And here's the next chapter! I hope you all enjoy it!
This chapter marks the beginning of what will hopefully be a regular updating schedule. I'm planning on posting a chapter of this fic every Monday and Friday, as best I can! Obviously if something happens, I'll keep you all informed.
Enjoy the chapter, and thank you all for the continued support!
CHAPTER SEVEN
"Hold still."
Nezumi clenched his jaw as the arachne plunged the quill-thin needle into his skin. A silver strand of indestructible silk followed the path of the needle; the spider-woman's delicate fingers made quick work of stitching the deep slice in his bicep.
He'd lost count of the number of times this particular arachne had taken care of tending to his wounds. Since the moment of his arrival in the Unseelie Court, she'd assigned herself to him, dedicating her spare moments to wrapping his bleeding fingers in soft silk, cleansing his wounds with rose water, and scolding him for getting into mischief.
The arachne had quickly become the closest thing Nezumi had to a mother in the Unseelie Court. He knew better than to grow attached to her—one day he might return to the Court and find her corpse smeared across the stones—but over the years, she'd become as difficult to ignore as the scent of iron permeating the human cities.
The arachne pulled the needle through the last bit of the wound; she severed it with her sharp nails, then clicked her mandibles at him.
He pulled his arm back and inspected her handiwork. The sting of the slice echoed through his veins, but from the outside, it didn't appear fatal. The silver silk blended into his pale skin, the dark line of dried blood marking the injury the only sign it had been there at all.
He dropped his arm into his lap and nodded. He didn't know this arachne's name. She had never told it to him, and he'd never bothered to ask. She stood out well enough; her black hair was the longest of her six sisters, so long it dragged on the ground several feet after her thin legs.
Her skull swooped in the grotesque combination of human and arachnid; two blood-red eyes sat above a piggish nose, and three little scarlet orbs sat along her temples. Essentially blind in these eyes, the arachne used them to intimidate her prey into thinking she could spot them from all angles.
Though human from crown to waist, the arachne closely resembled a large black tarantula. Tufts of vibrant orange striped their way down her eight massive legs. Her abnormal appearance had plagued Nezumi's nightmares as a child until he'd discovered that she had no intention of hurting him. Somehow he reminded her of someone she'd known long ago—someone who meant something to her, though she'd never specified what—and that memory reflected itself in her gentle treatment.
She clicked her mandibles furiously. "What have I told you," she rasped, "about picking fights with the solitary folk?"
Nezumi picked his damaged leather jacket up; he'd draped it over the back of the stones. The arachne lived in the depths of the Unseelie Court, where the light dimmed and the furniture grew sparse. The Unseelie blood in his veins allowed Nezumi to see in the dark with ease; the arachne were sensitive to light.
"And your jacket's ruined!" She snatched it away from him. She folded her two sets of arms as she surveyed the damage. "Well, not ruined, I suppose. I might be able to repair this."
Nezumi let her drone on about the tasks she had laid out before her. The arachne dedicated themselves to making clothing for the members of the Unseelie Court. Their silk created fabrics that were both comfortable and functional. He'd procured his signature leather jacket from a mortal shop, pulling the iron filaments from the zipper, and handed it to the arachne to reinforce.
"Are you able to repair it?" Nezumi asked. It would be something of a hassle to get another one, but he'd grown comfortable with the look.
"This is nothing for a seamstress of my skills." The arachne folded it over one of her right arms. "Give me the rest of the night to repair it, child. I'll deliver it to your door."
Nezumi stood from the stones and picked the backpack up off the ground. He should have brought it right to the Unseelie King, but the pain in his damaged arm compelled him to seek out the arachne first. She hadn't asked him any questions, though she'd raised an eyebrow at the foreign fabric comprising the makeshift bandages.
He knew better than to thank the arachne or offer her debts. She had no use for them. The last time he'd tried, she'd waved them away until Nezumi felt awkward standing in front of her. He watched as she retreated into the shadows with his jacket in her hands.
Nezumi made his way to the Unseelie King's bedchamber. Without a revelry to occupy him, that was a better place to locate him than any other. Nezumi didn't feel like hunting him down throughout the entirety of the Court. The Unseelie mountains rose high into the air, and the caverns below ground went on for miles.
His arm ached, but Nezumi shoved the pain aside.
Inside the blackened halls of the Unseelie Court, any drop of weakness spelled death. Nezumi's dark reputation preceded him, but there were still those who would attempt to take him out at a moment's notice. Without his knife and the protection of his reinforced leather jacket, he felt no more armored than a duck in a pond.
The Unseelie Court was divided into strange sections. The further up the mountain one went, the more structures had been carved into the cavern walls. Columns lined with glass baubles lined the halls, casting frightening shadows against the high ceilings. The main Court sat directly in the center, a hodgepodge of stalagmites and stone furniture. It bustled with activity most nights and quieted during the daylight hours, even though the sunlight couldn't hope to penetrate the stones comprising the mountain face.
Nezumi's shoulders relaxed as he ventured down the hall leading to the Unseelie King's bedchamber. Scorpia stood outside it; the King's wretched Knight lingered at his side most of the time unless the King slept.
The phooka's presence outside the King's bedchamber meant he was, in fact inside—and he didn't desire company.
Scorpia's golden eyes clicked to Nezumi's face. His lips drew back over his teeth as he said, "About time you made your way here. His Majesty expected you back some time ago. He grew tired of waiting."
