The Iron Queen (21 page)

Something nudged me from behind, just enough to make me lose my balance. Shrieking like a bean sidhe on a roller coaster, I fell forward.

For a moment, I couldn’t open my eyes, certain I was going to die. The wind whipped around me, howling in my ears as I seemed to plummet straight to my death. Then the glider curved upward, leveling out as it caught the wind currents. As my heart slowed and my death grip on the glider’s legs eased a bit, I cautiously opened my eyes and looked around.

The land stretched out before me, flat and infinite, fractured with glowing threads of lava vanishing into the horizon. From this height, the Iron Realm didn’t look quite so ominous. The wind shrieked in my ears and whipped at my hair, but I wasn’t afraid. Experimentally, I tugged on the glider’s front leg, and it instantly swerved to the right. I pulled on the other leg and it swooped to the left, sending a thrill coursing through me. I wanted to go faster, higher, to find a flock of…something…and race them into the sun. How had I been afraid of this? This was easy; this was awesome! The glider buzzed in excitement, as if sensing my mood, and I would’ve sent it into a steep dive if a voice hadn’t stopped me.

“Exhilarating, isn’t it, princess?” Glitch had to shout to be heard as his glider swooped down next to mine. The lightning in his hair snapped wildly, trailing threads of energy behind him. “First time on a glider, and you’ll never want to walk again.”

“You couldn’t have let me jump on my own?” I yelled, glaring at him. He laughed.

“I could have. But we would’ve been standing there till the sun came up.” Glitch pulled on his glider’s legs, and the insect swooped skyward, rolled, and came down on my other side. “So, your highness, you seem to be getting the hang of this, no pun intended. Want me to show you what these can really do? That is, if you’re not afraid of a little challenge.”

My adrenaline was pumping, and the thrill of flying made my blood soar. I was annoyed at the Iron faery and up for a challenge, little or not. “You’re on!”

Glitch grinned, and his eyes sparked. “Follow me, then. And try to keep up!”

His insect shot skyward, his whoop ringing out behind him. I yanked my glider’s front legs back, and it followed instantly, shooting up like a bottle rocket. Glitch banked sharply to the right; I pulled the glider’s right leg, and it performed the same maneuver, sweeping around in a lazy arc. We chased Glitch across the open sky, through a series of loops, arcs, curves, and dives, all at top speed. The ground rushed beneath me, the wind howled in my ears, and my blood raced faster than it ever had before. I pushed my glider into a steep, vertical dive, pulling up at the last second. My adrenaline surged, and I whooped with sheer, unrestrained joy.

Finally, we caught up to Glitch again, back to flying in a normal, straight line. He shot me a grudging look as I joined him, still panting from the thrill of stunt gliding an insect. “You’re a natural,” he said, shaking his head. “The gliders don’t perform that well for just anyone. You have to bond for it to really give you its all. Guess you made an impression.”

I was absurdly pleased at the compliment, and had the strange impulse to pat my glider on the head. “How much longer to where we’re going?” I asked, noticing that the huge red moon above us was beginning to set. Glitch sighed, and his playful mood vanished.

“We’re almost there. In fact, you should start to see it…now.”

We soared over a rise, the land dropping away into a shallow basin, and I saw the forces of the false king for the first time.

They covered the ground in a glimmering carpet, a small city’s worth of Iron fey, marching forward in perfectly square sections. The army was massive, easily twice the size of the forces of Summer and Winter. Great iron beetles, like the ones we saw in the earlier attack, lumbered forward like tanks, overshadowing the ranks of smaller fey. I counted at least three dozen of them, and remembered how hard it was to bring down just one of the massive bugs. But that wasn’t the worst of it.

Behind the army, creeping forward at an impossible rate, was a massive iron fortress. I blinked, rubbing my eyes, wondering if I was hallucinating. It was impossible. Something that size should not be able to move. But yet, there it was, rolling after the army, a huge structure of iron and steel. It was lopsided and uneven, looking cobbled together from whatever was lying around, but somehow shaped into a monstrous moving citadel.

