The Fiend Queen (5 page)

Katya climbed to her feet. Castelle’s hands were bright red, the fingertips pale blue as if she’d plunged her hands into icy water.

Redtrue leaned against a bookshelf, but as Katya watched, she wiped the blood from her nose and pulled herself to her feet. Even with tears streaming down her face, she seemed triumphant. “Let’s go get your mother.”

Starbride

Between the pain spiking in her head and the sharp ache of Dawnmother pressing above her elbow, Starbride barely held in the urge to scream. Freddie and the others had engaged a group of corpse Fiends. They depended on her for pyramid support, but her Darkstrong-cursed head wouldn’t leave her be, and the pressure point was helping less and less.

“Is it working?” Dawnmother asked, her fingers digging into Starbride’s flesh.

“Yes,” Starbride said through her teeth. She held a cancellation pyramid and tried to focus, tried to gain the corpse Fiends’ attention like she had before, but she couldn’t concentrate past both sets of pain. Her fingers inched toward her destructive pyramids. She wouldn’t feel bad about killing corpse Fiends by fire, and maybe that would give her a break from the agony.

Blinding misery roared through her temples, and her vision went white. Her legs turned to water, and someone shouted in her ear. Before she could hit the ground, her strength returned, pain gone, unruly thoughts vanished as quickly as if someone had pulled a bag off her head.

“Star!” Dawnmother shouted.

Starbride threw back her head and laughed. “It’s gone!”

“What?”

“The pain’s gone, Dawn. I’m free!”

Dawnmother smiled, looking confused but still happy. Starbride whipped toward the fighting and focused on her pyramid as easily as slipping into warm water.

When the corpse Fiends had to divide their attention between her and their attackers, the fight progressed quickly, leaving only scratches and bruises on her side and a host of unmoving bodies on the other.

Starbride leapt among her comrades and hugged everyone in reach. “The pain’s gone!”

“Just like that?” Hugo asked.

“Who cares?” Freddie gripped Starbride’s shoulders. “As long as it’s over.”

“But aren’t you a little curious—” Hugo started.

“Princess Consort!” Captain Ursula called from up the street. “Have you found any—”

Starbride couldn’t help turning toward the familiar voice. Unfortunately, that left Freddie with no one to hide behind and with his face plain as day.

“Freddie Ballantine!” Ursula roared. She pointed her sword.

“Oh shit,” Freddie said.

“Stand where you are!”

“Freddie Ballantine,” Scarra muttered. “Wait,
the
Freddie Ballantine? The Dockland Butcher Freddie Ballantine?”

“It’s not what you think,” Freddie said.

Ursula stomped toward them, eyes unblinking, mouth set in fury. Her sword didn’t even tremble, though her arm had to be getting tired. Her dark blond hair was slicked back with sweat, and her Watch uniform and chain shirt were smeared with soot, including the hawk and pyramid badge pinned to her sleeve.

“Captain, wait,” Starbride said. “You don’t understand.”

“Death just can’t hold you,” Ursula said.

Starbride grabbed back for Freddie. “Stay behind me.”

“I
knew
you looked familiar!” Scarra cried.

Freddie twisted out of Starbride’s grasp. “I don’t need you to protect me.”

“Darkstrong can take your ego.” Starbride stepped into Ursula’s path. “I know there’s a lot to explain.” Ursula just stared over Starbride’s shoulder. Starbride caught her by the waist, making her look down at last as she lowered her sword. “You’ve been a good friend to me, Captain, to all of us, and you’re owed an explanation, but there isn’t time.”

“I warned him what would happen,” Ursula said, “if I found him in my town again.”

“That was Dockland,” Starbride said, “and it might as well have been the moon, not to mention long ago. Circumstances have changed.”

“He’s the masked man, your ex-thief,” Ursula said. “No wonder he ran from me.”

“Ursula,” Freddie said, and Starbride heard him step closer.

“That’s Captain to you!” Ursula shouted. She gestured to her squad. “Take him.”

“You can’t!” Starbride said.

“Don’t worry about the charges,” Ursula said to her squad. “I’m sure there are more than a few.”

“This is madness.” Starbride backed up and felt the others close ranks with her, even Scarra, the pack of them facing off against the Watch.

Freddie stepped to Starbride’s side, a sad smile on his face. “I told you once that I’d never be taken again.”

“And I gave you the choice between leaving my city for good and spending your life in a cell,” Ursula said.

