by Amy Sumida
Sitting beside me and Arach was Lorna, mother to Guirmean's son, Prince Morgan. And beside her was Darius, one of my lions and Lorna's lover. Yeah, it was a weird situation but everyone got along, which was more than I could say for me and Queen Aalish. The Earth royals were seated across the aisle from us due to the well known animosity between me and the Earth Queen. The Air royals were seated beside them to keep them company but the High Queen was with us. Probably because the High Queen was once a fire faerie.
High Queen Meara was a leanan-sidhe, from the House of Fire, and although she hadn't physically changed, technically she was a spirit fey since she had married Cian and become a member of the High Royal Family that ruled all of Faerie. Still, she knew where she came from and had requested to sit with us while her husband conducted the marriage ceremony. Plus, I think she wanted to be near the babies and even now had Prince Morgan on her lap, cooing at the little prince.
But she stopped cooing when the music began and we all stood to watch Nora come walking up the aisle escorted by her father, Albion. Albion was of course a fire phooka but he was beyond proud to escort his daughter to her soon-to-be water fey husband. Nora's mother, Sonasag, was at the end of our row, right beside the High Queen, and she was already crying happy tears.
Nora looked amazing. She may have got her wish to have the ceremony in the dry ballroom of Castle Under but Nora was still getting married in water. Her dress matched Guirmean's cloak and frothed about her in a liquid mimicry of a bridal gown. A pale blue underdress showed through some of the thin areas but most of the outfit was moving too quickly to be transparent. It was accented with bits of cream colored lace and the veil that trailed over her dark hair was made solely of the fabric, so that it draped behind her on the watery train of her dress like beautiful flotsam. She wore a necklace of pearls but no tiara, that space was reserved for the water crown.
I beamed at her as she passed by us but her eyes were set on Guirmean and they were shining with happiness behind that lacey veil. Her father helped her up the steps and her mother rushed forward to take her massive bouquet of fey water flowers from her. Sonasag came back to her seat with her husband escorting her and we all slid over to make room for the father of the bride.
The High King came forward and just as he opened his mouth to start the ceremony, Brevyn opened his eyes and slapped me. Okay, he didn't exactly slap me but he smacked his palm into my cheek forcefully. It was one of those baby slaps except his had psychic intent behind it and was very purposeful.
We'd recently discovered that my sons had been born with two souls. Brevyn had a god and a human soul while Rian had a faerie essence and a human soul. This would have affects on my children that we weren't entirely sure of yet. However, we were sure that Brevyn had a god magic which was brand new; the magic of Borrowing. He could copy anyone's magical ability and use it for as long as he wished. Because he also had a human soul, he was even able to copy fey magic. And due to this constant questing magic of his, Brevyn also had a psychic gift. We believe it was meant to help him choose which magic to borrow but lately he'd been using it to show me all manner of strangeness... and usually at the most inopportune moments.
“A Thaisce?” Arach whispered to me but that was the last thing I heard from the real world.
I fell into Brevyn's vision; a world of fluttering shadows. I squinted into the dark and flinched as something brushed my face. A cry sounded, a horrible screeching cry that made me shiver. Then came the slapping sound of something moving through water. Splash, splash, thwack. Whatever it was, it landed hard, as if it were thrown. The shadows continued to screech and move about me but slowly, they started to separate and I saw that they weren't shadows at all. They were birds, lots of big, black birds.
Wings beat madly as the birds swarmed upward and surged through a bright blue sky. I stared at them as they circled overhead. Their cries continued to fill my ears but they faded the further up the birds went until it was just a background murmur, sounding strangely like sobbing. I blinked up at the rustling shapes, sunlight streaming through them, and pondered what they had to do with me.
“They're crows,” a woman said from somewhere nearby.
I gave a start and looked towards the voice. She was old and hunched, bent even further while she washed a black jacket in the river that rushed by her. We were standing on a flat plain. The grass of the fields looked dead, almost completely brown in spots, despite the wealth of water which ran through it. The sky seemed cold suddenly, a winter sky without clouds, and the river was crusted with ice.
Still, the old woman swished the fabric through the water and pulled it out to slap against a flat stone before her. Splash, splash, thwack. Splash, splash, thwack. She didn't even spare me a glance.
“What did you say?” I asked her.
“Crows,” she muttered, angry at having to repeat herself. “They're carrion crows. Stupid girl,” she made tsking sounds to herself.
I looked again at the field, peered closer at the grass, and saw that it wasn't dying at all. It was simply covered in death. The brown patches were dried blood and when I lifted my gaze to the horizon, I saw the outline of a pile of corpses. Some of the crows were perched upon them, feasting.