“He’s been gathering his forces for a while,” Glitch said as I stared at the fortress, unable to take my eyes from it. “Those skirmishes at the edge of the Nevernever? Just a distraction, something to weaken the other side while he gathers his strength. At the rate he’s going, he’ll reach the edge of the Iron Kingdom in a little under a week. And when he plows through the Nevernever with that fortress and the full might of his army behind it, none of the oldbloods will be able to stop him. First he’ll take out the courts, and then he’ll plant that castle in the middle of your precious Nevernever to finish it off. Faery will be converted to Iron in a matter of days.

“So, your highness,” Glitch said, as we wheeled our gliders around, retreating from the army and the fortress of death that followed. My excitement had fled, replaced with sheer fright and a nagging despair. “What do you expect to do against
that?
”

I had no answer for him.

T
HE REBELS HAD CONVERTED
part of Machina’s tower into their underground base. Though much of it still remained a ruin, enough had been cleared out for us to be given separate quarters. Glitch showed us a set of rooms we could use—small and windowless, with a rough stone floor—and said he would leave them unlocked for the time being.

“You can roam the tower grounds all you like, but I’d prefer it if you didn’t leave the ruins,” he said, pushing open the door to another identical room, furnished with only a cot, a lamp, and an upside-down barrel that served as a table. “You’re our guests, of course, but be warned that I’ve given specific orders to keep you from leaving the tower, by force if necessary. Not that I want a fight. I’d much rather things be civil between us.”

“Yeah, good luck with that, socket-head,” Puck sneered, and I was too tired to argue. Glitch needn’t have worried; I wasn’t planning any grand escape. There was no place for us to go. We couldn’t get to the false king through that huge army, and even if we did, we’d have to somehow find a way into that moving fortress, which would certainly be heavily guarded. I was at a loss. Asking Glitch and the rebels to charge the false king’s forces would be suicide, but if we didn’t do something quickly, that castle would reach the battlefront and then it would be game over.

Ash moved close, putting a hand on my shoulder, his eyes bright with concern. “Don’t worry about Glitch, or the castle,” he said in a low voice, so that only I could hear. I’d told him about the army and the Iron fey and the moving fortress the moment I came back with Glitch, and the Winter prince had nodded grimly but didn’t seem terribly concerned about it. “Nothing is impenetrable. We’ll think of something.”

“Really? ’Cause I’m feeling a bit outgunned at the moment.” I sighed and leaned into him, closing my eyes. Puck and Glitch were throwing insults and challenges at each other a few yards away, but it didn’t seem terribly serious so I wasn’t going to worry about it. “How are we supposed to get in that thing?” I whispered. “Or even get close? There’s no force big enough to stand against that huge army. And by the time they reach the wyldwood it’ll be too late.”

“We have a little time.” Ash’s voice, low and soothing, flowed over me. “And you haven’t really slept since we left Leanansidhe’s. Get some rest. I’ll be right outside the door.”

“You’re always—” the statement was interrupted by a huge yawn “—telling me to rest,” I finished, deliberately ignoring the irony. Ash snorted, and I frowned, poking him in the chest. “I can take care of myself, you know.”

“I know,” he replied, steering me toward the room. “But you also have this tendency to push yourself beyond the limits of your endurance, and you don’t notice until you fall over from exhaustion.” He escorted me over the threshold, smiling as I glowered at him. “As your knight, I’m entitled to point these things out. Part of the job description when you asked me.”

“Yeah, right,” I muttered, crossing my arms. Ash smiled.

“I don’t lie, remember?” He stepped into the room, bent down, and brushed a featherlight kiss to my lips, making my insides melt. “I’ll be close. Try to get some rest.” He closed the door, leaving me with a growing ache that wouldn’t go away.

Tired as I was, it was hard to sleep. I lay on the lumpy, uncomfortable cot and stared at the ceiling, my thoughts swirling too furiously to rest. I thought about the false king and his moving fortress, of the armies of Summer and Winter camped on the edge of the Iron Realm, oblivious to the danger. I tried formulating ways to stop the moving citadel and the huge army bearing down on the camps, but my plans looped in crazy, complicated circles or were too suicidal to take seriously.

