A Veil of Truth and Trickery by Analeigh Ford

Chapter Twelve

No wonderhe said nothing else would matter after tonight.

There wouldn’t be anything after tonight.

There was nowhere to run. No way to run, not with Tethys’ arm still clutching onto mine.

I struggled against him, but all it bought me was a few stumbling footsteps across the mossy ground. Long tables stretched along the length of the room on either side. Fae were sitting on benches and swinging in hammocks and lying on the floor as other fae fed them strange red and orange fruits from their slender fingers. Compared to the Woodland Fae, Tethys beside me looked almost like an entirely different species.

A species that could drag me, probably without realizing he was dragging me, the whole length of a room before I had the chance to force a word out against it.

“I want to speak to Caldamir,” I said, my breath hitching as I struggled to keep up with my own racing heart. I was drowning, but this time it wasn’t due to the poisonous air or magical pools of water. “He’d never …”

“Who do you think arranged it?”

My mouth clamped shut.

Of course, he did. He’d tricked me, lulled me into thinking he wanted to keep me alive, when really, he just wanted to make sure I could live long enough to be made a sacrifice of.

I should have expected nothing less from the fae.

We came to a shuddering halt at the end of the two long rows, where a third table had been placed slightly raised above the others. The roots here piled onto one another writhing and reaching for the fae seated at the center of the table.

This time, however, even Nyx’s preternatural beauty couldn’t force the persistent thoughts from my head.

This was it. What they’d brought me here for.

The worst possible fate.

Male and female fae filled the table spreading out to either side, but only those closest to the prince of this kingdom didn’t seem utterly and hopelessly infatuated with him.

Tethys gave a little eye roll as he half bowed to Nyx before giving me a slight push forward.

I, in turn, refused to bow. Not that I was given much of a choice, not when the roots beneath my feet sprung up to force me down. They pressed like knotted fingers into my spine until I had no choice but to fold at the waist.

They held me in place until Nyx waved them away dismissively. They may have been able to force me to bow, but they weren’t able to force the scowl from my face when I once again faced the Woodland prince.

“Glad to see your spirits weren’t damped by the pool. Armene here was just telling me about your little swim.” Nyx’s eyes grew hooded as he took me in again, taking his time. He picked the last cherry from a bowl and plucked the stem before popping it into his mouth. The fruit mulled between his lips before he leaned forward to carefully spit the pit back into the bowl. He didn’t speak again until he’d set it aside. My resolve wavered only for a moment beneath the weight of his gaze. “You don’t look mad.”

“Looks can be deceiving,” Tethys said, his arm finally dropping from mine before he launched himself up over the table to take the last remaining open seat nearest to Nyx. “After all, take a look at you.”

Either Nyx ignored Tethys’ comment or, more likely—I was starting to think—didn’t understand it, because his attention never wavered from me. That was what kept me anchored in place long after Tethys’ hand no longer stopped me from bolting.

That and the hundred other fae surrounding me, each one eager to do whatever Nyx bade them do … not to mention Caldamir and the others. I wouldn’t even have made it to the end of the first tables.

From a distance, I could see the glazed-over look in the fae’s eyes, but I knew that wouldn’t last long. Not if Nyx didn’t want it to.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, silly girl.”

Nyx’s jacket was left open, the shirt beneath it unbuttoned to reveal the smooth, carved surface of his chest. He leaned forward toward me, and for the first time, I noticed a simple necklace strung around his neck. It was a tiny root so thin that it had been twisted into a kind of choker that rested just above his clavicle.

Tethys caught me looking and leaned forward too, his eyebrows raising conspiratorially. “Nyx has been in and out of a relationship with a tree for the last half century.”

When I didn’t say anything in response, he added, “Well, she’s technically a dryad. Which also technically makes her a tree.”

“And also, technically,” Nyx said, frowning. “We’re not together anymore.”

“Yet you still wear her memento …”

“What? Was I supposed to throw it out just because we’re not together?” Nyx asked. “No, seriously. Tethys,” he said, concern flickering across his face as he twisted in his seat to face Tethys. “Was I supposed to throw it out?”

Tethys didn’t answer him. Caldamir didn’t give him the chance.

