Master of Shadows

by E. A. Copen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sir Malcom knocked on the door to the queen’s private chambers. It had been three days since Cian’s trial and still she had refused to pass judgement. His spies reported she’d been to see Cian’s widow, and then to see Cian himself in the dungeon, but not before dismissing the Pale Horseman. Perhaps she was just being thorough. That wasn’t unlike Queen Remy when it suited her, but it was time to hand down Cian’s sentence. The people were getting restless, and they were ready to put all of this behind them. Besides, his guests would be arriving soon.

  Queen Remy’s personal guard opened the door, placing himself in the space so that Malcom couldn’t see into the chamber unless he moved.

  Malcom gave the guard a sour look and tugged down his jacket. “I must speak with the queen in private. The matter is urgent and cannot wait.”

  “One moment.” The guard closed the door.

  Rude, Malcom thought and crossed his arms to wait. Once, shutting an advisor out of the royal apartments would’ve been considered unthinkable, especially given his track record. He’d done more for Remy in recent years than anyone except for perhaps Sir Foxglove. Unlike that prick of a knight, however, his motivation hadn’t been the hope of winning her affections.

  The door opened again. This time, the guard stepped aside to let him enter. Once inside the queen’s apartments, Malcom waited for the guard to exit, but he just closed the door and stood with his back to it as if Sir Malcom hadn’t asked for privacy.

  He frowned at the guard. “I believe I said it was a private matter I wished to discuss with the queen.”

  “Anything you have to say, you can say in front of him,” said the queen. She stood in the doorway between her sitting room and her bedroom wearing a simple orange gown with red trim.

  Sir Malcom inclined his head slightly. “As you wish.”

  The queen gestured for him to sit on one of the couches, an offer he graciously accepted. “Would you like some tea, Sir Malcom? I’ve just had some brought up and a few lemon cakes.”

  “No, thank you.” He placed his hands on his knees and leaned forward, glancing beyond her as she came to join him. “Where is your lady in waiting? The human one with the plain face? I haven’t seen her around lately.”

  “I’m afraid she’s gone to Earth to be with her family for a short time.” The queen smiled and sat on the sofa across from him. “I thought it would be better than having her mope around here. She was quite distraught when Declan left. The two of them are very close.”

  “Indeed,” he said with a nod. “I do hope they come back soon and in one piece.”

  “As do we all. Now, what can I do for you today, Sir Malcom?”

  He folded his hands in his lap. “I came to ask for your thoughts on Cian. The trial has all but concluded. All that remains is for you to pass judgement. It’s been several days. I was hoping you had reached a decision in that regard, especially since the common folk are growing more anxious to see the traitor punished by the day.”

  Queen Remy relaxed against the back of the sofa cushion, sipping her tea. “I’ve been reviewing my options. Did you know there have been quite a few books written on crime and punishment in fae courts? It would seem the previous monarchs were all very inventive when it came to punishing traitors, especially since death wasn’t an option. There was a time when banishment was considered a fate worse than death. However, with all the advancements Earth has made, and our close relationship with the fae of Earth, that’s no longer the case.”

  Sir Malcom forced himself to offer a strained smile. “Yes, well, you have no need to rely on such inventive punishments. With your unique gifts, you can simply sentence him to be executed. I myself am willing to carry out the sentence. You shouldn’t have to dirty your hands with the blood of a traitor.”

  “Actually,” said the queen, placing her teacup on the table between them, “I’m not inclined to sentence him to death. I’m not even completely convinced of his guilt.”

  “What?” Sir Malcom shot to his feet, prompting the guard at the door to shift toward them.

  How could she not believe in his guilt? After all that testimony, all the evidence... The case was ironclad. Cian had opened the gate, letting the Nightclaw into the Summer palace, thereby putting the queen’s life at risk, and resulting in the deaths of twelve good men. Based on the testimony given during the trial, there could be no other solution.

