Chapter 52
Fifty-Two
A good little slut is much better at handling murders than a brownie.
Granted, the bar for that is not high…
- Arienna
I hurry down the hall to the secret room, my heart pounding even faster than my legs are carrying me. As I near the final turn, however, someone calls out behind me.
“Your Majesty.”
My arms flailing, I skid to a stop. I turn to find Deirdre coming towards me with long strides. “Deirdre? What are you doing here?” But please go because I can’t enter the room with you here!
“Evangeline told me what was happening and to come here in case I was needed.” She stops in front of me, and I really wish I was fairy enough to tell her to go away, but there’s only so much meanness I can muster in one day.
“You know,” she says slowly, “I really do care about Richard even if he doesn’t believe it. We were all good friends once.”
My heart twisting at everything my king’s been through, I reach out and hold her hand. “What happened?”
She looks down at the grip I have on her, then back up to my face. “Aurelia died.”
A sadness washes over her, a flicker of emotion over her normal mask of indifference. And I realise that just like my king, she’s learned to distance herself from her pain.
“Aurelia and I were betrothed by our mothers before we were born. Our engagement ceremony was interrupted with a call to war, but I would have married her. Despite our many differences, I did love her.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“When Richard told me she died, I wanted to bring her back so badly…” Trailing off, she shakes her head. A small smile graces her lips as she looks around, her mask back in place. “You should head to the room now. I know it’s around here somewhere, but if you don’t have the key, you can’t find it.”
I keep hold of her hand, torn between helping her and helping my king. But of course, he wins out. “Just stay here for a second, please. We can talk after I get these hostages?” I offer as I walk backwards.
“Of course.” She inclines her head, and despite wanting to comfort her, I turn on my heels and disappear down the hall.
Looking over my shoulder, I check no one’s there. Then I dig the key out of my pocket and open the door. “Great news, everyone. You’re now free to –”
A gasp leaves me frozen in the doorway. My eyes sweep around the horror of the room. Blood and bits have been flung everywhere – the floor, the walls, the ceiling. Body parts are in too many pieces to count.
In the middle of it all is the yondu, ripping apart Isabel, Coo’s second, like a chew toy with a squeaker inside.
“Yondie, no!” I hiss as I step into the room and quickly lock the door behind me. I’m not sold on that name at all, but I need something to yell. “Bad, Yondie! Yondie! Yondie, come here! Drop the arm, girl. Yondie!”
Rushing towards the yondu, I grab the arm of the woman it has in its mouth and start tugging. “Let go!” Digging her claws into the floor, Yondie growls at me. “No! No, we don’t have time to play. We have to get you out of here before someone sees.”
Worried Deirdre might hear our commotion, I use my sternest voice. “Drop it. Drop. Drooop.”
The yondu yanks really hard. With a wet slurch, Isabel’s arm tears free, and I fall back onto another body. I hold up the severed arm with a look of horror. Flinging it away from me, I try to ignore the wet pool I’m sitting in.
Dropping Isabel’s body, which now only consists of a torso and one leg, the yondu chases after the flying arm. It snatches it out of the air and gives it a goodhearted shake.
“No! Bad, girl. Drop it!” I scramble to my feet. “Dro– Okay,” I say suddenly, trying a different tactic as my eyes skirt around the room. “I guess you can keep one arm. I don’t think anyone’s going to notice that missing. But we still need to get you out of here.”
Heading for the door, I wave to the yondu. “Come on, girl. Come here.”
Ignoring me, she turns her head to the left, looking at the large wardrobe.
Trotting over to it, she paws at the double doors, and one of them swings open.
She pushes her nose in the gap to widen it further, then crawls inside.
Dropping the arm, she circles tightly in the relatively small space for a creature her size, then curls up into a ball.
Her bloody tongue lolling out, she closes her beautiful eyes.
I stare at her for a second, wondering how I’m going to possibly get her out of there. What if she’s as bad as Fabia when she gets woken up? My skin crawling from the state of my surroundings, I slowly ease back. I mean… if she’s going to sleep, I’m certain it’ll be okay if she stays there.
Standing, I slowly tiptoe away, then turn to face the mess around me. Fuck.
Without the yondu to distract me, the whole situation crashes down on my shoulders. I start to shake. I feel sick. I agreed to release the twelve in exchange for my king. How am I possibly going to –
Deirdre!
