Sirensong (19 page)

I could practically see the calculation in Henry’s eyes as he looked back and forth between my father and me. Our guarantee of safe passage probably meant Henry couldn’t give me to the Green Lady by force, but I doubted it would be any kind of violation if I volunteered. Which meant Henry was currently within his rights, and my dad was within a heartbeat of getting himself in serious trouble.

I didn’t think letting my dad and Henry keep up a dialogue was a good thing, so instead of waiting to see who said what next, I broke into a run, surprising everyone around me.

“Dana!” my dad cried, and I was sure the next thing I’d hear was the thundering of his horse’s hooves.

I was wrong. The Green Lady was apparently eager to accept my sacrifice, and she quickly lost her humanoid shape and tendrils of thorny vines shot out toward me.

I was a willing sacrifice, but I
am
human (at least mostly), and I couldn’t help pulling up short at the sight of those vines reaching for me. The thorns were as long as my fingers, and a hell of a lot sharper.

My dad yelled out something else that I couldn’t hear over the thundering of my heart. In seconds, the vines had surrounded me, trapping me in a circle of greenery. A circle that grew darker and darker as the vines packed themselves together around me until I was completely buried within them. If I so much as twitched, I was going to get firsthand knowledge of just how sharp those thorns were.

I’d been feeling really brave a couple of seconds ago, but right now I was so scared I could barely suck in a breath. I closed my eyes, hoping that would make me feel less claustrophobic, and forced myself to think of poor Elizabeth and her terror. Sure, I was scared. But I knew without a doubt that I wasn’t as scared as
she
would have been.

“Do not struggle,” the Green Lady’s voice said. Maybe I was crazy, but I could have sworn there was a touch of gentleness in that voice.

The vines pressed closer, until I could feel the prick of thorns against my skin. I couldn’t help the little half-gasp, half-whimper that escaped me.

“Shh,” came the Green Lady’s voice, coming from all around me. “Be still, and this will not hurt so badly.”

And suddenly, the vines contracted around me, driving the thorns into my flesh.

The thorns were everywhere, piercing me from head to toe, and it was all I could do not to scream. My most primitive instincts urged me to struggle, to pull away even though there was no escape, but I fought those instincts. I understood now why the Green Lady told me to be still. I felt like a human pincushion with all of those thorns sticking into me, but although they hurt plenty, the pain was … manageable. If I struggled, those thorns would tear me to shreds.

“Well done,” the Green Lady said, and just like that, the thorns withdrew from my body and the vines retracted, giving me room to breathe.

My knees were wobbly, and I would have fallen on my butt if several of the vines hadn’t wrapped themselves around me—without piercing me with their thorns—and held me up. Greenery still surrounded me, but it was less dense now, allowing light and air into the Green Lady’s center. I glanced down at my hands and saw lots of tiny pinpricks of blood. I suspected my whole body looked the same.

“You honor the land with your willing sacrifice,” the Green Lady said. “Such courage and generosity of spirit I have not seen for a long, long time.”

I almost said a reflexive thank you, then remembered at the last moment that there were certain creatures of Faerie you weren’t supposed to say that to. For all I knew, that was nothing but a legend—certainly the Sidhe seemed to have no problem with the words—but instinct told me that if the restriction applied to
any
creatures of Faerie, it would apply to the Green Lady.

My knees steadied, and the vines that held me snaked away. Then the circle around me receded, and the Green Lady reformed into her humanoid shape. People rushed in to help me, so I didn’t see the Green Lady disappear back into the forest.

Ethan was the first to reach me, wrapping me in his arms, practically smothering me. His magic tingled over me, and I knew he was healing the myriad pinprick wounds the Green Lady’s thorns had left. I put my arms around him and clung to him, burying my face against his chest, reveling in his warmth and comfort.

“That was one of the bravest, stupidest things you’ve ever done,” he said into my hair. “You just scared ten years off my life.”

