by Viviene Noel
They looked at each other as Mahena readied herself to jump ship for land, and perhaps that feeling was deeper than she’d ever come to understand, perhaps it should simply be appreciated and accepted, not explained. So she did what she’d missed doing the most since she arrived here—she hugged him goodbye, saying as she pulled away, ‘I hope we meet again.’
49
Kingdom of Valàander, The Royal Castle of Vassalis.
‘Y our Highness.’
‘What, now?’ The bitterness of the last two weeks had sunk into her bones like a piece of rotten chocolate.
Idan stepped inside the throne room with a letter in his hand. He strode toward the throne
faster than usual, an urgency in his step.
Nepherym hated sitting upon her father’s damned chair. She would burn the piece of furniture if it wouldn’t create an uprising among her fragile citizens. Yet she had to suffer some time upon it every day for any query to be answered.
‘You received a letter from the high seas.’
Nepherym’s head tilted. ‘Pirates?’
Her two councilmen retreated into the corners of the room as Idan walked up the dais and handed the letter over to her.
Nepherym looked at the rough envelope, then at the seal. The heir frowned. ‘That is an… Ellenvil seal?’
What did the Fairy royals want with her people? They had turned their backs on mere mortals for longer than even her family had.
She squinted. ‘The slightly curved wing. I don’t recognise that.’
‘It is Morgane Ellenvil’s seal.’
‘The disowned heir? Tangled up in pirate business?’
‘It is said she has joined Rowan Mohanny.’
Nepherym’s head whipped up to her general. ‘The last descendant of the royal line?’
It was Idan’s turn to frown. ‘Where do you take that information from?’
The heir huffed a laugh. ‘I read a lot.’ She breathed out as she gingerly broke the seal. ‘It is quite reassuring, in a way, to learn the Black Spear has survived upon the turbulent waves of the last years.’
Idan let her read the letter. It was brief, to the point. As though the two Princesses had been long lasting friends.
Your Majesty,
I write to you with anguish, as I am presently the witness of a large and terrible fleet bearing the dark colours of Einar sailing to Sahra.
I keep feeling pulses of magic. Small, almost insignificant. Yet sufficient to get to me in my sleep.
I harbour the hope, after your impressive display of power two years ago, that you might still find an answer within the incredible knowledge of your people to put a stop to this war.
Morgane Ellenvil
Nepherym dropped the letter in her lap, looking at her general incredulously. ‘What am I meant to do with this? Why address a letter to me?’ She brushed her hair back. ‘Should she not be attempting to get her own people to fight? Why not write to her coward of a father instead? Hundreds of years of existence and he bowed to that monster like a little girl before a barking dog.’
She crumpled the letter in her fist and threw it on the floor.
Idan cleared his throat. ‘Are there coordinates?’
She sneered, ‘Of the ships sailing to raid the sinking dunes?’
The man tilted his head, his voice softening. ‘Are you feeling unwell?’
‘I have a writhing in my head that will never go away. An insufferable crone who wishes me dead refuses to aid me to save this gods abandoned world. I know my brother is alive somewhere being tortured every second of every moment. The people I rule tolerate me solely because I cast the last spell known to men. My general has been avoiding me for weeks. And now, apparently, even the daughter of a spineless butterfly believes I must save everyone. Shall I go on, Idan?’
When he choked on his own reply, the heir only waved him off. ‘Send in the next one. Get this awful day over with.’
50
Kingdom of Valàander, Forest of Vasharli.
Emmerentia looked warily at Mahena, half-dozing atop her mare as they entered yet another mass of grey trees—as if the lack of light had turned them into ash and mist. The silence of these woods was oppressing, smothering; eyes they could not see watching their every move. The heaviness of the air rasped along her throat, a taste of mold and rust. The shudder of the wind was a plea for help, for the release of a punishment upheld for too long. These emotions, they belonged to others. Yet, they hit straight through her core and melted into her own blood.
