Chapter Twelve #5
He laughed. “My queen, that is the last stage of everyone’s life. Fae live for hundreds of years, but in the end, sickness, old age, and disease take our bodies and minds. At least faeriken get to live life at the top of the food chain before that happens.”
“I guess.” Although I didn’t sound too sure. “Why are you telling me this?”
“I simply want you to understand us. The wolves,” he explained.
“My pack. My people. I know you must’ve heard a number of unflattering things about us, but it’s not true.
We’re treated as evil outcasts because we dare to like who we are.
We embrace it instead of cloaking ourselves in self-loathing, and pretending we’re still fae. ”
Thud.
I whipped around. I was certain that time. Someone was out there—close by.
Alisdair?
“All we desire is to stay as we are, and live the life that Meya intends for us.”
“Meya didn’t intend for you to be cursed,” I responded immediately. “That was fae treachery, not her divine hand.”
“Meya created magic, magic birthed curses. Everything is traced back to her divine hand.”
I shook my head, pressing my lips together tight.
Every fae worshipped Meya, but some of them worshipped her a little too hard, and a little too fervently.
I learned a long time ago that there was no point arguing with a zealot.
But still, it steamed me to even think someone would suggest that it was Meya’s plan for Emiana to destroy my life, steal my body, break my mind, and endanger my mom and two sisters in the process.
She could never be so cruel.
“Even the Taken,” Meallan continued. “There’s a reason they were placed here with us. They’re the key.”
“The key? The key to what?”
He laughed. “I told you. The key to living forever. If we could understand them—understand how and why they never get sick, old, or diseased, we could harness that ability for ourselves. Even more if we could understand how they strike terror with their mere nearness. We’d have eternal lives, and every day of those lives, no one would dare approach us to end them.
“The powers of the Taken combined with the strength and power of the faeriken would create a new, stronger, and the best race of fae.”
My stomach heaved. “You would actually want to look and be like those vile things?”
He blew out a breath. “We’ve certainly tried. For years, my pack has captured and experimented on Taken, attempting to unlock their secrets. We’ve learned much, but ultimately not what we’re looking for. For example, we learned that certain scents attract them like moths to flame.
“A mixture of linseed, rosehip, and suet drives them mad. They come running far and wide,” he said. “I arranged for that mixture to be put in your bath that day you and your king traveled to Bevin—”
I stopped dead on the frozen path.
“—but, of course, you survived.”
Meallan’s outline disappeared into the shadows. I panted hard, spinning this way and that for any sign of him—any sign of where he’d strike from next. “What are you saying?” I croaked. “You’re the reason the Taken attacked us that day?”
A laugh echoed out of the dark. “I’m the reason for a lot of things, my lady.
I’m the reason poisoned food was placed on your gilded tray and carried up to your royal bedchamber.
Sadly, you weren’t in said bedchamber”—anger bled into his voice—“because you chose that night of all nights to dine with the court.
“Aeris, in her wisdom, had your meals prepared separately, so that you always dined on your favorites. The meal for the main table is not so pompously handled. You’ve taken every meal with the court since that night, and we lost our chance.
” He swore. “The last attempt, tripping you coming down the stairs, was desperate. I admit that.”
Horror filled me.
“You kept slinking away from death like a scampering rat. So what else do you do with rats but lead them into a trap?”
“How could you!” I spun, trying to find him. “Why would you do this!”
“It was nothing personal.” I didn’t have to see him to know he was shrugging—the unrepentant kakka. “Believe it or not, I like you. If this were different, I’d want you as my own mate, but alas, it wasn’t meant to be.”
My lips twisted. “That’s disgusting. I wouldn’t mate with you if it’d unbind my magic!”
“I couldn’t give a shit about your bindings,” he growled. “This is about my own.”
“What are you talking about!”
“I’m talking about you! Every day, the change spreads deeper and wider—turning this land and the fae into what we’re meant to be.
But then you chits show up, seduce Alisdair, fill his head with stupid love nonsense, and risk the chance that he’ll throw it all away to destroy his heart, and love you back.
If that happens, it all goes away,” he roared. “We return to being nothing!”
“Being a summer fae isn’t being nothing, you lunatic! Rolling around naked in a dirty pit with fangs and claws isn’t a better life!”
“You like this life just fine, or you wouldn’t be crying for leaving it.”
