Disenchanted

by Brianna Sugalski

  Numbly, Lilac allowed Garin to tow her into a circular room lined symmetrically with a dozen shadowed doorways, a torch between each. They must’ve been directly under the hill; the roof arched upwards into a shallow dome with a metal grate at its center. A single beam of moonlight shone down through the iron bars, illuminating dust particles that danced like celestial embers in the putrid air. The silver light hit the ground, illuminating a round plate engraved with the outlines of two swords crossing at midpoint.

  Something shifted behind them, and Lilac was startled to notice two vampires—a man and a woman—who flanked the arched entryway. They wore dark leather armor, but Lilac could see no weapon like the sword Garin carried. With a shudder, she realized that there would be no no need.

  Garin relaxed noticeably beside her as he took the room in.

  “Are you glad to be back?” Bastion asked.

  He only cleared his throat. “As you can imagine, circumstances are less than ideal.” He turned sharply on the guard vampires. “One of you, take care of the girl’s body in the vestibule. Put her in the entry hall just before the boulder. The other, bring a meal to my room. A meal for my thrall,” he clarified.

  “We burn the bodies at the pyre,” the woman replied lazily, as if she couldn’t be bothered.

  Garin froze. He exhaled next to her.

  The other scoffed and raised a brow at Bastion. “Who is this?”

  In a flash, Garin was at the vampire’s throat. “I’m who you answer to from now on, you insipid cretin.” He snapped his neck, just as quick as he had Piper’s. The woman scuttled back in alarm as Garin’s second victim fell to the floor.

  “He’ll wake in a couple hours, for fuck’s sake.” The woman, who cowered against the wall, nodded vigorously. “You get to do both chores now. Get to it.”

  “Fledglings,” said Bastion, rolling his eyes as she scurried out of the room.

  “Are they new?”

  “They joined us a few years after you departed.”

  “Fantastic,” he groaned. “The more idiots, the merrier.” Garin was already gripping the back of Lilac’s dress once more, though this time, his hand rested at the small of her back.

  Bastion waved a hand dismissively at the first door on the left. “No one’s been in Laurent’s room or office since his death.”

  Lilac tried to remain expressionless, but the moisture in her eyes made it difficult. She blinked them back, glad for the distraction of the vampires’ exchange. She wiped them before anyone could notice.

  “Let’s keep it that way until we have a better idea of what happened. I think I’ll sleep in my old quarters tonight.”

  “Are you sure?” Bastion studied his brother curiously. “His quarters are much bigger than ours. More room for two.”

  “We’ll make due.” He tugged Lilac toward one of the dark passages to the left of Laurent’s quarters.

  Bastion shrugged. “I suppose. Anything must be better than wiping down bar tops at the tavern.”

  “Bastion,” he growled, spinning on him. “I returned to ensure someone sensible takes Laurent’s position as head, and to save our coven from overzealous pricks like you. Do not test me.”

  Without another word, Garin adjusted his grip on her waist and steered her into the hallway.

  Being alone with Garin allowed her to refocus, and after everything, she wondered if he planned on keeping his word after all . He’d killed three people in the span of a few hours without showing a bit of remorse. Not to mention the disabled vampire out in the circular chamber.

  Was he that convincing, or was it all no longer part of an act?

  “Wait here,” he said quietly, opening the door at the end of the drafty hall.

  She blinked, willing her eyes to adjust to the darkness, but stopped at the rasp of flint and steel. A burst of flame grew as Garin fed the fireplace wood, casting ominous shadows across the rest of the room. Then, one by one, he lit the torches adorning each of the walls.

  “Enter.”

  Walking into Garin’s bedchamber reminded her unnervingly of earlier that evening at Sinclair’s campsite, and the evening before that back at the inn. As the fire danced, again was she alone with not a man, but a monster that had garnered more of her trust than was deserved.

  Wooden racks lining the wall next to her held bottle after bottle of wine—or, at least, what looked like wine. A bed sat in the middle of the room atop a wool rug, the ironically burgundy sheets made and untouched. An impressive sword stand stood against the wall opposite them, an assortment of gilded long and short blades suspended in the wooden rackets. Next to that, a towering bookshelf with volume upon volume, frosted over in a thick layer of dust. Across the mattress, a person-sized cage contained a bench, pile of straw, and a chamber pot.

