14. Puck
“No, Edina. My left.” I scrape my hands through my hair, digging my nails into my scalp as Edina almost faceplants into a tree. Again.
To say my team has been difficult has been the understatement of the century. We started strong. They followed directions well when we first entered the enchanted forest, their fingers trailing from the pliable bark of saplings to the weathered bark of ancient trees, using them as a guide rail. Each tree they passed seemed to lean forward in an attempt to help. Roots lowered and branches brushed against their backs in encouragement as the forest I call home helped me in this challenge.
Then, the path curved.
I felt the shift right away. These trees are older, set in their ways, and less willing to help. As soon as my team didn’t have the presence of magic helping them, everything went to shit. Radley disappeared, and I haven’t found him since. Edina constantly yells at me for better directions. Eldoris keeps trying to correct said directions, but he’s as blind as everyone else.
It’s a fucking mess.
“Why the hell would I go to your left?” Edina shrieks, correcting her course. One of her fathers, the only Fae we’ve collected thus far, chuckles but doesn’t offer any input. He simply holds onto her shoulders and the two of them waddle forward like penguins.
“Because I’m the one giving the directions.”
“I’m the blind one!” The trees shiver, either in fear of her or with laughter. Either way, I give their shaking branches a dirty look. “Figure out a way to invert it, because if I run into one more tree, I’m going to use an icicle to slice your dick off.”
“You don’t have magic.”
“I will when we get out of this death trap.”
I keep backing up and run into something soft. The texture reminds me of a gym mat from the mortal realm. When I turn, I find a huge structure that shoots straight into the sky, with unevenly spaced handholds scattered throughout.
“Everyone stay put,” I demand and grab a piece of paper that’s magically stuck to the side. “I found a note.”
Before I can read it, Radley stumbles out of the forest, a giggling dryad guiding him forward. Her earthen skin seems to shift colors as she moves, blending into the forest like a chameleon, though its texture remains bark-like. When he falls in line with Edina, the dryad runs her fingertips through Radley’s beard and fixes his mussed hair. He blows a kiss after her as she saunters away, disappearing into the trees.
“Are you kidding me?” I glower as Radley’s laugh booms around the clearing.
“I was helping you,” he says, shoving his cock into his pants and fixing his open zipper.
“How is fucking a dryad helping me?”
Eldoris laughs. Edina reaches over until she finds the back of Radley’s head and smacks him. “Oy,” he grunts, dropping his dick in favor of the welt Edina gave him. “She’s in tune with the trees, so after the deed, she told me where Lysandra’s team is.”
“Please, never refer to it as the deed ever again,” Edina says with a grimace.
“Where’s her team?” I ask.
“They’re winning.”
“Fucking hell.
“You’re welcome,” Radley says, satisfied with himself.
“I didn’t thank you,” I grit through my teeth.
“You should. My dick’s covered in splinters; I did that for you.”
I scrape my hand over my face. “We have to move. I’m going to read the instructions for this fucking obstacle, okay?”
By the goddess. I knew leading this group would be hard, but I thought they’d be able to pull it together. Now, Lysandra is ahead of us. How is she better at commanding a group she barely knows than I am with three friends?
Maybe that’s the problem. They know me too well.
Is this what I’ve signed up for? I assumed ruling alongside people I’d known all my life would make things easier, but will it be a constant fight? Will they never respect me?
“Puck,” Edina whispers, groping through the air with her father in tow.
“You can’t touch me.” I jerk out of the way before she grabs my hands. She withdraws hers quickly, clasping them over her heart.
“We’re here, we can do this,” she says. The threat in her voice is directed at the males at her back. “We won’t let you fail.” Eldoris and Radley nod in agreement.
I sigh and open the note.
“You’ve reached your first obstacle,” I read. “Contestants must direct their team up and over the structure without setting foot on the course. The red handholds will disappear after three seconds of contact and should be avoided. Remember, no touching your teammates under any circumstances.”
I glance at the wall, marking the locations of the red handholds.
“I think it’ll be easiest if we do this one at a time.” It may cost us time, but if one of them falls, I will either need to catch them and risk disqualification or let them fall.
“I’ll go first,” Edina says.
“I’ll be flying beside you the whole time.” I have her walk forward a few paces until she reaches the soft wall. “Lift your right hand, you’ll feel the first handhold.”
Edina makes it up the wall easily. As soon as we reach the top, I tell her to sit. “It’s a slide, so you can just—” She whoops her excitement as she hurtles down. When she’s safely on the ground, I instruct her to move a few paces away from the slide before flying back and repeating the process with her father.
“Shit,” Edina curses as I get back down to guide Eldoris. “El!”
“What?” he calls, moving like he’s about to round the structure and go to her. Right before he crashes into me, he remembers himself and stops.
“Get over this wall as fast as you can.”
I rise to my role as leader, directing him up the wall as quickly as possible. When he’s three-quarters of the way up the wall, there’s a feminine wail.
