The Fox’s Tale

Once we were all ready we went through the gate. I pulled it shut and locked it, then tucked the key back into my pocket. I transformed and grabbed my boxers in my teeth. Quinn took off, Carter thrown over his shoulder, followed by Andy, who swore as the smell of cat spray filled his nostrils.

As soon as they were across, Lee set off, with Sam on his back, followed by Scott with Ryan on his. We waited until they’d made it safely to the other side before sending Grant with Chris, since he was the fastest animal of all of us. Next went Nick and Matt, who jumped with joy once they reached the safety zone on the other side.

Lucas looked down at me. “I insist you go next, sir.”

I shook my head and snorted at him. I knew the jacket would keep me safe.

“Sir, I would never forgive myself if something happened to you.”

I dropped my shorts and bit Lucas on the hand and then growled.

“Fucking hell, you are stubborn.” He threw Dylan over his shoulder and when I bent to retrieve my boxers he grabbed me under his other arm. “Let’s go together then.” With that, Lucas took off. It felt like what I imagined being pureed by a blender would feel like.

When he put me down on the other side I was livid. I transformed before my paws hit the ground. “You rat bastard! What the hell was that?” I demanded as I pulled my boxers back on for the second time that night.

“I think I’m going to puke,” muttered Dylan, who then promptly followed through on his declaration.

Lucas was unapologetic. “You said to put dignity aside.”

I shoved him. “You asshole.”

Lucas invaded my personal space and bared his fangs. “We are almost out of this garden, but we still have a distance of fifteen miles to go once we exit the other side. You and your friends have been here at least an hour already. Think, Alexander. Think of your friends and of Ellery.”

I was still fuming, but I turned to my teammates and said, “let’s go.”

We managed to make it through the garden without another major incident, although a vine of creeping ivy tried to get overly familiar with Sam who was saved by the belt Lucas had wound around his arm. We also had to punt a few oversized toads off the path after one flicked its tongue against Lee’s bare legs leaving a burn.

“We could have used you as kicker on the football team,” said Grant after I sent one flying between the limbs of a tree some thirty yards away. I snorted with laughter.

“My dad always thought I should play soccer. Too bad I hate it.”

As I locked the last gate Scott tapped me on the shoulder. “You should try out for lacrosse with me. You’d be great.”

I handed the key to Lucas and groaned. “Right now, I’m not even sure I want to finish playing the rest of the basketball season. I want to sleep for the next five weeks.”

“Yeah, but if you play lacrosse then maybe Ellery will….” Scott left his original thought unfinished. “I know she’s your mate and everything, but she makes me feel better, and I thought, maybe she’d come to more of the games if you were on the team.”

“Listen, I get it. I do, but can we not talk about sports right now? We’ve still got a long ass way to go.”

Scott growled at me. “Ever heard of distracting yourself from something upsetting?”

“Sorry dude, I just can’t think about anything else right now, besides getting us out of here.”

“What’s lacrosse?” asked Quinn. Scott looked at him in relief and began explaining the game to him. I decided to give Quinn a medal or whatever you gave someone in the Unseelie realm for services to the crown. I walked over to Lucas.

“Which direction do we need to go?”

“Northeast,” he said pointing. “We don’t have to sprint, but we need to move.”

“Alright guys, same formation as before. Let’s get moving.”

As we set off I heard Quinn say “for real? I’d get to whack the other team with the stick? Wicked. I’m in.”

Lucas fell into pace with me and we ran over the Unseelie countryside. “Is your title really Lord of Gloom?” I asked as a way to smooth things over between us.

“What?” Lucas looked at me like I’d grown a second head until he remembered. “Oh. No. That’s just one of Lady Oleander’s lame attempts at humor. She’s not permitted to use my actual title, no one but other Incorruptibles are. I’m not overly fond of it.”

“Why? Is it embarrassing?”

“No, I just don’t like it, much like you dislike being called sir, Sir.”

I rolled my eyes. “Why do you keep calling me Sir then, Lucas?”

“Because it amuses me to discomfit you, and when you’re as old as I am, you take your amusements where you can still find them.”

