Chapter Twenty-Seven
"Who were you following earlier?"
"Excuse me?" Naeyrs asked, pausing to listen within the emptied cavern.
The two of them hung precariously on a thin ladder. Naeyrs put a finger to her lips, signalling for Pasiphae to be quiet. When she was satisfied, she pushed at the space on the wall where it met the lining of the ceiling.
A slab of metal slid to the side. Naeyrs climbed through.
As Pasiphae followed her, she tried not to be too begrudging about the fact that only a few days earlier, she had been dragged through this very underground cavern and tossed over the palace walls. At least now they were on the same side.
Pasiphae's hands sunk into thick carpeting. She clambered to her feet, brushing off the grit clinging to her palms.
"So this is how you're sneaking around?"
It would seem that the strange sub-levels led vertically up into the King Consort's underground floor. With the celebration earlier and the dive-bombing sylphs, there was nothing here with them but the sound of the occasional dripping pipe.
"More or less," Naeyrs replied. She frowned then, peering down into the space they had climbed through. "Was Lauha behind you?"
"We lost her ages ago," Pasiphae said. Then, "In the woods," she tried, "you and Lauha were following someone."
Naeyrs kept her attention fixed on the slab of metal she was sliding back into place, but her spine stiffened. "They have been following us for weeks now."
"They?"
"He, she, it—one, two, or even more, whatever—I don't know. Each time we give chase, they disappear. We almost thought we had them this time, but once we got to the palace walls—" she made an outward gesture with her small hands as she stood, "—gone."
"So you don't know who it is?" Pasiphae thought back to the silhouette. It had paused in spotting her, and stopped to watch. Maybe if it had lingered a bit longer, Naeyrs and Lauha would have caught up.
"We suspected the captain of the Guard for a while: thought he was onto us."
"Warin?" Pasiphae shook her head. "He was moving across town at the same time we saw the figure."
"Yeah, we figured it wasn't him eventually." Naeyrs stopped again, listening closely. "He was too nervous when Lauha approached him."
Pasiphae remembered seeing the two at the restaurant. She wondered if Seth had discovered what it was Warin was hiding yet.
"Exactly what are we waiting for?" Pasiphae whispered when Naeyrs hadn't moved for a few moments. She made to proceed ahead, but Naeyrs yanked at her wrist with a fierce grip.
"Wait."
"Why?" Pasiphae asked. "The palace is deserted."
"Not quite," she said, frowning. With another precautionary glance, Naeyrs hauled her down a complicated route of hallways. She appeared panicked, sensing something that Pasiphae wasn't, almost tripping in her haste when they came to a stop outside a door with a knob thick with dust.
Naeyrs hadn't knocked more than once when Lauha popped her head out.
Pasiphae had to rub her eyes in disbelief.
"By Callistra—" She jabbed at Lauha's arm, making sure the girl was solid. "Where did you come from?"
Lauha appeared puzzled. "This is my room."
"How did you get here before we did? You went in the other direction!" Pasiphae held up a hand immediately. "You know what, forget I asked."
Lauha frowned into empty space, but then promptly focused. "I smell sylphs."
"You— what?"
Pasiphae squinted into the dark. The dilapidated dining hall—the main area of the floor—was only a few steps away, lit by a single, warm bulb. A wisp of something moved.
The outline of a sylph materialised.
"What are they doing in here?" Pasiphae whispered, trying to make herself smaller to avoid being seen.
"I don't know," Lauha whispered, "but there are more coming from the other direction too."
Meanwhile, Naeyrs was digging around the fabric at her waistline, retrieving something in her loose pants. The object reflected a line of light as she found it and presented it to Pasiphae.
"My dagger!" Pasiphae exclaimed. Relief and resentment battled within her. She pointed a finger at Naeyrs as she snatched it. "I knew you took it."
"Yeah, yeah," the girl replied flippantly. "I'm giving it back now."
Pasiphae ran a finger along the blade lovingly.
"Listen to me," Naeyrs said hurriedly. "I'm estimating three guards blocking the entranceway from the sub-floor to the first. You need to deal with those. From then on, you find the room where the sylphs are coming from by magic. It feels clustered and smoky."
"What?" Pasiphae demanded. "I thought you were taking me there."
"Change of plans," Naeyrs hissed. "The sylphs can literally eat me. Like—" She mimed chomping her teeth.
Pasiphae grimaced.
"We're going to resume our covers," Naeyrs continued. "We'll find you again when you're ready."
"We're going to need more weapons too," Lauha added absently. She was staring down the passageway like she had every intention to fight the oncoming sylphs.
"But I can't find the room on my own—" Pasiphae protested.
It was a lost cause. Panic filled Naeyrs' eyes as a noise skittered at the end of the hallway, and she yanked at Lauha to get into the room.
As Pasiphae looked around to make sure she was still in the clear, they shut the door.
Pasiphae was left alone in the hallway, accompanied by the sound of a leaking water valve.
"Wait!" she hissed, banging her fist on the door before she could think about the racket it made. "You're telling me to do this with a single dagger? Are you kidding me?"
The sylphs heard her.
"I— arghh!" She broke into a frustrated scream, which then morphed into horrified as two sylphs came charging after her. Pasiphae sprinted off, mentally cursing the jinni and the banshee.
She braved a glance over her shoulder. The sylphs were gaining.
In an attempt to slow their process, she picked up the chair and threw it back, but she shouldn't have bothered: it passed through the sylphs like they weren't even there.
Pasiphae was panting within seconds. She pressed her cloak up against her face, the smell of the sylphs worsening with the closer they got.
The stairs to the first floor came into view, and Pasiphae charged up, taking three at a time. A cold breath brushed her neck.
She stretched her legs further to take four steps at a time.
