The Wicked King (The Folk of the Air Book 2)

The High King’s personal guard follows us at a distance. Questions run through my mind—how was he poisoned? Who actually put whatever he drank in his hand? When did it happen?

Grabbing a servant in the hall, I send out runners for the Bomb and, if they are unable to find her, an alchemist.

“You’re going to be okay,” I say.

“You know,” he says, hanging on to me, “that ought to be reassuring. But when mortals say it, it doesn’t mean the same thing as when the Folk do, does it? For you, it’s an appeal. A kind of hopeful magic. You say I will be well because you fear I won’t be.”

For a moment, I don’t speak. “You’re poisoned,” I say finally. “You know that, right?”

He doesn’t startle. “Ah,” he says. “Balekin.”

I say nothing, just set him down before the fire in my rooms, his back against my couch. He looks odd there, his beautiful clothes a contrast to the plain rug, his face pale with a hectic flush in his cheeks.

He reaches up and presses my hand to his face. “It’s funny, isn’t it, how I mocked you for your mortality when you’re certain to outlive me.”

“You’re not going to die,” I insist.

“Oh, how many times have I wished that you couldn’t lie? Never more than now.”

He lolls to one side, and I grab one of the pitchers of water and pour a glassful. I bring it to his lips. “Cardan? Get down as much as you can.”

He doesn’t reply and seems about to fall asleep. “No.” I pat his cheek with increasing force until it’s more of a smack. “You’ve got to stay awake.”

His eyes open. His voice is muzzy. “I’ll just sleep for a little while.”

“Unless you want to wind up like Severin of Fairfold, encased in glass for centuries while mortals line up to take pictures with his body, you’re going to stay awake.”

He shifts into a more upright sitting position. “Fine,” he says. “Talk to me.”

“I saw your mother tonight,” I say. “All dressed up. The time I saw her before that was in the Tower of Forgetting.”

“And you’re wondering if I forgot her?” he says airily, and I am pleased that he’s paying enough attention to deliver one of his typical quips.

“Glad you’re up to mocking.”

“I hope it’s the last thing about me to go. So tell me about my mother.”

I try to think of something to say that isn’t entirely negative. I go for carefully neutral. “The first time I met her, I didn’t know who she was. She wanted to trade me some information for getting her out of the Tower. And she was afraid of you.”

“Good,” he says.

My eyebrows go up. “So how did she wind up a part of your Court?”

“I suppose I have some fondness for her yet,” he admits. I pour him some more water, and he drinks it more slowly than I’d like. I refill the glass as soon as I can.

“There are so many questions I wish I could ask my mom,” I admit.

“What would you ask?” The words slur together, but he gets them out.

“Why she married Madoc,” I say, pointing to the glass, which he obediently brings to his mouth. “Whether she loved him and why she left him and whether she was happy in the human world. Whether she actually murdered someone and hid her body in the burnt remains of Madoc’s original stronghold.”

He looks surprised. “I always forget that part of the story.”

I decide a subject change is in order. “Do you have questions like that for your father?”

“Why am I the way I am?” His tone makes it clear he’s proposing something I might suggest he ask, not really wondering about it. “There are no real answers, Jude. Why was I cruel to Folk? Why was I awful to you? Because I could be. Because I liked it. Because, for a moment, when I was at my worst, I felt powerful, and most of the time, I felt powerless, despite being a prince and the son of the High King of Faerie.”

“That’s an answer,” I say.

“Is it?” And then, after a moment, “You should go.”

“Why?” I ask, annoyed. For one, this is my room. For another, I am trying to keep him alive.

He looks at me solemnly. “Because I am going to retch.”

I grab for the bucket, and he takes it from me, his whole body convulsing with the force of vomiting. The contents of his stomach appear like matted leaves, and I shudder. I didn’t know wraithberry did that.

There’s a knock on the door, and I go to it. The Bomb is there, out of breath. I let her in, and she moves past me, straight to Cardan.

“Here,” she says, pulling out a little vial. “It’s clay. It may help draw out and contain the toxins.”

Cardan nods and takes it from her, swallowing the contents with a grimace. “It tastes like dirt.”

“It is dirt,” she informs him. “And there’s something else. Two things, really. Grimsen was already gone from his forge when we tried to capture him. We have to assume the worst—that he’s with Orlagh.