  When she looked up at Garin, she found him staring at her, a lock of black hair falling onto his forehead, which he pushed back. It seemed like such a human gesture for someone who was anything but.

  “You know,” he said, his brows knit together as he reached past her to pull the chamber door shut. “You should really stop doing that. For both your sake and mine,” he added.

  He’d brushed against her lightly, and the faint scent of cedar and juniper made her dizzy. “Doing what?”

  “Blushing.”

  “That’s not exactly something I can help,” she snapped.

  She’d clearly made a mistake in going along with him, in agreeing to play along. She was the reason Piper was dead. Lip quivering, she felt her devastation begin to morph into fury. She let it.

  Garin had the nerve to smile warmly in the thickening silence, but it faded when he registered her scowl. “What?”

  “You monster—”

  “Here we go,” he muttered, half to himself. He cocked his head at the open cage door. “Go on, then.”

  “—like hell, you repulsive swine! I’ll—”

  “Right. Your father will have my head. Anything else?” He strode over to the door and leaned against it, unceremoniously sweeping an arm in. “The cage is yours, Your Highness. I am sure the haystack has been plumped to your liking.”

  Lilac’s string of profanities stopped. She inhaled sharply. “In there? Absolutely not. I’m not spending my time with you, stuck in there.”

  “The choice is yours, princess.” He gave a one-shoulder shrug. “I didn’t think you’d fancy sharing the bed.”

  Fuming, Lilac snatched her sack from him and tromped into the cell without another word. She warily watched Garin as he walked over and closed the door, which locked with a loud click.

  “What am I supposed to do in here?” Her rage simmered as she gripped the bars. “This isn’t necessary.”

  He slipped his baldric belt over his head; there was her dagger, sheathed in the pocket beside Sinclair’s gold-hilt sword, both glimmering in the firelight. The vampire threw her a molten grin as he perched on the edge of his mattress opposite her and began removing his shoes.

  “Oh, it is too, necessary. If anyone enters and you’re roaming freely, I’d be subject to even more scrutiny. It would give Bastion reason to investigate more than he already has. So, I don’t know. Preoccupy yourself with princess things. Your kingdom won’t miss their pseudo-queen an extra night.”

  Lilac plopped down on the bench to steady herself. She’d hardly had time to process anything at all. Garin, a Darkling. He was not only a vampire himself, but the leader of the Brocéliande coven, making him one of her largest adversaries.

  Yet, here he was, poking fun at her as she sat helpless in a cage. Helpless and underground, leagues and even further away from anyone who could come to her aid.

  “I am no pseudo anything.” She crossed her arms, refusing to entertain his jabs, knowing her reaction would only amuse him further. His raillery seemed without cynicism, but his last comment had struck a chord, and it annoyed her immensely.

  She pivoted back to face him. “I am well-aware of what the kingdom thinks of me, you ass. I’m not oblivious
to any of it.”

  He watched her through the bars, eyebrows slightly raised.

  “That doesn’t make me any less of a leader. And, even then, I intend to protect my people at any cost. Now, I need to know. What if the Night Court confirms it was a human who staked Laurent? What will you do?”

  Garin frowned, massaging the soles of his now-bare feet. “Ember Court,” he corrected, straightening suddenly. “Why? Do you know anything about what happened? If you do, I’m not releasing you until you tell me.”

  “I would have told you if I knew anything. I was just wondering what would happen.”

  Garin studied her warily, probably searching for a tell. “They are… interesting creatures, the Fair Folk. Much to their chagrin, they cannot lie—which is why they speak only in nonsensical riddles. If I’m careful, if we ask them the right questions, I’ll be able to get the truth from them.”

  “Well then, I’m glad,” she replied, trying to keep the sudden defensiveness she felt from her voice. As far as she knew, no human was involved. “For one of my family to do that to your coven leader would be extremely foolish.”

  “Yes. Yes, it would,” he agreed, and his eyes followed her closely as she shifted uncomfortably. “It would give us the grounds to seek retribution against your kingdom.”

