Page 78 of Samhain

“How?”

“Your gifts, my gifts, they’re elemental. Organic. Poppy’s are from space and time.” I wanted to ask what Ashley meant by that, but she continued before I could. “Our seer had a vision about Poppy—that she would use this gift to bring peace to the realms and reunite the humans and fairies. Once the king found out about that, about what she could do, he wanted to kill her. In his mind, there doesn’t need to be a reunion. He can be terribly superstitious.”

“But the queen doesn’t believe it?” Ivy asked.

Ashley rolled her eyes. “My queen does not believe all prophecies should be taken literally. The seer’s exact words were ‘reunite the humans and fairies.’ Which humans? Which fairies? All of them? Or only a few?” She raised an eyebrow as she looked between us. “Prophecies are notoriously vague. Besides, Poppy’s a little girl. She hasn’t done anything wrong. She barely talks. She’s the sweetest thing.”

My heart melted for Poppy, but at least the queen saw reason. This king sounded like an asshole.

“As you can imagine,” Ashley continued, “this caused a rift in their marriage. They’ve been living separately ever since…which is a problem.” She downed her drink and poured herself another one. “One cannot survive without the other. They are equally powerful. Where she is light, he is dark. Hence my lady’s irritability. This cannot go on much longer, or we will all suffer for it.”

“Where’s the king?” Ivy asked. “If he hates humans so much, what’s stopping him from going to the other side of the woods and killing us all?”

Ashley took a deep breath as if gearing up for a twisted tale. “A long time ago, he tried. He almost succeeded. It took a powerful fae to banish him back to Faerie, and now he can’t get out. Neither of them can, not without a key.” Her gaze landed on Ivy, suggesting my wife held the very thing that could allow the king to wreak whatever havoc he wanted.

“The ring,” Ivy murmured.

“Exactly,” Ashley said with a solemn nod. “This is why I’ve been hunting you for it. This is why I wanted you to give it back to me. Siobhan knows you have it, and if the king finds out Siobhan knows where it is, he could use it to get out.”

“And if he gets out?” I asked, a slice of panic shooting through my sternum.

“Well”—Ashley whistled—“I can’t imagine anyone in the human realm would be able to stop him.”

“I don’t understand. I lost the ring in the woods.” Ivy squinted and shook her head. “It was smushed under moss or whatever. Why would Siobhan give it back to me?”

Now it was Ashley’s turn to be confused. She furrowed her brows and narrowed her focus on Ivy. “What do you mean?”

“She came to me,” Ivy said. “Six months after Midsummer. She told me about the gift and, when I woke up, the ring was in my lap. If she’s working for the king, why wouldn’t she give the ring to him? Why would she give it back to me?”

Ashley didn’t have a good answer. I couldn’t think of one either.

“That’s why we came to find her,” Ivy said. “She owes me an explanation.”

“Well, she’s gone,” Ashley said. This time, her voice sounded cracked and jaded. They were sisters, after all. Siobhan’s loss must have hurt. I hadn’t seen my sisters in months, and the absence ached more than I’d ever admit.

“No,” Ivy said. “No, she was seen not far from here a few days ago.”

“What?” That got Ashley’s attention, and she snapped her attention Ivy. “How do you know that?”

“That’s why we came now,” Lex explained. “She was at a gas station a few kilometers outside Killwater.”

Ashley launched to her feet, eyes wide and fists clenched. “You’re certain of this?”

“I wouldn’t have traveled all this way if I didn’t think I’d get my answers,” Ivy said.

A moment of silence passed between us where the weight of this realization hung like smog. Then Ashley rushed out of the tent. We followed her.

“My lady,” Ashley called, ducking and weaving through the crowd. “My lady.”

“Yes, Ashley. What is it?” the queen said, coming out of her tent again, twisting her features into annoyance when she saw we were still here.

“Siobhan is here.” Ashley held her skirts up so she could run faster. We chased her, my heart pounding at the increasing panic in her tone. “Siobhan…she was…”

She didn’t get another word in before everything around us faded to a dark glow like an impenetrable cloud had moved over the sun. When I looked up, big puffy clouds of obsidian twisted through the sky, and a scream ripped through the atmosphere from somewhere behind us. Power settled in my gut, overwhelming and sickening, turning my knees to jelly. My hair stood on end like I’d stuck my finger in an electrical socket, except the entire world was a conductor and the very air could kill me.

“Hide!” a fairy shouted as they rushed by.

“He’s back,” came another cry. “Hide! Hide!”

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