by Elle Cross
“Where is it?” asks Lyser.
“Who is it?” Flitter whispers.
I whirl to her in surprise. “What do you mean?”
As always, Flitter is slow to speak, as though animal languages come more easily to her than fae. “They are...individuals,” she finally says. “I would not say they have personalities, but they are driven by different desires. At least, that is how I understand it. My knowledge of them is limited.”
“She’s right,” Galog says. “I’ve studied what the royal archives say about them. The autochthones are sentient, a kind of elder god, but their consciousness is unfathomable to our kind. They are like archetypes, embodiments of emotions or concepts. If we can discover which one is in our midst, we may be able to devise a plan to avoid it.”
“Will it not let us pass?” I ask.
They both shrug. “Their whims are unknowable,” Galog says. “This one may ignore us completely. Or, it may choose to destroy us, eat us, possess us.”
“Well,” I say briskly. “I would certainly prefer the first option. How can we make that happen?”
“We watch,” Flitter says.
“What do you mean?” I ask. “It’s invisible.”
“No,” she says. “We watch around us. Observe what it creates. What it makes us feel. How it alters the landscape. Then we will know.”
I break apart from our group and inform the rest of the party what is happening. On my command, they sit, doing their best to calm their mounts.
The air is still, hot, and fathomless black.
And then the smell wafts to us on the burning breeze. It’s both sweet and rotten, like nectarines gone to decay. The scent crawls up my nostrils, tendrils of odor that seem to wrap around my brainstem and nestle there, becoming a part of my being.
I turn, suddenly determined to reenter my carriage. It doesn’t matter where I go, so long as I leave this place. Immediately.
“My queen?” Lyser calls out, but I ignore him, a single thought pressing at me.
I must depart at once.
Behind me, I hear a thump. I glance back to see Galog sitting on the ground, digging in his heels. Flitter frowns at him and tugs his hand, but he won’t be budged. Even as I watch, Lyser spins on one heel and begins marching away from our party. Something is very wrong. I know it. I can feel it.
But I cannot stop it. All I can do is return to my carriage, that sweet-sick stink clogging my whole body and squeezing my mind.
“Go. Leave. You are not welcome here. Do as I say.” I feel more than hear the voice in my mind, a prickling reverberation that makes my skull tingle uncomfortably.
I shake my head, trying to work it loose, but the feeling intensifies. There is only one way to make it stop, only one option left to me in all the world: I must leave the Steppes immediately.
I’m mere steps away from the carriage door when I feel a tentative hand on my shoulder, followed by the warm, downy scent of my gameskeeper. I turn, ready to shoo Flitter away, when the most astonishing thing happens.
She slaps me right across the face, her skin cracking against mine, the retort splitting the air.
I stare at her, astonished, and she does it again. Then a third time.
At last, the awful pressure in my head recedes, the stench fades, and my mind feels clearer. I blink at Flitter.
“Enankia,” she says.
I shake my head, uncomprehending.
“That is what walks among us,” she elaborates. “The autochthone of compulsion.”
“Shit,” I mutter. “Everyone else?”
She gestures, and in the dim illumination of our faerie lights, I see the havoc that an autochtone can wreak in mere minutes.
The entirety of our party is scattered, wandering about and behaving like madmen, except for a few, including Galog, who is quite literally digging himself deeper into the sandy soil. “How did you avoid the compulsion?” I ask. “And can it strike me again?”
“Awareness helps. Knowing what’s there will aid you in avoiding its power. But there’s no true immunity.”
“We have to collect everyone before they wander into a fire spout or get eaten by a fachan.”
Celester, the court historian, has stripped naked and is pouring ink over himself, which is certainly messy but not deadly. He and Galog can wait. I’m far more concerned with Lyser, who has marched well into the distance, and my courtiers Lietta and Regin, who are fleeing in opposite directions whilst tearing off their clothes and shrieking in pain.
