Page 8

Chapter

Eight

I didn’t have time to sleep. I lay curled up on the blue mat in Ruin’s clothing until the warehouse was dark and quiet, all the kids sprawled in a pile of limbs and fur while I carefully searched fairy minds for who could have known I was here, and who would have wanted to kill me, or Max, if he was the target.

Soft fur brushed my hand, and I automatically reached my fingers out to touch it. That wolf hair was well-conditioned. Was it Max? I forced myself to focus on the fairy minds in the surrounding city, and not on Max and his many variations. There were so many minds that were unclear, filled with a buzzing haze that offered me nothing. I couldn’t find the mind of the one who had explained how to terraform a cave so thoroughly until hours had passed, and I was struggling not to fall asleep.

There was a flash of fear that cleared the mind enough for me to recognize it as the terraformer. I saw an image of a feral fairy with a knife, felt the pain in his neck, his chest, as she stabbed him, and then turned and darted away, pink and yellow wings flopping uselessly behind her as she ran with whatever she’d taken from him clutched to her chest.

I sat up. I needed his knowledge. Fairies didn’t have books, we had people who carried information with them. Maybe we should do books, because people died, and their knowledge with them unless they imprinted it into a tree like they were supposed to. Hm. Maybe we could have a repository forest in the werewolf caverns. That could be a noble cause for the sake of my kingdom. Otherwise, terraforming the caverns was too altruistic, and all because Max had trapped me in my words.

I needed to find out who was targeting him and his people. I need to find out how someone was able to block me. None of the fairies seemed to have the slightest idea, but Max had a whole stack of books about Fairyland. Maybe an outsider had written something that was impossible to see from the inside. As for the terraformer fairy who was bleeding out…I wasn’t the greatest healer, but I could certainly keep him alive.

I crept out of the warehouse, wishing I had my cloak of shadows, but it was in the caverns wherever Ruin had stashed it. I hurried through Song, pulled east, in the direction of the river, hunching in my hoodie and wishing my wings were invisible. No one looked at me twice, so maybe the normal clothing helped camouflage me.

Once I got to the top city, I ran, not trying to be stealthy, needing to get to the fairy before he bled out. I followed the thin, buzzing, hazy threads of his mind until I reached a gate in the golden wall that surrounded the city. Above me was a stretch of road with the roaring cars thundering above, rushing through the wall and across the wide river. The lights, the sound, it was all very distracting, but I held onto that slippery mind as I dashed through the gate and headed south, on the walkway beside the street that followed the curve of the river.

I found him beneath another massive car bridge, between the wall and the cement. A metal bridge was suspended above the terraformer where he curled up in a pile of rags and rubble.

I put my hands on his face and called on the night, the moon, the stars behind the filmy wisps of clouds, to bring him peace and rest. Then I put my palm over the cut in his neck and the gash in his chest and called his blood back into him and commanded the flesh to smooth together. He smelled like garbage mixed with sticky-sweet syrup. He smelled worse than Max’s beast, by far.

He sat up abruptly, covering my hands with his as he stared at me blankly. Most fairies couldn’t see in the dark without some effort. “My Queen?” he whispered, the exhale of his breath like a punch in my nose. Gag. His breath was putrid.

I flinched before I smiled. “Princess.”

It was his turn to flinch. He tried to scoot away from me, but he was already between a rock and a hard place. “What do you want?” he whispered. “Have you finally come to punish me for deserting your army?”

I stared at him, the fear and panic in his eyes mixed with hopelessness. He wouldn’t fight me. Of course not. Only an idiot would fight the death fairy. “Who stabbed you?” I finally asked, because that was the priority.

He shrugged and glanced past me into the darkness before refocusing on my face. Was it glowing? Probably, because the moon was out, and that kind of thing happened. “I don’t remember.”

I sent the image of the girl who had stabbed him into his mind and he gasped and flinched back again, this time hitting his head on the golden wall behind him.

“You’re really in my head,” he whispered, horror in his eyes and across his face. “They’ve been saying that they could hear you, but I never thought the Queen…Princess would want any of my thoughts. Are you really terraforming werewolf caverns? Why?”

“Who stabbed you?” I repeated.

He blinked rapidly. “Apologies, Princess. Her name’s Shotglass. She’s been here a little less time than me. I was one of the first, came here directly after I left Fairyland during the war. Are you going to execute me? It would almost be a relief after all this time.”

I wanted to poke his forehead or shake him. Yes, I came to heal you so I could execute you. Idiot. “Your thoughts are very hazy. Why is that?”

He blinked at me. “Pixie dust. They say that not even the Queen can touch our minds when we’re riding the stars.”

“Pixie dust?” That’s what Max thought I was doing. Riding on the stars? “Explain. You can use words, or, if you’d rather, I can get it out of your thoughts.”

