The Underworld (34 page)

Something had shifted.

And Alex and I were screwed.

Back during my first visit to the City of Crystal,

Dyvinius had explained to me how visions work. He

said that if a vision wasn’t read correctly then the

world as we knew it could shift. I never considered

that we just might be playing with fire when Nicholas

and I had been bouncing around in and out of visions.

And the vision where I took Nicholas and myself to

The Underworld had never real y been finished.

Nicholas had freaked out and made me take us back

to Adessa’s before I was able to see the entire

outcome of the vision. I have been so stupid not

realizing this, and now I have dragged Alex into a

mess he hadn’t known he was getting dragged into.

Crap. I couldn’t believe this was happening. What

other things had changed because I hadn’t been

careful? Playing with visions was such a risky thing.

And now I had no idea what was going to happen.

“I have to say,” said the Queen. “It isn’t every day

that someone voluntarily enters my world. Usual y, it’s

with much force and fussing. And yet you two are

here, entering it on your own free wil . Tel me, what

has brought you here?” She wasn’t being kind; she

was taunting us—I could hear it in her voice.

“We came here to get something,” Alex told her in a

firm voice.

“Ah, I see.” She eyed us over with her empty eyes

and then turned around and motioned to us to fol ow

her.

While she had her back turned, I leaned over and

whispered in Alex’s ear. “This isn’t right.”

He gave me a look like I was insane. “What isn’t

right?”

“This isn’t how I saw the vision go,” I whispered, and

his eyes widened.

We fol owed the Queen back down the tunnel, past

the cluster of floating Water Faeries, and up a set of

marble stairs, which led us to a room that had a long

antique table trailing down the center, and a massive

chandelier hanging from the ceiling. There were no

crystals decorating the chandelier, but pieces of

thorn-covered wire that were bended and turned in

every direction. Covering the dirt wal s were twisted

pieces of vines that looked like seaweed.

“Have a seat,” the Queen told us, gesturing to the

chairs trimming the table.

Alex and I did what she asked, and then she took a

seat at the head of the table. There was a long pause

while she sat, watching us.

“So you’ve come here for something, have you?”

she final y asked.

“
Someone
, actual y,” Alex told her. “Her name is

Jocelyn Lucas.”

I could tel right away that the Queen knew who we

were talking about—you could see it in her face.

“Tel me boy, what is your name?” the Queen

asked.

“Alex Avery,” Alex said with some hesitance.

“Ah, I see. You’re a Keeper.” She moved her

attention to me. “And you? What is your name?”

“Gemma Lucas,” I told her, forcing my voice to

come out steady.

Darkness masked her face. “So you are what? The

daughter of Jocelyn?”

I nodded. God, I hoped she knew nothing of the

star.

“I see.” The Queen tapped her sharp fingernails on

the top of the table. “So what did you expect? That

you would come down here and demand I give you my

best slave, al because you asked?”

“No,” Alex said, “We’ve actual y brought something

to trade for Jocelyn’s freedom.”

“I can assure you, Alex, that you have nothing I

want,” the Queen replied with a disdainful manner.

Alex slipped the sapphire teardrop diamond out of

his pocket and held it up for the Queen to see. “Not

even for this.”

She looked surprised, which I took as a good

sign…at first. But then she started to laugh, the high

pitched laugh that rang sorely against my eardrums

and shook at the chandelier.

I gave Alex a glance, and he shrugged.

The Queen stopped laughing and her laughter

swiftly shifted to anger. “You think that you can come

down here, and try to make a bargain with me with

something the Keepers took from me to begin with.”

She rose from her chair, towering over us. “How dare

you insult me. You are just like your father. Taking

whatever you want and doing whatever you please.”

I wanted to bang my head against the table. Was

there anyone who didn’t have a grudge against

Stephan? Probably not, but stil …

“I have been waiting for the day when I would see

your father again and settle what he started a long

time ago.” The Queen sauntered toward us, her eyes

locked on Alex.

Alex, being Alex, held her petrifying gaze. “I

understand that you may have had some issues with

my father, but I can assure you that—”

“Silence.” The Queen’s loud voice caused the dirt

wal s to quake. “I don’t want to hear any excuses. I

always swore to myself that one day I would get even

with Stephan, whatever it took. And here you are…It’s

the perfect opportunity. A much smal er version of

him, of course, but stil it’l do.”

“He’s nothing like his father,” I said abruptly, and

then shrank back when the Queen focused her

attention on me. My body quivered but I pressed on.

“And he only came down here because I asked him to

—so I could get my mother.”

The Queen’s face was not ful of anger, but of

inquisitiveness. She walked back to her chair, but

didn’t sit down. “You know Jocelyn has never

mentioned having a daughter, so I find it rather

peculiar that someone would show up with the son of

one of my sworn enemies and claim to be her

daughter.”

“Wel , I am,” I assured her. “And I want to take her

back with me.”

“Take her back?” She started laughing again. “Oh,

I’m afraid there’s no way I can do that. You see, you

can’t take her back with you, because you yourself are

never leaving.”

“No, we can leave,” I told her, but my certainty that I

real y could was questionable. “I came here through

the Ira, and you can’t keep us here—there are laws

that say you can’t.”