My footman Florizel is waltzing with a creature he has found; I’m too far away to determine what it is or how dangerous it might be, though I suspect it’s spriggan. Regardless, Flitter will know. As I watch, a dark rivulet trickles down his arm, and the creature’s tongue flicks out to lap it up. The thing has opened a vein in my footman. The very thought makes me indignant.
“Go help Florizel,” I order, seeking out Gull, the other footman. Either he’s too far gone or it’s too dark, but either way, I cannot espy him.
Sorel and Myla, two of Lyser’s best guards, are still reasonably close by. Sorel is crawling on his hands and knees, his fingernails bloody from digging through the rocks. His boots are gone, abandoned several feet away, and sand mites are crawling all over his toes. They can—and will—quite literally eat him alive, though it will take hours. Myla is still upright, at least, but even from here her eyes look wild and she’s howling. She wrestles with something invisible, and I cannot tell if it’s a tangible entity or a figment of her mind.
It would seem we are not worms after all, because the autochtone has certainly taken notice of us. Enankia would have had me abandon my people. To simply get in my carriage and let the stags take me away, while they all died a hundred different horrible deaths.
What a horrid bitch.
“Fuck,” I grumble aloud. I march over to Sorel and yank him up by his hair. He screeches, and I rake my nails across his cheek, a vicious bid to restore his sanity.
“Sorel!” I scream. “Comport yourself!”
He blinks and stares at me, awareness returning to his blank gaze. “My queen?”
“Welcome back.”
“What’s happening?” He rubs at his cheek, soothing the scratches I left there. If we make it out of this hellscape, I will make certain he is given a balm for the wound.
“I’ll explain later. Right now, get the mites off your feet and your boots back on. Then go fetch Lyser. Punch him if you have to. Kick his balls. Do whatever it takes to bring him back, but know that pain works best. I’ll deal with Myla and send her to aid you.”
I glance over my shoulder to see that Flitter has wrangled not only Florizel, but the two remaining guards as well. She seems to be directing them, and I leave her to it, making a mental note to reward her somehow, because without her, our entire party would be lost. A promotion, a medal, her own tree in which to build an enormous nest? Flitter is a strange one, and I really don’t know what she would most appreciate. But I’ll figure it out. Later.
As with Sorel, I use minor violence to wrest Myla from the compulsion. I check her injuries—copious but minor—and when I’ve confirmed she’ll heal, I send her to assist in Lyser’s rescue. Flitter has dispatched the other two guards to do the same and is already rounding up the scattered courtiers and attendants—those she can find, at any rate. Several fight back, still lost in whatever compulsion Enankia has blanketed them in. I shove my sleeves up to my elbows, toss my stiletto into my carriage, and plunge into the fray, determined to save as many of my people as I can.
There are at least five members of my entourage still missing, including Gull. My attendants Kalina and Ianthe are nowhere to be seen; nor do I spot Ozeer or my courtiers Bariel and Maurelle.
In the darkness, I can hear the crashes and cracks of violence. I can only hope it is the guards bringing Lyser in hand, and not members of my party meeting an unhappy demise in this cursed place.
With a growl, I ball my fingers into a fist and start swingin
g.
When all is said and done, we resume our journey, but it takes hours and a heavy toll. Six of our party remain lost: Gull, Ozeer, Maurelle, my carriage driver Ren, Ianthe, and Lietta. Although Lietta did not disappear into the darkness like the rest, she clawed at herself as she ran, rending her flesh into a bloody mess. The trauma was too great for her to survive, and I held her hand as she bled out, shuddering and crying and lamenting ever partaking in this journey. I could not blame her for that.
Worse still, we were further delayed by burying her body in the sand, leaving ourselves vulnerable to more attacks. Fortunately, none came. The courtiers protested her burial; it is our custom to burn the dead on a ritual pyre. Several practical matters made that impossible. Not only did we not have the wood for a pyre, but the sight of the fire might well have attracted more unsavory creatures to us, and we were in no way prepared to defend ourselves further. Besides, what we would perceive as burning the shell of a fallen companion might be perceived by others as the mouthwatering scent of cooking meat, and quite frankly, I just did not want to fucking deal with that. No one argued with me once I pointed it out.
