Reign of Rebels

by D. D. Miers

  Finally, he screeched to a halt in one of the parking spots marked ‘customers only,' and we raced inside.

  I don't know what I was expecting when I walked into the building still bearing the Tell's Bonds sign, but it wasn't an emissary from the Light Court in full regalia, standing guard outside Orson's office door.

  Penelope and Julian paced the floor wearing twin expressions of worry, and neither they nor the plumed and puffy-sleeved messenger.

  “Where’s Prescot?” Grays’ voice was level, carefully controlled, but I felt a push of…something, in the air, and behind me, his breathing became strained. His beast pressed against his skin, turning his aura from gold to crimson as I watched him fight something that seemed to be forcing him into his animal form.

  Pen shuddered and backed further toward the door, and Julian pulled her against him, helping her control her new and still untamed power as well.

  With a start, I realized where the push to call their beasts was coming from. “Hey. Knock it the fuck off, you pimple on a noble’s ass,” I growled at the pompous Fae guard.

  Gray’s red glow intensified, and without a conscious thought, Caorach was in my hand. I handed the sword to Gray, silently commanding it to draw off some of the Fae magic that was attacking him, and go in the guard’s face, pressing the toes of my boots to the daintily curled tips of his silk slippers.

  “You aren’t strong enough to change him, asshole, but you are testing my patience.”

  He sidled sideways to get away from me, and I backed toward where Gray was standing without looking, tracking his heat back to his body and placing myself between them. Behind me, Gray went rigid, so still, I could feel the space he was taking up in the room. Thinking he'd lost the battle to his beast, I stepped aside and got the hell out of his way.

  For the first time in the moments since we'd walked in, the messenger's smug expression faltered. Fear tightened the corners of his eyes, and his throat bobbed as he swallowed hard. His hand hovered over the pommel of his ceremonial short sword, but he didn't draw it.

  “Please, try it, you simpering little shit.” I gathered my power like I would when calling down a storm, then reached out and drank in Gray’s beast until he could push it all the way into submission. Next, I began to pull the power out of the room around us and into me, filling up ‘til even my fingertips sparked with raw Fairy magic.

  The Fae glanced between us, his fear naked on his face as his glamor failed. I’d drunk all the power in the room into me, creating a vacuum of magic, but I could only hold so much.

  “Would you risk turning the Light Court against you?” he hissed, but his voice shook with fear and sweat beaded on his upper lip and forehead.

  “you struck out at the allies of the Light Court, my allies, and you think the consequences will fall on me?" I laughed aloud, the sound harsh and overly loud in the tense room. "I am the fucking princess of the Seelie Sidhe, only daughter of King Emris Stormkeeper. I will fry that ridiculous velvet tabard off your body and present your fucking head to my father for your insolence."

  Never had I even considered doing anything I’d just threatened to another being, but as I spoke, I realized even the magic wanted violence, and I thanked the Goddess I wasn’t holding Caorach, or I might’ve acted, instead of using my words.

  I tried to rein in the flood of raw magic, but I'd taken too much and couldn't manipulate it. Power leaked out around the edges of my threadbare control, creating wisps that zipped around the room in confusion. Grayson, Pen, Julian, and the messenger all ducked, and at least one of them cried out in alarm.

  When I raised my arms, they flew to me, landing on my outstretched limbs with a feather-light touch.

  “What the hell is going on out here?” Orson burst from the office. Knocking the terrified messenger over as he tried to hide behind my former boss.

  Behind Orson, Duncan appeared in the doorway. At over six feet tall and impossibly thin, he was the very epitome of the Seelie high Fae. He was also my father’s most trusted advisor. King Stormkeeper would not have sent him away from court on a whim. From behind him, Prescot peered out the door, his eyes wide.

  The messenger began to complain to Duncan in a whiny tone. “Sir, the witch…”

  “The Princess will most certainly not be addressed with such disrespect, Ryden," Duncan cut him off in a flat tone that sounded bored, but I knew held a warning for the squire. "Am I to assume this rudeness is the cause of your display, Highness?" he turned to me, and his voice softened as he stared in wonder at the baby wisps clinging to my body like I was their marsupial mama.