  Malcom swallowed his surprise and forced himself to regain his composure. “With all due respect, Your Highness, I’m surprised you would doubt his guilt. Cian has been nothing but a thorn in your side for years. It’s no secret that you dislike him and that he has no love for you.”

  “Perhaps,” she said with a shrug, “but that doesn’t make him a traitor.”

  “Yes, but opening the gate and letting that creature in does. And there’s no evidence that it wasn’t him. If anything, all the testimony given points to his guilt. Your Majesty, you have a gentle heart, but you must be firm in this matter.”

  Remy squared her jaw. “I have heard evidence to the contrary, though it wasn’t presented in your trial. In fact, I believe some of the testimony your witnesses brought forward may have been falsified.”

  “Falsified?” Malcom exclaimed. “But all the witnesses were fae. Lies are impossible.”

  “I haven’t yet figured out all the details, Sir Malcom, which is why I haven’t sentenced anyone to anything.” She folded her hands in her lap. “I’m still continuing my independent investigation.”

  Malcom rose promptly to his feet. “If you doubt my ability to lead this investigation myself—”

  “It’s not that, Sir Malcom. It’s simply due process. I must be certain. If I go around executing everyone accused of treason based on the accusation and limited testimony alone, then people will start accusing someone every time they want to get rid of them. I must use my powers over life and death responsibly. That means being absolutely sure.” The queen stood and smoothed her hands over her dress. If she was bothered by Sir Malcom’s outburst, she didn’t show it. “Now, if that’s all?”

  “It is,” said Sir Malcom with a bow. “Forgive me for my show of emotion. My concern is only for your wellbeing, my queen.”

  “There’s nothing to forgive.” She turned her back to him. “I’ll see you in court later?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Sir Malcom left the queen’s chambers with his jaw clenched. The queen was too trusting, too naive. Too weak. It was her human side getting the best of her. Due process? Ha! Titania would’ve executed the traitor without so much as a trial. That was why Titania was feared, why she ruled as long as she did.

  A commotion outside drew his attention and Sir Malcom paused on the stairway. The window next to him faced out toward the palace’s main gate, giving him a prime view of all the protestors who had gathered. Every day it seemed like there were more of them.

  At first, it was just the refugees making a fuss. They wanted the protection of the palace walls, guarantees. Rights. They didn’t seem to understand that after Shadow attacked Summer all those years ago, they were lucky Titania and the Pale Horseman didn’t crush their entire kingdom. Though they didn’t deserve the Summer Queen’s mercy—especially not after Princess Odette’s murder—Titania allowed them to live provided they never took up arms against Summer again. She’d allowed them to keep their miserable lives and live out their days in their twilight land. Now that Shadow was overrun, Queen Remy had allowed them to come into Summer without restriction.

  That wasn’t enough. They wanted more. More food. More shelter. More medicine. “We are citizens of Faerie,” they cried. As if it made no difference which court they served. But it made all the difference. The Shadow fae should’ve been thankful for what they’d been given so far. Things could be far worse.

  Now some of their own people had joined the Shadow fae in protest. Somehow, they believed if they intervened on the Shadow fae’s behalf, the royalty would listen. Hundred
s of them had gathered.

  Titania never would’ve let them gather like this, he thought looking at the protesters with their signs and their slogans. She would’ve ordered her guards to fire on the crowd. If they didn’t like the scraps left for them, let them eat arrows.

  He continued down the stairs. Hopefully, the protesters didn’t get in the way of his guests arriving on time.

  Once he reached the lower level of the palace, he made his way through the corridors and eventually to the dungeons. The commander on duty rose from his desk and fumbled to give Sir Malcom a salute.

  “Take a break,” Sir Malcom commanded. “Leave me the keys.”

  “But sir, the queen said—”

  “Unless she ordered you to disobey a direct order from a superior officer, you should be doing as I said,” Malcom snapped and held his hand out. “Keys, Commander.”

  The commander frowned but did as he was told, hesitating only at the top of the stairs on his way out.

