The Queen's Choice

Instead of returning home, I spent a restless, thoughtful day wandering the city, seeing it in a new light. Most of the Faerie population lived in the sprawling city of Chrior, although our Realm included a large section of the Balsam Forest, where we hunted and kept a few animals; gathered berries, nuts, and medicinal plants; laid to rest our dead; and held celebrations. The idea that I would be expected to rule these people and this land was paralyzing. I tried to convince myself that it wouldn’t be so difficult to adjust to the responsibility of being Queen, that I could embrace the new lifestyle that role would entail. But I couldn’t shake the portent of trouble that gripped my heart, the same portent that gripped me when I thought of Illumina. Neither of us was ready to undertake the tasks the Queen had set before us.

When darkness fell, I went to visit my cousin, needing to see for myself that she was packed and ready. Though the hour was late, she was not asleep. How could she be with such a daunting mission resting upon her shoulders? Instead, she was going through the scant things she intended to take with her—she would have been told not to carry much—and checking her weapons. The travel satchel beside her was imprinted with the royal seal, and was identical to mine, for they had been gifts from Queen Ubiqua.

“I expected you eventually,” she said, looking up from her seat in the corner, where the heating furrow that ran along the walls created an especially cozy space. “I know you’re not happy with Aunt for giving me this charge.”

“I don’t want anything to happen to you.” I pulled up a deadwood stool of my own and sat opposite her.

“I thought it might be that you don’t want Zabriel to come home.”

My eyebrows drew close, narrowing Illumina’s view of my eyes. “Why would that be?”

She shrugged, running a polishing rag over her long-knife. “Well, once he’s here, he’s the rightful heir to the throne, isn’t he?”

This hadn’t occurred to me. Zabriel seemed so distant lately, more of a dream than a person, that I hadn’t really contemplated his claim to the Laura. I shook my head, dismissing the thought before it had the chance to morph into a hope.

“Zabriel doesn’t want to be King of this place. His actions have more than established that. He has a wanderer’s spirit, not a politician’s. Aunt says he takes after his father in that way.”

“That human Aunt married. That’s what she gets for involving herself with them.”

My gaze darkened. “Just so you know, not only did Aunt love William Ivanova, it broke her heart when Zabriel left. She tried to make him feel connected to our Realm, to see that he belonged here, but Fae like you drove him away. Watch what you say, for Nature’s sake, Illumina.”

“Sorry,” she muttered, adding a few medical supplies to her pack.

I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, releasing my irritation.

“Anyway, I came because I wanted to see if you had any questions, any concerns. It’s your first time in the human world. Things are going to be different from the way they are here.”

Illumina smiled sweetly. “Thank you, Anya. I can always trust you to look out for me, can’t I? But no, I prefer to learn from experience.”

I bowed my head, no longer in the mood for conversation. If she didn’t want my help, I couldn’t very well give it to her.

“Then I’ll merely wish you luck.” Vaguely dissatisfied, I stood and moved toward the door. “Don’t forget to bring Sale with you, but keep it well hidden. It’s illegal to have in the Territory. And watch for hunters. The human world can be dark for Fae.”

“I’m not naive, Anya. My father schooled me better than you know.”

I ignored my cousin’s comment and departed, stepping onto the branches of the Great Redwood and into the freezing air. But the chills that assailed me weren’t only related to the temperature—whether with purpose or not, Illumina had mentioned something I had ignored, and that was Zabriel’s right to his inheritance. He was the Prince. And prior to his exodus two years ago, he had been a good one, a compassionate young man who had been born with wings but no elemental connection. After struggling for fifteen years, he’d decided he belonged in the human world, put up his shroud and run away, across a Road that had been cursed by the Fae to end the war and separate the races; a Road that might have killed him because of his paternity.

If he could be persuaded to come back, he would make a better ruler than I would. He would be a better bridge to the humans since he shared blood with them. He would not feel like a usurper, like the Laura didn’t belong to him. The line of descent said he should be given the option of claiming the throne.