He shuddered. “No, Princess. No need to pierce my mind. I will tell you all. Pixie dust makes life sweet, bearable, and it is the greatest treasure you can find.” His eyes were sunken, like his cheeks. He was in terrible shape, even worse than I’d been when I came here, sick, my own thoughts blurry.

“What is it?” I repeated. “What is it made out of? Where does it come from? Why aren’t you eating? Is it the death-sickness that makes you look this way?”

He blinked at me, confusion written on his face. “You are not what I expected the death fairy to be like when she came for me. So many questions. The pixie dust is a drug that changes the mind, however bleak the reality. But it wears off and you need more. There are dust dealers, and some fairies work for them for their supply. I did for some time, worked for a sorcerer, but that was long ago, before the fall of Song, and then the recent rebuild. The death sickness isn’t as bad as being cut off from Fairyland. But none of us will ever go back,” he said, suddenly fierce.

“Why not?” I asked, curious.

He stared at me. “Why not? Because we’ll be executed by the death queen.”

“Princess. And I didn’t kill all the werewolves when I had the chance, just sent them away. Why would I execute my own?” I shook my head. “You make no sense. I guess that’s the mind-altering pixie dust for you. No one is going to force you to return to Fairyland. If you’ve committed a crime, you’ll be tried by law. But fairy law doesn’t do executions, just exile if your crimes are truly horrible. You’ve already exiled yourself.” I frowned as I studied him. “You should stop taking pixie dust and eat real food instead. We need your mind. If you aren’t going to live well, at least find someone who you can pass your wisdom to before you expire. Or I suppose you could write it down. Or put it in a tree.” Yes, that would be doubly useful.

He stared at me. “Are you mad? You must be. Write down my knowledge, when it has been so carefully hidden for so long?”

I shrugged. “Who else is going to want to terraform caves? Or shells? Preserving the knowledge is more important than hoarding it. Now then. Other fairies have whispered that they heard me. Are any of them competent enough to perform a spell that could bring a cave down on my head?”

He stared at me, unblinking for a long time, before he finally shook his head. “No one would be so foolish as to try and harm the Queen of Death.”

“Princess of Death. Of course not, but is there anyone here with the skills to do so?”

He blinked at me. “Of course. There are not many pure-blood fairies from Fairyland, but there are many, many of mixed blood who call themselves fairies. They have the wings. The mayor is one of those. His magic is strong, and he studied at some academy for light creatures, so he probably has the knowledge. There are others, fairy descendants who are studied, and might not know who you are and what it means to threaten you.”

“How many fairies from Fairyland are in Singsong?”

“Less than a hundred. More than fifty. They come and go. If you want to see them, I can take you to the docks, where they gather for gruel.”

“Gruel?”

“The alpha werewolf brings breakfast to the homeless who live on the river banks. You didn’t know? I thought that might be why you were terraforming the caverns for him, to return the favor he’s done for fairies for the last seventy-five years. He’s kept more alive than I can count. Still, he’s terrifying, and if he catches you stealing from him, or causing trouble, he’ll take you and rehabilitate you.” He shuddered theatrically. “No more pixie dust,” he cried mournfully.

That explained so much about Max and the way he looked at me, someone he’d caught breaking into his caverns, so he was going to rehabilitate me. Why in the world would he do such a senseless thing? “And these fairies he rehabilitates, they get better?”

He shrugged. “That’s what they say, that they’re much happier, and we should all quit pixie dust. But who can when we’re cut off from Fairyland?”

“You can go back if you want. I’m not even there to be terrifying, if that’s what worries you.”

He frowned, then shook his head. “But there is no pixie dust there.”

“Ah, the catch twenty-two. I don’t know what that really means. I just picked it up somewhere. If only I could pick up reading as easily as spoken languages.”

“You can’t read?” He looked more fascinated than horrified, but that was in there.

I shrugged. “Take me to the gruel.”

He looked up at the sky. “It won’t be for hours yet, but that’s where all the fairies will be. You can ask your questions. I don’t socialize much. I’m far gone, just waiting for the final night to take me.” He touched his neck, his chest, frowning at me. “You healed me? Ah. You healed my mind as well. Good thing, or I’d be mostly incoherent.”

“You’re still mostly incoherent,” I said and patted his head.

He flinched away from me, but I found it more amusing than insulting.

“Since it’s not for hours, you can go to your hotel and rest until daylight.” He gave me a smile that was incredibly sketchy, and missing most of his teeth. He was officially in terrible shape. Happily, fairy teeth grew back, like wings.

I smiled brightly at him. “That does sound wonderful, but not nearly as exciting as spending the night here, with my new friend…What is your name, friend?”

He sighed heavily. “Berry. What are you going to do to me until sunrise?”

“I’m going to talk to you about terraforming, naturally.”

