Chapter 10

The Crimson Court was drenched in fear.

It was a sensation not unlike the warmest summer days on Mirova, when the air had been so heavy with humidity that drawing in a breath felt like drowning … except that the weight existed only to Naxi’s demon senses here, and except, of course, that it would be blasphemy to compare Mirova in any way to this hell of a place.

She loathingly bounced down the stairs, glaring at every wall and window she encountered: stupid violent frescos, stupid pompous marble, stupid flashy gold. There was not an inch of this castle that wasn’t stained with that hallmark fae pomposity. Hoarding treasures here, building this grand and glittering facade for the rotten core of the empire, while the world was left to starve around it – a game the Mother had played better than anyone else, but it surely hadn’t ended with her.

It wasn’t the disregard for life that bothered Naxi. She wasn’t much bothered with anyone else’s life herself, after all.

Rather, it was the arrogance of believing only fae had the right to kill without consequences. The way they’d left thousands dead in their wake, yet razed Mirova and murdered everyone on it after some islands took up arms against them and returned the favour.

It wasn’t unwelcome to her, the fear permeating every insufferable nook and cranny of this place.

But Thysandra wanted it sorted out, and she wanted Thysandra – so down the quiet corridors she dashed, scanning her surroundings for those telltale flickers of emotion that indicated fae were nearby. Unsurprisingly, the few of them she found were all moving rapidly away from her. The only exception was a presence in one of the bedrooms she passed, who was exuding more pain than fear; a moment of focus told her someone had cut out the poor sod’s tongue and broken their legs, then presumably left them to die in their bed.

Just another night of fun and games at the Crimson Court. Naxi shrugged to herself, skipping past.

No one else came near on her way down. No fae warriors stood guard at the ruined entrance of what had been the Mother’s bone hall. Either the magic had lured them into the caves, or they’d fled; whatever fate had befallen them, their absence was rather convenient.

The hall beyond still looked much like it had done the day before. Naxi tiptoed to the edge of the crater in the marble floor and peeked into the depths below – the glorious, deadly hollow Emelin had uncovered with a few offhand blasts of red.

The heart of the Labyrinth was as large as the hall itself, a gaping cavern shaped by rocks darker than ink. It might have looked bleak and ominous if not for the hundreds, thousands , of glowing gemstones embedded in those same rocks. Sparkling in all the colours of the rainbow and then some, they lit up the space like stars in a midnight sky.

It’s very friendly as long as you’re nice to it , Emelin had said.

So Naxi crouched down on that marble edge, smiled her sunniest smile at the flickering gems below, and cooed, ‘Hello, sweetheart.’

The lights blazed brighter for a moment, then began sizzling out one by one – dimming the green, the purple, the yellow, until only a sprinkle of pink remained, shrouding the enormous cave in a blushing glow.

‘Oh, you remember my favourite colour!’ Naxi clapped her hands, beaming at the dusk below. ‘That is so very lovely of you. Do you think it would be possible for me to come down somehow even though I don’t have wings? We only had time for a short chat yesterday, and I’m so excited to get to know you a little better.’

There was a moment of silence.

Then the mountain rumbled.

A deep, unearthly thrum, echoing back from the ruined walls and arches of the bone hall … and beneath her, in the shadowy depths, the smooth rock rippled, then billowed. Rising like a wave from the floor of the cave, shaping …

Stairs .

A peal of laughter tumbled from her lips as the upper step bumped into the crumbling marble edge of the floor; she hopped onto the dark stone, hurrying down into the depths. Behind her, the staircase sank back into the smooth surface of the cave. Which meant she’d have to ask the Labyrinth for permission to leave again … but then, if it wanted to keep her prisoner, it would probably stop her before she returned to this part anyway.

She wasn’t too worried. The mountain’s emotions were subtly different to those of more conventional sentient beings, but they were emotions all the same, in the same way an unknown language still sounded like language . She’d studied its reactions and responses for an hour or so the previous day, while waiting for Thysandra to show up. Unless she was terribly mistaken, the main feeling surrounding her now was one of a slightly grumpy satisfaction, like a sulky housecat who’s finally found someone to rub its belly.

‘They’ve been neglecting you terribly, haven’t they?’ she said, rolling her eyes at the castle above.