“Where are we?” I whispered.
“Nowhere,” the old woman said conversationally, satisfied that I was finally paying attention. “This is nowhere but it is still somewhere important.”
“What happened here?”
“Battle, girl!” She snapped. “What do you think happened? People will die. Not yet, no, not quite yet, but soon. Oh yes,” splash, splash, thwack. “Soon,” she lifted the cloth to her face and inspected the torn fabric. “Almost out. Almost clean. Almost.”
“I know that coat,” I walked towards her slowly. “That's my husband's jacket.”
“Is it now?” She cackled.
“What are you doing with it?” I demanded.
“Washing out the blood,” she shook her head at the coat and stuck it back in the water. “That's what I do. I wash and I warn. I warn and I wash but no one ever listens.” She lowered her voice to a mutter again, “Why don't they ever listen?”
“I'm listening,” I insisted. “Why does my husband's coat have blood on it?”
“Because he's going to die,” she turned to me and cackled. Her eyes were sightless gray but I knew she could see me. This woman could see more than most. She continued to laugh as the birds swooped down from the sky and surged around me.
“When?!” I screeched. “How? Tell me! Give me your warning!”
“As the crow flies, my dear! As the crow flies.”
I jerked out of the vision, my heart racing as I found myself staring into Brevyn's eyes again. My skin was freezing even though Arach was leaning in against me, one arm around me as he tried to surround me while still holding Rian. Brevyn looked calm for just a moment and then he opened his mouth to take a deep breath. He screamed with such terror that the whole room went quiet and stared at us. Rian woke up and began screaming too, which then sent Morgan to screaming.
“My apologies,” Arach stood and helped me to my feet. “Please continue, I'm so sorry for the disturbance.”
He led me out of the row of seats and then out of the room. Lorna followed after us with the wailing Morgan, and Darius followed after her.
“In here,” Lorna opened a door off the hallway and ushered us into a sitting room. “Shh now,” she bounced Morgan, who had already started to calm.
Arach and I had a harder time with our twins but after a few minutes, we were able to get the boys quiet again and they soon fell back into exhausted slumbers.
“What did you see?” Arach already knew what had transpired, he'd seen Brevyn share his visions with me often enough to recognize the signs.
“See?” Darius asked.
“Brevyn has been showing me visions,” I explained but it was hard to speak around the lump of fear lodged in my throat.
“Visions?” Lorna asked softly an
d gave her son a fake smile. “Visions,” she repeated in a happy voice, widening her already massive blue eyes at him until he giggled.
“Of the future,” I whispered and sat heavily on a couch. “Sometimes of the past.”
“What did you see, Vervain?” Arach laid Rian on the couch beside me and then knelt before me.
“A washer woman,” I swallowed hard and looked into his dragon eyes.
“What?” He frowned. “A bean-nighe?”
“No, she wasn't a faerie,” I took a deep breath, trying to hold it together. Don't scream, don't scream, nothing's happened yet. It was only a warning, remember? It can be stopped. Can't it? “She was... I don't know; a goddess perhaps?”
“I don't know of any goddess washers,” Arach frowned. “But if she was a washer, it means only one thing.”
“Whomever's clothes she was washing will die,” Lorna finished and Morgan started to whine. “It's okay,” she said brightly. “It was just a vision, yes it was,” she cooed at him.
“Vervain,” Arach took my hands and flinched when he felt how cold they were.
He slid Brevyn from my arms and laid him beside his brother before returning to me. He put my palms between his and focused his fire into me. I took a relieved breath as my temperature went back up. Why hadn't I thought to do that?
“She's in shock,” Darius came into view, his turquoise eyes going dark with concern. “Tima focus, tell us what happened. Whose clothes was she washing?”
“Kirill's,” I burst into tears.
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About the Author
Amy Sumida lives on an island in the Pacific Ocean where gods can still be found. She sleeps in a fairy bed, high in the air, with two gravity-defying felines and upon waking, enjoys stabbing people with little needles, over and over, under the guise of making pretty pictures on their skin. She, like Vervain, has no filter but has been fortunate enough to find friends who appreciate this... or at least tell her they do. She aspires to someday become a crazy cat lady, sitting on her rocker on her front porch and guarding her precious kitties with a shotgun loaded with rock salt. She bellydances and paints pictures on her walls but is happiest with her nose stuck in a book, her mind in a different world than this one, filled with fantastical men who unfortunately don't exist in our mundane reality. Thank the gods for fantasy.
For information on new releases, detailed character descriptions, and a in-depth look at the worlds of Godhunter and the Twilight Court, check out Amy's website;
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