A Kingdom of Lies (Realm of Fey #2)

CHAPTER 31

The streets of Lockinge city were crammed with humans. They watched, leering and spitting, as I was dragged like cattle before them; tugged, kicked and pushed by my captor. There was nothing I could do to shield myself from the hateful shouts of humans, or the stones and other unseen objects that were thrown at me. From the moment I’d passed into the city I felt nothing but hate around me. It was demoralising.

Even though my legs burned, and my feet felt broken, I wasn’t allowed to stop. If I did it awarded me another jarring push. I focused on putting one foot in front of the other whilst keeping my head held high.

Something smacked into my face, cutting the skin beneath my eye. It happened so fast I didn’t see what had been thrown, but it hurt. Badly. I took the pain, gathered it up and fuelled my focus. I tasted the sharp tang of blood as it dribbled into my mouth; it coated my teeth, splattering onto the cobbled street as I spat it out. With the iron cuff strangling my neck there was no healing ability that would help me.

Lockinge was built upon a natural incline of land. It felt like every street we walked leaned upwards, each leading towards the haunting castle that waited ahead of us. The dark grey stone towered above the city like a crown atop a king’s head. It was harsh and ugly against the cloudless sky, it blocked out the winter sun and bathed a chill across me that prickled at my skin.

I focused on the castle, drowning out the screams from the humans as they spat their detestation at me. It was all I could do. Chin held high I tried everything in my limited power to not let their words hurt me.

Fey scum. False king. Demon. Freak.

There was something deadly about words. I feared them more than a blade or arrow. Words spat with hate may not spill blood, but they left deeper scars that were harder to heal. And in this moment, I felt as though my soul had no room left for pain. It was already riddled with it.

Duncan was somewhere in the crowd behind me. I heard the humans scream at him too.

Traitor. Sinner. Unclean.

That hurt me deeper than anything they could’ve done or said to me. Because I’d been the cause of those names, I’d done this to him.

I wondered if the Hand watched, peering out of one of the castle’s dark and lightless windows as I walked through the city to greet him. It was clear his poison had spread like wildfire. Buildings I passed held his banner, the white hand symbol stitched onto an array of materials. I couldn’t see any marker of the Creator and his faith, only the Hand, as though he was a god and not the strange promise of Duwar.

What has happened here ? What had allowed such twisted hate to spread through the people of this city and leak into the world of Durmain beyond? I’d been so lucky and untouched in Grove for most of my life, and it was clear why Father had kept me there, far away from Lockinge’s poison.

The incline to the castle worsened the closer we got, yet the crowds of humans thinned, which gave me some reprieve. Lockinge was not a city surrounded by walls, but the castle was, as though whoever dwelled within it was granted protection but those who lived in its shadows did not. As we entered beneath its gates, I recognised the glint of sun against metal. Guards watched from positions within the walls and upon turrets. They weren’t garbed in the markings of the Hand but held billowing cloaks of deep scarlet and pointed helmets that could have been used as weapons. Kingsmen, a rarity, weapons jewelled and decorative, a perfect symbol for what they were now. They were nothing but decoration. No longer required as the true army of soldiers now entered the castle’s grounds – this was the Hunters’ playground now.

My legs shook violently as we came to a stop. The Hunters fanned out across the courtyard we had entered, a wave of bodies that stomped feet and called out to one another with excitement. There was a buzz here. I could sense it.

I caught a blur of red hair and spotted Kayne at the front of the crowds. He spoke with the Kingsmen, then he pointed towards me. I felt every eye upon me until the soldiers moved towards the main doors of the building before us and disappeared within.

Kayne cut across the courtyard towards me, his gaze on mine as he muttered something to the hawk that still perched across his shoulder. He finished sharing whatever secrets to the bird before he reached me, and it threw open its wings and flew off.

“I’ll take him,” Kayne said to the large Hunter who still held my chained leash. “Join your fellow brothers and prepare for the evening’s celebrations.”