“Also, I was given this.” She takes a note from her pocket. “It’s from Balekin. Cannily phrased, but breaks down to this—he’s offering the antidote to you, Jude, if you will bring him the crown.”

“The crown?” Cardan opens his eyes, and I realize he must have closed them without my noticing.

“He wants you to take it to the gardens, near the roses,” the Bomb says.

“What happens if he doesn’t get the antidote?” I ask.

The Bomb puts the back of her hand against Cardan’s cheek. “He’s the High King of Elfhame—he has the strength of the land to draw on. But he’s very weak already. And I don’t think he knows how to do it. Your Majesty?”

He looks at her with benevolent incomprehension. “Whatever do you mean? I just took a mouthful of the land at your behest.”

I think about what she’s saying, about what I know of the High King’s powers.

Surely you have noticed that since his reign began, the isles are different. Storms come in faster. Colors are a bit more vivid, smells are sharper.

But all that was done without trying. I am certain he didn’t notice the land altering itself to better suit him.

Look at them all, your subjects, he’d said to me at a revel months ago. A shame not a one knows who their true ruler is.

If Cardan doesn’t believe himself to be the true High King of Elfhame, if he doesn’t allow himself to access his own power, it will be my fault. If wraithberry kills him, it will be because of me.

“I’ll get that antidote,” I say.

Cardan lifts the crown from his head and looks at it for a moment, as though somehow he cannot fathom how it came into his hand. “This can’t pass to Oak if you lose it. Although I admit the succession gets tricky if I die.”

“I already told you,” I say. “You’re not going to die. And I am not going to take that crown.” I go in the back and change around the contents of my pockets. I tie on a cloak with a deep hood and a new mask. I am so furious that my hands shake. Wraithberry, which I was once invulnerable to, thanks to careful mithridatism. If I had been able to keep up the doses, I could have perhaps tricked Balekin as I once tricked Madoc. But after my imprisonment in the Undersea, I have one less advantage and far higher stakes. I have lost my immunity. I am as vulnerable to poison as Cardan is.

“You’ll stay with him?” I ask the Bomb, and she nods.

“No,” says Cardan. “She goes with you.”

I shake my head. “The Bomb knows about potions. She knows about magic. She can make sure you don’t get worse.”

He ignores me and takes her hand. “Liliver, as your king, I command you,” he says with great dignity for someone sitting on the floor beside the bucket he’s retched in. “Go with Jude.”

I turn to the Bomb, but I see in her face that she won’t disobey him—she’s made her oath and even given him her name. He’s her king.

“Damn you,” I whisper to one or maybe both of them.

I vow that I will get the antidote swiftly, but that doesn’t make it any easier for me to leave when I know the wraithberry could yet stop his heart. His searing gaze follows us out the door, blown pupils and crown still clenched in his hand.

Balekin is in the garden as he promised, near a blooming tree of silver-blue roses. When I get there, I note figures not too distant from where we stand, other courtiers going for midnight strolls. It means he cannot attack me, but neither can I attack him.

At least not without others knowing about it.

“You are a great disappointment,” he says.

It’s such a shock that I actually laugh. “You mean because I wasn’t glamoured. Yes, I can see how that would be very sad for you.”

He glowers, but he doesn’t even have Vulciber beside him now to threaten me. Perhaps being the Ambassador of the Undersea makes him believe he’s untouchable.

All I can think about is that he poisoned Cardan, he tormented me, he pushed Orlagh to raid the land. I am shaking with anger, but trying to bite back that fury so I can get through what must be done.

“Did you bring me the crown?” he asks.

“I’ve got it nearby,” I lie. “But before I hand it over, I want to see the antidote.”

He pulls a vial from his coat, nearly the twin of the one he gave me, which I take out of my pocket. “They would have executed me if they’d found me with this poison,” I say, shaking it. “That’s what you intended, wasn’t it?”

“Someone may execute you yet,” he says.

“Here’s what we’re going to do.” I take the stopper out of the bottle. “I am going to drink the poison, and then you’re going to give me the antidote. If it works on me, then I’ll bring out the crown and trade it to you for the bottle. If not, then I guess I’ll die, but the crown will be lost forever. Whether Cardan lives or dies, that crown is hidden well enough that you won’t find it.”

“Grimsen can forge me another,” Balekin says.

“If that’s true, then what are we here for?”

