Queen's Gambit

by Karen Chance

  And then I saw her blue-gray eyes, almost lost in folds of wrinkles. The eyes were the same, I thought, staring upwards. Nothing else was, but the eyes . . .

  “Yes, it’s me,” Nimue said testily. “I know. I know. Not what you expected, hm?”

  She dropped her burden, which turned out to be Ray. The many arrows were gone, but, alarmingly, the wounds were still open, splitting his flesh in terrible ways. He wasn’t dead; he hadn’t dusted away. But he was close.

  “Removed the arrows,” Nimue panted, squatting down beside him. “Didn’t know what else to do. Don’t have experience with these things.”

  She poked him.

  “He needs blood,” I croaked, wondering how much I had left.

  Not enough.

  But then a miracle happened, something that had me gasping in surprise and gratitude: she threw our three blood bags onto the stone. I managed to get a hand underneath me and reached for one. I tore it open with my teeth, and yes! It remained fresh.

  “The waters still bring me things,” she said, by way of explanation.

  I did not know what she meant by that, nor did I did question it. I focused on crawling over to Ray, before Nimue made a disgusted sound. “Some god-killer you are,” she said nonsensically, and took the bag away.

  She was no longer wearing seafoam, I noticed, but dirty, tattered robes of what might once have been silk. It was no longer possible to tell, as it looked like she had been wearing them for a while. But I doubted that Ray cared right now.

  She dragged his head into her lap and looked at me expectantly.

  “He needs—you just have to feed it to him,” I panted.

  She made a disgusted face, but did the job matter-of-factly enough, pulling his mouth open and drizzling a little of the blood inside.

  “You must make him swallow it,” I added, as most of it dribbled back out again.

  “Oh, must I?” she replied testily.

  “I’m sorry. I just . . . I meant—”

  “Stop tearing up, girl. I’ll make the creature drink. Here, take this.”

  She shoved a dirty vial into my hand, which I ignored. I needed to make sure that she did this properly. We had no blood to waste. She had to—

  “Drink it, or he gets nothing,” she told me flatly.

  I drank.

  It tasted vile, as most potions do, but I barely noticed. She made me upend the container to show that I’d finished it, then she started feeding Ray again, massaging his throat as I had once done to make sure that he ingested it all. Three bags later, his body had started to close some of the wounds, but he was still deathly pale and out cold, likely in a healing trance.

  I relaxed back against the stone, feeling dizzy. I did not understand why, unless it was because of the potion Nimue had given me. I watched her through bleary eyes, as she less-than-gently pushed Ray back onto the floor.

  Then, to my surprise, she lay back, too, obviously exhausted.

  For a while, there was silence.

  I was not sleepy, but I was so tired that the ceiling of the cave seemed to spin above me. I wondered if it would be the last thing I ever saw. Strangely, that thought did not fill me with the alarm I would have expected, but with a sense of wonder. I had seen so much, experienced so much, and in such a short time. I was greedy for more, and yet, it was enough. I was content.

  Except for one thing.

  “Please,” I finally said. “If I die here, can you get my companion to a portal? He has family on Earth; they will find him—”

  “You’re not going to die,” Nimue said, sounding annoyed. “Or else, what has this all been about? No, no. You don’t get to die.”

  “I don’t think . . . we have much choice there. I do not know what is wrong with me—”

  She laughed, and it sounded genuine. It also went on for a very long time. It went on, in fact, until I began to worry for her. She had sat up slightly as we spoke, but now she lay back down and cackled at the ceiling.

  “Do not know what is wrong,” she finally gasped.

  “I do not, unless the potion you gave me . . .”

  “That was a healing potion, girl, and I went to a lot of trouble to get it. Hope it works, but with your strange composition, who knows? At the very least, it isn’t hurting you.”

  “And yet, I feel like I might die,” I said truthfully. “Hollowed out and . . . strange. Weak—”

  “Of course, you’re weak! You just summoned half the fauna in this part of Faerie to your aid! You’re lucky it didn’t kill you. But it didn’t. You should be fine with some rest.”