“Get back. Who are you?” The voice is deep, raspier than Edina’s, and it takes me a minute to place it, but by the horror on Eldoris’ face, he knows what’s happening.
“Queen Talia—” Edina soothes, trying to calm the frightened queen.
“What kind of trick is this, Gwyneira? Unblind me,” she demands.
“Gwyneira is my mother. I’m Edina, your son’s betrothed—”
“I have nothing to do with Tamara’s quest for power and her twisted magic. Let me go.”
Tamara?
Queen Tamara was Talia’s sister. Her quest for power ultimately led to her demise and Talia’s rise to her station as queen. But she’s been dead for centuries, killed by Edina’s mother in a devastating battle. Why on earth would—
My distraction has Eldoris scrambling up the rest of the wall on his own, and I turn back just in time for his foot, the one bearing his weight, to land on a red handhold. “Eldoris, it’s going to—”
The handhold disappears, and Eldoris barely gets his fingertips on the edge of the mat before his feet slip, dangling down the sheer face of the obstacle. “Fuck,” he grunts. “A little help here, Puck.”
“I can’t touch you.”
“Tell me where to put my damn foot!”
Right. Shit, I am bad at this.
“Swing your right leg up and to the side,” I instruct. Eldoris does what I say, the toe of his shoe connecting hard with the material used for the handholds. He swears but finds enough purchase to propel himself over and onto the slide.
“What’s going on?” Radley calls from the bottom, having started the course on his own. He’s managing to avoid the red holds, but our luck can only last so long.
“Not that one,” I bark, and he moves off a red handhold before it disappears.
“How long do I have on the red ones?”
“Three seconds.”
“Ha!” He clambers up the obstacle so fast I can barely keep track of his movements. He hits the red handholds, but he never stays on one long enough for it to disappear. In the blink of an eye, he’s over the structure, sliding down on his stomach.
I fly to the other side, where Eldoris has his mother out from within the shield. “It’s okay. I’m going to help, but I need you to follow me.”
“Don’t touch me,” she hisses, drawing in on herself. Her usual ocean-blue eyes are clouded with the blinding spell, and her sleek dark hair is matted from running her fingers through it. There’s a coating of mud on her fair skin and her nails are broken, like she tried to dig her way out of her shield.
“Mom,” Eldoris pleads, his unseeing eyes darting around. His brow is pinched; he’s terrified.
As if the clouds part, Talia goes still. “Eldoris?” she asks, reaching for his cheek and hitting his nose. He shifts so she’s cupping his face, and he finds hers in a much smoother maneuver.
“I’m here. It’s okay.”
“What’s happening?” she whispers, A tear streaks down her cheek and onto her son’s palm.
“We’re in a competition, that’s all. You’re going to stay by my side and we’ll be out of this forest shortly. Just stay with me.”
The words hit on multiple levels.
Edina—somehow—comes to a stand directly in front of me. “How long has she been fading?” I whisper. The fade is a terrible disease amongst Fae that strips them of their memories and their personality. Over time, they become a shell of the being they once were.
“If you’ve ever cared for me, you’ll keep this to yourself,” Edina says, her voice deep and menacing. If this got out—if people learned the Summer Court’s queen was vulnerable—it could be devastating.
“I won’t,” I vow.
“I won’t, either,” Radley says from beside me, making me jump.
“Can we get a move on?” Eldoris snaps, but I know it’s not out of anger. It’s fear.
I make my way to the front of the group and start guiding them forward again. This section of the path is pretty wide, so Edina walks beside me, her father dropping back to help Eldoris with Talia.
“Why would they put a queen in this course?” she asks, keeping her voice low. “If they wanted to use the monarchs as an extra challenge for the contestants, my mother would have been here.”
She can’t see my pitying look. Edina tends to believe the best in people. She wasn’t raised in Faerie, so while she claims to understand the motives and ruthlessness of our kind, she hasn’t seen the worst of it.
I have. I was tethered to one of the cruelest Fae in history.
“You think they did this on purpose?” she asks, reading the subtext in my silence. “You think they’re trying to get Devorah and El to admit their mother is sick?”
“I do,” I answer honestly, instructing her to drop back so she doesn’t trip over a root. “It hasn’t gone unnoticed that she’s been missing events. They’re going to have to do something soon.”
“Uhh, Puck?” Radley says. The dryad is back, whispering in his ear. “Lysandra is at the final obstacle. They have all three of their Fae. It’s a tough one, but once they finish, they win.”
I swear under my breath.
We’re going to lose. Even if we take the rest of the course at a run, we won’t catch them in time. And I don’t think Talia will be able to run.
How am I going to pull this off?
An idea dawns on me. It’s not technically against the rules, but it would bend them. “Little nymph,” I purr at the dryad, whose cheeks turn the color of blushing roses. Her large brown eyes blink at me, and she curls one piece of vine-like hair around her finger. “Could you tell me where each member is on this obstacle course?”
She nods, a petal-pink tongue darting out to lick her bottom lip.
“What are you going to do?” Edina asks.
“Just a bit of distraction.”