The Unseelie King (The Kings Book 6) (16 page)

Chapter Twenty-Five

Minerva Trystaine,

Would not hurt a soul in the world,

So she hurt a hundred,

Somewhere just outside of it.

A sing-song poem to the tune of Lizzy Borden’s eulogy mimicked madness in Minerva’s brain. She almost smiled. Almost. Lucky for her, she wasn’t yet that far gone. When the unthinkable strikes, it takes the ground out from underneath you. Everything you once thought you knew or understood is replaced with a static kind of uncertainty. It’s numbing and nauseating and you float after that, and let life take you where it will.

Life had taken Minerva to the Twixt.

The final portal closed behind her and she stood in the dark, in a clearing, where a stream trickled peacefully nearby. Star and moonlight bathed the clearing in a blue-white glow, highlighting small blooms that, during the day, were probably pink and red and yellow and orange, but now were muted into different shades of gray.

Trees surrounded the clearing, leading to dark and tangled forests of the kind found in fairytales, or maybe in Germany. Here and there, mushroom rings sprouted from the ground, sporting caps of spots, stripes, and even squiggles.

Nothing moved in the clearing. There was only the sound of the creek and Minerva’s breathing. If there had been bodies there at one time, they were gone now. She hugged herself as a shiver of reality racked through her at the thought of those bodies.

“They’re long gone,” came a voice from behind her. It was male and calm and polite, but Minerva didn’t recognize it. She spun to face the stranger.

He smiled. “I’m guessing Dahlia has only told you half of the story.” He shrugged, his smile spreading. “Typical jealous Tuath. Hell hath no fury, eh?”

Minerva stood frozen to the spot, her eyes glued to the grotesque figure before her, the air trapped in her lungs, where it began to ice over in fear. Lungs full of frost. That was the sensation that swept through her.

She’d heard the urban legends, and she’d seen the images on the internet. The
Slenderman
, as he’d been referred to, was normally portrayed as a very tall, exceedingly thin man with a white, almost featureless face. He stood in the shadows, half hidden by the shapes and angles around him. Sometimes, he could only be seen upon close inspection. And the moment you realized what you were looking at, a coldness would scrape through you. You’d retreat from the screen and suppress a shiver.

The
Slenderman
, however, was merely a modern fairytale, created by a man named Eric Knudsen several years back. Minerva had read all about it one day, as she and her sister shared a common curiosity about the supernatural. It had been made for some sort of contest, then incorporated into countless other stories, mythos, and games, including Minecraft, which sported its own version of the
Slenderman
, the
Enderman
.

It was a myth, though. That was all. It was pretend.

But then again – there was the man standing before Minerva at that very moment.

So very, very tall. So very, very thin. Dressed in a black suit that would fit no mortal, with arms that stretched nearly to his knees, a face so white, it looked like paper, and features so smooth, they were barely there. He had eyes like pin points of coal. He was a stretched out, skinny, well dressed snowman.

She could only stay where she was and look up, her entire body encompassed in a kind of palpable terror. She could taste it in her mouth, like metal, like iron. Distractedly, she felt something trickle above her top lip, and realized her nose was bleeding.

Who are you?
she asked, almost knowing without a doubt that he would tell her he was, in fact, the
Slenderman
. But she hadn’t actually asked the question out loud. No air would leave her frozen lungs to give voice to her query.

As if he’d heard her anyway, the man said in his polite, calm, and utterly normal voice, “I am not a
who
, but a
what
.” He turned, his elongated movements strange and disjointed. It was like watching a nightmare. He took a few steps to the right, circling her. “I am merely a part of something. This is the most I can materialize on this plane without the proper vessel.” He stopped and turned back to face her. “That is why you are here, Wisher.”

*****

He’d been king of the Unseelie Realm for a very long time, hence Caliban was well practiced in the art of thinking quickly in desperate situations. The fact that this was the most desperate situation he’d ever been in was one he forcefully pushed to the back of his mind so that he could concentrate.

Someone, somewhere knew where Minerva was. One of those people was Dahlia Kellen. But Dahlia had been taken, most likely by the very same person responsible for Minerva’s disappearance.

Cal had already tried a location spell on Minerva. Given that he possessed some of her magic and she some of his, he’d hoped the spell would be even stronger and more successful. However, either landing the platform safely had drained him more than he’d thought, or she was being hidden by someone far more powerful than he’d wagered, because the spell failed.

His best bet would be to locate someone who knew where she was, instead. They might not be as shielded. Then he could ransack that person’s mind and retrieve Minerva’s location.

Caliban was just turning away from the mess of the platform, fallen columns, and felled trees, when he was approached by a very out-of-breath Tuath fae female.

“Violet!” he exclaimed. She was Dahlia’s sister!
She
might know!

