The Knights of the Faerie Queens, Part 10

Answers Only Beget More Questions

The Knights of the Faerie Queens is a dark fantasy serialized novel. Two fey, charged with keeping their queens and their Courts safe, must hunt down a savage monster—no matter what secrets, creatures, and curses stand in their way.

In Part 9, Kestrel tentatively explored the few memories he has of his life and family outside of the Court of Stars.

It was hard to fit two decades of absence into one conversation. Kestrel didn't even know where to start. The silence and the hug were both starting to feel awkward, but he didn't want to be the first to break them.

"I feel like I'm hallucinating," Ekta said, stepping back, though he still kept his hands on Kestrel's shoulders. "I'm sorry, I just--" He chuckled. "I feel like I'm bein' really dramatic, but you and your parents just disappeared so suddenly. We never thought we'd find you again."

"We?" Kestrel asked.

Ekta's face fell. "Well...just me now, I guess."

Kestrel's throat tightened. "Your parents too? I'm so sorry." He pressed his hand against his cousin's, squeezing gently.

"It happens to everyone in the Deepwoods sooner or later," Ekta muttered. "Sooner, more like, with everything recently."

Right...Ekta had seen the monster. Kestrel wondered if it had been friends, or his parents, that Ekta had watched the monster destroy. And how had he escaped? "Was Caden right, earlier? The Wildlings have suffered over two dozen losses?"

"That we know of." Ekta glanced out into the forest, eyes darting back and forth. "Our village...it fluctuates. Especially in the spring and summer. People leave for the nicer months--as much as it can be nicer in the Deepwoods--and come back for the winter. But there's a core group of us that always stay. Villagers and warriors alike, we've lost twenty-four since the monster began killing. Others are starting to return for the winter, but there's still a lot missing, and we have no way to know if they're just late, or..." His voice trailed off into a tense silence.

Kestrel had had no idea that there was a Wildling village in the Deepwoods. He had so many questions--about their family, about the village, about the monster--and they swirled in his mind, unwilling to sort themselves into any sort of hierarchy. "Can you tell me about the monster? Was it a nature spirit, or an elemental? Seren and I have almost no information about it, and if Jasper or Desma know anything, they're not sharing. You're the only one I know who--" He saw Ekta's shoulders hunch, felt the luxfey pull away slightly as if shrinking into himself, and forced himself to stop rambling. "I'm sorry, Ekta. There's just so much..."

Ekta suddenly grabbed his hand, pulling him along as he started back toward the campfires. "You should come talk to Caden."

This is familiar too, Kestrel thought, letting his cousin tow him into the camp, skirting around fires and fey who stood in little tense knots, low murmurs of conversation filtering between the ember pops and twig cracks of the fires. He could smell herbs mingling with the smell of roasted meat now, pungent sage and citrusy juniper berries, and the caramel scent of sweet potatoes. He could feel the eyes of his fellow court members, following him and Ekta. Would the others of his court think he was disgracing them? Would he appear as strange, unlike what they thought a Knight should be, to the Shadow Court?

He smirked to himself. It wasn't like the Shadow Court would know what a knight should be--they had a werewolf, after all.

"This is Kestrel," Ekta was saying as they slowed to a halt. Kestrel refocused his attention. They stood in front of a smaller fire, the other Wildlings gathered tightly around it as if the flames would guard them from the wild beasts of the Courts around them.

The stocky werewolf, Isayr, cocked his head to the side, ears twitching. "Is this the one you thought was dead?"

Ekta nodded.

Caden glanced up at Kestrel, one eyebrow raised. He jerked his head at an open space on the ground between him and Maddox. "Sit. You'll have to forgive our humble fare--we don't usually host a Knight."

"I don't need special treatment," Kestrel said, taking his place. Maddox scooted over closer to Sorley, letting Ekta sit beside Kestrel.

"So, you two have a nice little reunion?" Caden asked, picking up a stick and poking at the fire with it,

Isayr smacked the stick away. "Stop it. You're gonna get ash on the food." He reached out and flipped skewers of meat over on a framework of green twigs.

"Yeah, I guess," Ekta said.

