Faery (The Faery Chronicles Book 3)

by Leslie Claire Walker

  I could get it back, after a fashion. I understood that if I chose to stay in the memory, right here and right now, time could stop. The kitchen would always smell like the beginnings of spaghetti and my mom would always have sunburned cheeks and sand between her toes and she’d never leave. I’d never have to grieve.

  I watched my mom pull a wooden spoon out of the big drawer by the dishwasher and stir the meat in the skillet. She could always be this way.

  The prospect of that, that it was even possible, felt like the electricity hovering and humming in the air before lightning strikes, when the air is so charged you’re sure it will catch fire, and every hair stands straight up. I felt it in every single molecule in my body. I’d never wanted anything so badly in my whole life. I’d never felt so hungry for anything.

  If Famine could give that to me, what price wouldn’t I pay?

  I wouldn’t be the only one to pay it.

  The whole of my mother—her sun-kissed hair and her smile and her gold-flecked eyes—started to fragment in front of me like shattered glass from a mirror. I could no more stop it than I could stop time.

  I could never go back. My mother was dead, killed by a drunk driver late one night. The police had come. I’d never forget the sound of that knock on the door, or waking up groggy and pissed off about it, or feeling my legs give way and the harsh thud that shivered through my bones as I hit the floor, or the expression on my father’s face and the hot, fat tears that’d run down his cheeks. I’d never seen him cry before, not ever.

  Nothing had ever been the same, and it never would be.

  I blinked and the scene in my mind’s eye receded, my mother along with it.

  “Wasn’t expecting you to come to me,” Famine said.

  Her voice struck me wrong. A little girl’s voice on the surface, but beneath that lay something akin to fingernails on a chalkboard or chewing on tinfoil.

  I wanted to hit her.

  She was a little girl, but she wasn’t. My hands balled into fists at my side.

  “I don’t know why not,” I said. “I’m told you like to size up your enemies. You should know I’m not one to run.”

  She smirked. “It’s what humans do. Most of you, anyway.”

  “If I was most humans, you wouldn’t give a crap about me. I’d just be a number to you, like number six million, ninety-three thousand and two of the souls burned at the end of the world, if that much.”

  “Say you’re right,” she said. “You walked right into my hands. If I wanted to, I could reach out and snap your neck like snapping my fingers and it’d all be over.”

  Regardless of how she looked, given what she was, I had no doubt. “But since you’re not killing me already, you have something else in mind.”

  “I want you to show me everything you know, Kevin Xavier Landon. I want you to introduce me to the highest of the high in Faery. You’re the liaison between humans and fae. You know things. I want you to name names.”

  Naming names was exactly what I would never do. That would give her control over those fae whose names I told her. If that was what she wanted me for, she’d never get it. I’d die first. But it did say one thing: she wanted to control the realm of Faery. That would put her in charge of shaping the Human world. That would change everything.

  “We all want something,” I said. “So, I give you what you want, after which I’ll no longer be useful?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  No, she hadn’t. And that made me even more uncomfortable. Because I couldn’t figure out what that was about. “I make a lousy puppet.”

  “Why don’t you let me decide what you’re lousy at?”

  My turn to grin, in part because she thought she was being funny, and unless she wanted me to pass messages or cook her a bowl of spaghetti, I really wasn’t that talented. Also, I could feel nerves roiling in my belly. “Whose game are you playing?” I asked.

  “I’m not playing,” she said.

  “You’re working for somebody, though. I mean, you’re not the boss of the apocalypse. You’re a minion, right?”

  Her smirk faded. “I’m a harbinger of the end.”

  “So’s earthquakes and climate change and super-size French fries.”

  “Ask your friend Malek,” she said.

  “Count on it.”

  I heard footfalls on the gravel behind me, a couple of rows back. I glanced over my shoulder and caught sight of a bald head, gleaming in the morning light.

  “Looks like I’ll be asking him in about thirty seconds,” I said, looking back toward her.

