by H. D. Gordon
Charlie sat silently beside her. She took a deep breath and snapped her fingers, reciting a simple spell to put out the dwindling flames of the fire in front of them.
Nothing happened.
She tried again. Still nothing. Her heart did a standstill. She tried a different spell, a harder one, just a small teleportation over to the cabin door. It didn’t work. She shot to her feet, spells rolling off her tongue one after the other, her hands flying gracefully through the air as she cast and cast and cast.
Not a one of them was successful.
She slid the necklace holding the stone back over her neck and wrapped both hands around it, her knuckles white with her grip.
She tried more spells, running through a good portion of the ones she knew before slumping back down to the ground beside Charlie.
He was still silent, and she was grateful for this. The magnitude of what had happened was too much for her, and her brain had nearly frozen with the realization. She wasn’t aware of it, but her arms were wrapped around her legs and her eyes distant and dull.
When his hand touched her shoulder a tear fell from each of her eyes, but Charlie’s thumbs were there to brush them away before they could lead hot trails down her cheeks.
“It’s gone, isn’t it?” he asked, and she winced at the words.
It took a few breathless minutes, but slowly Surah regained her composure. The fear in her eyes was so great she could see it reflected in the emerald of Charlie’s as they stared at each other in wonder and confusion.
At last, she said, “Yes. I don’t know how… but it’s gone. Magic is gone.” She looked at him now, her pretty face as grave as the dead. “And I don’t think it’s just us, Charlie. I think all the magic might be gone.”
But Charlie wasn’t looking at her, his eyes were focused somewhere over her shoulder, and she could tell at first glance that danger was near.
She slowly scanned the trees around them, straining to pierce the shadows of the forest to see what monsters lurked there. Suddenly, she was sure that something lurked there.
Then they began to slink forward out of the trees, some of them perched on branches, others appearing from behind bushes. Dozens of strange, slanted eyes staring at them in the darkness, surrounding them on all sides.
Surah took Charlie’s hands and pulled him slowly up to his feet as she rose to hers.
She unclasped her cloak, still moving very slowly, and whispered to Charlie. Her voice came out calm and focused.
“What’s your weapon, Charlie?”
“Whatever you have to spare, princess,” he whispered back, his voice as calm and cool as hers.
Surah’s hands disappeared under her cloak. She grabbed her sais with one and a folded-up crossbow with the other.
She snapped her wrist and the bow’s wings flipped out, a spinning barrel holding several arrows perched at the ready. She slipped it through the front of her cloak and pulled her eyes away from the threat long enough to see one side of Charlie’s mouth pull up as she passed him the weapon.
“That’ll do,” he whispered. “Are those… Fae?”
Surah nodded. “But not just any Fae,” she said, her voice held low, her lips barely moving. “That’s the royal guard.”
Under her cloak Surah switched one of her sais to her free hand, the worn leather wrapped around them comforting under her fingers.
Then she shrugged her shoulders and let the cloak slide off and fall to the ground. She looked into the eyes of those staring back at her, and anticipation for what would surely follow next welled up in her.
She hoped like hell Charlie was a good shot, because she wasn’t sure she’d be able to protect him without her magic.
Surah spun the sais around in her hands, making the moonlight reflect flashes of silver off their surfaces.
“Come on then,” she said in her deceptively sweet voice. She stopped spinning her weapons and raised the sharp tips of them just slightly at the intruders directly in front of her. “What are you waiting for? Come take what you came to get.”
Charlie chuckled beside her, and she took a moment to give him a sidelong look. Most people she knew would be having a hard time controlling their bladder at a time like this. There had to be at least fifteen Fae Guardians moving in on them, long swords in each of their hands. She gave him a small nudge with her shoulder, tucking these thoughts away for later examination, body tensing for the coming attack.
“Charlie,” she said, just before the first of the Fae reached them.
“Yes, princess?”
She nodded toward the crossbow in his hands. “Shoot to kill,” she said.
Then there was no more time for words.
Chapter 9
Surah
She shot forward and thrust the sharp tips of her sais through the midsection of the nearest Fae Gaurdian.
Blood the color of sapphires sprang from the wound and seemed to hang in the air as the scene took on a slow-motion state in front of her.
The Fae were all male, and all enormous, even compared to Charlie, who was not a small man himself. They dwarfed Surah, but she used this to her advantage, darting around them with her quick, precise movements, her lavender hair flying out behind her and her weapons (which were now dripping sticky blue blood) glistening in the moonlight.
One of the Guardians charged toward Charlie, the sword in its clawed fingers held outstretched, aiming straight for his heart.
The black, insect-like wings on its back fluttered too fast to be anything but a blur. Its slanted silver eyes were filled with murder, lips pulled back revealing a line of sharp, dripping teeth.
Surah could only catch glimpses as Charlie lined up his shot and pulled the trigger on the crossbow. It hit its mark and the Fae’s whole body jerked once before crashing to the ground, a small arrow sticking out of the place one of those silver eyes had been.
The barrel on the crossbow spun another arrow into place automatically, and Charlie fired three more of them in rapid succession, taking out one Fae on either side of him and another that had been standing too close behind Surah’s back.
