Faerie Wars 02 - The Purple Emperor

by Brennan, Herbie

  Henry decided to feel his way around it. With luck he might not have to give himself away. 'The new Queen's not too happy with me,' he said as casually as he could. If he played it cool enough, he might find out subtly what they felt about the Queen before he had to commit himself.

  'The new Queen's loony as a Border Redcap,' Peach Blossom said.

  CHAPTER FIFTY SEVEN

  He knew there was something he should have done. He'd thrown her in without staking her heart. Brimstone looked up at the crows circling overhead and making such a racket. Too late now. There was somebody coming and he didn't know how much time he had before they got here. Whoever was approaching was close and there was no way Brimstone could afford to be found beside an open hole with his wife's body at the bottom. Especially with her skull smashed in and her stupid wizened little brain oozing out of her nose.

  He grabbed the spade and set to filling in the grave.

  It was hard work, but he couldn't afford to slow. The crows were going berserk now, stupid birds, and he even fancied he could hear somebody stomping through the undergrowth. Fortunately filling a grave with loose earth was a lot faster than digging it in the first place. He flung the last spadeful and glanced around desperately. The whole place looked what it was - freshly-dug earth. He might as well have put up a notice: New Grave Here.

  Dead leaves!

  That was it - dead leaves! Dead leaves for a dead wife. If he could just get the body covered up loosely now, he could divert whoever was coming and get back later to finish the job. He began to strew armfuls of dead leaves across the newly-dug grave. But he was nowhere nearly finished when he was transfixed by a bright blue light and something tall and hideous stepped into the clearing. Brimstone dropped the rest of the leaves. He felt his heart stop and his face go pale. No more than five yards away loomed Beleth, Prince of Darkness.

  Beleth looked awful.

  He'd appeared in his gigantic demon form, but one of his horns was crumpled, two of his fangs were broken and he had an ear missing. There was a fading bruise under his right eye, a pulsating lump on his head and a hideous scar that ran all the way down his left cheek, over his jaw and across his throat. Brimstone had always been terrified of the Infernal Prince, but at the moment the creature hardly looked capable of chewing off a baby's leg. His heart restarted and the colour flooded back into his face. 'What happened to you?' he asked. Beleth scowled. 'That's not important.' 'No, really,' Brimstone said. 'I'm concerned.' 'A bomb blew up in my face,' Beleth said shortly. 'Fortunately this form is virtually indestructible. But what's important -'

  'How come all the Hael portals are closed?' Brimstone asked curiously. Beleth must have come by vimana: it was the only way. And since a transport vimana trip would take years, he had to have come alone in one of the fast single-seater saucers, which he'd never, ever done before.

  Beleth covered the distance between them in three massive strides and caught him by the throat. Brimstone felt himself lifted up as if he were thistledown. 'Gaah!' he choked. 'Gaah!'

  'What's important,' Beleth repeated quietly, his face close to Brimstone's own, 'is that the rest of the Hael Realm wasn't as fortunate as I was.' He released Brimstone, who dropped back to the ground with a spine-jarring thud.

  'The Hael Realm was destroyed?' Brimstone gasped, massaging his throat.

  'Don't be stupid. But it's in serious need of reconstruction.' He glared at Brimstone with blood-red eyes. 'The cost will run to billions.'

  Brimstone swallowed painfully. 'Bit strapped at the moment, I'm afraid. I -' He caught Beleth's expression and ground to a halt. 'That's not what it's about, is it?' He wondered what it was about, but one thing was for certain: this had to be good news. If the Hael Realm lay in ruins, then Beleth would have more on his mind than a broken contract. Besides, that whole silly business about sacrificing Pyrgus was old news now, hardly worth even think--

  'What it's about,' growled Beleth, 'is treachery! What it's about is ingratitude! What it's about is broken agreements, welching on bargains, turn-coating scumbags!'

  Perhaps it was worth thinking about after all. 'I'm sorry about that contract business,' Brimstone said hurriedly. 'Circumstances beyond my -'

  'Not you, you imbecile!' Beleth roared. 'That mealy-mouthed cretinous little upstart Hairstreak!'

  Brimstone blinked. 'Hairstreak? Lord Hairstreak?'

  Beleth and Lord Hairstreak had been allies in the last attempt to overthrow the Faeries of the Light.

  'Yes. Lord Hairstreak! Crapulous crud-faced puke-mouthed sewage-headed little ... little ... little ... '

  Beleth was losing it. His eyes were flashing seven colours and flecks of spittle were flying from his mouth. The bump on his head had started to pulsate and the scar across his throat seemed to be opening up to show a row of straining stitches. Brimstone wondered if he might actually have had to sew his head back on after the bomb exploded. But this was clearly no time for speculation.

  'I thought you and Hairstreak were allies?' he said quickly.

  'Were,' said Beleth sourly. 'Operative word. Past tense. Hairstreak was happy to accept my help when he thought it would put him on the Peacock Throne. Now I need his, he doesn't want to know.'

  'That's dreadful,' Brimstone said sympathetically, wondering what Beleth had expected from a Faerie of the Night. 'He's betrayed you in your hour of need, is that it?'

