Shayne Lyro and the Present
The amount of glitter on the Lyro table was a form of eye torture all on its own. Shayne squinted when the late evening sun dipped low enough to pierce through the arched dining room windows and reflect off the thousands of silver flakes adorning the tablecloth around everyone’s plates. It brought a whole new meaning to the term ‘blinding sunset’. He covered his eyes and peeked through a slit in his fingers, his gaze falling on an empty seat at the far end of the table. A seat that had been empty for more years than he could remember now. Truly, he almost forgot he once had a sister.
Shayne sighed and dropped his hand, deciding to close his eyes for the rest of the dinner instead. He wasn’t even hungry. He wouldn’t have come to this feast at all if Hans-Der—Shayne’s ever-smiling blood father—hadn’t required everyone’s attendance for whatever unimportant announcement he claimed to have to make. It made Shayne wonder what he was even still doing in this House.
He’d come to kill a dreamslipper. To rid himself of his nightmares. To sever the new, creative hold the House of Lyro had on him and be done with them forever .
Unfortunately, he didn’t realize until he got here that he couldn’t kill the pretty, trapped fairy. That he perhaps didn’t want to—ever since the moment he saw her in that miserable gilded cage and read the story in her eyes that told him she despised the Lyro name just as much as he did. Truly, he’d expected to meet some powerful siren queene working alongside his brothers and laughing in the rewards of their mutual wicked deeds. But Mycra Sentorious wasn’t that.
No, she was a night blossom with her petals torn off. A butterfly with ripped wings. A lovely beast with its ankle caught in a snare. She was, in every way, a prisoner.
And Shayne didn’t kill prisoners.
He adjusted in his seat, his heavy boots getting caught on the floor because he once again forgot he was wearing them. Down the table, a few of his blood brothers and his father’s esteemed guests lifted their heads at the boot-stomping ruckus. But they soon forgot about Shayne’s tap-dance show when the wide doors were opened and the Lyro’s favourite family prize was guided through their midst: their lovely, imprisoned dreamslipper with her wildly piercing green eyes and silk black hair.
The most powerful allies of Lyro grinned around the table, nodding their approval and clapping—including Lord Isbeth; former war fae with wind power that could rip up a forest. Many allies of the Lyro House were terrifying in their own way, wielding North powers so great they could freeze enemies or bury a fairy in the cold earth with a sweep of their hand. Shayne was no match for them, but that had never stopped him from chasing their daughters for kisses and challenging their sons to reckless duels in his youth.
In the grand doorway, a tetrad of Lyro guards held tight to gold chains clasped to the gilded collar at the dreamslipper’s throat. Mycra Sentorious scanned the faces down the table from beneath her ink-black lashes. Even though she was being led into the feast like a dog, she looked as if she hadn’t a care in the faeborn world, and for that Shayne mustered up a special smile just for her. When her gaze swept across the feast, it caught on Shayne’s magnificent smile.
She didn’t smile back.
Mycra did, however, swallow. The second her eyes met his, a fearful expression appeared.
But by the time the guards brought her to her seat at the foot of the table, the look was gone. Mycra lowered herself gracefully into her seat, and a heaping plate of spellbuns and hot squash was placed before her. She didn’t touch her chopsticks. She didn’t eat. Shayne wondered if her next ploy to escape this household was to starve herself to death.
Frankly, he’d observed her forced to attend numerous events since he’d arrived. She’d been decorated in the finest jewels, blossom wreathes, and gold-braided crowns, and paraded before the Lyro House’s powerful friends like an expensive painting they wanted to brag about. Yes, Shayne guessed she would probably rather be dead than to continue living this way. His guesses were put on hold though when Hans-Der Lyro uttered across the space, “I’ve brought you all here to announce that I’ll be leaving the House for ten days,” he said. Then he nodded to his allies around the table. “As you can see, I’ve brought witnesses to this announcement. Which means, I expect you all to behave until I get back. Or you’ll suffer my wrath and the wrath of my allies who will be checking in on you while I’m gone.” Hans-Der seemed particularly intent on eyeing Kahn-Der—the oldest brother of the Lyro family—and Jethwire—Shayne’s first younger brother—and Massie—Shayne’s second younger brother—and, of course, Shayne.
That was it. Mycra’s bright gaze darted to Shayne’s. It was swift, and pointed, and full of warning. Her eyes dropped to her plate again, and the nonchalance returned like a beautiful mask.
