Reckless (Free Preview) (32 page)

The bride
would be next.

Once upon a time, there was
an Empress who had lost a war.
 
But the
Empress had a daughter...

Not even the
organ could drown out the roar outside announcing Amalie's arrival.
 
Whatever the crowds on the street thought
about the groom, a royal wedding was still a good occasion to cheer and dream
of better times.

The princess
wore her Fairy-lily beauty like a mask, but nonetheless Jacob thought he could
detect something akin to happiness on those all-too-perfect features.
 
Her eyes fixed upon her stony groom as if it
had been she, not her mother, who had selected him.

Kami’en
awaited her with a smile.
 
"The Jade Goyl must remain by his side
until the wedding is over."

Walk
faster
,
Jacob wanted to shout at the
princess.
 
Get it over with
.
 
Her
mother's highest-ranking general, who was leading the bride to the altar, was
obviously in no rush.

Jacob looked
at the Empress.
 
Four of her guards stood
in front of the enclosure and the Dwarfs.
 
And there was also her adjutant.
 
Donnersmarck.
 
He was
whispering something into the Empress's ear.
 
They both looked up at the balcony, but Jacob still didn't realize what
was going on.
 
Blind and dumb, Jacob
.

The first shot
rang out after the princess had barely walked a dozen steps down the
aisle.
 
It came from a sniper hidden next
to the organ on the balcony, and it was obviously aimed at the King, but Will
pushed him aside in time.
 
The second
shot missed Will by less than an inch.
 
The third shot hit Hentzau.
 
And
the Dark Fairy was caged in a skin of willow bark in the imperial gardens.
 
Well
done, Jacob.
 
They used you like a
trained dog
.

The Empress
had obviously kept her assassination plans not only from her daughter.
 
Her ministers were desperately ducking behind
the thin wood paneling of their pews.
 
The princess had stopped, and she was looking straight up at her
mother.
 
The general leading her tried to
pull her away, but both of them were swept along by the screaming guests as
they crowded out of the pews.
 
But where
could they go?
 
The great doors had been
locked.
 
The Empress was obviously hoping
to rid herself of a few unwanted subjects as well as the King of the Goyl.

Fox and Clara
were nowhere to be seen, and neither was Valiant.
 
Will remained standing in front of his
King.
 
The bodyguards had formed a wall
of gray uniforms around Kami’en.
 
The
other Goyl were trying to fight their way through the crowds to join them, but
the imperials shot them down like farmers shooting rabbits in a harvested
field.

And you took care of the Dark Fairy for
them, Jacob
.
 
He pushed his way
through to the altar, but one of the imperial Dwarfs immediately jumped
him.
 
Jacob elbowed him in the face.

Screams and
shots.
 
Silk soaking up
blood on the marble flagstones.
 
The imperials were everywhere, but the Goyl stood their ground.
 
Will and the King were still unharmed, though
it hardly seemed possible.
 
The Goyl
supposedly prepared their skin for battle by exposing it to heat and by eating
a plant they bred especially for that purpose.
 
It seemed they had done just that for the wedding.
 
Even Hentzau was back on his feet.
 
But there were at least ten guardsmen for
every Goyl.

Jacob gripped
the golden ball, but it was impossible to get a clear throw.
 
Will was surrounded by imperials, and Jacob
could barely lift his arm without one of the soldiers stumbling into him.
 
They were lost.
 
All of them.
 
Will.
 
Clara.
 
Fox.

Another Goyl
fell, then Hentzau went down, and Will was the last man shielding the
King.
 
Two imperials attacked the
Goyl.
 
Will killed them both, though one
of them rammed his saber deep into Will's shoulder.
 
"Kami’en needs him!"
 
The Fairy had known.
 
The Jade Goyl, her lover's shield.
 
His brother.

Will's uniform
was soaked with the blood of Goyl and humans.
 
The King and he were fighting back-to-back, but they were already
surrounded by white uniforms.
 
Soon not
even their Goyl skins would save them.

Do something, Jacob.
 
Anything!

Jacob saw a
flash of red fur between the benches, and Valiant standing protectively in
front of a crouched figure.
 
Clara.
 
He couldn't tell whether she was still
alive.
 
Right next to them, a Goyl was
fighting four imperials.
 
And the Empress
was sitting behind her carved roses, waiting for the death of her enemy.

Jacob fought
his way up the steps to the enclosure.
 
Donnersmarck was standing right next to the Empress.
 
Their eyes met.
 
I
warned you
, his said.

Will was
fighting three imperials at once.
 
Blood
was running down his face.
 
Pale Goyl blood.

Do something, Jacob
.

An imperial
soldier knocked his arm as he reached for his handkerchief.
 
The willow leaves scattered onto one of the
many fallen bodies.
 
Goyl
and humans.
 
Whose side are you on, Jacob?
 
But he could no longer think of sides, just of his brother, and of Clara
and Fox.
 
He managed to snatch up a few
of the leaves, and he screamed the name of the Dark Fairy into the roar of the
battle.

The bark was
still peeling from her arms as she suddenly appeared in front of the altar
steps, her long hair covered in willow leaves.
 
She lifted her hands, and glass tendrils grew up around the King and
Will, deflecting sword blades and bullets as if they were children's toys.
 
Jacob saw his brother collapse, saw the King
catch him in his arms.
 