But mostly, I thought of Ash, who kept invading my thoughts every few seconds. I wanted him here with me, alone in this little room with the door locked, but at the same time I didn’t know if I was ready. Several times, I thought about opening the door and dragging him back inside with me, but would that be too forward? Would he think it inappropriate, considering where we were? Or was he waiting for me to make the first move? He had said he would wait for me, right?

I must’ve drifted off, because the next thing I knew, something landed on my stomach, and I bolted upright with a yelp, throwing it off.

“Ouch,” exclaimed a raspy voice, and a gremlin leaped from the floor to the edge of the cot, regarding me with electric green eyes. “Found you!” it exclaimed, and I yelled.

Ash burst into the room a millisecond later, sword already drawn, ready to attack whatever had ambushed me. Seeing the gremlin, he tensed, and I threw my hand up, stopping him before he could lunge.

“Ash, wait!” He paused, scowling, and I turned to the gremlin, which was now in a defensive crouch, hissing and baring its teeth at Ash. “Did…did you just talk?” I stammered. “You spoke, right? I didn’t just imagine it?”

“Yes!” it exclaimed, bouncing up and down, its ears flapping like sails. “Yes, you hear me! Razor found you! Found girl and funny dark elf.”

“Razor,” I repeated, as Ash stared at us in complete bewilderment. “Is that your name?”

“You can understand it?” Ash said, frowning at the gremlin, who snarled and scuttled up the wall, hanging there like an enormous spider. “The creature is actually talking to you?”

I nodded and looked back at the gremlin, which was now gnawing on one of its huge ears and still glaring at Ash. “When did you guys learn to talk?”

The gremlin blinked at me. “We talked,” it stated, cocking its head as if confused. “Always talked. No one hears us, though. Except the Master.”

I winced. Even though I had suspected for a while now, to have a gremlin actually confirm it was disturbing. They listened to me because they thought I was their new master. I was at a loss. Not long ago, I thought the gremlins mindless and animalistic, cunning but lacking any sort of language or society. To hear one speak was more than a little surprising.

I looked down at Razor, beaming up at me, hanging on my every word. I certainly had no idea what to do with a gremlin. “How did you get in here?” I asked instead.

“Followed!” The spindly creature grinned, flashing his neon-blue, razor-sharp teeth. Its voice buzzed like a bad radio station. “Brothers say they see you at old city. Razor followed. Followed you here. Found you!”

“What does it want?” Ash muttered, frowning as the gremlin cackled and scurried to the ceiling, hanging upside down as it swayed from side to side.

“I don’t know.” I looked up at the gremlin. “Razor, why did you follow me? What do you want?”

“Food!” the gremlin crowed. “Razor smells food! Hungry!” Hissing, he scuttled across the ceiling, zipped out the open door and vanished into the ruins.

Ash sighed and sheathed his blade. “Are you all right?” he asked. “It didn’t hurt you, did it?”

I shook my head. “I can understand them,” I said, wondering what to do with this new revelation. Standing, I walked to the door, peering out at the ruins. Lights flickered erratically, and a faint hum filled the air, the buzz of machines and electricity. “They think I’m their master now, Ash,” I said, leaning against the door frame. “Like Machina was. I guess…because I have his power, they think they should follow me.”

“Interesting.” Ash’s thoughtful voice made me glance back. I was half expecting him to be worried or disgusted with the whole talking to gremlins thing. But the look in his eyes was one of intrigue, not contempt. “I wonder what you could do,” he mused, “with all the gremlins under your command.”

A sudden commotion somewhere in the ruins drew my attention. “Gremlin!” someone shouted, accompanied by much cursing. “We have a gremlin! Get away from those wires, you little—hell.” The lights sputtered and went out, plunging the ruins into blackness. “Glitch! It just ate through the electrical cables!”

“Get the backup generator going!” Glitch’s voice cut through the commotion. “Diode, see if you can reconnect the lights. And someone catch that gremlin!”

Puck appeared, fading out of the shadows, yawning and scrubbing his hair. “Sounds like they’ve got a little pest problem.” He grinned as the lights flickered and struggled to come back on. Ash glared at him.

“Where’ve you been, Goodfellow?”

