by Molly Ringle
Haluli was holding him, tears on her dusk-violet face.
The ghost of Merrick drifted farther, straying already. Love would only hold a ghost here if their beloved was imprisoned, it seemed. Without Vowri to impose such despair, the ghosts were already dispersing, vanishing, wandering free. Even Philomena was looking fainter. “Please give Cassidy and Elemi my love,” Merrick said. “Larkin, you need to help keep Elemi safe. She’s too brave for her own good. Just like you and me.”
Larkin nodded, unable to speak. His tears fell, making wet spots on Merrick’s shirt. In fairy tales, teardrops imbued with grief and love would work life-restoring magic. Here they did nothing at all.
“Your Highness,” Rosamund said.
“Yes, I know, it’s hopeless,” Larkin snarled. “Keep your distance and leave me be. You’ve done enough in your lifetime.”
“No. I haven’t.” She pressed her bony hand on top of his. “There’s one more thing I can do. But I shall need your assistance and all of your strength.”
He wiped his nose and stared at her in confusion.
“Together,” she added. “Using the powers of us both. If I give my all, if we hurry.”
Her all. He grasped her meaning. “You would bleed dry?”
Under the wrinkles and scars and grime blazed the indomitable court sorcerer he had known. “It’s time you and I worked together toward common purpose, don’t you agree?”
He drew his back up straight, brushed the tears out of his eyes, and placed both hands upon Merrick’s chest. “If … if you are indeed willing.”
Rosamund set her hands on either side of Merrick’s head. “I am.”
The souls of Merrick and Philomena watched, held by curiosity. “Please,” Larkin told Merrick, “come back, if you’re able. I love you.”
Then a fierce sparking warmth lit up in his hands, traveling through Merrick’s body from Rosamund’s. “Now, friend,” she said, breathing hard.
Larkin shut his eyes and concentrated. The flood of Rosamund’s power was a storm tide, a force like none he had ever encountered from any but fae. Even when Rosamund had been controlling Larkin to do her bidding, it had not felt like such a wild surge. It had been more a suit of armor locked coolly around him.
But as a witch, and especially as an exo-witch sending power to another living creature, one had always to hold back somewhat, or one could give up too much of one’s own energy and die. On a few legendary occasions, someone had done it, to reawaken the life force in another. It was rare, but possible.
I should not let her, Larkin thought, even as he poured all the energy he could into Merrick. I don’t want anyone to die, not even her. She has suffered longer than anyone should, regardless of her crimes, and she created the way to free me and meant to do it long ago …
Still he kept throwing his strength into Merrick. His heart galloped and his head pounded, and he did not stop. His longing to resurrect Merrick overthrew his qualms. If Rosamund wanted to sacrifice herself, let her. He was not proud of the thought, but he wanted Merrick back too desperately to give up.
His hands felt like they were catching fire. He forced an extra burst of energy through, sending Merrick everything. The pain in his hands and body dissipated and floated apart. The world turned to a field of gray full of multicolored sparks. All sounds faded into ringing. He became weightless, drifting, nameless.
Cold water splashed over Larkin’s face. He coughed and tried to move, but his arms and legs lay like anchors. A velvety night sky spread above, sparkling with a thousand stars and the Milky Way. The air smelled of rock and ash, but also of the sweetness of pines, and of the sea too.
“There,” said a musical voice. “He’s all right.”
“More water?” said someone else.
“No,” laughed the first voice. “Thank you, that’s enough.”
Haluli, the air faery. That was the voice—and the form leaning over him, glowing in soft blue light. A mermaid peered over her shoulder, water dripping from her hands: likely the one who had splashed him.
“You’ve slept a while,” Haluli said. “We’ve been healing you. How do you feel?”
“I can barely move. Though … ” He wiggled his hands and feet, took a deep breath. “No pain.” He could scarcely keep his eyes open. He wanted only to sleep. Then he remembered, and blinked wide, and struggled to sit up. “Merrick—where’s—”
“He’s all right. He’s sleeping too.” Haluli shifted aside so he could see.
