Page 121 of Court of the Fae Princes

“Stairs!” he says, and then we’re going upward.

“You really think this is the Keeper’s plan? To see if we can escape?” Zane asks.

Sulien shrugs in front of me, but only I can feel it. “Maybe. What other purpose would there be for her to just leave us in the dark like that?”

“Maybe she simply forgot about us,” Zane suggests, which seems like a Winter Fae idea to me. Fall Fae would never forget an enemy, and yet, we typically don’t leave them alive long enough to cause problems for us.

Enemy? I don’t know why I thought of that. We’re not her enemies. The House of Death may be odd, but they obey the courts. We’re not their enemies, we’re their leaders. They should be wanting to impress us. To flatter us. To make us remember the House of Death and bestow upon it more wealth and power.

This? This is a waste.

“Why aren’t they working harder to impress us?” I ask, being cautious with my footing on the stairs as I do.

“Maybe they are,” Zane suggests. “Maybe in showing us that they don’t care for our opinions, they’re trying to impress us in their own way.”

Cobar snorts. “You see, we Spring Fae tend to impress people with naked beauties, lots of food, and enough liquor to take down a dragon.”

“Oh, I’ve been to the Spring Court, remember, Cobar?” Zane teases back.

“The Summer Fae are no better!”

There’s a smile in Sulien’s voice. “We have fewer orgies.”

I laugh. “The Fall Fae often find themselves in the woods, lost among a number of naked beauties.”

“Mostly other men though, right?” Cobar teases.

I’m glaring, even though they can’t feel it. Technically, our hunters spend a lot of time alone and hunting away from the women. And, technically, I have seen quite a number of them finding comfort in the assholes of their friends, but I didn’t like the implication that I swung that way. I mean, it’s not like the Fall Fae are as dainty as the Spring Fae. A Spring Fae, in the dark, might just pass for a woman until you felt their erection.

“Lost in memories?” Cobar asks sweetly.

“Fuck off,” I grumble.

“The stairs have ended,” Sulien warns ahead of me, then slows, so we each come off the stairs carefully.

We’re in another dark room, but Sulien isn’t bothered by it. Instead, he’s back to trailing his hand along the wall, leading us forward. Warning when there are bones or bodies under foot. It’s strange working together like this. I wouldn’t have thought to warn the people behind me about what’s up ahead. It bothers me that Sulien always falls so easily into a leader’s position and does it so well.

“Doesn’t it seem like the House of Death has… too many dead?” Cobar asks from the rear.

He’s right. Most of the creatures we’ve seen since coming here were dead. There were handfuls of fae, but they looked worried. Rightly so. The House of Death had made a deal with the fae princes, and The House of Death appeared to be taking advantage of that deal. The fae here have to know that in doing so, they’re putting their entire house at risk.

There’s silence for a minute before Sulien answers. “During all the great wars and the times of darkness, the most powerful fae among the House of Death would call home the dead. My grandfather said you could see the dead walking the streets, walking through the woods, marching back to the House of Death. The dead work these lands. There’s always been some humans, but it’s mostly the dead who plow the fields, build things, tend to the livestock. So the more dead, the more help they have here.”

Another moment passes before Cobar’s voice comes again. “There doesn’t seem to be that many dead here.”

Zane’s voice comes, cool and calm. “Didn’t your tutors go over all of this? The House of Death can only use the bodies for so long. They go from bodies to bones, and eventually they can’t pull them together enough to be useful. The longer they’re dead, the less useful they become.”

I kind of want to change the subject. All this talk of death in a painfully dark place is unsettling. I could go the rest of my life without ever returning to the House of Death again.

“I’ve met a few people from the House of Death before,” Sulien says, followed by a warning about bones just up ahead. “Most return here when they’re pregnant and never come back to the courts, but they were always quiet, powerful, and unsettling when living amongst the other fae.”

“They are always powerful… and weird,” Cobar adds.

“Because they kill their babies if they aren’t powerful,” Zane whispers.

I shiver. Were there babies amongst the dead in these catacombs?

“Light up ahead!” Sulien whispers.

---