The aroma of spice and cooking meat hit me next, and then the room broke into a cacophony of sound.
“You found the lass.”
“Of course he did.”
“Look at the mite, frightened little thing.”
“Elsi, hot water and bandages,” the stranger demanded.
Voices, so many voices and faces—kindly, weathered, young, and old—the people dressed in colorful tunics, long dresses, and winter boots. Wooden tables and jugs and tankards dotted the room and a bar stretched along the back. The place was something out of a fairy-tale. Apt considering this was Faerie.
The stranger leaned in to whisper in my ear. “Merryville is one of the few villages that prefers to do things the old-fashioned way. The magic here is primitive but the people are golden.”
A buxom middle-aged woman came hurrying out from behind the bar carrying a bowl. She headed toward us, inclined her head in our direction, and then placed the bowl of water, washcloth, and bandages on a table to our left. She reached into her pocket and took out a small tub, unscrewed the lid to reveal some green goop, and placed that on the table too.
The man pulled out a seat. “Sit so that I may tend you?” he said to me.
“My lord?” The woman looked up at him in surprise.
He chuckled. “Don’t look so horrified, Elsi. I’ve tended to my fair share of wounds.” He looked to me. “Please.”
Elsi was staring at me now, as if I was some kind of anomaly.
There was nothing I’d have liked more than to sit. My body was quivering, my shoulder was throbbing, and I was exhausted, but I needed to see Sage. I needed to know he was okay.
“Where’s Sage? You said he was here.”
Elsi’s kind face crinkled in a smile. “Your djinn friend is resting. I gave him a draught to put him to sleep. He was extremely agitated and worried for your safety, but I told him, I said, if anyone can find her and bring her back safely, it’s the—”
“That will be all, Elsi,” the stranger said. “Why don’t you be so kind as to bring us some food?” He turned to me again. “Please sit, Eva.”
He knew my name. I fell
into the seat he’d pulled out. He took the chair beside me and reached for my shoulder to examine the wound. All eyes were on us, and the tavern was completely silent.
The man sighed and raised his voice to address the gathered. “Please, continue with whatever it was you were doing. I doubt our guest wishes to be the subject of collective scrutiny.”
There was a second more of silence and then the room broke out in murmured conversation and the regular sounds associated with such a place.
“We’ll have to tear the material to get to the wound,” he said, fingering the fabric at my shoulder.
I bit back a wince. “Do what you have to. Just clean it. I don’t want to get an infection.”
He nodded and set to work. His movements were quick and economical, and it took only a few minutes to clean the wound thoroughly, apply the green goop, and then cover it with the bandages. The wound tingled, and then the pain ebbed.
“What was that stuff?” I sniffed my shoulder, but the goop had no discernible scent.
“Herbs,” the man said. “Healing herbs. Elsi has a gift with poultices.”
“Well, I could use the recipe.”
He sat back in his seat. “It won’t help you. The herbs only grow in Faerie.”
So, he knew we weren’t from around here. “What did Sage tell you?”
He studied me carefully. “Enough.”
Elsi returned and placed a plate of cheese, meat, and bread on the table and hovered.
He indicated the food. “You should eat something.”
I was hungry all right, but not for food. My stomach cramped, and my gums ached.
“I’m fine.”
His gaze narrowed, his dark lashes casting shadows on his cheeks, but he didn’t push the issue.
I licked my lips, tasting the salt there, and then lifted my gaze to look at Elsi. “I’d like to see Sage now.”
Elsi looked to the man for instruction. Who was this guy? The mayor or something?
He pushed back his chair. “Come, I’ll take you to him.”
Sage lay still and silent in a small room at the back of the tavern. His chest rose and fell steadily, but my gaze was fixed on his head, which was swathed in bandages. Oh, God. He was pale. Too pale. I bridged the gap between us and gingerly parked my butt on the edge of the bed.
“What happened. How bad is he hurt?”
