Misrule, page 21
This is worse than I could have imagined.
“She forced me to lie,” Rose rasps. She’s weeping, making insufferable little sniffling noises. “You’ve seen what the necklace would do if I dared speak out. There are more Graces in the dungeon. We’ve been there for decades. They call it the Garden, the twisted beasts.”
The Goblins snarl at the insult, closing in. Malakar makes no move to intervene. The Vila take up their battle cry. The Imps flip from one perch to the next, tails thrashing. Some of the Demons dissolve into their shadow forms and slink like wraiths along the ceiling.
Aurora ignores the brewing danger. “There are other Graces? Imprisoned? What else has she forbidden you from telling me?”
So quick I almost miss it, Rose flashes a smirk in my direction. And then it hits me—she has been plotting. And the Garden is not the only secret she intends to expose.
Panic reaches its fingers through my veins. “Aurora—”
“It’s your sleeping curse,” Rose speaks over me, climbing the blood-slick steps on her hands and knees. “I was there the night Laurel and Endlewild softened it. Anyone could have woken you. Anyone but Malyce. All they had to do was kiss you.”
Beneath the sounds of jostling Imps and the mutterings of the Goblins, a dull ringing starts in my ears. I should do something. Say something. But all I can do is stare. A storm of emotion crosses Aurora’s face.
“You knew?” The question is low, but it smacks like thunder. “You knew how to wake me and you let me sleep? For a hundred years?”
“It’s not that simple,” I croak out.
She throws up her hands. “It never is with you.”
“I tried everything to wake you!”
“Except, apparently, the one thing you knew would work.”
“I thought you would forget about me. I couldn’t let that happen.”
“All this time I’ve been wracking my brain, trying to determine why Derek’s kiss broke the curse. You knew all along, and you lied about it. And you’re asking me for a fresh start?” Aurora’s chest rises and falls in short bursts. “You could have woken me every day for a hundred years. But you wouldn’t because you didn’t trust that our love was strong enough to withstand any curse. Because you couldn’t bear to see me with anyone else, even for an instant.”
I open my mouth to argue back, then realize that an unnatural stillness has settled over the court. The chamber hums with it.
Torin is the first to speak. Her gown is fashioned out of what looks to be huge moth wings and a matching cape flutters in the draft. “Did she say your love?”
Curse everything to the bottom of the sea and back. Imps begin to chitter. The Vila murmur to one another, foreheads creased beneath their bone spikes.
“You were in love?” Malakar’s ears lay flat between his horns. “With a member of the family who allied with the light Fae and destroyed Malterre?”
Aurora is glaring at me, expectant. But my lips refuse to work. My pulse thumps out a terrified rhythm. And, most of all, I’m painfully confused. The court was warming to Aurora, more so than I ever could have expected. They agreed to throw her this party. I thought—
That is not the same as their mistress being in love, Mortania supplies. She will always be a symbol of those who sent you into exile. They will never truly accept her.
Truly.
“It was not real,” Aelfdene’s sinister words echo in my mind. And this time I cannot convince myself in the least that he was wrong.
Tears threaten and I blink them back. Aurora waits with her arms folded, and I can practically see the line drawing between us. Carving itself into the marble stone of the dais. The court or her? But I cannot turn my back on this—on them.
I force steel into my spine. “The princess is sorely mistaken. We were friends, nothing more. Anything else would have been impossible.”
For one horrible, endless moment, pain flares bright in Aurora’s amethyst eyes. It spears through me as well, poison-tipped.
She plucks the ring from my grip and hurls it at me. It pings off my bodice and clatters against the marble, the sound like all of my ludicrous hopes shattering. And then she turns and bolts from the dais, the gems on her gown winking in the candlelight.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
My first thought after Aurora leaves is that Rose must be dealt with. But the traitorous Grace slithered away like the snake she is. Her necklace shines in a pool of her golden blood, so she’s free to run wherever she likes. She cannot get far, though. And I dispatch a few Imps to ferret her out.