  “No. this is the power I was forced to swallow, that Sir Ryden was using to force our shifter allies into their animal forms.”

  Duncan's face looked like Ryden was about to meet a fate worse than the one I'd threatened. "My lady," he sighed. "Lord Alpha, Sir Leo, and mate." Somehow Duncan knew everyone in the room…

  Damn, he's got, good spies.

  Caorach, still safely gripped in Gray’s fist, silently agreed with my mental appraisal. Lord Duncan certainly had made an effort to know what was going on so far away from the evergreen forests of Arcadia, the land of Fairy.

  “Lord Duncan, may I assume your visit has nothing to do with me, and I can go somewhere to…vent all this extra energy?”

  "My apologies, Princess. Of course, you do whatever you need to feel comfortable…but you must know, it's been an age since anyone could create wisps. The pixie queen will be quite pleased, as will lady Ravenna, the healer."

  I remembered her. She’d been the only Fae to openly assist me when I’d decided to take on the Fae prison, an oubliette that leeched magic from the prisoners, draining them as the nobles stole the power for themselves. It seemed even after I’d killed my cousin to protect my father and the throne, the nobles who hated me the most, had been the ones using the oubliette to feed their greed for more power.

  “And how is cousin Ravenna?”

  "She is well and looks forward to your next visit, where she hopes you will have time to visit with her. I'm certain she will only be more insistent when she hears you've created new wisps, as will Queen Myst."

  “Is this a rare talent?” I had never considered where wisps come from.

  “It is unheard of in the current age. Once, every queen of Arcadia had wisps follow them wherever they went, bursting to life spontaneously and renewing the lights of the palace.”

  Gray and I shared a look, and he handed me back Caorach. “Demon-blade, wisps, commanding shifters…what else are the Fae looking for, before they’ll accept you?”

  He had a point.

  “So, what brings you to San Francisco, Duncan? I hope you weren’t planning to visit Orson and slip away before I got to say hello.”

  Duncan cleared his throat as his head wagged slowly from side to side. “Still not much of a diplomat, are you?”

  “I thought that’s why the rulers had advisors like you.”

  He scoffed at me and barely stifled a sigh. “You are not incorrect, but those of us in that position always hope the next king or queen will have a sense of caution on their own.”

  “Don’t worry, Duncan. I won’t embarrass you, or my father, at the upcoming festivities to welcome the new king of Fairy’s Dark Court. But seriously, why are you here, and why didn’t you think to contact me beforehand?”

  He glanced at the pale, trembling messenger standing almost tucked into his robes, and I understood without another word. Duncan had sent word and likely heard that I was too busy to be seen, or whatever little fungus-faced courtiers gave as excuses when they didn't want to have an audience with the king's people.

  Grayson cleared his throat to interrupt. “Uh, at any point, were we going to discuss the attack on your home, Morgan?”

  Duncan’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline as I shrugged. “Yeah. Chthel paid me a visit. Seems to have had some miscommunication about her king.”

  “She decided Morgan wanted to, uh, marry, the Unseelie king a
nd came to kill the competition.”

  My father's friend started to speak but shut his mouth when I shook my head vehemently. "Nope, we're not even entertaining that idea. I have a man and more other offers than I care to think about. My freedom is not going to be part of negotiations between the courts."

  “I would not have suggested it, Princess.” Duncan bowed deeply, his long, silver hair falling over his shoulder and trailing almost to the floor.

  No, you would not have suggested it, Kingmaker, but you would have made sure someone did. I sighed and gave him an almost imperceptible nod of acknowledgment. Enough that I wasn't rude, but not so much that he'd forget that I didn't really trust him.

  It wasn’t even an issue for us, it was just the way of the courts. Duncan had been the one to teach me both to reserve my trust for my non-Fae friends, and how to compose myself to the courtiers and nobles to be better received at court. He’d never pretended to be my friend, though.

