A Court of Muses Read online

  When they reached the lowest level, and could search no more, they had examined all the dungeon—save for the hidden chamber where King Viridios kept his secret weapon.

  “Did she give them to the Jabberwock?” Errol asked.

  “No. That floor is warded. I expect the king is the only one who can undo the enchantment that would allow someone to transport themselves past his defenses. And he’s the one who controls the Jabberwock with his ring. Likely it’s asleep when he hasn’t need for it.”

  “But you don’t know that, do you?” Errol asked. “The queen could be strong enough to send our heroes there. I can’t just stand by and let them suffer if that’s where she might have sent them.”

  She groaned. “I was afraid you might say something foolish like that.” Helga started up the stairs, the air around her bright, even when her wings were out of sight. “Have you heard the legends of how the king tamed the Jabberwock—before he’d acquired the Ring of Solomon to help him?”

  Errol followed her. He had heard many tales, most of them contradictory: that the Jabberwock was a collection of shadow goblins; the creature was the old sovereign, King Viridios’ father, a miscreant muse; and that the creature was as old as the earth. Not all the tales could be true.

  Errol hadn’t heard the story of how King Viridios had tamed the creature.

  Helga stopped at a landing where there was no door. “Our king only had goodness in his heart when he faced the beast. He wrapped a blanket around himself made with thoughts of pleasure, joy, and kindness. If he had allowed a drop of fear into his mind, the creature would have preyed on that and torn him apart. Instead, it lay at his feet like an obedient hound.” She turned to face the wall.

  Errol’s gaze fixed on the wall behind her. It shimmered, the glamour so thorough and well made he had missed it the first time he’d passed it. There was a door there, but it was difficult to see. When he sank his awareness past the stone, he sensed a dark gloom of nightmares. Beyond that, he could sense no more. He shivered.

  Helga squinted at him. “Are you capable of keeping all sorrow and anger from your heart and surrounding yourself with only goodness, hope, and merry thoughts?”

  He swallowed.

  “Can you keep all fear from your heart? All sorrow and bitterness?” she asked. “All doubt?”

  “I don’t know. Can you?” If anyone could, he expected it would be Helga.

  “No. I’ve seen too many battles and lost too many not to feel sorrow.”

  “I have to try,” he said.

  “I know.” She shook her head. “Tell me when you’re ready, and I’ll open the door for you.”

  Errol closed his eyes and cleared his mind. He focused on his breathing, relaxing his senses in the way Helga had shown him when teaching him glamour. He could see through the glamour of the door more easily now, but that wasn’t the same as what she was asking.

  He needed hope and happiness in his heart. Errol imagined Alma’s baking. He tasted her ginger cacao biscuits, joy singing through him as he imagined sitting down at a table and eating them with Semmy and his sister.

  A smile touched his lips.

  Errol stepped forward. The door opened at his touch. He didn’t require Helga’s assistance. Either that or she’d already unlocked it for him.

  He kept his happy memory in his heart as he strode down the corridor. He released his wings from his glamour, lighting the way with their warm glow.

  The cold-iron door locked the creature in the room beyond. Errol closed his eyes and grasped the memory again before grabbing for the handle of the door and pulling it open.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Try This One Weird Trick That Pandora Kept in Her Box

  Errol held on to hope and joy, keeping himself surrounded by the cushion of happy memories and the faith that all would be good.

  He opened his eyes and gazed into the large chamber. It was recessed, and the creature lay below, the shadows undulating like the waves of a calm sea. Errol saw no burning eyes staring accusingly, nor a tempest of violence. All was quiet in the lull.

  There were no traces of soldiers who might have been transported there. Going to the Jabberwock hadn’t solved the mystery or saved his friend. Errol backed away, fighting the anguish threatening to rise in him.

  A red eye opened, followed by five more.

  Errol slammed the door closed. The Jabberwock roared, the screech a squall in his ears. The creature smashed into the door. Bits of stone fell from the ceiling onto Errol. The earth trembled under his feet.

