Inimical

by Genevieve Iseult Eldredge

  Laughing, Aldebaran claws at the air, clawing the power of Fair Faerie from her in a golden wave. The queen shudders where she stands, her mouth falling open and slack. Her skin blanches from velvet night to grey death.

  Then she crumples and falls.

  The queen is dead.

  A booming crack rumbles through the Aureate Throne, starting at the queen and rocking outward in a circle. Fair Faerie darkens. The stones go grey and shred apart. The pillars sag and shift, the sky turns flat grey. Grass withers. Above, a flock of white doves breaks from a tree. In a flash they turn black and fall to the ground, sickly plops that plume upward with ashes and cinder.

  Aldebaran pulls the last of the golden light toward him, sucking it in like a vampire. On the floor before the throne, the queen’s body bursts into darkfire.

  She’s consumed in seconds.

  “No!” My heart aches like I’ve been stabbed with a Moribund blade.

  Aldebaran steps toward the king. My father. He stirs, the thunder-rumble of his voice booming through me. Syl, my daughter, help me.

  I get to my feet and flame on! White flames wreathe my hands as I square off against Aldebaran. Every word tears out of me on a sob. “You will not touch him!”

  Aldebaran’s hollow laugh echoes over the long stair. “You think you can protect your father?”

  I grit my teeth, fire raging around us. “Yes. I do.”

  “We should be them, Syl.” Aldebaran’s eyes are dark with desire, power-mad. The heat ramps up, his Inimicals blazing crimson. “You and me. Together. Ruling over all of Fair Faerie.”

  He’s back to bargaining.

  “You know what?” I clench my hands into fists, the fire of my rage leaping white all around me. “I don’t have time for you to go through all the stages of grief.”

  His face twisting in fury, he lunges at me, wrapping his hands around my throat. The burning, searing pain of Inimical magic lights my flesh on fire and agony. His eyes turn a soulless void-black that promises oblivion. “I wanted you to be with me willingly and share your power with me. But now, I’ll just take your loyalty.”

  I slam at his hands, but it’s no use. His leering grin is in my face. His breath is hot as the desert. I am a fire in a casing of fair Fae skin.

  Burning with the power of corrupted Summer.

  Aldebaran lifts one hand, and crimson Inimical claws shear from the fingertips. “Now we will rule together. Infected, Inimical.”

  I can’t defeat him alone. In pain and desperation, I call out to the one person who always comes through for me. “Roue!”

  Fair Faerie is deadly to her, but my Roue always finds a way.

  Together, we can defeat him. If Fair Faerie doesn’t kill her first.

  20

  ROUEN

  Everything

  I would risk

  Everything

  For you

  “My Everything,” Euphoria

  * * *

  Dark Fae are not supposed to show emotion, especially any of the “weaker” emotions—love, mercy, empathy. Fear that your girl was stolen by a filthy, dandelion-swilling fair Fae prince. I’m losing it. At least inwardly. The last shimmer of Summer heat that took Syl—my Syl—puffs out like the exhaust of a truck backfiring.

  A blast of heat, and she’s gone.

  Leaving me standing in the dimly lit parking lot behind the Nanci Raygun, music throbbing through the walls, vibrating the asphalt at my feet.

  My hand aches where she was ripped away.

  My head throbs even more as Dark-Rouen rises up in my soul. You fool. Together, we could have stopped him. But you were too afraid to give me control.

  Cold anger and fear constrict my chest. With all my mental fortitude, I stuff her down deep into her prison. You wouldn’t have given it back.

  Is this how my father fell to his dark side—a little at a time?

  I touch the Adamant Queen necklace. I have to be stronger than him.

  Dread creeps in, wrapping me in doubt. What if I’m not?

  Syl. Concentrate on Syl.

  Right. I pace, dowsing for ley lines—anything I could use to get to OverHill.

  No luck. I’m a dark Fae. The Winter in my blood calls to the moon’s ley lines like the moon calls the tides, but the sunlit ley lines, the ones that lead to OverHill?

  Zip. Zilch. Nada.

  I can’t access OverHill’s Snickleways. I don’t have Summer in my blood. Like calls to like. Blood to blood.

  And I don’t have the right blood.