Surah flashed him a grin, her face and hands splattered with blue. Then she spun around and killed two more Fae in the same moment, the tips of her weapons sliding through them as easily as if they were warm butter.
Before long, the Fae still standing realized their best shot at taking Surah and Charlie down was from the air, because they took to their wings and circled above them, blotting out the stars.
Surah’s head tilted back as she looked up, waiting for what was inevitably coming next.
“How good are you at hitting moving targets?” she asked Charlie, her eyes never leaving the sky.
Charlie was already lining up his next shot. “Good enough,” he said, and pulled the trigger.
A Fae fell from the air and tumbled to the ground, head over heels, an arrow lodged deep in its chest.
Down they came in one big mass, like a swarm of people-sized wasps, the fluttering of their wings drowning out the sounds of the night.
Charlie went one way and Surah went the other, gaining deep gashes on her back as the clawed feet of one of the Fae slipped over her skin in a barely missed attempt to sever her arms at the shoulders.
Surah’s brows furrowed when the Fae who’d almost killed her fell face-forward to the earth. Surah pried the sword from the fallen Fae’s hand quickly, noticing an arrow sticking out of the back of its neck, having landed in just the right spot to kill instantly.
She looked up to see Charlie flash her a grin. He lined up another shot and took out a Fae approaching her in the time it took her to kill three others.
Before she had a chance to breathe or blink, bodies leaking blue were scattered all around her. It had all happened so fast, and yet had seemed to last forever.
Now that the battle had stopped, she could smell their strange Fae blood on the air, a stomach-turning mixture of iron and sugar.
Several sets of silver eyes stared
heavenward, but they were blind to the stars and the moon forever more. It made a rush of horrible images fill her head, memories she’d suppressed and done her best to forget. Though she had never battled a small army of blood-crazy royal Fae Guardians, killing was killing, no matter how you cut it. You owned the lives you stole, and you had to carry the weight of them.
“Not quite done yet, Charlie,” Surah gritted out.
He turned just in time to see a final Fae heading for him, but Surah ran up the side of the tree nearest him and hopped onto the Fae’s back, the two long points of her sais pressed into his throat.
The Fae lost his footing and fell face-first to the ground. Surah fell along with him, but managed to keep her weapons in place on either side of his neck, pushing the tender skin there in painfully but not quite breaking it.
The Fae let out an oomph! as he hit the ground, the sound of fallen branches crunching beneath him. Surah sat atop him in triumph, her features relaxed but the air panting in and out of her.
Charlie looked around again at all the fallen Fae. More than a handful of them had died by his hand, but she had taken out a healthy number herself.
She could feel his eyes on her as she flipped her head back, clearing her wild lavender hair out of her face. She leaned forward slightly, staring down at the back of the Fae’s head she had pinned beneath her.
“Who sent you?” she asked, and though her voice was still that soft tone, now it was commanding and surprisingly intimidating.
The Fae turned his head to the side and spat into the dirt. “Kill me,” he said.
Surah rolled her eyes. “Stupid answer, fairy. I had no intention of killing you, but now that you’ve mentioned it…”
Calling a Fae a fairy was a serious insult.
“You don’t even have to tell me,” Surah continued. “I would assume you know who I am, since you were sent to come and kill me… Or was it to capture me? No matter, I guess, but if you know who I am, you must know I know who you serve. How is your queen? I don’t believe I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting her.”
“Go to hell you Sorceress bitch,” the Fae spat.
Surah clicked her tongue and slapped the Fae hard on the back of his head, the metal of the sai in her hand making a painful-sounding thud against his skull.
“Haven’t you any manners?” she asked. “I am no ‘Sorceress bitch’. I am Surah Stormsong, daughter of King Syrian Stormsong, next in line to the throne.”
She slapped the back of his skull again, and he made a choking sound as leaves and dirt were stuffed into his mouth. A bit of blood now leaked out of the back of his head.
“I’m going to let you live, not because I think you deserve to, but because you have a message to deliver to your queen on my behalf.” She pressed the tips of her sais a little harder into his neck. “Think you can handle that, fairy?”
Charlie stood off to the side and watched all this in silence, his crossbow aimed at the Fae’s head just in case he tried anything sneaky.
The Fae nodded begrudgingly.
“Good,” Surah said. “That’s a good choice.” She leaned forward now, her lips only inches from the Fae’s pointed ear. “You tell her Surah Stormsong sends her regards. You can remember that, can’t you, fairy?”
“Fine,” the Fae snarled. “Let me up.”
Chapter 10
Surah
“So… uh… you’re pretty fearsome,” Charlie said as they were walking back into the cabin.
Surah laughed shortly, though she found nothing about this situation humorous. She began to recite a spell to clean herself of the sticky gore that covered her, and stopped when she remembered it wouldn’t work.
Now that the fight with the Fae was over, the reality of the current circumstances came back with a staggering sense of dread. Even the shielding spell she’d cast around the cabin had disappeared.