  Duncan Kingmaker had a surname once, but it had been forgotten across the eons of his life as the real power behind the throne. He had no need for a crown, he'd said it was just like wearing a target, and he preferred to pull the strings of a king than to be constantly under fire.

  But I knew he loved my father, even as he denied loyalty to any Fae. It was more than the office he protected, and more than curiosity I’d seen on his face the night I’d dueled my cousin to the death to save his king.

  How long had it been since either of them had a wife or lover to turn to? Anyone other than the two of them to trust? I looked at Pen and Julian standing with their arms around a pale Prescot, and Gray who still watched Sir Ryden, almost unblinking.

  My father, who had lived over a thousand years, had one friend. Suddenly, I felt like the richest princess in the whole world, and maybe Fairy too. Especially Fairy, where the courts have forgotten that Fae laughter used to summon Spring.

  “So, why are you here, Kingmaker?”

  “To summon Orson to Arcadia with honors. The king wishes to have Orson by his side for the festivities, assuming you will not miss him from your…entourage?”

  Yes, I needed the shifters…no, I didn’t want Orson on the wrong side of the room when we arrived.

  “I am not even going to pretend that I get to make any demands regarding my boss, Duncan. Especially not in our workplace.”

  Orson nodded at me as though I’d given him my permission, or maybe he just approved of my response. It was hard to tell, still lit up with all the power I’d swallowed. “I’ll be waiting for you when you arrive, my girl, at your father’s side.”

  With that, Duncan opened a portal I hadn’t noticed in all the fuss, not into the ‘tween space of the garden, and certainly not into the naiads’ pool, but into the throne room. I caught a glimpse of my father sitting at his desk near the throne, looking pensive, and (I thought) a little lost.

  He glanced up and met my eyes, then Duncan stepped into the doorway and blocked him from view. When Sir Ryden scurried through last, my father had disappeared from view, presumably to welcome Orson home.

  It was almost like I was back in Fairy, so close to having his attention, but never quite getting there. The emotions that rose in me sent the baby wisps scattering to the corners of the room, and I silently apologized to them for my lack of control.

  “Sorry, wee ones. My feelings about my family do tend to have that effect.” I glanced at my remaining friends and stifled a self-piteous sigh. We still hadn’t discussed what we were going to do for the feast, and I still had to get Tryst on board with not letting the celebration happen at all. It was going to be a long day.

  Nine

  I paced in front of the club door as Gray leaned against one of the Grecian columns until Booker, the head of security, told me to get my ass inside before I wore out the welcome mat.

  “Thanks, Book. But I gotta tell you, I’d rather stay out here, this time.”

  He just laughed raucously and sauntered back toward the dressing rooms, leaving me alone in the coat check area. The club was deserted, but Gray’s shoulders instantly went taut as he lifted his nose to scent the room.

  "Goddamn, that Fae. I knew he couldn't be trusted."

  “What?” I wished for the umpteenth time that I had Gray’s preternatural sense of smell. “What is it?”

  “I smell those foul creatures that broke into the apartment. The dark Fae.”

  My heart raced, and I carefully sent tendrils of my human magic out like metaphysical fingers, quietly searching for signs of power. The dancers were all in their dressing room, their energy upbeat as they donned body makeup and, if I knew them, poked fun at each other as they got ready for their sets later in the evening.

  There was nothing on the first floor, but I hesitated to check the floor above, even though that’s where Tryst’s office was. That’s where Gray headed, sniffing the air with his mouth partially open the way Akane did when something wasn’t quite right.

  I followed as he loped up the stairs, his head moving slightly from side to side as he moved quickly and silently to the floor above. He moved almost like his beast, his body low over his knees, head below the level of the large picture windows that looked out over the dance floor.

  He crept up to the door, every muscle in his body tensed to pounce and waited for my signal. We’d been doing it so long we didn’t even need to communicate it. I simply used the raw force of my magic to throw the door open, and he lunged into the room as I raced in behind him with Caorach drawn.

