The Fae Files

1. Reine-1

The dumbest thing I ever did was to make a Fae bargain with my mother.

The second dumbest thing was to make one with myself.

I"m not sure what instinct made me agree to spend my sentence in the asylum in the dark Fae capital of Cruaidh. While I didn"t regret agreeing to a self-imposed exile in exchange for the lives of my lover and friends, I almost immediately questioned my judgment as to where. But that"s what had gotten me in that situation—bad judgment, even though it was for a good cause.

After the trial, I rose and faced Basil. Two burly guards stood on either side of me. One"s angular face reflected stoic regret, the other"s, rounder and almost boyish, a kind of cruel glee that reminded me of the joy some Fae took in torturing humans in certain fairy tales.

Fairy tales or part of our history? It was hard to tell anymore. Before I"d left Faerie, I’d thought I knew our history, my history. Now I questioned everything I"d been told, taught, or remembered.

The one who looked like he"d rather be doing anything but that said, "Come along with us, Your Highness. Your transport is ready."

Basil regarded me with sorrow and something else, that thing in his expression I chose not to see. "Good luck, Your Highness. I"ll continue to work on your case."

I nodded and said, "Thank you. I trust you"ll do your best."

"I always do for you."

He"d come a long way from the mischievous Troubadour to the serious Fae researcher who was part of my Council of Three. Perhaps he"d gone too far in the other direction. Another regret to add to my list. One thing hadn"t changed, though… When I glanced back at him, I found him gazing after me with longing and sadness. I suspected he"d find an opportunity to visit me shortly.

The two guards led me toward a doorway at the side of the courtroom, the one that condemned prisoners left through. Before we got there, a male voice said, "A moment, if you please."

The youngest member of the Fae Council, Roshal, approached. I recalled he had been in the palace when I was growing up, but as children of the Crown Princess Maeve, Rhys and I hadn’t been encouraged to play with the other Fae kids. Or rather, we had, but only the ones my mother wanted to ally with. We were wielded as weapons, and my heart went out to my younger self. How would my life have been different if I"d learned to make allies earlier?

Maeve doesn"t teach her daughters to say no, Ellerin had told me once. It was true, at least when it came to her. And she"d forced me into another difficult yes.

Maeve doesn"t teach her daughters to say no,Roshal walked up to me and bowed. His nut-brown hair curled around his ears, and when he rose, his amber eyes had gone dark with grief. "Your Highness, I wanted to express my sympathy." He glared at the two guards, and they moved back, although I was sure they could still hear us. Roshal touched my wrist and said in secret conversation, “I don"t believe for a moment that you are guilty or that you made this plea bargain willingly.”

I don"t believe for a moment that you are guilty or that you made this plea bargain willingly.”“Thank you,” I responded, “but I don"t know what there is to be done for it at this moment.”

“Thank you,”but I don"t know what there is to be done for it at this moment.”“I"ll work with your counsel, but I can only do so behind the scenes. I fear that your mother will soon have an iron grip on us all.”

“I"ll work with your counsel, but I can only do so behind the scenes. I fear that your mother will soon have an iron grip on us all.”With that, he scurried away.

Maeve had left the courtroom after the fall of the gavel sealed my sentence. Hopefully she wouldn"t find out about Roshal"s and my interaction, but I also suspected that the gleeful guard"s loyalties lay with her. I hoped Roshal hadn"t put me in the position to make another difficult bargain.

I turned to the guards and mustered my best royal attitude. "All right, gentlemen, let"s go."

The hallway off the courtroom held the chill of centuries of despair, and not even the glowing Fae lights in intervals along the sandstone wall did anything to dispel the thick gloom. The guards brought me down a set of spiral stairs, and instead of turning right to the prison, we went left, which brought us to a courtyard I had never seen. It, too, held a sense of lingering sadness and hopelessness. With a shiver, I surmised this was where the extremely unlucky—or evil—had been executed.

A black coach and four waited for me. The horses" eyes shone with the black light purple of the dark Fae.

The driver climbed down from the perch and removed his flat driver"s hat. He bowed minimally at the waist. "Queen Lilith sends her regrets that this is the best she could send at such short notice."

"I"m sure it will be fine."

He held the door open, and I climbed in. The vehicle had plush purple velvet chairs, a small refreshment center that held a few nibbles—mostly fresh fruit, cheese, and bread—and crystal decanters of red wine and water.

The door closed. The click of a lock being engaged from the outside reminded me that although the accommodations might be nice, I was still a prisoner.

The coach vibrated when the driver resumed his seat, and then it lurched forward. I fixed and devoured a snack. I hadn"t eaten in I didn"t know how long. All my time-hopping made the determination of the last time I’d done normal bodily things difficult to pin down. Like the last time I"d slept.

