Page 96 of Wrath of the Fae Queen
I share a look of pure horror with Cyprien, and am forced to take a moment to control my breathing as panic threatens me.
We are running out of time.
It is progressing faster than I was expecting.
I lead the entire regiment toward that lake. I nearly lose the road multiple times, with the flagstones almost completely covered in snow. Tree branches arch over the passage, creating a tunnel with foliage that sags with dark rot dripping from it. We are forced to throw air shields above our heads so we are not covered in sludge.
The sickly-sweet scent of it gets stuck in my nose. The horrid taste curls on my tongue from the sheer amount of decay in the air.
Huge chunks fall sporadically from the trees and hit the road with a splat, creating a rhythmic song that is echoed throughout the forest. Amber runs down the trunks in wide channels, the golden liquid forming great globules that look like congealed blood.
We pass spriggan collapsed on the ground, moaning in pain, their huge bodies of many twisted woody limbs, spikes and antlers incapable of supporting their weight. One pitiful creature sits in a pile of ash, only stubs left of its four legs.
Distressed cries rise up from the soldiers behind me. They still don’t understand what they are seeing. Why our beasts aresuffering such agony. I send out orders to slaughter any dying spriggan as a mercy to the creatures, then push forward. Past the lake, where the black veins ripple and throb on its surface, moving ever so slowly toward the life force it detects in this regiment, like it wants to suck us dry of magic.
I glance at Valentine. “Is this what you experienced in the court of your birth?”
“Yes.” His expression is stony. “It sucks the essence out of any fae it captures, leaving a hardened husk of rock behind.”
I force us on, beyond the lake, through the thickening snow and toward the desolation of the Dividing Cliffs. We pass an empty Watchtower Tree and another damned fortress without a single soul inside it. The sight sends a violent reaction rippling through the troops.
The trees here are piles of sludge and rotten, weeping branches hanging all too fluidly across the ground, only the stubs of the trunks still erect. Their forms dot the landscape, lessening in number until the powdery snow becomes knee-deep.
The white expanse of a featureless landscape spreads out around us, its only distinction the cliffs that hang over the border with Winter. The wind howls with ferocity, freezing flesh and whipping ice particles painfully into exposed skin. We craft warmed bubbles of air magic as our only protection.
I lead the soldiers right up to the view at the edge of a cliff, keeping my back to the desolation and taking a moment to examine their reactions.
Faces fall and eyes turn wide.
Tears form on cheeks and freeze immediately.
Many embrace as they stare down at our greatest enemy. It is no fae army. No foe we can defeat with a sword. It is a disaster of nature. One we will be lucky to survive.
When all those eyes settle upon me like a flock of lost cattle, filled with the hopelessness I have been grappling with for decades, I finally glance over my shoulder.
The desolation has gotten so much worse.
The flat plains that stretch on into the Winter Court as far as the eye can see are completely devoid of life. There are no wondering ice sprites, no burrowing beasts or colonies of pixies. Nothing moves except the ash.
Great rifts slice open the ground, like a colossal god has raked its claws through it in long slashes, churning up the ice into tall, jagged peaks around the voids. There is pitch darkness within. Complete nothingness, like if a person tripped inside, they would fall through space for eternity. Every muscle in my body tightens at how the quantity of those tears has vastly increased. It is a wonder that the plains do not collapse in on themselves completely.
The corruption is getting out of hand.
I turn back to my people crowded around me and thread magic into my voice so every one of them can hear me over the wind. “This is not the work of the Winter King. There is no technology that can do this, and why would they destroy their own lands along with ours? This is not a hostile takeover, simply converting Spring into Winter before an invasion. This is rot, decay and death. It is a corruption that is destroying our entire realm, devouring it piece by piece.”
“This…” I throw out a hand toward the devastation behind me. “This is how Greenwood Locket and Red Rose Grove are going to look in a number of years if we don’t do something to stop it. It affects every court in just the same way. You have witnessed how the low fae are fading away because their magic is being sapped. How the trees are turning to rot, the earth itself disappearing. How long until it reaches the capital? How long until it affects the high fae and our bodies decay too?”
One soldier breaks formation and calls out, “Why is the High Chancellor not doing anything about it?”
“How do we fight this?” another wails.
Commander Calypso rushes forward, stopping at my side. “You will keep your ranks and listen while your king speaks,” she barks.
I give her a sidelong look. Have I won her over already, or was that a slip of the tongue, to call me their king without negating the title by mentioning my exile?
I hold up a hand. “I want to hear what my people have to say.Iwill not silence them.”
Voices call out, all saying much the same, and I listen.
