The Last Faerie Queen (23 page)

32

E
l
o
r
A

I awoke in a bed.
My own bed.
For a moment, I sprawled out, tangled up in velvet and satin, in red and black. Those colors I couldn't escape. Those colors that
were
a part of me, but not the only part. Each one of us is a spectrum filled with darkness and light. Filled with violet twilights and golden dawns, crimson sunsets and emerald leaves. Emerald eyes.

Taylor.

I sat up in bed. My mother sat beside me, upon the actual bed, rather than in the ever-present
throne that she'd built into every room of the castle as a symbol of her omnipotence
.

What did this closeness mean? Was she coming to me as an equal? The idea seemed ridiculous, but so did the thought that she'd kill me here, so far from her congregation.

Why not make it a show?

I licked my lips and came away with the foulest taste.

“Here,” my mother said, holding out a goblet of silver. I lifted the liquid to my nose.

“It's
water
,” she said, and I almost laughed, it was so unexpected. “To flush out the iron.”

“Why?” I asked, drinking all the same. She was right. It was water. It tasted amazing.

Beside me, my mother kneaded the blankets silently. No matter, I had more pressing questions to ask.

“How long have I been asleep?”

“Hours,” she said simply, studying my face. Was there something wrong with me? Was I covered in blood?

Oh, Darkness.

The night was coming back to me slowly. But if I closed my eyes, I could almost push it away.

My mother caught me before I fell back onto the bed. What was
happening
?

“Is it morning?” I managed, dread creeping over my gut. I had to open my eyes to see she was shaking her head.

“Several hours until dawn.”

“And the congregation?”

“Some continue to dance. Others are sleeping wherever they might fall.”

Yes, perfect. Perfect, perfect. I can still finish what I started.

“And you?” I asked, giving her doe eyes. Trying, but my body wanted to sleep so badly, possibly forever. I didn't remember drinking Brad's blood, but I could taste iron on my lips. “Have you come to grant me my minute?”

“More fairly, your
second
,” she said, confirming my suspicions. “You were unable to complete my simple request for a tea party, but you did manage to fall into a puddle.”

I swallowed thickly.

“You ingested but a little blood,” she said. “There, where it splashed on your lips.”

I turned to the side of the bed and retched.

“Probably more effective than the water,” she said, ever calm and unperturbed. Then again, she wouldn't be the one to clean up after me.

“I'll use my second wisely, then,” I said, wiping my lips. She handed me the water again. I didn't even remember her taking it.

How am I going to fight?

“Whenever you're ready,” my mother said, glancing at an invisible watch. Good Darkness, was she making a joke? Who was this creature? Had the Bright Lady somehow taken her place?

It didn't seem possible, and I wasn't taking any chances. I spoke quickly. “When I arrived at the Unseelie Palace, I traded places with the mortal girl in the burgundy gown, using glamour, and
she
is the one who lied to you about my feelings for the mortals. I remain a humble servant to Faerie, unable to tell an untruth.”

My mother stared into me, her eyes widening to illustrate her surprise. “That was more than a second, but well used.” She inhaled slowly. “I must admit, it frightened me to learn you could lie so easily. To see Naeve spell it out in his own blood. That was the moment I knew that I'd lost you.”

“You never
had
me,” I said, and tears sprang to my eyes. “Never held me. Never spoke to me of love.” How could she claim to have lost me?

She lowered her head, but she did not cry. My mother could never, would never show such emotion. Still, the idea that she might actually
feel
it, and keep it hidden, did more than surprise me. It called my entire life into question.

I lay back in the bed, promising to only close my eyes for a moment. Promising myself. Promising my people. I only had a few hours left to accomplish my task.

My mother's voice brought me back. “Suppose I believe you,” she said, and even in my exhaustion, I murmured, “You
do
believe me.”

“I want to. But suppose it is true, what you say. What then? You've put me in an impossible position, Elora. Whatever your intentions, you
cared
for a
human.
And thus, the laws of Faerie
have
been broken.”

“Those aren't the laws of Faerie,” I exclaimed, and I was startled by my own outburst. “Those are
your
laws.”

She shook her head. “The earth has guided everything I have done.”

“But all of us believe that. You, me, the entire Seelie Court. How can it be the earth's will for us to destroy each other, and all humans? What purpose would that serve?”

My mother shrugged. “Clean slate,” she said simply. I realized, then, how deeply her hatred of humanity ran. She would destroy all of Faerie if it meant the death of humanity. “The earth will survive. That is the bottom line.”