If the rest of the court is upset at Aurora’s rejection, they instantly forget it. The party returns to its riotous glory. I should be dancing with Aurora. Lighting the candles on her cake and teasing her about what her wish might be. Instead, one of the Imps somersaults from a chandelier and lands on the top tier of that cake. Frosting and sponge go flying, and everyone cheers. And it pains me more than I can say that they’ve so easily dismissed her. Mortania was correct. They could never love her. She was only ever a novelty.
Before anyone can speak to me, I stalk down the dais steps and fight my way through the press of bodies, into the cool of the night air.
* * *
—
In the garden, my enchanted candles are still glowing in their nooks. Shafts of moonlight manage to battle through the clouds and reflect off the jeweled flowers. Indignation pounds through my veins. Aurora would have chosen us tonight if Rose hadn’t interrupted. When I find that wretched Grace I will…
A faint crunch of gravel reaches me through the other night sounds. And then a voice. I Shift my hearing to distinguish it. Derek’s. And he isn’t alone.
“How could she do that to me?” Aurora is more furious than I’ve ever heard her. I melt into the nearest shadowy space, detesting Derek more than ever. She chose him as a confidant? “Did she think I’d never find out that she let me sleep in a cage for a hundred years while she did…this?”
This. Aurora had been enthralled with the garden when I presented it. But now it’s an ugly, monstrous thing.
You do not need her, pet.
“You’ve a right to be upset, but it didn’t sound to me as though Nimara lied to harm you. Not on purpose.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Aurora shoots back, exasperated. “I don’t know her anymore. The Alyce from before was kind, underneath everything. They treated her so cruelly—the Graces, the Etherians, my own father. And I believed this whole time that she was still there, somewhere. But now, her brutality. Her…malice. I do not…”
Outraged tears prick against my eyelids. I dig my nails into the flesh of my palms to keep them back.
Derek moves closer to her. “You cannot stay here.”
“This is my home. My realm.” She hugs her arms to her body. “I won’t abandon the humans who have survived so far. You saw how they were at the funeral. They need me.”
“But the Fae envoy said your alliance with the Etherians was intact. Think of the protection the High King could provide if you escaped.”
The cry of a raven drifts from the ballroom.
“It’s my decision. The Etherians are devious, despite their light magic.”
“But what else can you do?” Derek strangles his hat in his hands. “You can’t just—”
“Whatever I’m thinking is none of your concern. I will not be managed or manipulated.”
A wind bullies through the garden and rattles the branches.
“Forgive me, I did not mean—”
“You did,” she cuts him off. Not rudely, but with a finality that gives me immense satisfaction. “I explained to you about my suitors and my father. Every man in my life has thought me an object for their pleasure or amusement or power. I did not wake from a century’s sleep to succumb to the whims of another.”
Gravel scuffs. “I want to help you, though.”
“I know you do.” Her tone gentles. “And I’m grateful for your friendship.”
Why couldn’t he have drowned with the rest of his crew?
“I just…you call this land your home, but look at it. Nothing grows. There’s no trade. Is it worth holding on when there’s so little hope?”
“There’s always hope.” Green light lends a halo around her body. “And just because something is at its worst doesn’t mean you should abandon it.”
A chill runs down my spine. Does she mean that Briar is at its worst? Or me?
“Will you let them tear you apart, as I’ve seen them do to their prisoners?” He waves his swan hat toward the ballroom windows. “They cheered you when you snubbed the Etherian envoy, but you’ve drawn a line, Aurora. And you’re on the wrong side of it.”
“What would you suggest I do?” She wanders down the path. The garden flowers emit their strange music. “Run away on your ship—the planks of wood scattered on the seabed?”
Derek pauses and seems to debate his reply. “There’s something I’ve wanted to tell you, but I never had the chance with your keepers about.”
I sharpen my hearing and dare a half-step closer.
