Slowly, another image took shape. When it formed fully, Violet very slowly straightened. A coldness swept through her, tightening her skin into goose bumps.
“She’s in the Dark.”
Few knew that she’d trained herself in various forms of non-fae magic, including the warlock spell she’d just utilized to locate her sister. A fae warlock. Was there such a thing? Well, she guessed there was now.
Her gut churned. Her head began to throb.
“The Dark, huh? You don’t wanna go there,” said Pi in his crackly voice from where he bounced in the hearth across the room.
“No, you don’t want to go there,” corrected Poppy, Violet’s best friend, and the only other fae aware of Violet’s magical dealings. “No light, no heat,” Poppy shook her head. “No wonder. But we’re not fire elementals.”
Poppy’s given name was Persephone, but because she hated being compared to the Greek goddess, and because she loved picking poppies, everyone had called her Poppy since childhood. She seemed stubbornly oblivious to the fact that picking poppies caused her to resemble Persephone even more.
She turned back to Violet. “I’ll go with you, Vi.”
Violet had known she would offer. But she also knew she couldn’t allow it.
“The road to the Dark is paved with Shadows,” she said aloud, quoting an old fae nursery rhyme.
“That means you actually have to travel through the Land of Shadow to get there,” came a new voice. Violet and Poppy turned toward the door.
But it was Pi who greeted the newcomer first. “Good evening, Lalura!”
“Good evening, Pi.”
“Lady Lalura,” greeted Violet respectfully. She knew what the old witch was in the mortal realm: A magic user nearly unrivalled in power, and worth more respect than people normally possessed to give. She had an inkling she knew what she’d once been in the fae realm, as well.
“Violet,” Lalura nodded, making her way into the room. “I hear you’re off to save your sister, or some such thing.” The old woman was utterly unconcerned, except that she looked from one piece of Violet’s furniture to another with an arched brow and a rather put-out expression.
Violet jerked herself into motion, rushing to take a pillow from one hard wooden chair and place it over the cushion of her velvet loveseat. “Please, sit here,” she gestured, smiling hopefully.
Lalura hobbled over to the chair, gave it the once-over, and then turned around and settled into it, setting her cane to the side.
Violet sighed in quiet relief. Then she said, “I suppose you don’t think it would be wise for me to go?”
Lalura laughed. It was an odd, dry sound that somehow got into Violet and felt funny. “Oh, I absolutely don’t think it would be wise,” she said, still smiling. Her blue-blue eyes twinkled in the low light of the fireplace where Pi still bounced, watching and listening. “But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go.”
Violet’s eyes widened. She looked to Poppy, whose brows just about hit the ceiling. Poppy came around Violet and addressed the old witch. “You think I should go with her, right?”
“Not even a little bit.”
Poppy’s mouth dropped open. “But… she has to travel through the Shadows!”
“I’m well aware, child,” Lalura said testily, moving a little bit to adjust the position of her rump on the pillow. “That’s exactly why you can’t go.”
Now Lalura looked up and settled a very stern, very powerful gaze on Violet. The air in the room grew still, and the Pi stopped bouncing. “Violet Kellen, you must make this journey alone. Something waits for you in those shadows.”
Violet’s throat tightened. “Like… what?”
“That’s something you’ll have to discover for yourself.”
Time skipped, and the space between them shrunk.
“I’d go so far as to say, it might just be your destiny.”
*****
“So we’ve narrowed it down to one of seven possible traitors amongst the Thirteen.”
“Make that six,” Lalura corrected as she entered Roman’s study.
Evelynne D’Angelo was there, as were Damon Chroi, Diana Chroi – and their three newborn babies. “Oh my goodness, now why didn’t anyone tell me there were wee ones here?” Lalura instantly lost focus on whatever else she’d been about to say and instead made a bee line for the bassinets lined up against one wall. Vine-covered canopies hung over each one, and tiny sprite-like creatures danced atop those canopies, peeking down once in a while to make faces at the babies.
Squeals and giggles of joy emanated from the folds of the blankets inside.
“Kobolds,” Lalura muttered as she approached the first bassinet. “Good babysitters, but not much for gettin’ the kids to sleep on time.” She leaned over the opening, and the tiny kobolds leapt from the other bassinets to join her as she pulled the blanket down to reveal the baby’s face.
“Why, Diana, dear… I have never seen a more beautiful little goblin princess.”
She said it as if she truly meant it, with all her heart, and Diana beamed with pride. The Goblin Queen left the table where the others stood and joined Lalura at her baby’s side. “Her name is Anyu. She’s the youngest, with two older brothers.”
She turned then to peek in on her other little ones. “This is Lagan,” she said, as Lalura turned and smiled down at the little boy. “And this is Doryan.”
“Oh my,” Lalura laughed that sound of leaves on parchment that somehow managed to be a sound of pure joy. “Little Anyu is going to have a very difficult time getting away with anything with these two watching over her.”
“She already steals their food,” Damon said, chuckling from where he stood at the table. “She’s going to have them wrapped around her little finger.”
