The King of Faerie (Stariel Book 4) Page 9

  Wyn was silent. Technically, Stariel had killed his father, but he’d known what would happen when he’d translocated him here. It had been an act of desperation, to save him and Hetta both, but it didn’t change the outcome. Now his father’s bones were buried beneath the earth of this faeland, and Hetta carried a child of King Aeros’s bloodline. A stormdancer child.

  “Still, it’s a relief to know you are capable of ruthlessness on occasion. You may need it, to come through this with your feathers intact.”

  “You sound like Cat.” Cat had always called him too soft-hearted.

  “Someone needs to represent her in this, since she’s not here to speak for herself.” But there was less bite to the words than before. Rakken sighed and handed him the gin.

  Wyn took it, not reassured. They drank sloe gin as the clouds thinned and revealed a gibbous moon. Five days—four, now, technically—until it was full, until Lamorkin had promised to return. Would his godparent be able to help them?

  His thoughts ran in unfocused eddies, spinning around the two halves of his life. He should have better appreciated the decade of grace before the Iron Law was revoked. There had been no Hetta for much of it, after she’d left for Meridon, but also no one had eyed him like something dangerous, and no one had suffered because of him either. His heart clenched. He did not regret his father’s death, but he wasn’t the only family member Wyn had lost in this.

  “How did Torquil die?”

  He felt Rakken’s stillness. They hadn’t spoken of their brother’s recent death, not since Rakken had broken the news that Aroset had murdered him. Wyn hadn’t seen Torquil in more than a decade, not since he’d first left ThousandSpire. Now he never would.

  “I don’t know, precisely.” Rakken spoke softly. “I had barely registered his return to ThousandSpire when I felt his presence snuff out. If we’d known what he intended, perhaps we would have reached him before Aroset. Perhaps together, we could have bested her.” He sighed. “But there has ever been little trust between us all. He must have assumed we would slaughter him too in a bid to gain ThousandSpire’s throne.”

  “And would you, if Cat wasn’t against it?”

  Rakken didn’t answer for a long time, staring out at the lake as the wind ebbed and its surface settled into a great mirror. Abruptly, he laughed, a sharp sound of glass shattering. “Not now, I think. But then… Ah, what has our bloodline come to, little brother, that I don’t know the answer myself, that we have such a history of killing each other for madness or power, parents and siblings both? Perhaps I was hasty to blame you for the whole of ThousandSpire’s sufferings. Perhaps we brought this ruin upon ourselves.”

  “You’re a very depressing drinking companion.”

  Rakken chuckled and held out his hand for the gin. They watched the sky clear and stars spread across the sky, their reflections glimmering in the dark water below. A shooting star blazed towards the horizon, its watery twin below nearly as brilliant. The Court of Falling Stars, Wyn thought absently.

  “Goodnight, brother,” Rakken said, some time later. He slid down off the parapets and looked as if he would say more, his wings shifting. But then he folded them back and left without another word.

  Wyn sat for a long time alone, until the darkest hours of the night, until the blurred edges of the gin had sharpened back to cold sobriety. He went back into the house, wandering the dark hallways on silent feet, leaning on his fae side for night vision, not quite admitting to himself where he was going until he stood in front of Hetta’s door.

  He’d only entered Hetta’s room a handful of times during his time as house manager while she’d been gone, and not at all since she’d returned home; they usually met now in his own room, since the risk of being caught was lower there.

  Hetta’s room still had a sense of being frozen in time, holding the relics of the girl she’d been before she left Stariel. In daylight the walls were papered in faded yellow, but night drained the room of colour. A chink in the curtains let through a single beam of moonlight, painting a stripe in the shadows of Hetta’s hair. She didn’t wake as he crossed to the windows and closed the curtains properly.

  He had a small internal argument with himself despite already knowing he would lose it. Hetta needed her sleep; he shouldn’t wake her. There weren’t that many hours left in the night, and he’d have to be back in his own room anyway before the first of the servants rose. Even as he thought this, he unbuttoned his shirt.

  Hetta half-woke as he slipped in beside her, murmuring a sleepy, wordless question as they re-arranged themselves. The bed wasn’t designed for two people, but he didn’t mind the excuse to hold her close.

