The seven year crow, p.5
The Seven Year Crow, page 5
“What are you doing here?” I finally spoke. I was proud that my voice wasn’t a shrill of fear.
“Rest assured, little witch, I was just leaving.” The King snapped his fingers, and his men moved away from my father. “I came to inform the Darkmore family of the devastating news, the death of our sweet Aoife Darkmore.”
“She is ours, not yours,” I snapped back.
“As it seems, time does drag on. Crafty little thing, she was.” Solas’ laughter burned inside my head. He walked into the garden, chewing on an apple from my kitchen table—made from an apple tree Nix had tended to with his bare hands. I hated the man for sullying mine and Nix’s home.
Beginning today, I’d finally pray. I’d pray for the death of the man with our apple. I wondered if my God would show up for Solas’ death. He hadn’t come for ours, but I could hope he’d come for someone more deserving of a hole in the ground. And I didn’t care how selfish that was. It’s not like I could be damned any more than I already was.
Faolan stepped forward. “Enough.”
Solas bowed. “As the Unseelie Master commands.”
“Unseelie?” I whispered, caught off guard. I felt my temperature rise. My constant companion, anger, threatened to spill over. It came with hating half of who I was. Faolan was dark Fae, Unseelie Fae?
“That’s not the best part, little Crow. Ask the Winter King, Faolan, why he is here,” Solas added, stirring up an already blazing fire within.
“Stop it, Solas,” Faolan commanded. Solas backed away with his hands up, taunting him.
“King? What? What’s going on?” I asked and pulled back from Faolan, a friend I thought I knew. I shouldn’t have been so stupid. Trusting a Fae was digging your own grave. Trusting a Fae always led to pain and suffering. It’s what my father had made sure I knew. And to my ruin, I hadn’t listened to him. I had invited him into my life, and with him, all the agony I would soon feel. I had a brief moment to think back to my previous thoughts about the fools who trusted Fae. I was one of those fools now.
“Enough.” My father raised his hand and slammed it on the table. “That’s enough.”
“Not quite, Guardian.” Solas turned to me when Faolan wouldn’t answer me. “Your Unseelie King here has come to collect a Crow. As I recall, he wanted his very own Darkmore Witch and marked you for the Taking the day of your birth. Why do you think no one has Taken you? When a king marks a Crow, they are off-limits to all but him.”
I stepped back. “Faolan, answer me.”
“Perdita.” Aelfdene said my name as an order. “You can come willingly or I can force you.”
“Me? You haven’t Taken a Darkmore since Aoife,” I countered.
Solas grinned. “I do miss her. She was feisty. Sadly, you would be going to Faolan’s court.”
I stepped farther from Faolan. “I’d rather die.”
“No.” King Aelfdene’s words cut the air with a hot knife. “She is mine.”
“No, she belongs to the Unseelie Courts.” Faolan’s voice shook the very ground.
King Aelfdene smirked. There was a challenge held in the grin on his face. “Young one, the Darkmore line is mine. It always has been and always will be. Her line belongs to us. It has been written.”
“I have marked her for the Unseelie Court.” Faolan stepped forward.
“A war, for a Crow? And here I thought this day could not get any better.” Solas leaned against my apple tree, enjoying the show. “Who thought kingdoms would fall for a little Crow?”
“What will it be, Faolan? War?” Aelfdene asked. He looked like he hoped Faolan would choose war.
“Eagla aon rud, iontaobhas aon duine.” Solas stared into my very soul as his words flowed across my skin for only me to hear.
“Fear nothing, trust no one,” I frowned and whispered back. Those were the exact words my mother had carved into the very table my father sat at, penned into the Darkmore journals on page one.
I stepped back. I shook my head slowly, side to side, as the world tilted just enough for me to stagger slightly. I looked from Solas to my father’s wet eyes, and my heart broke. I felt the hairs on my arms stand at attention. The air grew icy and coated every inch of me. I felt naked in a snowstorm. Faolan grabbed my shoulders, yanked me backward and turned me to face him. He twirled on the now-frosted ground and put himself between the king and me. “Close your eyes.”
