Chapter 17
“Among those forest-beings of whom legend speaks such malice none is more relentless than the Korrigan, who has power to enmesh the heart of the most constant swain and doom him to perish miserably for love of her.”
Once the two W?chter soldiers are on their way out of the park with Emma—who pauses to wave at me flirtatiously—I make my way to the palace. Although I have a small laboratory at the town house in the city, I need to access the archive.
I approach the gates of the palace, identify myself, and carry on.
No words beyond basic exchanges pass between the palace guards and me.
I welcome the silence as I make my way into the labyrinthine hallways of the palace.
I need answers, and I am feeling increasingly alarmed by my inability to find any facsimile of them.
“Her Majesty is in with advisers,” an attendant in the queen’s livery says, catching up to me as I stalk toward the small door beside the main library door.
Unlike the carved, elegant library doors, this entrance looks like nothing more than a panel in the wall.
Now that I am the Hunter, I have the magic to press my hand there and whisper a word to make it open.
In the past, I could only access the room with Father’s accompaniment or the application of an old-fashioned key that the queen herself carries.
It feels wrong to be able to open the door on my own, wrong for Father to be dead, wrong to be the person carrying the burden of this mystery—and yet it is the destiny I’ve expected my whole life.
I splay my fingers over the silken panel sewn onto the wall and mouth the word so quietly I’m unsure if there is actual sound escaping my lips.
The word itself is a strange sibilant sound that, like many of the Hunter’s words, is not in the language spoken by anyone else in Alveus. Or on the continent.
The attendant steps back as the door lets out a click when the locking mechanism turns. He stares at me as if surprised that it opened for me.
“The Hunter is dead?” he asks.
Though word was passed to the nobility, I realize that news of the Earl of Fleuriste’s passing has not been sent officially to the soldiers or palace guards.
Was that something I was to do? Was there an official presentation of the Hunter I failed to complete?
My attention has been on the monster and my father’s death, not on formalities.
“My father has passed. I am the Hunter.” I clear my suddenly dry throat before adding, “I have matters to investigate, but I will see Her Majesty before I leave the palace.”
Then I step inside and pull the door closed behind me, leaving the gaping man outside. I am the Earl of Fleuriste now, but the title means less to me than the other weightier one I must carry.
I am the Hunter.
That title is the one that defines me, shapes my days and my future. Being the earl is a small measure, a minor thing. Being head of my family means adding to the weights I already carry, and idly I think it would be good to have a wife to share that responsibility.
How do I watch over Mother? Over Rylan?
How do I manage the family’s holdings?
Adjudicate disputes in the village?
All the tasks that were Father’s—as well as hunting—will fall to me.
I again shove my fears and thoughts aside to focus on research.
My microscopy so far has revealed little, so it is past the time to consider comparisons within the archive.
Failing that, I will need to ask the queen to summon a court liaison to the gate to discuss what faeries have left their land and come here to Alveus.
One way or another, I’ll find the killer, and after that, I can focus on my duties as Earl of Fleuriste.
I pull out the fabric from Emma’s dress and my notes, and I start to look at the items available here for comparison. The dilemma is that I don’t think that a monster attacked Emma. Faeries don’t hunt in full daylight. If she’s lying, it misleads me. If she’s honest, there are other issues.
On the back wall are a series of weapons forged in Faerie.
A bronze rapier, a silver-coated, two-handed sword, several daggers of some metal not seen in Alveus or—to the best of my knowledge—anywhere in the known world.
Armor, both chest plates and pieces for arms and legs, rests on hooks.
All of that is interesting, but the items I need are the casts of wounds.
“Not teeth.” I examine the impressions of incisors and blunt teeth. I cannot see how even the longest sample incisors could be responsible for beheading a man. “Unless someone is using one as a sword? Could they mount a tooth on a hilt? Why?”
My own encounter with the beast tells me that its teeth are not long enough, and I saw no blade hefted in hand.
Teeth are not the right weapon. I turn, then, to the mounted fist impressions of varying sizes.
The hands of several creatures are webbed, and a few are massive.
One has six forward-facing fingers rather than the normal four forward facing that humans—and the most humanlike faeries—have. “Not fists.”
The thought of something simply swiping the head off a man is not impossible.
I think about the spiraling claws, but the cut from such oddly twisted things would not be smooth or straight.
I picture them and think it would be more likely to tear—but tearing leaves a different skin pattern than slicing.
I turn then to study the weapon prints. The wounds I’ve seen were as if one strong blow had severed almost the entire head of the victims. That seems to indicate weapons.
And the beast was strong—I felt that myself.
A sharp blade in a strong creature’s hand could do the damage I’ve seen, but I’m not sure that clawed beasts would use blades. That’s the best guess I have, though.
The plaster casts show each blade line, varying thicknesses, and lengths, but this is still not illuminating. The casts don’t highlight the strength of the blade’s wielder. At best, they show width and length of the weapon.
Frustrated yet again by the lack of new information, I make my way to the microscopes and boxes of samples that line several drawers.
In these samples are venom, thin hairs, fur, scales, saliva, and even blood sections from several dozen faery species.
Though I haven’t brought the samples from the murder sites, I have stared at them long enough that I know what they look like.
Unlike a lot of things tied to faery beasts, wherein the contaminants were green, some of the taints left behind from this creature are a hue of purple leaning toward black.
Over the next hour, I slide sample after sample under the lens, make note of the lack of match, and then note it on a piece of paper I’ve brought in my pocket. The purple appears to be faery blood with an additive, as if the faery who bled was contaminated with something.