Balekin grimaces, and I consider the possibility that the little smith isn’t with Orlagh after all. Maybe he’s disappeared after doing his best to set us at one another’s throats.

“You stole that crown from me,” he says.

“True enough,” I admit. “And I’ll hand it over to you, but not for nothing.”

“I can’t lie, mortal. If I say I will give you the antidote, I will do it. My word is enough.”

I give him my best scowl. “Everyone knows to beware when bargaining with the Folk. You deceive with your every breath. If you truly have the antidote, what does it harm you to let me poison myself? I would think it would be a pleasure.”

He gives me a searching look. I imagine he’s angry that I am not glamoured. He must have had to scramble when I hustled Cardan out of the throne room. Was he always ready with the antidote? Did he think he could persuade Cardan to crown him? Was he arrogant enough to believe that the Council wouldn’t have stood in his way?

“Very well,” he says. “One dose of antidote for you, and the rest for Cardan.”

I unstopper the bottle he gave me and toss it back, drinking all the contents with a pronounced wince. I am angry all over again, thinking of how sick I made myself taking tiny doses of poison. All for nothing.

“Do you feel the wraithberry working on your blood? It will work far faster on you than on one of us. And you took such a large dose.” He watches me with such a fierce expression that I can tell he wishes he could leave me to die. If he could justify walking away right now, he would. For a moment, I think he might.

Then he crosses toward me and unstoppers the bottle in his own hand. “Please do not believe that I will put it into your hand,” he says. “Open your mouth like a little bird, and I will drop in your dose. Then you will give me the crown.”

I open my mouth obediently and let him pour the thick, bitter, honey-like stuff onto my tongue. I duck away from him, returning the distance between us, making sure I am closer to the entrance of the palace.

“Satisfied?” he asks.

I spit the antidote into the glass bottle, the one he gave me, the one that once contained wraithberry but, until a few moments before, was filled only with water.

“What are you doing?” he asks.

I stopper it again and toss it through the air to the Bomb, who catches it handily. Then she is gone, leaving him to gape at me.

“What have you done?” he demands.

“I tricked you,” I tell him. “A bit of misdirection. I dumped out your poison and washed out the vial. As you keep forgetting, I grew up here and so am also dangerous to bargain with—and, as you see, I can lie. And, like you reminded me so long ago, I am short on time.”

He draws the sword at his side. It’s a thin, long blade. I don’t think it’s the one he used to fight Cardan in his tower room, but it might be.

“We’re in public,” I remind him. “And I am still the High King’s seneschal.”

He looks around, taking in the sight of the other courtiers nearby. “Leave us,” he shouts at them. A thing it did not occur to me that anyone could do, but he is used to being a prince. He is used to being obeyed.

And indeed, the courtiers seem to melt into the shadows, clearing the room for the sort of duel we definitely ought not to have. I slip my hand into my pocket, touching the hilt of a knife. The range on it is nothing like a sword. As Madoc explained more than once: A sword is a weapon of war, a dagger is a weapon of murder. I’d rather have the knife than be unarmed, but more than anything, I wish I had Nightfell.

“Are you suggesting a duel?” I ask. “I am sure you wouldn’t want to bring dishonor to your name with me so outmatched in weaponry.”

“You expect me to believe you have any honor?” he asks, which is, unfortunately, a fair point. “You are a coward. A coward like the man who raised you.”

He takes a step toward me, ready to cut me down whether I have a weapon or not.

“Madoc?” I draw my knife. It’s not small, but it’s still less than half the length of the blade he is leveling at me.

“It was Madoc’s plan that we should strike during the coronation. It was his plan that once Dain was out of the way, Eldred would see clear to put the crown on my head. It was all his plan, but he stayed Grand General and I went to the Tower of Forgetting. And did he lift a finger to help me? He did not. He bent his head to my brother, whom he despises. And you’re just like him, willing to beg and grovel and lower yourself to anyone if it gets you power.”

I doubt putting Balekin on the throne was ever part of Madoc’s true plan, whatever he allowed Balekin to believe, but that doesn’t make the words sting any less. I have spent a lifetime making myself small in the hopes I could find an acceptable place in Elfhame, and then, when I pulled off the biggest, grandest coup imaginable, I had to hide my abilities more than ever.

“No,” I say. “That’s not true.”

