Tales from Shady Grove: Stories from the Trailerverse, Volume One

by Kimbra Swain

  My jaw dropped open. He was going to take the agony for me. I shook my head, but he narrowed his eyes at me. It was his most lucid moment of my entire stay in Winter. He chose the pain over my death, and I had to watch it all.

  Slowly, the lowered his body into the acid. He cried out as the liquid scorched his skin. Tears rolled down his cheeks as the nobles laughed. My body shook in grief for him. Inch by inch, they lowered him into the cauldron. The acid ate away at his skin. His screams were indescribable. Yet, he never lashed out or stopped him. My life wasn’t worth this.

  But then I remembered their words. This time. They had done this to him countless times in countless ways before I had arrived. This wasn’t just about me. It was about Winnie. It was about Grace. Hell, they could have threatened anyone in Shady Grove, and he would have taken the pain.

  His death came before they could lower his entire body into the vat. Once it reached his heart, he turned to ash which fell into the acid. It floated on the surface as his final scream echoed through the underground chambers of the Winter castle.

  I cried. It was more than just tears. My throat closed up, and I gasped for air. My body shook violently. It reminded me of how weak I was, and how strong he was.

  “Dylan,” I muttered.

  I knew he would rise, and I don’t know how they would contain him. It didn’t matter. I’d seen too much. And yet, as the Winter nobility and Brockton soon proved, I hadn’t seen it all.

  42

  While trying to compose myself, the door to my cage opened. Wart walked in with a few fellow guards. They grabbed me by the arms and dragged me into the center room. The nobles were exiting. I was placed at the far end of the room from the cauldron. Dylan’s ashes still covered the surface. A few had fallen to the ground.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “What we were told to do,” Wart replied simply.

  Finally, to my surprise, they removed the shackles that had suppressed my power. I felt it rush back into me. It felt so amazing that I was afraid I might orgasm right there.

  “Now it’s time for the fun,” Brockton’s voice filled the room.

  Wart dropped a nasty, rusted dagger next to me.

  I looked up to see that the ceiling of the room which I hadn’t noticed before was a large grate. The usurper and the nobles looked down into the room.

  “What is this?” I asked while trying to formulate a plan to get out. I had my magic, but I didn’t dare strike immediately. I had to guess that Brockton would be ready for an attack.

  “I told you. You have a choice. Decide who lives. Kill Dylan and yourself, and you have my word that Winnie will be returned to Grace. Kill Dylan, choose to live, and Winnie will die. It’s very simple,” Brockton said.

  “I can’t kill him. He’s the phoenix,” I said.

  Brockton squatted down to speak to me. “You and I both know that you share her power. A mutual bond was formed. You aren’t her servant. She made you her equal. A foolish thing to do, in my opinion, but she has always been a foolish girl. Snap your fingers, Bard, and this will end.”

  The ashes on the floor began to spark and flame. He was rising. I had to hope that he would have a plan. Between the both of us, we could take them down. I waited eagerly for my friend to rise.

  I’d seem him rise once before, and the sight was inspiring and glorious. This time was spectacular. The ashes lifted out of the cauldron joining with the others. They swirled around in a magical dance forming into the outline of a large raptor with flaming wings. My heart warmed, because despite the horrific death, my friend was alive. Together, we would overcome this torture.

  He rose majestically with fiery wings outstretched. The heat melted the ice on the walls, and I welcomed its warmth. Slowly the great bird descended to the floor forming legs, torso, arms, then head. The fire engulfed him. When he opened his eyes, my heart sank and a fear I’d never felt welled up inside of me.

  Fury. Pure, blazing hatred. Worst of all, it was directed toward me. I shrank back to the cold wall, gripping it with my hands. I had nowhere to run, and Dylan’s wrath seethed. I began to sweat as he stepped toward me.

  My fear gripped me, neutralizing my thoughts. I only had one thing on my mind. I was going to die.

  “I told you that if I could get to you that I was going to make you pay for breaking your word to me,” he said. His voice was deeper than usual. The harshness shook me.

  “Dylan, don’t do this. Please, we can get out of here together,” I pleaded as he continued his slow path toward me.