  'Exactly!' Beleth said.

  Seemed like a good idea to Brimstone. Beleth was clearly weak now. On his knees, in fact. Perfect time to kick him. Except that demon princes always had their resources - they commanded some very nasty magic. Besides, Beleth now knew Brimstone had been burying a body. Perhaps it was safest to be more subtle.

  'So,' he said cautiously, 'what do you want from me?'

  Beleth told him.

  CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT

  It was weird to approach the Purple Palace as an enemy might, examining the terrain for cover, checking points of vulnerability, looking out for guard patrols. Pyrgus felt a mixture of nervous excitement and nausea. It was all so familiar - the river, the island, the palace itself.

  He glanced at his companions. Blue, of course. Dearest Blue. He didn't think he'd have got through any of this without her. He'd always been better at doing than planning and since he ... since his fa-- and now he could hardly think straight any more. It was thanks to Blue they had a plan in place now. And it was thanks to Blue that with just a little luck, they might clear up this mess.

  Next to Blue was a wizard engineer named Ziczac -a tiny, bearded Forest Faerie with brown eyes in a wizened face that made him look like a little woodland animal peering through a bush. He had the technical skills to penetrate walls.

  Pyrgus remembered how lost he'd felt during that little discussion, although Mr Fogarty had obviously followed it. The bottom line seemed to be that while Forest Faerie were able to phase-shift into solid surfaces once the necessary magic was in place, setting it up for the first time was something that needed specialist skills. (And testing the set-up was always dangerous, Queen Cleopatra warned. It took only a small mis judgement and you could find yourself trapped in the middle of a solid rock, suffocating to death.) Ziczac was one of the few who had the skills. He carried the necessary equipment in a small backpack.

  Protecting Ziczac, Blue and himself were three Forest Faerie soldiers. One of them, to Pyrgus's secret delight, was Nymph.

  That was it. There'd been a brief discussion about sending more troops but Blue had overruled the idea without even bothering to consult Pyrgus. She said a full-scale attack might precipitate just the sort of civil war that had been so narrowly averted only weeks before. Far better to stage a small-scale commando raid and simply rescue their father. Once he was removed from Hairstreak's influence, they could decide what would happen next.

  Pyrgus hoped they'd be able to find their father quickly - the operation relied on the element of surprise. But he felt fairly confident he could still command the loyalty of many in the palace buildi
ng. They should have help once they were safely inside.

  There was no question of using the ferry to get across to the palace. Neither Pyrgus nor Blue trusted personal illusion spells, and without them their faces were far too easily recognised for them to approach the island openly. Consequently they were now crouched in the shelter of reeds nearly two hundred yards downstream of the official crossing.

  Pyrgus glanced at Nymph. 'Do I take your Queen at her word, or should we all get ready to swim?'

  Nymph gave Pyrgus a basilisk look, softened by the hint of a grin. 'Today you keep your feet dry, Crown Prince,' she told him. He noticed she never used his given name, and his title was always granted with a tiny emphasis as if she found it ironic. She had really nice legs. The uniform of the forest army ended in green tights that showed them off wonderfully.

  Pyrgus reluctantly dragged his gaze upwards. Nymph was pulling some sort of net from the pouch around her waist. As she drew it clear, she cast it outwards over the river as if trying to catch a fish. But somewhere between the movement of her wrist and striking the surface of the water, the net transformed into a smaller version of the raft-like transport the Forest Faerie used on their overhead roadways. It should have been swept away by the current at once, but instead remained as firmly in place as if it had been anchored.

  Pyrgus blinked and tried not to show he was impressed. The Forest Faerie kept producing spell technology like nothing he'd ever seen before. Transforming the appearance of something was easy enough: all you had to do was coat it with an illusion spell. Changing what it did was more difficult, but still possible if you had the money for expensive magic. But nothing he'd ever seen changed the essential nature of anything. You could make a pandatherium look and act like an endolg, but it would still have the weight and mass of a pandatherium. Yet this raft, in different form, could be rolled up small enough and light enough to be carried in a slim girl's pouch. That simply wasn't possible, except that he'd seen it for himself.

  'On to the raft!' Nymph hissed. 'I have to get us cloaked.'

  There was something about her that reminded Pyrgus of Blue. Not that they looked alike, and Nymph was older, of course, but now he was getting to know her better he noticed a bossy streak emerging. Certainly she was a take-charge sort of girl. He wondered what she meant by getting them cloaked, but decided to trust she knew what she was doing.

  Blue was less trusting. 'What do you mean, get us cloake"'

  'Hide us so we shall not be seen by anyone in the palace,' Nymph said.

  'Invisibility?'

  Nymph shook her head. 'With invisibility you're still there.'

  Which, as an answer, made no sense at all to Pyrgus. But he was anxious to get on. 'I think we should climb on, Blue,' he said softly. She glared at him, but stepped at once on to the raft.

  Both Blue and the raft disappeared.

  'It is invisibility,' Pyrgus said.

  But Nymph was shaking her head again. 'Cloaking,' she insisted. 'You cannot feel the vessel or your sister unless I deactivate.' She caught the look on his face and added, 'Go on - try: we have time.'