“How old are you really?” When he didn’t respond I began guessing. “Sixty? Eighty-five? One hundred?”

“I’m two hundred and nineteen.”

I was so startled I stopped running, and Lucas slowed to a stop. “Sir, keep moving.”

“Okay, you really need to stop calling me sir,” I said as I began running again. “Are you really two hundred and nineteen?”

“I told you when we met that the Incorruptibles have impossibly long existences. Yes, I am two hundred and nineteen.”

“How old is Darcie?”

“Darcie is my half-sister and is only fifty. She is the genuine equivalent of a human teenager. I’m more the equivalent to someone in their late twenties. Quinn is only in his thirties.”

“Wow.” We ran in silence for a while and then I asked “what’s the deal with you and Lady Oleander?”

“Aside from the fact that she is an incorrigible attention seeker?” Lucas shook his head. “For one thing, she and Plumeria kept Quinn as their, I’d guess you would say boy toy, for ten years.”

I peered through the darkness at Quinn who was leading the group, a huge grin on his face. “He seems to have survived unscathed.”

“That’s not the point. He was young, they took advantage of his good nature, and they were allowed to do so because he is half Incorruptible.” He shot a pointed look my way. “There is a great deal of animosity towards our kind, as you saw when you met Wolfsbane.”

“Wolfsbane? Oh, Sir Aconite the Asshole. Why do the Unseelie have an issue with Incorruptibles? I thought you all had pledged fealty to House Thorn like a thousand years ago.”

“We did, only it was a little over two thousand years ago, shortly after the two Faerie courts split. As for why they don’t like us,” he shrugged, “I suspect it is because they can’t screw with us the way they can with other beings. The Unseelie have a twisted sense of humor, a twisted sense of justice, a twisted way of existing.”

He looked over at me. “Not all of them mind you, but enough of them that the balance Ellery will bring to the realm is both desperately needed and feared.”

“Great.” I mulled that over as we ran on. “Is there something else besides her treatment of Quinn that makes you dislike Lady Oleander? Because that was one hell of a kiss you planted on her.”

Lucas smirked. “Ola is enamored with the male members of my family. She finds Incorruptibles fascinating in general, but for some reason my family is like catnip to her. She has engaged in relations with all five of my brothers.

“I’m the lone hold out, and the fact that she used your safety to blackmail me into kissing her made me decide to leave a lasting impression of something she’ll never have. Besides, I am confident that she seduced Quinn just to make me angry.”

“He’s related to you? I thought he was your boyfriend.” I grimaced as I thought back to Lucas’s comment about Quinn having more to use for bartering with Darcie.

Lucas laughed until tears ran down his face. “Whatever gave you that impression? Quinn is my youngest sibling. He’s a half-brother, but a different half than Darcie. He’s my mother’s son, whereas Darcie is my father’s daughter. Altogether I have twelve younger siblings.”

“Oh.” I blew out a sigh of relief.

He continued to snort with laughter. “I can’t believe that you thought Quinn was my lover.”

“Hey, it was an easy mistake to make. You two have a casual familiarity that I’ve only ever seen between couples. I don’t have any brothers or sisters you know.”

“I suppose that’s fair. Quinn and I do have a closer relationship than most.”

I grunted. “You can say that again. Besides, Darcie was always introduced as your sister, but no one ever mentioned that you and Quinn were brothers. And you all do live together. Oh. Shit. Are Darcie and Quinn a couple? Because I’m pretty sure she’s Scott’s mate.”

“No, nor have they engaged in sexual activities with one another. I’m not sure if this is true of the Seelie realm, but in the Unseelie realm nearly everyone is related in some way. Rhiannon is Ellery’s cousin, for example.

“Ginger, the Changeling who killed herself, was Rhiannon’s cousin on their mother’s side. It is even truer amongst the Incorruptibles as we do not have the same fertility issues that the Unseelie have developed through their isolation.

“Until Quinn was born there was no proof that Incorruptibles could reproduce with anyone other than other Incorruptibles.” He snuck a peek at me as we ran.

“Quinn is also Lark’s half-brother on their father’s side. Much like my mother, human females seem to enjoy handsome but not terribly bright males. Himbos I think they call them?”

