Steelfated, p.30
Steelfated, page 30
There was some complex, eight-sided math to all of it, but as a general rule, the worse the injury, the longer it took to come back. The more powerful the dead Fey, the faster they’d come back. Death by iron took the longest to come back from, as iron would make the Fey crumble to a fine ash and get dispersed among the mist.
For the pixie, trapped between the hard surface of a gold coin, and the cobblestone of the courtyard, it may take as long as a season to come back. It was not a powerful Fey by any means, but crushing was also a fairly mundane and rather typical death for the smaller Fey, and it was one that could be fairly rapidly recuperated from.
Morgain didn’t miss her brother’s slowly growing look of confused concern. She hid a small smile by turning her back to him and waited for him to speak. Though she was far from a regular in the Fey Court, she HAD been here before, as part of her druidic training. Everyone, or nearly everyone, asked the same question eventually. The Fey banked, reliably, on that fact. Morgain heard his feet drag to a stop, but didn’t turn to look at him.
“Wait a minute.” He drawled. “This can’t be right.”
“It is, Terrence. We are going uphill to the Fey Court.” Gwen answered.
“But it’s in a valley?”
“It looks like it’s in a valley.”
“So the valley is actually higher than the hill tops?”
“No. It isn’t.” Terrence paused and gave her a dumbfounded look. Morgain turned to look at them.
“You’re confusing him, Gwen. Terrence, just don’t think about it. It’s part of the intent of the Fey. They want you to ask about it, so when they answer, you owe them something. Remember the rules.” Morgain said.
“But the… how…” She slapped him lightly on the cheek.
“It’s magic. It doesn’t have to make sense. By definition, it makes little sense. Its FEY magic, which, like the Fey, is its own mess entirely. No one is truly sure where, or even when, exactly the Fey court is, only that to get to and from it, one must walk five miles uphill both ways.”
“I don’t-”
“Hey, it could be worse. We could be barefoot and in the snow.” Rodhlann said. Morgain turned her head to look at him, and a sudden thought occurred to her. As one afflicted with Lycanthropy, Rodhlann was nearly immune to magic- she’d trained with him several times before his promotion, for that very reason. She could throw lightning bolts at him all day long and they did nothing more than ruffle his hair a bit, and maybe make his clothes smolder.
“Rodhlann Cae’ardwyn,” she said with a significant ensure that there could be no misconstruing who her question was intended for. “What do you see?”
Gwen turned to him, suddenly interested. He arched one eyebrow and smiled slightly, in faint amusement. The answer he gave was rather coy.
“Magic.” He shrugged. “And not magic.”
“That’s not helpful.” Gwen sighed.
“No, not really. But as you said- nothing comes for free, and you would not wish to pay the price required to learn this.” Rodhlann acknowledged. Radyn tapped two fingers across his nose.
“Bad dog.”
“Spear-ear.”
“At least he doesn’t have fleas.” Terrence cut in.
“No one asked for your opinion, you great carrot.” Rodhlann barked back.
Morgain watched the three men as they somehow created an unexplainable, impossible, yet totally natural phenomenon. The nature of their insults simultaneously devolved in maturity, as they evolved in creativity. Which led Morgain to ponder the true meaning of balance and how the world and nature worked. If time was a loop, did anything anyone did ever have any meaning? Did they continue to make the same mistakes repeatedly, or was there some sort of “wobble” that allowed for some relatively minor freedoms and gave actions true weight? She stopped herself just inches shy of falling into that philosophical rabbit hole, from which she knew there was likely no escape, and no bottom.
After a time, during which none of the men repeated an insult, Morgain looked at Gwen and Natalia.
“How often do they do this?”
“The three of them together? Not all that often. Once a year maybe. Any pair of them? Once or twice a month.” Natalia said.
“How long will they keep it up?”
“Oh, quite some time. The first one to repeat an insult loses.”
“And they remember them all?”
“They seem to.” Natalia shrugged.