Maybe Charlie was right, maybe she was fearsome in terms of battle, but the lack of magic had left her feeling unprepared and uneasy. And not being able to simply clean herself off with a spell drove this fact home. Right now, she had a feeling Charlie would have a much easier time getting by than she was going to have.
The sooner the magic came back, the better.
A thought occurred to her then, and it was very possibly the single worst thought she’d had in all her existence.
What if the magic never comes back?
She shook the thought away, it being too big to chew and swallow, and realized he was waiting for a response. “Look at me, Charlie.”
“I am.”
She smiled at this and her shoulders relaxed a fraction. It really was amazing the effect he had on her. “Don’t you think I need to be feared. Just in the past week you’ve seen what kind of danger my position as princess and Keeper puts me in, and even more so now that I’m the last remaining Stormsong heir. My father thought it best that I be trained to protect myself, and over the years I’ve mastered every weapon we know of. I’ve spent months in the jungles where the Great Beasts rule. I’ve killed demons and even some Accursed once. Being me is a dangerous thing. Being around me is a dangerous thing. Now, the magic is gone, and it’s even more dangerous. Magic is a main part of what has kept me safe over the years.”
She was rambling, and she knew it, but she hadn’t been able to stop the words from falling out. She snapped her mouth shut now and drew a deep, shuddering breath.
Charlie came forward and smoothed her hair back behind her ear. “I guess it’s a good thing I don’t scare easily,” he said, giving her that half smile that made a small dimple in his left cheek. “And I’d be willing to bet that magic has also been part of what has put your life in danger over the years.”
She’d never thought of it that way, but as she looked back over countless memories, she supposed he was right.
Still, this was a game-changer. There was no time to sit around and wait for things to come to them. The trouble was here, and at the very least, she needed answers. Like whether or not the loss of magic had affected all of her kind, or just her and Charlie.
Also, how to get it back and who caused it to disappear in the first place were pretty hot questions. She had a few theories, but she needed answers.
Then, she could decide what to do.
“We can’t stay here,” she said. “With everything that’s going on and the magic being gone, my father’s kingdom is more vulnerable than ever. The fact that Fae had the nerve to cross the border is beyond troubling. It means the danger we face goes beyond our kind, and I’ve got a feeling things are headed in a catastrophic direction.”
Her memory of the Silver City just a month ago surfaced. The death, the devastation, all that white snow stained with red. She shivered as she remembered how cold she’d felt that night, watching the army led by the Sun Warrior storm the castle where the army of their sick king was waiting for them. The howls of the Wolves, the screeches of the Accursed and the dying cries of the innocents still haunted her dreams at night.
She pulled away from the thoughts, looking around the small cabin and then to Charlie, who was rubbing his hand down his jaw again.
For once, he wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were distant, and she could practically see the wheels in his head turning.
“What?” she asked.
There was a long moment of silence before he answered. “It’s nothing, really. It’s just… Michael said some things similar to what you just said when he broke me out of that holding cell back at the castle. He said the Highborns are incapable of protecting the kingdom. That something big was coming, and it would involve all the races. Like another Great War, only more devastating.”
He looked at her now, and she could be mistaken, but she thought she saw a little fear in his eyes where usually there were only calm waters. It made a stab of fear strike her own stomach.
“He said that when the shit hit the windmill, Highborns would only care about protecting themselves. That common people would be left to die in their
fields and forests, left nearly magic-less and unable to defend themselves.”
“And I suppose he thinks he could do a better job protecting them?”
Charlie nodded.
A puzzle piece fell into place for Surah, and her earlier theories about who was responsible for the disappearance of the magic were all but confirmed.
“So he takes the magic away somehow, to show everyone how weak Highborns are without it. And then…” She trailed off, trying to see how it all fit together. “Does your brother have any connection with Tristell, the Fae Queen?”
Charlie shrugged, understanding dawning in his eyes. “It’s possible, I guess. From what I’ve heard about her, she’s one crazy lady, so they’d make a good match.”
Surah nodded her agreement. “So then he uses the Fae Queen’s army to take the throne while we’re weak. He knows magic is our biggest defense and weapon, and the Fae are trained in physical battle. If they stormed my father’s castle and the Hunters had no Magic to help them…”
Charlie came forward and placed his hands on her shoulders, holding down some of the panic that was boiling up in her with his gentle touch.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. You’re talking about my brother and a bunch of fairies overthrowing an empire. Even I wouldn’t give him that much credit.”
Surah bet that was what the Vampire King William thought just before his empire fell to shambles, and all the rest of the rulers who had fallen to unlikely adversaries over the long course of history.
“I think you’d be silly not to,” she said. “But you’re right about one thing, I am getting ahead of things.” She looked down at her hands, which were still sticky and sick with the Fae’s blue blood. “Is there somewhere I can wash up?”
Charlie’s eyes ran the length of her. “There’s a creek around back.”
They left the cabin, and after they’d rinsed themselves off as best they could in the cool creek water, Surah noticed that the sky was beginning to lighten on the horizon, pinks and blues appearing in the distance. She slung her black cloak over her shoulders and clasped it at the front, pulling the hood up over her head.
