Henri could feel Genny shrink into him, but something within him, a fire from deep down, would not allow him to look away. He nodded, but it was only because his chin was beginning to hurt. As she let go and yelled for the group to continue, he felt the familiar flash of warmth move through him as he always did when he sensed someone about to use their power. His mother began to bark out orders and their horses began to pick up speed.
Something strong was stirring within his mother. She claimed that all she did was for him, but Henri was sensed that whatever power she was harnessing was volatile and barely restrained. In fact, it didn’t feel like it belonged to her at all.
Suddenly, Henri wanted nothing more than to hide in Miss Isa’s arms once again. For that, he would happily trade having a mother.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
The Other One
“Take her to the dungeon and my children to their rooms,” Sacha announced as they marched through the Fortress’s grand entrance. “I want to speak with my brother.” She turned and glared at her companions. “Alone.”
Ever glanced at Isa, who gave him a weak smile and a nod as the Fae began to pull her toward the main dungeon. At least, it seemed, they didn’t know about the outer dungeons. Not that either was highly desirable. His heart ached when the children also turned and looked at him, their eyes wide with fear. It killed him that he could do nothing. But the poison from the hemlock was thick in his blood by now. And even if he could fight, he couldn’t best all of her men. They’d already proved that. Isa or one of the children might be hurt.
As he turned and began to follow his sister, it looked as though new banners hung from the walls. A sickly mixture of green and yellow, it looked like, but his headache was painful enough that he couldn’t really trust his eyes.
Ever’s heart sank even deeper as they descended into one of the lowest levels of the Fortress. He didn’t have to look up from the floor to realize they were headed toward the practice room. As they neared it, to his surprise, she fell back a step to walk beside him. When she did, he couldn’t help but study her in the dim light of the torches hung on the walls. Seeing his father’s familiar features in a female’s face was strange. She wasn’t what he would call beautiful, but handsome would have been a better word if his view of her hadn’t been so skewed by her evil.
“So, little brother,” Sacha said pleasantly, “I want to get to know you. Tell me about yourself.”
“What is it you wish to know?”
“Did our father love you?”
Ever studied her for a moment, a bit surprised at the question. Her tone was friendly enough, but she was blinking too rapidly to be as calm as she appeared. “In his own way,” Ever said slowly.
“How so?”
“He trained me.”
“Ha,” she scoffed. “He trained me, too. What else?”
“Tell me where Garin is, and I’ll answer you.”
“How about you tell me what I want to know, and I’ll not kill him right at this moment.”
Ever bowed his head in concession, but inside, he was rejoicing. His mentor was still alive. For now, at least.
“Our father taught me to control my temper, a hot one that runs in the family, I’m afraid.”
“Maybe,” she said, not looking at him this time, “if you hear my side of the story, it will loosen your tongue a bit.”
Ever was all for that. The long walk was beginning to strain him. It was far too much like the time he was cursed, for his breaths were beginning to come hard and fast, and sweat trickled down his temples and back.
“Rodrigue never lived with me and my mother in the Fae world. He couldn’t, he said. It shifted too much. Nothing lasted, he would rant, and that was not his way. But he visited quite a bit, and always with gifts.” Her gray eyes became distant. “He had the best presents. Toys, dolls, and as I got older, gowns, jewels, and weapons. When I was six, he decided to train me. He would bring a new weapon every few months. A sword, a bow, a knife, and so on. I was good, he told me. I had a gift! Then about the time I was eight, he began to teach me how to use my special powers. Powers, he said, that came from a long line of strong warriors.”
Her voice had become dreamy, but then she shook her head and lifted her chin slightly higher as she spoke. “I always begged him to take me with him whenever he left. Enough of his human blood was inside of me for me to hate the Fae world. There is no continuity, and the older I got, the more I could see why he disliked being there. My mother cared little, for she had other men. Fae are not monogamous, you know.”
Ever didn’t know, nor did he really want to.
“But I was half human, and though my peers shared little care for their parents’ affection one way or another, I did care. Still, he never let me go with him. He said his world was not the place for me, and mine, not for him.”
Finally, they reached the large wooden door that opened up into the great room of stone and walls covered in weapons. “Choose,” Sacha said once they were inside. Ever stared back at her until she rolled her eyes and gestured at the hanging weapons. “Choose one, or I shall choose one for you.”
Ever trudged slowly over to the wall. The larger weapons were tempting. After the sword, he was quite comfortable with the short handled mace, or even one of the staffs. But his strength was waning quickly, and he needed something small and light that would allow him to fight without being hindered by its size.
“You’re stalling,” Sacha said.
Ever walked slowly to the wall and pulled down the claw blade, a knife no larger than his hand with a hilt and blade that curved up like a crescent moon.
“Interesting choice. Now it’s my turn.” Sacha went over to another wall across the room and pulled down one of the daggers. “This way we will be even, little brother.”
“And what exactly are we fighting for?”
“I want to see how our father did with you.”
“Didn’t we just do that?”