Alex shot me a look that warned me I was treading

on very thin water.

“Oh I’m afraid that’s where you are wrong,” The

Queen said. “The Ira was created for the leader of the

Foreseers to enter The Underworld. Therefore the law

of releasing only applies to him.” She smiled a big

empty smile before gesturing her hand around the

room. “So Gemma and Alex, let me welcome you to

your new home.”

“Let me welcome you to your new home.” The

Queen’s words kept running through my head like a

plague. You could see it on her face that she got

some sort of sick, twisted pleasure when she told us

we couldn’t leave. Which wasn’t surprising. She was

the Queen of a world that ran on fear.

But don’t get me wrong, I stil tried to get us out of

there. I tried so hard to blink us out of that horrible

place that I gave myself a splitting headache.

After the Queen declared we were never al owed to

leave, she locked Alex and I in a cement chamber that

had a single bed in it. It was like being in a jail cel ,

except there were no bars on the door.

The Queen was probably going to keep us here

until she was ready to begin our torture sessions,

where we would end up being faerie food. Or at least

our fear would. Fear was not a new emotion for me—I

have felt it many, many times. So I knew that in order

to bring it out of a person, something bad had to

happen.

“I’m real y starting to wonder just how long the list of

people who my father has pissed off is,” Alex said.

We had been sitting on the bed, staring at the

cement wal s for awhile, so the sound of his voice

startled me a little.

“Probably pretty long,” I said, and he shot me dirty a

look. “Sorry, but it’s probably the truth. I mean, he

walks with the Death Walkers, betrays the Keepers,

forces faeries to help him al because of a Blood

Promise made ages ago. And he’s also pissed off

the Queen of the dead for who knows what reason.

That list, right there, is real y long.”

Alex let out a sigh. “Yeah, you’re probably right. We

probably wil be running into a lot more people who

hate him.”

I was right. What the…

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked.

I kept looking at him the same way. “Like what?”

“Like I just shocked the heck out of you.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know…because you said I was

right.”

He stared at me perplexedly, as if he was trying to

figure something out.

“So what are we going to do?” I asked. “I mean,

are we going to be able to get out of here?”

He let out a loud breath as he ran his fingers

through his hair. “I don’t know Gemma. I don’t even

know what exactly happened. I mean, do you have any

idea why this didn’t work out like how you saw in the

vision?

I massaged the sides of my temples, trying to force

my headache away. “Because I didn’t finish seeing

the vision, at least that’s what I think happened.

Nicholas forced me to take us away before I saw the

whole thing play out.” Someone screamed not too far

away, and I shivered. “I’m sorry,” I said.

Alex cocked an eyebrow at me. “Sorry for what?”

“For messing this up.”

He shook his head, dragging the knife he brought

with along him on the frame of the bed. “You didn’t

mess this up. I did, by being my father’s son.”

“Wel , I think we can also put a little bit of the blame

on Nicholas.” The mention of faerie boy’s name

caused an acidic taste to burn in the back of my

throat. “For not giving us al the details about how the

Ira works. Although, we never should have trusted him

to begin with.”

“Yeah, I know,” Alex leaned back against the

cement wal and folded his arms across his chest.

“What wil they do to us?” I asked quietly. “The

Water Faeries—what wil they do to instil fear in us?”

“I’m not sure,” he said, and I knew he was lying by

how he avoided looking at me.

“Just tel me,” I said tiredly and slumped back

against the cement wal . “I think I need to know what

I’m in store for.”

He locked eyes with me. “You real y want to know?”

he asked, and I nodded, even though I felt like I was

being choked. “Okay, wel to put it simply you’re in

store for a lot of pain.”

I nodded, the choking feeling practical y strangling

me to death.

It got quiet. Noises of dripping water fil ed our little

concrete prison in a way that was almost maddening.

Pain. I was going to be in a lot of pain. But, was he

talking about the physical kind of pain or the

emotional kind?

“Look,” he said, before I could ask him to clarify

which kind of pain he was referring to. “No matter

what happens, I need you to hold on, okay? No matter

how bad things get, don’t give up.”

The idea of not giving up was suddenly eating away

at me. “But wouldn’t it be better if I didn’t hold on? If I

just let myself go?”

He looked alarmed. “What’s that supposed to

mean?”

“I don’t know…” The prickle was starting to poke at

me. Poke, poke, poke. I scratched viciously at the

back of my neck. “It means, wouldn’t things be better if

I was gone?”

His eyes widened, and he looked as if he was

freaking out. Not the reaction I was expecting, but

okay. “Wh—why are you saying this?” he asked.

The prickle was real y going at it. “Because, it

would be better for a whole lot of people if I was. I

mean, if I might be the one who’s going to open the

portal instead of closing it, wouldn’t that make me be

responsible for everyone’s deaths?”

“Where did you get the idea that you’re what’s

going to open up the portal.”

“It’s kind of obvious, once I real y thought about it. I

mean Stephan’s working with the Death Walkers,

bares the Mark of Malefiscus, and I saw him in that

vision where the world had ended in ice. What do al

those things have in common? They’re al bad. So

why would Stephan want the star’s power for anything

good.”