  I pace, biting my thumbnail to the quick. For the record, going to OverHill is a bad idea for a dark Fae, even a princess. We’re all things Winter, and OverHill is a place of sweltering heat and brutal, punishing sunlight.

  Dark Fae die there, scorched to ash and bits of bone.

  But I don’t care.

  Syl needs me. There has to be something, some way…

  Short, clompy footfalls echo behind me. I whirl around, barely keeping my violet lightning in check. Lennon sees the electricity in my eyes and puts both hands up. “I come in peace!”

  “Lennon.” Relief shoots through me. “When did you get here?”

  Worry shines in her eyes. “I was late, but I saw the tail-end of what happened.”

  Lennon knows about me and Syl being Fae. She became Wakeful when Fiann took her hostage for the sixth Ouroboros. Long story short, Syl and I still came out on top.

  Cheat, cheat, never beat, Fiann.

  “Where’s Syl? All I saw was a flare of sunlight.” Lennon looks around, the fear on her face mirroring my own.

  “Aldebaran took her to OverHill.” My voice shakes, but I don’t care.

  Syl’s all I care about.

  Now Lennon’s pacing, too. “We have to do something.”

  She’s so sweet, but I ease her off the Bad Idea ledge. “Not we. Me.”

  “But, Euphoria—”

  “Wait. Let me think.” I rack my brain for a solution. Blood calls to blood. Like calls to like. I can’t walk the Summer pathways to OverHill, but there must be some other way in. For glory’s sake, OverHill and UnderHollow are colliding.

  That should give me some leeway.

  “Should I call someone?” Lennon takes out her phone. Of course it has cute cat ears on it. “I could call Syl’s mom—”

  That’s all I need. An anxious Georgina Gentry and her huge hand-cannon all up in my ladybusiness. “Hell and harrowing, no! I don’t— Wait a minute.” My mind whirls as a crazy idea forms. “Harrowing. The harrow-stitches!”

  The harrow-stitches are small tears in the Shroud between the mortal realm and Faerie. They were caused when the Ouroboros spawned months ago.

  I meet Lennon’s worried gaze. “If I can only harness their magic, push my way through to the other side… One of them should take me to OverHill, right?”

  It’s a crazy plan, but it’s all I’ve got.

  “Ummm…” Lennon toes a piece of broken asphalt with her Mary Janes. “Aren’t those really dangerous?”

  “I’ll figure something out.”

  “Will you now?” a new voice interjects.

  Dread sinks into my bones. “Miss Jardin.”

  In her pristine blazer, pencil skirt, and bright blouse, those chunky black glasses perched on her snub nose, she’s suddenly just here. Completely out of place in the parking lot of a goth club. “Did you lose our Syl?” she asks calmly.

  “Our…?” I arch an eyebrow at her. It’s not like I’ve got time to argue over words, but seriously? Pocket púca like her are mischievous, dangerous. Volatile, even. Someone, somewhere, defeated her and bound her to Syl, so I can be assured that she wants to help.

  For a price.

  Miss J folds her arms over her chest. “Our.”

  I don’t mince words. “Aldebaran took her into OverHill.”

  “And you are planning to go there?” Even though her voice is mild, I hear the accusation in it.

  “Yup, you betcha.”

  “Hmmm…�
�� She taps the arm of her glasses, a maddening tack, tack, tack. “How do you propose to do that?”

  My mind’s racing. Syl’s the plotter. I’m definitely more of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-leather-pants kind of girl. Hence, my wild plan with the harrow-stitches. “I’m figuring it out.”

  I pace the concrete.

  “Time is slipping away. I could help.” Miss J’s eyes flash, practically bleeding fire. “If you remove a condition of my geis.”

  Even the thought of that terrifies me. Once all those conditions are removed, there’s no telling what Miss J might do. Or if she’d even be on our side.

  All my dark Fae rage thrusts to the surface like deadly ice spears. “If you think I’m going to release you from your geis, think again.” The soul-bond allows me to make the decision for Syl, but even still, I’d never release Miss— Ohhhh, wait.

  “The soul-bond! That’s what I was missing.”

  Lennon’s face screws up in confusion. She edges away from the librarian. “Euphoria?”