Running for the door, I yank it open and race into the hall. “Deirdre!” I shout, not caring that I gave Evangeline my word that I wouldn’t reveal the room to anyone. If I have to choose between her or Richard, he’ll win every time.
Skidding around the bend, I slam into the necromancer, and we both crash to the ground with me on top.
“What the – Why are you covered in blood!” Her eyes track my face, then look down my body. Scrambling off her, I reach down and grab her hand.
“No time. I’ll explain in a bit.” Yanking her to her feet, I start to turn back down the hall.
“Arienna!”
My eyes widen at the sound of Fabia’s voice.
“Come on!” I hiss at Deirdre, pulling her as fast as I can.
The door looms open in front of me. I run straight inside, still pulling a protesting necromancer behind me.
“Arienna!” Fabia shouts. “What’s taking – Oh my gods!”
Shooting a guilty look at my best friend coming down the hall, I slam the door shut. Shaking, feeling sick to my stomach as I twist my hands in front of me, I turn to my new friend. “You can fix this, right?” I ask, hoping she’s as good as she’s bragged about being.
When she doesn’t say anything, her eyes sweeping back and forth across the bloody room, I start to panic. “You can help me?” I repeat, needing her to say yes. Richard’s life is on the line, and I cannot – absolutely cannot accept a no.
“Help?” Deirdre says, the word cracking. Swallowing, she finally turns her head to look at me. “You mean help you hide all the body… parts, right? Not bring them back?”
I pale. Shaking my head frantically, I grab her arm and pull her over to the first body. “No, no, no, no, you have to bring them all back. Start with this one. One at a time. I’ll pay. Whatever your fee is, I’ll –”
“Payment is not the problem,” she says, tugging her arm free. Waving it at a corpse, she says, “I need their body to put their soul back in. I can’t even tell who this is.”
“What if I found her head? I could match the cut on her neck with –”
“Match the…” She looks at me, her eyes wide. “Why would you need to match anything? Surely, it’s the only decapitated head in here?”
I swallow, my eyes darting to the left. “Well… uh… no. You see…”
“How many did you decapitate?”
“I didn’t really count.”
“Give me an estimate.”
“Six?” Maybe? I have no bloody idea. I haven’t counted at all. Glancing at her, I giggle nervously, then look away again. “Maybe eight?”
“Oh my gods. How?”
I open my mouth despite having no idea what I’m going to tell her.
I can’t throw the yondu under the falling tree.
She didn’t mean to hurt them; I’m sure of it.
She probably just got bored at some point, and they didn’t stop her when she started to play with them.
So she didn’t realise she was playing too rough.
This isn’t her fault at all. She’s just a big baby.
When I start to make a noise, Deirdre immediately holds up her hand. “Actually, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. You are so getting executed for this, and I don’t want to be charged with aiding and abetting.”
“But it was an accident!”
“An accident?” With a bark of laughter, she shakes her head, her eyes scanning the room again. “No way in hel was this an accident.” Her gaze flicks up, and I do the same even though I already know what’s up there.
A woman’s face was ripped apart by a fury of claws and then her body was flung up onto the dusty chandelier. One of her eyes drops out of her skull – or at least, I think it’s an eye; it’s really hard to tell at this point.
When it splatters in front of Deirdre, she looks at me dryly. “Please tell me that’s one of the eight you counted as being ‘headless’.”
“But she clearly has a head,” I squeak, my cheeks heating even though I’m absolutely correct.
“I still can’t bring her back.”
“You’re not even going to try?” I ask desperately.
“No.” She doesn’t hesitate at all. “Necromancy requires me to give up part of my own soul each time, regardless of whether it’s successful or not. I’m not wasting a limited resource.”
“But –”
“The earlier issue of needing a relatively intact body is still a requirement.”
“But that can’t be right,” I say, grasping. “You bring back dead people.”
“Dead people whose soul can be plonked back into their original body. I can’t just create a new one out of scraps.”
“So what are we going to do?”
“We? There is no we in this. I’m heading back home immediately so no one knows I’ve been gone.” She starts to head for the door as I hurry after her, but when someone knocks, we both froze.
“Arienna?” That’s Irin! Fabia must have run back to get someone with magic to help her find the door!
“Shit. I can’t be seen here,” Deirdre says as she shoves me forwards. “Get rid of them while I…” Her head twists around. “Hide in the cupboard.”
“No!” I yelp, then clasp my lips together as I grab her arm. “You can’t go in there. There’s a… uh, another body… in there.”
“In the cupboard?”
“Yes.”