Unlike Duncan, Kayne didn’t have a natural command about his tone. It almost felt forced. From the hesitation of the Hunter behind me handing over the chains, I could recognise that he felt it too. But alas, the chains were handed over and I had a new owner.

“You don’t understand what you’ve done,” Kayne muttered out the corner of his mouth. He watched the crowd around us, as though he didn’t want a single one of them to hear him. “Duncan does not deserve this. He’s suffered enough. But you wouldn’t care about any of that, would you?”

“Why are you telling me this?” I said, shoulders crying in agony as my hands had been held clasped behind my back for such a long time.

“If he dies because of you, I will personally make sure you suffer the same fate. No matter if your life is protected by the command of the Hand, I will kill you.”

It wasn’t a threat, but a promise.

“If you care for his wellbeing then do something,” I seethed, not caring who heard me. “Help him, Kayne.”

Kayne panicked and tugged on the chains, hissing through the side of his mouth. “Watch your words. They’ll personally seal Duncan’s fate before he has had the chance to survive the night. I have spent years trying to help him so don’t speak on something you don’t understand. Even I know when he is beyond saving, no matter how painful that is.”

Kayne suddenly straightened his posture in response to the three new figures who exited the castle and walked towards us. It ceased the little conversation we had between us. One was the silver-clad Kingsman, who didn’t wear a single hint of the Hand’s symbol. Beside him, garbed in gowns that practically dripped with wealth, were two women.

Fey women.

Their long hair was pulled free from their shoulders, piled upon their heads in woven curls. From a distance it looked like crowns. The noticeable similarity between them both was the iron collar around each of their necks – similar to the one I wore – except theirs presented more like elaborate necklaces than a shackle to drain power.

Fey, walking free and without leashes.

I felt the crowd of Hunters stiffen. Some sneered and others spat at the ground at their feet. But the women didn’t flinch. Their unblinking, vacant stares were kept forward without showing much realisation that anything happened around them.

“The Hand welcomes you, Robin Icethorn.”

The blood drained from my face, every muscle in my body hardening into stone as I listened to them both speak in unison. It was up close that I could see the blue stains of bruises that hid beneath the necklaces and the dark purple shadows that hung beneath their wide eyes.

I looked to Kayne who showed no sign that the scene before me was not an illusion of some kind.

“You must be hungry. Please, follow and we will take you to your rooms. Food awaits you. A wash if you desire.”

Even if I wanted to follow, I couldn’t. My feet were rooted to the cobbled stone ground.

One of the fey women held out a hand for Kayne who welcomingly handed over my leash. She didn’t tear her eyes from me, not even when the chain was placed within her grip.

“Wait,” I spluttered, straining as I turned back to Kayne who started to walk off.

He paused, spared me a glance that reached straight into my soul; his eyes burned with such disgust, it had me swallowing my next plea. Kayne disappeared into the crowd of Hunters with the swish of his cloak, leaving me in the hands of strangers.

“It is best we go inside, Robin Icethorn,” the women spoke as one again, not a speck of emotion in their voice. “The castle will soon be full of Hunters, and it is best we are kept out of their way.”

I couldn’t resist as they began to walk back to the door, pulling gently on the chain, guiding me towards the castle.

“What’s going to happen?” I said, skipping a step to catch up, all the while searching through the crowds of Hunters for a sign of Duncan. He was nowhere to be seen.

“You will rest, eat and bathe.”

My skin shivered as they spoke again, not a syllable or word out of sync.

“I wish to speak with the Hand,” I said, hands grabbing the chain and adding resistance. “I need to see him urgently.”

“And you shall,” they replied together. “The Resurgence is shortly upon us. The Hand will see you soon. But first, there is much to prepare for tonight’s festivities. Until then, you are in no fit state to be speaking with him.”

Resurgence? There was something of importance behind the word; it caused the Hunters close to us to react with a childish excitement.