Mahena was affected far worse than either of them were, she could see it, could feel it—so badly she’d silently folded next to her the first night, dragging her arm around her waist to claim the few hours of sleep they allowed themselves to take. And had done so every night since.
Goruna. The word had been chanting at the back of her head, a low whisper she folded and shoved into the abyss of her subconscious—later, never.
‘This forest should be burnt to ashes and planted anew,’ she said, pushing aside a tree branch that almost poked her eye out.
Mahena whipped her head to her. ‘I wouldn’t say that, if I were you.’ Emmerentia gave her a side look. The girl murmured, her eyes constantly scanning the shadows, ‘They are here.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The murdered mages. Or at least, something is. We are not alone.’
The twins paused for a second.
She shuddered, then shrugged it off, clasping her horse’s mane for comfort. ‘Seriously, you can’t feel it? I feel like I have billions of eyes watching me from a distance, leeching off my energy.’
Emmerentia looked at her beneath lowered lashes. ‘I wondered why you were so quiet.’ An attempt at shifting her mind from her environment. But if she felt like admitting it, the twin felt it too. Probably differently, but eyes that felt disturbingly sentient.
Mahena stuck out her tongue.
Fàaran rolled his eyes, then added, ‘We are not sh...hostile. If your intuition is to be believed—’ Mahena’s jaw dropped at that ‘—then they will feel our energy and let us pass peacefully. With magic gone, they shouldn’t be able to take physical form.’
The girl turned to her. ‘I swear sometimes I understand why you hate magic.’
Mahena’s horse snorted softly. Emmerentia thanked the lords of all the plains for having bred and trained such incredible horses—still under all circumstances.
‘Do you think that’s it?’ Mahena asked. ‘The…spirits of dead mages sniffing at us?’
‘What do you mean?’
They had not mentioned a single word to each other about what Mayfair had said so convincingly. Not even glimpsed at the possibility of discussing it. She wouldn’t push for the talk until she settled with herself on what she could accept.
Mahena added, ‘Like the air is being contained to a minimum. As if more than just us were sharing it.’
Emmerentia frowned—she felt an overwhelming, disturbing presence, but didn’t struggle for breath.
Mahena rolled and cracked her neck. She rested the reins on the saddle and applied the same fate to her knuckles. ‘Don’t look at me like I am a nut head.’
Fàaran chuckled. Or something that came close.
‘I am trying to explain, and your perpetual inquisition isn’t helping sorting it out.’ Mahena removed a branch. They entered an extremely bushy pathway that required them to unsaddle to pass through. ‘What did I say that got a sort of positive human reaction out of you?’
Fàaran turned to her, his shoulders dropping slightly, and his lips spread. A second passed, his eyes timidly sparkling when he burst out laughing.
And laughed, and laughed, and laughed.
Mahena shot her an incredulous look, and even she fell short of answers. But then it got to her—and the burbling of laughte
r breached her lips. Fàaran was now bent in two in the middle of the dirt road, his hands on his knees, and she felt as though a veil of tension lifted.
‘Those Earthen terms of yours,’ he finally grunted from between two breaths, wiping a tear off his face, ‘why would a nut be associated with insanity?’
Mahena watched him warily. ‘Etymology—which is the study of the origin of words—isn’t something I gave my attention to.’ She patted him on the shoulder. ‘Glad to know you are human after all.’
Emmerentia teased, ‘You’re not the first one to doubt it.’
Mahena pressed her two hands against her chest in a dramatic gesture. ‘I would never dare think that!’ She put two fingers up. ‘Scouts honour.’
Emmerentia muffled another laugh.
Fàaran threw his hands in the air in resignation and abdication.
They had spent the last days in near silence, attentive to any sound, any movement, any gush of wind, and as brief as this moment had been, it warmed Emmerentia’s soul—as any moment of normality, of humanity, did for all of them, she thought.
