Shadow's Light (16 page)

The crowd erupted in musical exclamations of joy and agreement. A unified chiming started to escalate around the room. With it a wash of excitement and hunger as obvious as if they had been vampires. I can sense increases in
Sanguis Vitam
. I can even tell why a vampire's power is accumulating. It was the same here. The chiming was in direct relation to their fey magic and although I had never been able to recognise fey by their magic before, now it seemed so obvious. Each increase in that musical hum around the room, told me how excited they all were becoming.

The Queen's words hadn't escaped me either, even though a sense of panic had settled in my soul and was threatening to make the world hazy and my mind evaporate in a dizzying sense of alarm. I had heard those words she shouted to the heavens before. I had read them somewhere, but right now, I couldn't think where that had been. But the fact that they were familiar, only made the panic rise and begin to engulf me further.

The Queen stepped down from the dais and brushed past us, resting her hand briefly on her son's. Lutin led me up the steps and settled me on the edge of the altar. His Light wrapping around me, calming me and filling the gap that had been left by the loss of my own Light. If not for Lutin's Light influence, I would not have remained sane. My inner monologue was humming, but not the hum to indicate an illusion. This was not an illusion at all. But the hum that precedes a warning. It wasn't happy and it couldn't figure out why I wasn't fighting back.

Servers with little plates of food started proceeding in front of us. Plates with exquisite morsels laid out just so. Pastries fit for any fine French patisserie. Fruit sculptured into little animals and flowers. Mini savouries with elaborate decorations on the top. All of it a feast for the eyes. And although I had eaten in the antechamber I accepted every morsel Lutin placed against my lips.

The crowd were eating and drinking too. The noise of their celebration becoming almost deafening. It was enough to create a buzz of background noise that allowed me to sink further within my mind and pretend I wasn't even there.

Once the food had been consumed, a fey servant approached us with a tray. On it lay two necklaces, both made of silver with a sparkling jewel hanging off the chain. The jewels were about the size of a walnut. A jagged edge to one side of each. As they lay side by side on the tray, it was obvious the two golden jewels were once one and had been ripped apart to make the two pieces of jewellery. It reminded me of those silly broken heart necklaces that were all the rage when I was in high school. One side of the heart fitted perfectly into another. You kept one and your boyfriend kept the other. And when you got together, you'd make a fuss of lining up the hearts to make just one perfect melding. Somehow, I didn't think I'd be wanting to join these two jewels up any time soon. Separated they thrummed in fey magic. I didn't want to know what they would be like when unified again.

Lutin took one and placed it over my neck. The jewel lay perfectly between the crease at the top of my breasts, right where the décolletage of the dress ran. It also sat exactly where my dancing dragon necklace had always sat. My heart clenched at the forgotten memory of hiding it back in Rio, in my apartment in fact. I had stashed it safely behind a loose board under the bed. Lutin's necklace, though, felt warm compared to the cool platinum of my dancing dragon. Too warm for a lump of a gem.

“Place the other necklace over my head,
elska
.” he prompted and without hesitation my hands obeyed. But my inner monologue barked out a sound I couldn't quite decipher in my mind.

The minute his matching necklace was in place, I felt connected to him. My eyes shot up and met his vivid green ones. He smiled his impish grin and leaned forward to brush my lips with his and whisper, “We are as one.”

My breath left me in a rush but I didn't have time to dwell on what he had said as another servant approached with two golden goblets on a tray. Mena had mentioned a drink and I knew instinctively that drinking it would be bad. I flicked a glance around the room, hoping to see most of the Fey too preoccupied in their own personal celebrations, but every eye was on us. I swallowed past a suddenly dry throat, which was ironic. It only made me thirsty and hey! Here was Lutin offering me a drink.

My hand shook so badly that he kept his over the top of mine on the goblet and guided the vessel to my lips. The look in his eyes frightened me more than I had ever been frightened in my life. Such hunger. Such lust. Such powerful conviction.

I tried to pretend to drink and swallow, but Lutin knew what I was doing and slammed me with his Light. I cried out to Nut in my head to save me and received, shockingly, nothing in reply. Despite the fact that she rarely answers. I was in deep shit and normally when so close to the edge she'd break the rules and offer me help. But there was nothing from my goddess and in that moment I felt my life truly start to slip away.

A solitary tear streaked down my cheek and Lutin simply brushed it aside as I finished drinking the last of what had been in the goblet. Nothing happened and I let myself relax marginally as he drank his own goblet dry. Then the chiming in the room from those attending started again. Lutin's own chiming joining in. And to my horror, my inner monologue began its own musical accompaniment.