"Where... you... going?" the sylphs hissed after her. "You taste... familiar."
Pasiphae reached the end of the stairs, stumbling as they ended suddenly and almost barrelled head-first into the guards that Naeyrs had mentioned.
She tore her collar off, and threw it at the stupefied guards. The one in the middle struggled to catch it, her face a picture of shock.
"They're your problem now!" she shrieked at them, taking the moment to dart between the gap and run. She didn't stick around for when the guards saw the sylphs, hurtling into the labyrinth of hallways.
Pasiphae resisted the urge to pause, her lungs burning. Though she had lost her pursuers, the palace was eery in its silence, and she felt far from safety.
Pasiphae did a complete circle on her heel, looking around as she ran.
She slowed.
Naeyrs had said that she would feel where the sylphs were coming from by magic, but she felt nothing except the complete absence that fae magic prompted. Was sylph magic supposed to be different? Maybe her own void blocked out whatever it was that she was supposed to sense.
"Think," she murmured to herself, scrunching her hands into her hair. It was an unruly mess atop her head, and she half-heartedly tried to push the sweaty strands away from her face before giving up.
The sylphs came from the back of the palace. Kalis' room had been at the back. She knew how to get to Kalis' room. She would go from there.
Pasiphae glanced up and tried to identify the neon-white lights. She gasped for breath, and began moving again.
"Come on, come on, come on," Pasiphae muttered. She looked up at the lights. She had taken a wrong turn. She back-tracked and went around another hallway.
Pasiphae doubled over, clutching the cramp that was forming around her middle. With her other hand, she reached up for the chain still tight around her neck. There was a weight lifted now that the collar had been abandoned, but the chain still reminded her of what was at stake.
It reminded her of the sacrifices that Circe was making an ocean away, and that Pasiphae needed to do her part.
She drew up against the wall, spotting a familiar rip in the carpeting at her feet. She had to be near the back now, surely, but how could she find the sylphs?
Pasiphae shut her eyes.
Her senses had dulled after being in Khotadi for so long, but she still knew what witch magic felt like. There was only absence here. There was nothing drifting in the hallway that her heart could absorb.
She stood in that hallway for what felt like hours, simply trying to feel, and yet nothing stirred in her chest, nothing rushed in her veins.
Deaths, she thought. I'm useless.
Pasiphae inhaled sharply, pushing back the prickling in her eyes.
And a dusty, coal-packed smell flew in.
She straightened up immediately, glancing around. There were no sylphs nearby.
She sniffed again.
Yet she could smell them.
Perhaps this was how she detected their magic.
Suddenly invigorated, Pasiphae followed the scent of swirling flowers and honeydew, a sweetness doused heavily in gasoline and soot.
It was as straightforward as following a marked path, and before long, she found herself outside a plain door. There was no doubt that this was where it came from, but the sensible part of her knew it wouldn't be so easy.
The hopeful part of her wanted this to finally, finally be the end.
She twisted the knob, flinging the door open without intention to be sly.
The room was bright.
Electrical fixtures poured light in at every angle, warming the lone figure in the middle of the room. He sat slumped on a chair, staring into a large, rounded bowl on the table.
Pasiphae's breath caught.
This was King Consort Prees, she knew immediately, recognising the regal profile.
But he wore no shirt—or he did, only it had been so shredded beyond repair that there was nothing left save for a few diamond-shaped fabric pieces on the lush carpet.
Beneath the shirt, there was a pair of wings.
A pair of wings, perhaps, a while ago. Now, it was nothing but a four spindly lines, two on each side that pieced together at their ends, mercurial black slashes that protruded from his back. On each, less than a hundred silvery strands remained out of the natural thousands, half ripped and hanging, almost but not quite still attached.
All others looked like they had been removed, plucked, or sliced off. On the left wing, the lower spindle still dripped with dark blood.
The room was silent.
King Prees was unmoving.
Pasiphae slinked into the room, hesitant to take the first step. The closer she moved to the Unseelie King, who hadn't yet blinked, a tangible pressure tried harder and harder to repel her, pushing at her hand as she closed her fingers around the dagger in her pocket, holding it in her steady grip.
This was the source of the Somnus.
But this wasn't the final destination.
Pasiphae had crept close enough to reach out her hand and touch the king. He hadn't heard her come in, never mind register her heavy breathing as she loomed over him.
He was staring at his own reflection in the bowl. It was filled to the brim with water.
"Your Majesty?" she tried.
No response.
Pasiphae reached out and roughly seized the king's chin. His head lolled back, his stare following the movement.
She let go violently, shaking her hand to get rid of the imaginary filth she had acquired. King Prees had no life in his stare. There was only absence.
It should have been easy then, to press her blade against his throat and slice. But she had moved his face, and now his empty eyes were pinning into her, unwavering.
Someone had destroyed him already. He surely wouldn't feel anything if she killed him.
Pasiphae's hand shook.
Do it, she screamed at herself. Just end it!
Her mind resolved, she pushed forward with her wrist.
But before she could draw a line of scarlet onto the king's throne, a force yank her arm backwards so roughly that she heard a click in her socket.
Pasiphae flew to her side, crashing into the table and knocking over the bowl of water so that it soaked into the carpet.
For a moment, as Pasiphae blinked in shock, she could only think that the water had been heavy, for the stain pushed the plush carpet completely flat.
Then, she realised what absolute deep shit she was in, as Circe would say.
"It would be great if you could not do that," an airy voice said from above her. There was the swishing of skirts, and then Queen Morgana of the Unseelie Court was peering down at Pasiphae, her head tilted curiously.
"We meet again, Pasiphae of Eo."
The queen slammed down her staff, and then Pasiphae saw nothing.