He twists the swan hat. A feather molts from its wing and floats away. “When I told you about my home—”
A beating splits the night, and a shadow swoops over the garden. Derek spins around and pushes Aurora behind him. But he has no weapon, absolutely nothing to defend them. And he will need it.
An Etherian rider treads the air above them.
In half a heartbeat, I’m leaping out of my hiding place. My bones crack as wings peel themselves from my spine. A wicked-tipped tail whips out behind me. Fingernails elongate into claws. I have never Shifted this abruptly, and I’m dizzy with it. Disoriented as my wings vault me into the air and the world shrinks below me.
The Fae warrior is not expecting me. His mount rears and whinnies in panic, but he regains his seat as I summon a bit of my enchanted fire from the garden and hurl it at him. The shot misses, careening over Briar in a green crackling ball.
Gilded shields spring up around him just before my next attack makes contact. It deflects, and stone explodes where my power connects with the wall of the palace. Half of a second-story balcony plummets toward the garden. Derek knocks Aurora out of the way just before the massive thing flattens a tree. One of the hollow black limbs is cleaved from the trunk and cartwheels into Derek’s shoulder. He staggers to his knees. Rage gallops through my blood. That could have been Aurora.
Destroy him.
In two wingbeats, I am high above the Etherian. If my Vila magic will not touch him, I shall have to try another tactic. I tuck in my wings and dive, knowing I have only seconds before his shields reappear. The wind whistles in my ears. A blast of gold—his shields or his magic, I cannot tell—blinds me. But I am just fast enough. I slam into the Etherian’s side, raking my claws across his body. The mount screams, flailing, and the Etherian tips off the saddle and plunges to the ground.
The commotion has called the others from the ballroom. The court spills into the garden, and the Etherian hits the ground with a sickening crunch. Miraculously, the fall doesn’t kill him, and neither have the wounds my claws inflicted. His steed lands next to him, bucking and stomping its hooves in a futile attempt to protect its master. Demons are upon both in an instant, seizing the Fae’s staff and binding him with ropes soaked in blight elixir. The mount is penned in by a ring of Goblins.
I Shift back to my natural form as soon as my heels touch the gravel, the short-lived battle fizzing in my veins. Derek is moaning and clutching his arm. And Aurora—
“You were spying on me. Again.”
* * *
—
The tide of adrenaline in my blood begins to ebb. Night air kisses the bare skin exposed by the ripped fabric in the back of my gown. Someone drapes a cloak around my shoulders, but I feel nothing of its warmth. The betrayal in Aurora’s expression, the same look she wore in the throne room barely an hour ago, is bone-deep.
Several Imps surround Derek and begin tending his injuries. They’ve removed his jacket, and the shoulder of his shirt is slick garnet. He cries out as they prod at the wound, and I hope they make it worse.
“Another lone rider.” Malakar kicks the Fae warrior. Golden blood seeps from where my claws shredded his skin. “Where are the others, beast? Waiting for your signal? Come to tear our palace down?”
“The damage wasn’t his,” I say. “He didn’t attack, the same as the battalion that brought the Shifters.”
Torin points. “Look at his uniform.”
Those nearest the Etherian begin to mutter. The jacket he wears seems to be fashioned out of a latticework of gnarled roots and knobby antlers. Twin horns spiral up from his shoulders and curve behind his back. The orb and laurel leaf sigil of the High Court is displayed on his chest, but this version differs slightly. Within that iridescent orb are two crossed arrows. The Fae symbol of the Hunt.
And that is why this creature’s shields were strong enough to withstand my magic. Oryn’s Hunt is comprised of the most vicious and feared of the High King’s warriors, and the shock of seeing him here snuffs out all thoughts of the disastrous party.
“A member of the Hunt.” I grant him a mocking bow. Mortania’s loamy presence unspools through my limbs. “To what do we owe the honor? You’re not under the protection of a rowan wreath. Has Oryn dispatched you on some clandestine mission?”
The Fae rider glowers in answer.