“You were distracted by the others. This time, if you are distracted, you have no one to blame but yourself.” She backed up and began to make a wide arc around him as she walked about the room. He had no doubt his father had trained her as she melted into the stance of a great cat. It was his stance.
“He said nothing to me of you,” Ever said quietly. “I swear.”
“I’m sure he didn’t.” Her voice was bitter. “No king would want to admit his illegitimate child to his heir.” She kept circling but regarded him with an unreadable expression. “I heard someone say one time that you grew up a lonely boy. But even you can’t empathize with a half-human who grew up in the world of Fae.”
Ever stood still as she circled him, trying to regain the energy he lost on the walk to the weapons room. “We reproduce,” she continued, “but there are few family ties. There were once, I heard, but that hasn’t been since... well, since your precious steward betrayed us all. It was decided that loyalty to the people should be chosen over that of the family. Children are kept alive by their parents when they are young, but most simply fend for themselves within a few years of birth. Parents do little in the lives of their children now among my people. Keeping to the Fae way is more important.”
“That makes little sense.” Ever crouched, but found his joints stiff.
“Does it?” She began to close the distance between them. “I don’t know what your steward told you, but the young Fae that he killed to save the Fortier line? That was his son.”
Ever stared at her, and Garin’s last words came back to him from that awful night.
The Maker saw it fit for me to defend this sacred ground from the bloodied hands of my own son.
In one brilliant leap, Sacha closed the distance between them. Ever ducked and rolled, but his shoulder screamed with pain, and the swift movement made him dizzy. Before he could orient himself, a thin line of blood rolled down his left arm, breaking, Ever was sure, the quick stitches Isa had been forced to give him before leaving them after the fight.
Sacha hopped back a few feet.
“Too many died in the Fortress’s final scourge. After that day, the remainder of our people, thanks to the traitor, decided that families should not be tightly knit. Rather, children would learn from all. That way, there would be no particular ties to one individual or another. Along with families, monogamous bonds disappeared as well.” She flipped her short blonde hair as she began to circle him once again. “It couldn’t have been a difficult transition, I suppose. Our natures are transient enough.”
“You don’t sound convinced,” Ever said as he pushed himself to his feet again, praying suddenly for some way, any way to reach her. The pain and loneliness on her face were clear. If only he could use that to show her what she could have if she joined him. Them. Everyone Ever held dear. A curious, childlike voice inside of him wondered what it would truly be like to have a sister.
Sacha shrugged. “It’s how the Fae are, and I have seen the efficiency of their methods now. But there was a long time before that when I didn’t.” She pranced forward again. This time, Ever was able to block her first strike. He leapt forward himself to grab her wrist and twist it. She grunted as he wrapped her arm around her back and stole the dagger. The fast movements were making his head spin, however, giving her the time to elbow him with enough force to bloody his nose and loose the dagger from his hands. In a second, it was hers once again.
“I always saw myself as lesser,” she said, hopping back, “because I couldn’t disappear completely as my peers could do. I longed for our father the way none of them had ever yearned for their parents. When he was around, I could be proud, for he was able to show me what I was capable of. He even taught me how to use the power from both of my heritages. One day, I vowed, I would be like him.”
“When did he stop coming?” Ever asked, trying to ignore the violent throbbing in his nose as he wiped the blood on his shoulder. A shudder passed through him, and for a second, his hand and wrist seized from the poison. He needed to keep her talking so he could catch his breath.
“When I was seventeen, he visited less and less, and finally told me he wouldn’t be returning again. He was needed elsewhere.” She stopped moving for a moment, her face suddenly hard. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”
Ever didn’t know how old his sister was, but a whisper in his head told him he knew exactly what period of time she was referring to. And from the cutting look in her gray eyes, a look his father had worn often, Ever knew he had just forfeited his chance of winning his sister over. Or rather, his father had.
“When he told me,” she whispered, “I clung to him, begged, wept for him to take me with him. I couldn’t stand living in that wretched world forever. The last time he touched me in my world was when he brushed me aside so he could return through his precious veil.”
“I am sorry,” Ever said, unable to think of any words more adequate. As harsh as Rodrigue had sometimes been with him, it now seemed incomparable to what his sister had lived with.
A small smile touched Sacha’s thin lips. “He thought he’d sealed up the veil behind him, but I was able to use my powers to place a foothold, as one does with a door to keep it from closing. I bided my time until I could hoard enough food for some sort of journey. Then, when I was eighteen, I slipped through the veil and set out in search of our father.”
“How did you find him?”
“Sometimes people took me in. I looked and acted human enough not to raise too much suspicion. Other times, I slept in the forest or on the road. I knew that I would probably find him near the beloved Fortress he’d told me so much about. It took me weeks, but eventually I did find him. When I did, he was making a speech at Soudain’s edge, just at the foot of the mountain.” She looked at Ever, tilting her head slightly and placing a finger on her cheek.
“You were there by his side. He had never told me I had a brother, but you looked so much like him that I knew immediately who you were. Still, I was so excited to see him, and I was so sure he had missed me, too, that I shouted out in the middle of his speech and ran to him as fast as I could.”