“But isn’t it faster for you to take the knowledge from my mind?”

“You make it sound as though I’m stealing.”

He shook his head rapidly. “No, Quee—princess! Not at all! You are all things just and virtuous and beautiful.”

I snorted. “You are clearly a smidge off the straight and narrow, Berry. If your name’s really Berry. I’m nothing close to beautiful and virtuous, but I am mostly just. That’s Vervain. He keeps me honest. Mostly.”

“Your consort is Vervain the Terrible, Lord of the House of the Rising Sun?”

I blinked at him. “The Terrible? That’s so true though! He’s really terrible, always being so virtuous and good, and telling you that you need to go to court functions and stop feeling sorry for yourself.” I patted his head again. “He’s not my consort, though. I’m not virtuous enough for him.”

He stared at me, his mouth opening and closing. I wished it would stay closed. Finally, he said, “You choose your consort. The Queen always chooses her consort. No one would dare refuse.”

“Yes, but I’m not the Queen, and only an idiot would choose someone who doesn’t like them. I might be sketchy, but I’m not a fool. So, tell me about planting trees in the fresh soil. Will I need to amend it with anything? I used blood, saliva, and a roach. There’s also so many owl droppings. The bugs here are so filthy and ugly. Nothing like Fairyland.” I now understood the café guy’s reaction when he heard I ate bugs. The black roaches weren’t cute at all.

“Yes,” he said absently, staring at me. “The bugs here are bad. You’re the Queen, so your power would be stronger, but the process takes time. At least a week with a whole crew of experienced workers, forming the spells, deepening the soil, expanding the field gradually.”

I frowned at him. “So, you’re saying that I’ll need to deepen the soil so the trees can get root? It took a few minutes, maybe hours, to transform the rock to soil in the cavern. I don’t know how wide it went because the ceiling came down on us, but we had to dig our way out through the soil, so that was at least, hm, six feet deep, and we were in there for a good long time. Although it may have seemed disproportionately long considering the circumstances. At least twenty feet, probably twice that, and it was loose soil all the way to the mouth of the cavern.”

His mouth fell open and stayed that way. “A few minutes? You terraformed rock into soil in a few minutes? Why do we do anything if the Queen can do it so easily and without any effort?”

I blinked at him. “I could only do it at all because you have the knowledge. And I’m not the Queen.”

He scowled at me, his disgust apparently outweighing his fear. “You’re only not the Queen because you’re in denial. And you don’t have pixie dust to blame it on. What are you doing here when you have Fairyland to fix? I’ve heard stories about it. You’ve let it go, and you could have…” He sputtered at the end, leaving me to nod.

“Sure, if I was the Queen, I could have done something, but I’m not the Queen, and I can’t fix something when I’m broken. It’s a reflection of me. Look at how Fairyland’s gone, and that’s me. I’ve been feeling better lately, so maybe being cut off from Fairyland helps, but the death sickness keeps me from doing much of anything useful there.”

“That’s why you left? You have to go back and fix it! You can’t abandon your people!”

I eyed him. “Really? Unlike you, who did what? The Princess or Queen isn’t any more essential than any other person. If you want to lecture someone, go with the person inside your own skin. Then again, you’ll be talking to yourself, and everyone will think you’re a crazy person, but if you do pixie dust, which does worse things to you than death sickness, of your own free will? That’s crazy.”

He scowled at me, then shook his head. “It’s not possible that one person, even if she were a Queen, could have transformed so much stone in such a small amount of time.”

I stared at him. “Why do people keep saying that things aren’t possible? You have fairy wings and sweat glitter. Do you know what’s impossible? For fairies, weak, pathetic, helpless creatures to defeat the most powerful army known to man. Impossible? I don’t think you understand what that word means. Impossible is talking to a terraformer who doesn’t terraform anything. I’m glad you left during the war, because we didn’t need doubt when we were determined to do the impossible. Which, for the record, wasn’t impossible after all. Go to sleep.” I blew on him, a little vapor of my sleep potion, and he slumped down in his rags and started snoring. “Seriously, Berry. You know so much, but understand so little.”

“Ahem.” Someone cleared their throat in the shadows. I could see in the dark, so I didn’t understand until Max dropped my cloak of shadows and came forward, wrapping it up before he crouched down next to me. “You sound so wise for one wearing a hoodie.”

I stared at him, feeling uncertain. “I’m not here looking for pixie dust.”

He nodded. “I heard. Death sickness? What’s that about?”

I looked at him and then away, out over the water that flickered silver as it picked up the city’s reflected lights. “Fairies weren’t made for death. Too much of it makes us sick.”

“Huh. So, why are you the princess instead of the queen? What’s the difference if there is no queen and you’re still the ultimate ruler?”

