The Flute Keeper's Promise (The Flute Keeper Saga) (13 page)

Katriel gave a short nod. “Yes,
Your
Highness
.”

All the joy drained from me as
though it had never been there. It was replaced by something frigid and
terrible. I thought my heart had stopped. Unable to move, I just stared at the
boy I thought I loved and let the truth sink in.

He lied
.

“All set, Your Highness,” Katriel
said, flying back from the ship. “They can’t wait to get underway. Neither can
I. I’m sick of being around all these Fay.”

“After all they’ve done for us?”
Lev said with unmistakable sarcasm.

Katriel snorted. “You know as well
as I that they’d sacrifice us all in a heartbeat if it meant saving their own
skins.”

Lev rolled up the parchment and
glanced in the direction of the castle. “They may very well intend to.”

It was like being punched in the
gut over and over. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This was not my Lev.
He had never been my Lev. He had lied about everything.

Suddenly Katriel sniffed the air
and jerked her head towards me. “Hey! Who goes there?”

Lev’s head turned. He spied me. His
face drained of all traces of color. “Emma! What are you doing here?”

I couldn’t breathe or think or
move. A horrible pressure settled in my chest. Never had I felt so betrayed.
Never had I felt so foolish.

“I can get rid of her,” Katriel
said, spreading her wings.

“Get back in the ship,” Lev growled
at her.

Looking startled, Katriel nodded
and said “Yes, Your Highness.”

Lev started towards me. The sound
of his footfalls rattling the dock shook me out of my stupor. Unwilling to face
him, I turned and ran.

“Emma!” Lev called after me. “Wait!”

I kept running. Each breath tore
through me like a knife. My shock was quickly giving way to fury like I’d never
known.

Lev flew overhead and landed in
front of me, blocking my way off the dock. His face was a strange mix of
annoyance and agony. He tried to grab my arms. “Emma, please!”

“Don’t touch me!” I screamed,
recoiling from him. “You liar!”

Lev winced. “Emma, I can explain—”

“You don’t have to explain
anything,
Your Highness
. I guess Ivywild isn’t good enough for a Slaugh
king, is it?”

 “I was going to tell you,” Lev
said, reaching out once again.

I drew back. The feel of his
fingers sickened me. “You had plenty of chances to tell me! I asked you flat
out if you were King Hagan’s son. You looked me right in the eye and lied!”

Lev hung his head. “Yes. I did. But
I had my reasons. And it wasn’t entirely a lie. I am Lev Hartwig.”

His excuses only made me more disgusted.
“Don’t feed me more of that crap! What’s your real name?”

“Hugo Winterwing VI,” he said. “But
I am Lev Hartwig, too. That’s the person I became to start my new life.”

“Your new life? You mean the one
where you mooched off the Fay for years and lied to everyone who tried to help
you?”

Lev’s head reared up. Something
dangerous flickered in his eyes. “If you’ll recall, they sent me to die in the
labyrinth when I first came here. I haven’t asked anyone for anything.”

I was beyond listening to reason.
“We should have left you at Moonlight Pass!”

“Maybe so,” Lev said. His eyes had
narrowed to hard little slits. “Why did you come here, Emma?”

His question brought the first real
threat of tears. I tried to conceal the trembling of my lips by sneering. What
was I supposed to say? That I’d come to tell him I was in love with him? That I
had come to beg him to stay or take me with him? The very idea made me sick to
my stomach now.

“Come on, Em,” Lev said, trying to
lay a hand on my shoulder.

I flicked his hand away while
shoving him backwards with a magical barrier.

Looking stunned at first, then
angry, Lev recovered and pulled himself up to his full height. The bony points
on his wings drew up rigidly like the hairs on a cat’s back.

“Bloody hell, Emma!” he exclaimed.
“Just calm down! You don’t know everything that’s going on here!”

“All I need to know is that you
betrayed me!” I countered, drawing on my own strength for another attack. “I
should have expected it. You’re a Slaugh. You’re all worthless. You. Your
father. His mistress, Marafae. All cowards. It’s no wonder your race is almost
extinct.”

There was an ominous growl in Lev’s
voice when he spoke. “You don’t mean that, Emma.”