“What causes that change in the blood?” I ask myself aloud.
The soft clatter of lenses adjusting, samples sliding across platforms, and drawers opening and closing is regularly interrupted by the scratch of my pen tip on the paper. The work, as always, is immersive. The results, unfortunately, are not encouraging.
“Any clues?” The queen’s voice startles me, and I turn with a hand already on my hilt.
Morag’s attention drops to the weapon I quickly release.
“Your Majesty.” I stumble to my feet too slow, curtsy, and face her. “I’d not heard the door open.”
“I came through the passages.” Queen Morag gestures toward the east wall, where a curtain hangs.
Beyond that curtain is a network of hidden passages that can lead to the door into the queen’s rooms, or to another tunnel through which one can wend her way under Regina Centrum.
The passages have only one maid assigned to their cleaning, so no one else on staff knows of the route or the access points.
Aside from that maid, the only one who could startle me here is the queen.
Yet startled I am. “I saw Isabeau earlier. I heard you mention the curse . . . when she was at the vow ceremony,” I begin.
“I am aware.”
“Is she actually cursed?” I watch the queen’s expression grow even more placid.
Whatever she knows, she’s not sharing.
“I want to help her. I care deeply for her,” I say. “Did the monster that’s killing men curse her? Is that a clue? Does it kill some victims and curse others?”
“No.”
“No to which?”
“You are misunderstanding the evidence,” the queen says in a low voice, even though we are the only people in the room.
“Are there creatures not in the Hunter’s journals? Not listed in the archive?”
“I would suspect so. I do not visit their lands, but I know that a great many faeries are banned from our world. In truth, we do not enforce it as much as perhaps we should.”
The queen walks over to a small window that is not visible from the street.
The angle is such that someone in the archive can stare into the city, but no angle will allow a citizen on the street to see into the archive.
It’s not citizens we want to prevent, though, is it?
I’ve thought about all the faeries that live in Alveus.
I still have no species that is the clear suspect.
“Are there dangerous faeries you know are hidden in the city?” I ask. “I am trying to ascertain if the killer is something recently arrived from Faerie, or if it was already here.”
The queen spears me with a look. “You have so many questions I cannot answer.”
“Cannot? You have secrets then,” I clarify.
“The nature of being a queen, I fear. Ask direct questions, Hunter. I will never lie to you.” Queen Morag looks like she wants to share more words.
I have no idea what questions to ask, so I settle on the most direct one. “Do you know what’s killing men?”
“Something that sees them as trespassers. Something that will need to be killed or sent back to Faerie, and it will need to be done quickly, Hunter, or things will unravel for us all.” The queen glances away from the window, meeting my gaze.
I swear she’s trying to tell me more than I can hear in her words. “What will unravel?”
“Accords that predate your life, Gabrielle. Peace between our kinds is fragile, and this violence will endanger it. You will have a solution if I can get an accord.”
The full weight of her admission hits me. “You already know what’s killing men. Show me some clue or direction.” I spin around the archive, hefting samples, casts, and weapons. “This? Or this? Or maybe this?”
Her expression is unchanging. She neither nods nor gestures. “I know a great many things I cannot say.”
“Pick something up. Show me.”
“That is not a direct question.” The queen turns her back to me. “You are the Hunter now, Gabrielle. You will learn that not all truths we know are ones we share with the world.”
“Tell me where to find the monster.” I take a step closer to the queen. “People are dying. My father died.”
“I have ordered announcements sent to the local villages banning all travel within Brimmond Wood. I have also sent a message to Faerie.” The queen sounds as if she’s being helpful, but it feels as if politics outweigh the safety of Alveus.
Her political machinations are not helpful, not in finding real solutions.
“That’s not enough.” I snarl the words. “People will continue to die. Emma Iversson was attacked today. I have been attacked twice. Three men dead. My father is one of the dead.”
“Then find the beast, Hunter.” Morag shrugs slightly. “What more can I do?”
“What more . . . Surely, you jest!” I let out a noise that is half anger and half shock. “You could tell me what the beast is, where it is, what its weakness is. You’re withholding clues that I can use, clues that will let me save lives, Your Majesty.”
Instead, the queen glides toward the curtained passageway. “I believe the Chathams are hosting the Hunter. You should depart soon.”
I take another step toward her, hand raising, but I’m not certain how much freedom I truly have. Touching her is treason, and if I am imprisoned, who will stop the Beast of Brimmond?
“My duty is to protect all of Alveus, protect your empire, so why would you withhold answers?” I ask in a raw voice.
The queen glances back at me. “Even queens must follow treaties and rules. Do you think, truly think, that the faeries would not craft holes in the treaty?”
“I know they did. That’s why I exist,” I say softly. I am, in truth, a living loophole for them. “If they break the treaty, I exist to stop them. If they ever intended to adhere to it, there would be no need for a Hunter.”
“Indeed. And if you exist, so, too, must we know other things exist, Hunter. You will resolve this. I believe in that. I believe in you, Gabrielle. My hands, however, are tied.”
“So there’s something here like me? But working for them?” I ask.
Queen Morag smiles in a way that feels like an answer. Then she pushes the curtain aside and leaves me alone in the archive to puzzle out what would make the queen unable to share answers with her own Hunter.
Only one person could force Queen Morag’s obedience. Queen Gloriana, ruler of the Faeries for centuries, cocreator of the original Queens’ Treaty. My first duty as Hunter is, apparently, to stop a beast protected by the queen of faeries . . . and I have no idea how to do so.