by AJ Lancaster
He wanted to say something, a thousand somethings, but they were all caught in his throat. The cold rage still clawed at him, and he could not remember how to thaw. How to articulate the riot of emotions that had driven him here?
She winced at his blistered palm. “We should put ice on that.” She considered the hole in the roof, where hail had been replaced with swirling snowflakes. “Fortunately, we seem to have a lot of ice. In late May.” Her lips curved. “Did you steal a relic from the Conclave?”
“Ah. Yes.” He shook his head to clear it. “I need to find the nearest resonance point and build a portal. We need to get Aroset back to Stariel before she wakes up.”
Hetta ignored him, bending to scoop up a handful of clean hail and offering it to him. He took it without thinking, preoccupied by the leylines curving around her, and the cold burn of it surprised a hiss of displeasure from him.
Living things always cast a shadow on the fabric of magic, and without Lamorkin’s heartstone draining the excess charge, he could see the charge building in the centre of her more clearly than before. Carefully, he reached out with his good hand and stroked some of the excess away, letting it disperse harmlessly into the air. It began to build again as soon as he stopped.
She grimaced as she felt what he was doing. “How long do you think we have?”
He didn’t know, and he didn’t like the answers his mental calculations suggested. “I think…we should find the High King sooner rather than later.”
She exhaled a long, slow breath and put a hand against his chest. “Go and find your resonance point. I’ll watch Aroset.” Snowflakes caught on Aroset’s feathers, melting softly as soon as they touched her. “Also, there’s a woman upstairs who Aroset compelled.”
He nodded. “I will see what can be done.”
He found the woman rocking back and forth in a room above. She started at the sight of him and bowed low.
“Mighty stormdancer! I am blessed!”
Aroset wouldn’t comprehend the wrong she’d done here, but Wyn felt guilty by association.
“I am sorry,” he told the woman, unplucking the strands of compulsion as deftly as he could and wishing Rakken were with him. Though would Rakken think it worth expending energy on an ordinary mortal where there was no political advantage to him doing so? Wyn would like to believe Rakken’s finely tuned sense of debts and obligations might win out, if nothing else, but he’d rather not test it. Perhaps I am being too harsh on him; perhaps he would have compassion. But that might actually be worse, because Rakken’s compassion had to date extended only to creatures he saw as lesser, such as the lowfae.
And this woman wasn’t a lesser creature. He found her name among the tangle.
“Bonnie McSymon,” he said, pulling the strands away and giving his voice the same bit of snap he’d occasionally used on more junior members of staff with a tendency to daydream. It was a tone that said, with a slight curl of sternness, you’re not being told off—yet—but do pay attention, will you? It worked; the woman jerked free of the compulsion all at once. The unsettling worship in her eyes crashed into confusion.
“I am sorry for what was done to you. You are not crazy,” he told her, as she began to shake. “And I’m sorry I don’t have time to help you as I ought.” He pulled coins from his pouch and placed them in her unresisting hand. “I am Hallowyn Tempestren; seek me at Stariel Estate if you wish, later, and I will try to set to rights what I can. I am taking the person who did this to you away with me.”
She scrambled away from him, a strangled scream starting in her throat, and, hating himself a little, he sent her to sleep. It was much, much too easy. Any natural resistance she’d had to compulsion—and most people had at least a little—had been stripped away by Aroset.
He left the woman on one of the beds, hoping the sleep might do her good. He hoped also that she came from somewhere nearby, that there were others she could turn to for support. Aroset wouldn’t have bothered to transport a mortal great distances, would she? It seemed as if she’d simply taken over this place, servants and all, as he met other servants as he stalked the halls, each of them equally enthralled by the sight of him.
Undoing the compulsions took time, as did searching the house for some point of resonance to work with that would get them at least slightly in the vicinity of Stariel, and impatience itched at him. What if Aroset woke sooner than he’d estimated? How quickly would the charge around Hetta build, without the heartstone to drain it? What if he missed a compelled servant somewhere in the house?