I’d hit the tender spot. I relished
it. I wanted to hurt him as much as he’d hurt me. “Violent, pigheaded, inferior
brutes. That’s all you are. Go ahead, take that Slaugh girl on the ship and try
to replenish your race. You’ll all just end up killing yourselves off again.”

“Stop spouting nonsense!” Lev
growled. “I’m sorry I lied, Emma. How many times do I have to say it? I’m
sorry.”

“No,
I’m
sorry,” I spat.
“Sorry I wasted any of my time with
you
.”

I wanted to see the barb dig in,
but Lev had hardened himself to my words. His black eyes glittered coldly. “Is
that really how you feel?”

I had a hard time meeting those
cold, dark eyes. I’d never seen Lev look that way at me. Then I caught myself.
This wasn’t Lev. This was King Hugo.

“Yes,” I said. “I wish I’d never
met you.”

He looked away. “If you feel that
way then there’s nothing left to say. It’s a shame that you won’t listen. This
is so much bigger than me and you.”

Hearing him echo his father struck
a nerve in me. My barrier reacted again. This time it knocked Lev sideways. He
fell on his hands and knees and almost tumbled off the dock.

Seeing my chance, I rushed past
him. He caught me by the ankle. I spun and brought my hand down in a sharp chop
across his right arm, which he had broken once before. I always avoided hitting
it in practice, but this time I put as much force into the blow as I could
muster.

With a sharp gasp Lev let me go and
cradled his arm. He got to his feet. His face was contorted with pain, but his
eyes flashed pure resentment.

“Don’t make it be this way,” he
said. “I didn’t want us to part like this.”

“You wanted me to believe your
fairytale rubbish,” I said. “You’re off on some gallant mission to prove to the
world you’re worth something, right? You’re just another king out to feed his
ego! Go ahead. Leave. There won’t be any friends left here to pine over you.”

“Emma—”

“LEAVE!” I shouted. “If you ever
come back, I swear right here and now that I’ll treat you the same as all my
other enemies.”

The order snapped Lev’s last bit of
restraint. He showed his teeth in a horrible snarl. All the light left his
eyes. His wings arched up and he was as frightening a Slaugh monster as any I
had faced in the past.

“Fine,” he sneered through his
teeth. “Good riddance to you and all your pathetic Fay friends.
Rodden ef
hekel
.”

I didn’t have the composure to ask
him what
rodden ef heke
l
meant. I didn’t have to. The venom in
his voice made it perfectly clear that he wished nothing but the worst for me.

“Same to you,” I hissed.

Lev said nothing. His lips were
still frozen in a bitter sneer. With an agitated flap of his wings he turned and
walked up the dock to the ship.

A breeze filled the sails one by
one and the small vessel began its journey to the horizon.

The rage that had been feeding my
strength gave way to despair. Exhausted, I slumped to my knees. I had never
felt so empty. The most important person in my life was now my biggest regret.

I found myself wishing I had stayed
at the funeral. If I had, I might have gone on never knowing Lev’s true identity
or how he had played me for a fool. Ours would have been a sweet, long-distance
romance.

No. It was all a lie—a whole
relationship built on falsehood and misplaced infatuation. I wished I could go
back and erase it all; every smile, every secretly coveted moment spent with
him in flight or training…all a joke.  

Lev’s crumpled note was still in my
pocket. No, King Hugo’s note. Lev had never really existed. He was a fabrication.
I’d been in love with a fake.

I pulled the letter out and read
the words one last time. Then, with trembling hands, I tore the page to tiny
pieces and let them blow away out to sea.

CHAPTER SEVEN

I sat there for a long time, unable
to grasp the enormity of what I had just lost. All the faith I had in myself
was gone. I didn’t know how I could ever trust anyone again after making such a
huge misjudgment about Lev.

The cusith hound I’d abandoned
sidled up to me and licked my hand. The breeze made its green fur ripple. I absently
scratched its head. The dog and everyone else may as well have been on a
different planet.

The hound would not be ignored. It
butted my arm with its long snout. Its ears were perked up and they kept
twitching towards the direction of the road. When I still didn’t get up, the
hound whimpered.