“I don’t think Delph here cares what Nyx here has been using to get his cock wet. Even less what jewelry you choose to wear.”

He wasn’t wrong. It was the last thing on my mind at present, the princes’ banter doing nothing to stop my knees from wanting to give out beneath me.

Nyx’s eyes cut over to me, and then back to Tethys as they narrowed. “Hey you, what did you tell her? She’s practically shaking.”

He motioned with his hand, and the middle of the table parted like the walls of the court had earlier, splitting a path between the tables that led to the other side. As I watched, a kind of pedestal grew from the ground, forming in the space directly beside Nyx. Caldamir didn’t look pleased at being pushed ever so slightly away, but it wasn’t him I was fixated on.

It was what lay on the pedestal—another root, this one sharp as a blade.

“Come forward.”

Nyx’s next words were an order. I found it impossible to disobey him.

This was it. If he planned to sacrifice me here in front of all his gathered subjects, there was nothing I could do to stop him. All I could hope was that I died with what little bit of dignity I had left.

I might not be a hero to my village, but one day, Sol would know I was a hero for him. That was all that mattered. That was the image I held in my head as I stepped through the gap in the tables and onto the other side.

Overhead, the setting sun had illuminated the branches so that they appeared to glow with golden light themselves. Mirrors had been hung from the natural rafters, catching the light that radiated down on us in flashes like falling stars. Soon the sun would dip down below the horizon, but for that single moment, the whole forest seemed ablaze with its light.

There was a heat that radiated off of Nyx that I hadn’t felt off any of the others. Standing this close to him was overwhelming. No wonder the others were drawn to him like a moth to a flame.

“Caldamir was kind enough to bring you here so that a deal I made with that lord of yours was finally fulfilled,” he said, looking deeper into my eyes. “And so now, I fulfill it.”

With that, he promptly reached forward, grabbed the knife from the pedestal, and slashed the tip of the blade across my outstretched palm before I could so much as try to draw back. The knife dropped with a clatter to the table, the entirety of the hall falling silent as he leaned forward and pressed his full lips to the cut.

His hand enfolded mine, cupping it around his face as he drew in the iron of my blood. When he lifted his face again, that perfect golden palette of his face had been smeared with dark red. He mulled my blood over in his mouth like the cherries whose pits he leaned forward to spit it into.

For the third time, I heard the familiar rumble of magic. That breeze from nowhere blew back the already wild tendrils of Nyx’s hair as the bowl in his hands began to shake.

Caldamir, Tethys, and Armene leaned in to watch, their faces intent.

The pits in the bowl began to quiver and take form. Tiny wings unfolded and legs sprouted to form several gnat-like creatures that rose slightly to hover, for a moment, in the air above it.

All four of the fae princes’ faces flickered with hope—but it was as brief as the lives of the small magic-born creatures. Almost as soon as these new small creatures had taken flight, they crumbled to black dust in the bottom of the bowl from which they’d been resurrected.

As soon as they did, the thrumming stopped. A sort of emptiness settled in its place, a hollowness that came with a bitter aftertaste.

Caldamir shattered the silence by slamming one hand down on the table. “It’s not enough.”

The other three fae fell back into their own seats.

“I told you it wouldn’t be,” Armene grumbled. He tugged at the sheer fabric wrapped around his shoulders, masking for a moment the disappointment on his own face.

The scent of blood and honey overwhelmed me as Nyx, beside me, tilted back his head and closed his eyes for a second, his nostrils flaring as he took a deep breath. When his head nodded back down to look at me again, I caught a hint of a familiar mischief I’d already grown accustomed to seeing in Tethys’ eyes.

“At any rate, the deal is done.”

My heartbeat still thudded in my chest. “That … that’s it?”

Nyx let my hand drop to my side, but not before I caught him looking once more at the gash on my hand. It was already healing.

“How did—”

“Oh, I love you humans, you’re always so naïve,” Nyx said with a tinkling laugh. He grabbed my wrist again, tilting it up toward the setting sun. “You didn’t think I was just going to waste all that pretty blood, did you?”

“It’s fae fluids that allow us to heal. It can heal humans too, if they’re so lucky,” Caldamir snapped from my other side. His patience had thinned with the failed magic. He stared straight ahead, his head already sunk halfway into his cup of wine. “Not that any humans have ever been so lucky.”