I will return here and check them all thoroughly, after this is done, he vowed. Perhaps he could think of some leverage to convince Rakken to help him with it. The vow didn’t dent the despair winding its way through his blood. How can the mortals possibly accept the greater fae when we can do such things to them? He curled his hands into fists. If the High King wouldn’t act, Wyn would. There were substances—like vervain—that increased resistance to compulsion, and others—like yarrow—that clouded the ability of fae to see magic. He’d plant them in every garden in Prydein if he had to and throw himself into helping Marius with his experimental devices.
Would I make the world hate my child, though? The question lurked, unsettling, in the back of his mind as he pushed open the door to a broom closet, hoping its similarity to one at Stariel might help him. A broom clattered to the floor, the sound unnaturally loud in the eerily still house now that the servants slept. Wyn replaced it carefully and shut the door. No resonance. But then, it was wildly optimistic to expect a resonance point between this house and Stariel House to neatly fall into his lap just because he wished it. Not only did two places need to share sufficient characteristics with each other in order to resonate, but the portal-maker needed to be familiar with both of them as well. And this house largely did not resonate with the North; it had a very Southern feeling to it, despite its location.
He went back to Hetta, time ticking at him. Her face fell at his expression. Had the charge around Hetta increased? And how much would it increase again before they returned to the estate?
“Nothing?”
“No.” If only he were more familiar with the area around Stariel. Perhaps some place outside but near the estate would resonate, if only he knew it better, but he’d only been able to leave the estate recently. Before that, he hadn’t wanted to risk flouting the High King’s Iron Law by entering the Mortal Realm; he’d been prepared to argue that technically Stariel Estate counted as part of Faerie. I hope I get the chance to argue that technicality. The High King still seemed as distant as a star.
Wyn unhappily considered their options; the problem, of course, was Aroset. Not that her being a problem is exactly new. But this one was logistical; he couldn’t carry both Hetta and Aroset. Air currents stirred tatters of crimson feathers across the floor as he weighed their options, disliking all of them.
“How long do you think until she wakes up?” Hetta asked, clearly following similar lines of thought to him.
As if in answer, Aroset began to wake.
To his astonishment, it wasn’t fear that sliced through him first, swift and breath-stealing, but relief. He hadn’t killed his sister. Aroset is right; I am sentimental. Somehow, he didn’t think this would appease her when she woke, de-feathered and defeated.
“Get back,” he said, but Hetta had already done so.
Would Aroset survive another lightning strike like the first? Should he and Hetta run and return with Rakken and Irokoi in tow? Aroset would be easier to deal with now, grounded, but what if they couldn’t find her again? How much time did Hetta have?
But before he could make up his mind what to do, the heavy scent of cherry and beeswax spiralled out, mixing with the storm. With a slight pop, Princess Sunnika appeared. Beside her was Gwendelfear.
48
Faerie Princesses
Hetta had never been happier to see Princess Sunnika. The princess’s eyes widened as she took in the scene, but before she could say anything, Aroset woke.
Hetta sort of knew how fast fae could move if they wanted to, but it was still disorienting to see it in combined action. As if there had been some pre-arranged synchronisation, Wyn flared out his wings and grabbed for one of Aroset’s tattered wings, Gwendelfear snatched up Hetta’s hand, and Princess Sunnika took hold of Wyn’s outstretched primaries.
Princess Sunnika’s eyes bored into hers fiercely. “Let me through the wards.”
The translocation stretched longer than ever before, darkness and a dizzy, disorienting sensation so sickening that Hetta was momentarily glad not to have a physical form. Home, Hetta thought, as tightly as she could.
And then the world snapped back into place again, and she knew exactly where she was: the rose garden at Stariel, next to the dormant Gate to DuskRose.
Aroset snarled, and storm magic blasted outwards as air, knocking Hetta off her feet. Charge began to gather, but Stariel swallowed it. The land rose behind her eyes, a hammer about to fall. They could stop this little fae who’d been so warped out of her proper shape, as they’d stopped the leviathans. They would protect their land and their family.
The faeland paused. But their consort would mourn her, because she was family.