I sighed heavily. “You know the worst thing? I touched him, so my hand now smells like ick. Your beast smells so much better than him. I think I’m going to make them bathe before they come to the caverns.”

“Who?”

I turned to smile at him, leaning my cheek against my knees over the soft fabric. “All the fairies at your gruel party. I’m going to have them plant trees for your forest while we go find some sky. I want to see your favorite sky in the whole world.”

He raised a dark brow. “What if they don’t want to go plant trees? They’re pixie-dust addicts.”

“Are you going to say it’s impossible?” I raised my head and studied him.

He smiled slightly. “Never. You have fairy wings and sweat glitter. How could I doubt? It might not be ethical, however. If you’re not even their Queen, how can you ask something of them?”

I elbowed him. “Like you rehabilitate people against their will? What’s up with that? It’s right up there with worshipping owl gods.”

“I don’t worship an owl god, I worship the moon goddess. The owl god is just a buddy.”

“Oh. That explains everything. I need to shower your beast. Can we do it when we get the sky? There are falls, aren’t there? Then he can have more space.”

“You mean you can have more space.”

I looked at him and shrugged. “I’m more than slightly overwhelmed at the prospect of shampooing your beast. Oh, but I didn’t bring the bubblegum shampoo. I was all set on us having the same fabulous candy scent.”

He blinked slowly. “I’ll have someone bring it when they bring the car to the gruel party. You’re a little scary, Princess Sparkles.”

I nodded. “I am, but you’re scarier.”

He shrugged. “I suppose that depends who you ask. Did you put him to sleep by blowing on him?”

I pressed my lips together for a moment before I smiled at him. “Maybe.”

“Maybe? You have poison, venom, glue, and a sleep potion in your mouth? The Swiss Army Knife is jealous.”

“I have no idea what that is.”

“I’ll get you one for your birthday.”

“I have no idea when that is.”

“Then I’ll get you one for my birthday. Actually, I don’t know when that is, either. We can choose a date and share it, so we can get double the presents.”

“Or halve them. You could get me a knife, and I could get you the same one. That sounds positively efficient.”

“I am alarmingly efficient. All the death fairies say so.”

I flinched and turned away from him, pulling my limbs in and feeling the cold more than I had a second ago. Yes, some people called me a death fairy, but that’s not what I was. That’s what I’d been forced to become so I could save my people the only way I knew how. I was young, inexperienced, and ruled by emotions.

“Sorry, Princess Sparkles. You’re a midnight fairy. The only death you deal is when you play cards.”

“I don’t play cards.”

He pulled a small rectangle out of his inside pocket and winked at me. “Now you do. What’s your pleasure? Go fish? Rummy? Or poker?”

“Poker?” I asked blankly.

He started shuffling the cards rapidly. “Good. Fairies are supposed to bluff better than a buffalo. That’s another saying that makes no sense, like Catch-22 unless you’ve read the novel.”

“Oh. It’s from a book. You’ve read it?” I asked, taking the cards he offered me.

“My beast read it. He reads more than you’d think. Are you impressed?”

“Very. I’ve only read ‘The Wolf Wore Pajamas.’ I imagine Catch-22 had a different plot, and a few more words.”

“That’s right. Actually, it’s surprisingly relevant. A soldier feigned madness in order to avoid a war, but the fact that he did so proved his sanity. Catch-22. Your efforts to avoid prove the ultimate vehicle to bring about what you were avoiding. So, you’re avoiding being Queen…”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “You think you’re so smart.”

He nudged me with his elbow, only gently so he didn’t knock me over onto Berry. With his superior senses, no doubt he was reeling from the scent of the pixie-dust addict. “I’m the Alpha, so I can avoid being controlled, but the pack controls me more than I do myself. Catch-22. Also, I won’t take any higher positions, because I know that responsibility is the ultimate trap. I have to be free to follow my moon.”

“Well, I’m nothing like that.”

“No? Why, then? Why are you dodging Queenship like a bullet?”

“Because bullets kill you. And so does being Queen.”

He studied me for a long time before he put an arm over my shoulder and pulled me over so I fell into him. He was warm in spite of the chilly night breeze, and he smelled much better than my bubblegum shampoo. Spicy. Like the wind and something fresh.

“Okay, Princess Sparkles. I personally think you’re just avoiding being tied to this Vervain the Terrible.”

I looked up at him, but I didn’t lift my head off his shoulder. It was comfortable, and I was very tired. “I’m going to close my eyes for a second. Can you make sure Berry doesn’t take off? You can teach me poker later.”

“I’ll keep an eye on Berry if I don’t fall asleep.”

“Werewolves are nocturnal.”

“So are Midnight fairies. Yes. Sleep. I will guard your dreams, princess. And the rest of you.”

I closed my eyes and let his warmth soak into me, surrounding me like a blanket of warmth and safety that nothing could pierce. Even a bullet.