“There's more to life than a bottom line. Why focus on a perfect world instead of improving this one? Certainly, an earth devoid of all beings would have the
purity
you crave, but we would cease to exist.”

“As long as the earth survives, there will be faeries.”

“But not these ones. Not
us
.”

“I would sacrifice myself for that cause.”  

“Easy to say, Mother, but you haven't. I'm the only one making sacrifices. I've been making them all night. Why did you do that to me? If you truly believed I loved him, it was evil. And if you didn't—”

“I
didn't
,” she shouted, and the ceiling shook. “How could I believe that? Good Darkness. Elora, my precious daughter, sullied by—”

“You put on a good show.” I shook my head. “But so do I, so I've learned to recognize it. And you knew there was a possibility that I cared for one of them. Even a little.” 

“Must you make me say it? Yes, I knew there was a possibility. But in my heart of hearts, I never thought you would react so pathetically.”

“Is that what I did?” I asked, thinking:
That was the show.
Of course, I had felt awful for Brad, but that original cry, and throwing my body in front of him, had been intentional.
Answering
the riddle would've revealed my true feelings. But
showing
feelings for Brad, well … that was the only way to save Taylor.

“Yes, you made quite a scene. I wasn't expecting it.”

“What did you expect?”

“I expected you to be smart enough to control yourself, to behave like a princess. Don't you see? If you had simply allowed me to kill one of the
other
mortals, and refused to react, I could've freed you of the charges! You would be sitting beside me on your throne, with Naeve as your footstool, instead of lying in bed half-alive with blood on your lips.”

I am not the only one with blood on my lips
, I thought, an image of Naeve flashing through my mind. But I did not say that. I was too filled with sorrow, too filled with regret. The idea that my mother had being trying to
help
me with her riddle seemed impossible
.
And yet …

“Lady—Mother,” I amended, and pushed myself onto my elbows. “I want to tell you everything. I want you to understand that what I did was not an abomination of nature. I went to the human world to help our people. I
promise
you.”

She couldn't argue with that. Not if she believed I couldn't tell a lie. And I
couldn't
, in spite of the fact that mortal blood was now swimming in my veins. It was only a taste, and besides, I'd meant what I said: I remained a humble servant of Faerie.

Whatever the price.

“Now that we've spoken our truths … ” I lowered my head, feigning shyness. “Could we go somewhere, away from all this? Away from the foolish dancing, and Naeve, with newly royal blood in his veins. Somewhere we won't be bothered?”
Or found.
“I want you to know everything, but I don't want them to overhear and use it against me. It will not make as much sense to … simpletons.”

I smiled wickedly, and she smiled to match me. I wanted her to think we were cut from the same cloth, the only faeries good enough,
royal
enough, to understand what others could not.
That false sense of superiority would be her downfall.

But for now, it was the key to separating her from the rest.

“Perhaps the forest at the base of the mountain?” I suggested. There, we would be close enough to the borderlands for the Bright Queen to come to my aid, but not too far from the castle to return by morning.

“Ah, and perhaps you'll catch a glimpse of the humans on their travels?” the Dark Lady said suspiciously.

I rolled my eyes. “Trust me, Mother. The last thing I want is to cross paths with them tonight.”

And that, too, was the truth. The farther away they were from this place, and from
me
, the safer they would be.

But my mother, poor darling, did not catch my meaning, and she smiled down at me. “Very well,” she said, lifting my golden crown from the ground. It must've fallen off during the sacrifice. “I do grow tired of the same old thing. Let us venture from this place, and if you can prove your intentions were favorable to the dark faeries, I may find a way to spare you yet.” She placed the crown atop my head.

I smiled, as if joy was flooding my heart. Really, I was drowning in a sea of darkness. By the end of this night, the Dark Lady's foolishness might well spare my freedom.

Pity I couldn't say the same of hers.

33

T
ayl
o
R

I was having the strangest dream. I knew it was a dream, in spite of the fact that it felt
so real
, because Elora was in it. She was sitting right in front of me.

“You're here,” I whispered, pulling her into my arms. I was in the Dark Court, just like I'd been when I passed out. Elora felt unusually hot. Like, lit up from the inside. Like a burning ball of light come to set me ablaze.

I guess I was a little delirious.

“God, is it really you?” I asked, touching her cheeks, her lips, her hair. “I thought I wasn't going to see you … ”

Until tomorrow?
Ever?

“I know,” she said, her voice strangely garbled. It must've been the dream. You know how you try so hard to remember something correctly, and it just gets more distorted?

“I missed you so much. I love you.” I pulled her back into my arms, and she hugged me back, kind of. “I'm going to stand with you tomorrow. I'm going to fight.”

