The Cornish Princess by Tanya Anne Crosby
ChapterThirty
Fear squeezed at Gwendolyn’s heart as complete darkness enveloped her.
Was she dead?
Alive?
It was so dark!
After a moment, she coughed and sputtered, spewing more dirt than air. Her fingers still ached from the crush of Málik’s boot, and her stomach protested violently.
Even after the dust cleared, it seemed an eternity that she sat, trying to catch her breath in the damp, musty air. She knew Málik survived the collapse, only because she heard him breathing… or was this the echo of her own breath?
Gods.
What if she was alone, with no way out?
What if the collapsing shaft buried Málik beneath it?
What if—she heard digging.
Sudden, furious digging.
Coughing.
Bellows.
Screams.
Then, all at once, the digging ceased abruptly, and the heavy silence lengthened, until Gwendolyn heard the hiss of Málik’s blade as he re-sheathed his sword.
Holding back her fear, she slapped a hand against her trembling lips, if only to keep from sobbing. After a long moment, when the muffled voices did not return, a tiny blue flame flickered to life… in the palm of Málik’s hand, wobbling uncertainly, perhaps vying for the same air Gwendolyn needed to breathe.
But now she could see what happened.
Somehow, Málik had cut down the wooden braces supporting the shaft, leaving the earthwork to collapse. Whoever was above trying to open the door must have been sucked into the shaft and smothered with dirt.
The flame he held now danced in his palm, forming itself into the shape of a small moon, spitting bright blue flames like arms that embraced the orb, twisting and swirling, emitting embers like a damp flame. His eyes met hers, and in the dancing reflection in his pupils, Gwendolyn saw the truth.
A mountain of rubble lay where she’d once crawled. The rope ladder was gone. Buried. As dust settled more and more, the little light grew brighter and stronger, lighting more and more of the environs. Apparently, when Málik tossed her away—like a rag—she’d landed against the far wall, but her foot lay close enough to the rubble that it was covered by a small mound of dirt. Blinking, confused, Gwendolyn sat, testing the movement in her limbs. Nothing seemed broken, so she shook her leg and drew up her knees.
In the meantime, Málik grabbed the hilt of her fallen sword, drew it out of a larger mound of dirt, and handed it to her. Only then, as he faced her, every tumultuous emotion that warred within Gwendolyn was reflected in his pallid face—a mirror against her own pain.
She didn’t cry, nor did she speak.
There was nothing to say.
So, it appeared they were trapped. In a small cavern. With myriad tunnels creeping further into darkness.
“What now?” she asked, and shivered as she asked, “Will there be spriggans in those tunnels?” Ill-tempered creatures, like piskies, but grotesque, with wizened features and gnarled little bodies, although they could swell to gigantic proportions if threatened. They were also the ones responsible for leaving changelings in the place of babes.
With a hint of his usual mordancy, Málik arched a brow, then cast Gwendolyn a sideways glance. “Spriggans do not exist,” he said, tossing the flame in his hand in her direction. Wide-eyed, she watched as it flew—flew!—then paused, like a deer suddenly wary of a hunter. She gasped softly as it crept closer, then poised itself over her, sprinkling light like fairy dust over the pate of her head. Open-mouthed, Gwendolyn watched the swirling orb of blue.
“What… is… that?”
She met Málik’s gaze.
“You call them piskie lights. Tis faerie fire.”
Gwendolyn blinked.
Incomprehensible.
He came to sit beside her, nudging it slightly away, then down, so that it burned directly before Gwendolyn’s eyes, bright as stars.
Gwendolyn lifted a hand to its vicinity and found it cold to the touch. “Faerie fire,” she said, with wonder, realizing what that meant.
His eyes were keener than most and his strength was greater than any man’s she had ever met—because he wasfae… well and truly fae.
Seizing her by the leg, but gently, he brushed off a clump of soil on her hosen to better inspect her weeping wound. He said, “Spriggans are but a figment of your mortal imagination.” He pulled off her boot and set it aside. “Shadows play tricks,” he explained. “Men too long in the mines carry fantastic tales.”
He gave her a pointed glance, peering up at the orb of flame that seemed to obey him like a small pet. “Not that there are not worse things to be found in the dark.”
He returned his attention to her wound. Perhaps because it was closer than his, he plucked up the blade from her boot, and cut her hosen from the hem halfway up her leg. Ripping it, he turned the material inside out to brush at the wound on her leg, removing all dirt from the vicinity. It was still bleeding, though not much. “Fortunately, it appears to be superficial,” he said, sounding relieved. He returned Gwendolyn’s dagger. “Art hale otherwise?”
Gwendolyn nodded quickly, even though she wasn’t precisely sure—in fact, she could be dead. That would certainly explain what she was witnessing here.
Her gaze returned to the glowing blue sphere, as he handed her back her boot and wrapped her leg with the strip of cloth he’d made from her hosen.
Gods. Her entire body hurt, and even if she’d not sustained some greater wound, her heart ached too much to admit. He tied the cloth, then gave her a nod. Then, with some effort, and a little help, she slid her foot back into the boot.
As for Málik, his face was no longer quite so glowsome. His skin was grey with filth… as hers must be. His hair, once so silken and shiny, was dull and covered with dust.
Somehow, probably during the descent, he’d sustained a small scrape on his cheek that was… bleeding… redblood… like hers. Worry lines furrowed the edges of his beautiful mouth, and it was all Gwendolyn could do not to cast herself into his arms and sob.