Suddenly, her brother abruptly lifted his hand. The urgency had her yanking the leads back. Mahena did the same and she felt her go rigid.
He pointed to a cluster of bushes ahead of them. Without a sound, she leaned cautiously to the side—a spindly leg. Shit. Emmerentia glanced back at Mahena, her face pallid. The horses remained completely still, luckily. They held their breath as they all frantically scanned the path ahead of them. The leg wiggled, as though tempted to move forward. She strained for the clickety-clack of pincers but nothing answered her.
Fàaran looked behind them, and she wondered whether he thought of retreating. She saw no other hairy legged forms around them. It couldn’t be this easy. The hair on her neck rose, a chill so imperceptible she almost shrugged it off. Then she felt the wet patch on her shoulder. Before she could register, before she could even think, a shriek resonated in the density of the woods; a muffled thump echoed it—the ground rattled slightly.
Emmerentia whipped her head to where a spider the size of her laid dead, two arrows through her head and abdomen.
Fàaran released a steady breath as he knocked another arrow—she had even forgotten he travelled with it. Mahena’s face was strained with painfully controlled panic, her eyes kept steady on where they had seen the first spider leg.
She yelped, pointing towards it, ‘I can’t see the leg...do you think it’s gone?’ Her brother’s eyes were scanning skyward for the nest, then he launched forward with only an indication of his hand, his bow still drawn.
They cantered out of the masses of trees and Emmerentia brushed off the cobwebs she’d been thrust into by Mahena, the girl’s face a land of barely restrained fear—she wanted to scream, that much was clear.
Mayfair had given them a tonic to repel insects and maybe it had helped until now, but...the twin shrugged off the crawling sensation spidering down her back.
‘At least we know you haven’t lost your aim,’ she muttered to her twin, half-annoyed she hadn’t noticed the crawler herself. She nudged her mare toward Mahena, stopping at arm’s-length. She squeezed her hand. ‘You look half-way to death.’
The girl answered with a panting breath, her eyes widening and scanning the world around them as though she had only understood now that danger crawled around them. When she realised she wouldn’t calm down, Emmerentia handed her the satchel where she kept their spare clothes. ‘Bite into it and scream.’ It was the best she could offer, they would not get far with her in that state of panic.
Mahena shoved the bag between her teeth, closed her mouth and let go. They barely heard her, but the twin felt the terror ooze out.
As they stepped out into a bigger path, Fàaran looked around, and ahead, and whistled low. ‘The path seems to be clear enough, we should pick up the pace.’
They kept the pace up for a few hours, lucky enough to encounter only owling birds and no screeching crawlers, silence their everlasting companion.
B
Fàaran picked up Demeera’s scent as soon as they stepped into the forest—ash, and rose, and strength. This forest had been designed as a trap, and he had to maintain his focus on the sinuous paths ahead, on the treacherous bushes and thorns, on the insects and crawlers that would poison them dead. He didn’t even want to know how Mayfair, the alpha, pulled a perfectly well mapped route to the castle.
From the second they entered the natural fortress, their breathing had been the only noise tempering its stillness. A town of wolves. He still failed to understand how Lorna could have sent them—sent Emmerentia—through a town full of howlers. But he knew how much his sister meant to the bartender, and that was why he had trusted her with it.
A flash of red hair and glinting horns.
Fàaran shook his head. He had learned now the differences between when he summoned her face to his mind and when it came from proximity. But this place…this place was a festering of wrong—of malice, evil, trapping.
He turned his head to where his sister and Mahena had started whispering. A whiff of wind brushed past them as the latter lifted her hand to move leaves away—
‘Oh, gods!’ she gasped, her nose wrenching. ‘The stench!’
Emmerentia hissed a dramatic laugh. ‘The Princess needs a bath?’
‘Please! And you need one, too.’
Fàaran sniffed at himself, too. ‘I know I need one.’
Mahena puffed, ‘Who knew all you needed to be funny was a morbid forest?’
