Chapter 14
PRINCESS ARIANNA
"You are the chosen one, there is a prophecy, and danger, and, of course, my sexy charms."
—Asher
I am cold. So cold. I can't stop shivering. I've wrapped my wrist, but the bandages keep bleeding through.
Our fire is dying, and we are nearly out of wood.
Fen's fever seems to have abated. His color is returning, and he's breathing well, but he hasn't woken. His wounds are healing though. Now I just have to find a way to not die of hypothermia while we wait out this storm and his recovery.
Baron stays by Fen's side, keeping him warm and watching over him like a worried mother.
I cross my arms over my chest in a vain attempt to warm myself by the meager fire. It won't take long to burn out and the storm still rages outside. Surely someone would have sent scouts out to look for us? But could they even travel in this weather?
I look down at the blood seeping through my bandages again and sigh. This wound won't heal quickly, but it might have saved Fen's life, so I have no regrets. This world, this kingdom, needs him.
I need him.
I also need more fire.
I stand and walk to the cave's opening. It looks miserable out there. A flurry of snow has piled at the exit to the point that we are almost trapped.
"Baron, I need your help to get out of here. We need more wood."
He comes over quickly, and I point to the snow blocking our escape.
He understands my intention and begins digging, making me a path. I follow him through to the other side. I have never felt so cold in my life as I crawl through a snow bank.
The world is completely covered in white. My only hope is to find a tree that has some lower branches I can break off to burn.
Baron moves to follow me, but I turn to him and shake my head, pointing back to the cave. "Guard Fen. Come find me if he gets worse."
Baron looks to me, then back at the cave, whining. I can see the uncertainty in his eyes. He wants to protect us both.
"It's okay, boy. I won't wander far. I'll be back in a minute. Just keep the entrance open for me."
Finally he turns to head back to the cave, and I wonder if I've made the right decision as my legs sink into thigh deep snow.
I feel like the answer is no. But Fen can't be left alone right now. And I remember a good tree not too far from here that should have some branches I can use.
Walking is laborious. I'm weak from blood loss, lack of food and cold. My limbs are frozen. But still I take one step in front of the other. The tree shouldn't be much further. It will have what I need, and I will go back to the cave, and it will feel positively toasty compared to this winter hell.
I might lose a few toes or fingers, but I'll live. That's the important thing. I wonder if my digits would grow back once I am turned into a vampire. That would be nice.
My mother's words run through my mind as I walk. Dum spiro spero. While I breathe, I hope. I am still breathing. I will not give up hope.
My mind wanders to my night with Fen before he passed out. Before I fed him my blood.
The way his mouth felt against mine. The way it felt to hold him and be held by him. Just the thought of it seems to warm me.
I see the tree just ahead and nearly cheer out loud with relief, but it feels too hard to open my mouth.
It takes a long time to reach the trunk, as slow as I'm walking, but when I do I'm happy to find that there are some branches that will work if I can break them off.
I focus on the smaller ones. I don't have the strength left to break thicker branches. Once I have as many as I can carry, I turn around and begin my slow plod back to the cave.
I try to imagine the heat of the fire, the comfort of being close to Fen as he sleeps and heals, the safety of having Baron there, anything to keep me from thinking about the cold seeping into my bones. Even my soul is freezing at this point.
The snowing stops, giving me a respite from the cold coming down upon me, and allows me to follow my trail back to the cave without getting lost. I just pretend that was my plan all along, that I wasn't worried about the snow filling in my tracks, me lost in the middle of a forest in the middle of a storm and dying as an icicle.
Without the sound of the storm whipping through the trees, it's a peaceful walk back. My arms burn from the weight of the wood. My wrist stings as the branches rub against my cut. But it's so breathtakingly beautiful and calm that I can almost forget about the pain.
It is because of this absolute stillness and silence that I hear them before they attack.
I drop my hard-earned wood into the snow and grip my sword's hilt, slowing my breathing so I can hear better.
They approach from my right. There's more than one person, but it doesn't sound like a big group.
I pull Spero out slowly, quietly, and make my way to a large tree to hide behind. It could be a search party looking for us. Someone from the castle here to help. I want to believe that's the case, that we will be rescued and taken back to warm Stonehill and all will be well.
But my gut says otherwise.
This isn't a rescue party.
It's the Fae coming for me.
They led us into this trap, bringing Fen out here. They are the only ones who know where he is.
I crouch behind a tree, sword ready.
I was smart enough to at least cut my left hand, so my sword arm still functions as well as it can in this weather.
But I am weak and tired and they are many. And I don't have Baron to help. My best chance is to hide. To not be found.
But what if they find Fen? What if they hurt him to find me? I won't let that happen. I'll surrender first.
I'm glad Baron is guarding him. If something happens to me, Fen will be safe. I can at least make sure of that.
