before taking off. I flew with Faun and Claudette to the treetops, weaving among other spectators just as my brother was stuffed inside team purple’s net.
That’s when I felt something grab my arm. I screamed as I was dragged down. Sharp pain as my hip collided with a branch, my breath knocked out of me. As quickly as it happened, I was released. I turned, but all I could see were excited spectators darting all around as Linden raced towards me.
The final horn blew as Linden reached me. ‘What happened? Are you hurt?’ He turned and snapped at the guard coming up behind him. ‘Too slow.’
My eyes searched the treetops. ‘I’m fine,’ I said, rubbing my hip. ‘I think someone bumped into me.’ I almost believed it.
Linden frowned. ‘Are you certain?’
I rubbed my arm, the sensation of clutching fingers lingering. ‘I don’t know.’
The creases in his forehead deepened. ‘Stay close to your friends, I’ll investigate.’
I left him, adrenalin sharpening my every sense as memories of the Shadow King’s cave flooded my mind. As I caught up to Faun and Claudette, I told myself it couldn’t have been the Shadow Fae—they’d die the moment they came out into the sun.
Both teams gathered to wait for the results, the players sprawled across the ground, exhausted. There were bruises, bent wingtips, a couple of sprains and Lysander was nursing a broken collarbone. I knew now why the game of evadenet was reserved for immortal faeries.
Claudette sidled up beside me. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ she said, smirking. ‘You look like you just saw Haigen rubbing her big boobs all over Leif.’
I rolled my eyes and stepped on to the podium, waited for the results to be tallied. What happened in the treetops had to have been an accident—or a case of mistaken identity. But it had felt so … aggressive.
The results were brought and I glanced down at the page before me. ‘With a score of ninety-three tokens to eighty-nine,’ I announced, ‘the winning team is … purple.’ My stomach sank. I would have loved for Lysander to win his first game.
I waited until the applause died down and carried on. ‘With a catch of five, the champion catcher is Kalor of team purple.’ More cheering as the muscular Kalor got wearily to his feet and waved to the crowd. ‘And finally, with a find of twenty-two tokens, the champion forager is …’ I smiled, my disappointment morphing into pleasure. ‘Lysander of team orange.’ My twin’s face exploded into a wide grin as he lifted his good arm and shook it to the whoops of the crowd.
After congratulating everyone on a fantastic start to the season, I stepped down and went to Linden, waiting for me at the foot of the podium.
‘I checked the area,’ he told me, leaning close. ‘Nobody saw anything suspicious.’
‘It was probably nothing,’ I told him. ‘I mean, if someone was after me, why would they just let me go?’
Chapter Seven
‘You said you were going to tell me something the other day,’ Lysander said as we lay on the pier attached to his new home a few days after the game.
I knew exactly what he was talking about. ‘I remembered something when I was watching the spectators at your game. It’s weird, and the more I think about it, the more I think it must have been my imagination.’
Lysander pressed a hand to his newly healed collarbone as he sat up. ‘Well, come on.’
‘I don’t know if I should say, you’ll only want to do something stupid.’
He tutted. ‘If you weren’t going to say, you would have said you didn’t remember.’
‘True.’ I sat up with him, dangling my legs over the edge of the pier. ‘At my welcoming ceremony, I had to sign my name with Leif’s in this old book and …’ I peered at my feet through glass-clear water.
‘And?’
I glanced at my brother. His eyes were brighter than the gemstones twinkling among the pebbles at the bottom of the lake. ‘And on the page beside mine and Leif’s I saw Atara’s signature with King Telophy’s. But the thing is, it looked like there was another hidden underneath.’
My brother’s voice was barely louder than a whisper. ‘You think it’s our mother’s?’
‘I don’t know … Possibly. But it doesn’t make sense.’
‘Why not? You told me she was with the King.’
‘But think about it—nobody even remembers them being a pair, let alone her being welcomed. And if she were welcomed it would have been as Queen-to-be. There’d have been massive celebrations across the kingdom because Finelle would have been theirs. Even the faeries who know Leif and I are no longer together see me as belonging to them, and he could end up in any kingdom.’
‘Maybe they signed the book in private.’
‘That would defeat the purpose—the welcoming is for the people. It’s like an introduction.’
‘We need to see that book.’
I sighed. ‘Of course we do.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t pretend you don’t want to.’
I couldn’t, so I didn’t. It might be a way of getting information about my mother and King Telophy that didn’t involve asking him. What we could do with that information, I had no idea, but I’d worry about that later. ‘Getting the book will be the problem. There’ll be guards.’