Illumina might not want to give it to him. I trembled at the conviction I felt—she could calmly reconcile herself to my ascendance to the throne, but it would be another thing for her to see the Faerie Realm under Zabriel’s authority. He was an outrage in Illumina’s eyes, his right to rule illegitimized by his human heritage. Sending her after Zabriel was a bigger mistake than even I had appreciated, for if she found him, she would not want to bring him home and risk that he might take back what was rightfully his.

* * *

My cousin left without fanfare the following morning; I only knew she was gone because she was absent from the Queen’s Court as we went about our business.

The day marked the official start of winter, and in anticipation of the approaching solstice, there were festivities throughout Chrior. Ubiqua’s Court toured the sights, I beside Davic, clutching his hand for warmth. It was hard to feel frightened about the future when I was with him; the challenges of the world seemed far away. Up ahead walked my father, his wizened wings deep blue and glimmering in the sun, while the younger members of the Court surrounded my promised and me. Davic’s friends laughed and jostled him, while I exchanged amused glances with my soft-spoken best friend, Ione. She was stunningly beautiful, but lacked confidence—she assumed the worst of people’s stares when in truth they merely could not look away.

“Where is Evangeline?” I asked, referring to our mutual friend who had for years lived with Ione’s family. Evangeline’s home life was unhappy at best, her parents among those who made me thankful for my father’s kindliness.

“She hasn’t returned from her Crossing yet,” Ione revealed, tying her long blond curls around her neck like a scarf. “I thought she’d be back around the time you left on your trip.”

“She’s probably enjoying her newfound independence in the world outside Chrior. She’s always been a bit adventurous. Remember when we were younger and she would disappear into the woods overnight? And the scary tales she’d make up about her encounters with mystical creatures like Unicorns and Sepulchres? Well, her Crossing is a chance to come home with some genuine stories, and she’s going to chase after them long and hard.”

“Some Fae don’t come back, you know.” Ione cast her eyes downward in ill-supported dejection. “Some choose to stay in the Territory.”

“Evangeline wouldn’t do that.”

“I’m not so sure, Anya. What reason does she have to return?”

“She has more than enough reasons. For one, everything she owns is here. And her family is here—her real family.” I took Ione’s hand with my free one. “Your parents, and friends like us. And the human world is much bleaker than ours, even considering Evangeline’s troubles at home.”

I looked around me at the tall trees, their boughs curved like drapes from the weight of a healthy snowfall, meeting each other in a pretty pattern that framed the street. We were in a paradise, where soft lights twinkled at us from houses and businesses on all levels of the city without effuse. Slender catwalks constructed out of deadwood denoted the roadways above our heads, fittingly resembling the rings inside a tree, as far as could be seen. The city of Chrior was taller than it was wide.

“We’re a more contented race than the humans. They quarrel and compete with each other, hoarding money and possessions. The Warckum Territory is an interesting place to visit, but it isn’t home. For most of us, it never could be. So don’t worry. Evangeline will be back.”

Ione smiled, reassured, and joined me in surveying the beauty around us. But my father’s words from the previous night crept to the forefront of my mind. A number of our people are late in returning from their journeys. Could Evangeline be in trouble? Could some injury have befallen her? Humans hunting Fae for sport was a danger in the Warckum Territory, despite Governor Ivanova outlawing the practice, and there were always the perils posed by wild animals and unknown terrain. But these were risks we always ran when entering the human world; they were no greater for her than for anyone else. Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to heed the words of comfort I had just offered to my best friend.

Our tour continued, though it was interrupted several times by spontaneous revelry about which we could hardly complain. When a line of Fae came dancing in front of us wearing booties with curled toes, loud laughter erupted. The shoes were a stereotype taken from the artwork of humans, with no basis in reality. My fellow Fae looked ridiculous in their matching outfits, chanting drinking songs and tossing elemental gifts into the air. A gust of snowflakes, harmless embers, and leaves that ought to have been dead this time of year came floating around us. Queen Ubiqua, smiling unreservedly, was the first to applaud. Davic chuckled and kissed the back of my hand, then pulled a leaf out of my hair.

A deafening crack interrupted the crowd’s exultation, and gasps traveled like a wave through the assembly. Davic pulled me closer and I instinctively looked up, thinking that a tree branch had broken, or a rare winter thunderstorm had taken over the sky. Instead, the sea of people parted from a focal point ahead of us. I glanced at the Queen and saw her face darken, her shock replaced by malice.