  So much for keeping hope in his heart. Errol tried to embrace that moment of tranquility he’d felt before, but it was gone. He flew down the corridor, emerging onto the landing beside Helga. He slammed that door closed too.

  Helga lifted an eyebrow. “I take it you lost your blanket of goodness and joy.”

  “What would have happened if you had been wrong, and that tale hadn’t been true?” he asked.

  “I suppose you would have been dead, wouldn’t you?” She started up the stairs. “Did you find the answers you were looking for?”

  The burden of his failure pressed heavily on his shoulders. Or perhaps that was the weight of his new wings. “No. I didn’t see Semmy or anyone else. Where else can they be?”

  “I don’t know. I have tracking magic, but it isn’t my strongest asset. I can’t detect them anywhere.” Each step she took seemed to weigh her down too. “The queen said they were nothing. It is possible she has turned them into nothing.”

  Errol wasn’t an adept tracker either. He wished he’d practiced this skill, but he’d had little need for it in his career in the military thus far. There were men who specialized in such abilities, which came in useful when spies or assassins threatened the kingdom. The king had requested specific men after his granddaughter’s death—which he’d blamed on the Raven Court.

  Errol had assumed Quenylda was the one who had drained and broken the neck of her husband’s daughter. With the Raven Court’s recent attack on the king’s family, it was difficult to doubt their involvement. Yet when he thought of the white feather that had surely come from Quenylda’s gown, he couldn’t rule her out.

  What had the Raven Queen said in her letter? They were informed the king would be traveling that way? Was that a hint that someone within the Silver Court had tipped them off? Was that bird a reference to Quenylda in all her downy white dresses?

  Quenylda might have been the culprit. She certainly had the motive if she knew about her sister’s plan to tell their father the king what she’d done.

  Errol didn’t doubt Quenylda was cruel enough to kill or cunning enough to pull it off.

  Once Errol made it back up into the sunlight, he sought out the king’s tracker. One of the men happened to be Lieutenant Paega. Errol had had no idea the young Witchkin man had any skills at all other than being a secret ambidextrous poet. Then again, it made sense that the royal guard kept him around for some reason.

  Paega shook his head sadly when Errol asked him to track Semmy and the others. Errol’s wings blazed brighter, righteous indignation fueling his desperation.

  “I’ll pay you myself for your efforts,” Errol said, his voice coming out gruffer than he intended.

  “You don’t understand.” Tears welled up in Paega’s eyes. “I already tried. They’re gone. Vanished. She turned them into—I don’t even know. Air.”

  His best friend truly was gone. Errol was left with the task of telling Alma that her husband was dead.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  The Importance of Being Errol

  Twice as many as usual kitchen maids were at work when Errol trudged in. His back ached, and it was difficult to keep upright in his exhaustion.

  Alma was directing a scullery maid in cutting butter and flour together in a giant bowl when someone nudged her.

  “Look at those wings,” someone said.

  Errol was too melancholy to realize they w
ere talking about him.

  Alma must have known by the look on Errol’s face as she saw him.

  She stared at him with horror in her eyes. “Where is he?”

  Errol shook his head, his throat too tight to speak.

  “Where is Semmy? He was supposed to receive an award today. Where is he?” Her voice rose in panic.

  “The queen—you must have heard—” Alma was always the one who knew all the gossip—far before he did.

  She shouted over the clamor in the kitchen. “I’ve been stuck here all day cooking this blasted feast. Where in the bloody realm is my husband?”

  “I don’t know. It was Queen Anwynn. After the king gave out the medals.” Errol choked on a sob. “She killed them. All the survivors. She turned them into nothingness.”

  She clutched at her heart, her mouth working but no words coming out. She shook her head, as if unable to believe it. He gave her a moment to process the news.

  Her disbelief hardened into fury. “What are you doing here with a medal around your neck and a barmy set of glowing wings, but my husband is dead?” She tore off her cap and hit him with it.