I clamped my mouth shut, breathing hard. As I just said, there was no point in arguing with a zealot. The only thing I needed to do was get away from him.
Slowly, I backed up—desperate not to let the words “I have excellent vision” deter me.
“Alisdair has no right to rid our land of the change, nor does he have a right to rule it. Wind and Wild is wolf territory. We are its natural-born and rightful leaders. When Raelina threatened that...” His voice whispered through the dark.
“When she got too close to him and began addling his mind, my father turned around and addled hers.
“He cursed her with a love curse that made her hopelessly obsessed with that bastard Salman. She practically chased after his carriage out of town.” He barked a laugh. “Curse or not, it was pathetic.”
“You monster.”
“I’m the monster?” He sounded right next to me.
I spun to the left, fist flying, but struck nothing.
“Your husband is the monster. He’s a violent, uncaring beast, and we were certain you were no threat, because there was no way a pampered princess such as yourself would ever fall for him, or make him fall for you.”
Thud. Snap.
“Seems we were wrong, so you had to go. Three times we tried, and then you did something wonderful.” Another harsh, chilling laugh. “You walked straight into the wolf’s den.”
“But you don’t have to do this,” I snapped. “I walked into the wolf’s den because I want to leave him and this cursed place. Holding up your side of the bargain would achieve the same end!”
“I can’t take the chance. What happens when Shadowsoul showers you with enough gifts and praises that you forget this temper tantrum and come running back to him? The only way to end your threat is to get rid of you for good.”
I swallowed hard—feet coming to a stop. “We’re not alone,” I said—voice flat. “Are we?”
“Afraid not,” said a female voice.
“Nope,” sang another.
“This is where it ends,” said someone else.
I nodded slowly, mind churning. My own mind.
Emiana had gotten me into this mess, and it appeared she had no intention of rising up to get me out.
“All of this because you’re all too chickenshit to kill Alisdair yourselves, or indeed, even face him yourselves.
You’d rather skulk around in the shadows, arranging the deaths of innocent women. ” I scoffed. “Pathetic.”
A hand roared out of the dark and slapped me across the face. I bit my lip against the pain, not allowing a single sound out while my ears rang.
“Watch your mouth, slut!” How quickly Meallan did away with my lady and my queen.
“We’ve tried every means of killing him, but he’s too smart.
His cult of loyal followers trail him everywhere, destroying the poison flowers the instant they appear, and throwing their lives before the blade to protect him.
“And unlike us, Alisdair has unlocked the secret of the Taken. Or he’s harnessed enough power and magic that the result is the same. He doesn’t age, wither, get sick, or die. He just keeps going, he just keeps ruling the kingdom that belongs to me.
“All we need is for him to die as the empty shell he is, and then the heart will remain where it is. Safe, hidden, forever cursed. Until that glorious day, we cannot allow whores like you to give him or the faeriken hope. We can’t risk him breaking the curse,” he whispered in my ear, “for something as worthless as you.”
Shaking my head, I laughed. “So that’s it? That was the grand plan for why you wanted to reenter Lumenfell society? So you could sneak around, plotting poisonings, and getting close enough to sense if I’m getting too close to Alisdair, therefore threatening your rightful rule?” I laughed louder.
“What is funny?” Meallan barked. “The only joke here is you!”
My laughter ceased abruptly, strangled by my disgust. “No, you whining, mewling pup. You’re the joke. A stupid, pathetic, delusional joke if you truly believe you’re meant to rule Wind and Wild, or that if you even tried, the people wouldn’t rip you off the throne and tear your ass limb from limb.”
I sensed the other hit coming and jerked back, catching the tips of his claws across my cheek. Vicious pain sliced my face open, but I didn’t stop.
“You’ll never have Wind and Wild, and you’ll never defeat Alisdair.
You can’t even open your eyes wide enough to see I was never a threat to you.
Alisdair doesn’t l-love me.” My voice cracked.
“He never has, he never will, and he’d never wanted to.
You underestimate your enemy, and that’s why you always lose, Meallan.
“It’s why you can’t rise higher than a dirty, dark pit.”
“Argh!”
The shadows lunged and I jumped—hands reaching blindly, and smashing against their salvation. Seizing a limb, I heaved myself onto the branch and climbed as fast as my adjusting vision would let me.