“Me? Oh, I’ve been scouting the compound, chatting to the natives, exploring possible escape routes, you know, useful stuff.” Puck scratched his nose and leered at Ash. “What’ve
you
been doing all night, ice-boy?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

I sighed, loudly, before they could start insulting each other. “Has anyone seen Grimalkin yet?”

“Nope, but you know our furry friend.” Puck shrugged and leaned against the wall. “He’ll show up when we least expect him, being all cool and mysterious. I wouldn’t worry about the furball.” The lights flickered once and finally stayed on. Puck rolled his eyes. “You know, if we ever wanted to cause a lot of havoc, we’d just have to find a dozen gremlins and turn them loose. Those things make more trouble than me. Almost. So, princess.” He turned to me, and his voice dropped to a murmur. “Any idea of when we’re getting out of here?”

“I don’t know, Puck.” I shook my head. “I don’t exactly have a plan, yet. We have to somehow get around that huge army, sneak into the castle, find the false king, and take him out, all before he reaches the wyldwood.”

“Sounds pretty impossible to me,” Puck grinned. “When do we start?”

“Start what?” And Glitch came around the corner, eyes narrowed suspiciously. “I hope you’re not planning to start anything with the false king, because if you are, let me say again how stupid and impossible that is. Also, I’m not going to let you deliver yourself right into his hands, princess. You’ll have to get through me before you go off on any suicide missions. Just letting you know. So please…” He smiled at me, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Behave yourselves. For all our sakes.”

“What do you want, Glitch?” I asked, before Ash and Puck said anything that would get us thrown in rebel jail. Not that I didn’t doubt our ability to fight our way free, but I didn’t want needless bloodshed from those who were supposedly allies. Even though I knew it would probably come to that eventually. Neither of the boys did well in forced captivity, and we would have to go after the false king soon, planned or not. I couldn’t let him reach the wyldwood and destroy everything.

“Just wanted to let you know, if you haven’t guessed already, that there’s a gremlin running around the base. They’re not dangerous, usually, but they’ll make a nuisance of themselves by chewing on wires and short-circuiting any equipment we have. So if the lights flicker, or if something stops working abruptly, you can thank our little friend.”

Puck snickered. “It gives me all kinds of hope knowing your highly trained forces can’t track down one teensy little gremlin.”

“You think you can do better, you try finding the thing.” Glitch glared at Puck, and his spines bristled, before turning to me. “Anyway, here.” He handed me a bag. “Thought you might be hungry. Since you’re our guests, it would be impolite if we didn’t share our food with you. That’s your rations for the week. Try to make it last.” At my surprised look, he rolled his eyes. “Not all of us live on oil and electricity, you know.”

“What about Ash and Puck?”

“Well, I’m
pretty
sure eating our food won’t melt their insides to gooey paste. But you never know.”

“Thanks,” I said dryly.

The lights flickered again, and a voice yelled for Glitch somewhere overhead. Sighing, Glitch excused himself and hurried away, calling instructions. I wondered if I should be helping the rebels try to catch the gremlin, since it was my fault Razor was here, but then decided it was Glitch’s problem now. He wasn’t willing to help us or let us go, so he could deal with the trouble it caused.

At the mention of food, I realized I hadn’t eaten anything since the night before, and my stomach grumbled. Opening the bag, I found several cans of processed meat, beans, fruit cocktail, a tube of squeezy-cheese with crackers, and a six-pack of diet soda. There was also a stack of paper bowls and a handful of plastic spoons.

Peering into the bag over my shoulder, Puck made a disgusted noise. “Of course, all their food would be wrapped in those stupid cans. What’s so great about preservatives, I ask you? Why can’t humans just be happy with an apple?”

I glanced over my shoulder and sighed. “I take it you’re not going to eat anything while we’re here?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Well, stop griping then, and let’s find a place to eat.” Closing the bag, I started down the hallway, looking for some privacy. My room was the logical place, but I felt cramped and claustrophobic in that tiny space and wanted to see the open sky.

“Fine, princess.” Ash and Puck followed me up the stairs into the ruins above. “But if I get sick, I expect you to wait on me hand and foot.”

“If you get sick, I’ll just have Ash put you out of your misery.”

“I’m touched that you care.”

