A Veil of Truth and Trickery by Analeigh Ford
Chapter Twenty-Three
There wasno choice but to travel straight through the broken, rotting remains of the forest. The whole thing was like a skeleton, with the great white-bleached trees making up the exposed ribcage of some giant monster rising up along us as we rode in silence.
They rest of the party had managed to retrieve Nyx’s horse and my mule both, who’d had the good sense to wander back in the right direction after they’d thrown us over the bramble wall. My mule begrudgingly took me back, though his burden had grown considerably lighter now that Tallulah had taken to riding with all of her weapons, her eyes constantly shifting over to the two newest members of our party.
The duo was the most unremarkable pair of fae I’d met yet. I hadn’t spent much time paying attention to the fae of Nyx’s Woodland Court, and when I did, I was mostly interested in the shapes their bodies made intermingling together during the Midsommar celebrations. If I thought back, I couldn’t remember them individually, their faces all blurred together into the same kind of high-cheekboned mix with eyes in different shades of blue and green.
I’d quickly learned upon meeting Caldamir, and then coming to Avarath, that the fae weren’t what the picture books and old tapestries made them out to be. More than just their appearance—which up until the prince’s arrival I’d thought would be strikingly similar to mine—they were a far more complicated people than I’d ever imagined.
The two males that had joined our party where no exception.
I wouldn’t call them ugly, for by human standards they’d be far above average on all accounts, but compared to the other fae I’d seen, however well I remembered them, these two were positively plain. Their faces were emotionless, their voices bland and unfeeling. Even when they spoke to each other, always in hushed tones that were hard to make out, it was difficult to tell whether they were pleased or not. From the sound of their voices, it was impossible to tell whether they’d been traveling for a few days, or a few years. Their dark cloaks bore something that looked like it might have once been the emblem of Caldamir’s court, but the threads were worn to the point of unraveling. These might be his fae, but they’d been gone a long time.
Long enough that even Caldamir didn’t remember them.
No one had said as much—no one had said much of anything since we rejoined—but I could see it in the way he snuck furtive glances their way more often than he did mine. There was a questioning look on his face, as if he was trying to remember something that he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
Armene, meanwhile, was far less subtle with his suspicions.
“I don’t trust them,” he said as soon as he settled down by our campfire at the end of our first day traveling together again. His eyes shifted over to the smaller fire our two companions had made a few yards off. He didn’t bother keeping his voice low. He hoped they’d hear him, hoped they turn their hunched shoulders to meet his gaze, provide some kind of assurance either way. “Who’s out traveling this time of year?”
“Lots of fae travel for Midsommar,” Nyx said, shifting glances in his direction.
Nyx’s face stared blankly into the fire. He hadn’t spoken much since we’d discovered the ruined forest. The lighthearted joy in his face had faded, the look replacing it far more pensive.
It didn’t suit him.
“Not the kind that don’t stop to spend it with a nearby court,” Armene argued. He finally peeled his gaze away from the newcomers’ silhouetted forms, only to fix it on the fire alongside Nyx instead. He shrugged up his own shoulders and hunched forward, brows furrowing. “They would’ve been at the court in time. Who passes up the opportunity to enjoy a Woodland celebration?”
“As I recall,” Tethys said, appearing suddenly beside the log where I sat, “we did.”
“Yeah, well,” Armene said, “we had good reason.”
“And maybe they did too.” Tethys flopped down onto the old branch beside me and stretched out his legs with a contented sigh. “We’re not the only fae struggling to find our place in this new world. You think we’re the only ones who’ve noticed the magic is going missing? Just because our advisors think it’s best left alone doesn’t mean there aren’t other fae out there looking for a solution. We’re just the only ones who may have actually found one.”
“Please don’t tell me you’re stupid enough to be talking about that right now,” Caldamir said, appearing out of the darkness next, a dark shape before an even darker sky. He dropped an armload of branches into the fire, so dry that they almost immediately turned to ash.
“Tethys is over here flapping his mouth as usual,” Tallulah grumbled from where she sat across from me in the shadows. She was the only one not sitting in the light of the fire. She’d preferred to stay back, pulling a log of her own up behind our inner circle—creating a sort of armored shield between the two camps with her own body.
“Well, unless you’d like to spend the rest of our days in Avarath watching helplessly as all our lands turn to ash too, then you’d best learn how to shut that pretty mouth, Tethys.”