  “I love you,” he told her, kissing her hair.

  “Hmmm,” she agreed sleepily, burrowing into his shoulder.

  His thoughts grew long and slow-moving as taffy as he listened to the sound of her breathing evening out. Hetta’s back was to him, his arm draped over the curve of her waist, just beneath the soft weight of her breasts. Without thinking, he spread his fingers over the warm skin of her stomach. The child had storm magic—his child. In self-defence, he hadn’t dared to let himself speculate. Hadn’t let himself want. But on the edges of sleep, the ghosts of possible futures slipped through his guard and curled around his heart. His last thought before darkness pulled him under was of a child with Hetta’s grey eyes and auburn hair—and his wings.

  He dreamt.

  He was a small child, dwarfed by the enormous throne that stood empty atop the dais. He pulled himself up the stairs, flapping his wings to help haul himself over the lip of each one in turn. Panting, he reached the top and backed up until his wings hit cold stone. He could do this; Cat had made it look easy. Taking a deep breath, he ran in a wobbling line, leaping from the edge of the dais with wings outstretched.

  He fell, tumbling head-over-heels in an uncoordinated ball of feathers. Pain burst bright as he caught himself. He sat sprawled on the marble floor, lip trembling. He wouldn’t cry. Cat wouldn’t cry if she fell.

  A rich chuckle behind him. “Ah, youngest. A valiant attempt.”

  Frustration boiled through him. “Why can’t I fly?” Even Quil could fly!

  His father, huge and reassuring, crouching down. Warm golden eyes. “Because you are not big enough yet. Here.” A hand in his, helping him to his feet. “You need to practice strengthening your flight muscles. Hold your wings like this.” He demonstrated, his feathers rustling as they unfurled, red and silver, wide and sure.

  Wyn mimicked the motion, his father’s hands guiding his wings.

  Familiar feminine laughter, Father’s expression softening at the sound. “May I join your flight school, my love?”

  Wyn turned towards his mother and—

  He woke.

  10

  Younger Brothers

  Marius had never been inside a police station before, and he would’ve preferred, on the whole, not to be inside one now. The atmosphere prickled oppressively, even though he was only standing at the front desk and not, say, in the cells, where presumably it was much more oppressive. The back of his neck crawled with an oily sensation that made him want to rub at it self-consciously. It’s just a gift of your overactive imagination; atmospheres are not physical things that leave marks.

  “Good morning, sir. I’m here for Mr Gregory Valstar,” he told the officer manning the front desk. He even managed to make it sound polite, despite his churning emotions. Damn Gregory. Was he all right? He wasn’t sure exactly what Greg had done—a brawl and a broken shopkeeper’s window had been referenced by the friend of Greg’s who’d found him—but if it had landed Greg here, it definitely qualified as stupid. Hadn’t he told Greg to watch himself?

  The officer had the look of someone dividing time into ever-tinier increments to make it pass more quickly. He gave Marius a tired once-over. Marius knew what he saw: a bespectacled toff, either over- or under-dressed for this hour, depending on whether you considered it too early or too late. Marius could
practically hear the unimpressed conclusion he reached: Gods, another useless academic who thinks he’s above us all. Normally, Marius would wilt under the flat judgement in the man’s eyes, but he wasn’t here for himself. The officer could think what he liked, so long as he got Greg out of here.

  The officer referred to a large logbook and ran a finger down the column. “No Valstar listed here. Got a Greg Smith.”

  Honestly, could Greg not come up with something slightly more original? “That’s him. He’s my brother.”

  “He’s in for disturbing the peace.”

  “If there’s a fine, I will pay it,” Marius said wearily. “And I apologise for any inconvenience he’s caused.” Oh, he would strangle Greg when he got him out of here. He gave a grimace he hoped the officer might be sympathetic to. “He’s young and stupid, and I’ll have his ear for this, but he’s my little brother.”