The tower was buzzing tonight as scores of rebels scurried back and forth, trying to repair the damage one lone gremlin had caused. I felt a nasty glow of satisfaction as I watched them, and a strange pride that I had caused this. Well, that my gremlin had caused this. What good were they, these rebels, if all they did was hide from the false king in the hopes that someone else cleaned up the mess?

And when did I start thinking of the gremlin as mine?

Despite the activity in the tower, the space around the great oak was quiet and still. I felt drawn to it, just as I was the first night we came here. Beneath the towering limbs, nestled in a circle of roots at the base of the trunk, I sat down and started pulling out rations.

Ash and Puck looked on warily until I waved a plastic spoon at them. “Sit,” I ordered, pointing to the roots. “I know this isn’t faery wine, but it’s all we’ve got and we have to eat something.” Dumping a can of fruit cocktail into a paper bowl, I passed it to Ash. He took it and perched gingerly on the edge of a root.

Puck sat and gazed mournfully into the bowl I handed him. “Not an apple slice to be found,” he sighed, picking through the gooey mess with his fingers. “How can mortals even pass this off as fruit? It’s like a peach farmer threw up in a bowl.”

Ash picked up the spoon, gazing at it like it was an alien life form. Dropping it back into his untouched food, he placed the bowl on the ground and stood.

“Ash.” I looked up from my cold beans. “What are you doing?”

“It’s watching us.” Very casually, his hand went to his sword hilt. “Very close this time. It feels—” he closed his eyes, and I saw a shimmer of glamour around him “—like it’s right above us.”

He whirled, blindingly quick. There was a flash of blue light as he hurled something at the tree, and a second later a high-pitched squeal rang out as something dropped from the branches, nearly landing in my lap.

I jumped up. It was a big metal insect of some sort, shiny and wasplike, its wings still buzzing faintly as it died. Our mysterious stalker, finally brought into the open. An ice shard had gone clean through its body, ripping it apart, but its hooked legs clutched something long and slender. Bending down, avoiding the needlelike stinger on the end, I wrenched the object from the creature’s grasp.

It was a stick, a branch with several leaves sprouting along the wood. The wood was still alive, though the leaves were flecked with iron, and shiny threads ran along the length. A note was wrapped around the stick, and as I pulled it off, Ash gently took the branch from me, narrowing his eyes.

“Do you know what this is?” he murmured.

Puck smirked. “Uh, yes, actually. In most circles, it’s called a stick. Used for starting fires, poking large insects, and playing fetch with your dog.”

Ash ignored him. “It’s the branch from a rowan tree,” he said, meeting my gaze. “And, given the circumstances, I don’t think it’s a coincidence. He knows we’re here. He sent this directly to you.”

My blood ran cold. “You think he’s out there?”

“I’m sure of it. Read the message.”

I unrolled the note, feeling my stomach clench as I scanned the words.
The Iron King has a proposal for you. Find me.

Peering at the note upside down, Puck scowled. “Find him? Like we’re going to drop everything and tromp all over the Iron Realm looking for him? You’re not thinking of actually meeting him, are you, princess?”

“I think I should,” I said slowly, looking at Ash. “He might know of something that we can use against the false king. Or, maybe the false king is offering to end the war.”

“Or it could be a trap, and Rowan will betray us like he did all of Faery.” Ash’s voice was cold.

“That might be, but I still think we should see what he wants. What he’s offering.” I looked around at the dozens of rebels moving about the ruins. “But first, we need to find a way out of here. You heard Glitch—he’s not going to let us walk out the front door.”

“Finally.” Puck grinned, rubbing his hands together. “I thought we were never going to get out of here. So what’s your pleasure? Diversion? Fight? Sneaking out the back door?”

“Before we bring the entire camp down on our heads,” Ash said, handing me the branch, “perhaps we should figure out where Rowan is first.”

“Oh, right. That would make sense, wouldn’t it?” I stared at the note, wishing yet again that faeries would just say what they meant without making it into a riddle. “I wish Grim were here. He’d know where to find Rowan.” I felt a sudden stab of guilt for not thinking of the cat until now. “You think he’ll be all right? Should we try to get him a message?”