In one small bit of luck, after the guards collected Lyser, they found Bariel wandering with his eyes closed, apparently compelled to ramble blindly. Like the rest of us, he’s a bit worse for the wear, but at least he’s alive. Kalina also turned up in the end.
Those of us who are left are exhausted and filthy, scratched and clawed and battered. A black eye darkens Lyser’s perfect face, and my fingernails were torn to stubs when I wrestled my people into submission. Flitter lost more than a few feathers from her wings, Sorel has developed a significant limp, and Galog is aflame with mite bites and humiliation. One of the guards has a broken rib, and I suspect more snapped bones will reveal themselves soon enough.
Now we travel without footmen, as Florizel has taken up the reins to the carriage. The others have remounted their stellarae, but the mood of the party is grim, which is no surprise. Honestly, the true surprise is that all the stellarae are still with us. They are apparently immune to autochthones, and even in all the mayhem, stayed huddled together in their flock. They may be mere birds, but I like them, and something about the fact that they were not also taken eases the sting in my heart.
Now they will ferry us the rest of the way, this worn, beaten, bloodied group. We are in shock; when the reality of our losses kicks in, the grief will make itself known. But until then, all we can do is carry on to the Court of Thorns, a place of dark madness.
I only hope this incident is not a harbinger of things to come.
Chapter Seven
Sitara
Our journey takes two full days. We reach the Court of Thorns just as twilight blooms, chasing away the enfeebling heat of the day. My entire party perks up, as if we are wilting flowers that have finally been granted water.
A courtier greets us at the gates. Some sort of hellbeast mix, he’s covered in shaggy, matted fur topped with court livery. His eyes are the orange of a banked fire and his jaw—snout?—seems misshapen.
“Welf-mae, trav,” he says, painfully slowly. “Ae bid ye felcom on beff of Keen Acan. Uff you lev yer moun wif fa stard, Ae fod shaw ye in.” A little plume of smoke puffs out of his nose.
I pause, taken aback by his speech. It’s clear that animal tongues are in his nature; he struggled to get the sentence out. Leave it to a Dark Court to force a courtier to use a language biologically unsuited to him. It takes me a moment, but I manage to decipher what he said: Well-met, travelers. I bid you welcome on behalf of Queen Acanthe. If you would leave your mounts with the steward, I would show you in.
“Thank you,” I reply. “I would prefer to be shown directly to my quarters, so that I may refresh myself from the long journey. I do not wish to insult your queen with a soiled and travel-weary appearance.”
He bows his assent and leads us into the palace, all but Flitter, who follows the gamesman to the stables with our mounts. My words weren’t entirely true; I have no interest in impressing the Mad Queen. But the idea of languishing in a jasmine-fragranced bath, of eating succulent grapes and sipping cold bramble wine…I simply can’t resist it. Besides, the power balance is bound to be delicate with all the visiting courts. Standing back and observing for a bit could well be to my advantage.
The palace is what I would expect from a Dark court: gold-veined obsidian marble floors, with flickering sconces and mounted skulls lining the walls. Every doorway is framed with thorns and briars and there’s a charred smell in the air—the scent of someone or something burning through power at an unsustainable rate.
I don’t know precisely what’s happened in this court or what to expect from the coming ceremonies, but I’m certain of one thing: Wearing weapons was a very wise decision.
I glare at the row of courtiers in front of me. Galog, flanked by his two remaining aides, stands with his arms crossed, quite nearly glaring back.
“Your majesty,” he says through gritted teeth. “It is only proper. That is why you brought me along, is it not? To coach you in these things?”
“I brought you to advise me, should I request it. Not to try to order me about or make demands. Remember your place, Galog.”
“This is my place,” he retorts. “Protocol dictates that you must go and greet the queen immediately. If you do not, it will be considered an insult. Not just by Acanthe herself, but by all the assembled royalty present. It would nullify the entire point of this senseless journey.”