The group passed a massive amphitheater, which Morgain turned to gawk at.
It was a magnificent feat of architecture, even with the aid of magic. The entire amphitheater was made of seamless blue marble, and at its height could seat ten thousand people comfortably in the bottom, and three times that in the stands that stood supported by vast pillars that would have been spread too thin if not for the magic used in the construction. At the front stood a wide platform, fifty paces across, and almost twice Morgain’s height above the first row of seats. The platform was far enough from the first row of seats that the occupants could lounge back comfortably and see what was happening without putting a kink in their necks. At the back side of the stage stood two massive doors, one of silvery mithril, the other of black adamantium. In the center of the doors was a large, slowly rotating circle of silver, gold and some other metal, either painted or glamoured, a dusky red to be the color of rust, signifying the sun and moons. It had to mean something. But Morgain wasn’t sure what.
“That’s where they bond Gwefri yn rhwym caomhnoir.” Gwen whispered to her. “It’s the central point- the fulcrum on which the whole area rests.”
They walked a few hundred more paces, before Rodhlann shot a creative, and crude, insult at Terrence involving a donkey, a honeycomb, and a brothel.
Terrence cut him off, almost guiltily Morgain thought, before he could finish the insult.
“Yes, well, at least I don’t have fleas!” he snapped. Radyn and Rodhlann both gave a small cheer. “Shite.” Terrence pulled a coin purse from his belt and threw each of them a pair of silver coins.
Rodhlann and Radyn continued their verbal duel of insults.
It was a truly masterful flyting.
A few hundred paces ahead, above or below, the twisted reality kept Morgain from being able to tell exactly which, the clearing appeared before them, with a large archway wrought of sung trees and laced with some sort of silver-webbing.
She did not, however, miss the knot of a dozen guards by the archway.
They were tall, taller even than she, though perhaps not so tall as the men in her own family. The dozen guardsmen were lithe, graceful, and… statuesque. Their skin ranged in tone from cream to the faint silvery green of lichen on sandstone. They held nearly the same level of physical perfection that Thoran Halstraad did, and apart from the darker tone of his skin, he’d have fit in well among them. Oh, and they were completely nude. Or so it seemed at first glance. As they walked closer, their skin seemed to flicker and flash all over, except for right around their eyes and the palms of their hands.
She realized a moment later that they all wore scale armor made of some completely transparent material, and the name for the group circled through to the surface of her churning mind. That was Feyglass, which meant these were members of the Glass Guard- the hyper-elite guards of the Fey Regents.
Feyglass was harder than iron, sharper than steel, lighter than either, and extremely rare and expensive. She’d only ever seen two pieces of it in the “real” world. Her uncle had a looking glass made of it, though he’d never let her touch it, and her father had bought her mother a hairpin with a red stained Feyglass insert once when she’d been a child.
Their weapons were made of the same material, though they were more translucent than transparent. They held a pale, faint green color to denote the edges, and the handles were dark brown, like a tree. Two bore swords, two had spears, two had bows, two had maces, two had clubs, and two had hammers. They all also each carried a small crossbow of a strange design at their belts.
She’d heard of these bows, but had never seen one in person. They were called several things. Mage-killer, Fey-bane, Druid-thorns. Their result was the same. These weapons were designed SPECIFICALLY to combat magic users, at a medium range. The crossbows were too small to be very effective beyond about thirty paces, but they would pass much closer to the Glass Guardsmen than that. Rather than firing standard bolts, which could be set on fire, or easily deflected with magic, these weapons fired small iron discs about an inch across and an eighth of an inch thick. The discs were sharpened to a razor’s edge all the way around. Fire couldn’t burn hot enough fast enough to damage them, and they were too thin, and too heavy to be overly affected by a spell of wind.
Morgain found her eyes drawn to one just to the left of the center, one guard that was carrying a spear. He stepped out of his place in line and grinned at her coyly, almost inviting her to go to him.