  “You promised to stay with her. To protect her. You cannot do that here. You’ve broken your word to me, and I will not suffer to punish you for that betrayal. Don’t you see, she will die without us,” he said.

  “She has both of us. We are both right here and we will get back to her,” I said.

  “No, I’m already dead.”

  I didn’t get a chance to ask him what he meant before the flames intensified. I tried to dodge him, but he pinned me to the wall with flaming hands. My skin burned, and I screamed in horror.

  “Dylan! Stop! She wouldn’t want you to do this!”

  “Stop me,” he growled, pressing harder.

  The stench of burned flesh filled my nose, and I cried out in agony. “No, I won’t!”

  “Stop me!” he screamed in my face.

  I hardened my will. “No!” Grace would never forgive me for killing him, and I couldn’t live with it.

  “Then you will burn,” he said sadly. The flames engulfed my body burning away the new warm pants. I tried my best to get away from him, and eventually, I couldn’t take the pain. But I refused to kill him, I wouldn’t give him or Brockton what they wanted.

  I managed to pull enough power to play a few notes of a sleeping spell. The flames ceased, and the phoenix crashed to the ground in a heap, snoring.

  My flesh had suffered, and the pain threatened to knock me out. I used the rest of the power I’d drawn to heal as much as I could of the damage before I passed out.

  No dreams. No hope. Just the cold.

  43

  I awoke in my cell. The cuffs had returned, and my magic was unreachable. Someone had graciously given me a new pair of pants. Looking down at my body, I was amazed. For all the damage that Dylan had done, the scars that remained were only on my stomach and chest. Perhaps my magic was stronger than I knew.

  Slowly I raised up from the bed in my cell. I heard sobs. Daring to look outside my cell, I saw Dylan returned to the center spot in the room. Chained to the floor. He was hunched over, and his body shook. He murmured and whimpered words that I couldn’t understand. Normally, I would have immediately called out to him, but the fresh scars on my body warned me not to provoke him.

  I grabbed my torn blanket and curled up next to the door where he couldn’t see me. I listened, and after a while, his words made sense. But only in knowing what he was saying. What he meant escaped me. He sounded mad.

  “I worship her wrath.”

  The only her I could imagine would be Grace. I waited to hear more.

  “Let’s try this. Let’s do this. See how long he lasts.”

  His voice took a mocking tone as if he were speaking someone’s words. Then, he was himself again.

  “I need a beer.”

  I wanted to follow that one up with a ditto, but I waited. No cries of pain. Just the mutterings of a madman. They had broken him with their games. My heart ached for him. For Grace and the things she didn’t even know. And I listened.

  “Lavender’s blue, dilly, dilly. Lavender’s green.”

  Each sentence, word, or sound made no sense. Sitting there, shivering in the cold, I realized that my friend had lost his mind. If faced with him again, I needed to use my magic to protect myself. But I swore that I wouldn’t kill him. I knew what that would do to Grace. In a way, it would be keeping my oath to Dylan. By keeping him alive, I wouldn’t suffer the fate of murdering him and having her go without us both. I just had to bide m
y time until I could figure a way out.

  “Did you fuck her?”

  I held my tongue. This wasn’t Dylan. He knew I’d never cross that line.

  “If I were you, I would have. Just to have her. I’d do anything to have her. You must not love her like you say you do.”

  Not Dylan. Not Dylan.

  “She is the softest thing I’ve ever touched.” He huffed out a laugh. “And I’ve touched a lot of things.”

  Not Dylan.

  “When I am king, dilly, dilly. You shall be queen.”

  I tried to tune him out. I didn’t realize how much the ramblings would affect my emotions.

  “She’s the cutest child, and she deserves everything that I can give her. But I can’t give her anything else, because she is dead.”

  “She’s not dead,” I said. I clamped my hand over my mouth.

  “That’s right. You are right again, Bard. I’m dead.”

  I sat for hours listening to him talk. Wart brought me a plate of mush. I didn’t care what it was, I was starving, and I ate all of it.

  “What about him?” I asked.

