Chapter Twenty-Six #2
“It’s what you two said in the cell. It’s missing an element, which means it isn’t complete, and if it isn’t complete, it can still be broken. Which, thank fuck. I think any third person added to the mix would have made this a lot more difficult.”
My heart leaps. “You’re sure?”
“I’m as sure as you two were,” she says, gesturing at me and Grant. “Which is to say, no, I’m speculating a lot. But what you said seems to make sense, so why won’t this?”
“A third person?” Lark asks.
Ophelia sighs and drops into one of the chairs. Grant sits on the arm next to her, and Lark draws me down to sit on the sofa next to him. Oisin remains standing, on edge.
“There were three rulers before,” Ophelia says. “We think. Three crowns. Three… everything.”
Lark sighs. “I met the witch in the halls. She is angry. Particularly with my parents, but she wishes to punish me, too. I suppose this makes more sense than anything else.”
“I was never meant to be here, was I?” Oisin asks.
“I fear not,” Lark replies. “But that does not mean you are not meant to help your people.”
“Yeah, about that…” Grant pulls a face. “You know that whole Seelie versus Unseelie thing was made up, right? I mean, I get that it’s an issue now, but it doesn’t stem from anything.”
Lark huffs. “Yes, I have been somewhat aware of that for a while.”
I lean over and rest my head on his shoulder. I want to sleep. Only, I think sleeping might not be a good idea, but then again, Lark’s here, and he would never let anything happen to me, would he?
“…do not know how we will break it…”
“…powerful bond…”
Their voices slide in and out of my consciousness. Lark smells so good. Like pine and lavender and—
“Oak,” I murmur.
“What’s that?” Lark’s voice is gentle. The others are all talking over each other, not quite arguing, but they’re getting close to it.
I blink up at him. “The big oak tree. What’s it for?”
“It is this realm’s source of power. It is… It has been dying. My parents could not feed it enough power.”
“And it’s…” I don’t need to ask if it’s sentient. I know it is. I felt it when we walked past it in the town. It was sleeping.
I sit up straighter. “We need to go to the oak. I need to talk to it.”
They all start talking at once. It’s getting light out. The oak is sacred. Since when could I talk to trees, anyway?
I look up at Lark’s face. He’s silent, and his eyes soften when he looks at me.
“You truly believe,” he says, “that you can speak with a millennia-old magical representation of a tree and convince it to let us go?”
I chew my lower lip, then nod. “I think I can try. I think I have the best chance of trying.”
I really do. The plants in Lark’s greenhouse are reaching for me, even though my magic is barely a drop at this point. I can feel the ancient energy of the pine forest we walked through to get here.
And that oak… When I turn my attention to it, it is all I can sense. It’s as old as Lark says, and deep and hungry and it might not let them go at all.
But it’s fae, too. It might let me make a deal.
Lark kisses me quickly, hand still tight around mine. “Very well,” he says when he pulls back. “We will go.”
Oisin shakes his head. “This is madness, Lark. Nothing will happen. And you—You both…” He looks distraught. Part of me is glad that Lark wouldn’t have been alone here, but I’m more excited at the prospect that he might not have to stay at all.
“You three go to the oak and wait for us,” I say. Grant is on his feet immediately; he doesn’t have a problem with this idea. “We’ll be with you in a minute. I want to check something first.”
Ophelia wants to argue, but she knows when I won’t be budged, so she ushers the others to their feet and out instead. Lark disappears into the bedroom to get his crown. When he steps out and sets it on his head, I wince.
“Does it look that terrible?”
“No.” I narrow my eyes and study him. “Well, it is a bit gaudy. But no. I can feel it.”
“You can?”
I nod. He comes closer and tugs me into his arms, then buries his face in my throat. “If this does not work…”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“Dante.”
“We don’t even have a secure way out. And what if I get there and there’s nothing anyone can do? This crown has my magic, too, doesn’t it?”
Lark presses a kiss to my neck. “It is mostly the deal I was tricked into,” he says, “but yes. It is taking every scrap it can from me, and that includes what belongs to you.”
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. No changing the past. Let’s see what we can fix now. “Okay. Fine. Let’s go check on the other crown and then get this sorted out.”
He follows me agreeably enough, hesitating only when we reach the door that leads to the tombs. The castle is beginning to wake, and we’ll be lucky not to be seen when we leave, which I don’t think will be possible at all once we get down to the oak.
“You believe there is a third crown in here?” Lark says. He leads me through the dark tunnels and to the room we were in the other day. The cold stone faces of his parents stare sightlessly up at the ceiling.
“Yeah. You said fae fade.”
“We do. No bodies. They have returned to the magic of the realm. These are just memories.”
“And you never checked any of the other tombs?”
Lark shrugs one shoulder. “If I did, I do not remember it.”
That’s the other thing, too, though I think he has an inkling of it. “We think there’s some kind of memory spell in the veil.”
“The witch?” Lark huffs when I nod. “She tricked me when I gave her my magic. I did not ask for us both to die if I got my magic back and did not fulfil my fate.”
“Yeah, that seemed unlike you.”
Lark smiles. He turns his calculating gaze on the room. “The crown then?”
The faces unsettle me now. Still, I study them, searching for any hint that the crown might be down here. I’ve got to admit, it’s a bit of a stretch. I run my fingers over the wall. “I think it’s hidden in here,” I say. “I don’t know why. I just—”
“What is it?” Lark asks when I stop speaking.
I run my fingers over that same spot again. The stone feels different, but I can’t tell why without my magic.
“Can you…”
Lark comes over and presses his hand next to mine. “This stone is… not from here,” he says. “It has been brought from your realm.”
“Can you move it?”
He nods and shifts the stone with his magic. It scrapes loudly against the others and I grab it, tugging it free. We both pause, looking at the small recess left behind.
Another crown sits there. A third crown. It’s not as ornate as the one on Lark’s head; it’s a collection of branches that I realise, with a jolt, have been taken from the oak down in the town. Lark stares at it, unblinking. “I think I did not truly believe it until now.”
“What?”
“That they would do something like this. Lie like this, when we cannot lie at all.”
“I think you’ve all got lying without lying down to a fine art,” I say and heft the stone back up where it belongs.
“Wait,” Lark says. “Should we leave it here?”
I shrug and push the stone back into place. “It’s safer here than anywhere else. We’ll tell someone. Veles? He can get it when he finds whoever’s supposed to bear the crowns.”
Lark considers this, then nods and uses a flicker of his magic to seal the stone back just like it was before. He presses his hand against it again. “I would have never noticed any of this… We have, none of us, realised that something was terribly wrong.”
“The Seelie know,” I reply. “And the rest. The ones who’ve been pushed out with them.”
“I could have done more to help them.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” I take Lark’s hand again. It feels as easy as breathing to touch him like this. “We do have to help ourselves right now. Then the rest, okay?”
“Yes.”