The light turned from pink to something that was closer to red – a light red, but red all the same.

‘Yes, I know.’ She skittered to the nearest wall to sympathetically pat the dark stone. It was surprisingly warm to the touch. ‘I too would prefer to burn the whole place down, if you want the truth. But my friends are trying to make it better rather than destroying it, and it seems polite to at least give them a chance, don’t you think?’

The Labyrinth felt doubtful .

‘We’ll see,’ Naxi said philosophically, making her way to the nearest tunnel. The floor was smooth like slippery ice beneath her bare feet, but much warmer, like stones that had basked in the sunlight all day. ‘For now, let’s just have a chat. You’re probably rather bored, aren’t you?’

All the colours slowly flickered back to life around her, but they remained muted. Even the pink and red were no longer so bright now, a dullness that seemed almost … sad?

‘Oh, dear.’ She sighed, glancing into the winding dark of the caves ahead. ‘Is that why you started pulling people in, now that Emelin’s opened the gates? So you would have some company again?’

The stone went a little cooler beneath her feet. Not anger – the wave of emotion that rolled in around her was nothing like that scalding sensation of true fury. Instead, the mountain seemed to be withdrawing in a way Naxi could only call …

Yes, defensive .

Like that same housecat, caught stealing bites of meat from the kitchen counter.

‘Oh, don’t worry,’ she said, an entirely genuine giggle catching her by surprise. ‘It’s not as if I care about the fools. You can crush all their toes and fingers, as far as I’m concerned. I’m just wondering if we can’t find you some better entertainment, because I imagine a bunch of frightened fae aren’t really doing the trick. Could you show me where you’re keeping them?’

For two endless heartbeats, nothing happened.

Then veins lit up in the floor beneath her feet.

Not gems, this time. Rather, it looked like a trickle of some sparkly pink fluid running just below the surface, drawing an almost-straight line towards the low tunnel to her left. Naxi turned and whirled after it, following the glowing trail deeper into the maze. Right, right, and left again. Past a gem-studded forest of stalactites, through a passage so narrow she only fit sideways and holding her breath …

It was then, just a faint tickle of emotion in the distance, that she caught her first glimpse of the Labyrinth’s fae captives.

Unsurprisingly, the sensation was mainly one of fear .

Good news for them, in a way. If they were still experiencing fear, that suggested there was something left of them to save.

The screaming came soon after, a bend or two past the place where she’d first become aware of the fools. Sobbing, too. Hoarse cries for help. If Lyn were here, she would no doubt remind Naxi that these were natural reactions to the shock of being held captive by a mountain and that it would be rather callous to roll your eyes at desperate people in need … but natural reactions or no, how the hell was anyone supposed to think clearly with all that useless whining in the background?

Naxi rolled her eyes anyway. Lyn wasn’t here to see, and she suspected that the Labyrinth quite probably agreed with her.

The gust of warm air brushing past her suggested it did indeed.

On she walked, more slowly now. She’d thought matters through until roughly this moment, but confronted with the unexpected fact that the Labyrinth’s guests were still alive, she had to admit she wasn’t quite sure how to save the fools. Convince them to be better entertainment from now on? Explain to them that all they needed to do was stop crying and start complimenting the caves around them, preferably with genuine excitement?

The waves of suffocating panic rolling over her demon senses suggested most of them might be well past that point.

Bloody unhelpful. She rolled her eyes again.

The pink veins in the floor ran around the last bend, and a small cavern opened up before her. No colours here, not even that ominous red. The only gems still glowing were white, shrouding the dark walls and low ceiling in a sickly pale glow; between them, the slumped, writhing fae figures were little more than silhouettes.

They were also stuck.

It took her a few blinks to realise it: that the Labyrinth hadn’t chopped off their feet but rather buried them. Each of the captives were sunken ankle-deep into the ink-black stone floor. Some had lost use of their hands in a similar way, and one or two wings had been caught into the walls – pretty secure, unless they tried to chop off their limbs and crawl out of the caves on the bleeding stumps.

Not that the Labyrinth would allow that, of course .

For now, it didn’t seem any of the captives had grown that desperate yet. Mostly, they were crying. In the back of the cave, a tall male was desperately flinging red magic into the floor, to no avail; every chunk of stone crumbling away beneath that destructive force grew back in place before the next blow struck.