I floated in the space that symphony created for a few minutes and then my inner voice cried out in alarm. The moment it voiced concern at what was happening, Lutin reached over and removed the silver bracelet from my arm. I cannot adequately describe the sense of relief I felt at having a connection to my Light again. I reached for it reflexively and received a jolt of warmth and happiness back in reply.

The drink made everything fuzzy, but I had my Light again, all was not lost. I grabbed it with a mental fist, I gathered it - as much as I could manage in such a short space of time - and then I went to release it towards Lutin. To blast him, despite knowing I needed him to escape and this was the last thing I should be doing. Having been separated from my Light for so long, I couldn't stop myself. I had to lash out and take back control and if that meant blasting every single fairy in that room and running for the hills without a plan, then I would.

But as soon as I aimed the Light for Lutin, my mind went strangely blank. I blinked a few times, shook my head to clear the fuzziness and then realised I was still sitting on the altar beside Lutin and my Light was only pulsing gently all around us.

"
Elska
," Lutin admonished quietly. "The drink will prevent you from harming any here."

I looked at him in dawning horror. I had my Light, but I couldn't use it as a weapon.

Clever
, I thought numbly and shook my head in defeat. What now?

Lutin reached up, unperturbed by my attempts to use Light against him, and brushed a strand of my hair away. "It is time,
elska
," he whispered. "Let us share our Light."

All breath left me, all sense of reality flew out the window and in its place a strange world where fairies lived and Light danced and any manner of things could transpire. I wanted to run. I wanted to fight. But, I had absolutely nowhere to go and nothing to use as a weapon. And truly, what was I fighting? A sense that this meant more than I could actually fathom, but even if it did, how bad could sharing of Light really be?

Lutin smiled at me, cocked his head slightly and then said, "Don't you want to know what it would feel like? How beautiful it could be? It is only a sharing of Light. It is harmless, it is fun. Share with me,
elska
. Let us make magic with our Light."

Lutin had said something like this when we first met.
Shall we make magic with our Light?
I had been tempted, even though I was scared of him and my inexplicable reaction to his Light. But now, although still scared of this fairy, I knew he wouldn't harm me. I was his one true love, he would do anything to keep me safe. And ultimately, I reluctantly admitted, I
did
want to know what it would be like. There was no one else I could share Light with, no one else had Light as similar as mine. I may have had no choice in this
sharing
, but it didn't mean I couldn't use the opportunity to explore, to discover something that would normally be impossible to find. I nodded slowly and his face beamed.

He scooted us to the centre of the altar and hundreds of different coloured ribbons rolled down and hid us from view. I'm sure the crowd could have seen something, through the odd gap, or when a breeze from goddess knows where made the ribbons and gauze fly. But, the sense of privacy the ribbons provided was welcomed, even though I knew the moment my Light was released nothing would be hidden from sight.

Lutin reached for my hands with both of his, I didn't fight him. I was shaking though, a fine tremor rippling through my body, but I had made the choice to experiment, to use this for something positive, an opportunity to meld my Light with another. I was not backing out, it would happen and at the very least, I would take away the knowledge of what it is like to share Light.

I had been feeling only heartache, loss and despair for so long, the clinical approach to this moment was equally as numbing as those emotions, but behind it all was the sense that I would finally feel something else. I wanted to feel something other than heartache and loss, and sharing my Light seemed less personal than sharing my body. That I would keep to myself until the end of my days.
That
belonged to Michel and would never be given away again. But my Light was mine, it had never been anyone else's. And I told myself, I wasn't giving it away to Lutin now, I was using Lutin to further my knowledge of just what my Light could actually do.

With that final thought I let go of my inhibitions, of my doubts and fears. I let go of any niggling thought that this was more than it seemed and I embraced Lutin's Light as it filled the space around me, wrapping my own up in his. Letting them meld and mingle, twist and turn against each other. Dancing a rainbow of colours, so beautiful and mesmerising, so gorgeous and compelling. His soft chiming filtered through the blend of colours and swirls of Light, I knew he was experiencing something beautiful, as was I, but it was as though he wasn't actually there. For me, it was all about the Light. My Light. His Light. The colourful creation they made together. The magnetic pull their combined brightness had on my soul. I basked in their mutual beauty. I relaxed into their welcoming embrace. I sighed with contentment and slumped back on the altar, vaguely aware that Lutin was lying down the length of me, breathing heavily, moaning softly.