She felt a flush rising in her cheeks, her breath and heartbeat quickened, her step faltered, and she adjusted towards the man.
A hand grabbed her brusquely by the shoulder.
“Far be it from me to dissuade anyone who is not somehow promised to me from seeking what pleasures and dalliances they may- but think about where we are, and what we are doing here, eh, lass?” Radyn’s voice whispered in her ear. She turned towards him, wondering faintly why she’d ever been drawn to the plain looking man, and he spoke again.
“What do you see when you look at them?” he asked quietly. Morgain blinked.
“Men, very attractive men. Nude men.” She mumbled.
“Hmm. And I see women. As do your brother and Natalia, I expect. Who or what Gwen sees is anyone’s guess. I’d be careful around that lot, though. Rodhlann is the only one who is not being drawn in by their glamours. They are Leanan-sidhe.”
It took the word a moment to sink through her hazy mind.
When it registered, she gasped and muttered the words to a knot she should have tied as soon as she had come into the Fey Court. One that allowed her to see beyond the magical glamours the fey were presenting- giving her a faint sense of double vision. It caused a faint wave of nausea to ripple through her, but since it was such a simple knot that required almost no power, the effect was no worse than if she ate too much, too fast, and gave herself a slight case of indigestion.
In this unfamiliar sight, the Leanan-Sidhe guards looked much the same as they had, save perhaps for slightly translucent skin. Beneath that skin, though, she could see swirling motes of… something disturbing.
The more… potent… members of the Fey had the potential for much more than causing mischief and misery. Leanan-Sidhe, as well as a few other types of Fey, were a sort of parasite. Some killed quickly, but others, the Leanan-Sidhe included, were more like leeches, slowly draining their victims until they were naught but empty shells.
Not only did these types of Fey have a mundane resistance to iron, because of their blood drinking, but they were also much stronger, much faster, and much more dangerous than many other varieties. These Fey also, at least the ones that did not kill their victims in a single night, often provided some benefit or other to those they were draining.
Leanan-sidhe were particularly known for their inspiration of artists, musicians, and craftsmen. Something about the energy of creating, or recreating, was borderline addictive to them. Many such “gifted” artists seemed to die far too young in mysterious circumstances. Some were accidental, sure, but more often than not, it was the work of a Leanan-Sidhe.
She shuddered at the knowledge that the swirling motes seen through their skin were fragments of souls. Nothing that she knew of could take the “whole” soul- but common knowledge held that those born into their current cycle with defects… of some sort, had suffered a spiritual fragmentation in their previous cycle. It was a disturbing thought that kept most people living in a faint state of paranoia of the Fey. She had to remember that, here of all places, especially.
Morgain shook her head and the smile of the man who had stepped forward faltered slightly. The look he turned on Radyn was openly venomous.
“Hmm. I don’t think it liked that.” he muttered quietly.
“Thanks.” she whispered back to him.
They entered through the archway into the court proper.
The small clearing was only a field, within which sat a slightly raised mound, with a small, crystalline blue pool of water with eight lily pads floating on its surface at random. Fish swam in the pool, half of them black, the other half white, chasing each other in an almost lazy circle, one which never seemed to end.
In the center of the pool was an island, maybe three paces across, upon which sat a pair of elaborate chairs, chairs that seemed both made of metal and organic.
The figures that sat upon them were no less impressive than the Glass guardsmen had been, though they did not bear any sort of glamour upon them.
That immediately attracted Morgain’s attention. Any member of the Fey bold enough to face a group of a half-dozen men and women without glamour was dangerous.
The figures were a man and a woman, as opposite as it was possible to be. The woman had milk white skin, of a fairness so pure it was almost painful to look upon. Long, loose curls of liquid silver hair fell about her face and neck, trailing all the way down her torso, and pooling on the seat of the black throne upon which she sat. Her eyes were a deep, verdant green, and she wore a green and silver dress, that, while modestly cut, and opaque in important places, was translucent than most others. It also fit snugly enough to leave little to the imagination.