  “Then . . .why did you bring me here?” I asked, but didn’t get an answer to that.

  Because someone else was coming, a lilting voice that echoed through the caves, as if singing. It was a woman’s voice, and hauntingly beautiful, but Nimue did not seem to find it so. She jerked upright, into a full sitting position, then used her walking stick to help her back to her feet.

  “What is it?” I asked, only to have her round on me.

  “Be silent, girl!”

  “Oh, let her speak,” the lilting voice said. “It’s not as if I don’t know where you are. Nimue, daughter of the oceans, queen of the tides, leader of a people now scattered and broken . . . like herself.”

  The voice grew louder, which was a concern, as it was definitely getting closer. But Nimue’s actions were more of one. She looked around frantically, stared at me for a moment, shook her head and raised her staff, lantern and all, sending flashes of light jumping about the cave.

  I did not know what she was doing, but a moment later, a familiar sight came speeding this way—for an instant. Until it was stopped by a too-narrow gap in the walls, where it hung up. I stared at it, and at the little rocks tumbling around the edges of it, as it tried to push its way through. For a moment, I once again thought I was seeing things.

  But no.

  It was the little capsule.

  I knew it was the same one, because I could see dark impact marks on it from the Svarestri weapons. The blue lights were also flooding the cave, spilling brilliant color onto the uneven floor and craggy walls. And onto Nimue’s face as she uttered something that sounded like a curse.

  “Should have left them outside, but you were afraid I’d find you, weren’t you?” the lilting voice asked. It laughed. “How ironic.”

  Nimue cursed again, and the little capsule increased its efforts, judging by the amount of rocks suddenly hitting and then scattering over the floor. I couldn’t hear anything that sounded like an engine, but if I could, it would have been racing. I could hear the walls begin to crack—

  And then the capsule suddenly went dark.

  “You forget, cousin,” the woman’s voice said. “I, too, can use our discarded toys. And, at present, I believe I am a little stronger than you.”

  I reached out, trying to add whatever strength I had to Nimue’s, but she shot me a look over her shoulder and shook her head. “Save your strength, girl. You’ll need it.”

  “Yes, do save it,” the other voice said. “I don’t want you any more beaten up than you already are.”

  “And whose fault was that?” Nimue demanded.

  The voice laughed. “Yes, I admit it. Although, those were not my orders. The idiots were instructed merely to find her and alert me to her location. I was meant to do the retrieval.”

  “But you trusted them to do it, and now, what are you left with?”

  “Enough.”

  There was an entrance at the opposite end of the cave that I hadn’t seen, because it was hidden in shadow. But a pale, white light began to flicker against the walls of it as I watched. It was merely a dim haze at the moment, but getting brighter.

  “Come, cousin,” the woman’s voice came again. “Let us not quarrel. I know what he did to you, how you’ve suffered. I will avenge you; this much I swear. After all, we both want the same thing.”

  The doorway suddenly flashed with silver fire, so brightly that I had to shield my eye
s once more.

  And when I looked again, a woman stood there.

  A woman I knew.

  She looked little different than the last time I had seen her. Long, golden blonde hair rippled almost down to her feet, unbound and beautiful. Her face was sweet, charming and as pale as the moon. Her dress was ludicrously fine for such a venue, with a pure white under gown in gossamer silk, and a silver overtunic of the same length, round necked and loose fitting, and made entirely of embroidery in a loose weave that showed the silk through the gaps.

  Efridis. I felt my lips form the word, the name of Aeslinn’s dead queen, but no sound came out. She was haloed by a wash of silvery light so bright that, for a moment, I thought that perhaps I was looking at a ghost. But then she stepped forward, dragging the trailing hem of her gown through a muddy puddle of water, and I frowned.

  Ghosts did not get dirty. But if she was not a ghost, what was she? I had seen her die.