  He got out his wallet with deliberate casualness. Sometimes, he had intuitions with a strength that was hard to ignore, and right now one was telling him the officer would prefer to be rid of both him and the blond lad, sick of bloody drunken students’ kick-ups but most of all the damn paperwork that came with them. He deserved bloody compensation for the waste of his time. At least the lad’s brother looked stern enough to take paint off. Let him deal with the lad.

  Gods, letting our imagination run away with us a tad tonight, aren’t we? ‘Stern enough to take paint off’—what did that even mean? Marius winced as a headache germinated behind his temples.

  “How much is the fine?” he asked, unsurprised when the officer named an inflated sum.

  “And your name?” the officer said when he’d duly noted down ‘fine paid, released without charge’ next to ‘Mr Greg Smith’.

  “Marius Valstar.”

  The officer nodded and summoned his co-worker, who seemed equally unimpressed with Marius and the entire situation but went and fetched Marius’s errant brother without further ado.

  Gregory emerged sporting a brilliant shiner and a wary expression. Relief flooded his features when he spotted Marius, followed quickly by guilty defiance. Shiner aside, he seemed unharmed, and a knot of anxiety unwound itself in Marius’s stomach. Thank the gods.

  He dragged Gregory out of the office, feeling sick, his head beginning to pound a warning that signalled a truly terrific migraine was pending. Lovely. They spilled out onto the cobbled streets of Knoxbridge, lit by the glow of elektric streetlights at this time of night.

  “Why did you tell him my name?” Gregory demanded, pulling his arm free.

  “Because I had to pay a bloody fine to get you out, and I’m not committing perjury!” Though maybe he should have. The truth was he hadn’t thought about it at all, but no way in the hells was he letting Greg turn this on him. It wasn’t Marius’s fault they were here, and Greg could show some small sign of gratitude at being rescued! “What in the name of all the little gods happened?”

  Greg kicked at a loose cobble, and they watched it clatter away. Somewhere distant, a dog barked, but the town was as quiet as it ever really got. It was past the hour of drunks and too early for tradesmen.

  “Nothing. It was just a bit of a disagreement that got out of hand, all right? You didn’t need to come.” He gave a laugh that was far too jaded for his age. It made the hair on Marius’s neck stand on end.

  “Like hell I didn’t! You know if I hadn’t come, it would’ve been your Dean bailing you out and packing you back to Stariel shortly afterwards! Do you want to be sent down?”

  “That’s why I didn’t give my real name, idiot.” Greg shot a wary look at Marius to see how he took the insult, and Marius nearly laughed at his expression. He was still so painfully young.

  “Watch yourself, brat. I’ve still got half a foot on you,” Marius warned him without heat. Though let’s be honest—he’s already far more physically able to take care of himself than you are. You’ve never actually thrown a punch in anger! For a moment, he felt Aroset’s fingers closing around his throat, and a splinter drove itself into his brain, an echo of remembered pain. He hadn’t been able to defend himself at all when it mattered. Though it’s not like punches would have done much against a psychotic fae princess with lightning powers, in any case.

  “Not half a foot! Two inches, if that,” Greg protested, recalling him to the present. “But I still don’t see why you told them who I was. You’re the one who told me to be careful of reporters poking about!”

  “Yes, I can see ending up in a holding cell is practically the definition of carefulness! What really happened?”

  Greg’s mouth grew mutinous. “What I said. I was drunk, and I lost my temper. It’s fine.”

  Marius said something then that he didn’t want to say. “It’s not fine, if you can’t keep your temper when you’ve had a drink.”

  Greg went white and looked away. “It wasn’t—I wasn’t…like that.”

  Marius felt like a cad. It was a thing they didn’t talk about. Greg hadn’t borne the brunt of Father’s rages, but he’d witnessed them target others. Namely me, Marius thought with bitter honesty. It hadn’t mattered what he did—everything about him had irritated Lord Henry on some level. “What’s wrong with you, boy?” had been the refrain of Marius’s childhood. Usually swiftly followed by, “Stop blubbering!”

  Marius wrenched his mind away from the memory. “Well, what was it like?” What could provoke Greg into an uncharacteristic burst of temper that would make him lash out? Oh. Oh. The knowledge came with sudden and piercing certainty. “Someone insulted Hetta, didn’t they?”