“Your Majesty, please listen. There isn’t much time,” Violet started right in, stopping before him beseechingly. “I overheard my sister speaking with him in the shadows. I wasn’t able to stop them, but I know where the queen has gone!”

“Where?” He couldn’t help himself when he took her by the arms just as he had her sister. All he could do was
not
squeeze and shake her.

“She’s gone to the Twixt,” Violet told him at once. “I went to Titania, and she’s gone to tell Pi. He has to get the others, because,” she swallowed hard and shook her head, “you’re going to need all the help you can get!”

Caliban released her and stepped back. His mind was spinning.

“
Where
in the Twixt?” But he had a feeling he knew what she was going to say even before she confirmed his suspicions.

“To the site of the massacre. But wait!” She held up her hand to stop him as he began to call forth another portal. “Please don’t go alone! They’ll expect you to do that!”

Caliban paused, his whole body tensed in painful indecision. He wouldn’t be doing Minerva any good if he fell directly into a trap – and he wasn’t doing his sanity any good by not following after her immediately.

Violet gritted her teeth, and added, “And please don’t kill my sister, your majesty. She’s not herself. I promise.”

Caliban processed her words, but ignored them. They were part of a plea that would be dealt with later. There were more important things to deal with now. He needed –

“Your majesty!” Titania’s tinkling, chiming voice was raised in alarm, and had a powerful edge to it that one would not expect from a fairy. He turned to see her running toward them with none other than his brother, Avery, and Avery’s wife, Selene.

“Where’s my sister?” Selene wanted to know.

That’s what everyone wanted to know. Cal met Avery’s gaze. Unspoken messages galore passed between them. They were headed into unknown dangers. A queen’s existence was on the line. And because of that, an entire realm’s welfare was as well.

There were three fae royalty grouped together now. “Good enough,” he said aloud, knowing that the two words would silence any further protest from Violet. He raised his hand once more, calling forth the portal that he’d let drop before.

Violet stepped back and out of the way, but Titania came forward and gently laid a hand on Caliban’s arm. “I’m coming as well, my lord.”

Cal glanced at her. “Suit yourself.” He finished opening the portal – and stepped through.

His brother and his sister-in-law followed closely on his heels. Titania brought up the rear, and the portal swirled shut behind her.

Chapter Twenty-Six

“I could have attempted to use your body once it had died and your spirit was free of it, but I have to admit, this is fresher.”

Minerva continued to stand still where she was, her eyes glued to the unnaturally skinny and tall man, and his white face that resembled the visage of “Odo” from
Deep Space Nine
.

“Your sister escaped from me. She accepted her place as queen, and once she had, she simply became too powerful for me to subjugate.” He opened his arms and shrugged like
Jack the Pumpkin King
. “However, you have yet to accept who you are. You have doubts. As is made ever more obvious by the fact that you ran away from your king to come here.”

At long, long last, maybe fueled by the mention of her sister in danger, or perhaps simply because she’d had enough time to stand there like an idiot, Minerva numbly came out of her stupor and asked, “Are you the Slenderman?”

The tall, thin man laughed. It was a pleasant, utterly normal laugh. “I can see why you might think that. However, the name of a current mortal horror trend is an inconsiderately limiting label, if ever there was one.” He straightened, and became very still. Minerva watched as his form shifted, going from solid to incorporeal. He was still there, but composed of varying degrees of darkness, as if chimney smoke and empty space had taken elongated, humanoid form.

“Just as Mr. Rushmore can tell you how gargoyles are composed of stone that has absorbed magic, and Mr. Pitch can confirm the Shadow People are composed of shadow that has absorbed magic, there are fractions of space and time beyond human comprehension that do the same. Call them black holes. Call them dark matter. Perhaps label them as neutrinos, or even dark neutrinos. Maybe they are all of the above.”

He spoke to her from this smokey darkness as if he still had lungs and a mouth.

“In essence, this is what I am.”

Minerva inhaled sharply and back pedaled as the shadowy slender man suddenly rushed toward her, moving with abnormal and unpredictable speed. She hugged herself and dropped to her knees, and then there was a flash and sizzle.

She looked up to find the Slenderman rematerialized, but now he was closer, and this time, she could tell that his eerily smooth features were not happy. Between him and herself, there was a
bubble
of sorts. It was a force field.

With stark certainty and quite a bit of shock, she realized that it was a force field she’d thrown up
herself
, without even meaning to do it. She’d absorbed Caliban’s magic during their lovemaking, and this was one of his abilities. She’d simply reproduced it.

“You might just make the perfect vessel, after all,” he said softly. “At long last.”