  She came another few steps closer, but then stopped. “We both want Aeslinn dead,” she said simply.

  Nimue, who had been so agitated a moment ago, was suddenly calm. And more regal than I had seen her since that moment on the river. Filthy rags, lined face, frazzled hair and all, yet she was every inch a queen.

  “Yes, we both want that,” she said, her lips quirking slightly. “But tell me, cousin,” and in her mouth, that simple word was obscene. “Will you give me back my ravaged soul, once you kill him? Will you return my power to me?”

  Efridis laughed. “I am afraid it does not work that way.”

  “No, I don’t suppose so. You’d put yourself in his place, wouldn’t you? That’s what you’ve always wanted—”

  “What I deserve!” Efridis’ eyes flashed silver fire. “My brother now rules two kingdoms; I have yet to hold one. Yet my abilities are as great as his.”

  “Not quite as great,” Nimue said, “or you’d have defeated your husband ere this.”

  “You know why I did not—why I could not!”

  “Yes, and now you would emulate him. Do you think it will not change you? Do you think you will not end up just like him?”

  “I am nothing like him!”

  “Not yet.” And once again, Nimue changed. From imperious queen to something kinder, gentler, almost motherly. “You can still choose. He is too far gone in his delusion, but you . . . there is hope for you.”

  “What hope do you think there is?” Efridis strode back and forth, until the trailing hem of her lovely gown was almost black. “For me to slink home to my brother, beg his forgiveness, end my days in seclusion at court, shunned by all, paying for my sins? All hope of power—gone, glory—gone, renown—”

  “Hope that you won’t end up like me!” Nimue cut in, spreading her arms. “Look at me! See what I have become. You think it is because of what was stolen from me, what your husband did?” She shook her head. “No. I would like to think so, but years alone have forced me to face the truth, a truth I would not have you bear.”

  “And what truth is that?” Efridis asked, impatiently.

  “That something ate my soul long before your husband came to take it. I was like you once; I wanted all the things you mention, not just for me, but for my people as well. I told myself that every compromise I made, every little cut I took to my honor, would all be worth it, someday . . .

  “But instead, one compromise became a hundred, one cut a thousand. Until I knew nothing but compromise and my honor was in tatters. I hurt so many, telling myself that it was needful, asking myself what would happen otherwise to all those who depended on me, all those eyes constantly looking to me?”

  “They would have died,” Efridis said bluntly. “Some of them, possibly all of them—”

  “And perhaps that would have been better. Look at them now. Enslaving thousands, butchering millions—”

  Efridis rolled her eyes. “Of dark fey. Those abominations—”

  “And we’re so much better? What Aeslinn did, in order to beat me; what you’ll do, in order to beat him.” Nimue suddenly looked at me, and her eyes were sorrowful. “What you’ll do to her.”

  Efridis suddenly laughed, a startled, genuinely amused sound. “Look at this,” she said, her voice marveling. “Look at this. I wish someone were here with me to see it, truly I do. The great Nimue, feared guardian of her people, the ruthless one, the vindictive one, the strong—”

  “Those things didn’t make me strong, any more than they will you,” Nimue said, sitting on a rock.

  “Oh, but you’re wrong. There was a time I couldn’t have touched you, a time when even Aeslinn feared you. And look at you now. Old, broken, weak, mewling over some abomination—”

  “An abomination you would absorb into yourself.” I made a small sound, and Nimue looked at me again. “Yes, child. That is what she plans for you.”

  “Enough of thissssssssssssss—” Efridis’ voice began normally, then trailed off, yet it didn’t stop. The last syllable was stretched into seeming infinity, something that . . . was a great deal more disturbing than I would have expected.

  “I cannot hold her for long,” Nimue said. “But you must know what she has planned for you—”

  “I don’t understand,” I whispered, frightened and confused.

  “I know that you don’t! Something that will not change if you do not listen!”

  I nodded, and bit my lip to stay silent.

