Chapter 9

She woke to the banging of fists on her door.

For a moment she barely knew where she was as she rolled off the couch and staggered to her feet, the riot of leaves and vines around her so different from her familiar living room that her sleep-fogged mind refused to recognise it. Then she hit her knee against the low table, and pain and memory bloomed together.

Right. Couch.

Naxi.

And a shrill, urgent voice on her doorstep, shouting her name.

Changing course, she raked a hurried hand through her tangled hair and snatched last night’s dagger from the floor. Could it be a trap? It could be a trap. Perhaps she should demand they bring in Nicanor first, to vouch for their peaceful intentions. Then again, that would put her further in Nicanor’s debt and show the court that she didn’t dare rely on herself, which—

The bedroom door swept open, and Naxi darted into the room as if she was about to leave for a summer picnic .

She was wearing her own flower dress again, although without the bloodstains; she must have washed it the previous day. Her hair hung loose over her shoulders. From the smile on her face, one could have thought she’d lived in these quarters for years – a suspiciously oblivious cheer, as if she had forgotten that she’d be out of here before she could move another vine.

Or … well, as soon as this more urgent disturbance had been dealt with, at least.

‘Morning, Sashka!’ she sunnily greeted, hiding a little yawn behind her hand. ‘They’re genuinely panicking outside, if you want to know. No murderous feelings waiting for you.’

Right.

That shouldn’t have been a reassurance.

Really, nothing this treacherous little creature said or did should make her feel any safer … and yet she couldn’t help her loosening shoulders as she took two steps towards the door and swung it open. Damn the caution, then. If anyone attacked her, at least she’d have a demon watching her back.

The black-haired female who came tumbling over the doorstep looked like attacking anyone was the last thing on her mind, though.

‘Thysandra.’ She gasped the name, falling to her knees in a rush of violet wings. ‘Your Majesty, I mean. My son , Your Majesty – my son was taken by the Labyrinth! He’s nowhere to be found, and the others aren’t either, and—’

Thysandra stiffened.

Her mind needed half a second to shift – an almost physically painful adjustment from the simple court quarrels she’d expected to something with the potential to be much worse. The bloody Labyrinth ? But she’d given orders that no one was to enter that cursed place yesterday, hadn’t she? She’d posted fae around the bone hall to keep curious idiots out?

Vaguely, she was aware of Naxi’s muffled giggle behind her.

‘Could you repeat that,’ she slowly said, bracing herself against the carved doorframe, ‘and then start from the beginning, please? ’

‘It … it started last night,’ the kneeling female stammered, her purple wings quivering. She was wearing a particularly flimsy chemise and nothing else, Thysandra only noticed then; most of the company around her was similarly dressed, or rather, barely dressed. ‘There were strange lights coming from the bone hall. Which didn’t seem much to worry about at first, but now people have started going in, and—’

‘Tell me more about that,’ Thysandra interrupted sharply. ‘Who? Why? I seem to remember I gave explicit commands yesterday that no one was to go anywhere near the place under any circumstances.’

The female at her feet let out a shuddering wail. ‘It wasn’t voluntarily , Your Majesty!’

A disconcerted silence fell.

‘Not … voluntarily?’ Thysandra repeated, lifting her gaze to the rest of the company standing huddled in the corridor – hoping, against her wiser expectations, that one of them would step forward and turn this madness into sanity. ‘Could you elaborate? Is anyone forcing people to go into the Labyrinth?’

A lanky male wearing only a lacy dressing gown cleared his throat, nervously glancing back and forth between Thysandra and the female on the floor. ‘The … the Labyrinth itself, it seems.’

Centuries of keeping a straight face were barely enough to keep her expression in check. ‘Come again?’

‘It seems to be … enchanting people?’ He swallowed visibly. ‘Their eyes go all glazed and they wander off towards its entrances. I saw three or four people flounder into the bone hall before I got the hell out of there, but some others—’

‘My son,’ the violet-winged female sobbed. ‘My son was lured into the gate near the west cove, Your Majesty!’

‘But that gate is sealed,’ Thysandra sputtered, knowing damn well it was hardly the most important point about this situation but unable to ignore it all the same. ‘The Mother closed it centuries ago. How could anyone—’

‘That little halfblood opened it!’ the desperate mother burst out. ‘ Emelin !’

Oh.

Oh gods .

It took them all down , Naxi had said about the fae who tried to reach her in the bone hall – but that had been only the bone hall, and only the people unwise enough to actively fly within the Labyrinth’s reach. Why in the world had no one told her the other entrances to the caves had been opened as well? She was the fucking High Lady of this court, for the bloody gods’ sakes – how in hell was she supposed to protect its people if no one even informed her of the dangers in the first place?