  The smell of hunter blood finally hit me as I rounded the corner into the outer office. Blue-green blood was splashed across the walls and the floor, and a redcap sat slumped in the corner, his blade wet with the foul liquid he’d spread across the room.

  My heart squeezed tight, I pushed past gray into the inner office, where just the day before I'd cursed at Tryst for his selfishness. It hadn't occurred to me to warn him about Chthel's hunters. Why had they come here?

  The scene in the inner office was worse than the V.I.P. room outside. Two hunters were sprawled across the floor, their heads severed from their bodies. They were dead, though perhaps the redcap who had beheaded them was not.

  Scarlet blood dripped off the edge of the marble, and I forced my eyes up over the blood-soaked paperwork. It was Tryst, facedown on the desk, as still as mortal death.

  I must have screamed, though I don't remember any sound coming out of my mouth, because Gray ran in with Booker on his heels. The men lowered Tryst to the floor, and Grayson checked his vitals after barking at the bouncer to warn the dancers that dark Fae may still be in the club.

  “He’s alive, but probably only because he’s Fae. You heal him, do what you do, and I’ll check on the redcap. He twitched once, so I hope he’s still alive.”

  I nodded, but my hands trembled. "Komodor must be told."

  “We’ll worry about that later. If you can save Tryst and the redcap, I’m sure he’ll be happier to hear from you.”

  Not likely, I thought. The redcaps were born and raised to die in battle. If the hunters lying in pieces on Tryst's office floor were the only ones who'd been in the assault, Komodor would be pleased, and the redcap would be lauded. If there were hunters, who escaped with all their limbs, and scars to show they had survived the battle…He was better off dying in the corner where he was.

  I was stalling again, while Tryst was lying on the cleanest spot on the floor. I pushed back the tinges of darkness that clung to every surface the blood had touched and called nature magic. Nature was slow to answer me, held back by wards Tryst had put in place to keep me weaker when we had our dealings.

  His paranoia and hunger for power had really fucked him up. "Best self-own better, you fucking asshole," I sniffled as I pressed my hands to the floor, summoning the only magic left to me. I'd never used blood magic to save a life before, and using the blood of the Unseelie Fae made my stomach churn, but his pulse was thready, and without the magic of his own, I knew he wouldn't survive the poiso
n in his wounds.

  The blood resisted my magic at first, but almost wheedling, I coaxed the power that lingered on the walls and floors to come to my aid. I expected it to feel sickly, like an infection invading my body and soul. Instead, once I stopped worrying about where it originated, it felt exactly the same as the magic of the Light Court. In fact, the hunters’ power was more like the shifters than any other I’d experienced, inside Fairy or out.

  Either the magic itself was capable of disarming me, or everything Komodor had said about the courts being much more similar than I realized, wasn’t just a complaint about Fae politics.

  I focused on the warmth and light inside that magic, like the glow of an almost full moon, and placed my hands over the slash marks on the power broker’s chest and back. From the wounds, it looked as though they’d managed to surprise him and attack from behind.

  I glanced up at the wall behind the desk, where he’d hung a massive painting. “Oh, you idiot, you wouldn’t have…” I glanced down at my handiwork and saw slash marks hat had healed leaving thick, pale, knotted scar tissue behind. “Well, he’s not going to thank me for that.”

  The ten-foot painting on the wall drew my attention again. If he’d hidden a portal there, I knew I had to seal it before more Unseelie came through. There was no active magic coming from the painting, but something about it seemed, wrong, though I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  Put my finger on it… Oh, hell, why not? I tapped the edges of the painting, rapping on the frame like I was looking for a secret door. Then I found one. It was just a spot of energy, like someone with magic stuck on their fingers had touched the frame in that one particular place. I pushed my finger into the residue, and it sank into the frame. In a flash, the painting had disappeared, and I was looking into a larger-than full sized mirror. The glass was old, warped in places, showing the gold leaf behind it in others, and once it was uncovered, magic shone through it like I’d thrown a switch.