At my side, Father exhaled. “They cannot attack her, because she’s enchanted them to be loyal, even when they disagree with her plans.”
Queen Melusina turned to Father, licking her lips and staring at him like he was a yule bannock, rich with fruits and spices and fresh from the griddle. “You were paying attention!”
When Father didn’t reply, her face fell a fraction, but she smoothed out her expression and turned back to her soldiers. “I should strengthen the loyalty enchantment to stop them from killing you to sabotage my efforts.”
My eyes darted from the rift to the Book of Brigid, which lay open on the stone floor. Could I risk grabbing it before diving out to my freedom? She would only follow us. But if I could convince her Generals to hold her back…
“Father,” I whispered. “How do we break her enchantment?”
“Her blood must be absorbed through her victims’ skin,” he whispered. “If you can get just one of the generals free, he might save the others.”
Queen Melusina’s head twisted back. She flicked her wrist, wrenching the Sword of Tethra from my fingers. It glided across the stone floor and embedded itself in the wall.
The air encasing us released, and I gasped and staggered back. I reached my sword belt for my dagger. It was gone. A curse tore from my lips. I must have left it in the cave, where I’d tried to stab the Queen of the Banshees.
“Traitors.” The word ended with an elongated hiss, and she twisted her head like an owl.
My heart pounded. My mouth dried. My feet shuffled back on their own accord. How could she move so bonelessly?
“Foul, scheming traitors.” Her silver eyes caught mine, making my heart stop.
Everything went numb, and I was trapped in her gaze. I’d been mistaken about her pupils. They weren’t slitted like Drayce’s. Hers were rectangular and dilated, like those of a goat.
Queen Melusina glided across the throne room with those graceful, undulating movements. Father pulled at my arms, shouted into my ear. He was probably telling me to run, but I couldn’t.
She’d locked me in the gaze of those silver eyes. They filled my vision with irises as dark as storm clouds and edged with midnight black. Networks of tiny, lightning-white fibers shot toward rectangular pupils. They pulsed as though living, breathing, hungering.
Seawater from the rift stung my cheeks. My tongue darted out to lap at the salt. A bitter, briny sensation burned at my sinuses and broke me out of her thrall like a fist through the heart, but I forced myself to keep still. The moment she came close, I would attack.
Another drop of saltwater spattered into my eye. I blinked hard.
“Mother will wipe away your tears,” she crooned.
“Neara!” Father’s voice was choked. He pulled at my arm. “We have to go.”
Still keeping her eyes on mine, Queen Melusina made that throaty laugh I’d heard outside her room. “Oh, Ailill…” She spoke in that indulgent tone used by wealthy people admonishing their pets. “If it’s a child you want, I can give you another.”
Father raised his hand, pointing the iron sword at the queen. “I won’t let you hurt my Neara!”
Her gaze flickered to him. “Put that away before I punish—”
With speed I didn’t know I possessed, I snatched the Dullahan’s bone whip from my sword belt and flicked it at her face. I missed but managed to rip off the bottom half of her gown.
A huge swathe of fabric fell to the stone floor, revealing legs fused like a serpentine tail. Shock barreled through my gut like a thunderbolt, and I reared back. The bone whip nearly slipped from my fingers.
Nathair.
Father often made me read about those creatures in the leather book. They were monsters that took on the appearance of beautiful women to feed upon the essence of human men. But they were more gruesome than fae predators, as they maintained their false facades by consuming the children they’d birthed. They were immortal and possessed just one weakness: they could only die from the killing blow of a child or parent.
Ignoring the anxiety twisting through my insides, I pulled back the bone whip and corrected my aim.
Queen Melusina leapt to the side, exposing the rest of her tail. She hissed and revealed a long, thin tongue.
The soldiers stuck to the throne room’s walls screamed.
Although my lips trembled, my legs shook, and my stomach heaved at the thought being birthed by that thing, I tilted my head to the side and forced a smirk. “Without the dress to hide your legs, you’re no more lovable than a bundle-of-twigs changeling.”