‘Alright,’ she said, gritting her teeth to keep down the scream welling up in her throat. Show no confusion , her thoughts droned. Show no weakness . ‘You there – get me a list of the opened gates within an hour. The two of you – I need names of the people who disappeared into the mountain. In the meantime—’

‘I could go take a look?’ Naxi’s bright voice interrupted.

Thysandra hadn’t thought anything could further startle the gathered fae around the doorway, but it turned out the presence of a broadly smiling demon in an adorable pink dress was enough to stun even the wailing female at her feet into silence.

‘ You ?’ she heard herself blurt, and there was far too much shock in her voice. ‘But—’

But you were going to leave . She almost let those pathetic words fall from her lips for half the court to hear – but I no longer needed you. You agreed so easily that you should finally leave me alone …

Far, far too easily.

The floor was sinking away beneath her feet.

‘Well, the Labyrinth is a natural phenomenon. With feelings.’ Naxi beamed at her, as if her magic wasn’t picking up on every tendril of escalating panic. ‘Nymph and demon magic seem rather well-suited to the task, wouldn’t you say, Your Majesty?’

Your Majesty.

Not Sashka , at least. She was almost grateful.

‘Do you have anything to do with this?’ she bit out, her tight voice the only shield between the outside world and the utter collapse of her composure. That little giggle, a moment before. Those knowing smiles – as if the demon had known , last night, that they’d wake up to this particular alarm. ‘Did you expect—’

‘I didn’t expect anything,’ Naxi protested, that plump bottom lip falling into a pout again. A few of the other fae shuffled hastily backwards. ‘But it was clear enough that the poor thing was still rather grumpy yesterday, wasn’t it? So I’m not entirely surprised it’s acting up. Honestly, I would be lashing out too if someone locked me down for eight centuries – it might just be getting started, for all we know.’

The disconcerted glances among the gathered fae were unmistakable now.

‘Alright,’ Thysandra said, making her decision in a heartbeat – because she sure as hell wasn’t descending into the eerie-lit bowels of the mountain beneath the castle, and she doubted many other volunteers for rescue missions would be available. There would be plenty of time to kick the bloody menace off the island after this had been resolved. ‘Do what you can, but if even a single fae dies on your way through the castle, you’ll feel the consequences. Clear?’

For a single moment she thought Naxi would object.

Worse, that the demon might laugh in her face and remind her she was in no position to make demands, not unless she wished for some particularly interesting rumours to spread – traitor’s daughter, counterfeit queen, and who was she to think she could make the rules after a handful of vines had been enough to reduce her to a pleading mess?

But Naxi merely considered her for three thundering heartbeats. Her smile dwindled. Her blue eyes grew thoughtful – no, calculating .

Then she nodded, so deeply it was almost a bow, and said, ‘As you wish.’

She flitted off before Thysandra could recover from the shock. The ranks of fae parted wide around her slight form, then turned to gape at Thysandra again – not in outrage, as she’d feared, but rather with something like … baffled respect?

Awe ?

Only then did she realise what the exchange must have looked like to the rest of the world – to those who had not witnessed the events in her rooms last night. Thysandra Demonbane, valiantly threatening the monster who’d single-handedly slaughtered all surviving members of a regiment the day before. More unexpectedly, the same uncontrollable demon bowing to that authority.

Reinforcing, deliberately or accidentally, Thysandra’s illusion of power over the court.

Gods have mercy. Who’d have thought any political savvy was hiding behind that carefree facade?

‘Anything else?’ she said out loud, using the silence to her advantage while it lasted. ‘Because if that was all, I suggest you spread the warning to stay away from the entrances and wait until our demon guest returns with news.’

She expected more objections, pleas, lamenting over children and lovers lost to the wiles of the mountain. But the purple-winged female at her feet scrambled up without another word. The rest of the company was already turning around, gathering robes and skirts, casting cautious glances at the stairs Naxi had just descended. Within a minute they were gone, murmuring quietly among themselves as they hurried out of her reach.

Were they too stunned to cause trouble, or were they too afraid of her to do so?

Perhaps it was a coincidence that no one accosted her on her way to the archives this morning, but Thysandra didn’t think it was.

The narrow aisles of the archive hall were no longer so hauntingly quiet as they had been the previous day, fae and a handful of humans hurrying between the cabinets against a background of constant murmurs. Somewhere in a far corner of the first hall, someone was slowly reading a list of names out loud. Elsewhere, the dull thuds of books against tables rhythmically broke through the hushed atmosphere. If the news of the Labyrinth’s antics had reached these dusky rooms already, no one seemed to be terribly bothered by it; more likely, the clerks had simply been too busy to hear about it.