“Somehow I doubt your father is a himbo.”

“No, Father was the opposite of unintelligent. Additionally, he lacked the kindness one needs to be given that appellation. I have no idea what attracted Mother to him.”

We paused our conversation as we navigated down a hill. Chris and Carter both tripped and went tumbling down the rest of the way. Dylan managed without any trouble, and in fact seemed to be holding up better than Ryan, Sam, or Andy.

“We sure Dylan isn’t part goat?” I asked Lucas.

“I heard that!” he called. “I ran cross-country.”

“He ran cross-country. Now he tells us,” I griped. At the bottom of a hill was a gently flowing river studded with rocks. As Quinn, Lucas, and I examined it for the best place to cross, the team took the opportunity to rest.

“Can we wade across or is there something lurking in there to pull us under and eat us?” I asked.

Lucas sniffed the air and peered into the depths. “It doesn’t look like it, but it would be better to not risk such an endeavor. This section with the stones should be safe for crossing.”

“Do you think we can stick our feet in it at least?” asked Carter. “My feet feel like they’re bleeding.”

Quinn and Lucas both sniffed the air again and sighed with relief.

“Not yet they aren’t. Don’t worry, you’re almost home. We’ve just got to go over this river and then through those woods over there.” Quinn tried to be cheerful.

“Oh goody,” Carter said as he flopped onto his back.

“Can we drink it?” asked Chris.

His query was met with a chorus of “can we?”

“Depends,” said Lucas. “Have you enjoyed your visit to the Unseelie realm? If so, by all means drink, and then you’ll never leave.” Everyone groaned.

“Gods damn it.” Lee was bent over, clutching at a stitch in his side. “I don’t even like basketball. I only play because Ellery said I would be good at it when I met her at my dad’s investiture ceremony.”

“Say what?” I asked.

“I. Hate. Basketball. I’m a bear shifter for fuck’s sake. If our season was in the summer maybe I’d feel differently, but it’s in the winter, and what I want to be doing is sleeping and eating!”

Somehow the absurdity of Lee’s declaration struck the team as funny. He was the best player on the team for crying out loud. One by one they all began to laugh and soon were hysterical with laughter. Behind their glee I heard something that made me freeze.

“Shut up! Shut up everyone.” My fear must have carried through my tone because they all stopped laughing. Lucas joined me at my side and after listening for a moment he turned around and began to shout.

“Run! Run like your lives depend on it because they do!”

“What’s coming?” cried Ryan as we clattered through the river in the selected spot.

“The Sluagh!” yelled Lucas as we ran into the forest.

“What’s the slug, the slew, whatever the fuck you said?” asked Grant.

“Malicious spirits that suck out souls,” I answered, remembering it from my book of Faerie Lore that Ellery had given me at Yule. “Don’t look back, whatever you do, don’t look back.”

We ran on, muttering prayers and profanities in equal turn. Lucas stayed near the back, urging everyone on. As we rounded a corner he yelled out “shift!”

The six of us that could did exactly that, bursting through what little clothing we had on, save for my magical jacket.

As we ran on Lucas and Quinn picked up my three human teammates and heaved them over the backs of Lee, Scott and Grant where they hung on for dear life. We ran on and I could hear the Sluagh gaining on us, their wailing growing louder by the second.

We’re not going to make it,′ I thought, only to hear Lucas shout out “bite them, Quinn!”

Lucas leapt onto Andy’s back and sank his teeth into his shoulder, then jumped back off. Andy screamed, but didn’t stop running. Instead he ran faster. Quinn bit Sam and Ryan on the arms and they too put on a burst of speed. The portal's framework came into sight as we cleared the woods and Lucas sprinted ahead to open it.

“Don’t stop,” he barked and we didn’t. We ran full bore through the portal and spilled out into the main hall of the Sinclairs’ home. The house forced us to shift back, but that barely slowed us down.

We ran full tilt, naked or partially naked, all the way to my apartment where we burst through the door to a room full of people.

The grandfather clock in our living room was striking one a.m. One by one we collapsed inside the door. Lucas and Quinn followed and slammed the door behind us.