Freddie shrugged. “That’s before you thought I was dead.”

“You should have stayed dead!”

Starbride drew a pyramid. “Please, don’t make us fight you.”

Ursula gaped at her. “Do you know what this man did?”

“I know he’s innocent of the crimes he was nearly hanged for. He’s no Butcher.”

Ursula paused before understanding passed over her face. “He hasn’t told you anything.”

“I’m sorry I hurt you,” Freddie said.

“The spirits curse your apologies.” Ursula looked back at her squad. “What are you waiting for?”

They stared at Starbride. “Isn’t she the…” One man waved toward the colors decorating his own uniform.

“There will be time to sort this out,” Starbride said. The booms they’d been chasing erupted one street over, and Starbride had never been so glad to see conflict coming for them. “Are you with us, Captain?”

The tendons in Ursula’s jaw stood out like steel bands, and Starbride thought she might launch herself at Freddie and damn the consequences. “Form up!” she called. Together, she and her squad turned toward the commotion and moved off as a unit.

Starbride and the others trailed in their wake. “That was a near thing,” Hugo said.

“One that’s not over,” Freddie grumbled.

When Starbride turned the corner, time seemed to slow. Bodies littered the street like scattered blossoms, torn or shredded or blown apart. Her eye fell upon one boy no older than Hugo, her emblem fluttering upon his still chest and the remains of his lower half spread across the ground. She followed the line of bodies to a few people still on their feet, holding their own against a line of corpse Fiends, and across the street…

The air left Starbride’s lungs in a rush. Roland stood before them as boldly as he’d once appeared in the palace. “Hello there.” He gave a cheery wave before lobbing a pyramid over the corpse Fiends’ heads.

“Get down!” Starbride cried. She dove with the others and covered her head as the resulting boom shook the ground. Mud and brick rained atop them along with wet things best not thought about. Starbride struggled upright. Some of the corpse Fiends had been blown apart along with the townspeople, but more of them were regaining their feet, some missing arms while those who’d lost a leg crawled forward.

“Scatter!” Captain Ursula called, and the Watch left large gaps between them as they advanced on Roland.

He laughed, and his features melted into those of a Fiend. Horns curled over his head, and fangs pressed down against his lower lip. His eyes turned all blue, deep and rich like Katya’s. He raced to the side in a blur and tore the face from one of Ursula’s officers. Before the others took two steps, he reappeared on the other side of the street, his eyes on Starbride. There had to be some way they could get close to him. Maybe she could get him talking.

Starbride drew her cancellation pyramid. “Getting your own hands dirty? Isn’t that a bit beneath you?”

“Oh, entertain me with your taunts, please!” he said. “How will you play this? Dare me to fight you one-on-one? Do you like that better than threatening me? Or playing a beggar on her knees?” When Freddie threw a knife, Roland plucked it out of the air. Several of the Watch darted for him, and he planted the knife in one of their chests before moving again. Scarra fought the corpse Fiends along with others of the Watch.

“I had hoped for something craftier from you,” Roland said, “more romantic. Like, say, your assurance that if I kill you, my son will challenge me to a duel.”

“You’re not my father,” Hugo spat.

Roland rolled his eyes. “Oh, I know! My daughter will challenge me in a lovesick haze if I dare to ruffle your hair, hmm? My already besotted niece will no doubt oblige me. How about my nephew? No! The entire kingdom is in love with you and will fight me to the death for the merest insult!”

Starbride focused on her pyramid. If he’d keep talking, she’d cancel as many of his weapons as she could. Before she could even detect the tell-tale glow of his pyramids, her mind lurched sideways, and her scalp ached as if someone had yanked her hair. Her pyramid had gone dark, cancelled. Starbride threw it to the ground and snarled.

Roland wiggled his fingers, a tiny pyramid in his own grip. “Do you want a Fiend of your own, Starbride? I think you’d enjoy it.”

Starbride lobbed a fire pyramid at him, but he blurred out of the way. “And who would give it to me now that I have your daughter?” she asked.

He winked. “I’m sure I could accommodate you, dear lady.”

Starbride shook her head. She’d been half wondering why he hadn’t given Lady Hilda a Fiend himself, why he’d had his daughter do it instead. “I think you’re far too dead to manage it.” She threw another pyramid while he scowled, and this time, it singed him a bit.