Hetta dug her fingernails into her palms, that thought shocking her into her own skin. Stariel considered Aroset family? Hetta wrestled with her own fear and desire for vengeance.
She was swept back up in the faeland, and they piled layer after layer of magical force upon Aroset. More magic than she’d ever pulled from the land before. Pine forest and new grass and chilli-pricked coffee inexorably overrode iron and rain-drenched roses until there was nothing left of Aroset’s magic.
Stariel subsided with grim satisfaction and Hetta collapsed. Strong arms caught her before she hit the ground, and she knew it was Wyn through Stariel rather than her own senses. She was too tired to look up, but she burrowed herself into his chest.
“Hetta, Hetta.” He was saying her name over and over, voice hoarse with anxiety.
“Mmmmmf,” she managed. Stariel buzzed along her tired nerves, slowly rejuvenating her, but whatever she’d done had impacted the land as well, as if it had been winded and was having to recover its breath.
“Well, that’s certainly an interesting solution.” Cat’s voice. How long had she been here? “Is she alive?”
Hetta reached for Stariel and found something so strange that despite her fatigue she opened her eyes and lifted her head, needing to see it with mundane senses rather than magic.
Aroset was still in the rose garden, but she was frozen, encased completely in blue crystalline. The rock was semi-translucent, so that Aroset’s form made a dark, disturbing shadow deep in the stone.
“Yes,” Hetta said. “She’s still alive.” What had she done?
“She’s in stasis,” Wyn said. “I didn’t know it was possible to do that to a person rather than a location. Can she break out of it?”
“Not while she’s on Stariel lands, she can’t. I’d have to undo it.” Hetta was relying on Stariel for the knowledge, but the land felt confident on this point. “I think it may have gotten the idea from ThousandSpire.” They both looked at Cat.
Cat extended a tentative hand towards the crystal, her movements stiff but graceful, like an old housecat. Was she thinking of her own time in such a state?
Princess Sunnika got slowly to her feet from where she’d collapsed, aided by Gwendelfear. There were deep circles beneath her eyes, and an air of exhaustion clung to her. It had cost her, translocating their little party across the country and through Stariel’s wards, even with Hetta’s help. Why had she done it?
Cat went utterly still, and the air between her and Princess Sunnika crackled with an antagonism that owed nothing to magic. Cat snapped her wings tight against her spine.
“Princess Sunnika. So we meet at last.” Princess Sunnika’s chin tilted. It struck Hetta that this was probably the first time Princess Sunnika had come face-to-face with one of her cousin’s killers. Killer. The word unsettled her. It was too easy to forget what Rakken and Cat were, underneath.
“Princess Catsmere Tempestren.” Sunnika’s tone, in contrast, held enough spikes to puncture kineticar tyres. “Murderer.”
Hetta knew enough of fae culture by now to know that the use of Cat’s full name meant something. Exactly what, she wasn’t sure, but the tension between the two definitely increased.
Cat appeared to be weighing a response, and Hetta tensed, wondering if she’d need to intervene, wondering if she should intervene. Her sympathies lay with Princess Sunnika on this, since even faced with a bristling princess, there was no apology in Cat, no hint of remorse. At least here I can bury them both to the knees if need be.
Cat’s gaze went from Princess Sunnika to Wyn and back, narrowing. “Thank you for retrieving my siblings.” Her lips curved. “And also Lord Valstar.”
“I did not do it for your benefit, murderer.”
“Well, whoever’s benefit you did it for, I am thankful for it,” Hetta intervened. She was surprised Cat had offered even that much, though acknowledging obligations was also a very fae thing to do. Hetta was pretty sure they had Gwendelfear to thank for Princess Sunnika’s intervention, and that only because Wyn had accidentally sped her recovery by sharing his power with her. Gwendelfear hated being indebted to people, which did make Hetta wonder if Gwendelfear now owed Princess Sunnika a favour, or if there was something else between the two. Her head pounded. Following fae logic through things was exhausting.