“Okay, okay,” I said. “Let’s get
you home.” I stood up to climb on the hound’s back. It was then that I noticed
the faint smell of smoke. Curious, but not alarmed, I steadied myself on the creature’s
back.

The cusith hound bolted so hard
down the road that I had to wrap my arms around its neck to keep from flying
off. “Halt!” I shouted. “Slow down!”

The hound only ran faster. Its ears
stood straight up and its nostrils flared, sniffing the smoke.

In a flash we left the sea road
behind. When we rounded the hill out to the main road I saw plumes of smoke
rising from the direction of Mag Mell. In the distance I thought I heard
screams.

The howling of distant cusith
hounds pierced the air. My hound howled back. The sound sent shivers down my
spine. Something must have gone wrong at the funeral. I put aside my personal
woes and urged the cusith hound to go faster.

The hound needed no urging. It sped
onward like a green comet. As we got closer to the ancient graveyard the
screams became louder. The hounds bayed nonstop. Smoke enshrouded the place
like fog.

I loosened my shortsword from its
sheath beneath my robe and wrapped my headscarf around my mouth and nose to
guard against the choking smoke. Peering into the haze, I saw orange flames
where several tents had caught fire.

A mother and three children ran
past me. 

“Monster!” screamed one of the
children.

Out of the smoke behind them clanked
a gruesome figure. It was made of dead Goblin parts joined together with
mechanical limbs.

“Mechamen!” I said with a gasp.

The mechaman spied me. I saw the
single-minded instinct to kill flash through its primitive skull.

The mechaman dashed towards me. I
charged towards it at the same time, casting a barrier before me like a shield.
When I could see the cloudy pupils of the mechaman’s eyes, I launched the
barrier energy at it. The mechaman fell backwards, its metal parts clanking on
the ground.

The hound jumped over the fallen
mechaman and I found myself in a scene of chaos. A dozen more of the undead
soldiers were wreaking havoc in Mag Mell. All of the Fay who hadn’t flown to
safety were trapped within the stone gates of the graveyard. People were using
magic or brute force to stop the attackers. Novices who were trying to use
their magic in defense only made things worse by causing more fire. Rows of
tents blazed with orange flame.

Some of the monuments on king’s row
had been broken. I searched for signs of the royal family. The smoky fog made
it all but impossible to see anything.

A cry came from a tree to my left.
A little Fay girl was stranded in its branches. One of the mechamen circled the
tree trunk, swiping its weapon-like arms at the little girl.

“Help!” the girl screamed. “I tried
to use my wings but this was as far as I could go!”

“Sit tight,” I shouted at the girl.
I jumped off the hound and squared my sights on the mechaman. “Hey, Ugly!”

The mechaman spun around. I was
about to hurl my shortsword between its eyes when a bolt of lightning struck it
from behind. The mechaman shook and lurched as electricity danced over its
half-metal corpse.

“A direct hit!” Bazzlejet shouted
as he shook excess electricity off his fingertips.

I barely recognized him. His wig
and maid outfit were scorched. He grabbed the little girl off the tree limb and
carried her on his hip. “You coming?” he asked me as he set off at a run.

I followed him. “Where’s Chloe?” I
shouted.

Bazzlejet ducked as a Fay marksman
shot an arrow at some mechamen who were chasing some Gnomes. “She’s safe for
now. Keep up.”

 “Where did the mechamen come
from?” I shouted.

“They appeared out of nowhere,”
Bazzlejet shouted back. Two mechamen stood ahead. Bazzlejet cast a lightning
bolt at a pillar. It fell on top of the mechamen with a sickening crunch. The
little girl screamed and buried her face on his shoulder.

 “Over here!” Bazzlejet shouted. He
was standing next to a mausoleum. The front wall had been knocked down and
hastily patched over with chunks of stone.

He handed me the little girl. She
wrapped her tiny arms around my neck and sobbed on my shoulder.

“Shhh,” I tried to soothe her.
“It’s going to be okay. That was very brave of you to try and fly.”

“My wings wouldn’t stay,” the girl
cried. “I want my mommy!”

“It’s me,” Bazzlejet yelled into
the mausoleum. He pulled out one of the stones from the makeshift wall, causing
it to collapse.