  Sir Malcom ignored the questioning look the commander gave him and stormed down the stone corridor to Cian’s cell. He thrust the key into the lock and jerked the door open.

  The last time he had been down there, Cian looked appropriately awful, having had no shave, no bath, and only a little food and water for several days. Cian seemed to believe his food was poisoned. Always intuitive, Cian. Malcom had thought to eliminate him slowly, just in case Remy’s weakness prevailed. A slow poisoning would’ve done the trick, or at least made him violently ill and less of a troublemaker when the time came, but he was too smart for that, wasn’t he?

  Now Cian was practically living in luxury. Someone had brought in a cot for him to sleep on along with a pail of water, a razor, and a comb. A tray sat off to the side on the floor with the bony carcass of a whole pheasant and steamed greens. The knife had smears of jam and crumbs on the floor told Malcom there’d been a biscuit in the cell. Cian had enjoyed the same lunch as the queen herself. Disgusting.

  Cian looked at him with fear shining in his eyes and rose from the bed. “Malcom. I didn’t expect to see you again.”

  “I didn’t expect to come again.” Malcom pulled the door closed behind him. “I see your situation has improved.”

  “Whatever I’ve done to make you hate me so much, Malcom, tell me,” Cian pleaded, his voice trembling. “Tell me and it can be undone.”

  Sir Malcom locked the door and turned back around to face Cian. “What is done can never be undone and has very little to do with you.”

  Cian’s naked chin trembled. “But I thought...”

  “That’s just the problem, Cian. You thought. You think. You question. And now the queen is starting to question, too. I can’t have that.” Sir Malcom pulled a dagger free from where it hung on his belt.

  Cian’s eyes went wide and he backed away. “Why are you doing this to me, Malcom? Why?”

  “Stop calling me that!” He hissed and grabbed Cian by the shirt. “Haven’t you figured it out yet? Malcom’s not here.”

  “Then who...”

  Malcom grinned. “My fingers are black vines crawling across your country, my breath the noxious green mist that taints everything it touches. My whispers lure away your warriors and with one touch, they become mine. When you turn out the lights and think you see eyes staring back at you, those are my eyes. I sit on the Shadow throne from where I see everything this land and the Earth have to offer, and I take it because I want to, and no one can stop me. I have many names. The Skinless One. The Dweller in the Darkness. The Faceless God. The Crawling Chaos. But today, you may simply call me Mask. We are all Mask.”

  Cian started to scream, but Mask’s dagger flashed, slicing across Cian’s throat. The blade was sharp and cut deep enough to sever his vocal chords, cutting off the sound. Blood splashed against the wall in a thick line of droplets like paint.

  Mask let Cian’s body fall and stepped back, watching as the fat fool tried to halt the flow of blood flowing down over his chest. He waited for Cian to fall over, to die, for the strange breathy gurgle to cease. And waited.

  And waited.

  But Cian didn’t die. He lost consciousness and paled noticeably, yet when Mask knelt to check for a pulse, it was still there.

  “How?” he snarled, rising. His spies had told him the queen’s presence had brought death into Faerie and that any fae within the walls of the palace would be mortal so long as she was there. He’d just come from the queen, so there was no way she could’ve fled the palace that quickly.

  Unless it wasn’t the queen he’d just spoken to.

  A slight chill touched Mask’s flesh façade, prompting the skin to develop small bumps. The missing handmaiden, the queen’s strange behavior, Cian surviving an otherwise fatal wound... It all made sense. Remy’s absence was the only viable explanation.

  The woman sitting on the throne was an impostor.

  Mask shifted his grip on the knife. “You may not be able to die while the queen is away,” he said to Cian, “but the impostor wearing her face can. That handmaiden is human, and once I expose her for who she really is, it won’t matter that you’re alive. Without a queen, Summer is as good as conquered already.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Finn opened his eyes to twitching shadows shifting on a slate-colored cave wall. Light flickered, pale and orangey red, the color of fire. Yet no matter how high the fire surged, it couldn’t beat back the night.

