by S L Mason
My mouth went dry. Arty was big and strong, but he didn’t lift weights or play sports. It wasn’t like he couldn’t. He was more of a bookworm, an egghead. It was one of the things I loved about him—his geeky nature.
“Is there any way I can bring him here?” A moist film formed on my hands at the idea that Arty was permanently a part of the Puca’s stables.
“Highly unlikely. Puca does not give up his prizes easily. Nor does he like it when anyone meddles in his affairs. I don’t think he would tolerate a human interfering.”
There was the only way I was ever going to see Arty again—interference. For all I knew, he might enjoy taking care of horses. He always liked all the dogs in the neighborhood. I didn’t care if he did like it; we were getting out of here. If music was the only way, so be it.
I whistled the mirror away but kept mentally chewing on what she’d said.
Everything has a vibration or its own song, some key. You had to listen for it and figure out what it liked and coax it into doing what you want.
The concept wasn’t difficult, it made perfect sense, like getting a horse to go where you wanted, using the reins alone. If everything in the world had that same concept behind it, all I had to do was listen for the right key. That was what I was missing when I had tried to open the door last night; I was using blunt force.
I didn’t get to think about it much longer because she made my shoes, and we were off.
CHAPTER 14
I stood at the top of the stairs while gazing down in horror. Seven flights. I’m gonna be sweaty by the time I reached the bottom. My foot pushed down on the first step.
“Sarah,” a voice called out, deep and commanding.
I stopped mid-stride to glance over my shoulder. It was him, Deston. I lowered my hand and put my foot back down on the top riser before turning to face him.
“Yes, Your Grace.” Lavender bobbed a curtsy, lowering her eyes. She placed one hand over the other in front of her.
“You’ll ride down to the evening meal with me.” He ignored Lavender, and she proceeded down the stairs.
He thrust his arm out, but I wasn’t sure what he wanted me to do with it. I tentatively reached out, not sure where to place his arm. His hand rose underneath mine to lie perfectly on top of his. We turned down a different corridor to a set of intricately carved doors.
He sang something low and guttural, and the door opened to a boxy room. Thank god for an elevator! I breathed a sigh of relief.
“You have misgivings?” His head never turned to glance my way.
“No, I’m just thrilled to not walk down seven flights of stairs in my dinner finery.” From the side, I glanced at his face. He had a smile.
“Yes, the stairs are rather tedious. Only the lower echelons use them. The lords don’t.” I took my hand down from his, and I turned to face him.
“Are you kidding me? So, all the servants have to walk up and down the stairs while the higher echelons do something else? What do they do?”
He laughed. “They don’t have an elevator. They have floating platforms to take them directly to their rooms.” His hand slipped with ease to his sides, hanging limp.
I put my hand on my hip and cocked it to one side. “So, if you’re not a big wig riding a floating platform to your bedroom window, you get to trudge up and down the stairs. That’s a real nice system you got going here. Why not put in a set of elevators for everyone? You wouldn’t have to worry about all these floating platforms all over the place. There must be thousands of them. Do you really realize how inefficient that is?”
He crossed his arms over his chest as his green, bright eyes turned to the dark moss of a shadowy forest.
I put my hand over my mouth. I’d lectured him about how to run his castle.
Keep your mouth shut, Sarah.
“I’m sorry, this is your castle. I really shouldn’t tell you how you run your life. I’m… I’ll keep my opinions to myself.”
His lips were pulled back in a smile, but his eyes told another story. “I know humans are impulsive; it’s a part of your charm.”
He hadn’t told me to mind my own business. He extended his hand back out, expecting me to put my hand back on his. Was it some weird formal thing? Having never been around royalty or aristocrats of any kind, I wasn’t sure how they behaved. I couldn’t learn new rules for protocol if no one was willing to inform me.
I didn’t feel the inertia of movement until the doors to our elevator opened. We were near the grand foyer. He led me off to a side section of the castle that I hadn’t seen before.
His full lips curved into a blinding smile. “You may not enter with me. You are not of my station, and I will not elevate you.”
I raised my eyebrows. Heat burned across my face. What?
“I didn’t ask you to elevate me. I’ll be happy to enter on my own. I’m used to being a girl, thinking and walking around without a man holding her hand.” I snatched my hand away from his.
His smile faded into a blank face with hard, dark moss eyes.
I didn’t need some stupid man escorting me to dinner. Although I was happy to not walk down seven flights stairs, his condescending attitude irritated me.
Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Sarah.
I turned away from him and pulled in a deep breath. I entered the room with my chin high and with as much grace as I could possibly scrape together.
CHAPTER 15
The table had to be at least thirty feet long. It was ridiculous, but it wasn’t a rectangle. It was an oval with a head seat that looked suspiciously like a throne. The other chairs mirrored each other, no station denoted. I didn’t know where to sit.
“My lady.” A servant motioned her arms that I should follow her, and she led me to almost the complete opposite from Deston’s throne. Considering I was the lowest person on the totem pole here, that made perfect sense.