She did not need to go back and see the carnage above to know what was left. The screams of the children in the garner would haunt her until her dying day. There had simply been too many to defend against.
Her uncle.Gods. Her throat constricted. He’d sent them off only to battle those men by himself. There was no way he could have defended against so many.
Poor Lowenna.
Her throat tightened again. Sweet, sweet Lowenna. She was gone before the battle ever began—dead and twisted, trampled underfoot.
Briallen and Jenefer.
Were they both dead now?
And what of Borlewen? What became of her with no one left to defend her?
So many questions hovered at the tip of Gwendolyn’s tongue, but she hadn’t the courage to ask a single one.
The fogous rambled ever onward,twisting this way and that, leading to nothing, always nothing. Every tunnel too narrow, barely wide enough for a single person to crawl through, much less two, although sometimes they heightened to allow one to walk with a bent back.
The walls were built of stone—all except for the shaft area beneath the trapdoor. Braced only with wood, Málik had somehow brought it all tumbling down.
He insisted upon leading the way, sometimes leaving Gwendolyn with the strange orb of light whilst he scouted the path ahead. Curiously, he hadn’t any need to touch the flame, ever. It followed like a pup, seeming to read his mind, moving ahead into the farthest reaches of the tunnel to light their way, and sometimes lagging, or else to one side, but never between them.
Twice Málik returned to say the tunnel ahead had ended, and they needed to turn back. Three times they encountered dead ends together.
Once, he was gone so long, leaving Gwendolyn with the curious blue orb long enough that she worked up the nerve to reach out and pet it. It didn’t move away, allowing her to wrap her hand about the spherule, but it wouldn’t budge—as though he’d purposely commanded it to stay, no doubt so Gwendolyn wouldn’t stray.
Well, it worked. She hadn’t any desire to discover if spriggans truly existed. Indeed, if piskies were real, and fae were real, why not spriggans as well?
Staring at the orb, Gwendolyn found herself intensely curious about how it worked. Lifting two fingers to tap it gently, she started when it showered her with tiny blue embers that took on a life of their own, wheeling about in circles until they joined the rest of the embers encircling the flame, like a tiny orbit of stars chasing a moon.
When Málik returned, though she wished to ask him about the light, she couldn’t find words to speak—not yet. For the first time in her life, curiosity fell prey to her mood. Grief settled into her breast, crushing her heart like a stone.
Hours later, Gwendolyn was exhausted, filthy, freezing, and she needed to find a place to relieve herself. The problem was that she didn’t actually wish for Málik to leave her again, and every time he did, she held her breath till he returned.
Gods help her, there might not be spriggans in these tunnels, and spriggans might only be a figment of some miner’s imagination, but she swore she heard breathing that wasn’t her own—nor Málik’s. Although perhaps this, too, was in her imagination.
She’d also heard some wheals were infested with knockers, but these were helpful creatures, given to song, who aided the miners. And regardless, she’d had more than enough of the supernatural for the moment, and whether they existed, good or bad, she didn’t want to know.
A rat rushed by, stopping to assess them, its eyes reflecting the blue of the faerie fire. Abruptly, it scurried away, and with its departure, Gwendolyn longed to weep. She wanted to follow but knew that wherever it had gone, she couldn’t go.
Now and again, they encountered brown bats hanging from beams along the tunnels—braces meant to sustain the passages. Wrapped in winged embraces, their black eyes shone against the flickering light, seeming to watch them curiously, though ultimately uninterested in their plight. Disturbed by the faerie light, one suddenly awoke, shrieking, and flew away.
In the silence that followed, Gwendolyn wondered who the raiders were. It was impossible to say whether the attack on her uncle’s village could be connected to her investigations, but she couldn’t help but feel everything was her fault. Could it be that someone—Alderman Aelwin, perhaps?—learned of her intention to speak with Bryok’s widow?
Was he so willing to murder the King’s only heir to hide his crimes?
For what reason did he wish Bryok dead? Was it only rivalry, else something more—something like what Málik proposed? To hide the truth of what they had done, perhaps alone, or together—greedy for what lay inside that Treasury?
Here and now, there was no one to ask, and if she dared voice these questions aloud, Málik seemed to be in no mood to converse. As the hours crept by, his mouth drew tight, and his face grew pinched.
Was it her imagination, or was the air getting harder and harder to breathe?
Gods. At one point, even Málik’s spherule of blue flame dimmed, and Gwendolyn held her breath, hoping desperately that it wasn’t depending upon the same air.
Later, as the hours lengthened, she became certain the air was growing thinner. And though Málik’s lungs seemed no worse for the wear, she could tell he was worried—for her?
Later there would be time enough for questions, she decided.
However, when they met yet another dead end, she cried out in dismay and finally cast her back against the wall, sliding to her bottom, miserable and fighting back tears. To keep from crying out again, she placed the pad of her thumb into her mouth and bit till she tasted her own blood. Without a word, Málik sat down beside her and drew her into his arms, putting out the faerie fire with only a gust of his breath.
“Málik,” she protested.
“Shhh,” he said, twisting a finger through her curls. “Do you trust me, Princess?”
Gwendolyn nodded, but words wouldn’t come. Tears, like dust, clogged her throat.
“’Tis late,” he whispered. “Let us rest.” And he held Gwendolyn as she wept—for her uncle and his family, for her responsibility in all their deaths, for Owen, for her father, for the mess she’d made of everything, for Bryn, for the situation in which they now found themselves, and for every cross word she ever spent on Málik.
It was all too much, and she couldn’t bear it.