Emmerentia piped up from behind. ‘Careful what you ask for, his sense of humour is of the most peculiar vein.’
Mahena shifted and turned in her saddle. ‘You mean like cream pie in the face?’
‘Don't give her any ideas,’ Fàaran interjected.
‘I mean like very laddy.’
Mahena blinked. Then smiled and cocked her head. ‘Lad is a word in this place?’
The twin nodded dubiously.
‘I can’t believe he,’ Mahena pointed to him, ‘could ever be called such. He barely ever talks!’
‘Life is a funny thing,’ Fàaran muttered against the wind.
They continued, yet he drifted away. Somehow, in his longing soul, he hoped the Shadow would find him again.
~~~ B
After many whiles, the mud road narrowed into a narrow passageway ensconced in between two hills—a vile, rancid breeze sweeping through. The darkness sang to that thing inside her, and it danced with glee in return.
Why, in all bloody hells, was she not afraid of being in this place? It had been days of threading through a deadly atmosphere, yet her heart had not once raced, not once skipped a beat. It was pain and draining and malice she felt, but never fear—except for the spiders.
She’d told Emmerentia about the little voice to an extent. Several times now, when sleep had been folding its wings around her battered mind and she laid a breath away from the woman, she’d almost confessed to the full of it. Yet as it stood, perhaps it was simply...her. However little belief she put behind that thought, however uncharacteristic, perhaps that’s all it was...her. The her she did not remember.
The her that had been stolen.
Stolen memories. It sounded so foreign, when she allowed herself to dwell on the idea. So insane and unbelievable. Mahena snorted. How could she even think of that word? Unbelievable... She had just met werewolves, gods be damned.
A few paces into the narrow path, a strong gush of wind pushed past them—Farsè’s ears straightened. Mahena tightened the leads and patted her neck. She gazed up but couldn’t distinguish anything around them. She looked over her shoulder at Emmerentia, who replied to her silent question by placing a finger on her lips.
So, there was something. At last, they could feel it. But where? They were enclosed by two massive piles of mud, with nothing growing on them, a
s if the soil that hardened to create them was toxic. Her pendant pulsed. Mahena clenched her hand around it, the warmth transmitting to her arm, filling her up with energy.
Mahena took the leads in her left hand, and slid her right against the formed wall. Her fingers connected to it, a vicious energy responding to her presence. It bolted to her like lightning. It was dark, starved and ready for a dance.
She froze.
It was loud, and it was coming for her, like a dark creature creeping in the shadows that only she could hear. She was blind in that reality. Blind and lost, with only her intuition to go on. She had to keep going, wherever the path led to. But then she wasn’t alone anymore. It smelled like dark fruits, a perfume so distinct in the darkness she could almost run to it. It carried her with it, as a tone to balance the horror on its way to destroy her. She let herself be guided, abandoned her fears as food for the creature, and accepted the help of the wind.
Her pendant screamed.
The monster, the spirit in the hill, pinned her with ravenous eyes as she froze entirely in her saddle.
‘Mahena, what’s happening?’ Emmerentia asked through clenched teeth.
But Mahena could only stare and stare at the form yapping and barking and snarling in the expanse of dirt with minds of blood. The little voice baulked inside of her, wary and furious—forbidding her to succumb to terror. Then it kicked her into action as the beast launched itself in a race for the dead.
‘Go!’ Mahena yelled. She yanked her hand back. ‘Now, get out of here!’
The training in Fàaran and the underlying desperation in her voice must have taken over as he drove his heels into Fàrak without questioning.
‘Faster, faster!’ Mahena was going to drop dead if her heart did not slow down. But the beast was on their heels and if it got to them...
They pushed the horses faster than they ever had. The thing in the passage was excited, famished, and chasing them—a malicious, vicious, perverted desire tangled up in all its hunger. She would not give it a second to get closer. The young woman focused on the tunnel, on getting out of it, on encouraging Farsè to run faster.