He looks surprised. Even in the Tower of Forgetting, when he was a prisoner, I still let Vulciber strike me. In the Undersea, I pretended to have no dignity at all. Why should he think I see myself any differently than he sees me?

“You are the one who bent your head to Orlagh instead of to your own brother,” I say. “You’re the coward and a traitor. A murderer of your own kin. But worse than all that, you’re a fool.”

He bares his teeth as he advances on me, and I, who have been pretending to subservience, remember my most troublesome talent: pissing off the Folk.

“Go ahead,” he says. “Run like the coward you are.”

I take a step back.

Kill Prince Balekin. I think of Dulcamara’s words, but I don’t hear her voice. I hear my own, rough with seawater, terrified and cold and alone.

Madoc’s words of long ago come back to me. What is sparring but a game of strategy, played at speed?

The point of a fight is not to have a good fight; it’s to win.

I am at a disadvantage against a sword, a bad disadvantage. And I am still weak from my imprisonment in the Undersea. Balekin can hang back and take his time while I can’t get past the blade. He will take me apart slowly, cut by cut. My best bet is closing the distance fast. I need to get inside his guard, and I don’t have the luxury of taking his measure before I do it. I am going to have to rush him.

I have one shot to get this right.

My heart thunders in my ears.

He lunges toward me, and I slam my knife against the base of his sword with my right hand, then grab his forearm with my left, twisting as though to disarm him. He pulls against my grip. I drive the knife toward his neck.

“Hold,” Balekin shouts. “I surr—”

Arterial blood sprays my arm, sprays the grass. It glistens on my knife. Balekin slumps over, sprawling on the ground.

It all happens so fast.

It happens too fast.

I want to have some reaction. I want to tremble or feel nauseated. I want to be the person who begins to weep. I want to be anyone but the person I am, who looks around to be sure no one saw, who wipes off my knife in the dirt, wipes off my hand on his clothes, and gets out of there before the guards come.

You’re a good little murderer, Dulcamara said.

When I look back, Balekin’s eyes are still open, staring at nothing.

Cardan is sitting on the couch. The bucket is gone and so is the Bomb.

He looks at me with a lazy smile. “Your dress. You put it back on.”

I look at him in confusion; the consequences of what I’ve just done—including having to tell Cardan—are hard to think past. But the dress I am wearing is the one I wore before, the one I got from Mother Marrow’s walnut. There’s blood on one sleeve of it now, but it is otherwise the same.

“Did something happen?” I ask again.

“I don’t know?” he asks, puzzled. “Did it? I granted the boon you wanted. Is your father safe?”

Boon?

My father?

Madoc. Of course. Madoc threatened me, Madoc was disgusted by Cardan. But what has he done and what has it to do with dresses?

“Cardan,” I say, trying to be as calm as I can. I go over to the sofa and sit down. It’s not a small couch, but his long legs are on it, blanketed and propped up on pillows. No matter how far from him I sit, it feels too close. “You’ve got to tell me what happened. I haven’t been here for the last hour.”

His expression grows troubled.

“The Bomb came back with the antidote,” he says. “She said you’d be right behind her. I was still so dizzy, and then a guard came, saying that there was an emergency. She went to see. And then you came in, just like she said you would. You said you had a plan….”

He looks at me, as though waiting for me to jump in and tell the rest of the story, the part I remember. But, of course, I don’t.

After a moment, he closes his eyes and shakes his head. “Taryn.”

“I don’t understand,” I say, because I don’t want to understand.

“Your plan was that your father was going to take half the army, but for him to function independently, he needed to be freed of his vows to the crown. You had on one of your doublets—the ones you always wear. And these odd earrings. Moon and a star.” He shakes his head.

A cold chill goes through me.

As children in the mortal world, Taryn and I would switch places to play tricks on our mother. Even in Faerie, we would sometimes pretend to be each other to see what we could get away with. Would a lecturer be able to tell the difference? Could Oriana? Madoc? Oak? What about the great and mighty Prince Cardan?

“But how did she make you agree?” I demand. “She has no power. She could pretend to be me, but she couldn’t force you—”

He puts his head in his long-fingered hands. “She didn’t have to command me, Jude. She didn’t have to use any magic. I trust you. I trusted you.”

And I trusted Taryn.

While I was murdering Balekin, while Cardan was poisoned and disoriented, Madoc made his move against the crown. Against me. And he did it with his daughter Taryn by his side.