CHAPTER 1
DASDEMIR, EIDOLONIA - 1799
LARKIN STOOD IN THE PLAZA, FACING THE mist-cloaked hills to the northeast. There the fae realm lay, and from there Ula Kana and her forces would come. Larkin’s parents, the queen and king, stood at either side of him. They wore bows over their shoulders, and quivers of iron-tipped arrows, as did Larkin. Three weeks ago, Ula Kana had destroyed a quarter of the city’s buildings, including portions of the palace, killing hundreds of people before being driven off. She had been attacking at random for months, but that day had wreaked the most devastation by far. The fires had been put out, and the lava had cooled and hardened, but Larkin could still smell the smoke.
The citizens had dreaded her inevitable return since. Time behaved differently in the fae realm; perhaps for Ula Kana, the upheaval of Dasdemir had been only yesterday. Regardless, the government did not wish to wait any longer and had instructed the Court Sorcerer’s League to enact a charm to summon her. It was time to end this. Not that Larkin truly believed they could.
He did not wish to be here at all. Had he been free to choose, he would have been on a ship far from Eidolonia, grieving to the indifferent ocean, letting the salt wind scour the dying screams from his ears.
But he was not free. He had been trapped.
The queen at times took his hand and squeezed it, and though he squeezed back, he was unable to tell her his wishes. The words raged within him, but would not emerge. Magic stayed locked implacably around his voice and his actions, so skillfully woven that not even his mother knew of the spell upon him.
A hundred and fifty of the country’s best soldiers from the palace and city guard stood in square formation around the royal family and the prime minister, with muskets, bows, and crossbows ready, wool cloaks about their shoulders in the December chill. The island of Eidolonia was of a latitude with Japan, in the middle of the Pacific, and rarely froze, at least not here at sea level, but cold gray days were common in winter. Or perhaps the biting wind stinging their faces was sent by malicious air fae. One never knew.
Fae stood among them too—the ones they could trust, their allies in the cause for peace. Cynics said it was no more than twenty percent of the island’s fae population who felt kindly enough toward humans to live among them in cooperation. Optimists said it was at least half. No one could take a precise census, the fae realm being the labyrinth of enchantments that it was, but Larkin had begun to believe the majority of the fae were either indifferent or outright hostile. Ula Kana was demonstrably the latter.
Just a year earlier, she had regenerated from some past form, born into this new and particularly lethal one, and begun striking out against what she viewed as disgusting incursions by humankind onto an island that should belong only to fae. Larkin’s fellow humans had only made everything worse by their retaliation, holding onto territory by staking it out with iron and spells, without attempting adequate deals with the fae first. Horrors redoubled by the week. Finally the country had reached this dreadful day, where he stood upon the cold stones of the plaza, his lover and so many others dead, his tongue locked.
Yet it was not Ula Kana nor any other faery who had lain this spell upon him.
He glanced over his shoulder at his older sister, the crown princess, who gave him a tremulous smile, tears in her eyes. I would never choose this, how do you not suspect? he wanted to shout at her. But all he could do was reassure her with a nod.
His family was weary of him, he reminded himself; they were tired of his protests against governmental officials and witches. Unseemly for anyone of the royal family to display strong opinions, they had told him time and again. To have him turn self-sacrificial instead was likely a blessing in their eyes. They would be sad, but relieved.
He turned to his other sister—twenty years old, six years his junior. She wore fine-linked iron mail and held a bow, and stood among the royal guard, in their uniform, quite against the wishes of their parents. She was stubborn, brave, and merry, though today she stood with grim expression and stiff spine, her elaborate black braid down her back.
His sisters did not know of his spell either. Only one person did.
Witches waited alongside the soldiers, sashes of green, red, or yellow across their chests. Tallest and stoutest among them was the court sorcerer, Rosamund Highvalley, the only one wearing all three colors. She glanced his way and gave him a deep nod, as if silently repeating all the unreliable promises she had given him two nights ago.
Shouts arose. Over the hills, black dots and glimmers of fire grew in the sky. Ula Kana was coming.
The captain and Rosamund barked orders. The soldiers and royal family lifted their weapons. Larkin nocked his crossbow—that, at least, he would have chosen to do even if he were not being compelled. No need for yet more innocents to die. Some of the witches raised charms they had made. Larkin felt the tingle of their preparatory magic even from five paces away.
In a streak as fast as light, the fae shot across the land and loomed overhead, a dozen or more, close enough that Larkin could look straight into the ember eyes glowing in Ula Kana’s ash-white face—the form of a woman melded to a nightmare. Smoke trailed from her lips, and her voice carried the hiss-crackle of a bonfire.
“How brave you’ve become. Do you summon me to tell me you surrender and will leave the island today?”
Yes, Larkin would have answered, if that is what it takes for us to live, then let us, by all means.
“We do not,” the queen responded. “We summon you to give you one last chance to surrender; to cease hostilities and return to the fae realm, never again to harm a human. Withdraw your forces now, or you will be imprisoned.”
Ula Kana did not deign to answer. She merely threw a lightning bolt at the royal family.
Larkin’s ears rang with the blast, though no harm came to him—magic swathed him and his family, a protection flung on by the witches. The bolt threw soldiers across the pavement, tumbling like stones. His younger sister and the other guards scrambled up again and launched their counterattack.
They would never succeed. Were it possible to catch and immobilize Ula Kana, someone would have done so already. Yet only the fae could have managed it, in cooperation perhaps with human witches, and never until this recent agreement had they consented to try.
Howls reverberated off the broken walls. Iron-tipped arrows flew among fireballs and debris. Larkin got off a few shots, hitting at least one harpy-goblin and sending her spiraling away, then smoke and lightning obscured his vision so that he could not see what became of the rest of his arrows.
It mattered little. The fae could not be killed. Using iron to cause them temporary pain was the best anyone could do. Pursuing force rather than diplomacy was thus more than reckless: it invited doom.
The ground shook. Paving stones tilted under his feet; one of the remaining palace walls collapsed behind him in a rumbling crash, and he prayed for the safety of his niece and nephew, waiting inside under guard.
Then the thunder ceased and people’s shouts became more orderly, even excited. Someone released the magical shield and blew away the smoke. Larkin felt dizzy in the aftermath of spells and fear. He lowered his crossbow.
Some of Ula Kana’s allies had fled, while others lingered stunned on the edges of the crowd, held in arrest by witches and soldiers. Several humans lay wounded or dead, but none of his family. One of the dead he recognized as a close friend of Boris, Larkin’s lover, who had been killed in the attacks three weeks prior. Larkin felt a pang for this friend’s death, an echo of the wrenching grief he had been suffering for Boris. Then it eased to a dull gratitude: perhaps now Boris would have the fellow to keep him company, wherever his soul had departed to. Soldiers gathered to lift the man’s body, and Larkin turned away.