She was not quite of a height with Morgain, though she was taller than either of the other mortal women with them.
The man was as tall as Terrence was, and broader. His skin was a deep brown, almost black, the color of rich loam, and he looked as if he could have been carved from obsidian stone. His eyes were deep pits of brown, so rich and dark they were nearly black, apart from scattered flecks of gold that glittered in them. Thick, dark hair fell to his chin, and he was dressed in a simple, though fine, vest of scarlet, with yellow trousers, and gleaming black boots tipped in gold. He looked down at them, with a face reminiscent of nothing so much as cruel, pointed stone.
His voice, however, was soft and earthy. Like rich loam, freshly tilled and ready for planting.
“Welcome to the Fey Court, mortals. I am Daeion, Regent and First among the Seelie Hosts.”
The woman, in all her regal beauty, stood with a face as warm and kind as that of a mother looking upon her smiling newborn the first day after the pain of childbirth had faded completely.
“Welcome to the Fey Court, mortals. I am Alystra, Regent, and First among the Unseelie Host.” The sharp, harsh tone with which the woman spoke held every ounce of edge she had expected from Daeion’s voice, and then some. They spoke together and the sounds of their voices somehow locked together, in a way that added a third register to them when they spoke. The enchanting, albeit creepy, triple harmony seemed to shake the very foundations of the world around them, every inch of the land between the four hills resonating the timbre of the tone, and folding it back over itself until it did not so much echo as it fizzled out completely not three feet from where they stood.
“You come here as seekers. Tell us what it is you are seeking.” Radyn glanced at Morgain and shrugged.
“You can do it, or I can. Your call.” He muttered to her.
“Or we take a page from their own playbook and each give them half the story.” she whispered after a moment.
The triple voice rang out suddenly.
“You two, tangle-threads. If you would speak, do so with boldness enough to address the whole of the Fey court. Lest it be thought that ye are plotting. The rest of you, wait without.”
Morgain stepped forward as Gwen, Natalia, Terrence and Rodhlann left the square to go stand by the Glass Guards. She carefully locked eyes first with Daeion, then with Alystra, and without breaking their gazes, offered each a curtsy. Just enough of a curtsy to grant respect for the pair, without dipping into the line of acknowledging their authority. Alystra beamed radiantly down upon her, though Morgain could now detect the ice cold behind the woman’s eyes. Daeion, meanwhile, raised a hand in acknowledgment, his cruel face not at all softened by the warmth and joy in his eyes.
“First among the courts, Regents. You are correct, we do come as seekers.” Morgain said carefully. “We have sought far, by my reckoning perhaps, though we have not sought long, and at our last destination, were recommended to seek here next.”
“Bandrui, tell us, what do you seek?”
Morgain grinned faintly at this.
“I seek many things. I seek to find balance and plenty for the world around me, every day. I seek Joy. I seek thrills. I’ve sought for drink, and I’ve sought to escape sorrows. I seek knowledge. I seek experience. Seeking is what it means to be Mortal after all. But you are aware of that.” Daeion’s smile widened slightly at this non-answer and he sat up straighter and his eyes glittered with interest. He had started off lazily, perhaps, but suddenly realized that perhaps this was a game worth playing.
“Perhaps. You mortals are strange to us, and they often look for that which they do not possess and can not get in their lifetimes. I do not believe that any of the things you listed are what you came here to seek, though.” He said with a grin.
They bandied words for the next two hours, each group dancing delicately around the truth, and careful to phrase their questions as statements.
Daeion’s grin grew wider and wider as the verbal fencing continued, but as the sun climbed to its zenith, Alystra seemed to grow more and more discomfited, and short tempered. As the wordplay continued, a crowd of different Fae slowly gathered. Finally, after Morgain barely deflected one of Daeion’s more cunningly crafted word traps, Alystra sat up, cold fury in her eyes, though her face still bore the same beatific smile that she had had the whole morning.
