Zydeco Queen and the Creole Fairy Courts

by Cutter, Leah

  Francine felt shabby in her solid human boots, jeans, and shirt. But Julius hadn’t told her any different. Maybe she should have guessed though—the Unseelie were here to watch their enemy imprisoned.

  Why did Erastus want her to fetter the queen? Maybe it would be a good thing. If she knew how the locks worked, maybe she’d be able to loosen them, or something, to give the queen respite.

  Not to help her escape. No.

  Francine awkwardly pushed herself forward, making her way to the front of the Grand Hall, where the king’s throne stood. Fairies grumbled around her, but they let her pass.

  Queen Yvette sat, still and poised, in her bamboo cage.

  Julius had transformed himself again, as if vanquishing the warrior who’d been there the day before, wearing a pea-green silk frock coat that shimmered with fairy lights over an off-white, ruffled shirt. He gave Francine a polite smile when she caught his eye, then motioned for her to come forward. Suddenly, the press of people ended, with the ones closest to Francine stepping to the side, a path cleared for her.

  Uncle Rene would look great in that outfit, despite how much weight he’d lost.

  Francine shook her head. She couldn’t afford to think about her human family now.

  “Good, good,” Julius said, catching Francine’s hand and giving the back of it a quick, formal kiss.

  “You look perfect.”

  Francine glanced at her casual clothes, then at Julius, then at the rest of the court. “I do?”

  “Trust me,” Julius said.

  Francine kept the smile on her face through sheer willpower.

  “Of course,” she managed to reply, swallowing down her shock.

  Until Julius had said those words, Francine hadn’t been able to put her finger on what had changed so dramatically between yesterday and today.

  Francine didn’t trust them. Any of them.

  Not Julius, not Erastus, not even Amos and Claire.

  It wasn’t that Papa had been right. The Unseelie just weren’t human, and Francine was only now starting to realize what that meant.

  A doorway shimmered to life beside Queen Yvette.

  Francine turned, startled, but Julius was nodding his head, smiling.

  Erastus came through the gateway, prancing on his goat legs. Unlike the rest of the court, his chest was still bare. He did wear a magnificent black-and-gold cloak that swirled with a life of its own. A small silver circlet wreathed his dark curls, making him look like a prince. His horns glowed with fairy light, weird and startling.

  Behind Erastus came four warriors, dressed in red paint and cloaks.

  Francine choked down her sudden fear. She made her hands stay still by her sides instead of reaching for the fiddle strapped to her back.

  The warriors scared her now.

  Francine worked hard to keep her trembling to the inside, to not show it in her face or stance.

  The four warriors carried a heavy wooden box, made of long planks, dirty and scratched, like it had been dug up recently. It wasn’t big enough for a coffin, and it was shaped square. The ends were pegged together, like an old-fashioned jewelry box.

  Francine would bet no gems lay inside.

  Something about the box made Francine want to squirm, as if spiders were crawling up and down her spine. Something was wrong with that thing, something bad that didn’t belong in Féerie, like chainsaws come to cut down the trees.

  “My friends!” Erastus called.

  The court settled immediately, shushing each other. Silence wove its way up through the trees.

  “It is only through you, my people, that this day is possible!”

  Francine expected cheering, but the fairies remained eerily silent.

  As one, the fairies in the front row, closest to the king and that box, had all stepped back.

  None of them looked at the king.

  They all stared at the box.

  “Today, today is the start of our greatest triumph! Our influence shall grow, stronger than ever before! We will be the directing influence of all the worlds! They will all dance to our tune!”

  A soft sigh went through the crowd, as if they were accepting their fate.

  “Release the Seelie queen! Bring her forward!” Erastus demanded.

  Grinning, the four warriors went over to the bamboo cage. They shook it, growling, as if daring Queen Yvette to shrink back from them.

  The queen continued to stare into space. However, she no longer looked serene—merely blank, stone-faced. Her gator eyes didn’t blink as the warriors suddenly pulled the walls of her cage apart.

  Erastus went over to Yvette, offering his hand to help her rise from her knees. She took it without looking at him.

  “See their queen!” Erastus said, bringing her forward, their hands held high as if part of a dance.

  “See her here, in our power!”

  Julius leaned over to Francine.

  “Open the box,” he said. “And take out the fetters.”

  Francine blinked. Her spine stiffened.

  What kind of fetters gave off such a feeling of wrongness?

  She didn’t want to get anywhere near them. She looked at Julius, biting her lips together so she wouldn’t just tell him no.

  “Go on,” he said, smiling at her.

  Either he wasn’t afraid of them, or he didn’t feel them.

  Refusing to show how scared she was, Francine made her way across the stage to the box. The lid was hinged with wood and leather, not metal. The dirt was just age, not soil. And the scratch marks looked like ordinary use, not like they’d been made with claws.

  Francine touched the top of the box lightly, ready to draw her hand back if anything growled or moved.

  The box felt surprisingly solid.

  Too solid.

  What did that mean?

  Francine glanced over her shoulder.

  Julius was no longer smiling.

  She was taking too long.

  Taking another deep breath, Francine threw back the lid, holding herself ready to jump back.