The Dark Fairy,
however, began to grow like a flame fanned by the wind, and the moths swarmed
from her hair, thousands of black insects, latching on to the flesh of humans
and Dwarfs wherever they could find it.

The Empress
tried to flee, but her Dwarfs and her guards were already collapsing under the
onslaught of the moths, and then they also found her skin.

Human skin.
 
Fox was
wearing her fur, but where was Clara?

Jacob leaped
over the dead and the wounded, whose screams and groaning filled the
cathedral.
 
He reached the bottom of the
altar steps.
 
Fox was standing over
Clara's slumped body, desperately snapping at the moths.
 
Valiant was lying next to them.

The Fairy was
still blazing.
 
Jacob tightened his fist
even harder around the leaves and stumbled past her.
 
She turned toward him as if she could feel
the pressure of his fingers on her skin.

"Call
them back!" he screamed, dropping to his knees next to Clara and Valiant.

The Dwarf was
still moving, but Clara was as pale as death.
 
White, red, black.
 
Jacob brushed the moths off Clara's skin and
dropped the willow leaves to unbutton his white guardsman's tunic.
 
There was enough blood on it, but where could
he get something black?
 
The moths were
converging on him as he put his jacket over Clara.
 
With a final effort he pulled a black cravat
from a dead man's neck and wrapped it around her arm.
 
Fluttering wings.
 
Stings cutting into his flesh like
splinters.
 
They sowed a numbness that
tasted of death.
 
Jacob collapsed next to
the Dwarf.
 
He felt paws pushing into his
chest.

"Fox!"
 
He
barely managed to utter her name.
 
She
swiped moths from his face, but they were too many.

"White.
 
Red.
 
Black," he
muttered, but she of course didn't understand what he meant.
 
The leaves... he felt around the floor for
them, but his fingers were as heavy as lead.

"Enough!"

Just one word,
but it came from the only person whom the Dark Fairy still heard in her
rage.
 
The King's voice made the moths
whirl up.
 
Even the venom in Jacob's
veins seemed to dissolve, until only a deep weariness remained.

Valiant rolled
over with a groan, but Clara wasn't moving.
 
She didn't open her eyes until Jacob leaned over her.
 
He quickly turned his head so she wouldn't
see how relieved he was.
 
However,
Clara's eyes sought only his brother.

Will was back
on his feet, standing behind the Fairy's glassy tendrils.
 
They turned to water as soon as the King
stepped toward them, spilling down the stairs and cleansing the blood from the
altar.

The moths
landed on the Goyl dead and the wounded, and many of them began to stir.
 
The Dark Fairy embraced her lover, wiping the
pale blood from his face.

Will dragged
the Empress to her feet and knocked out one of her Dwarfs who tried to stand in
his way.
 
Three of the other Goyl were
driving the survivors from the pews.
 
Jacob looked around for the willow leaves, but one of the Goyl dragged
him up and pushed him and Clara toward the altar steps.
 
Fox hurried after them.
 
Her fur was still the best protection.
 
Valiant was upright again, too.
 
And from behind a distant pew, a slender
figure rose.
 
White silk speckled with
blood,
and above it a dollface that, despite her fear, still
looked like a mask.

The princess
stepped unsteadily into the aisle.
 
Her
veil was torn.
 
She gathered up her dress
to climb over the body of the general who had led her into the church.
 
Her long train was heavy with blood.

Her groom
looked at her as if he was weighing whether to kill her himself or to leave
that pleasure to the Fairy.
 
The rage of the Goyl.
 
In their King, it had turned to cold fire.

"Get me
one of their priests," he ordered Will.
 
"One of them must still be alive."

The Empress
looked at him incredulously.
 
She could
barely stand, but one of her Dwarfs lurched to her side and propped her up.

"Yes?
"
Kami’en said, stepping toward her, his saber in his
hand.
 
"So you tried to have me
killed.
 
I don't see how that changes our
arrangement."

He looked down
at the princess, who was standing at the bottom of the altar.

"No,"
she answered for her mother, in a halting voice.
 
"It changes nothing.
 
But the price is still peace."

Her mother
started to protest, but one glance from the King silenced her.

"Peace,"
he repeated.
 
He looked at the dead Goyl
the moths had not brought back to life.
 
"I think I have forgotten what that means.
 
You shall have your own life and that of your
mother as your wedding gift."

The priest
Will dragged out from the sacristy stumbled over the corpses.
 
The Dark Fairy's face was whiter than the
bride's dress as the princess climbed the steps to the altar.
 
And Kami’en, King of the Goyl, wed Amalie,
princess of Austry.

51

Bring Him
To
Me

When Amalie of
Austry stepped out of the cathedral, her dress was covered in flowers.
 
The Fairy had made white roses from the blood
of the Goyl and red ones from that of the humans.
 
She had turned the stains on the bridegroom's
uniform into rubies and moonstones, and the waiting crowd cheered.
 
Some of the onlookers may have wondered why
so few of the wedding guests followed the happy couple, and some may even have
noticed the fear on the faces of the remaining guests, but the noise on the
streets had drowned out the shots from the cathedral, the dead were silent, and
the King of the Goyl and his human bride climbed into the golden carriage that
had long ago taken Amalie's great-grandmother to her own wedding.