Her face twisted into a rictus of rage, teeth lengthened into fangs, and her tail expanded and coiled. She flew forward, talons reaching for my eyes.
I flinched.
Father jumped in her path, wielding the dagger. Queen Melusina backhanded him across the face. He flew back across the room, but she caught him in solid air.
With as much speed as I could muster, I flicked the bone whip to her neck. Its vertebra separated and curved toward her left eye. She dodged to the right, and before I could retract the whip, she flew at me and pushed me to the ground.
The back of my head hit the stone floor. Pain radiated through my skull, and I squeezed my eyes shut.
“Insolent offspring!” Her nails ripped through my cloak and dug into my armor. “When I’ve bled you dry and released my sire, you will serve as our snack.”
I punched her so hard in the face, my knuckles cracked. She didn’t even flinch. Baring my teeth, I spat, “That one-eyed monster will eat you next!”
Queen Melusina grabbed my wrists. I butted her in the face and kneed at her stomach. Although we were of equal strength, she seemed to have a superhuman resilience. We wrestled on the cold, stone floor, neither of us winning. It didn’t seem to bother her, based on the manic grin stretching her lips.
“Help her!” cried Father from his prison of air. “If you let the queen win, we will all die!”
Queen Melusina twisted her tail around my belly, chest, and neck, constricting my lungs. I struggled for breath, eyes bulging and clawing at the thick, scaly covering around my collar. My arms flailed, and I fumbled for anything to use as a weapon.
Something glinted in the corner of my eye. It was the Sword of Tethra’s golden hilt. If I could get hold of it… I stretched out a hand, and my fingers grazed the pommel.
She grabbed my wrist and twisted. “We need that sword for the ritual.”
“Your Majesty!” said a familiar voice.
Her grip loosened, and she raised the upper part of her body and grinned. “Gerald! You’re just in time to meet my Father.”
I glanced over Queen Melusina’s shoulder.
Standing at the door was a handsome, smirking Drayce.
Chapter 23
Queen Melusina’s serpentine tail loosened around my lungs, but I couldn’t still breathe. Drayce had survived! But how? I had pulled his scales to the fire and watched them burn. It should have killed him, just as it had the Keeper of All Things.
Drayce pushed back tendrils of blue-black hair off his face, revealing viridian-green eyes that shone with mischief. “I would be honored to meet the great King Balor, but I would like to make a proposal.”
When my gaze fell to the unlit pipe held between full lips, it was like an iron dagger through the heart. This wasn’t Drayce. It was that wretched gancanagh. And he didn’t seem the least surprised that the usurper Fae Queen was an ancient, child-eating monster with the tail of a serpent.
I kicked at the part of the tail encasing my ankles and freed my right leg, but she tightened her grip around my lungs.
“This had better be important, Gerald.” Impatience laced her voice. “I’m in the middle of disciplining my daughter.”
“There is a way for you to survive in this realm without Fomorian magic. I can give you an immortal fae body.”
My breath hitched. Was this something new, or a continuation of Drayce’s and General Creach’s plan to use my body as her vessel?
Queen Melusina twisted her upper body toward the gancanagh, worsening the rip in her silk gown. “I’m listening.”
The gancanagh raised a scroll. “This just came in from General Creach. He says the girl inhaled the Banshee Queen’s last breath.”
Panic exploded across my chest, and I thrashed within her grip. He was going to tell her to use my body. Just like Drayce had planned all along. I wrestled free my right forearm and hammered my fist against her thick, muscular tail. It was as futile as pounding against stone.
“I don’t see the relevance,” replied the queen.
“You know the legend of banshee’s blood?”
She flicked her wrist in a gesture of dismissal. “Banshees don’t bleed, so nobody can drink their blood to enhance their power.”
“True, but inhaling the essence of the most powerful banshee has the same effect. Not only does Neara hold the most potent form of the Blood of Dana, but she now has an immortal fae body.” He pointed at my arm. “Do you see how she doesn’t reach for the iron sword Ailill dropped?”