Shayne leaned back in his chair, tapping a finger against the tabletop as he thought about that. For weeks now, Mycra had been warning him that his brothers planned to kill him, which he’d expected since the moment he’d set foot in his childling home. But today the pretty fairy looked different. Today, there was a tone of discovery in her eyes. Maybe she’d overheard something or stole information from his brothers’ dreams.
Shayne dragged his attention over to Kahn-Der down the table. Kahn-Der ate his hot squash in modest bites, his shiny white hair falling out of place when he leaned forward. Even while eating, the fairy possessed a crooked smile. He hadn’t reacted to the news of Hans-Der’s ten-day-long departure, which meant he already knew about it. Which meant he might have even crafted a plan to make the most of it.
Shayne’s gaze hopped to Jethwire next, where the flute he’d stolen from a sea siren rested quietly beside his dinner plate. Then to Massie. They were the only two Shayne thought weren’t a threat, since they’d both made it clear they didn’t desire the chair belonging to the heir of the household. But Massie lifted his head from his soup just a little. He stole a look at Jethwire, and Jethwire looked back.
A wide smile spread across Shayne’s face. He set down his chopsticks, finding no use for them now. How could he eat when it was so painfully obvious his brothers had a plot to kill him? Even the smell in the room had changed to one of hushed hatred and stabby intentions.
Truly, he wondered what had taken them so long. Every day he’d waited for the cold iron stab of Kahn-Der’s long-bladed fairsaber. He’d hardly slept in giddy anticipation of it. Shayne lifted his goblet of spiked citrus. He drank slowly, savouring the sweet and sour taste. It wasn’t like Kahn-Der to show mercy, and Jethwire and Massie were possibly worse. Shayne guessed they planned to either torture him until he was an eternally broken fairy—unfit to be seen in public or to take his birthright chair—or they’d kill him outright. Probably the latter.
It was hilarious that his brothers thought they could beat him. Sure, the Lyros had always been masters of unfathomable torture. But Shayne had spent many years as an assassin, and he possessed no shortage of ways to end them in style. Now that he’d decided not to kill the poor dreamslipper, Shayne’s plan had been to play along as the returned prodigal son for a while and sneak back out of the House when a good distraction presented itself. But maybe destroying everyone was the best way.
Since the announcement was complete, Hans-Der lifted from his seat while dabbing his lips with a cloth. “Shall we retire to the meeting room?” he asked his ally Lords.
Seven powerful fairy heads nodded. Seven fairies stood. Seven fairies left, until it was just Shayne along with his brothers in the dining room, a quiet dreamslipper, and a handful of lesser fairies in burlap carrying in sugar plums on bronze platters for dessert.
No one touched the dessert.
Shayne set down his goblet of spiked citrus and turned to glance at Kahn-Der down the table. He pulled his mouth into a smile. “Let’s die together then. Tonight,” he said.
And just like that, everyone in the room froze like an icy wind had blown in from the mountains. Like the words had been spoken by a ghost.
No, it wasn’t the suggestion that shook the pebbles in the floor and made the curtains shudder an exhale. It was the words that every Lyro brother had heard once before. Words meant to remind them of the fairy who used to sit in that empty chair at the far end of the table.
Kahn-Der, of course, reached for a sugar plum after all and bit into it with all the fake nonchalance of a stage actor in the North High Court’s seasonal Yule ceremonies. “What would make you say such a thing, Brother?” he asked. He licked the purple juices from his shapely lips, and his ice-blue gaze fired up to Shayne, sharp and laugh-worthy.
Shayne held his gaze like that, smiling just a little wider. “We’re evenly matched, I think,” he bluffed. Obviously, Shayne was far above Kahn-Der’s level. “Therefore, chances are we’ll both die in the end, right?” He took his goblet and downed the rest of his spiked citrus all at once to meet the absurd level of Kahn-Der’s drama. Then he slammed the goblet on the tabletop, making glitter puff into the air and swirl in the breezy current fluttering through the room. “I’ve been waiting for this for weeks. Meet me on the roof—just like in the dreams you sent me. Unless you’re a coward, of course? I can’t imagine the embarrassment you’d bring to this family if you didn’t show up.”
Jethwire choked on his plum across the table. He bit his lips over a diabolical grin, proving that even though he wished to see Shayne as a lifeless fairy corpse by the end of the week, he could appreciate a good verbal arse-whacking.
Kahn-Der was not so generous with his smiles. Instead, a death song chanted from his deep blue gaze. His fingers tightened around his plum, and streams of purple juice leaked through his fingers, running down his hand and dripping onto his silver plate like fairy blood. But the oldest Lyro brother kept a relaxed posture as he dropped the plum’s pit and reached casually for a cloth. He dabbed his hand dry, seeming lost in his own dark world.