I roll my eyes. Despite Mag’s words of wisdom before I left, I really couldn’t care less what the assembled royalty here thinks of me. And I’m not walking into the throne room of a Dark court until I’m damned good and ready. I’m exhausted from the journey, I’ve yet to bathe, and if I don’t get some food soon, I just might eat Galog.
“I have no intention of greeting her when I’m filthy and half-starved.”
“Majesty,” Janal interjects. “Galog is correct. There is etiquette that must be followed.”
“Or what?” I demand. “What threats do I face if I do not?”
He blanches. “Threats, my queen?”
“Yes. Threats. If I ignore your precious rules of conduct, what will the consequence be?”
He clears his throat. “Well. It’s as Galog said. You would be insulting the Queen of Thorns and earning a somewhat, er...negative reputation among those assembled.”
“Mm-hmm. And exactly how long do I have to make an appearance before it would be considered insulting?”
“Before midnight on the day of your arrival,” Typhin answers.
“Indeed,” I say, crossing my arms. “And since that is several hours away, I fail to see what the fucking problem is! I have plenty of time to settle in before anyone will think anything of it.”
I hear Lyser cough behind me, an obvious attempt to choke down a laugh. It almost makes me crack my own smile.
“I did not bring you three here to lecture me, particularly on how to greet other royals. As you may remember, Galog, we discussed this quite recently, with regard to the Court of Fog. Now. I don’t give two shits what any of these creepy Dark courts think of me or my House. I’m well-versed in protocol and quite capable of comporting myself appropriately. Besides, the Dark courts welcome that which is strange and unnerving. It’s what makes them creepy. I doubt they stand on such antiquated formalities themselves. The queen would probably like it if I strolled in and handed her the heads of my aides as a coronation gift. ”
I march in front of these irritating men, drilling my point home. To their credit, Typhin and Janal seem to take my threat seriously. They both turn pale and take a half-step back. Galog stares at me stubbornly and I continue railing at him.
“I brought you here to help me survive. To suss out alliances, to find out who is dangerous and who is merely pretentious. To warn me about enemies, traps, and snakes. Hidden spells, language with loopholes, espionage. Not to tell me when and to whom I should bow.”
“
My queen,” Janal begins, but I nail him with a mouth-shutting scowl and he scuttles back another step.
“Galog, get these useless fucking idiots out of my sight. When I want advice from any of you, I’ll let you know.” I turn on a heel and sweep into my bedchamber, knowing full well that Lyser is right behind me.
“They’re just doing their jobs, you know,” he says mildly.
“Well, they’re bad at it,” I retort.
He laughs. “They’re not. You’re overreacting.”
I give a delicate sniff. “If I am, that’s my right as their queen.”
He continues to grin at me. “They’re advising you on court protocol, which is exactly what they should be doing. You just don’t like them.”
“Well, that much is certainly true. What an insufferable lot.”
“It’s a shame we lost Ozeer,” he muses. “He was the least annoying of them all.”
“Whatev—” I begin, but a warning tingle down my spine stops me mid-sentence.
“My queen?” Lyser’s dark brows rise in concern.
I give him a seductive smile and lean close, curling myself around his body. I nibble at his earlobe, the perfect picture of seduction. “We’re being watched,” I whisper.
He stiffens in my hold, but otherwise doesn’t react, beyond bending his head to nuzzle at my neck. “Are you certain?”
“Yes. I can’t tell you precisely how I know. Only that I do, that I can feel it, and that nothing we say or do at this moment will remain private.”
“What do you want to do?” he asks.
“Not discuss our plans for our time in this court, that’s for sure,” I murmur. “If someone wants to spy on us so badly, perhaps we should give them something to see.” I graze my teeth along his earlobe, eliciting a satisfying shiver from him. He has a bit of an exhibitionist streak, and I know I’m pushing that particular button of his.
Of course, he’s not the only one whose buttons are being pushed. I admit, I’m a bit obsessed with Lyser’s body. Every inch of him is so long and sleek and...well, hard. Taut muscles, smooth skin, heat. Seeing him like this, lusty and eager, is one of my favorite things.