A few moments passed, in which the majority of them cooed over the children, who were admittedly beautiful, and then, at last, Diana turned to Lalura and asked, “What did you mean when you said we only had six kings to worry about, rather than seven?”
Lalura took the baby from her arms and cradled her lovingly against herself as only a very experienced woman can do. “We needn’t be concerned with Mr. Pitch any longer,” she told them while making faces at the baby. Little Anyu squealed and reached for Lalura’s nose, grasping it tightly. “The Shadow King has found his queen,” Lalura continued. “He just doesn’t know it yet.”
Epilogue
“What the devil does she think she’s doing?”
Caliban stormed through his castle, a fury of black-haired, black-garbed, black-mooded sovereignty with eyes of fire and clenched white teeth. All around him, his power snaked out, wreaking havoc as he strode on long, strong legs toward the off-limits portion of the castle.
Vases shattered, tapestries tipped or fell from their hangers, windows cracked, and servants scurried hastily out of the way, pretending to be invisible from their king’s wrath.
Drummar’s apprentice advisor rushed almost comically on short legs to keep up with his king, as Drummar just happened to have the day off. “She’s the queen now, my liege! I can’t very well order her not to –”
“Like bloody hell!”
Caliban tried hard to reign in his anger, but it leaked out through the tiniest fissures in his control. It was all he could do not to lash out and kill the young apprentice then and there.
Up ahead of him, the double doors to an empty marble room had already been opened wide. Perhaps because the queen had gone through – or maybe because the soldiers on either side of them were smart enough to know their king would be right on her tail. Either way, the room beyond was open, visible, and very obviously empty.
And the single white door on the other side was shut tight.
Caliban broke into a run. As he did, time seemed to slow down. The moments of the last few minutes of his life played out before him as if he were dying. Maybe he was.
Earlier that day, he and Minerva had gone for a ride across the palace’s extensive grounds. She??
?d chosen a dapple gray stallion that had taken a liking to her, just as everything in the realm seemed to have done. As usual, Caliban chose his favorite pitch black steed, Hades.
When it came down to the wire, Hades was the only one that seemed capable of matching Caliban’s heedless pacing and reckless need for speed. They were similar spirits, the two. Dark, beautiful, powerful, and untameable.
And yet it was Minerva who took the lead, spurring her horse into a fierce gallop and tossing laughter over her shoulder as her long hair went flying, a thick, white shimmer of pearlescent silk that beckoned and teased as Caliban was at once forced to try and keep up.
The two took off across the land as though Minerva had been riding her entire life. She was the queen now; everything here would come naturally to her, of course. It was something that continued to surprise him, as usual. But she took it in good stride, accepting it with incredible grace and a slight smile that relentlessly teased him in a wonderful way.
They’d been winding through the estate’s outer forests when Minerva suddenly turned a copse of trees and he’d chased close after her, only to find that when he rounded the same bend, she was nowhere to be seen.
The forest was too still. There was no sign of her.
He spurred Hades into a furious run and called her name, fear lancing his heart. It had been a week since she’d accepted her place as queen of the Unseelie Realm, and she’d already won the hearts of nearly everyone in the realm. But danger still waited out there. There was too much darkness all around them and at all times.
Until that very moment in that forest, Caliban had not left her side. For him, it was just too difficult. She was too precious, a treasure, an impossible thing that he’d somehow been nonetheless blessed with. And there was her gaze too… her smile, her body, her laughter. She consumed his thoughts night and day, in every possible way, and no matter how many times he pulled her to him in the night, loomed above her, and brought them both to exhausted ecstasy, he found himself endlessly yearning for more.
So he sped through the forest, chasing a hope and a mounting terror, for some horrible, indeterminate amount of time, before he realized there was simply no way her horse could have outrun Hades and escaped him. She must have opened a portal.
Or someone else had opened one for her.
At once, he did the same, shooting through his own portal to transport directly to the castle. He rode Hades to the front gates, dismounted, and spun to find a third portal popping to rapid life behind him, and none other than Antarris, Drummar’s bumbling apprentice, tumbling out through it. The man stumbled, and Caliban caught him with a fierce and sure grip.
“What’s happened?” he demanded at once, knowing there would be no other reason for the Duwomm’s sudden and alarming appearance. “Where is she?”
The man’s face was pure white, his eyes were enormous, and his breath was coming far too fast. “My liege! It’s the queen! She’s – she’s – she’s gone to see the u-u – ”
He’d had to swallow and take a shaky breath, and it was all Caliban could do not to throttle the final words from his throat. The Duwomm finally finished in one quick, terrified rush, “She’s gone to see the unicorns!”
But by then, Cal was already moving. Thinking back on it now, he’d absolutely known this would happen. Deep down, Minerva was going to do this. There was no other option.
She’d tricked him. She’d defied him. The woman had most likely been planning this all along. Probably all bloody week.
And he’d known. Of course she would do this! The unicorns were cursed by Wishers! There was no way in all the living fucking realms that she – a Wisher – and the most empathetic goddamned queen ever, wasn’t going to try to set things right again!
Caliban slammed into the white door, his fist gripping the knob with demanding strength. But it didn’t budge. He shoved his shoulder into it, railed against it, cast his magic out, and battered it with wave after wave of subjugating power.