  Pyrgus stretched out his hands to the spot where Blue had been before she vanished. They encountered nothing. 'Blue?' he whispered.

  'She can see you and hear you,' Nymph said. 'But you cannot sense her in any way. Nor our transport. Feel.'

  Pyrgus knelt down and swept his hand along the segment of water in front of him. There was no invisible raft. Blue might have stepped out of reach, but the raft had been solidly moored, or so it seemed. Except now it was gone.

  Nymph, who was clearly enjoying this, said, 'Now step on board, please.'

  Pyrgus straightened up, frowning. 'It's not there any more.'

  Nymph actually grinned. 'Just take a pace forward, Crown Prince. Did I not promise you would not get wet today?'

  He knew it was a challenge and took it up without a second's hesitation. He stepped forward into what looked like the surface of the swiftly running river.

  He was on the raft with Blue. The others were lined up on the river bank.

  'What was all that about?' Blue asked.

  'Could you see me?'

  'Pefectly,' Blue sniffed.

  'You could see what I was doing?'

  'Right down to your simpering at little Miss Nymph Know-it-all,' Blue said.

  Although there was no sign of a propulsion system and no distinctive scent of magic, the raft cut directly across the current.

  'What's driving us?' Pyrgus asked quietly.

  'No need to whisper,' Nymph told him. 'We can't be heard outside the cloak.' She glanced around as if to emphasise the fact there was nobody to hear them in the middle of the river anyway. She looked back at Pyrgus and smiled slightly. 'We have a standard magical drive. Forward thrust, directional controls, low-grade levitation to reduce the friction.'

  'There's no smell,' Pyrgus said.

  'Not much point in cloaking if they could still smell us,' Nymph said, without explaining how the Forest Faerie managed it.

  Pyrgus was about to press the point when he noticed they were approaching their destination already. The Old Keep of the palace, built in deep prehistory using stones so large that modern technology could no longer handle them, hung over the rearward cliff edge of the island. The Keep itself was largely used for storage now, but it remained attached to the main body of the building. Guard posts were minimal, since it had long been believed that the Keep could not be breached from the river - an idea Pyrgus promised himself would be quickly laid to rest if their present mission succeeded.

  The raft docked quietly within a tiny inlet beside some rocks. There was a narrow stretch of stony beach, then the low, sheer cliff topped by the towering walls of the Keep. Pyrgus allowed his eyes to drift upwards, then froze. There were guards on the battlements. Even at this distance he could see they were armed with lethal kris wands.

  He became aware of Blue at his shoulder, also looking upwards. 'Hairstreak's taking no chances,' she said.

  'There are guards,' Pyrgus called over his shoulder.

  Nymph moved to stand beside him on the other side from Blue. 'We're safe so long as we stay on the raft,' she said, 'but to get in we will have to cross that beach. Once we do that the cliff will shelter us - they can't see much looking straight down - but if they spot us crossing, they can pick us off like flies.' She'd clearly noticed the guards' weapons as well.

  Blue turned to the wizard. 'Can you make us invisible?'

  Ziczac shrugged. 'I'm a specialist. I don't do invisibility.'

  Pyrgus said, 'What about this cloaking business? Can you extend that? Maybe take the raft across the beach?'

  It was Nymph who answered. 'The vehicle is only designed for water usage. And there's no way to extend the cloak beyond it.'

  Blue glanced at Pyrgus. 'Is there another inlet that would take us closer to the walls?'

  'Not that I know of.'

  'So we have to risk the beach,' Blue said thoughtfully.

  Nymph said firmly, 'We soldiers will take the Wizard Ziczac and protect him while he does his work. You will remain on the vehicle where you will be safe. When all is ready, you may dash across the beach to join us.'

  Blue gave her a look that would have shattered glass. 'We all cross together. Two crossings double the chance of being seen. It's a small distance and the overhang will protect us once we reach the cliff.'

  Nymph turned to Pyrgus. 'Is this your wish, Crown Prince?'

  'Yes,' Pyrgus said promptly. He fancied Nymph a lot, but long experience had taught him not to get on the wrong side of Blue when she was in this mood.

  The plan was a simple one. They would wait until the guards were looking the other way, then make a run for it. The trouble was, the guards never seemed to look the other way at the same time. Some would stare out across the water, some to their left, some to their right, but there was always at least one watching the narrow stretch of beach. They all wore palace uniforms, but Pyrgus was firmly convin
ced these were Faeries of the Night: they had the jerky, paranoid look that made them such excellent watchdogs.

  After a while Nymph said, 'We need a diversion.' She glanced across at Ziczac, who nodded slightly.

  'What did you have in mind?' Blue asked. To Pyrgus there was almost a hint of suspicion in her tone.

  Nymph shrugged. She turned her head to look out across the expanse of water. The river was particularly wide here, but they could still see the encroaching city suburbs on the further bank. A few of the houses had their own jetties and personal boats.

  Ziczac squatted nimbly on the floor of the raft, adjusting his robe to cover his knees. He began to hum quietly to himself.