Tethys only grinned. “You think I have a pretty mouth?”
Caldamir picked a hot coal out of the fire with his bare hands and flicked it at the Sea prince, promptly wiping the grin off his face as he fought to bat it off him in time before it burned an already larger hole in his tunic than it already had.
He finally settled down at the fire alongside the rest of us, though he made no sign of relaxing. He leaned in close enough to the flames that I was surprised he didn’t flinch back from the heat.
There was a determined look on his face that I’d become all too familiar with over the last few days. Each day that drew us closer to his court—and my death—the reality of it was settling in for all of us.
We’d managed to make it to the old border of the forest by nightfall, but only barely. The ghosts of the ruined land still lingered in our peripherals, those bone-like trees standing out against the blackness surrounding us on all sides. After days spent traveling the forest, I was surprised by how uncomfortable I felt exposed in the dark emptiness of the plains. In the forests, I’d felt eyes on me constantly—but out here, it was a different feeling. A different kind of exposure.
Anything that stumbled upon us here would have to do it intentionally.
As some already had.
I cast a glance at the fae seated at their own fire, and once again caught them just as they were looking away from me. They had that same hungry look in their eye that I’d seen in some of the Woodland Fae, one that once again made me subconsciously shrink a little in my seat. It made me think that of all the warnings about the fae that I’d gotten wrong, the rumor that they sometimes ate humans might not be one of them.
Because the way they looked at me carried none of the tenderness that I’d spotted on the faces of the other fae seated around me. Well … all aside from Tallulah.
Strangely, it was this realization—and not the fear of our fae newcomers—that suddenly made the heat of the fire become unbearable.
I stood, motioning for the others not to follow even though I felt the weight of their eyes on me with each step I took away from the fire. I didn’t go far, just far enough that I couldn’t make out the dim voices around the fire from one another.
The air out on the plains got colder at night. Not cocooned by the trees of the forest, the fading of the sun gave way to an almost chilly breeze that carried the scent of the ruined forest far beyond its borders. It was a constant reminder of what was to come, should the fae fail in their quest.
This place was a constant reminder of what I was supposed to be, what I meant to them. To all fae. A burden. A blessing. A hope.
Hope was never something I’d associated with myself before, but I’d never imagined it to feel like this. So … so hopeless.
“You really shouldn’t be alone out here.”
Caldamir appeared at my side, as I knew he would. He couldn’t leave me alone, wouldn’t let me out of his sight since we’d reappeared. He hadn’t said as much, but I knew he’d feared the worst when I’d plunged after Nyx. Though the worst for him didn’t mean my death. It meant losing me. Dead, or alive, it was all the same to him until I lay on his sacrificial pyre … or whatever other way he planned to murder me once we arrived at the Mountain Court.
“I’m not alone, I’m with you.”
A low grunt issued from the back of Caldamir’s throat. “That isn’t what I meant. There were once fiends out here that could just swoop down and carry you off, you know. There might not be the numbers there once were, but all it takes is one. Out here, you’re totally exposed—”
“Like I’m not exposed everywhere I go?” I cut him off.
Despite Caldamir’s warning to Tethys earlier to quiet, I couldn’t help myself. I kept my voice low, but he still flinched at the words that followed.
“I understand the fiends. I really do. But why are you so worried about the other fae? Finding out about me, about what you plan to do to me, I mean?”
“Fae are dangerous. I thought even humans knew that.”
“But it’s more than that,” I said, resisting the urge to stamp my foot out of frustration. “Why would they risk that when I’m with you? With all of you? You’re princes, surely they wouldn’t want to anger you. Or do princes mean something different than they do in our world?”
Caldamir gritted his teeth. “No, we’re pretty much the same.”
“So, what is it then?” I insisted. “You promised to tell me back in the forest, but then you didn’t. Don’t you think I deserve to know?”
He made another grunt, but it wasn’t completely dismissive.
So, I continued. “Some fae don’t want the magic back?”
“Some fae just aren’t willing to pay the price.”
“The price? What price? I’m the one who’s going to have to die.” I didn’t mean for it to, but my voice had risen well above my well-intentioned whisper. “You do realize that I don’t get anything out of this deal, right? I don’t see why I shouldn’t just … just …” I flung my arms wide, feeling the breeze pick up as I did, rustling at the hem of my soiled dress. “Why don’t I just let the fiends take me, then?”