“It's too dangerous,” she said. “You've only just escaped—”

“But that's the point. Now that I know what they're capable of, I can't abandon you there.”

I started to feel hot, like intuition was reminding me of something. But that's the thing about dreams: you don't have to focus on anything you don't want to. So Elora's mother had sacrificed Brad. That was a problem for Real-Life-Taylor. Dream-Taylor was only going to focus on the girl in front of him. The girl he needed to be close to before morning came.

Who am I kidding? It's already here
.

I tried to chart the sun's progress across the horizon, but it was difficult. The darkness hovered over everything, blotting out the light. Wait, why was the dream world exactly like the real world, except for Elora's presence?

She couldn't
really
be here.

“Listen close, for we do not have much time,” she instructed, and I nodded, forgetting my thoughts so I could focus on her. She looked blurred around the edges, like she'd thrown on a glamour while racing through the forest. “I refuse to forbid you,” she said. “But I need to preserve you—”

“Like a jam,” I muttered, but what I thought was:
Like a non-corpse.
God, my mind was jumbled.

I needed to gather my thoughts. They fluttered like insects in my brain. They wiggled like worms. I tried to hook one. “But I owe it to you to fight,” I said, drawing the thought out of the muck of my mind. “I owe it to you, and us, and the world. I have to do what's right.”

“I thought you might say that.” Elora's lips curved down on the ends. I don't think I'd ever seen her frown so completely. Then her body flickered with light, like a lightbulb turning on under her skin. “I have something for you.”

“What is it?” I perked up, thinking she'd give me something romantic. A lock of her hair, or a drop of blood—no, not blood; I'd seen enough of that to last a lifetime. But something else. Maybe a life-affirming kiss.

When she stood and walked toward the shadows, I didn't understand. Then she came back holding something tangled and dark, and my stomach dropped so hard I thought I might fall over. “You still have your old wings,” I breathed, hardly able to talk. “But I thought … ”

“Oh these? These are not for me.”

I narrowed my eyes. In the dim light, I watched her pull a needle and thread out of her pocket.

“Think on it, Taylor. Think on what we have learned about faeries and mortals. If I give you these, perhaps you can—”

“What … fly?”

“Why not?”

“Uh, because I never had wings in the first place. Because I don't have anything to attach them to. What's going on with you?”

There was something strange about this entire operation—I mean, besides the obvious lack of logic. She was plotting something. Something she wasn't saying.

“You worry too much,” she said, brushing the hair away from my neck. “Now, won't you be a good boy and turn around?”

How could she talk to me this way? So casually, like there was nothing between us.

“Let's talk about this,” I said, turning my back to her. Wait, why had I done that?

“The time for talking has passed,” Elora said in my ear, and it gave me all kinds of shivers. But not the good kind. The kind that warned of something terrible to come. “I truly believe you'll be happy when this is all over.”

“When this is all over? What does that even mean? We're going to battle in a few hours. We're … ” Then it hit me. This whole sordid encounter was a means to an end. And all those stories about trusting and respecting me? Total bullshit.

I squirmed away from her hands. But damn, she was strong. Was she always this strong? “You can't do this,” I said, trying to catch her eyes. They looked greener than usual, which was strange, considering it was still dark under the trees. “You think this will keep me from going into battle, but it won't.”

“Why would I want to keep you away from the battle?”

“Because you don't think I'll survive.” I shook my head, talking more to myself than to her. “You said it yourself, that night on the hill. Trying to reattach your wings would have put you out of commission for weeks. Your body would have been too weak to fight. But it'll be different with me, because my body will reject them. This could kill me.”

“I would not be doing this if I thought that were a remote possibility.”

“How can you know that?”

Finally she looked at me. But the look she gave didn't calm me. It scared me. She had absolutely no emotion on her face. “You're going to make this difficult, aren't you?” she said, putting her hands on my shoulders.

I felt like two rocks were pressing down on me. “What are you doing?” I demanded, struggling to breathe.

She sighed, not even straining to hold me in place. “I had hoped that your love for the princess would allow me to perform the ritual with ease.”

“
What ritual
? And why are you talking like that? Is this the royal
we
?”

“The ritual you promised me.”

“I didn't promise—”

“You promised forgiveness, too.”

“I—”

“Taylor Christopher Alder.”

“What?
”

“Sit still.”

I couldn't argue. I couldn't move. It was like she had complete control over me. But it wasn't until the needle pierced my skin that I realized two things:

This wasn't a dream. And she wasn't Elora.