It clearly had been a while because the jolt of leaving the lands of the light Fae woke me from a slumber I hadn"t noticed I"d slipped into. The coach and four didn"t slow their pace for their journey through the lands of the gray Fae, which had been created to separate those of the light and dark Fae…and to contain beings that neither wanted to face. I gazed out of the window, but the fog hid everything more than ten feet from the path. Every so often I thought I could see something move, but it could have also been the swirling mists creating the illusion of movement within them.

I"d become so accustomed to the horses’ pace that when it sped into an erratic, panicked rhythm, I caught the change immediately.

“What"s happening?” I shot the thought to the driver, whose mind swirled with panic.

“What"s happening?”“Revenants! Hang on tight. I"ve called for help.”

“Revenants! Hang on tight. I"ve called for help.”I wanted to ask how and if they would be there soon, but he needed his concentration for keeping the horses on the path. Them bolting off it would spell doom for all of us. The revenants, reincarnated Fae souls, would devour any living creature they encountered until they grew flesh again, and they’d be harder to evade in the deep woods.

I found a handhold and opened the curtains wider. The shapes" swirling had increased in pace and timing to resemble a silent hurricane. Glowing wisps whipped around the carriage, and I forced myself to breathe, especially when they darted closer and leered in at me. Occasionally a purple flash of light would drive them back, but not for long.

I attempted a repulsion spell, which gave us a few minutes" reprieve, but they closed in again. In spite of supposedly being mindless, ravaging ghost-like creatures, they appeared to be toying with us, and I had the sense that I was about to find out what a good chocolate dessert felt like when I pounced on it.

Would I ever eat chocolate again? The thought made anger explode in my gut. I refused to lose my freedom and my life on the same day, and I rubbed my hands together to prepare a banishment spell. Let them languish in one of the empty orthogonal dimensions.

andBut the thought came to me—These were once Fae, and they will be again. As a Queen of Faerie, I couldn"t destroy them. How had they been handled in the past? Another answer lost to mystery.

These were once Fae, and they will be againOther hoofbeats came at us from the other direction, and I borrowed the trees" perspective to see a black-hooded rider on a black horse approach. The trees, less cooperative than those in Scotland, kicked me out, so I couldn"t see the rider"s face. They rode the horse with the grace one would expect of a High Fae.

They rode by my window and brandished an ebony wand tipped with amethyst. The stone glowed, and the revenants fell back with shrieks and cries. I could feel the Fae"s magic, but I couldn"t identify it. No, I knew it, but I didn"t recognize it, so it must have been someone from my distant past, pre-exile. First exile.

The rider continued to conduct the revenant storm and bought us enough time to cross the border out of the Gray Zone. At least the revenants stayed in that area, which had been created to contain them, although I questioned for how long. If they were becoming smarter before turning into Fae, then they would figure out how to leave the Gray Zone like the ones that had attacked us near Aoine"s castle on my last trip.

I slammed my fist on the chair beside me. The cushion kept the action from hurting, but I didn"t need the extra pain. What were the rules the revenants followed? Could they only escape on the nights when their guardians, the owl-like gwenhwyfar spirits, flew?

Well, I supposed I"d have time to research the question, assuming I could access a library. No internet in Faerie.

The black rider galloped ahead, and I sent my appreciation after them. The horses had resumed their easy pace.

Crossing the lands of the dark Fae felt like a sigh of relief filled with an inhale of sulfur. A sense of repulsion filled me. Not disgust, but more akin to the sensation of trying to push two magnets together at their same pole ends. If this was how I felt here, how did Basil manage in my lands? Or was it because I was the queen of the light Fae? I hadn"t had a similar sensation the last time I"d traveled to Cruaidh.

Soon the obsidian walls of the city itself loomed in front of us. Again, the pace of the horses didn"t slow, and we passed into a tunnel that reflected the glowing purple of their eyes.

* * *

The coachman took a back way to the asylum. Or perhaps an alternate way. I"d only been to Cruaidh the once with Kestrel Graves and the man she"d believed to be her father, John. Not that that journey had ended up well for them or for Lawrence, who had joined us later. Lawrence had almost been killed, John actually had, and Kestrel had attempted to use a dangerous facet of her power to save the man she"d known as her father and had never forgiven me for stopping her.

Lawrence… Not ready to touch the grief of never seeing him again, I"d managed to keep him from my mind, but memories flooded back. Lawrence flying in his gargoyle form to help us over the lake when the water wolves attacked. The first time we"d made love…and then had to escape from Aoine"s castle. His helping me to rescue our little group and evade the revenants in the woods. I"d ended up using my own dangerous power, that of folding the distance between us and our destination, but it had worked out and had further given me an inkling that the Gray Fae Ellerin was my father since that was a journeying talent.