Two men and a woman enter the clearing where I stood moments before. They are dressed in furs and leather and accompanied by a wolf. This one black and smaller than Baron. The wolf sniffs the ground, and then looks around.
"She's got to be somewhere close," the taller man says. He looks young, like all Fae, but his beard is long and grey. He carries a walking staff with a blue crystal molded into the top.
"It will be hard to get a scent in this snow," the woman says. She's nearly as tall as the man she speaks with. "We should have waited until after the storm cleared."
The shorter man looks into the sky and shakes his head. "This is our only chance. She is alone, unprotected by the demon she lives with. All the signs say we must act now."
They know so much. But how?
They circle the clearing, checking bushes and trees. It won't be long before they find my tracks, until they get to my tree. If I move or try to run, they will catch me. I'm paralyzed with fear.
The shorter man looks up suddenly, as if he heard something, but I haven't moved an inch. I'm barely breathing.
He smiles. "She's here. Somewhere close. She can hear us."
"Good," the woman says. "Then she will know we have only come to take her home. Princess Arianna, come out and show yourself. We are not the enemies you fear. We are your kin. Your true family." Her voice is full of authority, but I don't understand what she means.
"You do not belong with the demons who have tried to destroy our world," she says. "You are Fae. And you are the true ruler of this world."
Hands grab me from behind. "Found her!" It's the shorter man. He snuck up on me while the woman talked. This time, I am too weak to fight. He places a cloth over my face. "Sorry about this, Your Highness. But it's time to get you home."
***
When I awaken, I find myself slung over the shoulder of the tall man. I struggle free of his arms, and he drops me unceremoniously on the snow-packed ground of a wooded forest.
"Be gentle with her. She is not to be hurt," the woman says.
"She bit me," the tall man says, rubbing his arm where I did, indeed take a bite.
"Seems she learned more from the demons than we realized," the short man says with a chuckle.
The tall man glares at him, but I interrupt their bickering. "Who are you and where are you taking me?"
My hands and feet are tied together with rope, and I can't stand or do much but sit on the cold ground glaring at the three of them. My wrist is still bleeding, and with my hands behind my back, I rub my finger into the blood and draw on the earth. I know the symbol by heart, having traced it on Fen's wrist so many times.
If I can call to him through magic, maybe he can find me.
The woman approaches me before I can finish the symbol, and I shift my hands to cover it, so she doesn't see what I tried to do. I need them to lower their guard, so I can try again.
"I'm going to cut the ropes on your feet so you can walk," she says, "but if you fight me, you'll stay in the ropes, understand?"
I nod and watch as she pulls out a knife and frees my feet from the constraints.
She helps me stand, and I look around for a way to escape, but I have no idea where we are.
"You will freeze to death before ever finding help," the short man says.
I'm still wobbly from the drug they gave me, and my vision is blurry. The woman grips my arm and escorts me forward, to a cave carved into the side of a mountain. "To answer your question, we are taking you to your rightful kingdom."
"What are you talking about?"
The cave is large, much larger than the one Fen and I escaped into. Stalactites hang from the roof like menacing crystal weapons. They are beautiful in a cold, hard way.
"You will see soon enough," the woman says.
We walk deeper into the cave and reach a spacious cavern. Two towering blocks of stone stand as sentinels at the corners of a stone door. In the middle is an imprint in the shape of a hand with a small spike sticking out from the palm. The woman places her hand on it, impaling her skin. The handprint glows a bright white as she pulls away, and the intricate pattern inside runs with thin lines of her blood.
From within the structure something shifts and moves, metal mechanisms clicking into place, and then the door opens. The tall man nudges me into the stone box, and the others follow us in. The doors close, leaving us in utter darkness. The woman speaks a word I don't understand, and a ball of light forms just above us, glowing bright enough to illuminate the space.
Magic?
I don't have much time to consider, because the stone box we are in starts to move. I gasp and nearly fall, but the tall man catches my arm and holds onto me as we begin to sink into the ground.
"This is one of many secret passages that connect the two sides of our world, allowing us to travel between them with ease," the woman explains.
"Where is it taking us?" I ask, my voice falling flat in the confined space.
"You'll see," she says with a secret smile.
We begin to move faster and faster, and my stomach flips and topples until I feel like vomiting. I shuffle to one of the walls and lean against it, my shoulders aching from being pulled behind me.
"Did you kill the king?" I ask, thinking of Fen's investigation and the missing pieces he hasn't put together, like how the enemy gained access to High Castle. "Is this how you infiltrated the castle?"
"All your questions will be answered in time, but nothing is what you think. You have been deceived by the ultimate deceivers. The princes and their kind cannot be trusted."
The dungeon warden said something similar to me the day I arrived here, and while I certainly don't trust most of them, I think the Fae are wrong to judge them all. Still, the princes have my mother's soul, and I can't leave her at their mercy.