I tried to distance myself from what was happening, to see what those fairies in the hall would be witnessing, but all I could tell, was that there was so much Light, colourful, splendid, miraculous Light. More than I had ever seen before and because of how much surrounded us, I couldn't tell if those present were surprised, in awe or merely watching it play out. But part of knew, that what was happening could not be normal. I had nothing to base this on, but the magnitude of the Light, the enormity of the brightness, the range of colour we were creating was like nothing I had seen before.

Or felt. It was comforting, familiar, beautiful, welcoming, mesmerizing. It was everything I had come to think that Light should be. But as I rolled over slightly to get a look at Lutin, I realised his experience was different from mine. When I thought of my Light I saw good things and beautiful outcomes. I saw the best the world could be. For Lutin, an imp, he saw something different. Maybe a little fun, a bit of whimsy, but undoubtedly a lot of self indulgent release. That was what he was. A fairy of
Ljósálfar
. He had once described his kin as rulers, directors, engineers of whim and fancy. He said they made love like no other, they indulged their appetites and spread their desires. Right now he was having every desire and appetite met.

He opened his eyes and stared at me, his lids a little heavy. The vivid green shining with chartreuse. He reached a hand over and cupped my cheek and whispered, "His Light to her Light. Mixed together through sacred rite. Will create longed-for life." He swallowed visibly, a tear slowly tracking down his face. "Thank you,
elska
. Thank you so much."

Then before I even registered what he was doing, the silver bracelet was back on my wrist. Son-of-a-bitch!

I went to push him away from me, with the intention of kneeing him in the balls, or slapping him across the face, when an enormous explosion down one end of the room erupted and the mirrors in the hall began to shatter.

Screams escalated into panic. Lutin jumped off the altar without a backward glance, a long sword appearing from nowhere in his hand and he rushed away. For a second I was alone with my anger and my confusion and the lingering warmth from my now imprisoned Light.

Then adrenaline replaced lethargy and I rolled away from where Lutin had exited through the ribbons and stumbled out in amongst a fey stampede of multicoloured splendour.

I had to get to the throne. I had to get to the throne. I had to get to the throne.

Finally, my inner monologue was making sense and I immediately lost myself in the crowd and headed to the back of the room where one of the Queen's thrones sat unattended.

And I knew my salvation waited, one way or the other.

I was buffeted between one screaming fey and another. Some of the women losing their footing and crumbling beneath the boots of the others. I grabbed the edges of my stupid, stupid dress and hugged them close and then just elbowed my way through the horde.

I didn't stop to aid the fallen. I didn't care if the fairy I had just elbowed lost his balance and fell beneath my own feet. I ran. I dodged. I elbowed and I shouldered my way through the crowd, most of whom were heading in the same direction as me. Away from the explosion and what sounded like the clang on clang of swords.

Just before we all reached the throne, the group of fleeing fey turned towards the double wide doors that exited the room. There was a bottle neck and more pushing and shoving, but I managed to extricate myself from the throng, before it got too tight to escape. With a quick glance about me to make sure no one was watching – they weren't of course, too busy saving their own arses – I ran the few feet of open space to the throne and slipped into the shadows at its back.

The shadows were empty, so I leaned against the wall and tried to catch my breath. Great. So I was here. What now? I listened to the continued screaming and stomping of feet on the stone floor. I cringed at the cries of pain and fright from the women and the sounds of shouting and fighting from the men. And I hoped each and every one of them died a horrible death. I'd had it with this place. With these people.

I clung to that hope. I wrapped that Dark thought around me and used it like I'd use my Light to shield. It didn't sit as well on my shoulders, but I rolled them and stretched my neck and by the time my breathing had returned to something near normal, the cloak of Dark thoughts fitted like a glove.

Minutes ticked by and the noises still found me in my hiding place, in the shadows behind the throne. I began to wonder why the hell I was here. Why the sense of getting behind this throne and waiting was so important. Oh, I remembered what Alerac had said. I just couldn't believe I had acted on it. Just when I was about to give up and try to find my way out of the castle on my own, a firm hand landed on my shoulder.

“Well done, Princess. Follow me and stay close.”

I turned to face the deep masculine voice and was presented with Alerac's back. He was dressed much the same as the rest of the Fey men. A boldly colourful vest in reds and browns, over the top of a billowing white shirt. Tight fitting tan trousers, tucked into soft brown leather boots. He had a sword hanging from his waist and a dagger in his hand. His hair lay in a thick black braid down his back. It reached below his knees. I felt an overwhelming urge to grab it and hold on for dear life.