“I applaud you, Brother, for being willing to face me,” he finally said to Shayne, “and for not running off.”
Shayne sighed, smiled, and pushed his full plate away as he stood, letting his sliding chair send a sharp sound through the dining room. “Yes, well, not all of us are cowards.”
Shayne whistled as he rounded the table and headed from the feast toward the maze of hallways he’d gotten lost in so many times as a childling. Just another trap Hans-Der had devised to keep his family close. To ensure they never found their way out.
Something tickled the back of Shayne’s throat as he pushed open the dining room doors. He coughed, and then he paused, glancing back into the dining room where his plate rested, heaped with delicious looking, untouched food. He wasn’t foolish enough to eat it and ingest whatever poison might have been hiding inside. He rubbed a hand down his neck, remembering how his throat often acted up when the dry snowy season approached. His shoulders relaxed, and when he saw Kahn-Der sizing him up, Shayne winked. Just a little bat of his eye—yet a full promise.
The frostiness of Kahn-Der’s gaze followed Shayne until he kicked the dining room doors shut behind him.
It was less than three hours before Shayne realized his mistake. He stared at himself in the dull mirror of his bedroom, his reflection going in and out of focus. He’d tried to upheave the spiked citrus the moment his stomach grew warm, but it was much too late for that.
It started with his abdomen feeling pricky, and then it moved to his limbs, and it hit his eyes last. His breathing grew strained, and he leaned forward against his dresser as he fumbled around for his fairsaber, knowing he had to get out of this room. Knowing they would come for him any minute if he didn’t.
Knowing he had a prisoner to free before it was too late.
The basement was far too dark for someone to live in, but it was where the Lyro family kept their prisoner, nonetheless. Not even a torch or a fireplace was lit. Shayne was sure he’d walk into something face-first and break his beautiful nose if he wasn’t careful. He kept a hand along the wall, brushing over cool stones as he stumbled deeper into the space. He remembered running through these chilly tunnels in bare feet in his childling years; stealing tiny, rare items from the shelves, running his fingers along the weapons on the walls, pretending to fight shadows with a blade like they were real fairies.
Little did he know he’d turn out to be an assassin. That he would get quite good at fighting his enemies for real. That at full strength, he’d become nearly unstoppable.
He should have known his brothers would target his strength first.
Shayne hadn’t exactly been given a warm welcome when he’d waltzed in the front entrance and announced himself months ago. Only his father had accepted him back in with open arms, which was odd considering Hans-Der was the one who’d sent Shayne away in the first place. It was his brothers and all the old House allies that had treated Shayne like he’d walked over from the House of Riothin or some other hated rival. Since that day, the threat of Shayne’s existence had hung in every room he’d walked into like a loud, shiny, eye-catching chandelier. He’d become the focal point of several noble households’ gossip. He was pretty sure the House of Calamity was already trying to marry him off to one of their blue-haired females.
A tiny light flickered on, illuminating an orb of space in the basement. Shayne glanced over to find a dreamslipper, with a particularly pointed look, holding a lantern. He smiled and went to meet Mycra at the bars of her cage.
“You almost walked right past me,” she said. The lantern light made her bright eyes dance as she looked him over, taking in his state. “Tell me what you’re doing down here,” she demanded like she ruled the whole wide world, and Shayne sighed. “You’re not well,” she added with realization. “Don’t tell me they poisoned you with a numbing weed or something.”
“Fine,” Shayne slurred. “I won’t tell you.”
Mycra’s fingers tightened around her light. “Make a bargain for your life before they take it.”
Shayne shook a finger at her. “Never make a bargain with a fairy,” he said, using the same finger to flick a gold bar between them. “That’s my motto.”
Mycra blinked like she didn’t know what a ‘motto’ was, and Shayne waved a hand through the air. “Never mind. It’s a human thing,” he said. “But forget bargains. I’m here to set you free.”
Her face changed. “Why?”
Shayne shrugged. “Well, if they kill me tonight, they’ll probably kill you next. I think it’s obvious my blood brothers have caught on to our alliance.” Her features went blurry, and he squinted, sure she was disappearing. That his surroundings were all melting. He tried to shake the dizziness from his head.
Mycra grunted in her high voice. “I’d love to see them try. I’ll tear them to shreds from the inside out—mind first.”