Thysandra sure as hell wasn’t going to be the one to tell them.

She returned all greetings she received on her way to Gadyon’s new office, but never paused to engage in any further conversation. The lack of familiar faces was disconcerting. Even though she knew , rationally, about the slaughter at the White City, her heart still clung to the odd illusion that all absent fae were simply off on a lengthy vacation; that any moment Anysia could sweep from behind the bookcases and crack some deadpan joke about illiteracy and the army.

Perhaps it would have been easier to wrap her head around it if she’d been there. If she’d seen the blood soaking the grass, heard the screams of the dying.

Perhaps she would have felt less like a traitor, too.

She pressed that thought away as she finally reached the office that had been Anysia’s, the nameplate that had adorned the door for over a century gone.

The head of the archives worked from a spacious, octagonal room, sparsely decorated but for the broad desk and the carved bookcases along the walls. A single arched window looked out over the olive-covered hills and the azure sea beyond. At first, scanning the office for would-be murderers, she thought the place was empty; only as she stepped inside did she notice the small shape huddled in the corner behind the desk, a messy grey blanket from which only a blonde head and an arm emerged.

The pointy tip of a fae ear unmistakably stuck out from between those pale blonde locks.

Frowning, Thysandra came to a standstill in the middle of the room, throwing another quick glance around to make sure she hadn’t somehow overlooked Gadyon as well. But the brown-haired fae really was nowhere to be seen, and here was a half human clerk taking a nap in his office – did he have any idea?

Why hadn’t the bloody woman just gone home to sleep?

She considered her options for a moment, then closed the door, cleared her throat, and cautiously said, ‘ Inga?’

Allie’s sister shot up from her makeshift bed with a speed that could rival the most vigilant of soldiers.

‘I have permission to— Oh. It’s you.’ She slumped back against the side of the bookcase, voice lowering a little as she grabbed an old waterbag off the floor and took a swig. ‘Apologies. I was expecting Gadyon to wake me before you arrived.’

Which suggested her supervisor knew about the clerk in his room. Thysandra considered that for a moment, then suggested, ‘Long night?’

‘Yes. Stayed up until sunrise to get all the paperwork in order.’ Inga took a few more sips of water, then rubbed her eyes and rose to her feet, folding the blanket with efficient ease. ‘And then I couldn’t go home anymore, of course.’

She did not sound annoyed. She sounded, if anything, wearily resigned to whatever had made her tuck herself in on this hard wooden floor instead.

‘Ah,’ Thysandra said, with more confidence than she felt. ‘Yes. Why, exactly?’

A frown. ‘Why what?’

‘Why couldn’t you go home anymore? Sunrise was hours ago – you’d have had plenty of time to—’

‘Oh. Too many fae around.’ Inga shrugged, dropping into one of the chairs at the desk without waiting for an invitation. ‘To avoid getting caught by anyone with unsavoury intentions, it’s generally best to sneak in before sunrise and out during dinnertime. If one of your mages could accompany me back to Rustvale after we’re done with this meeting, I would greatly appreciate it.’

Thysandra blinked.

To avoid getting caught ?

A line of reasoning presented with such bland indifference. Was this something humans did all the time? Something all humans did?

She was still figuring out how to ask without sounding like a fool when Nicanor slid into the room – his silvery hair braided, his damask coat a sensible black today. His smooth steps faltered only for the briefest moment as he caught sight of Inga by the desk; then, as if nothing had happened, he closed the door behind him, nodded at Thysandra by way of greeting, and wryly said, ‘Another morning of bold choices?’

He must already have heard about Naxi and the Labyrinth, then. Better not to discuss that right before Inga’s wary grey eyes.

Instead, she said, ‘This is Inga, Nicanor. Inga, meet my Lord Protector.’

Nicanor gave a small, nondescript smile as he sat down. Inga’s response was a long, scathing look from behind loose strands of her long blonde hair.

Promising start.

Thankfully, the door creaked open before the silence could stretch to the point of awkwardness, and a pile of parchment stumbled into the room, followed by the tall male carrying it. Gadyon’s face and messy brown hair were barely visible behind the fruits of his labour. His unmistakable limp was enough evidence of his identity, though; there weren’t that many fae with a clubfoot at the Crimson Court.

Really, he might be the only one. The education system of the court was hardly gentle on those with a disadvantage on the battlefield.