Her head turned to the fallen sword. She paused for a moment, her eyes narrowing as though considering the gancanagh’s words. “Yes. She cannot abide iron.”
“Freeing the Fomorians will ensure your long-term survival in this realm, but you would no longer rule it.”
She parted her lips to protest, but he spoke first. “King Balor will grant you the highest of accolades, but what about those Fomorians envious of your newfound favor?” He shook his head. “They would plot against you and remind him of your less than pure blood.”
“I suppose you have a better solution,” she said.
“Indeed.” He spoke with a hypnotic lilt. “Take her body to survive in this realm and rule.”
Queen Melusina stiffened. I stopped breathing and stopped pounding at her tail. Would she listen to the gancanagh or continue with her plan to free the Fomorians? Her gaze slid in the direction of the throne room’s floor-to-ceiling windows, where the mist had pressed itself against the transparent rock like a sheet of white.
“Majesty, you are torn.” He walked across the throne room, his heels clicking with every step.
Her brows furrowed. “My father….”
“Did you know that the ritual to banish the Fomorians should have sent them to the realm of the gods?" He paused and when she didn't answer, he continued. "Something went wrong.”
I stilled and glanced at Father, who stared back at them with wide, stricken eyes. If there was something in the gancanagh’s story we could use, we might find a way to banish Melusina and the wretched mist.
“Do you know why the ritual didn't work?” she asked.
He nodded. “A thousand years ago, the banishing ritual required a thousand souls. The druids, humans, and faeries all contributed their amount of sacrifices, but there was one missing.”
“Who?” She leaned forward, somehow managing to maintain a tight grip around my torso.
“Your mother, Queen Pressyne, was supposed to be the last sacrifice. She faltered when the ritual snatched you from her arms.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?” she spat.
The gancanagh pressed his hands to his chest. “Until I found young Neara, I was a lowly scholar dwelling among the Free Folk, unfit for an audience with a high faerie, let alone the queen.”
She shook her head, platinum locks gliding over her shoulders. “It is too late. I will use the Blood of Dana to free my people.”
“Or you could use Neara’s body to guarantee your rule and release Queen Pressyne’s bones into the mist. This will send the Fomorians to their deserved rest.”
Queen Melusina stared at the Book of Brigid for several moments. Then she released her hold on the cúpla, who fell onto his hands and knees. “Do you have Ailill’s knowledge of the banishment ritual?”
The creature shuffled to his feet and wrung his hands. “Only his memories of reading about it in the Book of Brigid.”
“Will Queen Pressyne’s bones send my people to the realm of the gods?” asked the queen.
“You lose nothing by trying,” replied the cúpla.
The gancanagh nodded. “Throw the bones into the mist and complete the sacrifice. It will end the torment of the Fomorians, and you will be free of your obligation.”
“Please, do it, Your Majesty!” cried one of the generals.
My pulse reverberated in my throat. The gancanagh’s plan would save everyone in Bresail, but it would be catastrophic for Father and me. I sent the soldiers one last pleading look. They hovered against the wall, several feet above the stone floor, either enchanted not to raise magic against Queen Melusina, or too stunned at recent revelations to act.
A soul-deep ache seared through my being. I couldn’t stop existing. Not when Father was still in her clutches. He had suffered more than any human deserved, and I hadn't yet freed him. Panting hard, I writhed in the grip of that impossibly strong tail.
The sweat on my brow mingled with the tears stinging my eyes. With Father incapacitated, the sword out of reach, and no powers to speak of, I had no way of saving us. Queen Melusina had won, and she would either bleed me to death or wear my body like a cloak.
“All right,” she said. “Throw Mother’s bones into the mist.” She raised her hand, and the window disappeared.
With a sigh of wind, the mist tumbled into the throne room. It swirled into tendrils, taking on the shape of a six-fingered hand. The wispy fingers groped about the room, sending out breezes of foul, freezing air. Its chill seeped through my leather armor, making my flesh pucker into goosebumps.