‘Have you considered,’ Naxi said, as patiently as she could bring herself to be, ‘that you might not win its good favour by hurting it, you dummy?’

A fae female close to her shrieked, louder than anyone else.

And then at once they were all silent, gawking at her as if they’d swallowed their tongues – quite the improvement on the earlier cacophony, but not terribly productive all the same.

Time for a good chat, then. Naxi plopped down onto the floor, carefully rearranged her skirt around her knees, then looked up and beamed at the gathered company. Be considerate , Lyn would have said, so she swallowed the urge to rush straight into plans she didn’t yet have and instead started with a bright, ‘Looks like you haven’t had the greatest of mornings so far?’

They inched away from her as far as their trapped feet would let them.

Their fear turned denser, sharper , at the same moment – no longer aimed at the general deadly circumstances they couldn’t make sense of, but rather at her personal appearance. Which always made emotions hit her demon senses harder, and here were twenty-five souls or so feeling the exact same thing; the wave hit her with unpleasant strength in the fraction of a second before she yanked her shields up.

Bloody hell.

Never mind about the consideration, then.

‘Yes, yes, I’m a demon,’ she said, casting a disgruntled look at the ceiling. Unfair, admittedly. The ceiling couldn’t help the situation. But this was so stupidly tiresome , to always be the scary one even when she was there to help , and glaring angrily at the captives would only make them fear her more. ‘And yes, sometimes I kill people. No, I’m not going to kill you. I’m not even going to torture you. Well, just a little bit, maybe, if you say something particularly annoying. But probably not at all.’

That did not seem to have reassured them much when she lowered her gaze to the group before her. A quick peek around her shields told her their fear continued to burn at blistering intensity.

‘Did you … did you lock us in here?’ a young male whispered from the left side of the cave.

‘Of course I didn’t.’ I’m here to save you – but then again, that would possibly not go over well with the Labyrinth itself. She didn’t need the mountain to think her friendliness so far had been mere trickery. ‘Look, you’re getting on the poor Labyrinth’s nerves, and we need to do something about that. So can we talk about this with our big fae words, please? None of that wailing and whining?’

They gaped at her so blankly she feared for a moment the Labyrinth was spelling them all over again. But their emotions had changed when she quickly sampled them once more – still fear, but the sensation had mellowed and mingled with that woolly, fuzzy feeling of confusion.

‘The Labyrinth’s … nerves?’ someone repeated, sounding choked.

‘Very good. Words.’ She smiled at them encouragingly, only to be rewarded with another flare of immediate fright. Damn it. ‘See, the poor Labyrinth just wants some civilised company, and your screaming and fighting are really not going to do anyone any good. Alright? So let’s try again. Give it a little wave’ – she demonstrated the gesture, just in case it would help – ‘and greet it politely. “Good morning, Labyrinth.” I promise it’s not hard.’

The group of fae continued to blink at her motionless. In the back of the cave, one of them burst out sobbing again – shrill, grating sounds.

No waves.

No polite greetings.

All visible signs suggested this was not going to work.

Under any other circumstances, Naxi would have shrugged and gone on her way again. Not her problem if a bunch of snivelling fae didn’t feel like being saved; perhaps they would feel more inclined to listen to her after they’d spent twenty-four hours below the earth without food or water. If not …

Well, she wouldn’t miss them, would she?

But Thysandra would. Thysandra wanted the idiots saved, for some unimaginable reason, and that meant Naxi couldn’t just run off now and leave them here to die. Which was bloody vexing, but then again …

Thysandra wasn’t scared of her.

She could smile at Thysandra without getting that poisonous sting of fright reflected right back at her – anger and frustration and unwilling arousal, of course, but never fear , and she would be damned if she let this group of blockheads stand between her and that unimaginable relief. So she was going to suffer their company a few minutes longer. She was going to save them and take them back home, and then she would delay the next time Thysandra tried to send her away for as long as—

Oh.

Oh .

Inspiration struck like a tidal wave.

‘I’m afraid it’s hopeless,’ she said, taking her eyes off the paralysed fae and aiming her words at the ceiling again. She didn’t turn away entirely, though. The captives had to hear her in order to spread the word later. ‘It seems they’re too stupid to comprehend how pretty you are. Or too blind. Maybe both, actually.’