But it remained locked tight, the gold knob glittering innocently, the door not budging a millimeter in any direction. She was the queen in this game of chess. He was just the king.
Caliban released the knob and stepped back, running stiff hands through his hair to fist it briefly before he released it, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes. He once more gathered up his magic, this time calling it to him from the farthest reaches of his realm and the deepest wells of his ancient being.
In front of him, from all around its edges, light outlined the white door, bright and beautiful as ever.
And somewhere in that godforsaken beauty, Caliban’s new queen was wandering directly into Hell.
*****
The forest was exactly as she had imagined. It was the kind of forest one could only imagine, the type of landscape you saw in dreams and really lucky hallucinations. And yet, Minerva ignored it as if it weren’t there surrounding her, a candyland of impossibilities to make Willie Wonka seethe.
She ignored it because they surrounded her as well.
She felt them there, heard their hooves crush the foliage. Ten? Twenty? The forest parted with their shimmering bodies. Manes of pure black and white flowed like waterfalls amidst the tree branches. She felt their eyes on her, clear and bright.
She waited on her knees in the clearing, her head bowed, her hands in her lap. She’d been preparing for this moment for days, gathering up magic, saving it, planning. She would have only one chance. She had to get it right the first time.
When Minerva at last felt she had the curious, confused attention of every last one of them, she slowly raised her head, and opened her eyes.
It wasn’t ten or twenty. Hundreds of unicorns surrounded her. Like regal, shimmering, dream-like statues, they spanned as far back into the forest as she could see.
The largest and most beautiful of the majestic beasts stood directly before her, the only one among them willing to step hoof into the inner circle of the clearing. He wore a coat of sparkling snow, his horn spiraling like a diamond spire at least three feet long.
She knew her eyes were burning; she’d already felt them aching, throbbing from the heat that she had yet to get used to. All week, she’d been shoving that light and heat back as far as she possibly could in order to hide it from her husband. But now it raged and burned.
And so did the unicorn’s. It set him apart from the other unicorns, this flickering blaze in the depths of his gaze. It was as blue as her own, the hottest kind of fire. He was one of the first, she knew. He was one of the originals, a unicorn in its entirety from a time before the curse. There was a sadness in that blue fire – if you peered deeply enough. If you knew how.
If anyone did, it was Minerva. She was ready.
Now, Minerva.
She straightened, locking gazes with the ancient beast. She recognized it the moment power began to flow between them.
And then, in a manner that felt more natural than anything she had done in a long time, Minerva Trystaine began to sing.
At first, her voice was soft, her words a harmonized whisper that escaped her form and floated across the clearing. Here and there, unicorns fidgeted, their hooves striking the ground in unforeseen wonderment as ancient fae words rolled over and through them, carried on the wind of a spell cast in perfect melody. As her voice raised slowly in volume, her spell grew in power, and a light began emanating from her kneeling form.
She felt its heat surround her, and saw it spread from beneath her, covering the ground like a snowfall of stardust. With it went her power, casting it outward in the most difficult spell any Wisher had ever cast.
She felt it draining her as well, siphoning from her like a vampire from a vein – but she kept singing. This, right here, was what she was born to do. This was what she was made for.
She raised her chin, opened her arms, and the lyrics climbed in volume. As they did, the magic brightened, becoming a veritable moonshine across the forest floor, outlining the world in fallen midnight, and castin
g it into an otherworldliness the likes of which no fae realm had ever seen.
The unicorns shifted, they whinnied and trembled. One or two bucked, their keen senses on high alert, their bodies instinctive. But their leader, proud and tall and weathered by the hand of time, did not move. He did not break eye contact with the powerful queen of the unseelie fae.
He remembered.
And somewhere in the darkest, most shrouded depths of their troubled souls, the others did as well.
Little by little, word after word, the spell sank into the forbidden forest, into the spirits of their cursed inhabitants – and finally, into the infamous magic that had made them what they now were. It unwound the bindings of that curse as if unravelling an intricate knot. She sensed the ropes sliding away, un-choking, un-holding, releasing its victims from relentless captivity.
She sensed the pain the ropes had caused. She felt the regret each and every one of them experienced with every earned sparkle, every earned horn. She felt their unshed tears – they slid down her own cheeks as she continued to sing.
At the spell’s crescendo, she knew there were others there as well, others beside the unicorns. She noticed them at last, her own kind standing behind her along the clearing’s edges, listening and watching in stunned silence. Her king had finally made it into the forest.
But there was no stopping the magic spell now. She had carried the craft through to the very end, and it was at the reigns now, driving its own momentum, a storm that had picked up enough wind to see it across a vast sea.
At last, she was expended. The spell came to an end, and as the last flame flickered to a blue, slowly burning ember in the depths of her indigo gaze, she sat back upon her heels, and bowed her head.
The forest around her filled with layer upon layer of silence. She heard the shaking of her own breath. She felt the giddy, numb exhaustion in her limbs that came with a job well done. She heard the beating of her own heart.
And then she felt a warmth upon her forehead.