In the center of the walk was a scarecrow, a vulgar mannequin dressed in a human military uniform and smeared with crude oil. As the wind snaked its way down the street toward the Queen’s party, it carried with it the acrid smell of the thick black substance, one of the resources the humans used to power their factories. A Faerie stood proudly before the effigy he had built, while others tossed hand-sized boxes in an ever-steepening pile at its base. In the leader’s hand was the cause of the sound we had heard—a flintlock pistol pointed at the sky, reeking smoke.

Words like sacrilege and atrocity were murmured around us, and I made to storm forward to Ubiqua’s side, only to be yanked back by Davic.

“Don’t,” he warned, turning to shield me with his body. “Your father will handle this.”

I clenched my fists around my promised’s jerkin, knowing he was right. The Lord of the Law was already holding his right arm up to signal the Queen’s Blades, Fae who were trained to use conduit blades to concentrate their elemental magic in defense of the Realm. A dozen gathered round, wearing the colors of their elements, three each dressed in green, red, blue, or white. My father awaited the Queen’s directive, for she had yet to speak.

“Falk,” she called, addressing the man with the pistol. “Surrender yourself at once. Spare your children this shame.”

“The shame lies with you!” he screeched in return.

The high and grating pitch of Falk’s voice helped me to place him. He was an outspoken member of the Anti-Unification League—commonly known as the human-haters—and had historically been more of a nuisance than a problem. The AUL was an extremist group, not able to curry favor with the average citizen, the majority of whom trusted and supported Ubiqua whether their politics stood here or there. The men stacking boxes around the effigy were Falk’s sons, allies by blood, and they scrambled to the sidelines when their work was done.

Falk brandished the gun wildly, causing the Blades to tense and the citizens of Chrior to scream and cower.

“You call this an atrocity? You’d best accustom yourselves to the sight of it! Accustom yourselves to savagery, barbarism, and all manner of destruction, for they are synonymous with humanity, with the scum our Queen would welcome into this city!”

“Get rid of him,” Ubiqua snarled to my father, and he nodded at the men and women who stood ready to carry out her orders.

The Blades advanced, and Falk, a Fire Fae, thrust out his hand, shooting a burst of flame from his palm at the effigy’s head. The straw caught, and fire spiraled in a furious rush to follow the track of crude oil down to the bottom.

“Unification will be the end of the Fae!” Falk shouted, over and over until the Blades wrestled him to the ground. Then the onslaught began.

A hundred more cracks rent the air, only this time something was different—this time, people at the front of our ranks were falling, and people near me were on the ground. And blood was spilling onto the snow.

Despite the chaos that surrounded me, my brain organized what I knew about human weaponry, the details clicking into place like swords slotted into their sheaths. In the boxes were bullets, and the bullets contained gunpowder, gunpowder that had ignited, sending the bullets flying. Oddly, this realization sent a momentary burst of hope through me as though fate might reward my intellect by putting an end to the carnage. Then the hottest burn I’d ever felt ripped through the muscles of my upper arm. I cried out and clamped my hand over the offending area, staring in fascination at the blood weeping through my fingers. My hand slipped over the wound, and the true searing set in.

A battle cry heralded a tremor in the ground, and the crashing of water overpowered the sound of exploding bullets. Torrents washed over the crowd, knocking a number of us into the rapidly forming mud, but the shots ceased. When the volume of water slowed to rivulets, I looked toward the remains of Falk’s prideful effigy and saw one of the Blades in blue kneeling with her head bowed, but it wasn’t in deference to the scarecrow. She had thrown her hands upon the ground to call upon her elemental power, and had summoned the water to save us.

Only soft crying and the lowing of grief remained of the commotion. The boughs of nearby trees were bent across the street; Mother Nature had heard the call of an Earth Fae and hunched close in an effort to shield her children. Several of the Blades—those who had been closest to Falk—did not stir from their facedown positions on the ground. Falk himself lay still beneath the body of one of the Queen’s men. I drew in a cold, ragged breath, but my lungs refused to work properly and forced the air back out, making me gasp. Vertigo flitted around me like an insect. I pushed myself to my feet, the mud’s suction fighting to restrain me. It clung to my celebration dress, adhering the fabric to my legs and making it difficult to walk.