  The doorway was empty. Famine had vanished.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  MALEK SLITHERED into place beside me like the monster he was. Rage radiated from him. He smelled musty, like ancient texts and engine oil and reptile scales heated under a noon sun. His motorcycle boots were scuffed as hell. The hems of his faded jeans were frayed, but his black leather duster didn’t have a scratch or a tear. His black tank had small, white fingerprints on the front. They smelled sour.

  “Is that milk?” I asked.

  He looked down at the stain, then raised his hands to sign. Be glad it’s not blood.

  Because that would be so much more natural. “What, my blood?”

  Beth’s, for letting you leave her sight.

  “I’m pretty sure she watched me the whole way,” I said.

  That’s not what I mean and you know it. This is Famine we’re talking about.

  The empty doorway where Famine had stood stared at me like a dark, accusing eye. I planted my sneaker toe in the dirt, wrapped one hand around the plain wood doorframe, and leaned inside. It looked exactly like the building where Simone and I’d spent the night on the inside, too. Red brick walls, concrete floor, chalk dust. It smelled warm and salty, like tears. Like yearning. Like unfulfilled dreams. That I could make out the scent over the constant drone of the sulfur in the In-Between air scared me.

  I leaned back and turned to face Malek. “You know why I came over here?”

  He nodded, looking at me with gray eyes that’d seen almost every good and every depravity the world had to offer. I’m going to kill her.

  I believed him. I didn’t know what to say to that, though. Good luck?

  What did you find out? he signed.

  I caught him up on what Famine had said. And then on what’d happened to Simone and me in Faery. Who we suspected. I didn’t tell him about my mom. That was private. And in any case, it didn’t matter.

  Famine had given me that memory just from proximity. Or I thought she had. I mean, I hadn’t felt her rummage through my head and choose it special. It’d just happened, and the hunger for more right along with it.

  There’d been a moment when I could’ve lost myself if only I could’ve held the memory together. What would’ve happened then? Would Famine have spirited me into her building or taken me somewhere else and used my brainwashed ass to do her bidding? How close had it been?

  I had no idea. That scared me more.

  How were we supposed to fight someone like her?

  You know you’re in over your head, Malek said.

  Truer words. “I’ve never not been in over my head. It’s never stopped me before.”

  This is different.

  “It’s always different.”

  Not this time. He cocked his head toward where we’d come from, where Beth and Simone waited. We need to move.

  “Beth told me.”

  Don’t waste any more of my time, then. And don’t waste your time. You don’t have enough left.

  “Comforting,” I said.

  You want me to tuck you in and read you bedtime stories?

  “You have more experience with that now than you used to?”

  Malek raised a brow.

  “Beth told me about her ancestor,” I said.

  Malek shook his head. Just move.

  Beth waited outside the door to the building where I’d left her, pacing in sets of three steps, hands jammed
in the front pockets of her jeans. When she saw us, she popped the door open with her elbow and backed out of the way. I went in first, relieved to see that Simone was right where I’d left her, curled up on the blanket in the corner, and she looked exactly like I expected her to, except for the part where she was awake.

  She pushed up on her elbows and pulled her legs under her very carefully as if checking for injuries or pain. She scrubbed her hair with her hands, dried blood flaking onto her shoulders like the world’s grossest dandruff. She turned to look at me. Her eyes narrowed. “You look like crap, Kev. What happened?”

  “Tell you later,” I said.

  She frowned. “Famine?”

  “Beth tell you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Right here, and would appreciate if you didn’t talk about me like I’m not,” Beth said. She came from behind me and scooped Simone’s coffee from the carry tray. Beth handed it to her. “It’s cold, but it’s caffeinated.”

  “Gracias,” Simone said.

  Beth nodded. “De nada. So, we going?”

  Malek didn’t answer. He gave the place the once-over, his gaze roaming over the remains of the chalk circle and the candles we’d lit the night before, which had burned into a puddle of wax.