Then the mist dissipated and reformed, forming into a giant, misshapen head with a single eye in the middle of its brow. It was the face I’d seen in Ecne’s Pool. King Balor, the leader of the Fomorians. The terrible truth the vision had shown me—monsters emerging from the mist—was about to manifest!
“Release me!”
Terror stiffened my bones, and my pulse thrashed in my ears, urging at me to break free and run. I couldn’t let the mist touch my blood.
“Release me!”
The voice echoed across the throne room, ripping cries of terror from the generals pinned against the wall. They had been members of the Court of the Dead before Queen Melusina had gotten them to betray Kind Dunn. The Fomorians had probably killed those generals when they had been alive.
Queen Melusina flinched and tightened her lips. I clenched my teeth. Even she wasn’t immune to the horror of her people.
“RELEASE ME!”
The sound rattled my eardrums.
She raised both arms, and a section of the throne room floor parted. The mist circled the opening, and a limestone coffin rose from its depths. It stood upright, carved with the likeness of a woman who could have been me. From the crown around her head, I guessed this was Queen Pressyne, the rightful monarch of the Faeries.
Queen Melusina grinned. “Open it!”
The gancanagh’s shoulders sagged. “It is sealed by high fae magic.”
She twisted her upper body, lowering her face so it was inches from mine. “Be a good girl and stay there.”
Queen Melusina uncoiled her tail, ending the crushing pressure on my ribs. My lungs filled with cold air, spreading shock through my insides. I gagged, spun onto my front, coughing out the fetid mist.
She slithered to the coffin and placed both hands on its limestone covering. Then she whispered a long series of incantations I didn’t understand. Mist swirled all around me, and I cringed away, keeping the wound I’d made on my collarbone from its touch. It obscured my view of the sword, the book, and the rift I’d created to escape. Through the miasma, fiery magic crackled from the seams of the stone coffin, mingling with the sounds of the moaning Fomorians.
I staggered to my feet. Father still hung in mid-air, trapped by her invisible web. No matter what, I had to free him and send him to safety. Only the tiny spatter of salty wind was my indication of where to find the rift. I stumbled in it
s direction, holding out my hands.
The queen’s voice rose, and magical flames stretched to the ceiling.
"Your Majesty," said the gancanagh. "Do you need the help of the generals to reverse the enchantments?"
She groaned, seeming to add more power to her efforts.
Father slumped on the ground where the mist thinned. I hurried over and rolled him onto his back. His skin took on the pallor of watery milk, and thin breaths rasped through his lips. Had she done something to him with her magic?
“Father,” I whispered. “Wake up.”
His breaths deepened, and movement under his eyelids told me he was close to stirring.
I glanced up at Queen Melusina, who was still releasing the magic of her mother’s coffin. The mist gathered around her like a shroud, yet she continued raising her arms, making sparks fly across the throne room. A vindictive part of me wondered what would happen if a spark fell into the gancanagh’s pipe.
The coffin lid rattled, and my heart jumped. Why would anyone need to secure a dead body with so much magic? Had she left her mother in there still living? I wouldn't wait to find out.
Father still hadn’t awoken, but I pulled him toward the rift. I kept my hood up and my head down, letting the saltwater splatter on the cloak instead of on my exposed skin.
The coffin lid fell to the stone floor and splintered into pieces, revealing a pristine, white skeleton.
Queen Melusina’s shoulders relaxed. “In the end, she decomposed like everyone else.”
“True, Your Majesty,” said the gancanagh.
“Very well. Which bone sends the Fomorians to the realm of the gods, or should I throw the whole skeleton into the mist?”
My heart skipped several beats. I had to hurry before she turned her attention to me. Once she'd sent the mist way, she would take possession of my body to survive this realm. I gulped down a panicked breath and pulled Father's heavy, unconscious form a few more feet.
“Release me!” The floor shook with the monstrous voice.
“I’m sending you to a better place,” Queen Melusina turned her back to the skeleton to shout into the mist.
Curse of the Fae King Page 21