I searched the ground for Davic, and found him not far off, struggling to stand. Turning my head in frantic motions, my icy wet hair whipping across my face, I sought out Ione. She was also nearby, sitting on her bunched skirt, coughing and spitting out filth. My gaze went to the Queen, who had been protected by her Blades, their remaining number having moved her away from the site of the incident. My father broke through the guards and into my line of sight, his eyes manic.

“Anya! Anya!”

“Here!” I shouted, voice hoarse.

He rushed to my side, pulling me into a fierce embrace, and I yelped, my injury more serious than I’d realized. As he ripped open my sleeve to take a closer look, Davic and Ione joined us. Soon medicine mages and more Blades arrived on the scene to deal with the damage and the injured. Though it was clear the peril had passed, my body was levied with tremors. I tried to sit down, but my father picked me up with the ease of a young man, jerking his head for my friends to follow. I rested my head against his shoulder, for once content to let him care for me.

CHAPTER THREE

THE QUEEN’S ANLACE

Ubiqua was an emblem of righteous anger. There had been only three casualties besides Falk as a result of the previous day’s protest, a miracle considering the number of bullets that had been fired, but that was three too many. The solstice celebration was supposed to represent a new beginning, not signal the end of lives. It was supposed to be joyous, and yet even now thirteen Fae, including me, lay injured in various states of severity.

My arm had required stitches, but not much fuss beyond that. While Ubiqua paced before her throne of roots in the Court Room of the Great Redwood, I sat at a long table with my father and the members of the Queen’s Council, a group of eight who kept their ears to the walls and floors for rumors and mutterings in the Realm. They knew the people’s thoughts, feelings and plans, and made sure my aunt stayed ahead of whatever turbulence might be brewing. Unfortunately, foreknowledge of an attack like the one we’d endured yesterday, which the people had taken to calling Falk’s Pride, was hard to come by.

I sipped a mug of Sale, its primordial warmth coursing through my body with every swallow. The heat would seek out my wound and strangle the potential infection as one might wring water from a rag. The fresher the wound, the more acute the sensation—when I’d begun drinking yesterday, I’d had to breathe through the pain; now it was more of an annoyance, a tingling sensation like I’d hit my elbow. I would heal in hardly any time at all.

“The culprits?” the Queen snapped, her clasped hands white behind her back.

“Falk died during his own assault,” my father replied, shuffling some documents on the tabletop. A ceremonial fire pit crackled and hissed at his back. “One of his sons was a fatality, another has been arrested, and the third is missing.”

“A search is being conducted for the third?”

“Of course, but I have little hope of finding him. The bedlam across the city after the incident would have granted him more than enough opportunity to disappear. In my opinion, we won’t hear from him again.”

Ubiqua nodded solemnly, jaw and lips tight. She was regal in her simple brown gown, worn to honor the dead in their return to the earth, but beneath her composure roiled an anger the like of which I’d never seen in her before. It was cold and hard, the will of Nature that might at any moment quake the ground.

“Question the young man in custody,” she ordered. “Find out where the missing brother may have gone. Do not stop the hunt until he is located, arrested, or driven from our Realm. So help me, I will never see innocent blood on the streets of Chrior again.”

Respect emanated from everyone at the table. I watched Ubiqua closely for emotions and subconscious expressions, clues about how she was coping on the inside that might help me become as fit a ruler as she. Aside from granite conviction, I detected very little.

“The people look to us for guidance,” she continued. “They are gathering at the palm in accordance with my request?”

Tthias, Envoy to the Public, confirmed this. “They await the Queen, the Lord of the Law, and her Court.”

“Good. We shall meet them.”

Ubiqua descended her dais and all stood. Abandoning my Sale, I followed her and the members of the Council to the ridge, only pausing once when my father placed his hand on my shoulder. I turned to him, my gaze traveling upward to meet his blue eyes, and he pulled me aside.

“You’ve hardly spoken since you were injured.”