Shayne snorted a laugh. It was his favourite when she used her deadly words. “Tsk, tsk. Naughty siren. It’s not even my birthday and you’re offering up presents.” He drew a short dagger from his pocket. “And you know full well you can only destroy one fairy at a time. If you target someone from my household, the rest of the House will come after you in the morning.”
Mycra’s face fell. She put a hand over the bloodlock on the door and said, “Wait.”
Shayne paused with the dagger against his palm.
“You’re not going to run away with me?” Her throat bobbed. “I thought we’d go find your friend together.”
Shayne’s smile widened. “Are you talking about my Dranian?” He laughed, and the sound echoed through the basement. “You and I might be allies today, but we have a long way to go before I’ll trust a powerful dreamslipper to be near my forever friend.”
Mycra’s mouth pinched. It was hilarious, and Shayne almost barked another laugh.
“I could just wait until you sleep and steal the information of his whereabouts from you,” she pointed out with extra-thin words. “The only reason I haven’t already is because I thought we were on the same team.”
Shayne dropped the dagger back to his side. Naturally, Mycra’s eyes followed it, and a teensy flicker of regret crossed her face.
“You might as well join my blood brothers in trying to kill me if you want that information,” Shayne stated. “Now, quit begging for things you can’t have and get ready to run. The alarm will sing through the House when I break this lock.”
Mycra’s bright eyes widened. “Wait—”
Shayne slashed his palm and grabbed the bloodlock, but he ripped his hand back when low, dark laughter flitted through the basement. It was too late though—the wailing alarm vibrated through every staircase, room, and hall. Shayne whirled. His oldest brother was hidden by the darkness, but the scent of ripe plums and expensive linens floated through the space. He sniffed.
Many expensive linens.
Kahn-Der was the first to step into the lantern light. The glow illuminated the metallic-scaled lamellar armour and the long, thin fairsaber strapped to his hip. Shayne swallowed as more fairies emerged from the darkness. Jethwire and Massie wore cruel grins and the rich, red hanboks of Lyro. Behind them, others drew forward just enough for Shayne to know they were there—fairy faces of males Shayne once knew, fairies he once ran through the cherry blossom orchards alongside.
They all teetered along with the room. Shayne’s vision, limbs, and senses betrayed him as he forgot every trick of his assassin training.
Kahn-Der smiled. Shayne wanted to tell him his smile was ugly, but his throat felt full of pins and needles. So, he balled his hand into a fist around his dagger instead. Not that he could swing it properly. He relaxed and folded his arms, huffing a laugh and looking at the floor. He cleared his throat, but his words still came out gravelly. “You must be a coward after all, Kahn-Der, if you brought all these fairies to kill me,” he said. “How embarrassing for you.”
“We didn’t bring weapons,” Jethwire promised, and Shayne glanced down at Kahn-Der’s long sword with a doubtful face. “We just want to talk.” Jethwire’s twisted smile was a different sort of unsettling; a little too wide to be natural.
“Take him,” Kahn-Der directed in a dark voice barely decipherable against the loud ringing alarm.
Shayne rolled the dagger over his fingers, waiting for the first of his brothers and former friends to make their move. A horrid, bitter laugh filled his stinging throat as he realized his one foolish mistake would make this the day he died after all, perhaps even the hour. But a sound lifted through the space; a low creaking of hinges being turned, and the dagger stilled on Shayne’s fingers. A footstep sounded behind him. Then another.
Shayne dragged his wildly round eyes over to see the dreamslipper there. Standing beside him. Out of her cage. She looked unexpectedly frightening when she wasn’t behind bars or herded on chains. When there was nothing standing between her and the person she was glaring at—which in this case, was Kahn-Der.
The heel of Kahn-Der’s boot slid back an inch. His ever-present crooked smile remained, but the corners of his mouth wavered. The fairies at his back all reached for the hidden weapons Jethwire had lied about. It was a wonder what everyone was so afraid of while being wide awake, but maybe it was the slightly startling brightness of Mycra Sentorious’s eyes. And that was amusing, so, even though it could cost him his life, Shayne decided to conduct an experiment.
He tossed her the dagger.
Kahn-Der tried to grab the weapon as it sailed, but he missed, and the handle fell right into Mycra’s grip.
“Get that!” Kahn-Der commanded his allies. Massie reached for the dagger only to find his arm being sliced three times over, faster than anyone could blink.
Shayne’s jaw dropped. He slapped a hand over his mouth when four fairies surrounded Mycra and she fell to a knee in a spin, stabbing exactly eight kneecaps. Four fae fell to the ground, and Shayne wondered if he was dreaming. If this dreamslipper was messing with his slumber and he might snap awake at any moment. But he knew it was real when Jethwire and Massie sprang forward and grabbed his arms. Still, he laughed. Because even if he died today, tossing Mycra that dagger was…
Absolutely. Worth . It.