  “Look,” I say, my crazy plan getting even crazier in my mind, “I could step into a harrow-stitch and use the soul-bond as a kind of…tether to Syl. It should pull me right through the stitch to her location.”

  Theoretically. Possibly. Hopefully.

  I sound like Syl now, but what can I say?

  My girl’s been a good influence on me.

  “You shouldn’t overtax the harrow-stitches.” Miss J looks at me over her spectacles. “Overuse will stretch them thin. They’ll riddle with holes and then split like overripe fruit, tearing the Shroud, causing even more Bleed.”

  I roll my eyes. “Great metaphor.”

  “It was a simile, Miss Rivoche.”

  I clench my fist, barely tamping down on my cold rage. Don’t hit the librarian, don’t hit the librarian… “Whatever. If the Great Convergence hits, it’ll rip the Shroud to pieces anyway.”

  If Dark Faerie and Fair Faerie collide, the Shroud will be the least of our problems.

  My mind’s made up. “I’ll bring her back. I promise.”

  I summon my fairy wind, and in a blast of tingly cold, I’m off like a bat out of hell. The closest harrow-stitch is in Hollywood Cemetery. I shudder, remembering the Ouroboros tree we fought in that dark crypt beneath the earth. It nearly buried us alive and infected everything around it, living and dead.

  Syl stopped it. Syl and me.

  And we both bled there. For each other. That makes the harrow-stitch powerful. Powerful enough to wing you all the way to OverHill? My dark self seeds my thoughts with doubt, but this is for Syl.

  It will work. It has to.

  Syl’s positive influence steels my resolve all the way to the cemetery’s iron gates.

  Iron. It’s an allergen to Fae. It weakens us, steals our power.

  As if on cue, a wave of exhaustion hits me like a fist, some of my strength leaching out…

  I don’t have a lot of time. I vault the fence and hit the ground running, speeding past weeping angels and statues, fallen-over headstones, and rotted flowers. The stink of freshly mowed grass, turned earth, and funeral flowers chokes me.

  I hope I’m not too late.

  Horrid thoughts of what Aldebaran could be doing to Syl rise in my brain. Don’t think of that, Rouen. I squelch those thoughts down deep.

  Even my dark self doesn’t want to think about it.

  I zip around until I come to the old crypt, blasted and gutted. The remnants of the tree still sit there, a husk rotting out. It doesn’t seem so menacing now, without the black magic circuitry of the Ouroboros to power it.

  I close my eyes and dowse. The harrow-stitch is here. If I had Syl’s Fae-sight I’d be able to see where it pulls and tugs on the Shroud.

  As it is, I’m blind. I have to feel.

  I crouch down and touch the earth. This is where Syl and I bled together. I reach out, slide my senses into the Shroud between the mortal realm and the realm of Faerie. It’s like a thick, velvety membrane, resilient. It doesn’t allow passage easily. I feel around, and there! A hook, a pucker in its flesh, like a stitch in a wound.

  The harrow-stitch.

  It’s drunk our blood, gained power, swelling, swelling…

  I reach out, tug on it. It’s both anchor and entryway. I feel the stitch, and I step toward it. It’s like obtruding, where you push your consciousness into Faerie, but this time, my whole body will go.

  And hopefully, if I do this right, if I can tap into my soul-bond with Syl and use it to pull me toward OverHill.

  Blood calls to blood. I’ll end up in OverHill instead of UnderHollow.

  I take a deep breath and push through the membrane. At first, it doesn’t want to give way, and then slowly, slowly, it stretches, the harrow-stitch opening up like a gaping wound.

  I fill my mind with Syl—her beautiful face, her laugh, her heady scent, the touch of her hand—and reach for the soul-bond.

  Blood calls to blood. Come on, come on…

  For a long moment, nothing.

  And then before me, bright passageways—the sunlit Snickleways—open up like twisting, winding labyrinth, so many that my brain can’t make sense of it. Oh, it tries, but immediately, my thoughts are caught up in a dizzying whirlwind, a faestruck spell gripping my mind.

  Fae have gone mad here, trying to figure out the Snickleways.

  And then the agony hits hard.

  Sun and Summer and all things searing and bright wash over me. My body ignites in pain as though my blood’s been set on fire. The pain is like nothing I’ve ever felt.

