Grave Destiny

by Kalayna Price

  “I need a teacher before I hurt myself. The high court is said to have two changeling planeweavers.”

  His frown deepened. “You can’t reach them. No one can.”

  I gave him an incredulous look, and he sighed.

  “I know you’ve probably heard rumors of golden halls and grand balls or some other such nonsense, but they are, for lack of a better word, fairy tales. There is no court, per se. There is only the king. A very old king. The very last seelie king.”

  “The what?”

  My father sank back in his chair and ran a hand over his face. He looked tired, and his youthful fae face looked older, ragged. “Tonight you’ve been watching plays on Faerie history and listening to ancient songs depicting legends and events of times long past, correct?”

  I gave a small nod, not sure where he was going with this.

  “Then let me tell you a story mostly forgotten by time. Once Faerie was not as it is now with its seven courts. Once it was only two courts: seelie and unseelie. The seelie court was bright and beautiful and full of fae whose glamour was fueled by the adoration and fascination of mortals. The unseelie court was sometimes beautiful but often monstrous. The unseelie reveled in fueling their glamour with the fear of mortals. The wars between the two courts were of epic proportions. They shook both Faerie and the mortal world alike.”

  He lifted his hands, and a small scene appeared beneath them, conjured from glamour. Under one hand, the landscape was bright and full of gardens. Under the other, the landscape was dark and things seemed to move in the darkness that I couldn’t focus on. A small doll or maybe a stringless puppet appeared on each side. They were crude, featureless, but it was clear that the puppet on the bright side was male and the one on the dark side female. I watched, fascinated.

  “The final seelie king was cunning and ambitious. After winning his throne, he proposed a century-long truce between the courts through a union with the unseelie queen. They both went into it planning to use the time and marriage to the advantage of their own court, but over the course of the truce, the unseelie queen fell in love with her husband. He dazzled her and her court with the wonders of his court, while continuing to propagate loathing of her court among his people. When the century ended, the queen requested an extended union, but the king refused. He rallied his troops and attacked on the same night the truce dissolved. Some say the queen died of a broken heart. Others say she remained in their marriage bed that last night and at the stroke of midnight, when the truce broke, the king murdered her in her sleep. The war that followed was swift but brutal. The unseelie court was decimated, and the seelie king claimed rulership of both courts, declaring himself the high king of all Faerie.”

  The little seelie king puppet swung out with a small sword. The queen puppet stumbled back, doubling over, before falling face forward. I watched in morbid fascination as the little king puppet placed his foot on her unmoving back and lifted his sword aloft in victory. The light side of the scene poured over the dark side, driving the shadows to the far corners.

  “But Faerie is never only one thing,” he said, and the scene began to tremble. The little seelie king puppet stumbled. “The seelie court’s total victory upset the balance and Faerie shattered. The new pieces became the courts as you know them now. The seasons balance each other and light balances shadow. The high king sits in the center, ruler of all but connected to none. Faerie keeps him at her heart, allowing his law to bend her, but he has no court, no courtiers; he has only his throne and he cannot step down from it. In the beginning he exerted his will heavily on the courts, made his own house the nobles throughout all courts, enforced truces and created laws, but over the millennia he has become more distant and withdrawn, slumbering away whole centuries.”

  The scene changed. A wheel appeared under my father’s hands. The outside was the seasonal courts, depicted much in the same way as in the clearing that held the doors to all the courts. Inside them, light and shadow made up the next ring. In the very center, as the spoke of the wheel, the little seelie king puppet sat on a throne. Chains bound him to the throne, and his head drooped forward, shoulders bent. Though the puppet still had no features, it looked tired, defeated. The high king bound to his throne. I stared at Faerie laid out in this way, and then my father dropped his hands, and the scene vanished.

  “Why has no one ever mentioned any of this before?” I asked, and frowned. “And if the high king has no court, then what about the planeweavers? There are supposed to be two changeling planeweavers in the high court.”

  He grimaced. “There were. When the king learned that anyone with the gift of planeweaving was being systematically exterminated, he searched for those remaining with the talent. He found only two, both among the mortals, so he secreted them away and put them in a deep slumber, waking them only when needed.”

  “That’s horrific.”

  My father shrugged. “It is what it is.”

  “Well, then where are they now?”

  “Dead.” He looked past me, his gazing roaming over the multitude of revelers gathered for the festivities. He sighed. “You would think, in his overlong lifetime, he would have outlived some of his worst traits, but hubris and prejudice still plague him. When the fae were fading, Faerie dying, and the high king decided that the fae had to reveal themselves to this modern world to survive, he didn’t think the humans would accept us if they knew that some of the fae fed off nightmares. And, perhaps, if he were honest, he hated to see how well shadow had thrived even during the drought of belief that had caused most courts to weaken and fade. Shadow’s denizens reminded him most of the unseelie. So, before the magical awakening, he ordered the realm of dreams severed from the rest of Faerie. The changeling planeweavers were awoken, and they unraveled the threads binding dreams to shadows. But the task was too great for two mortals. Dreams are part of the human condition. Nightmares naturally conjured in shadows. Small threads proved difficult to fully sever, and the strain killed both planeweavers.”

