45. Ground, Open Up and Swallow Me Whole
forty-five
Ground, Open Up and Swallow Me Whole
I met the High Lady at the agreed time and place so she could show me to the palace training rooms, and while we walked, Morgoya gave me a brief political update.
It looked like the Court of Wind had settled in for a long stay—much to the High King’s chagrin—and the carousal was beginning to wind down in the city at last, no thanks to Enyd’s men.
“I’ve been doing the rounds, trying to get a read on public opinion after the Malum attack,” she enlightened me as we climbed a steep, narrow staircase.
There were numerous small windows high above us, smothered with fog and barely illuminating the dreary space.
“Most faeries were too preoccupied with drink and dance to notice that anything unordinary was happening. The sirens were loud, but only the sober faeries picked up on the fact that they were a warning alarm and not part of the festivities, and the faelight outage occurred while many were sleeping.”
A chill ran down my spine as we paused on the next landing.
The Malum had been right outside their homes, and nobody had known how much danger they were in that night. The clandestine nature of faeries was so extreme they didn’t even ask questions amongst themselves.
“There are, however, a few particular factions of the High Fae who are discussing the missing lights,” Morgoya went on, lowering her voice into a conspiratorial whisper.
Her slim-fingered hand drew me into the shadows against the wall, and I felt like concrete had been poured down my spine.
“There are rumours that the repeated instances of vanishing lights are connected. There is talk of the High King losing his power.”
Her words froze my blood.
“Does he know?” I choked out.
In the shadows, Morgoya’s features were severe.
“He doesn’t care. He thinks he’s immune to public opinion because of what he experienced as a child, but I’ve ordered my spies to see through the rest of the discussions.
I’m taking this seriously, Aura, even if he won’t.
” Her feline eyes glowed with an emerald viridity through the dark as she appraised me. “I think you should, too.”
A painful throb smashed into my chest, and it took me a moment to realise that it was anxiety affecting the beat of my heart.
I understood what she was trying to tell me.
We both knew Lucais’s power was impeded by the lapsus—though I didn’t think she was aware that the entire city was being held together by one of his spells—and he was under more strain than normal, which was a risk neither of us wanted to continue taking.
We also knew that I was supposed to have access to a certain type of magic, which might be helpful to him if I was able to master it, and my inability to do so had already incurred a cost to his reputation.
But there was one part of her warning that bothered me more than the rest.
“Don’t these faeries know I’m the one who took the light in Sthiara?
” My voice took on an unfamiliar, harsh edge that surprised me.
“They saw me in the Oracle. They’ve heard the prediction of a union between light and dark—not to mention the fact that he basically outed me to everyone at the meeting in the throne room. ”
“I wondered that, too,” she assured me. “I believe the narrative they’re trying to spin is that he’s covering up for the fact that you’re a human without powers. Two spells with one stone, so to speak.”
I was already shaking my head, a foreign rage simmering beneath my fingers as I flexed them to try to remain calm. I’d felt anger before, but the things Morgoya told me were making me absolutely livid.
How dare they? He’s their High King —
“That bond really does something to you, doesn’t it?” The High Lady’s smile was rueful but momentary. “I’m not saying any of this to upset you. I truly believe you need to know…because there’s more.”
Forcing myself to swallow despite the tension in my throat, I asked, “What else?”
“If you’re not a faerie with magic, as they’re suggesting, then that begs the question of what the darkness portrayed inside of the Oracle actually means.
” Her mouth flattened into a red slash across her face.
“Some think it signals the end of Lucais’s reign, but others have started asking about Blythe. ”
“Fuck.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
My gaze hit the ceiling, watery and unstable. “I see why you’ve invited me to train with you,” I said with a forced laugh, trying to lighten the oppressive mood that was cloaked around us in our secret corner of the palace staircase.
Morgoya curled her hand around mine and tugged me along beside her. “It’s not only for that,” she remonstrated. “I’ve been wanting to reconnect, but I respected your need for space.”
“That was on me.” I sighed. “Every time I wanted to say something, I froze.”
She squeezed my hand before exchanging it for the handles of a double door. “I never should have allowed him to take it that far,” Morgoya insisted, glancing over her shoulder as she shoved against the wood.
An enormous, open space was revealed with high, arched windows and a dome ceiling that merged a fair distance above a viewing balcony; it had indistinguishable carvings on the railing and spanned all the way around the top of the room.
Reminiscent of a ballet studio, an entire wall was covered with a mirror, magnifying the reflection of the gloomy stone, and showcasing a figure sitting in the middle of the polished floor.