I let out a little laugh, adrenaline still pumping through my system. “You’re immortal, dummy.”

“I was before I met
you,
” he quipped.

I would have loved to have stayed right where I was, oblivious to the outside world as I reveled in the glory of Ethan’s arms. Unfortunately, the outside world had other plans. Henry was barking out orders, trying to get us all mounted up and on the move again. I reluctantly let go of Ethan and found my dad practically on top of us, glowering.

“You’ll ride with me the rest of the way,” he informed me. The look on his face promised I would
not
have a fun ride.

“Um, maybe I should go back to the wagon,” I suggested. “I’m kind of sore…”

“Nice try,” he said with a strained smile as he gestured his horse over.

I sent Ethan a pleading look, but he held up his hands and backed away. “Not getting in the middle of this one.”

“Wise,” my dad agreed, giving Ethan a significant look that sent him scurrying.

I expected my dad’s lecture to start the moment I groaningly got on the horse behind him. The fact that it didn’t just heightened the anticipation—which I’m sure was exactly what my dad wanted.

With the Green Lady no longer blocking the way, our caravan mobilized once more, climbing the hill to the circle of standing stones. It was a tight fit to get all the horses and wagons within the circle, but we managed it, packing into the center, leaving about a foot or two between those of us on the outside of the circle—like my dad and me—and the stones.

Apparently, we were leaving that space so that Henry would have easy access to the stones. On foot, he walked from stone to stone, touching each one and whispering something under his breath. I felt the magic gathering, stronger with each stone Henry touched.

By the time Henry was halfway around the circle, there was enough magic in the air that I had trouble drawing in a full breath. I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing, knowing it was only going to get worse.

“Dana?” my dad asked, concern in his voice. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” I said, hoping I sounded convincing. “Just a bit of delayed reaction. And a little freak-out about whatever’s about to happen.” I sucked in a breath of air, wishing Henry would just get on with it and let go of the magic before I passed out. I
had
to act as normal as possible, unless I wanted everyone in the entire caravan to know I could sense the magic.

“There’s no need to ‘freak out,’” Dad assured me, the words sounding kind of awkward coming from him. “Using the standing stones requires a lot of magic, but you won’t feel anything except for a moment of disorientation.”

Yeah, right,
I thought as I fought for air.

“Hold on,” my dad said. “He’s going to activate the stones in a second, and the vertigo can be a bit uncomfortable.”

I figured the magic overload was so uncomfortable already I wouldn’t even notice a little vertigo on top of it. I was wrong.

You know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when a roller coaster is whooshing down a really steep hill? Well imagine that, only ten times worse, and combine it with the feeling of that roller coaster going upside down and sideways at the same time. That would be about how I felt when Henry’s magic activated the standing stones.

Even sitting down and holding on to my dad wasn’t enough to quell the falling feeling, and if he hadn’t held my arms against his body, I might have tumbled off the horse.

The only good news was that the effect didn’t last very long. Oh, and that I didn’t hurl, though my stomach gave the possibility serious consideration.

When I opened my eyes, we were still in the middle of a circle of standing stones, but these were situated in a broad clearing rather than on the top of a hill. I had to admit, that was rather cool—if also terrifying. The caravan started forward again, following a road that was far broader and more busily trafficked than any we’d yet been on. (Not surprisingly, considering we were now only a couple hours’ travel from the Sunne Palace.)

It was once we’d taken our habitual place near the back of the caravan that Dad’s not unexpected lecture began.

I bit my tongue and didn’t argue with him, because I knew it would do me no good. I hoped I’d never again have to step up to the plate like I had today, but I wasn’t about to promise not to. Elizabeth, in her terror, would have been shredded by the Green Lady’s embrace, and I would have drowned in guilt if I’d let that happen. I had done the right thing, and nothing my dad said was going to change my mind.