“I don’t understand,” I replied, neck aching from being pulled along. Desperation burned within me, in the same place my power would have been if the iron was not wrapped around my neck.

“In time you will. We all will.”

Something was terribly wrong with the fey who escorted me into the castle’s door, that much was clear. There was hardly time to make sense of what was happening as they finally tugged me into the cold, barren corridor of Lockinge castle. As we left the muted light of day behind us and entered the shadows of the castle’s innards, I was certain I’d spotted something on the fey’s arms. A dark mark, right in the exposed crook where their forearms met their elbows. Like their necks, it was covered in bruising, a perfect circle around a small puncture wound that was so fresh it had hardly scabbed over.

Before I could catch a glimpse again, we were in complete darkness. There was nothing but my heavy breathing and rushed footsteps that echoed around the strange walkway. The floor dropped out into steps, and we began our steep and terrifying descent bathed in shadows.

I felt as though we walked into the deepest pits of the underworld. And I knew where we were going the moment we descended beneath Lockinge castle. The fey were taking me to the Below.

The stairs we navigated were endless. For a long while, I had no sense of direction as they guided me through the dark, except that we went only downwards. But soon enough the narrow, steep corridor glowed with burning torches held in metal frames across the damp walls.

I felt as though I held my breath, unsure what to expect when the Below was finally revealed to me.

One of the fey women plucked a torch free then waved it before her as we trudged on. Whereas the other held a firm grip on my chain as though her life truly depended on it.

I wanted to ask after Duncan, to demand to be told where he was and what was happening to him. All I could think about was his slashed and bloodied body. Did he bleed now? Had he given in to the pain his fellow Hunters caused him? I should never have let him leave. If I’d refused him then perhaps his skin would have been unmarked by new scars.

Kayne was right, he’d suffered enough before. Then I came along and ruined him.

I focused on my surroundings for a reprieve from my mind. There was nothing I could do for Duncan, no matter how that fact pained me. I only hoped time was in my favour.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked, even though I knew the answer. I needed to hear it from them myself. The walls around me had gone from smooth layered brick to rough edges of rock; moss covered most. Dark splashes of water wet the carved steps beneath our feet, making each step risky, the threat of falling inevitable.

All I knew was that we had entered the castle, but wherever we walked now was far from it.

Far beneath it.

“It is not permitted for the fey to walk freely above ground. Too many risks. The Hand’s influence is strong, but not infinite. Not yet.”

They spoke about themselves as though they did not have points at the ends of their ears.

“I asked you a question,” I spat. “Answer it.”

The fey shot each other a look that spoke of a silent conversation. Then one of them answered, already confirming my suspicions. “The Below. It is a place in which the Fey can be kept safe.”

“A prison.” I pulled back, gripping the damp wall for security.

They didn’t tell me I was wrong – there was no point in lying this far beneath the ground.

“But the Hand allows you both to move freely,” I said, voice echoing over rough stone walls. “What grants you such special treatment?”

“We have our reasonings,” one of them said.

“Our purpose, in his eyes,” the other added.

My skin itched as though fire crawled across it, the discomfort caused by the synchronisation both women spoke with. This was all wrong. The Hand petitioned for the death of fey. I had seen it with my very eyes. But that was only for those fey without magic. The Hand needed those with power in their veins, and I knew it had everything to do with the human who displayed magic in Farrador.

“This is where he keeps them all then,” I said, feeling the realisation overcome me. “The fey with power, magic in their blood. That is what he needs, isn’t it? Keeping them like livestock for whatever he needs to create his powered humans.”

“Come, you will see. Everything you have come to know about the Hand may not be true. A short walk to go and your questions will be answered. You will hear them from the Hand himself.”

I didn’t stop again; the urgency of seeing what waited at our destination fuelled me onwards. I’d come all this way to see the Below. Knowing I was close renewed my sense of confidence. But what I saw, as the pathway opened up to a balcony of rock that overlooked the scene in the open cave chamber, was nothing that I could’ve ever imagined.