  Greg made a low growl of agreement.

  Marius sighed. He understood, he really did, but, “If you’re going to punch every person who insults our family, I’m going to run out of funds to bail you out rather quickly. Or, at least, I assume you did punch someone?”

  Greg looked offended. “Of course! You didn’t hear what he said.”

  “I can imagine easily enough.” Marius had overheard more than he wanted, seen more written than he wanted. I shouldn’t read the damned gossip rags. But it was worse, not reading them and then not knowing the reason behind the mocking glances sent his way, the suddenly dropped conversations when he entered a room, the titters of the students he tutored.

  “You—you can’t expect me not to do anything when someone says things like that about our sister!”

  “Words exist. Fists aren’t the only way to settle things, nor do I see that they’ve been particularly effective in this case. Whoever else was involved in your scuffle wasn’t in that cell with you.” He put a question into it. It didn’t matter who it had been, given how widely the gossip was circulating, but he’d still like to know.

  Greg stayed silent.

  “At least tell me it wasn’t a duke’s son or something.” The Southern aristocracy was more complicated and more numerous than the Northern, where you were either a lord or you weren’t, but they were also more closely connected to the Prydinian throne.

  “It wasn’t a duke’s son,” Greg hedged.

  Marius grimaced. “Earls’ sons are not much better.”

  “I hate it when you do that,” Greg groused, accustomed to Marius’s flashes of intuition.

  “Well, if it was an earl’s son, and he insulted you to your face, then you gave him exactly the reaction he wanted. You know the Southerners love to characterise us all as brutes rather than gentlemen!”

  “Pretty sure he didn’t want me to break his teeth,” Greg said with satisfaction and absolutely no sign of repentance.

  Marius rubbed at his temples. “Think, Greg! Think who exactly will be dragged into this if that boy goes complaining to his father that some violent Northerner roughed him up! You know there’s a reporter snooping about already—I’m sure she’d love to make hay of this if she hears of it. And who do you think that will cause trouble for, when the Conclave is about to meet?”

  Greg absorbed this as they passed a bookshop, the sign gleaming with dew.

  “
Hetta,” he said heavily.

  Marius felt old and jaded, watching his little brother’s righteous anger crumple into the hurt realisation that the world wasn’t a fair place, that being in the right didn’t necessarily matter.

  “It’s not fair!” Greg uttered the age-old words on cue, hands curling in and out of fists.

  “No,” Marius said. “It’s not. I hate it too.”

  “What am I supposed to do, then?”

  “Not break innocent shopkeepers’ windows, for one.”

  Greg did look guilty at that. “Did you…did you have to pay for that too?”

  “Yes.” And what a gold-plated window it was, he reflected, remembering the sum the officer had named. He ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t have a perfect solution for you. But I do know that if they figure out how to rile you, they’ll keep doing it.” Eighteen-year-old boys are not the most emotionally mature specimens of mankind. “Avoid them if you can, or at least try to avoid getting involved in any more fisticuffs. This won’t last forever, and I suspect Hetta will make our name more than merely notorious, given enough time. The same boys who insulted her tonight will make little impact on the world, in comparison.”

  Had he said too much, or not enough? He knew Greg both looked up to him and frequently discounted his advice—this was the trouble with being so far removed in age and personality. Unbidden, his mind began to speculate on what the bloody earl’s son had said about Hetta that had sent Greg into such a rage. An earl’s son… Marius had a flash of horror. The Earl of Wolver didn’t have a son Greg’s age, did he? Although if he did, Gregory punching him did seem suddenly acceptable. No, he told himself. You’re supposed to be the mature adult here.

  The gravel path crunched under their feet. “Are you happy she’s marrying Wyn?” Greg said eventually. “I mean…she is going to, isn’t she?”

  I’d be happier if I was surer of the answer to that. Hetta had told him of the obstacles that stood in their way. But Greg wasn’t asking that. Wyn was practically another brother to him, but Greg had been badly burnt by the fae when the girl he was courting turned out to be the fae spy Gwendelfear. He’d never quite recovered his equilibrium from the experience. Being made a fool in love cut deep. Which I know better than anyone.