  He walked over to Simone and knelt beside her. Take a look? he signed.

  Simone held out her arms.

  He studied her wounds. From what I could see, the redness had started to fade and the welts had begun to shrink. The gash on the back of her right thigh was gone. All good signs. Then again, I wasn’t looking at them with magical vision, and Malek was.

  “Okay?” I asked.

  He glanced over his shoulder at me. She’ll be fine, but I want to take a closer look.

  “Back at the shop?” I asked.

  No. In Faery.

  “People are looking for us there,” I said. “Hunting us.”

  Can’t be helped, Malek said.

  I met Simone’s gaze. Her eyes told me she didn’t know what Malek was after, but she trusted him, whatever it was. She popped the lid off of her coffee with her thumb and chugged half the contents. She took a deep breath and then swallowed the rest.

  “Fine,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  I picked up my backpack from the floor. The white feather that I’d held on to last night—that I’d set down on top of it—fell away, fluttering through the chilly air and settling on the floor.

  Simone looked at it, then at me. “Give us a minute,” she said to Malek and Beth.

  Beth huffed. “We don’t have one.”

  Simone held my gaze. “Make one.”

  Beth walked out the door. Malek followed her. I heard their footfalls, but didn’t turn to watch. I kept my eyes on Simone’s.

  Anger burned in them. “You went through my pack?”

  I felt like an asshole. “I wanted to know.”

  “You could’ve asked.”

  “I did ask. You didn’t want to talk about it.”

  “Then you should’ve just let it go, Kev.”

  She was right. “I’m sorry.”

  She held out her hand.

  I squatted and picked up the feather, passing it to her. She took it from me and resettled it in its protected place in her bag.

  “Everything I am and everything I have belongs to Faery. It belongs to the Queen,” she said. “I tried to have one private thing.”

  And I’d ruined it. Even if that private thing happened to be about me. I opened my mouth to say just that, but the look on Simone’s face stopped me. I shut my trap.

  “There are things we need to talk about,” she said. “I want to do that in my own time, when I’m ready. Not before. You understand that, Kev?”

  I nodded.

  She searched my face for a moment. Whatever she saw softened hers. “Help me up.”

  I did, as carefully as I could on my uninjured side. Still, the movement rippled through all the muscles of my back, pulling on the wounded shoulder. I took a shuddering breath and tried to steady myself. The pain faded just enough.

  Simone noticed. “I won’t break, Kev. But you might.”

  “I’m all right,” I said, trying to mean it.

  I picked up our packs and hung them over my good shoulder very slowly. I tipped my head toward the door. “Ladies first.”

  She shook her head. “Together.”

  I gave her my hand to hold. She held it tight as we made our way toward the door and stepped outside. Her skin felt a little warmer than usual, but not alarming. Her legs held steady, her steps closer to her normal gait.

  As we moved across the threshold, Beth stepped back inside. She looked small and feral all by herself in the big room. She glanced over her shoulder at her boss.

  No trace, Beth, Malek signed.

  Beth touched a mark on her right arm just above the elbow—a tattoo in the shape of a peacock feather—and closed her eyes. Two seconds later, a breeze whipped up inside the building, lifting the blanket back onto the stack where I’d taken it from, brushing away any evidence of our footprints. The carry tray and empty cups vanished as if they’d never been there. The flecked blood from Simone’s hair and clothes, and my hair and clothes, gathered into a rusty ball and poofed out of sight as well. The burnt candles and melted wax faded away.

  Beth’s footfalls didn’t seem to disturb anything anew as she walked toward us. By the time she joined us outside, you’d never have been able to tell we’d spent the night under that roof—not physically, anyway. And I’d bet a cool million not magically either.

  “You’re gonna have to tell me how you did that,” I said.

  She shook her head. “You don’t want to know.”

  “Really do.”

  She looked at me. Something about her eyes bothered me. So serious for the Beth I knew.