Merrick lay on a bedroll, with Nye asleep next to him on a blanket. Larkin dragged himself over, along with his own bedroll, which he had been placed upon, and set his fingers on Merrick’s cheek to feel the warmth, the steady breaths.
Alive. He was alive.
“He will wake? He’ll be well?”
“Yes,” she said. “He was awake a short time, asking after you. He was worried about you. But he needs to rest. He has many wounds to heal, and his soul has to finish fitting itself back into his body. It’s a tiring process.”
“You’ve seen such resurrections before?”
“No. But I can sense it.”
Larkin sank down against Merrick’s side. “We’re safe here, wherever we are?” he mumbled, though he was hardly able to get up even if they were not.
“Yes. The other fae and I carried you almost a mile away from the desert, so Ula Kana’s raging wouldn’t disturb you. We’re north of it now.”
Larkin glanced around. Aside from Haluli and the mermaid, there were only Arlanuk and his hunters standing guard. “Rosamund. She … ”
“She gave her all.” From a fold of her feathery garments, Haluli drew out a stone ball, about the size of the lapis lazuli sphere they had gifted Vowri, but pale gray and dull. “Her ghost joined Philomena’s. They embraced at last. Before leaving, she requested that we burn her body, and that you take her ashes back to be buried with Philomena’s in Barish Temple.” She caressed the gray ball—the ashes, he realized, likely fused into shape by a fire faery.
“Ah.” Larkin felt unexpectedly sad. “I wish I could have thanked her properly.”
“Merrick did, on his behalf as well as yours. Nye thanked her enough to fill six or seven poems.” Haluli smiled, though her face held a soft grief—Rosamund had been her friend for several years, after all, and her means of meeting Nye.
“She shall be fully honored in ceremony, in Dasdemir. I will see to it.” Larkin’s voice slurred in exhaustion.
“Sleep. The human world is safe again. You’ll need your energy for the journey home.”
“You’re a good mother, you know,” he murmured, but his eyes were shut and he had snuggled against Merrick, and he was not sure if her whispered “Thank you, brave prince” was a dream or not.
CHAPTER 47
MERRICK AWOKE TO SOMEONE KISSING THE tip of his nose. Repeatedly.
Larkin, lying halfway across his chest, beamed when Merrick opened his eyes.
Merrick smiled. “Hi.”
“Shh.” Larkin kissed him on the lips. “Your father still sleeps.”
The sky shone blue above them. A thousand birds sang in the surrounding hills. Haluli sat in a pine atop the nearest ridge, conversing with a fada, and no one else but the sleeping Nye was nearby.
Merrick stretched beneath Larkin’s weight and felt the burn of sore muscles all over, as well as a twinge in the leg he had broken, along with aches in several of his ribs, which he had probably smashed against the cliff. Still, all told, he felt surprisingly well.
He remembered, with a shiver, those minutes of weightless tranquility as he beheld his own dead body and his weeping family; and the enticing, luminous path of moss that he had almost followed, away from the living world.
Thank the gods he had come back. He gladly accepted all these pains, and all the future years of mortal uncertainty, for the privilege of existing right now in Larkin’s embrace.
He stroked Larkin’s cheek with his grimy thumb. “You brought me back to life.”
“Rosamund did, really.”
“With your help. Stupid. You could’ve died trying something like that.”
“I already died. So did you. The score is settled.” Larkin kissed him again. “I had no choice but to save you. I love you, in case you didn’t hear.”
Merrick grinned—another welcome stretch of muscles. “I did hear. Ula Kana told me. It’s what inspired me to stab her and fly away.”
“Ula Kana?”
“She gave it as an example of your many heartless lies. You notorious seducer.”
Larkin brushed his lips against Merrick’s. “Ignorant peasant.”
“I will never call you ‘Your Highness,’ not ever again.” Merrick nipped at his mouth. “Not ‘my lord’ either. Or anything remotely respectful.”
“Impertinent. But I suppose you’ve earned familiar terms.”
“I love you too. By the way.”
“I know. You said so yesterday.”
“I repeat it just in case you thought I was a heartless liar.”