“My thanks were sincere. I will take the debt from the lesser fae, assuming it was she who bargained for my brother’s rescue just now,” Cat said.
That made the hair on Hetta’s neck stand on end. What was Catsmere up to?
“Cat—”
Cat shot Wyn a firm look. “This isn’t your business, Hallowyn.”
Princess Sunnika’s eyes narrowed. “Are you attempting to pay the weregild for your crime? It’s insulting to compare the debt owed for this”—she waved around at the assembled group—“to the value of a life.”
Cat didn’t look away, and she spoke with a clipped tightness. “I do not offer weregild for your cousin, Princess; our courts were at war. I am sorry if his death pains you, but I won’t apologise for killing him, and I’m not sorry he’s dead. Are you, truly, who must’ve known what he was?”
Gwendelfear hissed and took a step forward, but Princess Sunnika stayed her with an outflung hand. Hetta couldn’t tell what she was thinking.
“Do not expect me to come to your aid again, Hallowyn,” Princess Sunnika said, without taking her eyes off Cat. “Not even for my former handmaiden.”
“I’m not planning to require any further rescuing,” Wyn promised. He too was frowning at Cat.
Princess Sunnika didn’t answer, disappearing with a pop.
“Thank you, Gwendelfear,” Wyn murmured.
“I didn’t do it for your thanks.” Gwendelfear stalked away on the echo of Princess Sunnika’s words.
Wyn whirled on his sister. “What are you playing at, Cat?”
She smiled. “You know, I don’t actually have to tell you, little brother.”
“And Rake?”
Hetta didn’t have to wonder what Rakken would think of this for long, because he crashed down inelegantly moments later in a storm of still-damaged wings and air magic. He had his knives out, but the sight of Aroset frozen into a blue-set statue made him pause.
“The DuskRose princess is gone,” Cat told him. She put a hand against the stone. “And Lord Valstar has dealt with Aroset.”
Rakken frowned at his twin, and a silent argument passed between them. Hetta could read it as if it were spoken:
What did you do, Cat? You’ve done something, I can tell from the way Hallowyn is looking at you.
Later.
Rakken didn’t like having to wait for an answer, but he grudgingly accepted that. They really did try to keep their unified image intact in comp
any, didn’t they?
Rakken clicked a fingernail against Aroset’s crystal. “Perhaps a long sleep will improve her,” he reflected.
“Well, it could hardly make her worse,” said Hetta.
Rakken didn’t appear to hear her, studying the crystal. “It would be helpful if you could move her to the Stones. I’ve begun laying the spell’s foundations there in Koi’s absence; it is a complicated working.”
She still felt like a wrung-out rag, but she closed her eyes and tiredly gathered up enough energy to explain to Stariel what she needed.
Of course, she hadn’t banked on fatigue making her so clumsy that she translocated not only Aroset but their entire party to the Stones. Wyn, Cat, and Rakken froze with surprise.
“Sorry,” she mumbled, leaning against a Stone for support.
Now that the adrenalin was fading, Stariel was the only thing keeping her upright. She drew on the land to steady herself and then hastily snapped the connection shut when she felt her senses start to spin.
The land pawed at her curiously, wanting to know why she’d stopped.
Hetta told it.
Puzzlement—it didn’t understand her fear—but the land subsided anyway. Still, even that brief burst of energy had helped, though she had a feeling she might pay for it later, the way one did after overconsuming coffee.
Wyn looked down at her with concern, then back up at Rakken. “Did Koi give any indication of when he’d return?”
Rakken was still staring at the crystalline stone of Aroset’s prison, but he shook his head. “But he knows there isn’t much time.”
“ThousandSpire hungers,” Cat added. Her focus had turned inwards.
Hetta shivered.
“But the spell is nearly ready, if our errant older brother will only fulfil his promises.” Rakken glanced at the sky, and Hetta couldn’t help following suit even though she knew there was no one there.
They left the twins to it. Hetta briefly considered translocation, but she knew how much Wyn disliked it, and the Stones weren’t so far from the house. And, she privately admitted, she was worried about getting lost in Stariel in this state.