The table was vacant of decoration without even a place setting or cards. There were simply chairs and things that I thought were napkins folded to resemble a tree—a real honest-to-goodness tree with a woody base. It wasn’t real. This was Fae; nothing here was real. Everything was beautiful and a lie, underneath it all was ugly. The reality was the same for Earth. From space, it was beautiful. Our world appeared peaceful, filled with life. A big blue and green glowing ball in the blackness. But the moment you arrived below the surface to the Fae, that was where the rot lived. They had pretty faces, but behind them hid ugliness.
No one sat in their seats, and Fae milled around the room in various states of crazy dress. I didn’t know anyone so I perched near my chair.
Lavender hadn’t even mentioned how you met someone, whether you we’re allowed to introduce yourself or wait to be introduced. The only person I knew wasn’t even in this room. I couldn’t exactly wait for His Grace to introduce me. I didn’t want to appear out of place. Not knowing what to do was more nerve-racking. Even if I had to stand on my head while holding a golf ball between my lips with a frog in my pocket, at least I’d know what to do—no matter how ridiculous.
The eyes of the female Fae were drawn back to me over and over, like a moth to a flame. I felt them assessing me from head-to-toe. The males also took their turn tearing me apart with their almond-shaped eyes. All had white hair with eyes every shade of the rainbow, some in soft pastels, others deep smoldering jewel tones, but the most frightening were the piercing neon shades. Cold yellows, frigid blues, and icy reds. I knew red was usually associated with warmth and fire, but only the Fae could make something hot, cold. Most of the clothing was predominantly see-through, revealing the swell of their breasts, and the curve of their buttocks. In some ways, the entire dinner party resembled a Renaissance Grecian fresco. With strips of fabric draped across body parts accidentally covering only the most important bits. The illusion was only disturbed by the sharp, pointy ears and the fierceness of their eyes. They had earrings, necklaces, and bracelets, made of several metals and semi-precious stones. Everything
was shaped to resemble nature, a butterfly brooch, ant-shaped chain links, or spiderweb bracelets. Their fabric, like mine, was woven in an interesting all-natural way, resembling something that they’d plucked from the forest floor. Their lithe bodies and their long slender fingers moved with grace around each other, allowing the fabric of their clothing to wave and ripple behind them.
I schooled my face, making it resemble boredom. I was alone, and time dragged on me. Deston was the one who’d led me to the door. How long exactly was he going to wait before he decided to enter the room? Was everyone going to starve to death waiting for him to appear?
CHAPTER 16
My mouth went dry when I saw the purple-eyed Fae who’d brought me here. He was dressed in his finery, but no longer had flashes of light all over him. In the interior light, you couldn’t see the Day-Glo markings on his face. But it was him, and I could tell the moment our eyes met. A smiled curled half of his face, and he made a beeline toward me.
“Well, Sarah, you clean up nice.” Appreciation colored his voice.
He made my skin crawl. “No thanks to you,” I mumbled.
He let out a deep chuckle. “If you only understood, you’d realize I have saved more lives than I’ve taken. How does it feel to be a candidate?”
“You know, you throw that word out there ‘candidate’ as if I understood what it meant, but I don’t.”
“I thought for sure His Grace would’ve immediately informed you what was expected. Well, no matter. I’m sure he’ll get around to it. Judging by the competition, I’m not sure he should put in a lot of effort.” He stood stock-still, arms resting at his sides.
My teeth ground. “What is that implying?”
“Well, there will be fierce competition. I’m not sure you’re up to it.” He didn’t think I could win whatever it was, assuming I even wanted to win.
Get real, Sarah. You’re super competitive. Of course you want to win. Whatever it is, you want to win. You want to do it, you want to be first. It’s the highest mountain, and you must climb it.
“I don’t know what your competition is for. Having a desire to win, compete, or even care, doesn’t exist in my world.” I didn’t want him to see how his words had stung me.
“Well, as I say I’m not sure that you’re going to really need to bother. I’ve seen the competition, and it’s stiff.” His face was blank as his eyes trailed around the room, examining each and every female in turn.
A thought struck me. “Is all of my competition human? All these girls? You know, people that you can’t compel?”
He stopped staring at the crowd. A smile curved his face as his predator-like, purple eyes turned on me. I tilted my head back to meet them. He was at least a good six to seven inches taller than me. His eyes bored down on me. “Well now, that is an interesting question. Probably the first truly intelligent question you’ve asked me. No, you’re the only waker. I’ve not heard rumor of any others.”
So I was the only one that they couldn’t compel. Sounds like I was already ahead of the game, whatever the game was, assuming the game wasn’t doing whatever they tell you. For all I knew, they might’ve been treating humans like racehorses, and they wanted me to run and jump over hedges.
“So what exactly am I competing for in this competition that I’ve been thrust into?” I let my fingers dig into the back of my chair.
“Second most intelligent question. Only the greatest prize of all time ever on planet Earth. I can’t tell you what it is, but once you know, you’ll want it.” He raised his chin as he spoke, allowing reverence to fill his voice. It added tonal quality to how he spoke as if he was trying to sway me.
“If you’ve seen all of my competition, am I to assume you’ve stopped making raids on the surface? You aren’t killing any more humans or abducting any more children?” Please say you aren’t killing anybody else.