  I blinked as shock rolled over me. Then the reality that the only other two planeweavers were dead sank in. The realization hit me like stones, and I collapsed backward into my chair under the weight of them. That meant there was no one to learn from. No one to go to for help or guidance so I didn’t accidentally kill myself.

  “It was tragic what happened to them, but it was also good they didn’t fully succeed. Those small strands still connecting dream to shadow have at least slowed the tragedy that came next. Though with them dead, it left no one to repair the damage.”

  I just stared at him, still numb from the loss of my own hope.

  “What do you see?” My father waved a hand toward the clearing behind me.

  I turned, trying to spot what he saw. There were fae everywhere. They laughed and danced, ate and toasted, sang and cheered. There was merriment from corner to corner in the enormous clearing. A dozen or so yards away I spotted Falin, hanging back but keeping an eye on me. My father wasn’t looking in his direction, so I didn’t think that was what he meant.

  “I see fae,” I finally said, turning back to him.

  He nodded. “Yes, but there are too many solitary independents. There have never been so many unaligned fae before. There are too many fae in the light court and far too few in shadow. The balance is off, and I fear for Faerie if it continues. If Faerie becomes too unbalanced, will it shatter again?”

  I studied the man across from me. With my shields closed, the glamoured face he wore was that of a stranger. But in truth, the face under the glamour was nearly as unfamiliar. I’d always known him to be calculating. To be scheming. But never to morosely ruminate.

  “If it did, it would become something new again, right? Like in your story when it went from two courts to seven? Would that really be such a bad thing? From what I’ve seen, the courts could use an overhaul.”

  His gaze snapped away from the crowd, sharpeni
ng as it landed on me. “I let you grow up mortal in a world full of change and with a short memory. This is not that world. Faerie does not deal with change well.”

  Probably true. Then something he’d said earlier registered. “What tragedy came next? After the planeweavers died?”

  He waved a hand at the clearing. “You are watching it.” And with that unhelpful bit of information, he pushed out of his seat. “I should go. The day is starting and I have a meeting with a senator this morning.”

  “You’re going to miss it. The door will spit you out at sunset.” How did he not know that?

  My father glanced back for only a moment. Long enough to give me a small, mischievous smile. “The doors can be rather fickle.”

  Then he walked away, leaving me blinking at his back as he headed for the hawthorn-lined path. Once he’d disappeared, I made my way back to Falin.

  “What was that about?” Falin asked.

  I shook my head. “It wasn’t related to the case.” Not directly at least. “Just someone who owed me some information.” Which I hadn’t actually gotten. He’d told me a lot of things I hadn’t known, but he hadn’t actually given me the answer I’d asked for. Of course, if he was right about the changeling planeweavers being dead, it didn’t matter. It wasn’t like I wanted to go talk to the high king.

  “You’re the planeweaver,” a female voice said behind us.

  I winced, but turned. I couldn’t exactly deny who I was.

  The Summer Queen stood with a handmaiden to either side of her. I blinked in surprise for a moment, then dipped into a small curtsy.

  “Your Majesty,” I said.

  “You are the planeweaver, are you not?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you are also the girl who was with my husband yesterday afternoon?”

  I winced again, and I was aware how still Falin had gone by my side. Theoretically, at a revelry the Summer Queen couldn’t punish any grudges she might have against me, but I wasn’t sure if that was an unbreakable rule that Faerie enforced or just a tradition.

  “Nothing happened,” I said, realizing how guilty and stupid that sounded as soon as it was out of my mouth.

  “Of that I have no doubt. You were still dressed when I arrived.” Her perfect lips turned downward. “You must be very much in love to have resisted his glamours. Considering what I know of winter and how she treats her knights, I’m not sure if I should congratulate you or mourn the tragedy of it all.”

  I spluttered, dropping Falin’s arm. I wanted to say we were only friends. But while it was true that we were friends, saying we were only friends wasn’t the full truth, and I knew it. Most of the time I had no reason to examine the feelings I had for him because he was, as the Summer Queen implied, off-limits.

  Falin, for his part, said nothing, his face cold and blank, like a carved ice sculpture.

  “Regardless,” the queen said, ignoring my reaction, “I think I would be happier right now had I caught you in flagrante delicto with my husband. Discovering he was in negotiation with a planeweaver is far more concerning. What did he want from you?”

  I considered her, this beautiful but rigid queen with her severe handmaidens. Her subjects were not the roisterous and exuberant collective the king surrounded himself with, but her people didn’t seem unhappy. Assuming they had the choice, the fae who followed her preferred her more restrained ways. The king had implied he wanted me to dissolve the marriage bond between them. Reading between the lines, that meant one of them would no longer be Faerie royalty. I doubted the king intended to vacate his throne. Did this stern queen deserve to know her lecherous husband’s plans? And was it my place to tell her?

  Well, I sure as hell would want to know. But there was one little problem . . .

  “I think that I would tell you if I could, but it is more complicated than that.”

  “You took an oath?” She furrowed her brow. Then her green eyes widened. “No, he laid a curse on you. I can see it hanging about you, ready to spring. What are the conditions?”