He nudged me with his shoulder. ‘You’re the betrothed of the Prince, as if they wouldn’t let you pass if you made up some excuse.’
‘Probably, but who’s to say the book will be in the welcoming room anyway?’
‘It’s a start isn’t it?’
That night I arrived in the healing room just as Leif’s bandages were being removed—a twice-a-day regime ahead of the nauseating wound treatment I was thankful he was unconscious for. On a stool by the foot of the bed were trays and pots containing salves and tinctures and poultices, their scents earthy and stringent. On the bedside table a jar of thin liquid sparkled like emeralds— mossiva—protein intense and vitamin rich. Assisting Hypatia, a novice held a hand beneath Leif’s mouth as he spooned the green liquid into the funnelled end of the feeding tube.
‘I’ll do that,’ I told the faery.
I finished feeding Leif, then carefully removed the tube, wiping his mouth before nodding to Hypatia to begin. As usual, I lay my hands on him. One, I closed around his fingers, the other I wove through his hair, my thumb resting on his temple. Then I braced myself.
Hypatia bent over Leif and I winced as she began scraping the morning’s application of poultice from his back, the only mercy that the wound, though deep, shrunk a little more every day. Immediately, Leif began to tremble, the vibration searing my hands like a burn. ‘I’m with you, Leif,’ I whispered, even though I’d been assured it was only a physical reaction, that he was completely unconscious and couldn’t feel a thing. I kissed his face, uncaring who saw.
When the wound was raw and clean, and all trace of the morning’s treatment had been removed from the unattached portion of his wing, both areas were dressed. My heart pounded as Leif’s trembles turned to shudders, the sight of his blood seeping through the tincture bringing tears to my eyes. Hypatia repacked the wound with a freshly mixed batch of thick brown poultice, then carefully aligned the wing to its correct position. She bandaged it in place and slowly Leif’s body began to calm.
‘How much longer?’ I asked, as Hypatia gathered her things together.
‘It’s difficult to know.’
The same old answer.
She gave me a nod and told me she’d be just outside, her novice following her out the door.
‘You’re getting better every day, Leif,’ I said, as I ran my fingers over his hair. ‘Your wings will soon beat fast and be as magnificent as they were before.’
There was no reaction and I hadn’t expected one. My betrothed was fast asleep and utterly unaware. He looked as though a kiss might wake him. It wouldn’t—I’d tried enough times.
Even so, I kissed the corner of his mouth. ‘I love you, Leif and I’m so sorry I hurt you.’ Even now I couldn’t speak the reason for that hurt out loud, the dark magic inside me as potent as ever. I lay my cheek gently on his. ‘I should never have got back with Jack. It was stupid and I’m so
rry for it. And now you belong to Haigen, and I wish things were different.’
Someone cleared their throat behind me. The guard was standing just outside the door. ‘Your brother is here.’
‘You can let him in.’
The guard moved aside. Lysander gave him a sour look as he passed. ‘What does he think I’m going to do?’ he said leaning the easel he’d brought with him against the wall. He nodded his head towards Leif. ‘How’s he doing?’
‘Healing slowly … It’s hard to see him like this.’
‘I remember the day I met him,’ Lysander said. ‘I’ve never felt so insignificant in my life.’
I dropped a kiss on Leif’s temple then turned to Lysander. ‘Come on then, let’s get this over with.’
The castle seemed even more enormous at night, a labyrinth of shadowy hallways and high-ceilinged rooms. We talked quietly and nodded to the guards as though it was an everyday thing to be strolling the corridors late at night with art supplies.
When we arrived at the chambers containing the welcoming room, I told the guard on duty I was on a mission for the Prince and needed access to complete it.
He eyed me suspiciously. ‘But our Prince is sleeping still.’
‘Yes, but the healer said he will wake soon. I once promised him a portrait of his grandparents by starlight.’ I thrust my basket towards him, filled with paints and brushes.
‘The welcoming room is not for casual use,’ the guard said, his voice prickly. ‘Choose another.’
‘It’s the only room with so many images all in the one place,’ I insisted.
He gave me a lingering look then removed a bunch of keys from his hip. We followed him up a spiralling staircase, every sound we made bouncing around us.
Inside, Lysander took his time setting up the easel before helping me unpack the basket. The guard watched, his eyes darting to and from the doorway.
After a few minutes, Lysander stopped what he was doing.
‘What?’ I asked, pausing as I set out a jar of blue.
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