“A nasty head wound. He had an unfortunate encounter, but I happened on him in time. The wound was deep and required mending. Elsi tended to him. The draught is potent and will help him heal. He’ll be fine once he awakens.”
“And how long will that be?”
“He’ll be healed by dawn.”
I stroked Sage’s cheek. His skin was cold, which was strange for him. I pressed my palm to his skin and closed my eyes. Where was it? Where was his flame? My heart beat a little faster as I reached out to him, to the part of us that was connected. Warmth bloomed in my chest and beneath my palm. Sage moaned in his sleep, his brow crinkling in a gentle frown.
Good. He was warmer now, but that didn’t mean he’d heal any faster. Dawn was hours and hours away, and we didn’t have that kind of time. I didn’t have that kind of time. Aside from the fact that I needed to feed, I had an expiration date that was fast approaching. There was only one thing to do. I’d have to leave Sage here and go on alone.
I looked back at the fey leaning against the doorframe, his wide shoulders blocking any exit. “What did Sage tell you?”
He shrugged. “He told me you’d come to petition the Winter King for aid in the mortal realm. He told me that there was a cure, hope for salvation, but only if the Winter King aided you in raising an army. He begged me to find you and then he collapsed.”
“Yes. We’re on a deadline, and waiting till dawn is not an option I can entertain. I need to get to the Winter King. Do you know where I can find him?”
His eyes narrowed to slits. “There is no point. He can’t help you.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes. I do. The Winter King has enough on his plate. That storm you traveled through is no ordinary storm, those wolves no ordinary wolves. Faerie is under attack by a force we do not understand, and every resource, every warrior has been summoned to the Great tree in the citadel by the High Queen, Morrigan. Every thinning out of Faerie has been sealed. I’m surprised you made it into Faerie. The thinning you came through must have been improperly sealed. Once your friend wakes, I will escort you to it and seal it personally.”
Every word he said plunged darkness into my heart. This couldn’t be happening. This had been our last hope. Our only hope. Without fey help, there was no way we’d make it into the Genesis Foundation. The cure would never make it to the masses and the Vladul would win.
And me … I’d die.
“There has to be something we can do?” My mind was whirring. “If the Winter King can’t help me, then I’ll go to the citadel and speak to Morrigan herself.”
He let out a bark of laughter. “You can’t just go to the citadel and speak to the High Queen. Your flesh is mortal; even if you do survive the journey—the kelpies and the boggarts and the knockers—even if you do get to the citadel, you will never be granted an audience with the queen.”
His tone was mocking, and it had my hackles rising. I climbed off the bed and strode toward him, my hands fists at my sides. “If the High Queen knows that there’s a chance that the mortal realm can be saved, then—”
“What do you think this is about?” He leaned in, his breath hot on my face. “This is about the mortal realm. The power that threatens us threatens all the mortal realms, it threatens every reality, and we will not put the survival of one reality over the survival of the many.”
What was he talking about? It made no sense.
He sighed and shook his head. “Jus
t trust that your plight is insignificant now. Your mortal reality is no longer a priority.”
Anger licked at my chest. “Not a priority? Who the fuck are you to tell me my world means nothing?”
He stared at me, impassive and unmoved by my rage. “Anger won’t change the facts.”
God, he was cold. As cold as the snow and ice, as cold as the blizzard, and as cold as the sapphires that nestled in his eyes.
I walked over to the bed, to Sage, who lay so quietly on the mattress, and reached out and caressed his cheek. “We came here for a reason, and I won’t leave without having tried.” I straightened. “Maybe it is a lost cause, maybe she won’t see me, but I have to try. Please point me in the right direction, and I’ll be on my way.”
“I just explained to you that—”
“Yeah, I know, but I’ll have to see for myself.”
“You won’t survive the journey.” He sounded almost sorrowful about that now.
I shrugged. “Then I’ll die trying.”
He scanned my face. “You have a warrior’s soul. It would be a shame to squander it on a doomed quest.”