He pushed against a stone in the wall next to where I had been leaning. And just like when Lutin had found that hidden passage, one opened before us. This one, however, was not lit with sconces full of flames. It was pitch black and Alerac didn't have a torch. As soon as the stone wall closed behind us, I was blind. I heard his feet shuffle off away from me and reached out stumbling in his wake.

His stride was longer than my short legs could manage and it didn't take long for the sound of his boots on the dusty stone floor to grow distant. My hands waved in front of my face and body, trying to prevent a painful collision with a wall. But, he just kept getting further and further away from me. I cursed my lack of Light and took a deep breath and ran. Still keeping my hands before my face and slightly above my head. If somewhere else on my body collided with a stone wall I could probably survive, but my head was too precious to not protect.

I don't know how long we trudged that tunnel. It curved and wound and went down beneath the ground and then back up. I did manage to reach Alerac though and as surreptitiously as I could, I clasped on to that wonderful braid of long hair. Trying not to tug it by keeping within a foot of his back. The connection made it easy to breathe and settled the beat of my heart. But, the closeness to his back meant I careened into him on more than one occasion. Getting a grunt back in reply to my squeak of fright.

Finally we exited from what had become a wet and mildewy smelling tunnel, no taller than five feet and only a shoulder width wide. Both of us had been hunched over, Alerac almost bent in half. My first lung full of fresh air was a godsend. We had come out in a copse of trees and when I spun back around to see where the exit to the tunnel had been, it was already lost in a mess of foliage. I strained to make it out, but it was simply gone.

I also couldn't see out of the trees we were in. Which meant I couldn't see the castle. I strained my ears but failed to pick up any sound of pursuit at all.

“How far are we from the castle?” I asked Alerac's back.

“Far enough,” he grunted. “Remove your necklace, Princess,” he commanded and swung back towards me whilst sheathing his dagger in his vest.

I'd reached for my necklace, but my hand stilled at the face of the person before me. I knew him. Jorge. Well at least, he looked like a younger version of Jorge. Not exactly like Gabriel, but close enough for them to have been brothers. Or an
umskipti
trying to mimic Jorge's son and the real deal.

His eyes flicked up to mine. Eyes that had laughed with me across the bar. Jorge's eyes.

“You're human,” I finally managed to say.

He nodded and slowly reached for my necklace, lifting it off over my head.

“I know your father,” I blurted and watched his face shut down.

He turned away without a word and smashed the gem against a boulder beside him. The jewel shattered and I felt the release of magic float away on the air.

“It had a tracer,” he said in a gruff voice and started forward down the hill leading away from where he had dropped the broken chain. I stepped over what was left of the connection I'd had to Lutin and mentally cut off all others to him too.

We walked in silence for hours. The forest gave way to a plain of tall grass eventually. Golden brown, softly flowing in a gentle breeze. It was tall enough to hide us from anyone following. It even knitted back together as we pushed through it, leaving no trail or path behind. I didn't hear anyone pursuing us. Neither did we cross the path of any other fey. Our muffled footsteps and the occasional bird song were the only sounds on the wind.

As the sun began to set below distant mountains and the temperature dropped about ten degrees, Alerac led us into some brush beside a roaring river. Hacking his way forward with a sword. Twenty minutes of strident swipes with broad sweeps of his arm he seemed satisfied and began to make a flattened area for us to rest.

“Sit,” he ordered, once a circle of about two metre diameter had been crushed beneath his boots.

I was exhausted, it wasn't hard to follow his instructions. So, I sank to my knees. Behind me, an obvious path led back from where we had come, but Alerac pulled a drawstring pouch from beneath his shirt and scattered a few pungent smelling herbs in a line across the path's entrance. There was a hiss and a billow of smoke and then the path began to reknit before my eyes. Within minutes there was no telling which direction we had even come from at all.

“Impressive,” I said looking back over my shoulder. That got the obligatory grunt in reply.

Alerac lowered himself to the ground and leaned back against a slightly thicker bit of brush than the rest and surveyed me. His similarity to Jorge was uncanny and I had to look away.

“So...” he said after a few minutes. “What is so special about you, Princess?”

“I'm not a princess,” I replied automatically.

“The
kvángask
was completed. You are now a Princess of the Royal Court of
Ljósálfar
.”