  It steals my breath, but my heart soars. “Syl! Syl, I’m coming!”

  Out of the fire and into the inferno. I would burn for her.

  For better or worse, OverHill, here I come.

  21

  SYL

  Hell hath no fury

  Like a Faerie scorned

  - Glamma’s Grimm

  * * *

  Some guys just can’t take no for an answer. Aldebaran, Prince of the Fair Fae is one of those guys. He thinks no means yes and get lost means infect me with Inimicals so I’ll be your slave-queen.

  Too bad for me, he’s got the upper hand. Literally.

  With one hand, he drains the Summer from my blood, just like he did the queen. Golden and liquid, the power pulls up from my pores and lifts into the air. Fire races through my veins, leaving me gasping like a fish.

  He’s not trying to kill me, just weaken me so he can infect me.

  With the other hand, he holds me still as Inimical circuits crawl down his arm toward my face. The bitter heat of them stings my eyes.

  If they get inside me, I won’t be able to burn them out.

  Panic shoots through my system. “Let…go!” I claw at his hand, but he’s immovable as a marble statue, the Inimical infection enhancing his strength to Superman levels.

  My fear makes me strong, too. Self-preservation is the name of the game. I summon my Summer power, pulling it from the depths of my soul.

  Flame on!

  The rush of heat comes, the tingles, but my white flame only sputters out.

  Darn it all!

  Aldebaran smiles right in my face. “Having trouble, Syl?”

  “Really?” I choke out. “You—koff—want to play Twenty Questions now?”

  “You know why you can’t purify them?” He keeps right on going, comic-book super-villain style. “Because this kind of Moribund, these Inimicals, are made from your blood. Corrupted sleeper-princess blood.”

  Horror worms into my stomach. “You’re lying!”

  But even as I say it, I remember the Xi’s words. “It’s you. The antithesis of you.”

  Suddenly, I know why King Reinghûl wanted all my blood. To make these Inimicals, to use them to enslave his people, me, Rouen…

  But Aldebaran’s getting enslaved first. He just doesn’t realize that part.

  His eyes flush from gold to blazing orange-red. “I’ll infect you, and then you’ll be mine.”

 
The Inimicals creep closer, closer… The nearest one brushes my cheek. I fight his grip, thrashing. “Are you a complete idiot?” And jeez, is this guy a broken record or what? “Both of us will be under the control of the dark Fae king. He’s the one who holds the master-key circuit.”

  “You and I will overthrow him.” Aldebaran tightens his grip. “It would’ve been like this with us anyway, Syl. You as my power source. Me on the throne. As Overking.” He pulls harder, and the Summer in my blood jerks, yanked out of me by the prince of its realm.

  My vision explodes in stars, my limbs heavy, my eyes closing as the Inimicals wave over me. I feel them creepy-crawling up my arms, across my cheeks, writhing into my hair.

  “Syl… Syl, I’m coming!”

  “Roue? Roue!” Her sending shoots a burst of adrenaline through my veins.

  My eyes flash open.

  I bring my forehead down. Right on Aldebaran’s nose.

  Smack! The meaty sound echoes, and he staggers back, blood gushing down his pretty face.

  The golden beads of energy sink back into my flesh, filling me with power.

  I call my white flame. Whoosh! A gust of heat, and Summer engulfs me, and all the Inimicals on my arms, my face, in my hair, all fry to ash. “Good riddance.” I brush them off.

  Al’s cupping his gushing face. “You…you boke my node!”

  Now that’s funny. “That’s one bone, jerk. You have hundreds of others.”

  With a scream, he blasts me with blazing-hot darkfire.

  I throw up my white shield. Just in time.

  Sparks and magma fly. Snarling, he pours it on, flaming up and down my shield, testing it. His rage is powered by all things Summer, but so is mine.

  And I’m just getting started.

  “It’s on, pal.”

  “We’ll see about that.” He spits blood. “When I take the Aureate Throne, my will shall become reality. You will be mine, together we’ll destroy Dark Faerie, and I shall reign supreme. As Overking.” His burning gaze flicks to the Aureate Throne. “But first…”

  He lunges at my royal father.

  Dad! I windwarp, throwing myself—and my shield—in the way.