“We all know you’re dreadful at lying, Highvalley.”
Larkin’s unbound hair was falling in a tangle around their faces. Merrick gathered it up and held it in a handful behind Larkin’s neck. Larkin sank onto him and hugged him. Merrick held him close, smiling. Overhead, a flock of kiryo birds sailed past.
Their progress home was slow, the three humans still not at top strength. But they had a reliable fae escort in the form of Haluli, two of Arlanuk’s hunters, and a fada who had hung around. She had met them in Sia Fia’s realm, then later answered Larkin’s summons.
“I loved a human once,” she told them as they walked through the mountain pass to the north. “And another, before her. I had met them in their world and brought them back to our haunt. I kept each alive as long as I could, but … ” Her flamelike glow guttered as she remembered. “Eventually each fell asleep and did not wake.”
“I’m sorry,” Larkin said.
“Sia Fia feels we shouldn’t interfere, that it’s not meant to be if humans can’t withstand our enchantment. Still, I would have tried to wake you if your alf friend hadn’t done it first.”
Merrick’s attention sharpened. “Alf friend?”
“Yes. She’s always about somewhere. Where is she? Ah, there.”
From a stream, an otter-shaped blob of water leaped out, shook herself until she was an ordinary fur otter, then jumped onto Merrick’s foot. “I’ve had a fine swim!” she squeaked.
Merrick knelt, cupping his hands to offer a step to the creature. She bounced onto his hands, then up onto his lap. Larkin crouched to peer at her.
The alf lifted her pointed nose, blinking her bright black eyes. “Greetings.”
“Sal?” Trembling, Merrick petted the creature between her small wet ears.
The alf’s features all pulled upward, in something like a smile—an expression so familiar he almost dropped her in surprise. “Friend,” she said.
“Sal!” he laughed, tears filling his eyes.
“But of course it is she.” Larkin reached out to stroke the alf. “It’s wonderful to see you again, Sal.”
“Sal the hob, from Ormaney University?” Nye said, stepping closer. “Why, hello, wise one! I had no idea you had taken another form.”
“You know this faery?” Haluli tilted her head at the alf. “She was in the birch wood with the pair of you. She raced out to find me and bring me to you. Just in time.”
“Thank you, Alf-Sal,” Merrick said. “I didn’t know you could remember so well, after reincarnating.”
“I doubt she remembers everything,” Haluli said. “But clearly enough for a great deal of loyalty.”
Alf-Sal leaped onto Merrick’s shoulder and curled around his neck like a scarf. “I will come with you.”
Haluli laughed. “Also she’s still young and a bit silly.”
“Okay, you want a ride?” Merrick said. “Fair enough. We’ll make sure to set you up with a nice pond in the garden, if you want to hang out at Highvalley House.”
Larkin reached out to pet her. “I was always fond of animals. My horses and dogs are what I miss most from my time, if I’m honest. I hope your rabbit and corgi are well.”
“They’re all fine, last I saw them,” Nye said. “Cassidy brought Elemi and the pets to my house, once the grid and the cell phones started going down, to keep us all together. They made it out just before the roads got bashed. Everyone was all right the morning that jinn grabbed me out of my garden. But who knows how long ago that was, with the time in here.”
“What was happening when you got taken?” Merrick asked. “Any other attacks?”
As they walked, Nye launched into the news: a handful of reported abductions by fae, another tower of the palace destroyed, phone and internet connections down, electricity knocked out to Dasdemir and several other cities, the water supply deemed enspelled and unsafe in others, and a ship picked up by giant tentacles and flung against the cliffs at Cabo de Lula.
Merrick’s contentment dimmed at the litany of events. “Not all those fae were directly swayed by Ula Kana. Some were just encouraged by what she was doing and came out of the shadows to attack. They might not stop now.”
“But they will be fewer,” Larkin said.
“Indeed,” Haluli said. “The tide will have turned against them. The news that Ula Kana’s been captured is spreading—it’s of tremendous importance among the fae, and humans will hear soon. That along with the returned lost from Vowri’s realm should bring great hope to all who want the truce back. Which, remember, is most of us as well as most of you.”