Together, Nyx and I watched the sliced skin of my hand knit back together until all that remained was a short, silver scar.

I wondered for a moment if the stories of the fae would’ve been the same had humans known this … or would we long since have found a way to trap fae, to use them for our own means instead of wishing them gone. I wondered if we’d hate the fae so much if we’d known they held this sort of power.

A power that might actually help us, and not just destroy us.

Nyx seemed to be the least affected by his failed attempt at creating new gnats to replace the ones Caldamir and I had killed. Tethys had fallen uncharacteristically quiet, while Armene, usually still and serene, had begun tapping his foot under the table.

The Woodland prince still hadn’t let go of my hand. His thumb traced circles around the back of my hand, the last of the inner heat fading from him as his eyes lifted to rest on my face instead.

“It’s been a long time since I laid eyes on a human, but not so long that I’d forgotten how they were supposed to look. I don’t remember any like you.”

“I don’t think any of us do,” Armene said, on his other side. His foot continued to tap anxiously beneath him. He cast first a sideways glance at me, and then at Caldamir. Neither of them spoke, but I saw the way Tethys watched them too.

Only Nyx remained oblivious, his attention still devoted to my face as if I was some sort of puzzle he was trying to work out. The last of the sunset faded, leaving the mirrors up above to tinkle in an unseen breeze, their dancing lights extinguished in an instant.

It was only then that Nyx let go of my hand and sat back.

“At least this business is done,” Nyx said, the weariness on his face seemingly unable to last more than a couple seconds. It was immediately replaced with that simple smile that seemed to most often occupy it. “Now, let’s enjoy the last of the evening before we’re all forced to return to the drabness of reality.”

“What do you mean, done?” I asked, head turning from Nyx to Caldamir, and then to the other two fae seated beside them in turn. “I thought …”

“What, don’t tell me you thought that I meant we had to kill you,” Tethys said, leaning forward. “We just needed Nyx here to taste a little of your fear.”

“A … a little …”

“For minor rituals, the fear is what really matters. You really think we’re savages?”

“Yes.”

Tethys let out a bark of a laugh, one leg slipping down from the edge of the chair where he’d wedged it up. “At least she’s honest,” he said, shuffling to rebalance himself. His golden eyes glowed again in the dying light as he took me in, in all my full chest-heaving glory. My heart had once again started to beat too quickly, this time, not out of fear.

“Such a shame, really.”

I wanted to ask Tethys what he meant, I wanted to ask a thousand questions, but there was really only one that mattered.

“Then does that mean I can go home?”

It was Armene who flinched back when I said it, a look of distaste marring his handsome face. But it was Caldamir who answered.

“Impossible.”

“But, the deal …”

“It has nothing to do with the deal,” Caldamir said, curtly. He still kept his eyes fixed on his wine glass, though it had long since emptied. He was taking the failed magic worse than the rest of them. “You wouldn’t be able to make it to the bridge in time.”

“In time for what?”

“Before Midsommar has passed, and the magic has once again slipped …” Tethys said, picking up some fruit only to let it tumble listlessly back down to the table “… through our fingers.”

My mind was reeling. “Fine then. I’ll just wait for the next festival. How long off could that be?”

A coldness had started to settle into the hall at the dying of the light. That far-off look in the fae’s eyes had started to fade, a sharp hunger replacing it in the way they glanced at me. I wasn’t the only one who noticed. Though Nyx remained blissfully ignorant, that same infuriating smile pulling at the corner of his eyes as it always seemed to, both Caldamir and Armene had started fidgeting restlessly with the knives on their plates.

Even Tethys sat up a little straighter, his muscles tensing at the ready.

“Just a couple months,” Caldamir said, hand still twiddling the knife a little too close to where my now-healed hand rested on the table. I drew it back to my chest and cradled it, though it no longer so much as stung.

“What’s a couple months? I can wait for that. I’ll make the crossing then.”

“It’ll be too late by then.”

A slight coldness followed his words, but I still pressed onward, despite the restlessness building around us. Caldamir’s hand had stilled, his fingers wrapped tightly around the blade.

“Too late … how?”

“Because by then, you’ll be dead.”