The Aspirant of Blood (The Starscourge Chronicles #1)

Prologue

brIGHID

There was only one way to survive an encounter with the fae.

Look not into their eyes, for their mask conceals their true face.

Heed not their words, for riddles are woven into their songs.

Trust not their promises, for they are false.

Speak not a word, lest your tongue betray.

Turn your back, hide away.

Wash the color from your life until you no longer draw their gaze.

I'd heard those words countless times from my handmaiden. Thus far, I'd followed her advice and kept my tongue. But curiosity gnawed at my heart.

Literature depicted the fae in multiple ways—few had ever truly seen one. Rumors spoke of powerful fae lords—accounts described anything from handsome princes to wicked, twisted creatures.

The man sitting across from me was not what I expected. Ebony waves piled in a bond at the nape of his neck, and he watched me with one wary, golden eye.

True to the stories, he concealed his left eye with a black and white mask—the kind nobles wore to masquerades. A scintillating purple cloak hung around his shoulders, draping him in royalty. His shirt was unbuttoned down to the navel, and I saw human skin, tan and muscled.

Had I not known better, I might've thought him a bard. Nothing more.

Snow fell outside the window, pristine white tumbling from our eternal night sky. Warm fire burned in the tavern's hearth, casting shadows across the fae's face. Shadows that appeared as birds and people and music notes—everything they should not.

As I sat alone at a table, three wine glasses into my miserable night, he'd approached me and spoken twenty-six words.

'In fifteen weeks and two days, you will be wed. Today is the last day to escape. Say the word, and I shall whisk you away.'

Twenty-six words that had stilled my normally sharp tongue.

I'd give anything to torch every invitation that had been sent for my wretched wedding. To drive a blade through my husband-to-be's heart.

Maybe I'd even be willing to deal with a fae.

When I'd remained silent, he'd wordlessly dealt me a hand and begun a game of cards. This was the third night he'd done so. Each time, his message changed.

'Three days remain . . . '

'Only two days left, dear . . . '

'It's your last chance to escape.'

Something otherworldly surrounded the man, like the crackling air around a fire. It told me nothing, and everything.

He was no human.

Curse the old rhymes and warnings. Curiosity gnawed at me, eating through my last threads of sense.

I tucked my fiery hair behind my ears and stared my would-be benefactor down.

I was clever. Far more clever than most.

What was the worst he could do to me? I'd already been condemned to marry the devil himself.

The fae cast me a wicked grin. "You're still playing the silent game because of that silly nursery rhyme? On the first night, you doubted me; on the second, you feared me. But the cards you played told me everything I already knew."

Rolling my tongue in my mouth, I gave in to my curiosity. "Does your kind always talk in riddles?"

He chuckled, warm and deep. "Would you prefer my every word be a question?"

Folding my arms, I leaned forward. "God, no. I assume you want something from me? My youth, my wealth? Maybe something as humdrum as my soul?"

"Why do humans think we take souls?" He flicked his fingers idly. "What would I do with it?"

"I don't know, eat it? You avoided my question. Does your kind offer vagueries because you're forbidden from speaking the truth?"

He lowered his hand and met my eye. "What I want comes far from today. It needn't concern you. But fate spins along your path, and I want to be a part of it. For something must be moved that only you can push."

I thought over his words a few times. Vagueries, again. It could've meant anything.

Picking up my fourth glass of wine, I sipped on it and glanced over the room. A drunken miner, his face smudged with soot, grabbed at a passing barmaid's ass and laughed when she jolted away from him.

A typical sight around here. It reminded me all too much of my doom. Of my wedding.

Setting the glass down, I flipped through my hand and played another card. "I'm not agreeing to that flimsy deal. Where would you take me?"

"Where you've always wanted to go. Away,” he enunciated. "But you need someone to force you to take that first step."

My only friend often said the same. 'You always want to go. But someone has to push first.'

I glanced at my hand and saw a winning combination. But something told me nobody ever beat fae at their own games. Setting down my last card, I stood.

"Prove it," I said. "Prove you can do the impossible, as the stories say. Show me how you can save me before I sign away something I don't know I'm losing."

A lazy smile stretched across his face. "But of course. Come here.” Standing, he drifted over to the hearth.

Though the tavern was full, nobody paid us any mind. It was as though we were but ghosts. Wrapping my cloak around my shoulders, I followed him to the edge of the raging fire and stared into its warmth.

"Every fae has a nature we cannot escape, nor deny." His golden eye gleamed in the firelight. "I was the storyteller. But not of the present. Not of the mundane, as humans speak. I weave the yet-to-pass."

I raised my chin sharply. Perhaps if I knew everything that would come to pass, I could flee from my father and the lord who was to claim me. I could escape from them.

Truly escape, and learn what it meant to finally live.

"Alright," I said carefully. "Perhaps I'll consider accepting your deal if you tell me one of these tales.

Something that will sweep the world, that every town crier will shout.

Something the bards will sing of. Something I will know came true.

" I paused, carefully considering my request. "But it mustn't have happened yet. No living creature yet knows of it."

"You're careful with your words, aren't you?" Turning to the fire, the fae waved a hand over the flames, and they changed. They grew tenfold, consuming the tavern. The world around us fell away until all that surrounded me was fire and night. It commanded my attention—I could not look away.

"At this very moment," the fae said. "A young woman stands by a lake. Alone. She will soon be the center of an unprecedented story. It will shake that little capital of yours to the core."

The flames rose into the perfect shape of a woman, draped in heavy furs and wearing an elegant dress. Her hair was bound into a braided bun, decorated with lavender flowers. The gentle waves of a lake lapped at her feet, and snow powdered her shoulders.

"Ah, but before I begin." The fae smiled at me. "It has been centuries since someone bested me in cards. I knew I was right to seek you out."

I tried to glance back at the table, but all that existed now was the story. The woman in flames, slowly growing colors.

White hair, lavender silks. Reddened cheeks from the cold. She reached down for a stone and froze, looking back at me.

As though she sensed us watching her, as though she knew of the fae who had disturbed Lavaire's sleepy evening.

I knew in my heart, then, it had never mattered what I'd told the fae. They always got what they wanted.

And my life would never be the same.