“No, I’ve been ordered to continue the raids. We’re not abducting any more females. We are indeed taking more males, only the young and strong.” Once again, his eyes trailed away from me.
My stomach clenched. They were taking boys, guys like Arty. He called them raids, but they must’ve still been killing people—lots of people.
“You’re still killing humans indiscriminately.” My heart raced. The bile in my stomach churned over and over again. He was killing, and he was going to keep killing. It seemed ever since I was a little girl, there was always someone killing someone else. That was why my dad went to Afghanistan, to stop people from killing other people. But the truth was he’d been killing people. It was his job, and I knew it haunted him.
“I know from the untrained eye, you humans assume that what we’re doing is evil or cruel or we’re doing it indiscriminately. There is a reason for everything we do. Fae are not so shallow they would kill indiscriminately. If we were, we would’ve been doing it all along. We would’ve never gone away. Trust me when I say it brings me no joy or pleasure to kill. It is simply something I must do as Minister of War. I have no choice but to do as my liege demands or give up my position and leave in disgrace; that cannot be done.” The sincerity in his words compelled me to believe him. I didn’t really think he enjoyed killing anyone. For now, at least I knew what his position in the world was. Minister of War—his entire job was to wage war and prepare those for it.
“How am I supposed to refer to a minister in polite society, Mr. War? Do you actually Joust?” I allowed my grip on the back chair to ease. The blood flowed back into my fingers, turning my knuckles from white to pink. I’d always been good with the turn of phrase, making the mundane into something humorous.
He burst out laughing. “Yes, I do joust. I’m assuming by your queries that you’re seeking my name. My name is Janice. I am a cousin to His Grace.” Great, the psychopathic serial killers were all related; that was fabulous.
I extended my hand to him. “Nice to finally meet you, Janice. Thanks for abducting me. My life will never be the same.” I put extra emphasis on ‘never’ as a lump formed in my throat.
“That fire, that instinct to immediately strike back, that is what will save you in this competition. You’re very quick-witted, Sarah. You know I saw you when we first landed, when you ran away and slipped through my fingers. I didn’t know where you went. I knew you were awake the moment I laid eyes on you. I hadn’t stopped singing when you started running. I only managed to stop you for a moment. It was fascinating, thrilling even hunting you. I knew we had to have you.” He moved closer to me, his eyes almost in perfect alignment with mine. Excitement laced his voice as his breath flowed toward me.
I wanted to throw up. Good hunting me, and he openly admitted it. He was thrilled by it. My mouth filled the saliva that I had to swallow back.
“I believe that if you do win this competition, it will be for the better of Fae and the world. If you lose, the world will be less bright without you in it.” The violet of his eyes turned into a deep smoky amethyst, and when he said less bright, his voice deepened.
I snorted. Not a very feminine feature, but I did it sometimes when I inadvertently laughed. I put my hand over my face and pulled back.
“The world will be less bright without me in it?” I mocked his tone of voice. “You live underground; it’s already less bright. How can having me in your world make it brighter?” I cocked an eyebrow at him.
“It’s not always dark here, just lately.” His brows knitted together, and his jaw locked down.
I felt like whenever I spoke to him, he was leaving something out—a super important piece of the puzzle.
One of the servants standing near the doors stabbed their staff into the floor, creating a tapping sound. All in the room went silent. Janice silently moved away to stand next to his own seat. I loosened my grip on the back of my own chair. As His Grace entered the room, I noticed that everyone bowed or curtsied so I did my best bob.
I didn’t know how to curtsy. I’d seen maids on television give a little bounce up and down. That was what I did. I heard
a giggle next to me. I didn’t know all the intricacies of Fae social life or the rules of their courts. I’d always thought all those stories were made up. Now I was standing here in a real-life Fae court. I had no idea what to do. I was going to compete for the greatest prize of all time. Ridiculous. What could possibly be so important that it’d be the greatest prize of all time?
Deston took his seat at the table. Everyone followed suit as did I. Janice was seated close to his cousin. He wasn’t just the Minister of War; he apparently was also the royal taster. He took a bite of everything from Deston’s plate before he ate. Was it really that big of a deal that someone would poison him? Like I said, I didn’t know anything about their politics, so for all I knew they could be trying to poison each other constantly, all day, every day.
Steam wafted from the plate of food in front of me, tickling my nose and causing my mouth to water. I picked up the two-tine fork allotted to me. I stabbed into something resembling meat, but as I pierced it, the texture was wrong. Still, the pressure in my stomach overrode my inclination to not eat it. I proceeded to raise it to my mouth.
Lavender’s voice whispered in my ear.
“My lady, do not eat anything until I have tasted everything for you.”
I froze with the forks, still midair, and then lowered it. As my appetite drained away, she took small bites with her own fork from every item on my plate and backed away. I looked around the table with wide eyes. Somebody here would poison me? Of course, they’ll kill you.
I’d allowed myself to be lulled into a false sense of security with pretty clothes and makeup. Sitting at a nice civilized table wouldn’t stop these evil creatures from killing me or anyone else they wanted to. They were bloodthirsty, no better than Attila the Hun.