The words were goading, as I intended. Of course, I had my own reasons not to let the wild fiends kill me now … but Caldamir didn’t know that. None of them did. Any fears I had of Nyx recounting the story of me in the puddle had died with his silence at the sight of his ruined forest.
The moon was but half of a silver coin overhead, crawling ever forward toward the new moon with each waning day. The sight of it was a stark reminder of just how long I was still expected to stay alive on my own.
One week left. One week too long.
Though Nyx and I had spent but one night in the forest, Caldamir and the rest of them had spent three looking for us. It was yet another strange way the forest had twisted around us. Though, for once, I didn’t mind.
It had brought me one day closer to my deliverance, bought me just a little more time.
And with it, a little more boldness.
I pushed onward, provoking him. “Why not take my chances with the unknown, if you’re just going to kill me as soon as we get back to the court?”
It worked.
“Because then your death would be in vain, and you would die,” Caldamir said, drawing closer, “that, I can promise you.”
When I still didn’t look at him, he grabbed me by the shoulders and forced me to look into his eyes. “You act like your life before I took you wasn’t suffering. I saw the way you were treated. I saw the scars on your back. You should be thanking me for taking you away from that living hell.”
This time, it was him provoking me.
“Thanking you?” I let out a scoff, the incredulity dripping like tar from my tongue. “Oh, thank you, Prince Caldamir, for taking everything from me. Is that what you want to hear?”
“I’ve done more for you than you know. I’ve killed for you.”
I paused.
“What are you talking about?”
I’d never seen Caldamir like this before. His face had gone white with fury and unable to stand still, he’d started pacing in front of me. His hands moved in short, jerking motions, as if he didn’t know what to do with them.
“Otto’s man. I painted the cellar red with his blood.” Caldamir suddenly stopped right in front of me and pulled me closer then, so close that I could feel his breath on my face. It smelled sweet, like the honey I’d once tasted on Nyx’s tongue. “And I’d do it again.”
“I don’t understand you,” I hissed at him, my heartbeat quickening at his touch. “You’ll sacrifice me in some ill-fated attempt to get your magic back, but you’ll kill a man who once took a switch to me a little too hard?”
He hesitated at that, just for a moment.
“That’s different.”
“How’s that different? Don’t get me wrong, I’ve no love lost for Raful—that’s the name of the man you killed, by the way—but how can you stand here and say that was justified?”
I took a deep breath. “Why would you claim to kill a man for me when you plan on killing me yourself?”
“That was a man. If there’s one drop of fae blood in you yet, I’ll not suffer another—fae or human—to lay undeserving hands on you.”
The utter hypocrisy of it all finally broke me. Really broke me.
For a long moment, Caldamir and I stood at an impasse, his eyes searching mine for something he couldn’t find.
But I found what I was looking for, found what I’d been trying to drag up ever since his arrival in Alderia to kidnap me in the first place.
I found hatred.
I couldn’t find it in me for the fae, try as I might. But I found it for him.
For this specific fae. For Caldamir.
A muscle spasmed in his jaw. His lips quivered dangerously close to mine, close enough that for one, brief instant, I thought he might be about to kiss me.
Fortunately for him, one of our new traveling companions chose that moment to appear from the shadows. We’d been so preoccupied that we hadn’t heard him approach.
“Everything alright out here?”
Caldamir’s hands dropped so quickly from me, it wasn’t until he took a step back that I even realized he’d let me go. “Everything’s fine,” he snapped, his tone announcing very clearly that he was anything but.
He turned to catch the rest of the campfire staring our way, half risen from their seats, hands already reaching toward weapons. Caldamir raised his voice, nodding toward the second guest at the fire adjacent to ours, making sure everyone heard him.
“Make sure to get some sleep, because from here on out, we ride hard. No more detours. No more hesitating. We’ve already wasted enough time.”
“Wait …” Armene said, stepping after him. “Does that mean what I think it means?”
Caldamir’s face was stony when he turned back. “Don’t tell me you believe the stories about the valley?”
Armene was silent as Caldamir turned away and walked back toward the camp, where Tallulah was already starting to work to dull the flickering flames for sleep. “I never took you for the superstitious type.”