Grave Visions (Alex Craft #4)(18)

A chill swept cold fingers across my nape, and I squinted. My eyes worked better in Faerie than in the mortal realm, and while this small pocket was a mess of planes that shouldn’t have touched, my sight was clear here. Still, the thing in the shadows was so out of context, at first I couldn’t make sense of what I saw. There were wires and wings and limbs . . . I blinked. No, the wires were actually vines, bound tight around a figure I finally identified as a harpy. My father lowered his clenched fist, and the vines drooped downward, lowering the suspended fae.

She thrashed, the talons at the crooks of her wings straining toward the vines, as did the beak that took the place of her nose and upper lip, and the large talons on her toes. Her efforts gained her nothing. She was well and truly caught, her wings and legs stretched to their limits by the constraining vines. More vines curled around her waist and throat.

Since the vines appeared to be growing directly out of the wall, I assumed they had been simple glamour initially, but my father must have been very, very good, because this little pocket of Faerie had accepted the vines as real and even with my shields cracked, they looked solid. The vines lowered the harpy until she hung in the air a mere yard ahead of my father. He studied her, shaking his head.

“Your master’s impatience is noted,” he told her after she finally stilled to hang limply in the restraints.

“He wanted to be prepared when you returned with the girl,” she said, her voice a harsh squawk.

I raised a questioning eyebrow at my father, as I was most definitely the girl in question. He didn’t spare me a glance. I did not like where this was going. I considered walking out right then and there, but I had my doubts that I could make it past the magical lock on the door.

“I appear to be here. Where is he?” My father asked, but while the question was delivered lightly, there was an edge to his voice. He opened his hand, flattening his palm, and the vines fell away from the harpy.

She touched the ground for only a moment before jumping back into the air, her large wings stirring up gusts of wind as she took off. She soared toward the shadows and they ate her form, swallowing her from sight. I frowned. The unnatural sky where the ceiling should have been showed the night sky of Faerie, the stars so close it seemed that if I stretched I might be able to reach one, but the moon was missing. Either it had set already or it was in the new-moon phase. As it was probably about one in the afternoon in the mortal realm, it was hard to guess what the moon cycle in Faerie might be. Regardless, as the only light filtered in from the stars, the room was darker than the last time I’d been here, but the shadows the harpy had dived into seemed too deep for the length of the room.

I’d seen harpies before, during my brief visit to the shadow court, so I wasn’t shocked when three figures stepped through what must have been a magical door hidden in the shadows.

I recognized one of the figures immediately by his oiled black armor, the dark, pointed goatee, and the unconcealed blood coating his palms. The Shadow King. Two steps behind him was a smaller figure, who I guessed must have been the planebender. He would have been the one who opened the hole between this normally closed pocket of Faerie and the shadow court. As with the first time I’d seen him, his small form was obscured by an all-encompassing cloak, a hood pulled down over his face. The third figure I didn’t know. Sleagh Maith based on his striking features and inner glow that made him shimmer despite the shadows around him. His long dark hair hung loose around his shoulders and he wore gray armor similar to the king’s.

I managed not to scowl at the small group, but it was a near thing. Last time I’d seen the Shadow King he’d followed a rescue from the winter court by locking me in a lavishly decorated room. Circumstances had prevented me from having to find out what the king had planned for me, but now here we were again.

“I understand you’re acquainted with King Nandin?” my father asked as he ushered me toward the newly arrived party.

My first instinct was to bark out a curt yes, but even if he wasn’t my king, he was still a Faerie monarch, old and powerful. So I inclined my head slightly and simply said, “Your majesty.”

“Dearest niece,” he responded, lifting his arms to engulf me in a hug.

Oh, did I mention the shadow king was my great-granduncle on my mother’s side? I didn’t return the hug, but I didn’t pull away either. As soon as he dropped his arms, I stepped back, out of reach. If he noticed, he didn’t point it out, but instead turned to the stranger with him.

“Alexis, this is Dugan.”

The gray-armored Sleagh Maith bowed, which made me wonder if I was supposed to curtsy or something. As I was in leather pants and knee-high boots instead of a skirt, I decided that would look ridiculous. Instead I lifted my hand in a halfhearted wave.

“Uh, hi?” I said, and then turned a questioning look at my father.

He smiled, but it was his politician smile, the one that looked genuine, even crinkled the edges of his eyes, but wasn’t real. “Dugan is prince of the shadow court.”

Good for him? I didn’t say it aloud though. Instead I said, “So does that make you my cousin?”

Dugan jerked, as if my words had stung him. It had seemed an innocent enough question.

The king chuckled, shaking his head. “No, my dear. You share no blood, nor I with him. The title is honorary, and indicates to the court that one day I may step down and make him king.”