  She didn’t need to be queen to know that any kind of retaliation meant war. It was a large-scale effort that she wasn’t at all prepared to support or organize—at least, not upon her immediate inheritance of power.

  Regardless, she couldn’t let Garin see it. Lilac took a deep breath and spoke as calmly as her nerves would allow. “And? Will you?”

  He massaged the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. “I don’t know.”

  She wasn’t sure what answer she was expecting to hear, but it wasn’t that. Lilac stood and placed her hands on the bars.

  “Please, let me go. I got you in, I did as was asked.”

  “You promised me one day,” Garin said firmly.

  “Well if you’re going to threaten to attack the kingdom—my kingdom—then I need to go. The faster I get to Paimpont, the quicker I can get back to the castle.”

  Ignoring the urgency in her tone, he stood and peeled his bedsheets back from the top of the mattress. “You mortals take everything so literally. I never threatened anything. I said it would give us the grounds to. Whether or not I act on it is up in the air; plus, if I were wanted to retaliate, do you really think I’d lay all my plans out for the one person who should know nothing of them?”

  Just then, a knock came at the door. Garin sauntered over and opened it a crack, returning with a tray of what looked like lumpy liquid and a mug of water. He retrieved a small key from his pocket and opened the cell door just wide enough to hand it to her.

  She hesitated, half considering shoving him out of the way and escaping. But where would she run? She would have nowhere to go, and very little time before Garin caught up to her—or worse, Bastion. The thought of the vampire guards in the main chamber and the many more probably slumbering in the other shadowed halls of the makeshift crypt made her shudder.

  “You can try,” said Garin, following her longing gaze to his door. “I promise, you won’t get far. Plus,” he added dryly, “I wouldn’t give any hungry vampire a reason to give chase, if I were you.”

  A jolt of fear rippled through her, but she quickly swallowed it. “You just… ate, though,” she said, wrinkling her nose.

  “I’m stuck in the body of a twenty-five-year-old man. I have the perpetual metabolism of one, and the blood of the dead never satiates me for long.”

  Reluctantly, she took the tray and sniffed at the suspicious gray-green matter floating in the bowl. She glanced up at Garin in shock. “It smells incredible.”

  “Smells like leek soup.” He shut her cell door and took his seat across her at the foot of his bed once more. “They have to keep those people—the cattle, I mean—alive somehow.”

  The cattle. The men and women in the cells of the vestibule. Despite the hunger gnawing at her stomach, she suddenly felt too sick to eat and placed the tray beside her and returned to the bench. In her determination to undo her submissive pretense, she’d momentarily forgotten about Piper.

  How could she?

  Unbidden, the image of gaunt Piper with a crooked neck and blood trickling from her lips flashed through Lilac’s mind. A pang of heavy guilt spread through her chest for not being more upset about it, but in the moment, she’d been forced to hold her tongue. Anger surged back up within her.

  Lilac buried her face in her hands. Other memories of her old friend began to surface, ones that she’d tried to block—for the most part, successfully—for years. Her face burned as she glared at the abomination watching her curiously from the bed. Piper, who was banished from the castle because of Lilac, who had become nothing more than a blood bag of skin and bones to the starving Darklings. She imagined Piper carried away by vampires. The moment she was captured, had the former handmaid gone along with it with minimal resistance, as Lilac had?

  Or was Piper braver? Had she fought back, kicking and screaming?

  “Was killing her necessary?” Lilac croaked from between her palms.

  She peeked through her fingers.

  Garin was staring at her, mouth open in confusion. “Who?”

  “Piper!” She raised her voice. “Piper.”

  “Oh, the redhead?”

  “She wasn’t just a redhead, you stupid Darkling,” Lilac exclaimed, shooting up and once more pressing up against the bars. “She was my former handmaid.”

  Garin wrung his hands and licked his lips before speaking. “I had to satisfy Bastion. I gave him the inhumanity he was seeking. If he’d asked me to drink from you, I would have been done for. So would you.”