He’s right, Eva. Measure the odds and make the smart choice.
For the first time in forever I ignored Dad’s voice. There was no smart choice, only the choice that saved the most time. “I’m no warrior, I just have the temperament of a mule.”
He let out a surprised laugh. “Very well. Once this night is over, I will give you the directions you need.”
“I can’t wait that long. I need to leave now.”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry, I can’t let you do that.”
A shiver of foreboding went up my spine. “Why not?”
“Because it isn’t safe out there at night. There are wards protecting this place and the people inside.”
“And the rest of the village? What protects them?”
“There is no one else.” His penetrating gaze softened. “What you see out there is all that is left of this place.”
There couldn’t be more than thirty or forty people in the tavern tonight. Was that all that was left of a whole village? “What is it? What’s out there?”
“The dead, Eva. The dead roam the streets at night and anyone caught in their path is lost.” He looked suddenly tired, his alabaster face drawn. “Wait for morning, and Sage will be awake. If you must go to the citadel, then I’ll draw you a map.”
It was the best I was going to get, but that wasn’t my only issue. There was no ignoring the gnawing in my stomach and the throbbing in my gums, or the shiver running across my skin. I was unraveling. Maybe if I fed it would stave off the fever and the deterioration, but Sage wasn’t well enough to feed me. God, that sounded awful even in my head.
Ride it, Sage had said, but that wasn’t possible here. If the rest of these people found out what I was, who knew how they’d react. My nature was only to be revealed to the Winter King or the High Queen to prove the existence of a cure, to prove the extraordinary.
“Are you all right?” the man asked.
He was suddenly way too close, his scent too intoxicating and the beat of his pulse a delicious melody.
He tilted my chin up and stared down at me with a strange look on his face, part curiosity, part wonder. “Your eyes … they’re bleeding shadows.”
I bit back a moan and jerked my chin from his gentle grip. “I’m fine. In fact, I think I will have some food after all.”
He inclined his head and stepped away from the doorway to usher me through. His scent hit me again as I passed, but this time it soothed the throb in my gums. With a final glance at Sage, I headed back down the corridor and into the tavern. The plate of food sat untouched on the table where the man had healed me. I reclaimed my seat and picked up a hunk of bread.
The fey took the seat beside me and cut a slice of cheese. “Try this. It’s delicious.”
The tips of our fingers brushed as I took the cheese. I didn’t even know his name. “What’s your name?”
“You may call me Alaron.”
Alaron. An interesting name. What did it mean? The cheese melted in my mouth, filling it with flavor and taking the edge off my hunger. My mind was buzzing, going over the events of the past hour or so—the blizzard, the wolves, the dead. Alaron had said something had come to Faerie, something that had prompted the High Queen to rally her forces. He’d said that it could affect the mortal realm if not checked, but he hadn’t told me what it was.
“Alaron, what is it, the thing that caused the blizzard and is controlling the wolves?”
He rapped the table with his fingertips. “An unseen force. A voice, an infection.” He swallowed. “It whispers, and it taunts, and it takes over the minds and hearts of its victims. It manipulates, and it coerces.”
A fey virus, how ironic. “And the blizzard? How can it infect the weather?”
“Nature is a living thing, Eva, and any living thing can be influenced by external forces that are powerful enough. Innocence and goodness and love are corrupted.”
And Faerie was the only thing standing between this force and the mortal realms. Another infection we’d have to contend with if the fey didn’t keep it under wraps. My curiosity, my need to know, reared its head.
This thing had to have a name. Rayne? He’d mentioned Rayne when banishing the wolves. “When we were faced with the wolves you called them minions of Rayne … Is that what this force is called?”
“No. Rayne is … was my daughter. She belongs to it now.”
Well, that explained why they hadn’t attacked him. “I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t be more than twenty-five, twenty-eight at the most. Not old enough to have a fully-grown daughter with minions, but this was Faerie and the fey didn’t age like we did.