It was about one hour after we’d passed through the standing stones when we came upon the first real town we’d seen since we’d left Avalon. Of course, this being Faerie, the town was like nothing I’d ever seen before. The Fae—according to my dad—were much more connected to the land than humans. They didn’t do row houses or apartment buildings or stuff like that. Even small homes came with at least a couple acres of land.

The homes were designed to blend with the surrounding forest, and some of them did it so well they were almost invisible, walls thickly covered in ivy, rooftop gardens making the whole house look like nothing more than an unusually steep hill. If I didn’t look closely at my surroundings I might have thought we were still traveling through uninhabited forest.

The illusion of traveling through empty forest was somewhat lessened when doors and windows opened, and people popped their heads out to watch our procession. I half-expected people to come running out of their houses throwing garlands of flowers—isn’t that how pompous princes are supposed to be received when returning home?—but no one did more than stand there and stare.

I know the Fae are way more reserved than humans, so I wasn’t
really
expecting such an enthusiastic greeting; however, I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was a tinge of disapproval in our reception, like Henry wasn’t everyone’s favorite person. It didn’t help that we were traveling down the only major road, and Henry’s people were forcing other travelers off to the side, like they didn’t have as much right to be on the road as he did.

No one protested the unfair treatment—stupid Fae class values!—but I caught more than one person shooting irritated and impatient glances our way. Once the prince was far enough past not to see, of course.

I thought after passing those first few houses we might eventually come to some kind of business district, a place with stores or inns or other, more town-like buildings, but the landscape remained the same, small, unobtrusive houses, spaced widely apart. There were no farms, no pastures, no orchards—nothing other than residences.

“Where’s the downtown?” I asked my dad.

“You’re looking at it,” he responded, and I wondered at first if there was more to the houses than met the eye. My father soon clarified. “The Sidhe do not engage in commerce as humans do.”

“But they have to get food and supplies from
somewhere,
right?”

“Yes, but those transactions are considered unattractive and are kept out of sight.”

“Like Brownies,” I grumbled under my breath. “Heaven forbid the Sidhe be seen doing something so vulgar as buying food,” I said aloud. My dad just sighed and let the subject drop.

Shortly after we crossed the border into the town, the road stopped all its gentle meandering and straightened out, giving me my first glimpse of the Sunne Palace in the distance.

Fae houses might blend into the background of the surrounding forest, but the palace was very much meant to be seen.

When I’d pictured the Faerie Queen’s palace, I’d imagined something beautiful and dainty and feminine. You know, like Cinderella’s castle at Disney. The imposing structure that rose out of the trees was about as far from my expectations as it could get.

What met my eyes was a solid, towering wall of stone with a crenellated top, punctuated by tall, skinny windows—arrow slits? Hexagonal towers, made of the same gray stone, rose from each of the corners, with tall, skinny turrets sticking up from the top, making it look like the towers were giving the rest of the world the finger. There was nothing remotely pretty or dainty about the place, and it looked more like a fortress—or a prison—than a palace.

This was a palace meant to remind everyone who caught sight of it that the Queen who resided there was untouchable and steeped in power, meant to intimidate the outside world and defend its Queen from attack. I suppose that considering the history of war between the Seelie and the Unseelie Courts, having a cozy little fortress to hole up in was only practical. No matter how ugly it was.

“I guess subtlety isn’t one of Titania’s strong suits,” I said, keeping my voice down so no one but my dad could hear me.

My dad chuckled softly. “No, it is not. In the eighteenth century, someone brought Titania a sketch of the Caernarfon Castle in Wales, and she fell in love with it. Titania had her palace rebuilt in its likeness, though it’s not an exact replica. To the Fae, mortal architecture is considered exotic, and this palace is stunningly beautiful.” He laughed again. “In a few hundred years or so, she will probably remodel it to resemble what you Americans would call a McMansion, because that will have become the new pinnacle of the exotic.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, feeling an uncomfortable flutter of nerves as we approached the forbidding walls. I wouldn’t be surprised if instead of a welcome mat, the front door had a sign over it that said ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE. I wanted quite desperately to go home.