Inga darted from her chair to help the head of the archives unload his burden onto his desk, sorting the books and scrolls into piles with a swiftness that proved she hadn’t held her job only because of Agenor’s interference. Gadyon muttered a word of thanks, and another one as Nicanor rose to close the door once again; he fell into the chair beside Thysandra as if it was the first time he was sitting down in twenty-four hours.

‘Busy night,’ he clarified with a nervous nod at the piles of parchment. ‘Think we should have all the information you asked for, though.’

Nicanor plucked a sheet from the nearest pile on his way back to his chair, frost-blue eyes shooting over the lines as he sat down. ‘Ah, the food again?’

‘Unfortunately,’ Thysandra said sourly, ‘twenty ships full of grain have failed to materialise in our harbours overnight. So yes, the food again. ’

He granted her that point with a quick grin. ‘Where do we stand, then?’

‘It’s rather bad,’ Gadyon muttered, rubbing his temple. ‘I had the numbers calculated by three people independently, as the High Lady asked, and all three clerks ended up with the same estimates: we have about two months of food left in the stores at the moment. Perhaps two and a half, if we limit the feasting. After that …’

‘We’re left without provisions in the middle of winter?’ Thysandra finished.

He grimaced. ‘Yes.’

‘How about the other fae isles?’ Nicanor asked, pursing his lips at the document in his hand. ‘Their harvests—’

‘—are far from sufficient,’ Gadyon interrupted bluntly. ‘Although, well, the main issue is that I’m not entirely sure which islands will end up pledging loyalty to the Crimson Court at all. The head of the department for tributes and taxation is dead, so administration is severely delayed on that side, and many houses seem to be biding their time before making a decision.’

Until they knew how successfully the three new courts would be ruled. Until they could be sure Thysandra would not lead this one into flaming disaster. No one spoke the words out loud, but she could read them in every pair of eyes in the room.

She cleared her throat. ‘But say we assume that roughly a third of them will choose to stay allied to our court …’

‘We never produce much in the winter,’ Gadyon said, shaking his head. ‘A few carts of cabbages aren’t going to keep this castle fed. So even if we can double domestic production for next year’s spring and summer – for which we should start taking measures soon, if that’s what we need – we’re still left with a gap of a few months between our provisions running out and the new harvests arriving.’

A few months.

Thysandra had known it would be the likely outcome of his research, and all the same, a stone sank in her stomach at the confirmation.

‘Thank you,’ she forced herself to say, calm and stoic, fighting to keep the dread from her voice. She did not want to know what the likes of Bereas would say if they heard about these numbers – something about armed raids and conquests, in all likeliness. ‘It’s good to know what we can expect, at least. In that case, it seems to me that our only reasonable option is to swallow our pride and reach out to the other magical communities, isn’t it?’

‘Good luck with that,’ Inga muttered under her breath.

Nicanor threw her a quick glance, then raised a silvery eyebrow at Thysandra. ‘I agree, but speaking as your Lord Protector, be careful with how you spread that news. Plenty of people would rather take that food by force.’

Inga’s muffled cough sounded suspiciously like a scoff.

‘Yes, thank you,’ Thysandra hurriedly said, before Nicanor could do worse than narrow his eyes in annoyance. ‘That was going to be my next question, as a matter of fact. What approach would you recommend to communicate the decision?’

‘We should probably keep the matter quiet for now,’ he said, rubbing his fingers over his sharp jaw – visibly making an effort to rein in any biting remarks in Inga’s direction. ‘At least until we have some idea what price the rest of the archipelago will demand. If the court finds out about the plan before that time, the scaremongering and speculation will run wild, and I can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to keep that in check entirely.’

Sensible. She looked at Gadyon and Inga, who both nodded – the first more eagerly, the second with a scowl that suggested she’d have loved to disagree.

‘Alright,’ Thysandra said, straightening her wings and spine. ‘I’ll start reaching out to some of the other peoples, in that case – I think it’s best I do that in person. Gadyon, could you get me an estimate of the minimum we need until spring and an overview of the tribute volumes we’ve received per island in the past decade?’

He nodded again, then added a slightly redundant, ‘Of course.’

‘Good. Other than that, please continue the work on the list of fallen warriors I asked for and have it sent to Nicanor once you’re done. Nicanor, could you reach out to Orthea and come up with some fitting memorial ceremony together? Please remind her that not every occasion requires wine and orgies.’

His sour grin broke through, sharp as a dagger but seemingly genuine. ‘Will do.’

‘Excellent.’ She braced herself, then added as calmly as possible, ‘That leaves only the matter of the humans for now.’

All eyes shot to the slender figure perched on her chair by the desk.