"I have to go back!" I say, my voice urgent. "My mother is their prisoner. If I don't fulfill my contract, her body on earth will die and her soul will be trapped in their dungeon forever." I can't sacrifice her like that. Fen would try to protect her, try to argue I was taken against my will, but demon contracts are not so easily violated.
"Your mother is not our concern," the tall man says.
The woman frowns at him. "What Gerard means to say is we will do everything we can to ensure the safety of your mother, but our first priority is getting you safely home."
Home. I know they don't mean earth. And they clearly don't mean the Kingdom of Inferna. So where is home? "You've got the wrong person. I'm just a normal girl trying to save my mom. I'm not your leader, or whoever you think I am."
They say nothing as our stone elevator moves faster.
I don't know how long the journey takes. My mind is still muddled with drugs. But at one point something changes, and I begin to float. We all do. My stomach turns, and I vomit. Bits of food glide in front of me.
I try to grab the wall but there's nothing to hold onto. The three Fae flip around so their feet point up.
"Do as we do," the woman says. "The gravity will shift in a moment and you will land on your head if you remain as you are."
I turn myself upside down just in time. When the gravity returns, we fall on what was once the ceiling. Now, we are moving up. Or down? Or… I don't know what just happened.
"Our kingdom is on the other side of this world," the woman says. "I would say bottom, if you imagine you've been living on the top. But really there is no bottom or top. It's all gravitationally irrelevant. We are now halfway home."
None of the maps I looked through indicated there was anything on the 'other side.' It looked like a floating island in the sky.
But if the woman is correct, and the princes don't know, they are in danger. They think the rebel Fae are isolated to the Outlands. They have no idea there's anyone living on the other side of the world.
I sit on the floor, my back against the stone, and try to process all my thoughts. My wrist is throbbing and my bandage is bleeding through, but I don't have any supplies on me, so I press my hand against the wound, hoping to stem the blood loss until we get where we are going.
The woman sees the bandage and frowns. "You were injured?"
I don't want to explain I was feeding a vampire, so I just nod. She sinks to her knees, cuts the ropes tying my hands together, and pulls my hand toward her, unwrapping the bandage as she does. "This is deep. We must heal it quickly. You've lost too much blood."
She pulls out a small knife and pricks her thumb, rubs a bit of blood on a green stone she takes from her pocket, then chants words in another language with her eyes closed until the stone begins to glow. With her eyes still closed, she presses the stone to my wound. It burns, and I bite my lip to keep from crying out. A deep ache spreads through my arm, and when I look down, the skin is knitting itself back together, healing the cut.
I feel lightheaded, and the woman looks paler than she had, but I'm no longer bleeding. There's not even a scar. "How did you do that?" Though I know the answer. I saw Kayla do nearly the same thing with Daison.
My heart drops at the thought of the sweet boy.
The woman smiles and slips the green stone back into a small leather pouch. "The magic is in our blood. In your blood. You will learn all of this and more."
While the idea of learning magic appeals to me, nothing they say can be trusted. I've seen how they attack the people I care for. How they burned an entire city, a city that included their own kind, just to lure me and Fen out. They are not my kin, and I will not be seduced by their empty promises.
The elevator finally stops, and the stone door opens, revealing a long tunnel lit with lanterns.
The glowing light above our heads disappears, and I follow the three of them through the tunnels.
The tall man has my sword strapped to his back, and I imagine taking it and fighting them all, but I'm still too weak. I have no idea where I am or how to get back to Fen. So I let them lead me until I can think of a better plan that might work. Maybe I can still draw the mark? I rub the ring Fen gave me as a talisman to give me luck and strength. I'm going to need both before this is over.
We walk through winding underground paths, then up stairs until we reach a giant cavern. Blue stalagmites hang from the ceiling, lighting the area. And before me stands a castle. More majestic than anything I've ever seen. It is made of crystal and marble with the most graceful and elegant design throughout. Tall spires rise high above, blending with the cavern's walls. The large gate is decorated with two white stags. It opens on its own.
I'm led inside, to a large hall with a wooden table in the center. It is covered with food and drink and at the head a man sits eating a piece of meat. He looks up and smiles when he sees me, then stands, arms out. "Princess Arianna, here at last. It is such a pleasure to finally meet you."
I know his face, but it's impossible. He can't be who I think he is.
"I know, it is quite a shock. I should be dead after all, but alas, as you can see, I'm very much alive."
"King Lucian? But, how?"
"I'm afraid that bit of trickery was necessary in order to find you and bring you here, in order to change things on our world for the better. My sons didn't understand when I tried to explain."
"I don't believe you. This is madness." I tremble. Confused. None of this makes sense.
"I can understand why you might not trust me just yet. But perhaps there is another whose word you might trust more?"
A man walks out from the shadows. A man I have come to know over the last few weeks. A man I thought I could trust.
"Hello, Arianna."
"Hello… Asher."