“Let me go…” I barely got the words out before the blast of frost hit Faolan’s back and chewed at my bones. My knees buckled. If it weren’t for Faolan holding me, I’d have hit the ground, frozen. I would never have survived the full force of the king’s ice.
“Now!” my father screamed, and Guardians poured into the yard. The Fae had never taken a Guardian’s child…until now.
“Nix,” I screamed until my voice cracked.
Faolan pushed me backward into the arms of Solas. “I’m sorry, Perdi.”
“Traitor,” I screamed at Faolan as the air was sucked from my chest.
“It is this or death. If King Aelfdene cannot have you, no one will.” Solas’ words cut the air in the yard to mist.
“Death!” I screamed.
“Fear nothing,” he whispered in the darkness that consumed me.
“Trust no one,” I answered. I didn’t fight. I didn’t exist. Everything solid, my home, my life, was gone.
* * * *
Smoke filled my lungs and stung my eyes until even my tears burned as they dropped. Screams and shouts blended together in the darkness that engulfed my body and dragged me from the mortal world. The land Faolan had spoken about, sang praises about, read me the history of, became the only thought I could muster. The pain of the Taking had shut out the life I had in a world full of iron and dreams and the promise of what wonderment my future held and pulled me to a place no one lived to talk about. It dragged me over hot glass I felt on my soul, somewhere unknown and terrifying. It drew me toward a horrifying new life. It burned away my past, charred the life I knew and begged to keep. It hurt more than words could say, a pain so deep and sharp that I couldn’t scream.
The mist pressed against my chest, suffocating me, stealing every drop from my lungs. Static prickled against my flesh as I starved for air. I knew I had to step forward. I had to cross the threshold of my own volition. Without hearing the words, I knew that if I stayed in the in-between, I would die, and the Taking would begin again. As tempting as it was to take their Crow, me, away from them, I couldn’t curse another with this fate. I took a hesitant step forward. My legs screamed in protest. Painstakingly slow, I inched my way through the darkness that was the Gate, farther away from my childhood, closer to a life I knew nothing about and wanted nothing of.
The void I moved in tugged at my subconscious, whispering warnings for only my ears to hear. It, the darkness, was surprised I would come willingly. For the briefest of moments, I wondered how many Crows had died in the in-between. Its whispers of shock were felt down my spine. I fought against its kindness, its offer to sit down and rest awhile—the empty vow of taking away the pain. I pulled against the pressing blackness until I didn’t know if I had shut my eyes or if the darkness had eaten my vision completely. Once the power of the Gate touched me, it was no longer curious. Where it had whispered kindness, it now yelled of anger and mistrust. It didn’t want me there any more than I had wanted for it.
You shouldn’t be here.
The voice hissed around me from all directions.
Go back.
I felt its fear snake down my spine.
You’re not welcome here.
When the magick of the Gate snaked its power along my skin, it pulled back as if I had burned it. It no longer desired me to curl in its arms and die. Gone were the empty words. It didn’t want me at all. Where there had been anger was now fear.
No. Turn back.
The Gate was everything and nothing at all. It was living and breathing, but not life as I knew it. It was all the lives before, the lives it ate and the promises of life not yet consumed. And it was terrified, of me, more than I was of it. It sent tendrils of magick to my feet, dark and oily. I felt it crawl across the ground toward me. The magick curled around my legs and pulled at me, tasting the power that was Darkmore. It twisted and snapped against my skin.
Go back!
I shook my head. I couldn’t go back, not without damning my people. The mist pulsed like a heartbeat, faster and faster, tightening around me. The Gate clawed along my legs, pulled at my arms, desperate to send me home. I pushed at it and pulled it from me, but it clawed at me frantically with each step I took forward.
Starved of air, I lashed out at the Gate in return. I pulled on the knowledge I was not meant to have or ever to use, from a time when dark-art writers were hanged, when the spoken word was the only way that we passed along our darkest knowledge. The Darkmore line was the wisest of women, the crafters of spells used to protect the mortal world, the only defense between our world and the Fae world. They wove their words in every act, every song and every story. These words were as much a part of me as my mother, a Master of Crafts, and I was the last holder of words.
