Chapter 33
Maddox
Iwake up alone in late afternoon light.
For the millionth time in my life, it takes me much too long to remember where I am. How I got here, naked, tangled in sheets. Then it all floods back.
The Myrtle Queen arrived in the Redwood Court.
I nearly poisoned Castor…who is not the king.
Durian is the king.
Castor is the cursed prince.
Castor.
His curse, the torture and pain in his warm brown eyes. Something he thinks is his fault. But something just doesn’t add up. Feels off about it all.
Because he thinks it was his curse that killed King Cyperus. Like some random mortal just happened to decide to sneak up here and chop down the king’s heartwood by compulsion. But that random mortal was my dad. My dad, who made a pact with the Myrtle Queen. Castor’s curse had nothing to do with it.
On the pillow beside me rests a single rose, deep red petals edged in black like a burnt scroll of parchment. I pick it up, worrying the stem between my thumb and forefinger. Castor’s horror stories replay in my mind. Each of them drags at my skin like a dull needle.
A thorn on the rose pricks me, and a bead of blood pools on the tip of my finger. I might as well take the opportunity to test my blood sugar. Judging by my dry tongue and aching head, I already know it’s a number I don’t want to see.
My weapons belt and supply pouch sit on the table beside Castor’s bed. I pull out my meter and test strips.
382.
Cool, that’s…great.
Pulling out my vial of long-acting insulin and a syringe, I suck up the last of it.
Just enough to battle my body’s own production of glucose for the day…
and not much longer. I take out my short-acting insulin—less than half of a bottle left now—and deliver a correction dose that is not enough to bring it down by much.
I’m nearly out of the drug I need to live.
My heart starts to race, moving between relief that I don’t have to kill Castor and the ugly realization that I do have to kill Durian if I want to complete this pact.
If I want to live. It’s too late to find another way out.
Too late for me to climb down from these trees and find a hospital or pharmacy to beg for mercy. I’ve made my fucking bed.
As I’m tying my pants closed, a crash sounds from downstairs. Followed by another. Then grunts of pain and loud scuffling.
Diving for my weapons belt, I grip the hilt of my golden dagger and pull it free.
Descending the stairs two at a time, I take in the bizarre scene in the open kitchen and entryway: Tamarind with his scythe in hand, fighting off two woodlings with jagged blades in their grips.
He’s bleeding profusely from his neck and there’s another dead woodling on the floor of the kitchen, black blood leaking across the ground like an oil spill.
Leaping forward, I drive the golden dagger into the back of the woodling who is readying a blow to Tam’s ribs. The creature lets out a yelp and turns on me, sinking his blade into the side of my thigh. Okay, I was going to let this little asshole live, but—
Wrenching his blade out with a pained cry, I plunge it into his thick, squat neck. The light leaves his red eyes, and he collapses just as Tamarind takes the head off the third woodling with one arc of his scythe.
The head rolls across the floor, landing with a dull thump against the wall, sightless eyes staring.
Tam and I look at each other, chests heaving.
“I was just resting my head on my arms at the kitchen island, and they snuck up on me,” Tamarind says, looking at the woodlings with a dumbstruck expression. “I don’t know why they just—”
“Because Castor is the cursed prince,” I say through a gasping breath.
He freezes. “He told you?”
“Yes.”
“What else did he—?” He sways on his feet and holds up a blood-covered hand. “Alternatively. Let me get us fixed up before we broach this.”
He takes care of the wound in his neck first—luckily, it doesn’t seem deep enough for internal damage—and we both take a disgusting, bitter tincture that helps with blood loss. Then he pulls up a chair at the kitchen island and begins to tend to the gash on my thigh. “Where’s Castor?” I ask him.
“The courtyard. He and Durian are welcoming leaders arriving to the kingdom for the Sylveris Solstice tomorrow.” His voice sounds hollow, like a log that’s been eaten away by rot.
“And you didn’t go with him?”
“He asked me to stay here with you. But I think that’s also because he’s trying to keep me safe for as long as he can.” Tam glances down at the dead woodlings. “That did not quite work out, I fear.”
“I’m guessing he knows that you said you loved him, then?”
He nods slowly. “I figured he should know, since I’d already said it to you. It’s not like I can die twice.”
I roll my eyes. “Oh my God, Tam. You aren’t going to die. Not from his curse, anyway.”
He finishes up with my leg and the two of us lean against the cool marble of the kitchen island, ignoring the three woodling bodies still seeping black blood everywhere. “You clearly don’t understand how his curse works.”