I cringed at the mention of the
kvángask
, then forced myself to shrug my shoulders in a show of nonchalance. “I didn't ask to be a princess. They can stick it where the sun don't shine, for all I care.”

He let a huff of air out in a laugh. “Yes, well, I didn't ask to be a mœðr, but that doesn't mean I can't be used to breed.”

I flicked a glance up at him to see if he was angry. He hadn't sounded it and when I studied his face, he didn't look it either.

“I thought only females could be
mœðr
. Doesn't it mean mother?” I asked, still watching his face.

“It also means mate. As in suitable mate to breed with.”

“Do all human
mœðr
know what they are?” I thought it strange. For some reason I expected those stolen from their cribs to have been kept in the dark. Raised as one of the Fey.

“It is obvious from an early age we are not like the rest of our peers. They have Light and magic, we have none. Some
mœðr
can recognise a fey's Light, they of course are
elska
. But the rest of us figure it out fairly early in our lives, just what a
treasure
we are to them.” Now he sounded a little bitter.

I wanted to ask if he had mated. If he had fathered a halfbreed fey. But, I stopped myself just before my mouth opened. It just seemed too personal. Too intimate a question and I wasn't sure I wanted hear him say yes.

“What will happen to me?” I asked instead.

“I don't know. Queen Sofiq has plans for you, no doubt. She wouldn't have gone to war over you unless there was a very good reason to do so.”

“She's gone to war over me?” I asked, incredulously. “And who is Queen Sofiq?”

“What did you think that explosion was all about? If I'd just wanted a distraction to spirit you away, I would have done something on a little less of a grand scale. But, at the last minute a dozen
Dökkálfa
breached the castle's defences with instructions from the Queen for me to bring you directly to her. She is the Queen of the
Dökkálfa
.”

I had kind thought she might be, but had been holding out hope of something else. All I had heard about the
Dökkálfa
, or the Dark Fey, was that they were really, really bad. Michel had said, when Lutin first turned up on the scene back home, that if the
Ljósálfar
were breaking through the portals from
Álfheimr
then the
Dökkálfa
wouldn't be far behind. And that
that
was not something anyone would want back on Earth.

It seems he was right. The
Dökkálfa
, who apparently had been imprisoned by the
Ljósálfar
for centuries here in
Álfheimr
, were obviously free and seeking revenge. But why did their Queen want me?

“So, I ask again, Princess, what is so important about you?”

“I have no idea. I'm a vampire hunter by birth, nothing more,” I replied and picked up a suitable stick to whittle with the sharp stone I already had in my hand.

“Well, Sofiq won't want you for
that
. She would rather her pet vampire remain in one piece.” He laughed at something obviously funny, but I didn't get it.

“She has a vampire?”

He looked at me sharply. “It's the vampire that sent me to you in the first place. I thought you knew. You seemed to recognise me when I found you by the lake.”

Michel. My heart missed several beats all at once.

I could tell my breathing had accelerated and shallowed, I was straining to get a full breath in. I wanted so badly to believe it was true. I kept hearing myself repeat in my head: just ask it, just ask it, just ask it. What is the vampire's name? But, a part of me that was broken so harshly, so completely, refused to allow any mending to be made. I couldn't breach that broken gap to voice the words in my head. I couldn't lay myself open for more heartache. I just couldn't.

Instead I asked, “So, why would you help a vampire?”

He shrugged, but I saw something flicker in his eyes. Hope? The vampire had promised him something. Something he wanted very badly, it would seem. I wasn't going to leave it at that though.

“So now, Queen Sofiq wants me and you change your plans just like that? Whose side are you on, Alerac?”

“Queen Sofiq controls the vampire. What he can give me, so can she. Besides, she is not one to disobey. And as to whose side I am on. I am on the side that works for me.”

“Very mercenary,” I muttered and promptly started shivering in the freezing night air.

“Why don't you sleep, Princess. We will reach the
Dökkálfa
by nightfall tomorrow, but it will be a hard walk from here.”

I didn't argue. I was so past this conversation anyway. The newly whittled stake tucked into my dress nicely and I curled up in a tight ball and fell fast asleep within seconds.

And within what felt like seconds, I was woken with a nudge from a boot and a roughly muttered, “Get up. It's time to go.”

My stomach rumbled and I needed to pee. But I said nothing and dutifully followed my rescuer/captor/mercenary down another hacked path. After half an hour we made it to freedom. Before leaving the shelter of the brush I insisted on a toilet stop, then trudged on in silence as the mountains got closer and closer and closer.