Batre was cross-legged with hands on her knees and her eyes closed.
Forgetting my reply, I paused on the threshold, entranced as I watched the earth faerie rising from the ground.
Her ascension was so precise I couldn’t discern what was happening for the first few minutes as her girlfriend and I observed her in a respectful silence—until the vines began to build up around her sides.
Batre didn’t show any signs of exertion as her magic worked to create a throne beneath her, using foliage and tendrils pulled up through the cracks in the floor.
Olive-coloured and flowering with little white petals, the vines wove in and out of each other as they grew in length and thickness, stitching together to create the chair that raised her until she was perched atop it like a goddess of nature.
Her eyelids fluttered gently as we approached, cracking open once the throne of vines settled into the foundations of the stonework.
“Hi.” She beamed at me. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
My jaw slackened. “You are incredible .”
Batre snorted, flicking her long twin braids over her shoulder as she wriggled her legs out from beneath her and rose from her creation. “I do parlour tricks like this when I’m not rescuing damsels in distress,” she informed me, winking.
“Thank you again,” I blurted, a wave of shyness washing over me. “I do hope you never have to rescue me again, though.”
“Well…” Her gaze flicked towards Morgoya before returning to mine with a sheen of shrewdness. “I don’t suppose the Court of Darkness will be interested in you anymore, will it?”
For a moment, my lower belly tightened with the memory of everything I had done with the High King in order to achieve that hopeful outcome.
The sound of Lucais’s voice echoed in my ear—how he praised me, begging me for one more, the feeling of his hips as they rocked into me, as he touched a part of my body that I could have sworn had never been noticed before…
“Aura?”
Shit.
“Um.” Blinking furiously, I rubbed my temple and swallowed down the filthy memory, praying to the High Mother that he wasn’t able to eavesdrop through our newly cemented bond. “I don’t actually know.” I dropped my hand. “I guess not?”
If I hadn’t been so spooked when we woke up in a completely different room to where we’d started, maybe Lucais would have stayed a bit longer to talk me through the next steps.
As it was, though, I didn’t even think to ask him for the specifics, simply being so relieved that we’d managed to do it successfully after all of that effort.
“I feel like a soulmate,” I confessed in a whisper. “I don’t feel like a High Queen.”
But I didn’t feel like the High Lady of the Court of Darkness, either.
Morgoya patted me on the shoulder as she strode past me to greet her girlfriend properly. They shared a sweet, chaste kiss before she told me, “There is a separate ceremony to the mating bond required for the coronation of any High King or High Queen.”
“You’re kidding.” I slouched as all of the blood drained from my face. “They didn’t mention that.”
Morgoya’s head whipped towards me so fast it could have flown right off her shoulders. “ They? ”
Ground, open up and swallow me whole.
If Batre could conjure up a throne of vines through the stonework, perhaps she could do the same with a sinkhole or quicksand.The earth faerie did no such thing, but she did speak up so I didn’t have to keep my foot wedged inside of my mouth, and for that, I was thankful.
“It’s not a really big deal if you’re the adjacent leader,” she promised me.
“If you’ve solidified the bond, then the hard part is over—no pun intended—and you’ve secured your place at his side as a ruler of Faerie.
It just isn’t completely official until they weigh it down with all of the bells and whistles.
” She nudged Morgoya in the ribs, who was staring at me like she was trying to read my mind.
“Is it enough for the Court of Darkness to back off, though?”
“The Court of Darkness, yes,” the High Lady mused distractedly.
I crossed my ankles, wishing that I could access the power of time travel. I’d go all the way back to the day I left Brynn in the human world, take her with me instead, and then I’d make sure this particular conversation never happened.
“It should release some of the pressure on you,” Batre persevered encouragingly.
“For now, let’s focus on getting a feel for your magic again.
I haven’t experienced this myself, but I hear that when a prospective leader is coming into their full power, they’re usually unable to access any other parts of their magic. ”
Rubbing the space between my eyebrows, I made an effort to physically shake my shoulders, imagining that I was freeing myself of the regrets that plagued me and the horrors that haunted my subconscious mind.
Like the memories from the Court of Darkness and the Court of Light, where magic had sent me into a spiral on more than one occasion.
And the lingering echoes of my childhood, where I had befriended an entity that abandoned me in my time of need and left me with countless scars on my heart.
If I was going to take magic seriously, I needed to understand it—how it could build a throne of vines beneath a woman with peace all over her face and bring light into the streets, instead of only seeing how it could paint walls black and leave whispers in the dark.
“Help me figure out what that means,” I pleaded.