  He frowned and squinted. “Wait. If she was your handmaiden, then how is she here? We wouldn’t dare bother your castle with kidnappings. Not even an idiot like Bastion would attempt something so foolish.”

  “I got her into trouble once and—and she was banished,” she explained miserably, then hiccupped twice. “Banished from castle grounds. I’m not sure how she got here, but I’d imagine she might’ve been captured on her way back to her parent’s house. I know they lived on the outskirts of Rennes.” She felt lightheaded, imagining Piper’s terror at being captured, then left in a cage for years to be used at the Darklings’ beckon and call.

  It was her fault. All of it. She sunk to her knees and bent over the makeshift toilet, heaving dryly.

  “And now,” Garin continued in mock reverence, hand clutched dramatically to his chest. “She’s dead. Gone forever. Fin.” He opened his eyes just in time to dodge the full stone mug that came flying at his head, liquid splattering all over the bookshelf. The mug bounced without cracking and landed near the swords.

  “Watch the armory,” he chortled as Lilac sobbed angrily, now standing and clutching the scalding bowl of leek soup to chuck at him next. “Put that down this instant.”

  “Or what?” she spat through the tears. Her churlishness wasn’t uncalled for; he had kidnapped her and thrown her in a cage, after all. And killed her friend. Her only friend, perhaps. “It’s not like you can do anything to me, anyway, you sorry excuse for a vampire.”

  Stunned, he crossed his arms, not a trace of humor remaining as he examined her from across the room. She couldn’t tell if the look was hunger, lust, or a combination of both—but she scuttled aside when he strode over to her cell door. She shrank into the corner when he entered the cage, snatched the soup bowl from her grip, and reached for her—but, instead of grabbing her again, Garin expectantly held his other hand out.

  “May I?”

  Lilac loosened from her recoil. “May you what?”

  “Your hand, princess.”

  Half surprised, half satisfied that he’d bothered to ask, she guardedly obliged and allowed him to lead her out. When she realized he intended to bring her to the bed, Lilac wriggled her arm away;
he let her, using his free hand to knock one of the two pillows onto the floor.

  “Bed’s all yours, Your Royal Highness,” he drawled, placing the bowl down upon the sheets. He fetched her sack and rummaged inside it until he found her damp wool cloak; he gave a good yank to shake it out and then placed it, hood hanging, at the end of the sword rack near the fireplace.

  Lilac watched in bewilderment, almost forgetting her anger. He then lowered himself onto the floor next to the bed, propping himself up against the pillow and wall.

  “Eat,” he said encouragingly. “And just so you know, princess. I didn’t kill her.”

  Lilac plopped onto the mattress, not out of comfort, but because her knees began to feel weak. It was surprisingly comfortable.

  “Don’t you dare,” she seethed. “How could she—I saw what I saw.”

  But Garin was shaking his head. “No. You think you saw. I turned her.”

  Lilac, who’s nausea finally prompted her to pick up the spoon, let it clatter back into the bowl of soup with a plop. She balanced the bowl on her knees.

  Garin watched her, his lips curving in satisfaction. “When Bastion turned her over to me, I force fed her a few drops of my own blood that I had drawn before killing her. There was so much of it all over the poor girl, no one took notice any of it was mine.”

  The blood upon Piper’s chalked lips had been his, not her own. Reeling, Lilac leaned back on an arm. She was glad she was already sitting. What a horrible ending for Piper.

  Or, depending on perception, a new beginning.

  “What will happen to her?”

  “She’s in transition now. Within a day at the longest, she should awaken. It varies person to person, on how their body reacts to the change. I’ll have someone find her a room somewhere here.”

  The matter-of-fact reassurance in Garin’s voice was almost too much to bear; she either wanted to smash the clay bowl over his head or hug him to show her gratitude. Instead, she gingerly picked up the bowl and scooted back until she was at the top of the bed, then slipped her legs under the covers. The cold she’d felt since leaving the castle had seeped deep within her bones, leaving her feeling like she’d never truly be warm again. Sighing, she put the spoon aside, lifted the bowl to her lips, and began to drink. The broth was smooth despite its pallor, steeped with lush greens and herbs. Incredibly salty. Surprisingly savory.