  “That device that broke you apart from your more human half?” Nimue said. “That is what she’ll use to weld your soul to what remains of her own.”

  “What . . . remains?”

  “She has already split her soul, with the same device she used on you, shaving off a small piece of it to take solid form—”

  “How?”

  “Our souls are not like human’s. They cannot exist separately from a body, to which they are fundamentally joined. Humans leave ghosts; we do not, as soul and body are one. Shaving off a piece of our soul, therefore, regenerates a body. Thus allowing Efridis to die ostentatiously on your world, yet still live here.”

  “But . . . why?”

  “She wanted everyone to believe that she was dead, so that her brother, Caedmon, would not search for her. She had kidnapped and tried to kill him, hoping that her son could take his throne and that she could use her brother’s armies against Aeslinn. She hates and fears her husband—she told you that true enough—and with Caedmon’s forces at her back, she would have a chance to destroy him.

  “But her attempt to take his throne failed, and she knew he would be hunting her. She therefore staged her death, gambling that, as distracted by the current war as he was, he might accept that story for the moment, leaving her time to do this.”

  “And what is this?” I asked, my head spinning. I did not know if Nimue was telling this badly, or if I was simply too tired to take it in. But I did not understand anything! Something she seemed to realize.

  “Calm down, girl, and I’ll explain. I forget: things that are common knowledge to us are unknown on your world. I—” She cut off abruptly, and her hand clutched her abdomen for a moment.

  “Is something wrong?” I asked, putting a hand on her arm.

  “Of course, something’s wrong!” The blue-gray eyes glared up at me. “I’m dying.”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Dorina, Faerie

  “Dying?” That did not make sense to me. How could such a being die? But then, how could such a being age, and in such ways?

  I remembered the amazing creature I had seen on the river, and for some reason, I felt like weeping.

  “Save your tears; you’ll need them for yourself,” Nimue said. “What Aeslinn did to me, his bitch of a wife wants to do to you.”

  “What did he do?”

  She thought about it for a moment, as if trying to come up with words that I would understand. “The gods were energy beings,” she finally said. “They battled other species and absorbed their energy into their own. What the old legends often forget to mention is that
they didn’t merely do it to outsiders, demon lords and such. But that they cannibalized each other, as well.”

  “They . . . cannibalized . . .”

  “In war, when a god was overcome, he could expect to have his essence torn apart and absorbed by the victor. Energy was too precious to waste, it was thought, and they could often absorb another’s abilities along with their essence, thereby making themselves stronger.

  “But when they came here, to Faerie, and began to experiment with our people, they discovered that we did not work the same way. We were restricted by our bodies, whereas they could take any form they wished—”

  “Zeus and the shower of gold,” I said, remembering a strange story I had heard once.

  “Yes. It didn’t matter to them what form they took; it was all energy. But for us, it did matter. They could not bend us so easily into what they chose, and thus they came up with a device—”

  “The one what was used on me.”

  She nodded. “It was employed in their experiments, to slice up souls and recombine them in new ways, and with new powers. For our people, a soul regenerates a body, so recombing souls changed the body that was produced as well. It allowed them to create amazing creatures, hybrids of many different species. As long as the root soul was fey, whatever they grafted onto it would manifest in the new body that the soul would form. You understand?”

  I nodded; I thought so.

  “Well, the god’s device was left behind when they were banished by Artemis. It remained at Aeslinn’s court, along with other godly instruments, until rediscovered by a human mage some years ago. He had been working to help bring back the gods, who Aeslinn assumed would fight on his side—their faithful worshipper—against all apostates, and hand him a kingdom. The mage was in it more for power, but he found the godly instruments fascinating.

  He began experimenting with them, grafting bits of soul onto himself, absorbing the new powers this gave him. And he began showing them off to his master, who started coveting the same for himself, but not for the same reason. Aeslinn went from worshipping the gods to wanting to be one, but the only godly energy left to absorb—”