  Memory of the slaughter at Rilvand replayed over and over, reenacted in the dance between shadow and light. He couldn’t even call it a battle. Those poor people, they had no chance of surviving. If only Finn and the others hadn’t stumbled on their little town, they might still be alive.

  Foxglove fed the last scraps of dry wood to the flame and jabbed a cloth wrapped torch into the fire. It was the last torch they could make, and even then they’d only managed to make it thanks to Declan giving up his cloak. Now there was only one left between the four of them and it lay draped over Finn, though it did little to warm him.

  No one had said much of anything to anyone, at least not in the few hours that Finn had been awake. He had no idea how long they’d been running, but it must’ve been some time. His ribs and shoulder joints were sore from being carried, then dragged. If only they’d managed to secure some horses during their escape, but there just hadn’t been time.

  Finn closed his eyes and winced at the sound of screams that weren’t there. The same people who had cheered his arrival had died while he ran, men, women, and children alike.

  Something brushed against his shoulder and Finn’s arm snapped out, closing around whatever it was. His eyes opened, but it took him more than a second to realize it was Declan he held by the throat and not some monster.

  Declan blinked at him, eyes wide. “It’s only me.”

  Finn let him go. “Sorry.” He stared at the wall.

  Declan moved away and into the firelight. “It’s all right. I’m just glad we all made it out of there. I thought I was the only one.”

  “It was awful.” Remy hugged herself harder. “Those poor people.”

  “You shouldn’t have come.” Foxglove crossed his arms where he stood toward the mouth of the cave, keeping watch. “What were you thinking, Remy? Your being here has put all of us in danger. I should march you back to the palace.”

  “What for?” Remy cast an angry look over her shoulder at Foxglove. “So I could sit and do nothing but wait anxiously for you to return? I’m tired of being told I can’t do anything, Foxglove. That’s not why you taught me to use a sword.”

  “I’m beginning to regret ever teaching you anything at all.”

  “Well, that’s too bad. You can’t take it back now. You should’ve thought of that before.”

  He pushed off the cave wall with a hip and stormed back toward the fire. “I didn’t instruct you so that you could run off and put your life at risk, Remy. I taught you so that you’d never be helpless in the event of an invasion!”

  “Summer is bein
g invaded!” Remy shot to her feet, fists clenched. “The blight is every bit as threatening as the Shadow army, or Winter, or any other threat. But no one wanted to listen to me when I was saying that a month ago. No one wanted to listen when I burned the farmlands, or when I said we should send more expeditions, or go to the other courts for help. Cian advised me to make grand gestures to the High Court to repair relations first, and you said burning the farms was the move of a desperate woman.”

  “It was!” Foxglove shouted back. “Or did you not see the throngs of angry protestors when we left the palace?”

  “I was desperate! Someone had to do something, and I wasn’t going to get any help from any of you!”

  Declan dropped the rock he’d been toying with and stood. “Enough already! All the arguing isn’t helping anything. What’s done is done. We need to be focused on what to do next, not everything we did wrong before. We came here to find the source of the blight and destroy it. Adrix said that this Mask person might be the source.”

  “We cannot risk the queen’s life on a maybe.” Foxglove gestured to Remy. “We have to turn around and get her to safety.”

  “You mean fight our way through the army of Fomorians we’ve only just barely escaped?” Remy scoffed.

  Declan put a hand on Remy’s shoulder. “We’re the first people to get this close to the source. Maybe is better than anyone else has ever had. Besides, we have the stone and someone who can wield it. If we turn around now, we might never get another chance before Summer and the rest of Faerie is overrun. We have to press forward.”

  Foxglove nudged Finn with his foot. “Doesn’t look like he’s in any shape to fight this Mask fellow. He killed a few of them yesterday and barely survived it. No telling how long it will take before he’s fully recovered. If he ever recovers.”

  “I can hear you.” Finn barely recognized his own voice. It sounded strained.