“He tore off some bread and slathered it with butter. “Faerie didn’t simply close the thinnings to stop a human infection from tainting us. We closed them to prevent an infection from seeping into the mortal worlds. It seems the thinning you used wasn’t sealed adequately, which will have to be remedied as soon as the sun comes up.”
It was time to fess up. “It was adequately sealed. We tore it open using a machine we built. It closed behind us. The plan was to get the Winter King to reopen a thinning once we had what we needed.”
His frown melted away. “Ah, well that would explain things. I appreciate your honesty.”
We ate in companionable silence while I took in my surroundings at leisure. The fey averted their gazes, pretending not to be interested in Alaron and me. They spoke in hushed voices, gathered in their little groups, hunched over their drinks and food. Several children lay on benches at the back of the tavern, covered with blankets. Was this their life now? To hide every night in this building. Five children, that was all I counted. The dead had done this? Elsi hovered behind the bar, her eyes going to the door and the shuttered windows every few seconds.
She was waiting for something to happen. They all were. The anticipation was thick in the air and then a scream cut through the night. It passed through the shutters and doors to reach every ear. There was a moment of stunned silence and then everyone headed toward the closed windows.
Okay, so not what they were expecting?
Alaron locked gazes with me, his eyes wide. “Oh, gods.” He shoved back his chair and the fey parted to let him through. I followed in his wake. He unbolted and opened one of the shutters and peered outside. My view was disrupted by his muscular shoulders, but I caught a glimpse of golden hair and a flash of pale blue fabric in the gloom outside.
“There’s someone out there,” a fey male said.
“Strangers?”
“They have to be.”
“A child. I heard a child.”
The scream came again, and I saw her clearly—a little girl running, her golden hair whipping back from her frightened face. Something was chasing her—a blur, a darkness.
I pushed back through the crowd and strode to the door.
“Wait! Where
are you going?” Elsi asked.
I grabbed the door handle. “I’m not leaving that child to die.”
The door opened with an ominous crack and then I was passing through a blue haze into a night that was saturated with shadows.
Chapter Fourteen
The night closed in around me, and the shadows weren’t just shadows any longer. They were specters and white bone. They were yawning mouths and bottomless eye sockets.
“Over here!” I ran toward the child, arm out to take her hand.
She veered toward me, her mouth open in a scream.
“Bella!” A woman emerged as if from nowhere, her brown cloak flapping behind her, a specter at her back, its bony fingers reaching for her.
The little girl faltered to glance over her shoulder. “Mama!”
The woman saw me and something akin to relief crossed her face. “Run, Bella! Run to the lady, I’m right behind you.”
Bella obeyed, turning away from the woman just as the specter’s bony hands tangled in the woman’s hair and yanked her off her feet. The woman’s mouth opened impossibly wide and then she morphed into a creature of shadow. The girl slammed into me, and I hauled her up and ran for the tavern. Alaron stood in the doorway, his face grim while the fey screamed at him to shut the door, to bolt it.
Specters closed in ahead of me, making for the door, for the fresh souls inside the tavern.
“The door. My lord, the door!” a female voice shrieked.
We were almost there, almost …
Alaron’s chest heaved and his mouth turned down, the resolution clear on his face.
No. “NO!”
He stepped back and slammed the door. Blue power fizzed over the tavern, sealing the wards once more. The specters screamed, furious at having lost their prey, and then they turned on us.
Shit, shit, shit.
The child sobbed in my arms and the chill slapped us repeatedly as the monsters closed in. I swerved and headed back toward the square at a sprint. What should I do? How the hell could I escape these creatures? Ice touched the back of my neck, gripping my skull and squeezing. A numb nothing seeped into my mind, an abyss of emptiness so vast it stole my breath and made me want to stop and tear out my hair. What was the point, what was the fucking point? My sprint slowed to a jog as the specters crept up on me.
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