  I just stared at her, unsure if I could speak about the curse without setting it off. Beside me, Falin twisted around, studying me as if he’d be able to spot the nebulous magic stilling my tongue.

  “Ah, you can’t speak of it, can you? My husband is not horribly original. I suppose you’ll start spitting spiders or snails if you do?”

  “Toads.”

  She gave a rueful laugh. “Of course.”

  Crossing her arms over her chest, she raked her gaze over me, taking my measure once again. This time I came out slightly better than I had in the flower tent. Then I’d felt like an ant; this time, more of a mouse. Not that much of an improvement.

  “I’m told you’ve promised my husband that you will spend three days in our court,” she said, looking thoughtful. “I can’t imagine you are well pleased with him considering his deception in getting you to court and now this curse business.” She waved her hand vaguely as if she could trace the shape of the magical trap the king had set. “No doubt when he made the bargain he assumed he’d charm you, bed you, and have you begging to help him simply for the favor of his smile. That didn’t work out well for him.”

  She certainly had a way of summing up the obvious. I only smiled at her, waiting for her to get to the point.

  “Visit me instead. I will show you my gardens and we can have tea,” she said, and graced me with her own beatific smile.

  She was without a doubt a powerful Faerie queen, terrible in her beauty, and yet I felt no pull of glamour while looking at her. If I ranked the Queen of Light as a ten on the “using entrancing glamour to fuck with people’s brains” scale, the Summer King would be a seven or eight. Even the Winter Queen had caught me briefly a time or two when I wasn’t guarding myself. But the Summer Queen was simply what she was. I had to admire that. Of course, the cynical part of me had to wonder if she was simply subtler than the other royals I’d encountered.

  “I think that would be an agreeable arrangement,” I said cautiously, committing to nothing.

  “Good. You can tell me about what my husband requested then.” She held up a hand to ward off my protest. “A curse laid by a royal can only be removed by another royal, and only after it has been triggered. I will be happy to remove it for you in my garden.”

  “A generous offer,” I said, again not committing to anything. After all, I didn’t actually need the curse removed as long as I never attempted to divulge what the king had said.

  She laughed. “I do hope you were this reticent with my husband. I will await your visit. Be merry.”

  It was a dismissal, and I took it as such. I made a small curtsy, Falin bowed his head, and then we hurried away from the queen and her small entourage.

  “I’d ask why you didn’t tell me you were cursed, but I guess I know the answer,” Falin hissed in my ear as we made our way around a boisterous group of revelers.

  I shrugged. “I did mention I was pissed off. I just didn’t elaborate on all of the reasons.”

  Falin grunted, and I knew he was thinking about what else the queen had said. And what she’d implied.

  We’d just swerved to avoid getting caught in a dance that had spontaneously erupted not far in front of us, when Falin stopped. Half asleep on my feet, I didn’t notice he wasn’t walking anymore until the arm I had laced through his tugged me back, my own momentum making me stumble.

  “What—?” I started, but he turned toward me and pulled me closer to him.

  He leaned toward me, and for a moment I thought he was going to kiss me again. Butterflies erupted unbidden in my stomach, but he pressed his lips just beside my ear instead.

  “Twelve o’clock, headed straight for us,” he whispered. “Smile as if I’ve said something clever as you look.”

  I did as instructed. Lunabella and two companions were maybe twelve feet away, comin
g from the opposite direction, and also avoiding the dance. There was no time to duck out of sight and we were right in their path. Falin’s actions made sense; at their angle, and with the way he was pressed against me, his face wasn’t visible. Though I’d been displayed with the Winter Queen’s court, I was far less recognizable than her knight. We were just another fae couple, caught up in the merriment of the revelry. With Falin’s breath trailing softly down the back of my neck, it wasn’t hard to play my role. I let my hands crawl up over his shoulders as I watched the trio through slitted eyes.

  Lunabella and her two companions—an auburn-haired male Sleagh Maith and a pale, drawn fae woman whose hair writhed like it was alive—were in deep conversation as they passed us, and they didn’t so much as glance up. I strained to hear what was being said, but the conversation must have been hidden by magic, because while they passed close enough that I could have reached out and touched the fabric of the auburn-haired fae’s topcoat, I couldn’t hear a word.

  I remained tucked against Falin after they rounded a group of revelers and moved out of sight, not because I was afraid they would suddenly turn and spot us, but because it was warm in his arms, comfortable. I was considering the fact that it might well be worth the Winter Queen’s ire for one more kiss when a flash of gold caught my attention. The hooded and cloaked figure I’d seen Lunabella talking to earlier rounded the corner. I couldn’t tell exactly where he was looking as no part of his face showed under the deep hood, but it seemed like he was following Lunabella and the other two fae. He hesitated as he drew nearer, and I swore I felt his gaze on me. It felt . . . hostile. He pulled the cloak closed tighter as he passed us, and the skin on his exposed hand was a sickly gray shade, but it glowed as if he were Sleagh Maith. Or maybe I was wrong and the glow signified he was light court? Had he entered with them? I’d been focused on Lunabella, and I couldn’t remember noticing him with any court.