“Castor told me how it works.”
“What did he tell you?”
I fill a glass with water from the tap, taking four gulps to satisfy my intense, high-blood-sugar thirst. “He said it’s unpredictable and erratic. He told me about all the people who died after he was adopted, about Cyperus, Laurel, and Jace. All the servants and friends when he was younger.”
“I see.”
“Unpredictable and erratic.” I laugh humorlessly. “Sounds more like convenient to me.”
Tamarind’s eyes narrow. “What do you mean?”
“People who get close to Castor just happen to die? They just happen to hang themselves in trees or get killed by mortal men? Or executed by the king? Or randomly attacked by three woodlings? This curse is made up of nothing but rumors and hearsay and dead bodies. No actual proof it even exists.”
Tamarind reaches for an apple in a bowl in the center of the island, but he doesn’t bite it, just tosses it back and forth between his hands. “Fae magic rarely makes sense to mortals. And I figure the dead bodies are more than enough proof, are they not?”
“A dead body is just proof that someone died.”
He catches the apple in his left hand and holds it. “So you think someone just made up his curse, then? That someone is having people killed?”
“Not just someone.”
“Who?”
“Are all dryads this naive?” I grumble. “Who would be the most upset by Castor’s adoption? Who would be jealous and annoyed and furious that King Cyperus was showing Castor so much love and affection?”
“Durian…?”
I hold my hands, palms up. “Everyone knows the Redwood King loves to play games.”
Tamarind is already shaking his head. “Durian loved Cyperus, though. Besides, Sovereign brothers can’t have anything to do with each other’s deaths or they would perish themselves.”
“I’m sure that particular death was just convenient for Durian to blame on Castor. But I know for a fact that Cyperus didn’t die because of his brother’s curse. He died because a mortal man made a pact with the Myrtle Queen.”
Tamarind places the apple on the table, brows pressing together. “How can you possibly know that?”
“Because that man was my father. Because I made a pact with the Myrtle Queen.”
Shock smooths every crease on Tamarind’s face. He blinks at me, tilting his head as if he’s trying to mentally chip away at my quickly crumbling mask. “You made a pact with the Myrtle Queen…?”
“Yep.”
He frowns deeply. “Why would you do that?”
Bowing my head, I pretend to examine my fingertips, looking at the constellation of needle pricks. “I lost my job and couldn’t land another one. I couldn’t afford my rent or medical supplies, which I am almost out of. I have a mortal disease that—”
“Which one?” he interrupts, and I remember he studied mortal medicine.
“Type one diabetes.” It feels odd saying it to him.
I’ve kept it to myself this whole time, partly because I didn’t want to try to explain what it was to a dryad and partly because I didn’t want them to mistake it for weakness even though it’s one of the reasons I’m as strong as I am.
His nod of realization throws me off for a moment.
“Anyway. I…panicked and maybe went a little mad. I’ve always been able to see things—dryads and sprites and other fae things.
When I was younger, my dad would tell me stories about the Myrtle Queen and wrote about her in his journal. So I went looking for her.”
It sounds absurd to say all of this out loud. To admit that I thought that was my only option.
“And what pact did you make?”
I can’t look him in the eyes when I answer. “I…vowed to kill the Redwood King if she would cure me.”
Tamarind’s copper eyes flick over to me again, narrowing. “The golden dagger at the top of the throne room?”
“Yes. I thought Castor was the king…and I was planning to kill him.”
He shakes his head, his expression a mixture of fury and triumph. “I knew it.”
“You were right about me,” I admit, hating it. “I tried and tried to get him alone. But when I finally did, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill Castor.”
He runs his hands down his face. “I can’t believe I left you alone with him.”
“Yeah, that was a horrible idea. Lucky for you, I’m a coward.”
A humorless laugh leaves his lips. “There is nothing cowardly about you, Maddox. You just aren’t a murderer.”
“I’m going to have to be.” My fingers drum on the countertop as my mind races. “What I can’t figure out is why Durian went along with Castor’s lie at the feast. Why would he pretend to be the cursed prince?”
Tamarind’s shoulders lift minutely. “Like you said. The king has always loved playing games. I imagine he thought it would be fun to have his courtiers in on the charade, to pretend to be the cursed prince for a night. I stopped trying to understand the king’s eccentric motivations a long time ago. ”
A recent memory smashes into my cranium. Durian wrapping the tree siren in vines, squeezing until she bled out. I didn’t process it at the time, but now that I think about it…he was smiling. He enjoyed watching her die.