  Though the box was easily three feet long, all it contained were a pair of black iron wrist cuffs with a chain between them. Instead of a ratchet, like modern handcuffs, loops on the edges of each cuff overlapped, held together with a pin.

  Francine checked the corners of the box. Nothing sat there, poised with fangs, ready to attack her. Still, she only used one hand to snatch the cuffs up.

  The sudden stinging in Francine’s hand made her nearly drop them again.

  Francine shifted the cuffs from one hand to the other, looking at her reddened palm. She didn’t see an obvious mark, where she’d caught her palm on an iron burr. Plus, the other hand now stung. She examined the cuffs. The metal felt rough under her fingers and the cold of it sank quickly into her bones.

  The metal never warmed in her hands.

  When Francine turned to the king, he looked uneasy as well. His words continued to be brave.

  “See what we have brought from the human world!”

  The crowd finally roared, loud and fierce, even those closest to Francine.

  “See how we will take her power!”

  Suddenly, Francine understood. The box didn’t belong here. It wasn’t from Féerie. Neither were the cuffs.

  In all the stories Mama and Uncle Rene had told Francine, cold iron hurt the Fée. But the stories had it wrong. In the human world, iron had little effect. Only here, in Féerie, could it bind and bleed.

  Of course the king had wanted Francine to bind the queen. She was the most human, the only one who could hold the fetters without horrible pain.

  Julius walked over to where Francine stood.

  “You must use them,” he said quietly. He wasn’t looking at her, but at the dark metal in her hands.

  “Now,” he added, cupping her elbow and bringing her before the queen.

  Francine knew she couldn’t refuse. The warriors would tear her to pieces and drink her blood if she tried to walk away.

>   Papa wouldn’t be proud of Francine for this.

  “I’m sorry,” Francine said, eyes downcast as she reached for the queen’s left wrist.

  Yvette didn’t say anything, though she hissed quietly as Francine fastened the cuff.

  When Francine looked up, she saw that Queen Yvette had grown ashen under her dark skin.

  “I’m so sorry,” Francine repeated as she put on the second cuff.

  Though the queen had been cruel to her, Francine wasn’t heartless. She didn’t want to hurt the queen like this.

  A cheer went through the court as Francine stepped away.

  Queen Yvette closed her eyes and her shoulders fell forward as she hunched.

  The court jeered and laughed.

  Francine wanted to look away. Shame washed through her.

  Revenge didn’t taste very sweet.

  When Queen Yvette opened her eyes again, they’d turned as white as her hair. Her stoic look returned, but lines now crossed her smooth forehead and curved around the corners of her eyes. She held her mouth in a firm line, as if to stop herself from showing more emotion and grimacing.

  Francine could only guess how much pain Queen Yvette was in.

  “Let the imprisonment begin!”

  The giant live oak just beyond the platform groaned and the ground began to shake. Francine looked left and right, but the rest of the court stayed where they were.

  A hole appeared at the base of the tree. Its sweeping branches lifted off the ground. The warriors pushed the queen back and back. She didn’t look behind her, but took one step after another.

  A root moved, tripping the queen. She fell backwards, gripping the side of the hole with both her hands, fighting her captors.

  Roots and limbs wrapped around the queen, then pierced her arms and torso, through her shoulder and above her hip. Bright blood marred the queen’s white gown. She screamed in pain.

  The Unseelie court howled louder.

  The tree sucked the queen back, down into the hole.

  Even out of sight, Francine heard Queen Yvette’s pained cries. The tree trembled as it fought to draw the queen deeper under the earth.

  Even after the hole disappeared and the trees’ shuddering had died down, Francine still heard Queen Yvette’s screams in the muttering of the wind.

  * * *

  Francine escaped the Great Hall as gracefully as she could. She couldn’t escape quickly. Too many of the court came up to her, to shake her hand, wanting to touch the hand that had so bravely touched the black iron. It struck Francine again just how much they perceived her as an outsider: family, but never the same.

  Their beautiful court clothing couldn’t hide the fact that they were Fée, different.

  Inhuman.

  It wasn’t until Francine got back to the grove she called hers that she realized she couldn’t stay.

  Under the constant whispering of the leaves came that single tremor from the great oak, a muted, constant scream.

  Desperate, Francine shaped the gateway to her woods, the ones shaped out of her need and blood, that Melisandra had sent her to.

  As Francine moved her hands down the edges, the center broke.

  Frustrated, Francine tried again. She spread the magic a little thicker, but it wouldn’t stick.

  Francine forced herself to take a deep breath. She even pulled her fiddle from her back, plucking a quick arpeggio just to calm her nerves. The wood and the strings also calmed her, the quick scent of wood and polish.

  The third time was the charm. Francine formed the doorway, then hesitated. What if she’d drawn a gate to the wrong place?

  Squaring her shoulders, Francine went through the doorway. She’d battled her own kin. She could get back if she had to.

  Everything looked normal to Francine. She took a deep breath, then tried to take a step.

  Francine’s feet stuck to the ground. Deep mud lay beneath the grass of the meadow. If she stayed, it would suck her down.