I opened my hands and reached into the darkness that was the Gate and drank the power it unwillingly offered. I greedily ate it until the Gate pulled away, its power resting in my bones, its fear thick enough to chew as I walked through the mist. Its power coiled inside me, and a part of me clicked into place. The part of me that knew, if I was going to hurt because of this hellhole, so would it, so would they…all of them.
You shouldn’t have done that.
“You should have allowed me to pass.”
You will die here.
“You all will die with me.”
The Gate echoed behind, as familiar hands pulled on me. I chanced one look back. An older woman and…me…stood mere feet from the Gate, which rested between two trees. But it was not me. It was a version of me—hardened, tired, sad. She spoke to the older woman, but I couldn’t make out what was said. The older woman felt familiar, like looking at the same photographs year after year. I heard Solas’ name dance across the mist before my ears popped. The ringing in my head was far too loud for me to hear much more, as my lungs starved. Solas gripped me tighter and pulled me through to the other side.
Bright light, white and sharp, prisms of blistering color, played out before me. A cloudless sky, full of every hue, filled my vision. Under the sunshine, every hue was a flash of painful beauty. It looked like a rare painting for only the eyes of Fae to see. Each color shone under the warm sky as if, like the Fae, they had evolved over eons. I stepped away from the darkness of the Gate and immediately doubled over. I braced my hands on my thighs and willed myself to calm. Breathing the air of Elphame made me dizzy at first, the new scents and purity of it. It twisted and settled around the fear, forcing it to become something vile and horrific. Vomit crawled up my throat as my gut knotted.
Solas stood in front of me. His body casted a shadow around me, blotting out the brilliance of this new and horrible world. “Breathe, little Crow. I don’t think you want to pass out here, of all places. Elphame is no place for a defenseless Crow.”
“I hate you.” I groaned and clutched my stomach. The words spilled out as nothing more than moans around gurgles.
“Good. Your hate for me will keep you alive. Let it grow and fester, give your rage a target,” he answered. “I’m the only one here you can afford to hate, as I’m the only one who won’t hate you back. Be thankful for that.”
“Screw you,” I muttered.
“I would not offer that so openly in Elphame. Unlike those you’ll meet, I’m the only one who doesn’t have a taste for broken Crows.”
When Solas stepped away with a smirk, he took with him his shadows and the cool breeze that stilled the fire in my stomach. I fell and curled onto my side with the force of this new land. Sweat and blood filled my nose, mixed with honey and sugar and a smell that the back of my mind told me to run from. My eyes slowly adapted to the shining sun. My senses took a few moments to catch up, as though they had taken a wrong turn and gotten lost at the Gate to Elphame. The sounds hit me at once, ripping my attention away from the beauty of the land—whispers, laughter, growls, the flapping of wings and the stench of death. Panic wretched at me, and I waited for a scream to rip from within me, but it never came. Only darkness. I fought against it, the fear of not being awake and aware and able to protect myself. But it wouldn’t matter. I’d never be able to defend myself here, regardless of my conscious state.
Chapter Three
Everything hurt in a frostbitten and fire burned sort of way. The air around me smelled of seared flesh, scorched with flame and left rotting in the sun. Gone was the sweet smell of a candy store. My bones were frozen, yet heat pressed down on me and coated my body with sticky sweat. My skin was bare, and my limbs felt too powerless to cover myself. My stomach cramped, and I felt nothing but that agony. I faded in and out, from excruciating pain to utter relief of nothingness. Wave after wave of illness and pain and relief pulsed against my body. It was what happened when a mortal came to Fae lands. Our bodies revolted against being pulled into a land we knew would kill us. The deepest of all instincts, survival, twisted inside our bones as a warning. But there was nothing I could do to help myself.