  “I don’t know why. The king spared me.” Whether that was true, he wasn’t certain.

  She hit him with her cap again. “Why?”

  Because of the color of his hair? His distant lineage? He didn’t know. Tears streaked down his face. He tried to hug his sister.

  She shoved him away, wiping at her own eyes. “You were supposed to look out for me. You were supposed to look out for him—for me. Now you’re telling me he’s dead.”

  Errol shouted back. “He wasn’t just your husband. He was my best mate too.”

  “If he was your best friend, why did you let him die?” Her voice was hoarse as she screamed at him.

  The entire kitchen had stopped working to stare.

  The head cook, Magdelyn, placed an arm around Alma’s shoulder. “Come, love, it isnae your brother’s fault.”

  Alma sobbed into the cook’s meaty neck. There was a time Alma might have turned to him and cried on his shoulder. And he could have cried on hers. They were kin. They were supposed to have each other.

  The cook nodded to Errol. “You’d best be on your way before you stir up more trouble. Let your sister cool off and go see her after she finishes her shift, eh?”

  Errol did wait until later, but Alma wasn’t in the kitchen after the feast. When he knocked on the door to her cottage, no one answered. He tried to use his senses to feel beyond the stone. It was a skill he was still a novice at, and he’d already used magic multiple times that day, leaving him depleted.

  He thought he detected her presence. He knocked again. No answer came. He distinctly heard a rustle and a sniffle. She was there. She simply didn’t want to see him.

  Errol had no one.

  * * *

  In the days that followed, Errol worked to exercise his magical muscles to learn a new skill. Helga had taught him about changing the tangible to intangible. He had been able to sense the difference between reality and a transformed object. He could transmute himself as well. It was another matter to keep his wings constantly invisible and ethereal so that he could wear his uniform without a problem.

  He didn’t fare as well when he slept.

  Amid his own personal challenges, the royal family had their own.

  The queen’s outburst, the heroes who had fought in battle—yet died at the queen’s hands, Errol’s wings, and the other details of the ceremony kept everyone occupied with gossip for weeks. People were so busy, including the royal family, that the death of Prince Elric-Atherius’ mistress went largely unnoticed by anyone but Errol.

  He was one of the first guards to arrive at the scene—and it was his day off. Winifred had been carrying a tray of tea from her room. On the surface, it looked as though her foot had gotten caught in the boning of her hoopskirt, and she had tripped down the stairs.

  Errol found two details to be questionable. Elric-Atherius’ mistress didn’t carry trays of tea. Servants did that. Winifred did, however, avoid the public hallways and stairs the royal family frequented. She kept to the servant passages and told her lady’s maid—who had once told Alma, who had told Errol—that she avoided the places Quenylda might traverse.

  Errol searched the body for signs of magic that could be traced back to Quenylda, but it was a skill for a tracker. Errol only knew enough to be aware that such traces of magic had to be detected immediately. If Paega were summoned, there would be nothing for him to sense by the time he arrived.

  There were no neat and clear clues such as a feather from Quenylda’s gown. He didn’t know where it was now that Steorra was dead. She might have hidden it or it could have been destroyed along with her.

  The incident was ruled as a tragic accident. Prince Elric-Atherius remained in his quarters and didn’t attend dinners or summonses. The only time he did venture out was to go to the dungeon.

  Errol was given specific instructions when it was his and his company’s shift to guard the outer doors of the prison floor where the Raven Queen’s granddaughter was kept. Prince Elric-Atherius had been expressly forbidden to visit Princess Perrusia. He’d tried twice already and been turned away.

  When it was Errol’s shift, the prince tried again. He disguised himself in a guard’s uniform and glamoured his face to look old. He darkened his hair from pale silver to dark brown. Errol would have recognized the prince even if it hadn’t been for his nervousness. Muse magic clung to him. That and he’d gotten the uniform wrong. He wore dress pants with a regular work uniform. He’d also forgotten to wear a hat.