The air around her warmed in agreement.

Naxi snuggled up against the smooth wall, grinning at the pink gems sparking back to life around her. ‘I have a suggestion for you. How about you let these boring idiots go, and I’ll keep visiting you instead? I’ll make sure to come say hello every day. Maybe I’ll persuade some others to come with me after a while – I don’t think they’ll agree to do that if you kill their friends now, though.’

There was a flicker of uncertainty in the mountain’s strange, all-encompassing emotional landscape. Not exactly doubt, but definitely a crack in the simmering anger and disappointment … creating room for Naxi to slip her hands around those inhuman feelings and knead them into the shape she needed .

‘Every single day,’ she repeated, enunciating clearly to make sure the fae heard her as well. ‘I promise. If I stop coming, you can start dragging them into your caves again, as far as I’m concerned.’

A collective shiver ran through the group of fae; a few muffled whimpers broke free. But the Labyrinth …

The Labyrinth moved again.

With a rumble not unlike the echo of distant thunder, the stone began to shift – melting like ink-black ice as it slowly pulled away from locked arms and feet and wings. Fae gasped and staggered forward. Coloured gemstones lit up again. A warm, almost cheerful kaleidoscope of a thousand different hues – as if this promise was exactly what the mountain had hoped to claim.

If that was the case, Naxi was not ungrateful for its assistance.

‘Let’s go, then!’ she said, turning away from the cave to pat the smooth black walls. ‘Would you kindly show us the way to the nearest exit, sweetheart?’

The pink veins returned, lighting up even brighter this time.

She shepherded the group of stumbling fae into the indicated tunnel, pretending not to notice the way they kept a few inches away from her. One or two of them had the presence of mind to mutter something about the place being very pretty, actually. The others just clung to each other as they hurried through the maze, heads bowed, voices muted if they dared to exchange any words.

The path sloped down and farther down – not back to the remains of the bone hall, then, but to one of the other exits Emelin had opened during her brief stint of court reforms. Naxi didn’t keep track of their direction. She was too busy petting and complimenting the Labyrinth at every turn, and besides, who cared where they ended up?

Every part of this island was as ugly as the next, after all.

The walk seemed much longer than her original path to the prisoners, now that she was stuck with a horde of hysterical fae clamouring against her demon senses. She barely suppressed a loud cheer of relief when finally the first whiff of fresh sea air reached her through the underground tunnels. Nearly there, then. Now all she had to do was shoo her accidental protegees out the Labyrinth and into the world outside, and they could—

The path turned its final bend.

Naxi froze.

Not because of the open gate before her, or the sound of crashing waves in the distance. Nor did she give a rat’s arse about the cries of relief as the fae captives stormed outside, smelling their freedom; she didn’t even care, not really , that none of them bothered to throw her the briefest parting glance as they swept out their wings and soared out of view, their voices rapidly dying away in the distance.

Rather …

It was the vision waiting for her outside.

The trees waiting for her outside.

So, so many of them, their presence digging into her nymph magic like roots digging into fertile earth … making her heart squeeze with some emotion she hadn’t felt in centuries, something she didn’t dare examine too closely as she staggered towards the looming exit. Gnarled trunks filled the world before her. Knotted vines. A mottled canopy of leaves that seemed to swallow every ray of sunlight, shadows curling through the undergrowth in decidedly unnatural ways.

It was alive , this wood.

Not in the way she was used to, lush and joyful like the forests on Mirova had been before the Mother’s armies had burned them, down to the last sapling. These trees were all crooked and twisted. There was something dark, something savage, in their veins that made a mockery of all nymph principles of peace and loving compassion … but hell, what did it matter if they didn’t sing to her, if they growled and snarled and hissed instead?

She wasn’t all sweetness and sunshine either.

She’d never been that good at playing nymph in the first place.

The Labyrinth warmed around her as she stumbled her last breathless steps forward, its fond feelings washing over her almost like a hug. Only then did she understand – that the second part of her walk had been much longer than the first.

The mountain’s guidance hadn’t led her to the nearest exit at all .