“I wish I remembered.” Ever shook his head, trying to clear the cobwebs inside that the hemlock was weaving in his mind.
Sacha gave him a sour smile then began to creep forward again. Ever tried to stand ready, but his strength was leaking like water from a cracked pitcher. His knee felt like it was broken.
“It was probably no more than a nuisance to you. And you were young. I’m sure a more unacceptable sight could never be seen by a father, though. His unwanted daughter was running toward him with her hands burning blue and green, wearing a dirty dress some peasant woman had offered me along the way when my own gown had become too torn to continue properly. To this day,” Sacha’s voice was suddenly dead as she raised her knife, “I don’t know what he did to me, but I could not use my power after that for a very long time. None of it, not even my Fae abilities. He personally dragged me to the edge of the crowd, and I’m sure would have gone farther, except that you ran up to him to ask him what he was doing.”
Ever tried hard to recall that day, but he couldn’t. How old would he have been? Had he truly seen his sister years before? Before he could remember, he was on the ground again. This time, the dagger traced his collarbone down one side and then up the other. Pain followed each slice. With a shout, he was able to shove his body over enough to knock her off of his chest. As soon as she was off, he rolled backward until he could pull himself up to his knees. But no higher.
“He stopped to tell you to stay where you were.” Her wry smile was gone, and in her eyes was only hatred. “I took that moment to run.”
“Where did you go?” he rasped.
She lunged forward again, this time leading with her fists. He blocked her first flurry of punches, and even managed to hook his little knife around her neck, but he wasn’t strong enough to hold her there. She shrugged out and danced away again. When would she tire of playing with him? I can’t hold out much longer, he told the Fortress. In response, a tiny breeze fluttered around him, only strong enough to tickle the nape of his neck. Ever almost smiled. If this is what you wish, then I will continue to wait, he thought. His cuts screamed, and his head throbbed, and his vision was most definitely blurred, but the Fortress was there with him. For this reason, Ever would hang on.
“I wandered,” Sacha said, “doing odd jobs here and there. I wasn’t much use after just leaving the Fae world, for few people want a half-starved woman who knows how to use the sword. But eventually, I learned how to feed slop to the pigs and corn to the chickens. Seven years of wandering will teach you that, you know. Then, after a particularly bad beating by my most recent employer, my husband found me in a gutter, filled me with wine, and dragged me down to some holy man not worth his cloth, who married me to a stranger without as much as noting my sobriety.”
Ah. This was why the Fortress wanted him to continue on. “You could have told me who you were,” he said.
“You wouldn’t have believed—”
“I would have felt your power, and so would Garin,” he cut her off sharply. “Father might have denied you, but I never would.” He leaned forward, begging the Fortress to let her see. If only Isa were here. “I always wanted a sister. I would have protected you! The Fortress would have protected you!”
She lowered her weapon and studied him with her too-bright gray eyes. For a moment, Ever saw the vulnerable, injured girl she must have been. Her eyes were wide, and despite the thin lines around them, she suddenly looked very young. And lonely. It was a look he had seen on Henri’s face many times.
“You would have been sheltered,” he whispered, taking a step forward, “just as your children were.”
The open expression was suddenly gone, and her mouth twisted into a smirk. “And how well were they received by your steward? After all, he killed his own son.”
“I still don’t understand why you wouldn’t come to me,” Ever said again, ignoring t
he bait. “You could have at least tried.”
“Let me put this clearly.” She melted down into her cat-like stance again. “You were his spitting image, down to that quirked brow you hold now. I knew better than to place my hope in a man.”
“I have changed,” Ever said quietly. “I am not that man anymore.”
“You’re right. You aren’t that man anymore.” Sacha began to stalk forward, and Ever sensed she wouldn’t be toying with him for much longer. Warily, he raised his own weapon one more time, trying to ignore the way his back and shoulders seized up.
“I might not have been in the Fortress courts,” Sacha said, “but I have kept watch on you and your little wife since the beginning. She’s changed you. Made you soft. If it hadn’t been for her effect on you,” Sacha crouched low, “I wouldn’t have gotten my foothold in the door. It took me five years to find, but I did find the veil’s tear, and when I did, I returned to a people who had mocked me for too long. But unlike your people, we hold on to our legends. They do not become a thing of myth. There are few direct ties between kin, but as a people, we are strong! And when I told them that I had found the man whose ancestor banished us to our realm, they were thirsty for blood.”
“Why are you telling me all of this?”
Instead of answering, she pounced. Ever’s head hit the stone floor. His already queasy stomach nearly convulsed as she planted a knee in it. Her dagger was to his throat, and her face was so close he could feel the heat of her breath. This was it then. Take care of them, he begged the Fortress. His fever was raging, and he began to shake violently, though from the head injury or the poison, he couldn’t be sure. He’d been using his power to hold off the worst symptoms, but now there was little left to fight.
Beauty Beheld: A Retelling of Hansel and Gretel (The Becoming Beauty Trilogy Book 3) Page 23