“Us, you,” Nye chided. “Are we still making those distinctions, darling?”
Haluli wrapped her arms around him and kissed him on the cheek.
Glancing at one another with amusement, Merrick and Larkin slowed their steps to let Merrick’s parents walk a few paces ahead in privacy.
“It’s almost like she still finds him gorgeous and irresistible,” Merrick said.
“And why not? He has his valiant poet’s heart and all the eloquence and generosity that comes with it.”
“So she’s good at seeing past appearances, you’re saying.”
Larkin linked arms with him. “I admit there are some things we could learn from fae.”
“Ah. You didn’t think I was much to look at when we met, did you.”
“Well, you still aren’t, dressed like that.” While Merrick huffed in protest, Larkin nodded toward his crumpled, musty T-shirt and shorts, the cleanest clothes he’d been able to find in his pack this morning. “But in a properly tailored jacket, say, in that fetching midnight blue Sia Fia conjured for you, and with your hair washed and trimmed so it’s not all a-tangle in your eyes, then there’s much less I must overlook in order to find you attractive.”
“That’s very eloquent. Is this an appropriate time to bring up how you find light switches and car radios too futuristic to comprehend? How you’re maybe going to need my help a while and should therefore be nicer to me?”
“No one’s ever been able to soften the edge of my tongue, Highvalley. You shall simply have to live with it. If … ” Larkin’s flippant tone faltered. “If you do wish to live with it, I mean.”
Merrick tugged his arm closer, holding it tightly as if Larkin had threatened to run away at once. “Please don’t move crosswater. Don’t even move back to the palace. Stay near me? For … as long as we both want?”
The smile Larkin gave him, sparkling like starlight, was all the answer Merrick really needed. “Of course. Though I’m not certain you’re allowed to do such a thing, stealing a prince from the palace.”
“Why not? I’ve done it twice already.”
Larkin pulled him close and kissed him.
“Ah!” Nye’s exclamation of joy echoed off the sides of the mountain pass. “My son getting snogged by Prince Larkin. This is the proudest day of my life, friends.”
CHAPTER 48
EVEN WITH THE SLOW PA CE SET BY N
YE’S INFIRMITY, Merrick’s technically-broken bones, and Larkin’s general exhaustion, they reached the human realm that day at twilight.
When they stumbled through the verge and out into the sparser trees, someone called, “Stop!”, and three people with bright flashlights ran toward them.
“Who are you?”
“Don’t move!”
“Human or fae?”
In the flashlight glows, Merrick spotted witch sashes on the volunteer guards. The verge, evidently, had acquired a lot more protection than it used to have.
He and Larkin stepped to the front of the group, hands raised. “Human and fae,” Merrick answered. “Prince Larkin, Merrick Highvalley, and my parents. We’re safe. We’re back.”
Commotion overtook the next hour. Backup was called in, stories were demanded, dawning joy was expressed when the rumor about Ula Kana was reported true. Someone loaned them a phone—apparently a temporary network had been set up for the time being—and he called Cassidy. Cassidy burst into tears of happiness when Merrick reported that all of them were fine.
Where Merrick’s group had emerged was almost halfway up the west coast, near Kikenna Bay. Nye had been missing for three days, it turned out, while Larkin and Merrick had been gone for two and a half months. It was almost June, and no one in Merrick’s family had heard from him for three weeks. But just a few days ago, the prisoners from Vowri’s realm had emerged, escorted by the kindly fae, who had told everyone that this amazing act was largely the work of Prince Larkin and Merrick Highvalley—and, confusingly, Rosamund Highvalley. No one knew what to make of that, and rumors had been flying since.
Cass told them to stay put; they were putting Elemi in the car and driving straight there.
Merrick and his companions were taken to a fire station where they could wash, drink tea, and eat biscuits while relating their story to the police and government officials who showed up. Haluli remained, declining refreshments but answering questions directed to her. Under the electric bulbs of the station, she looked eerier and less enchanting; a bluish person in a tattered gown whose colors kept shifting like clouds on a windy day.