“There hasn’t been much need.”

He nodded, though his furrowed brow told me it was not due to agreement. “I don’t care who you talk to—me, your aunt, Davic, or Ione. But open up to someone, Anya. Talk about what happened yesterday.”

I ran my fingers over my mending injury. “Father, I’m fine. This is hardly a wound at all.”

“It’s not the physical I’m referring to, my dear. When mortality rears its head, no one emerges ‘fine.’ No one.”

He squeezed my good arm and stepped past me, and I watched him go in bewilderment. I truly did feel fine, on the inside as well as the outside, but he evidently did not expect that to continue.

The Court joined us at the palm and we sang to honor the solstice and comfort one another, reinterpreting the melodies and verses of our ancestors’ joyous holiday cants to infuse lamentations...eulogies. Some of us could not carry a tune, but the observance was not about perfection; it was about embracing the imperfections in each other and in our world, imperfections that had been shown in sharp relief the previous day.

The citizens who had gathered on the walk below bowed their heads until we were finished. Then, in accordance with tradition, the Queen removed the Royal Anlace from its sheath at her hip and moved to the trunk of the tree, where love-carvings from every occasion surrounded the entrance. She would add something now to honor this solstice and remember the dead. But she stopped before touching the blade to the wood, contemplated, and looked to me.

“Anya,” she said, extending the Anlace. “You do the love-carving. This year, I feel it should be you.”

The Court, the Council and the citizenry were all still, waiting for my reaction to color their own, but I could muster none beyond a blank, stupid stare. No one but Fae rulers had carved the Great Redwood in the past—no one but Fae rulers had ever held the Anlace. But its ruby-studded pommel winked at me, expecting my fingers to close around it and shield it from the wind. I wanted to back away, but I couldn’t refuse the Queen’s offer, no matter how many centuries of tradition it shattered. Superstition aside, this was a distinction bestowed upon no other. Ubiqua was telling her people to follow me, to believe in me, alas before I’d been given the chance to decide if I believed in myself.

“Anya,” Davic murmured, a subtle prompt, while Ione reached out to touch my hand. Their presence gave me courage, reminding me that I would not be alone in facing my new future.

Ubiqua was compelling me with her eyes, and the Anlace still glinted in the bright winter light. Bolstered, I went forward and accepted it. In my hand, it felt diseased, as though the queasiness spreading through my body was punishment from the knife itself for seizing this power before it was due to me. Nonetheless, I went to the trunk and left my mark: half a snowflake, the top obscured by the crescent moon. The winter solstice was a long and frigid night that broke unto a fresh dawn, perhaps one with no more fear and no more needless death.

“Thank you,” Ubiqua said with that tender smile of hers.

The look she received from me in return was less than friendly. She had, without warning, put me center stage in what was sure to be a controversy. I hadn’t even adjusted to the idea of taking the throne; I didn’t need all Faefolk discussing the possibility, wondering what the Queen’s gesture meant. I held out the Anlace to her, wanting it gone, but she wrapped her hand around mine, trapping the knife in my fist.

“Keep it,” she whispered.

A painful throbbing began behind my eyes, the tension spreading its tendrils to my temples, and then, like a thorned vine, to my heart, squeezing slowly. Ubiqua gave an address, but I couldn’t make out a word. I left as soon as I could, not wanting to be in the presence of so many questioning gazes, not wanting to feel the anxiety and pressure they created. The Council especially was examining me, seeming to wonder how this daughter of a youngest child had risen to wear the Queen’s dagger on her hip, to pilfer it away from its owner and from Illumina, its rightful inheritor.

With the sun setting, I withdrew to my alcove and closed the door behind me. Though I wanted to believe I had shut out the world, even here I could not hide from the burden my aunt had handed me in the form of a gold-pommeled Anlace.

I stalked back and forth across the main living area, covering my mouth to keep near-hysterical gasps from razing my throat. Instead, they came short and fast through my nose, and dizziness threatened to overtake me. My life was no longer mine to control. By a single deed, I had become something more than I wanted to be in the people’s eyes. My aunt had known that I was, consciously or unconsciously, keeping a back door open, and without hesitation she’d closed it.