A fairy pinned Mycra to the ground while two others wrestled the dagger from her grip. Shayne punched Jethwire and kicked Massie in his ribs to free himself, then he wobbled across the space and took hold of the fairy’s head who pinned Mycra to the floor. With a quick twist and snap, the fairy seemed to have trouble still being alive. Shayne tossed the body to the floor and kicked the next fairy right in the teeth, sending him sprawling backward and giving Mycra a chance to jump to her feet. Shayne shoved her toward the basement door.
“Don’t waste my death, pretty Fairy,” he said as all the injured fae climbed to their feet, and those who hadn’t struck yet began surrounding Shayne and giving each other hand signals they thought Shayne couldn’t see. Mycra looked like she might protest, but she met Shayne’s eyes. With his gaze, he told her how dissatisfied he would be if she died beside him today. And she seemed to understand that his death would mean nothing if she became a corpse after this.
Something heavy struck Shayne’s head. His arms were grabbed, the backs of his knees were kicked. Vertigo spilled in, but even so, he growled at the fae and raged like a mad crossbeast, ripping himself from their grip only to have more hands latch on again. Mycra sprang back during his show, shooting him one last look of panic. Then she raced for the door, grabbing a spear handle from the wall display on her way out.
Shayne found a small, weak smile watching her escape. It wasn’t even that he cared that much—she was still a stranger—but she must have had something to live for, or she wouldn’t have run. He inhaled a mouthful of stale dungeon air as he was lifted to his feet, thinking all the while of how the beautiful, caged beast was free at last. The flower had a chance to grow new petals. The butterfly might fly again—
A rock collided with Shayne’s temple, and he toppled over. From there, he was kicked until purple blood ran from his mouth, from his ears, from his nose. His cheek scraped the cold stone floor as his body became the stomping ground for a dozen sets of boots. Most fairies would have cried or begged for mercy in his position, but Shayne laughed. He laughed and laughed as his bones were broken and his flesh was torn. He laughed because he came to this House to end his nightmares, and as it turned out, he’d found a way to end them after all.
Truly, dying would solve a lot of problems.
At least, that was his thought until Kahn-Der grabbed his shoulders and ripped him to his feet. The fairy had a gloating sneer as he tossed Shayne back into the hoard. “Walk him upstairs,” Kahn-Der instructed, and Shayne blinked through swelling eyelids.
“What happened to the whole ‘killing me’ thing?” he asked with a voice too dry for much sound.
Kahn-Der chuckled, his icy eyes grazing over Shayne’s cuts and blood. He lifted a hand to smooth his white hair back into place, and he licked his lips. “We have you for ten whole days, Brother,” he said. Past him, Jethwire’s and Massie’s blue eyes grew wild, their grins twisting, and Shayne swallowed against his tender throat.
Torment, then. His household’s specialty.
Jethwire nodded toward the basement door and the hands on Shayne’s body roughly escorted him to the stairs. They made him walk on his own two wobbling legs back to the main floor of the House, through the maze of halls, and into the dining room where he’d issued his first threat to Kahn-Der. Shayne fought a wave of nausea. He hoped he would at least barf on someone tonight.
His dining seat was lifted, carried onto the tabletop, and placed in the exact centre of the table. Shayne was hoisted up and shoved into it. Fairies grabbed his hands, and his forearms were tied to the armrests with vines. He watched it all past puffy eyelids. He didn’t fight them. He didn’t resist. There was no point.
He did, however, crack a small smile in the midst of it all when Kahn-Der said, “You will beg me for death in the end. And I shall grant your wish by flicking you off the roof of the pagoda and watching you fall a very long way to your death, just like in your nightmares.”
The small smile wasn’t enough. Shayne loudly chuckled. “Coward,” he said.
He couldn’t deny it—he was flattered. Flattered that Kahn-Der was too afraid of his Brotherhood of Assassins experience to want to take him on alone. That Kahn-Der would only face Shayne once he was in a weak state of battered body and mind. That Shayne was flat out amazing, and Kahn-Der was basic.
As the cold iron clubs swung, Shayne’s last thoughts weren’t of the dreamslipper who’d gotten a second chance, or of revenge on his family, or even of his failed escape.
They were of a simple café he loved, owned by a blonde human who could deliciously lie through her teeth, and a moody, one-armed fairy he hadn’t even said goodbye to.