He got his smile back quickly. “Why don’t we do this?” He blurred again and appeared next to Hugo. Before Hugo could turn, Roland reached inside his collar and yanked his pyramid necklace loose. “And this!” Roland shoved him hard, and Starbride knew it wouldn’t be Hugo who got up again. “And see what happens.”

Hugo’s Fiendish form barreled forward, reaching for his father, but Roland’s blur stayed just out of reach. Hugo’s eyes had become wholly light blue. A spike jutted from his chin, and two crow’s wings sprouted from his back. Fangs from his upper jaw plunged well past his chin, forcing his lips into a snarl as he chased his father across the street.

“Shoot them both!” Ursula called, and some of her people lifted crossbows.

“No!” Dawnmother called, but Starbride knew the bolts wouldn’t hurt either of them unless they were hit over and over, and both moved too fast for the bowmen to track. Starbride dug out her Fiend suppression pyramid. If Roland wasn’t concentrating, she might be able to use it, but she’d have to get closer.

Hugo slammed into what seemed like an invisible wall. He whirled around, tracking something. When Roland appeared just behind him, his eyes still followed something Starbride couldn’t see.

“Hugo, turn around!” Dawnmother cried.

He paid her no mind, nor did he look over his shoulder. Starbride searched for whatever had entranced him and caught the hint of a blur, dust cascading down a brick wall, an awning flapping in the breeze, something moving too fast for the eye to track, always just on the edge of her vision. Hugo moved too slowly to catch it, even as fast as he was.

“He can’t resist it, you see,” Roland said. “It’s hard for me not to follow them as I am.”

“Wild Fiends,” Starbride whispered.

“There’s nothing quite like their pull.” He watched his son caper around the square.

Before he could look her way again, Starbride focused on her Fiend suppression pyramid, and he shrank back from her, hissing. Freddie came with her as she advanced, and two of the crossbowmen took aim and fired. Roland leapt away from one shot, but the other caught him in the side. He wrenched the bolt out and threw it to the ground, trailing freezing blood in its wake. Starbride whipped her second cancellation pyramid from her satchel and focused, catching the one he carried before he could use it on her Fiend suppression pyramid. He crushed his cancelled pyramid in his fist.

Starbride tried to push him into a corner where he couldn’t retreat. He lobbed a flash bomb at the Watch officers. Starbride shielded her eyes and heard several cries from those who weren’t quick to take cover. Roland barked a word in the Fiend tongue, and Starbride flinched to hear it. Still, she didn’t lose her focus even as she tasted blood.

“Look out!” Dawnmother pushed her, but not before something sliced across her arm. The deep ache of severe cold set her back teeth together. Starbride’s pyramid tumbled from her grasp, and before she could reach for it again, Roland’s boot smashed it into nothingness.

Freddie lunged for him, but he sidestepped, grabbed Freddie’s collar and chucked him across the street into Ursula’s crossbowmen.

“You really don’t learn, do you?” Roland asked.

“I have.” Now she kept a duplicate of every pyramid she carried. Before Freddie landed, Starbride grabbed her second Fiend suppression pyramid and focused.

Roland staggered back with a cry. The Fiendish Aspect that made him so powerful was the very thing that made him vulnerable. Hopefully, it would keep the wild Fiends away, too. Hugo tried to grab them from the rooftops, leaping in their wake. Starbride tried to back Roland into a corner again, leaving Dawnmother to keep lookout.

The corpse Fiends who’d kept their feet before were now lying motionless in the dust. Roland dashed behind a Watch officer and threw him at Scarra before she got too close. Captain Ursula tried for a stab, but Roland flung a fire pyramid. Quick as a blink, Starbride switched focus and cancelled the pyramid before it smacked against Ursula’s chain shirt. Ursula threw her arms in front of her face, but the deadened crystal only shattered on the ground.

Starbride didn’t wait for Roland’s reaction before she switched focus again and used her suppression pyramid. Roland grabbed one of the injured corpse Fiends and threw it in her direction. It howled as it neared the pyramid, but it couldn’t stop itself. Dawnmother tried to pull Starbride out of the way, but the corpse Fiend landed atop them in a tangle of moldy limbs. Starbride’s focus slipped, and she pushed at flesh that felt like an old, hide-covered bundle of sticks. Dawnmother grabbed a broken piece of wood and shattered the corpse Fiend’s pyramid.

Something knocked into Starbride from behind, that same, bone-aching cold, and she flew face forward into the dust. She locked her arms over her chest, protecting her pyramid and put all her energy into focusing.