  Without hesitation, Francine pulled out her fiddle and played an uplifting melody, fast enough to raise the dead and maybe her little piece of land.

  It took a while for the ground to dry.

  Francine didn’t know if it had started sinking while she’d been gone, or if her tears had soaked into it, threatening to drown the place.

  As soon as Francine could dance easily along the path she did, racing to her grove of trees.

  The trees swayed in greeting, sleepy but not dulled as they’d been before.

  Francine played a song of greeting, then another, playing with her favorite partners. They swayed and danced with her, their leaves twirling in the talkative wind.

  It didn’t take too long before Francine realized she was exhausted. Her fingers trembled, skipping notes. Between the battle and Queen Yvette’s imprisonment, she felt drained, emotionally and physically.

  Francine reached for the nearest tree, intending to nap in its branches.

  Only when Francine had laid down in the soft nest the tree had made for her did she feel the tremor.

  The echoing screams from Queen Yvette touched her trees here, as well.

  Pierre had told Francine that all the worlds were just reflections of human world. If the Unseelie won, their influence would be the greatest in the human world.

  Humans were already petty and mean. Francine had experienced that first hand at school.

  Would the Unseelie make them even more so?

  Francine climbed as high as she could. The thinner branches didn’t transmit Queen Yvette’s pain as much.

  Though Francine didn’t think she’d sleep, she eventually did, her dreams full of her own heartache and Mama dying again, her own tears mingling with the queen’s.

  * * *

  Francine.

  Her name echoed through her spine, creeping across her skin, flowing up over her shoulders and into her chest.

  Francine, darling.

  Still groggy, Francine blinked open her eyes. No branches blocked her view of the pale blue sky. She peered over the edge, wary. The tree she’d slept in had grown taller over night to protect her, cresting the rest of the woods, thinning the constant screams. The sky ended sharply on all sides, cut off by trees.

  Nothing existed beyond what she saw.

  No wonder Pierre had called it a bubble world.

  Finally, Francine looked down.

  Julius stood beneath the tree, one hoof resting on the trunk. He’d called her through the tree, not out loud.

  Francine reached the ground and stood there, arms crossed, glaring at Julius. How dare he come into her woods?

  Julius frowned back at Francine. “What are you doing here?”

  Wasn’t it obvious?

  “These are my woods.”

  “But you agreed you weren’t coming back until the war was over.”

  “I thought—that it—there are more battles?”

  The pit of Francine’s stomach dropped and she suddenly felt lightheaded.

  Francine couldn’t watch the warriors battle again. Or the dancers. Or anyone, really.

  “No, no,” Julius said.

  Julius put a solid hoof on Francine’s shoulder, anchoring her. His palm was warm as her papa’s had always been.

  “Raids, only,” Julius assured her.

  “But darling, now is more dangerous to be here, away from the court, than before. You never know when a troop of Seelie warriors may blunder through.”

  “They couldn’t just come. They’d have to know how to get here.”

  Francine tightened her arms over her chest, holding back her fear.

  “The bubble worlds are all joined.” Julius spread his hooves wide, then made one hoof pitch and swerve like a snake, approaching the other.

  “And some are good at finding trails between them, traveling to ones where there’s people living.”

  “I’m sorry,” Francine said after another minute of expectant silence.

  She seemed to be saying that a lot.

 
“I didn’t mean to worry you.”

  Julius merely nodded.

  “I knew where you’d be,” he said softly.

  “Now, we have to get going. We have just a bit of time before the raid, and I’m needing your skills.”

  “But—” Francine paused, unwilling to step out from under her trees. They might carry the echo of Queen Yvette’s screams, but they were still her home.

  “What do you want me to do? What do you do in a raid?”

  “The Seelie, as you know, sleep in separate houses, not sensibly in trees that would protect them. We’re just going to show up at one of their ’neighborhoods.’ Surprise a few. Maybe take some prisoner.”

  “Like the queen?” Francine asked, her voice strained. She would not help the Unseelie bury more of the Seelie. The trees would be untouchable.

  “Child, no, not like that. We have a nice wooden cage for them. Takes too much magic to hide someone like we hid Yvette.”

  “Hide?” Francine asked.

  “Well, you and I, my dear, and the Unseelie, we know where she’s at. Everyone else just gets an echo of her. They can’t find her, find the tree that binds her.”

  “I see.” Francine said quietly.

  When Julius walked away from under the trees, Francine followed him across the meadow.

  Maybe he had been worried about her safety. He’d certainly sounded happy to see her.

  Or maybe Francine hadn’t hidden her feelings as well as they’d hidden the queen, and now Julius didn’t trust her, either.

  * * *

  Francine had expected to step through the arch and be in the Unseelie woods.

  Instead, she arrived at the borderlands. She recognized the stumps of the Seelie trees; instead of a single line, they now filled an entire field. The air held the scent of ash grown cold. Francine strained to hear the usual birdsong, but even the rustling of the trees was muted.

  “Today, I want a different type of music,” Julius instructed. “Slower. Gospels. Hymns. Music for picking crops.”

  Francine knew the types of tunes he was asking for.