The Goblin's Throne

Chapter Eight: Pride

Cerise had just finished cutting my hair when a pair of guards came to fetch me. They strode inside, their armor gleaming brightly in the little light that came in through the window. One, a tall dark skinned man, kept his hand on the hilt of his blade. The other shorter one carried chains. 

I stood and set back my shoulders. My face was still wet with tears, but I didn't hide my face. I held my head up so that they could see every mark of devastation that had been cut into me. "I can't hold my son if I'm to wear heavy chains," I said hoarsely.

"They are not for your wrists." The guard holding them growled. He stalked towards me and knelt. "Pull up your skirt." I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from slapping the pleased look off his face as I did as he commanded. With my free hand, I fisted the thin fabric of my dress and pulled up the skirt to my knees. He snapped the chains around each ankle. I tested them as he stood again, shifting where I stood. They didn't look it, the links of the chains were fairly small, but they were as heavy as mountains. I couldn't even lift my feet any more than to shuffle. There was no way I could run in them though with the leash around my neck I knew better than to try. Titania wasn't taking any chances. 

"Let's go," The one fondling his sword motioned with his head towards the door. 

Cerise squeezed my arm. "Good luck." She whispered and smiled reassuringly at me as the guards dragged me from the room.

I was taken back to the central tower and escorted down to its lower reaches where the rooms were no longer open to the air. There in a large chamber were lined numerous cages on carts the very same as the ones that had held slaves at Kieran's camp the night I tried to assassinate him. Like Mab's castle, there were spells in place to prevent the fae from just appearing wherever around and in the palace so the carts were needed to transport slaves over the distance that magic could not and control large numbers of them as well. With their hands gripping each arm, the guards hoisted me into the cage of the nearest cart. They stood in the back with me while another guard that had been waiting there for us sat on the driver's bench. 

"Ha!" The driver shouted and a team of horses, their bodies only a faint outline of flickering light, appeared. He snapped reins of molten gold and the team drove the cart forward, through a dark tunnel and into the skies flying with the same thoughtless grace as any faerie ever did. The horses ran on the winds, their hooves made sparks of lightning with each strike and their whinnies were the boom of thunder. 

I used to be afraid of storms when I was a child. The too bright lightning cutting through the air and the rumbling sound that followed it unnerved me. I remembered having to sleep with Jasper when it got too bad. I thought it was the noise that scared me, but maybe some part of me knew. It was faeries that made the storms when they came to whisk naughty children away. 

I'd grown out of that fear of storms and faeries as well. 

I rocked Magni out of habit, watching the lightning arc from the horses' hooves down to the human world far, far below wondering if it happened to strike anyone I knew. The guards were leaned in close together, staring and snickering at me as they whispered in old Seelie. While the two races of faerie shared a common tongue, they each had their own language as well that was now rarely spoken. Of course, they couldn't know that a girl that had been illiterate just a few years ago now spoke six languages. I had used my many months of being bedridden whilst carrying Odd wisely. 

"This can't really be her can it? This little thing Conquered the City of Thorns?" The one with the sword said. His teeth were blindingly white.

"I'd think she were a kid if not for her tits." The one holding my chains cackled to himself. "I wonder if she'd be up to a good roll. It'd be a nice reprieve from that hideous husband of hers, I'm sure."