"I hear some of the Wildlings have formed a village now," Kestrel said. "That's good to know."

Sorley smacked Ekta on the arm. "What'd you go and tell him about the village for? The Court saps don't need to know about that."

"It's not like they don't know," Ekta protested.

Isayr grunted. "Right. No one's patrolled outside the Courts in years. Not even Jasper." He glanced sideways at Caden, his yellow-brown eyes slitted as he waited for his leader's reaction.

Caden seemingly ignored him and poked his stick into the fire again.

"It's good to know the Wildlings are protecting themselves," Kestrel said firmly. "Maybe it'll avoid needless deaths, like my parents."

The circle went quiet for a moment. Sorley's shoulders hunched, and he looked down at the ground, picking at shriveled blades of grass.

"You haven't always been a Court fey," Caden said, poking the fire again.

Isayr snatched at the stick, and Caden barely yanked it back out of his reach.

"No, but like I told Ekta earlier, I don't remember that time of my life. I think I was seven or so when I came to the Court? I'm not really sure."

Caden chuckled. "That's interesting."

Kestrel raised an eyebrow.

Caden sat back, balancing the stick on one knee, one hand braced in the grass at his side. "We're opposite. You weren't born in the Courts, but joined when you were young. I was born in the Courts, but left when I was old."

Kestrel snorted. 'Old' among the fey was a nearly useless moniker, once they reached adulthood. Caden looked about ten years older than himself, but who knew if that was accurate.

"Oh no," Sorley groaned. "Don't let's get started on this again."

"Easy for you to say, feathers," Caden said.

Kestrel was beginning to recognize the tone Caden used around the other Wildlings...it was lazy, sardonic, but had an under-layer of affection. It was much, much different than the way he'd spoken to the Queens, or even to Kestrel, but it was similar to the way he spoke to Jasper.

Sorley fluffed up his wings, the motion making him look almost twice as big as he really was, and made a face at Caden.

"So...there's a story here," Kestrel said slowly. He didn't remember hearing about anyone leaving the Shadow Court--which shouldn't surprise him..

But...why would anyone leave the Courts to go live in the Deepwoods? The Courts were safety and sanctuary. The Deepwoods were forbidding, full of dangerous elements and capricious nature spirits.

Caden chuckled and pointed to the side with the stick.

Kestrel glanced over his shoulder and saw Jasper standing by a fire not too far away. The werewolf seemed to be studiously ignoring them all.

"You want the story, you'll have to ask the Shadow Knight over there," Caden said.

So he'd been right. Caden and Jasper had been known to each other before now. That explained Caden's familiar tone with Jasper.

"You always have to be mysterious about it, don't you." Isayr nudged Caden and grinned. He leaned forward, picking up a skewer, and studied the roasted, sizzling pieces of venison on it before leaning across Caden and offering the food to Kestrel. "This one should be done to a fey's liking. Maddox and I'll wait until the rest of you are done eating so we don't turn your delicate stomachs."

Sorley made a scoffing noise and rolled his eyes.

In the dim light, shadows flickering strangely around Isayr's hand, Kestrel misjudged the position of the skewer. The sharp, jagged point of the broken stick jabbed into his palm. Kestrel jerked his hand back, shaking it.

"You all right?" Caden asked.

Kestrel started to nod, but a low snarling sound behind him made the hair on the back of his neck rise. He saw all four of the other Wildlings start, their eyes immediately cutting to his right, where Ekta sat. Kestrel turned.

His cousin had turned away from the fire at some point, staring fixedly past the firelight to the circle of holly trees that surrounded the aspen glade and the Standing Stones. His spine was rigid, the fingers of his ones visible hand curled so tightly around his upper arm that his fingernails dug half-moon points into the skin. The glow in his hair and on the freckles on the backs of his hands and arms had died to almost nothing. The low, moaning snarl coiled around him, freezing Kestrel's blood.

Maddox nudged Ekta's shoulder. "You all right, mate?"

Ekta whipped his head around, and Kestrel only had time to see a flicker of teeth in the firelight before the luxfey lunged at him.

Thank you for reading this installment of The Knights of the Faerie Queens!