Had it not been for my halfling blood, I would be in even worse condition. Before the oath, there had been stories of mortals who had come to Elphame, only to be returned a hobbled mess, retching and writhing from the pain the cursed lands had left them in. It was rare for a human to survive once they were released from Elphame. We simply lacked the medicine they needed, and none were brave enough to enter Elphame to get it. Those who bargained with the Fae to save a loved one suffered a horrible fate. ‘Fae sickness’, it was called. But it was more of a curse or an illness. Halflings were built for both worlds, but it hurt just the same for me to be here.
I could hear voices in the background, like listening to a voice from underwater. “What have you done, Solas?”
“I had no choice.” Solas’ voice scratched along the inside of my skull. I cringed to know I was still with him. “It was this, or Faolan would have Taken her. Would you have preferred that? Say the words, Nix, and I’ll dump her on his border and he can deal with her. I’d like nothing more than to go home and not have to do this shit again.”
“No.”
The thought of opening my eyes felt like a choice between remaining in ignorance and the stark reality of where my curled body landed. The pain in my heart burned, the leftover fire from my Taking rolled my stomach. It owned every breath I took and controlled my desire to take another. It stole who I was, the part of me that pushed on, no matter what. Each groan that escaped my swollen lips snuffed out my inner light, little by little. I wanted the darkness to come. I yearned for the ice of hate to cool the pain of hurt. I knew my need for anger was a mask for the alarms going off in my brain. Fear. Terror. Dread. Betrayal. Anger would be easier to deal with over acknowledging I would die soon.
With my eyes closed, I pushed a little of my magick into the air around me. It was heavy, staticky, wet and tasted of sugar. But I couldn’t focus it. It blew around me like dust in a storm. My mind was scattered, fractured into a million little thoughts I couldn’t control. I picked up the pieces my magick brought back and understood none of them.
“Don’t, Perdi. Magick is wild here, and you have too little control,” Nix whispered.
Relief flooded my veins with the sound of his voice. I pulled my magick back in and slowly opened my eyes. The world swam with explosions of color. Nix stood behind me and held my hair back while I emptied my stomach onto a slim-covered wooden deck. Each sudden movement made me heave harder than the last as I rocked with the boat. My dread burned my throat. Fear gripped my stomach as I played back the Taking. It wasn’t the fear of death that grabbed me. It was the fear of still being alive, of being a Crow.
“Where… Where are we?” I asked, my throat raw and my voice jittered with a frost that still lived deep in my bones.
“A boat,” he answered.
“Where?” We were not in Whitwick Gates. I could feel it in my bones as if something were missing and something unknown was added. I had to make sure it wasn’t a dream, that I really was in Elphame. In the pit of my stomach, I knew that no amount of wishing would work. I would not wake, and this would not be a horrible nightmare.
“We’re not in the mortal realm anymore,” Solas answered, his voice too close for comfort.
“Elphame?” I groaned at the thought of where I was and who I was with. I vomited once again. I heaved until nothing but angry screams came up. I had a good reason for the fear. Solas. Elphame was a nightmare, and Solas is what haunted the Fae in their dreams. Solas terrorized both my world and his. He was the Taker of Crows. But what churned my stomach was not fear, it was anger, and it was all for Faolan.
“Where else would you be, little Crow?” he asked, sarcasm thick on his tongue.
“Don’t call me that,” I muttered.
The sky, once blues and oranges, was now black. I was in and out of consciousness. I woke to Nix and five other small creatures cleaning the vomit from my hair and face, dressing me and trying to nurse my wounds and empty stomach. Solas leaned against the side of the wooden boat and watched me. His gaze felt like spiders on the skin. Without a smile or frown, he looked utterly bored. I was an inconvenience, something to check off his list for the day.
“Why am I on a boat, Nix?” I tucked myself into the corner, as far from Solas as I could get, without being in the water.
“It’s the barge of the dead,” he answered.
“Am I…dead?” I asked.
He smiled and shook his head. “No, Perdi. The barge is how those banished, those who are seen as dead to the rest of Elphame, are brought to the courtless lands, to the Court of Less.”