  He tried to move past Errol, but Errol stepped before the door, barring his path. “No, Your Highness. Our orders are to keep you out. I apologize for the inconvenience.”

  Prince Elric-Atherius’s eyes went wide. “Captain Errol, how did you know it was me?”

  Errol thought back to the time Captain Manchester had told him all the ways he should have tricked him into passing Alma off as a boy. Errol liked the prince. He didn’t know why he wanted to get into the dungeon, but he half wanted him to succeed.

  Errol threw him a bone. “You’ve got your uniform wrong. And I can taste the muse magic on you.”

  “Indeed. I can see I was doomed to fail with your superior eyes.” Prince Elric-Atherius’ smile was tired on the older man’s face.

  It was strange being able to see through the glamour to the face underneath, the two images overlapping each other. The prince didn’t make any attempt to hide the sorrow in his expression or the bitterness in his frown with glamour or false expressions. He turned away, about to return down the hall and up the stairs the way he’d come.

  “Your Highness.” Errol feared he might be overstepping by addressing the prince directly, but he was compelled to do so. “I hope you’ll excuse my imprudence, but I wanted to say, I am sorry for your loss—losses.” Errol swallowed the lump in his throat, thinking of his own losses, his best friend’s death and Alma’s shunning of him.

  “That is kind.” Prince Elric-Atherius turned back. “You know about my mistress?”

  Errol wanted to tell Prince Elric-Atherius that he’d been there first and what his suspicions were. He had waited just as Steorra had asked him to, but she’d been the one who had suffered. Errol couldn’t believe it was a coincidence she had been the target of the Raven Court’s attack.

  Prince Elric-Atherius closed the space between them. For a moment Errol thought he might be trying to get past him again, but the prince threw his arms around Errol and embraced him. Errol stood stiffly at attention, wondering if this were a jest, but when he felt the other man shake, he realized he was crying.

  Awkwardly Errol patted Prince Elric-Atherius’ shoulder.

  “I have no one now. I’m surrounded by a court of vipers,” the prince said.

  Errol knew the feeling. He patted the prince’s shoulder again.

  “Your heart beats to a
different tune from those around you,” Errol said carefully, not wanting to overstep. “Perhaps you would do better not living at court.”

  “If only I could!” Prince Elric-Atherius dropped his head onto Errol’s shoulder. “Your words are the first kind thing anyone has said to me since they’ve died.”

  Errol didn’t doubt it. A Fae court was not a place where one showed weakness or sympathy.

  The scuff of footsteps came from the stairs, and Prince Elric-Atherius drew back. The glamour on his face thickened, his grief hidden under a smile stretched too tight. He passed the guard on the steps.

  Errol felt his pockets to ensure he still had the keys to the dungeon. Feigning emotion to access keys was a tactic Errol wouldn’t have put past most of the royal family. Either Prince Elric-Atherius hadn’t thought of the trick himself because he was too dim—or he truly was too honest to do so.

  The approaching guard was Private Norris, arriving early for his shift. The young man was so smooth-faced and small, Errol would have believed he was a lad of fourteen, not eighteen as he claimed. The soldier was teased endlessly by the men in his unit, though the men under Errol’s command were close-knit enough that they defended Norris when other companies made cracks about his height and soft voice.

  “Was that the prince trying to get in again?” Norris asked, his voice rising to a squeal.

  “Indeed.”

  Norris made a face. “Even I recognized him that time, sir.”

  A woman’s scream came from the prison. Errol took it the royal family had begun their latest diversion—torturing their Raven Court prisoner.

  * * *

  Errol thought about what he’d almost confessed to Prince Elric-Atherius. Perhaps the prince already knew about his sister-wife killing his mistress and child—and possibly his sister—but felt too helpless to do anything about it. He was married to a wife who wore the fingers of the Raven Court prisoners—both the dead and the living one—as part of a morbid tiara on top of her silver tresses these days.