  “He don’t need food. He’s immortal,” Ward replied, reminding me of my half-human status.

  Dylan didn’t acknowledge him and continued to mutter. I finished the food quickly, then settled in on my bed. I wasn’t eager to hear everything Dylan said. At times, he was very loud. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t tune him out.

  “I’m your huckleberry,” he said, quoting Tombstone, a movie we had watched together.

  He continued for hours. He continued until they returned. Five fairy nobles with new killing games for the phoenix. This time they wore hoods to hide their faces. They taunted and beat him. He cursed them. I covered my ears and hoped that I wouldn’t hear his death.

  However, when my hairs began to stand on end, I knew something was happening. Flashes of light filled my cell. I closed my eyes and didn’t look. But I heard him scream.

  “Levi! I’m coming for you! Do what I told you to do!”

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I swore.

  The flashes of light died down, but the strange metallic smell mixed with burned flesh wafted around the room. I gagged and tried to keep from dry heaving.

  Wart and one of his buddies came into my cell, picked me up, and dragged me past Dylan’s ashes to the other side of the room. Once again, they removed my cuffs. I immediately pulled power preparing to fend off Dylan’s assault. I concentrated on building the field around me. The power of Winter came to me easily. I supposed that was due to my blood bond with Grace.

  Dylan’s rise was just as impressive as the time before, and the fury returned to his eyes. He charged me, screaming at me about keeping my oath. I didn’t hesitate to unleash my bard powers on Dylan, who immediately fell asleep to the lullaby that I had conjured.

  And so, this continued, for days upon days.

  The nobles would come, torture and kill Dylan, and then unleash him on me. Each time I refused to kill him, hoping that one day I’d find a solution to the madness. Then, Dylan would spend his days in a mental fog. His mutterings became more and more incoherent. I felt myself losing control. My desire to end it all rose with each death. But Winnie needed me. And seeing Dylan’s state, Grace was going to need me, too.

  44

  Another day. Another round of kill the phoenix and let him attack the bard. Some days we fought. Dylan would lower his fire and come at me with his fists. I treated it like a training session. The dead look in his eyes hurt me to my soul. His desire for me to suffer and die was very real. On the other hand, it wasn’t Dylan. They’d ripped his humanity out of him by being savages.

  Today, I was pinned to the wall by one of the nobles who had decided to be super aggressive after Wart brought me out of the cell. He put his arm under my neck, and I met his eyes under his hood. My heart stopped. I saw the warning in his turquoise eyes. Wisps of white hair strayed out of his hood.

  I’d always considered Grace to be stunning in her Winter Queen form, which meant her brother, Finley was equally beautiful. Breath-takingly so.

  “I’m working on something. Stay alive,” he muttered.

  “Get off me!” I said, trying to shove him away.

  I didn’t understand. Didn’t everyone in Winter know Finley? He was the prince. With my magic unleashed, I saw the glamour he wore for everyone else. It was intricate and powerful. I doubted anyone could see through it, which meant, he was allowing me to see him.

  It disgusted me that he’d just participated in having Dylan drawn and quartered, but Finley had always worked on the ends, not the means.

  “He won’t survive this, but you will. Stay alive,” he warned again.

  “I said let me go!” I unleashed a chord of power, pushing him away from me. I hoped he knew I was just playing the part. I saw his glamour shimmer back into place. The white hair darkened to grey and his perfectly pale skin gained color. His eyes turned to a dark lapis. He stood, spat in my face, and walked away brushing dust off his cloak.

  It was a fists day, and I fought with Dylan. He got several punches in, but I was getting better at fighting him.

  Brockton snarled, “How long are you going to allow this to continue, Bard? Kill him. Kill yourself and I’ll let the girl go!”

  There were days I wanted to do just that, but I didn’t trust Brockton’s word. Fairies do have a sense of honor, but his heart was corrupted. If he had a heart. I had to make sure Winnie was safe. With Finley’s appearance, I felt a twinge of hope that I’d almost forgotten or lost. Whatever he had planned, needed to happen soon. Dylan was becoming more and more lost. I finally got a good shot on him and knocked him out.

