Page 35 of Curse of Darkness
Otherkin.
They were the race of creatures that walked this world long before the fae fought their way through the portal they rode from another world. They prayed to the Hallows and made their sacrifices there. They danced to the equinoxes and sang to the solstices. Their ruins dot the forests, and there are even ancient walls in Ceres that bear the mark of their chiseled runes.
He’s gone before I can do anything more than stare at him.
“Well, Daughter of Evernight?” muses the Erlking as I accept the wine. “Shall we drink and dance the night away? Or have you come to presume immediately upon your favor?”
I sip the elderberry wine carefully in order to give no insult. “I have come because times are desperate and the Mother of Night has granted me a quest. Else I would stay to dance the night with you.”
The cup of wine pauses at his lips.
The Mother of Night is one of the most powerful Old Ones in existence, and though she’s trapped within her prison world still, it’s interesting to note that her name gives even the Erlking pause.
“Ah.” He seems amused. “The Horned One stirs in the north, and of course, Imrhien wishes to involve herself.”
“You do not fear him?”
“He and I have danced the dance of war before. I owe him my respect, but I do not fear him. My brother will not come here. Not while I’m in residence. And the world is big enough for the two of us.”
What about the rest of us?
I grit my teeth.
“So speak,” he compels me. “Tell me how I may assist you.”
“Is Queen Blaedwyn still in residence?”
The Erlking’s smile fades.
They were lovers once.
“Aye,” he says. “Though I am uncertain as to how she serves any purpose in this debt of ours?”
“May I speak with her?”
He leans forward. “Is this the debt you wish to slake?”
“No.” I force a smile. “Mere courtesy instead. She owes me the answer to a certain question. It has been vexing me.”
He’s a long time in replying. The musicians watch with bated breath, and every set of lungs in the room seems to arrest.
Finally he smiles, snapping his fingers. The fiddlers jolt into action as the Erlking pushes to his feet. “Call me curious, but I shall allow it. Come.”
* * *
The Erlking pausesbefore the door to Blaedwyn’s tower chambers, the enormous breadth of his shoulders blotting it from sight. He doesn’t bother to knock.
The door slams open the second his palm hits it, but he doesn’t progress into the tower room.
Instead, he steps aside, gesturing me forward.
“As you requested,” he purrs.
Inside, the room is filled with debris. The tower’s long been neglected, and little sparrows flit around the room, nesting in the trunk of the age-thickened vine that’s grown through the walls. A broken spindle sits in the corner, but it’s the set of chairs in the middle of the room that captures my attention.
And the silent figure that stares out through a hole in the wall as if surveying the kingdom she has lost.
“Two visitors,” Blaedwyn says, turning around slowly. “And one of them a thief.”
