Page 31 of When Sorrows Come

“Is that so?” Aethlin’s voice was mild, but when I shifted my attention back to him, there was something in his eyes that I would have called amusement if a member of his guard hadn’t been sprawled dead on the ground between us. “For your information, ‘the realm’ is usually accounted kingdom by kingdom, although as being a hero really only gives you the authority to call yourself by that title and to be asked to involve yourself in rather ridiculous amounts of trouble, I have no qualms about assigning the role to you here as well as at home.”

“Great, then it is literally my job to tell the High King that we’ll be using my alchemist, who I’m sure will be thrilled to find out he’s going to be working during my wedding. Then again, so am I.”

“I am shocked,shockedthat you have managed to involve yourself so quickly in an apparently ongoing crisis of the monarchy,” said Tybalt dryly.

The air next to him ripped open, and a slender figure clad in the royal livery slipped through, like an acrobat through a hoop. Two globes of yellow-white light followed them through, rising promptly to spin in air at roughly eye level. The figure bowed deeply and formally to the king, then offered him a small jar of rowan wood.

“Give it to her, Caitir,” said Aethlin, pointing at me. “This is ourvisiting hero, Sir October Daye in the Mists. She’s the one who requested the jar.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” said the Candela, bobbing a quick curtsy before turning on her heel and walking toward me. I held out my hand, waiting for the jar. She dropped it into my palm.

“You may all want to move back,” I said. The guards didn’t like that. They moved to put themselves more firmly between me and the High King, stranding Caitir in the middle. That wasn’t as big of a problem as it might have been; as she had just so aptly demonstrated, Candela can teleport, shortcutting through the shadows in a much simpler, faster way than the Cait Sidhe.

I wonder if Candela who live in a place where there are no Cait Sidhe find their access to the Shadow Roads disrupted, or if the anchors the Cait Sidhe provide apply only to the Court of Cats.

Her Merry Dancers spun lazily around her head, getting brighter when they faced me, reflecting her curiosity. “You should probably also move back,” I said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen when I remove this.”

She frowned, then turned and dove into the shadows that had gathered at the bend of the hall, vanishing. She reappeared a moment later, behind the rest of the group, expression perfectly serene.

Teleporters. They never seem to believe distance exists for the rest of us. I pulled the lid off the wooden jar—it slotted into the container like a bolt, rather than screwing onto the top like a nut—and maneuvered it carefully under the little metal plate, setting it on the floor. “I’m going to take this off now,” I said as I picked up the largest of Raj’s lockpicks, using it to pry up the edge of the plate while I used the tweezers to press it down, keeping the needle in sight the whole time.

It was well-concealed but not particularly well affixed. After only a few seconds of prying, it came off with a scraping sound and fell, tumbling toward the waiting jar.

It did not bounce off. It did not swerve in midair and stab me in the arm. For once, the thing did exactly as it was meant to do, behaved exactly as it was meant to behave, and I was able to put the lid on the jar and stand, offering it to whoever wanted to take it. “This goes to Walther Davies,” I said firmly. “Blond man, Tylwyth Teg, traveling with my group. You really can’t miss him.” For one thing, he was our only blond. For another, he was our only TylwythTeg. We were rich in Daoine Sidhe, but Tylwyth Teg tend to be a little thinner on the ground.

One of the guards cautiously took the jar. “Are you sure that was the only trap?” asked Aethlin briskly.

“On the doorknob, yes; that’s what stabbed Aron in the hand, and killed him before he could hit the ground,” I said. “There could be more traps inside.”

“Understood,” he said. “Caitir?”

“Yes, Your Highness,” said the Candela, and stepped backward into shadow, vanishing. I stared, first at the space where she had been, and then at the High King.

“We don’t know what’s in there, and you sent her in alone,” I said slowly and with great deliberation. Raj stepped away from the High King and slightly behind Tybalt, trying to look nonchalant about it, like he wasn’t getting out of the potential blast radius. “You sent a single Candela,alone, into a room that could contain a corpse—and that’s sort of our best-case option right now since the whole place could be trapped to Annwn and back.”

“It was that or continue to wait for you to open the door,” said Aethlin implacably. “This seemed the more efficient option.”

I stared at him for a moment. “We have two Cait Sidhe with us,” I said finally. “If sending someone in, alone, without a way to scout ahead, were the most efficient option, don’t you think I would have already sent one of them?”

For the first time, the High King’s confidence appeared to waver. I couldn’t tell whether it was because he was listening to me, or because his Candela had yet to return. Caitir was hopefully alone in there, and not setting off any more traps, but we had no real way of knowing. I turned back to the door, putting the King behind me.

I didn’t have to wait long for the reaction to that. “A commoner does not turn her back on the High King,” snapped one of the guards.

“Not a commoner,” I replied, studying the door, especially the seams between it and the wall. The hinges were external—again, bad, if sadly predictable, security—and I could see that they hadn’t been tampered with, at least not on this side. That was a small break. “Knighted for services to the crown of the Mists, named hero of the realm by the Queen in the Mists, acknowledged as such by the High King, just now, in your hearing. If I need to turn myback on him to do my job, he can understand the necessity and forgive me for it.”

There was no more iron anywhere on the door. That didn’t mean I wanted to touch it with my bare hands. One of the first real killers I ever met was Oleander de Merelands, and she specialized in poisons. Contact poison was one of her favorite tricks. I stooped to wrap the hem of my dress around my hand, then stepped forward and grasped the doorknob.

People who put deadly traps on doorknobs often forget the obvious, which is that it’s a good idea to lock doors. The knob turned easily, and I jumped back as the door swung inward, revealing the short entry hall of what looked like a plushly furnished chamber. It wasn’t as large as the one where I’d been expecting to stay with Tybalt—we were probably going to have to move now, or at least have the place thoroughly swept for traps, several times—but it was equally well-appointed, at least from the slice I could see.

Of course, that slice included a motionless Candela lying sprawled on the floor, which was a little less pleasant to look upon.

“Caitir!” shouted one of the guards, and the Satyr rushed past me, diving into the room without glancing back. If he had accomplished nothing else, Aethlin had done a good job of convincing his people to be loyal to each other.

As the Satyr ran, there was a small snapping sound from floor level. I jumped away, putting still more distance between me and the open door. It was a good idea. The wire he’d broken was apparently connected to a small silver dipper hidden along the line of the wall near ceiling level. It snapped down, showering him in glittering green dust. He kept running for several more steps before he started to wheeze, clutching at his throat in terrified confusion, and collapsed to the floor next to Caitir.

I spun around, focusing on the sole remaining guard. “Get the High King out of here now,” I snapped, then switched my attention to Aethlin. “Sire, I need to secure this location, sweep for further traps, and get your people out of there, assuming they’re not both dead.”

Aethlin had gone pale and was staring in horrified fascination at the two unmoving bodies visible through the open door. “Y... yes,” he said. “Yes, of course. You have my permission to do whatever you feel necessary to resolve this and bring Nessa home, if possible.”

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