  Wart quickly appeared and dragged me back into my cell. His troll companion snapped on the magical cuffs. I sat on the floor allowing my wounds to bleed. I couldn’t heal them.

  I’d never faced the prospect of life without hope. I’d tangled with the swamp witch, but I never lost hope. Once I met Grace, I had high hopes for life. The separation made me ache. And Winter drained the hope out of me. Little by little. I began to see the world differently. Even with Finley’s appearance, I doubted he could pull off whatever he was trying. Yes, hope didn’t completely die. I had to hold on to one sliver of it to survive.

  When I saw the truth of the supernatural world with fairies and beings, I had felt an overwhelming sense of belonging and family. My experiences in Winter showed me that the whole world wasn’t like Shady Grove. In fact, our town was a special place. One that I’d probably never see again. My final hopes rested in saving Wynonna.

  I truly believed that Wynonna was responsible for thawing my queen’s heart. Without her, what would happen to Grace? She could lose Dylan. She could lose me. But she couldn’t lose her heart.

  When the next round of torture started, I did something stupid.

  Wart placed me outside the cell as we waited for Dylan to rise. He took the cuffs as he left me alone in the center room. I dug deep and called upon Winter. I called on the power that was mine through the blood bond with Grace. Brockton felt it.

  “Yes, feel the cold. Embrace it,” he cooed.

  I ignored him as filled my magical reserves. Dylan rose and kept his fire along with a little of lightning, which was new. The first bolt struck beside my head as a warning blow. I quickly formed a magical shield. It started at my shoulder tattoo and spread out as a glowing green half dome. Dylan threw bolts along with balls of fire.

  “Stop!” I yelled at him. “Stop this and we can save her!”

  “You will die for your betrayal. I’ve decided I don’t want you near her much less marry her!”

  Marry her.

  I lost my concentration. “Marry her?”

  “Kill him!” Brockton yelled.

  “You don’t deserve her!” Dylan yelled. He ran at me and bounced off my shield.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I asked, looking down at where he’d fallen on the floor.

  His fire died ou
t, and his eyes became clear. “The dream changed. You will marry her. Not me.”

  “No, even if you were gone, I wouldn’t dare cross that line. She would be devastated without you,” I replied, keeping my shield between us.

  He sat up and looked up to Brockton. He flipped him the bird. I laughed. It was a very Grace thing to do.

  “It’s a beautiful ceremony at the stones. A rogue-ish looking man stands before you and her. She’s so damn beautiful and completely in love. Winnie is there and my son. Our friends and family from Shady Grove are there. Some faces I don’t know, but I see the way they look at the two of you. It’s amazing. You do look ridiculous in a crown. Just saying.”

  “A crown?”

  He looked up at me. “You will be the King of Winter. So, maybe I shouldn’t try to kill you. No matter what happens here. The dream hasn’t changed, which means you get out of here and I don’t.”

  “Enough!” Brockton said.

  Wart appeared with three guards. I shoved them away with the power I’d saved up. It wasn’t a fair fight, because Dylan helped them. They were struggling to return to me, when he snapped one of the cuffs on my wrist.

  “What the hell?” I yelled.

  “You need to live, Levi. I need you to love her,” he said as Wart hit me with his beefy fist. I hit the cold floor, and Dylan said he was sorry before his eyes became cloudy. The room spun. The shield and magic were gone. Wart tossed me into the cell.

  “Sorry to hurt you, Bard, but you were too amped up,” Wart said. It seemed strange for him to apologize. It just reminded me that even the troll was just another servant of Winter.

  I crumpled to the ground, placing my throbbing jaw on the cold floor. Dylan’s dream had changed. I wondered when that had happened. I wondered why he hadn’t told anyone. We had talked about it before I left for Summer. I’d written his story. He considered it done, and I knew that he knew then even though he didn’t tell me. He hid the truth. I understood why. The dream could change. Just like now. If I didn’t survive this, it would change again. I wondered what a future would look like with us dead. I’d seen the dark cold inside Grace. I’d encouraged her to embrace it because I knew she could handle that power. But if you combined that power with grief and loss, I couldn’t fathom the damage she would do.