“You don’t want this body,” Minerva said, finding with even more shock, that she had the ability to speak so well. She straightened, coming to her knees and meeting the Slenderman’s bizarre gaze head-on. “It’s far too sensitive. And you have no idea what the upkeep is like on a female form. I would go for a guy if I were you.”

He chuckled. “As a matter of fact, I
do
know what a female form requires. In fact, my last form was female. And she will be mine again, if all goes according to plan.” He seemed to drift for a moment, his gaze leaving hers, his form slipping into the shadows behind him. “If she would only awaken.”

Minerva pushed herself to her feet. They felt strange, sort of prickly and painful, and her legs were weak. But she managed to make it upright, though she lost a bit of her breath when she did so. The force field around her pulsed in and out, stronger and weaker, threatening to disappear. She prayed it wouldn’t.

“Who was she?” she asked, because she wanted to buy herself some time. And also because she was actually curious.

“No one you would know,” he told her. “But she was magnificent. A goddess unrivaled.”

A goddess
. Minerva felt a flush of odd and totally inappropriate pride. It was muted by the horror of her living, breathing reality, but it was still there. The monstrous force before her had once inhabited the body of a god. And now he thought Minerva might suffice as a vessel too. Who wouldn’t be proud of such a thing?

“I gotta tell ya,” she said softly. “I think you’re out of my league.”

“Oh no, love. It’s very much the other way around.”

It wasn’t the Slenderman who spoke this time; the voice was new. But it was one she readily recognized. She and the Slenderman turned as Caliban, Titania, Selene, and the man Minerva assumed must be the Seelie King, Avery, stepped out of the forest lining and into the clearing.

Minerva had no time to greet them, or to so much as acknowledge their arrival with a single word or gesture. There was not even a full second of space between the split moment that the four of them appeared – and the very next instant, in which the Slenderman evaporated into that incorporeal miasma of darkness again and sped toward her.

This time, he zapped past her shield like it wasn’t even there, making her wonder just for a heartbeat, why he’d bothered pretending it had stopped him the first time. And then he was inside her, and everything changed.

*****

“Nooooo!”

Caliban was jerked roughly to a stop, and he hadn’t even realized he’d been running. His arm was nearly yanked free of its socket as Avery grabbed him from behind, locking both arms in a fierce grip. Avery knew how to use his fae magic to aid in his strength; he was just that kind of man, preferring hand-to-hand combat over spells and subtlety.

In this case, it was fortunate for both of them. Caliban’s mind spun erroneously out of control, as before his eyes, Minerva changed.

Her eyes were closed; her head had tossed back when the entity entered her form. An unfelt breezed seemed to circle slowly around her, lifting her from the ground. Her already fair skin became even paler, and inch by inch, her silver blonde hair went from white to yellow to brown to black. The silver dress she wore did the same, switching shades one after another, until the gown hung from her in tattered draperies of pitch darkness.

At last, she opened her eyes, revealing that her indigo blue had been replaced with the color and vibrancy of coal.

Avery’s arms slid free of Caliban’s, releasing him. He was no longer struggling, but frozen in place, watching in helpless horror as the woman he loved was subjugated by a monster.

She smiled an unlikely smile and settled that dull black gaze upon Caliban. “As usual, the kings are too late.” Her voice was her own, but as dulled as her eyes, the fae beauty taken right out of it. “Do you have any idea how far behind you are? I’m so many steps ahead of you, I can no longer feel you on my trail.”

“Why don’t you enlighten us?” Avery asked. He seemed to be the only one of them capable of speech. Caliban was too busy. His mind was cut in half. Part of it was dying inside. The other part was feverishly scheming.

The Minerva entity tilted her head to one side and gave Avery an admonishing look. “Now, what fun would that be?”

“I wish you would get the hell out of my sister’s body,” Selene hissed at the entity through gritted teeth of rage.

A white light began to emanate from the air around Minerva, and for a moment, the entity’s power and Selene’s wish were nearly a visible aurora borealis, like ropes of electricity that struggled with one another.

Caliban held his breath. Would it really be so easy? Was all the planning he was doing in his head even necessary?

But then the electric ropes snapped, the aurora dissipated, the white light disappeared, and the entity laughed. Now its voice was different. It was deeper, and it echoed slightly. “Nice try. But all you’ve done is remind me how powerful my host is. Thank you for that.”

At once, a rush of hard power filled the clearing, slamming into Caliban and the others like a brick wall. He felt his body bruise in two dozen different places as the wind was knocked from his lungs, and his form went flying. For a split second, he wondered what he would slam into. And then he pulled himself together, used a bit of his power, and blinked out of the air to return to the entity.

This time, he reappeared standing behind Minerva, feet planted firmly, eyes burning so hot, they felt they were leaving scorch marks in his face.

“You’re right,” he told the entity – who spun around in the air to face him. “She is powerful. But that power comes at a price.”