Valmar’s tail flicks. “Maybe the piss-eyed king decided to take the princess whether she wants to go or not.”
“If I desired the princess, she would be halfway to the High Court by now.” The Etherian’s accent is so much like Endlewild’s—dry leaves rustling in a wind—that I startle. He resembles the Fae ambassador as well, with skin like the bark of an oak tree. Windswept, reedlike hair is tied back at his nape. A faint pattern of rust-colored moss covers one side of his angular face.
Regan jerks at the rope. Blood drips from beneath the prisoner’s jacket and stains the gravel. “That must mean that you desired to be captured.”
He only grins one of those unnerving Fae grins.
“What is your name?”
“Larkspur,” he replies, but it’s obviously not his true name.
“And you will not tell us your purpose?” I ask. “If you insist on being obstinate, we will only take you to our dungeons, where your Fae magic will drain out of you, drop by golden drop.”
“You think I can be broken?” He sneers. “I am of the Hunt, half-breed.”
Regan and the other Vila hiss, and my anger rises in stride with theirs. I gesture for Malakar to hand me Larkspur’s staff, and let my fingertips play over the curves of the orb, where the Fae’s gilt magic swirls in a tempest.
Larkspur flinches.
“Perhaps you will not go to the dungeons at all and will meet your end right here.” I let my power tap lazily against the enchanted glass. “Or…you could swear to us. A warrior like yourself would be granted a place of honor in the Dark Court.”
Sweat beads across Larkspur’s brow and tracks down his high cheekbones. Blood weeps from the gashes on his torso. “There is no honor in tainting my blood.”
Tainting. Mortania thrashes in the place where my magic lives, and I run one fingernail along the orb. Larkspur’s back hunches.
But then a flicker of movement catches my attention. Aurora has pushed her way forward. She shakes her head once. And I can almost hear her telling me to relent. “Be the Alyce from before,” as she was saying to Derek.
But I have no interest in who that Alyce was, weak and ineffective. And I press my magic harder against the enchanted orb of the glass. Mortania whirls, urging me on.
“If this glass breaks, it will destroy both you and your magic. Even if you Marked a successor, it will not matter. Every piece of you will perish here. In the Dark Court.”
A mix of rage and terror shines in his gilt eyes. It must be a rare sight to glimpse in a member of the Hunt. I drink it in, inhaling the scents of damp earth and charred steel.
“Tell me why you’ve come,” I try again.
His mouth moves, but he doesn’t answer my question. Instead, his attention travels to something over my shoulder.
“Theodoric. I summon you forth. Return from whence you came.”
Confusion loosens my grip. “Theo—”
There’s a clamor of bodies being toppled. Everyone is moving at once. The Fae rider’s mount rears and whinnies, dispersing the Goblins with the thudding of its enormous hooves.
Seemingly out of thin air, Derek—Derek—vaults into the saddle and kicks the steed into the air. The Goblins bellow and hurl their tooth-studded clubs at him, but golden protections spring up immediately, blocking their assault. How is he managing that? He zigzags across the garden, keeping low.
“Aurora! Come with me!” Derek unfastens a rope from the saddle. “I’ll pull you up!”
“Land!” I yell at him. “This instant—I command it!”
He should be yanked off the beast in the same manner as he was tossed across the library when he broke Aurora’s curse. But nothing happens. Above us, Demon sentries nock their bows and fire. Others transform into their shadow forms and wend around Derek in their horrifying shapes. Any attempt to touch him slides away like rivulets of water. And my mind spins with the impossibility of this situation.
Aurora gapes at the scene before her, but she doesn’t move. “I won’t. I’m sorry.”
“Please,” Derek implores. “We must go now!”
“Get down from there!” I scream. Mortania’s presence pounds like a drumbeat.
He doesn’t even look at me.
Aurora backs away. “This is my home.”
Derek’s expression falters, but he does not repeat the request. He digs his heels into the steed’s sides and starts to turn away.