‘Oh, well done,’ Inga said testily – the bite in her voice not enough to hide the tension beneath. ‘You’ve all successfully identified the human in the room. As I informed Her Majesty yesterday, I’m here to ask for full citizen’s rights, legal protection, and decent wages and housing. I don’t need to elaborate on that, do I?’

What had she said, a few minutes ago? It’s best to sneak in before sunrise and out during dinnertime …

‘No,’ Thysandra said, suppressing the confusing twinge of her heart. ‘No, you don’t need to elaborate, thank you.’

Inga clenched her jaw, waiting. Gadyon was nodding again. Nicanor sat leaning forward, his blue wings splaying out ever so slightly behind his shoulders … but like last night, when she’d summarised the matter to him, he did not object.

Did he have the faintest idea of why she was going along with this, of the threats haunting her every decision?

‘I intend to honour the requests,’ she added, almost blurting out the words. ‘And I will do so as soon as possible. That said, we may need a little time to figure out how to best go about it. We can introduce wages rather easily, but as for housing, we’ll have to decide on a suitable location that doesn’t force us to relocate too many fae.’

‘Ah, yes,’ Inga said bitterly. ‘Imagine that, relocating people against their wishes.’

There was nothing Thysandra could say in response to that.

She tried – she opened her mouth in the hopes that some counterargument would come to her all by itself – but none of the words welling up in her held water in the slightest. That’s different , she wanted to say. That’s not at all the same thing as recruiting servants from human isles … but it was, wasn’t it?

If anything, the fae would only be made to move across the same island. The humans had been taken from all over the archipelago.

And that difference hardly strengthened her position.

‘Yes,’ she said numbly, a full five seconds too late. ‘Yes, good point.’

Inga’s expression didn’t soften.

‘All the same,’ Nicanor said, graciously breaking the painful silence, ‘it may be safer for the humans to move slowly. There are plenty of fae around who might take out their anger on you if they disagree with these changes.’

‘Ah.’ Inga scoffed. ‘How very convenient.’

‘I made a bargain to keep this court under control,’ Nicanor sharply retorted, his upper lip curling into an alarming sneer. ‘Convenient or inconvenient, I have no choice but to do my best for us all. If you prefer to spread the news before we have solidified our hold on the island, by all means, go ahead, but—’

‘I think you’ve each made your point,’ Thysandra interrupted, throwing Inga a warning glance. ‘Thank you. We’ll move as fast as we can, and in the meantime, we’ll keep these plans quiet outside this room. Does anyone have any objections to that?’

Nicanor sagged back in his chair, folding his arms. ‘Do you think it might be wise to make a bargain on our collective silence?’

‘I’m not making any bargains,’ Inga snapped.

‘I think we’ll be alright,’ Thysandra said, hoping this wasn’t a mistake, or at least no more than a small, easily fixed mistake. ‘None of us profits from leaking the information. Gadyon, please find a new head for the staff department and then instruct them to get wages for human employees set up. Nicanor, let your commanders know I’ll treat attacks on humans as punishable crimes from now on, and discuss enforcement with them. Is that enough for now, Inga, or is there anything else we need to talk about?’

It seemed for a moment that Allie’s sister would say something, but in the end she merely rose from her chair and snatched her blanket and bottle from the floor, her movements brusque and impatient. ‘If that’s all for today, would one of you be so gallant as to accompany me home?’ She turned, glared at Nicanor, and sharply added, ‘Not you.’

A biting smile curled his lips. ‘Don’t worry. I had no intention of volunteering for the task.’

‘I’ll come with you, Inga,’ Gadyon hastily offered, throwing uneasy glances between the other two. ‘Now that the preparations for this meeting are done, I have a few minutes to spare.’

‘That works.’ Her nod at Thysandra was strained, as if it took all she had not to throw a punch instead. ‘Thank you, I suppose. I’ll take that back if you disappoint me, though.’

‘I’ll try not to, then,’ Thysandra said wryly.

The next moment, the two archivists were gone – their footsteps echoing through the quiet archives as they removed themselves, hers brisk and impatient, his irregular and accompanied by the supporting slaps of his wings.

She fully expected Nicanor to say something, or worse, to ask something. Surely this was the moment to inquire why she was going along with Inga’s demands despite the woman’s outrageous manners. Why she wouldn’t so much as consider the far more popular option of food raids over costly treaties. Why Naxi was still at the court and what in the world she’d been doing with a demon in her rooms all night …

But all her newly minted Lord Protector said, rising from his chair and sauntering to the door with effortless grace, was, ‘Let’s have a word about the Labyrinth.’