  You can argue about it later, Malek signed. Grab hold of me and don’t let go.

  We did what he asked. His arm felt like iron inside the leather sleeve of his coat.

  The asphalt-veined concrete, the stink of sulfur, the cloudless sky, and the bright sun that lit the leaves of the oak seemed extra real—more solid underfoot, thick enough to choke a man, impossibly blue and blinding. I could make out the dull scratches on the individual bricks that made up the building we’d slept in. I could almost taste the look in Beth’s eyes that made me wonder what the hell she’d done to erase our tracks, and what the hell had been done to her that she could do such a thing.

  With my arm linked through Malek’s, I shoved my hands in the pockets of my jacket. Simone threaded her arm through mine and drew me close, holding on tight. I imagined I could hear her heartbeat, and that it sounded weak. It had to be imagination, didn’t it? I glanced at her.

  She looked right back at me. “What?”

  “I’m hearing things,” I said.

  “Thoughts?”

  “No. Your heart.”

  Her gaze turned speculative. “That shouldn’t happen. It shouldn’t be possible.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re human,” she said.

  If there was more to it, she didn’t have a chance to tell me.

  The In-Between disappeared with a pop as we stepped between worlds, into and through the fire. The flame seared away the sulfur stench and any thought I had except when I could take my next breath. I fixed all my will on it.

  My lungs ached. My head started to feel detached from my neck, like a helium balloon on a long string trying to break away. I clenched my teeth, sparks from the flame singeing the ends of my hair and the threads of my jacket and laying the sunburn on my skin until I couldn’t hold on anymore.

  I tightened my grip on Malek. I pulled Simone closer.

  My vision went fuzzy.

  A heartbeat later, we stepped out of the In-Between and into the Realm of Faery.

  In place of concrete, soil deep and soft enough for my sneakers to sink into. In place of the bright light and blue sky, the dim fade of twilight, everything tinted with indigo
s and grays. The air smelled of green so strong, it was like the opposite of the sulfur, like crushed grass and rising sap and life reaching up from the earth with so much strength and determination, it felt like a punch in the face.

  I let go of Malek’s arm, but kept hold of Simone’s. She was breathing fast. Faster than I liked.

  I turned us three-hundred-sixty degrees, searching for trouble. No one rushed us. No one in sight, even. I heard a caw that sounded far away, and one that answered it. Crows. Interested and marking our presence, but not coming any closer for the moment.

  This was a different part of Faery than where Simone and I had last been. Trees surrounded us—hemlocks and Doug firs like we’d seen before back where the fae girl with the knife had died, but also oak and holly and birch and yew and every kind of tree I could think of. I’d never seen a forest in my world where they all grew in one place, in such close proximity. I’d never known that to be the case anywhere.

  Except there was one place even in Faery where that kind of thing could happen, and I knew it even if I didn’t like to think too much about it: the home of the King and Queen. The Faery Court. The woods here were called the First Forest.

  The first time I’d been here, I’d been trying to sneak in and gotten caught—the night I rode with the Wild Hunt. I’d been held prisoner in a back room of the palace or the castle or whatever you wanted to call it. It’d felt like counting down the minutes toward my own execution.

  A little while later, a guard took me to dinner in the great hall, sitting me down beside the King. I fought a battle of minds with him. Being inside his head, figuring out what made him tick, his regrets, his complete and total disconnect from anything a human being would consider to be right or moral or good, and then becoming shackled to him as the go-between humans and fae—that did not fill me with happy memories.

  There was a path in front of us. Not paved or marked in any other way, but as my vision adjusted, I could make it out just fine. A ribbon of cleared earth wound through the trees and over a small hill I couldn’t see over. But on the other side, sure as I lived and breathed, there’d be a gate that led under the ground into the place the King and Queen—no, the new Queen, Silver—called home, with its smooth, river-stone floors and torches set into sconces along the walls, with its great hall where meals were served and business was transacted and Silver ruled absolute.