‘You knew,’ she whispered, feeling her bottom lip wobble dangerously. ‘You knew that I would understand this place.’

A last whisper of balmy air followed her, as if to nudge her into the wood. She tiptoed out, the breeze catching her hair and skirt even as the leaves and branches around her remained eerily still – waiting for her to act, perhaps, or simply not caring about mundane matters like little demons wandering into their domain. There were no birdsongs to be heard. No chirping crickets or small animals rummaging through the undergrowth. Just the perpetual rush of the sea close-by, and …

Distant but unmistakable, a howl.

The Mother hadn’t brought all her hounds to the battlefield, then.

Naxi grimaced and started walking, finding her way through the grey-green tangle of roots and thorny vines with feather-light steps. To her right, the mountain rose high and steep. Beyond its jagged edges, towering over the wood, she caught glimpses of the castle’s red marble walls. Somehow, she’d have to get back up there eventually … but in this thrilling place, surrounded by these mirthless but living trees, she didn’t mind if it took her a while.

Really, perhaps it was best if she wasn’t anywhere near when Thysandra heard about the deal she’d made with the Labyrinth.

A giggle escaped her, all by itself.

The forest didn’t respond, remaining grim and aloof around her. Had it always been like this? Was that why the Mother had chosen this place to build her red court, the urge for death and destruction already present in the very soil of the island? Or—

She stumbled.

Not over a root or vine – she never stumbled over plants, her nymph heart too aware of them to ever be caught by surprise. Instead …

A bone.

A rib, by the look of it, long and curved, sticking from the grey earth as if its dead owner was reaching for her ankles from the grave. The rest of the skeleton was nowhere to be seen. Naxi was hardly an expert on these matters, but it seemed unlikely it had walked elsewhere by itself – which suggested that someone had —

Another howl went up behind her, like the whistle of wind on a stormy night.

Right.

The bloody hounds.

Who were the Mother’s favourite way to dispose of her enemies … and if she’d done so here , in this forest, that would explain a thing or two about the trees as well. All that blood and despair soaking the soil would mess up every living thing.

Trust the old bitch to ruin the best part of her court with her bloodlust.

Naxi scurried on, keeping her eyes on the earth this time. Now that she knew what to look for, the traces were everywhere: a shard of a skull lying in the moss, two weathered knucklebones beneath the drooping ferns … Myriskeia , she knew the fae called this place. Deathwood. Bit of a melodramatic name, she’d always thought when Lyn or Tared mentioned their clandestine trips to the island, but now it was starting to sound like a euphemism; really, calling it a graveyard would have been more appropriate.

Another clearing opened up before her … and with it, carnage.

The other bones had been old, traces of fae who’d died decades or even centuries ago in this wood. This butchery, on the other hand, was recent. Very recent. Recent enough for the blood to remain clinging to the tree bark around the clearing; recent enough for the hounds not to have eaten all of their victims yet. Naxi didn’t care much about the unfortunate souls who had been reduced to the tattered bits and pieces spread out before her, but the smell was unpleasant, and she’d have turned away immediately if not for a single detail catching her attention a few trees away.

Half a blue-grey wing.

Marred by what seemed like an unusual pattern.

The edges had been torn by teeth or claws or both; that in itself wasn’t so strange. But across the rumpled velvety surface, crude lines had been carved – letters , likely cut into that sensitive membrane while the owner of that wing was still alive .

Only three letters remained now, the rest of the wing shredded beyond recognition. With some effort, Naxi could make them out: … tor.

Traitor .

A prickle of discomfort ran up her spine.

Because this was not the Mother’s doing. The Mother had already been dead by the time this butchery had occurred. Which meant others had fed these unlucky fae to the hounds roaming this forest – people still at the court, people still looking for vengeance.

As she’d known they would, of course. Emelin had made her threats for a reason. And yet it was a different thing entirely to stand here and see those pitiful remains of what had once been living, breathing individuals … A messy heap of bowels. A dark-haired scalp. Two hands bound together, neither of them still attached to wrists.

And that torn wing.

Traitor .

Naxi’s stomach rolled with a sudden premonition … and then she was running, to hell with the living trees and the treasures of the Labyrinth waiting for her.

She should not have left Thysandra alone today.

She should not have left Thysandra alone today.