Nezumi came to rest in front of the Wretched Knight. Phookas were short, by nature, but Scorpia was a strange exception. He looked no different than the bipedal goatmen that lived in the forests peppering the Unseelie Mountains, but he rose at least three feet taller. Nearly as tall as the Unseelie King himself, Scorpia's malicious streak and monstrous height compared to the rest of his species made him a formidable enemy.
"I'm here now," Nezumi said cooly. "Ran into some trouble in the mortal city."
Scorpia spat on the stones. He didn't care for Nezumi's errands, and he wouldn't question it.
Nezumi dropped the backpack in front of him. "Would you like to announce me so I can deliver this? Or would you care to do it yourself?"
"He grew tired of waiting," Scorpia explained slowly, as if Nezumi were a half-witted child bogged down with spiced apple wine. "He's retired to his chamber for the evening and does not wish to be disturbed."
Nezumi shrugged with his uninjured shoulder. "Very well. I was instructed to fetch the items, not deliver them. I'll leave them in your care, then."
Scorpia's eyes flashed. "I am not response for your tasks."
"And I wasn't instructed to hand deliver them to His Majesty." Nezumi turned and began to walk down the hall. Scorpia wouldn't come after him. Abandoning his position at the King's door would never cross the phooka's obedient mind. "I've done his task as requested. I'll be taking my leave."
Scorpia watched him go without a word. Nezumi's stomach churned with anxiety. Scorpia didn't terrify him, but the Unseelie King did. However, back-talking Scorpia wasn't cause for punishment. The King hadn't informed Nezumi to deliver the goods, and Scorpia was as good a drop-off point as any other. The Wretched Knight's reputation for violence deterred other members of the Unseelie Court.
The contents of the pack—whatever they might have been—were safest with him.
Nezumi exhaled and headed in the direction of his own chambers. There were several hours left until sunrise. Nezumi wanted to get at least a few hours of sleep in before the Unseelie King woke up the following evening. Nezumi's arm ached. His knife was missing. He'd screwed up, and if he didn't play his cards right, he'd watch the world fall to pieces around him.
The human boy's pale face flashed through his mind's eye. Nezumi clenched his jaw. Trusting him had been foolish. Offering him a favor had been worse. I owe you a debt. Nezumi had never extended a debt to a human being. He'd watched so many of them fall, he didn't know how to rescue one.
What the hell am I doing? Nezumi thought, and nothing but shadows answered him.
⁂
Karan knocked on his bedroom door. "Shion? Are you awake? Safu's on the phone."
Shion's eyelids fluttered open. His palms stung where his nails had bitten into the skin; he'd been clenching them in his sleep. The backs of his hands looked sore and abraded from where they'd pressed into the sheets. There were a handful of cross-shaped indents from the wrinkles in the fabric on his wrists, running up the length of his bare forearms.
His heart began to race. He flung the comforter off, looking down at himself. Nothing looked different. His pale legs stared back at him. Shion wriggled his toes to make sure this was real and not some pleasant dream.
He wrapped his arms around his waist and tried to remember the night before. The more he concentrated on the memories, on the fleeting images in his brain of the silver-eyed boy and the silver knife Shion had used to make bandages out of his shirt, the more they receded into the haze of his mind.
Shion's stomach dropped to the floor. All the rules Safu's grandmother had made him swear to follow had been broken. Shion had spoken to a faerie. He'd let that same faerie know that he could see them. I helped a faerie. Shion inhaled, tasting the familiar air of his bedroom. I took his knife. And I'm still here.
Shion's shoulders dropped with an unnatural mixture of relief and concern. The fact that it was the next morning meant he hadn't been taken away and punished for his theft—but it also meant that Nezumi hadn't come to fetch his knife. Shion looked down at the markings on his hands, evidence that he'd been sleeping soundly, and worried that his attempts to bandage Nezumi's arm hadn't been enough.
The silver knife was still sitting on the window ledge. Late morning sunlight caught against the blade, casting pretty rainbows against the pale wallpaper coating Shion's room. The carpet below was dry; it hadn't rained last night after all.
"Shion?" Karan called again.
"Oh!" He climbed out of bed, his legs shaking. "Y-yeah, Mom. I'm awake. Hang on."
He scrubbed the back of his hand across his eyes, wiping away the remnants of sleep. He willed himself not to worry as he opened his bedroom door a crack and took the phone from his mother with a grateful nod.
Karan's brown eyes softened with sympathy. "You feeling all right? You look awful."
"Just tired." Shion smiled at her. "I'm fine, Mom."
Karan returned his smile and left him alone with the cordless phone; Shion placed it to his ear and rasped, "Hello?"
"Shion! Are you OK?"
He blinked, trying to register Safu's words. "Uh... yeah, I'm fine." Closing his bedroom door, Shion crossed to his bed and sat cross-legged down on the rumpled comforter. It was designed for a queen bed, not a twin, and half of it pooled on the floor. "Why?"
"Your text sounded weird last night. And you didn't answer me when I tried to call you."
"You tried to call me?" Shion looked over at his cell phone. He'd plopped it on the nightstand beside his bed right before heading to sleep; the screen was still caked in a fine layer of dirt. He really needed to clean it before the dirt ruined it completely. He couldn't afford a new one. "I'm sorry, Safu. I didn't hear my phone go off."
"I was worried something had happened to you." Shion heard Safu shift, as if she were trying to keep the phone pressed close to her body so her grandmother wouldn't overhear. "You sound terrible. Are you sick?"
Shion cleared his throat. He didn't feel sick, though he suspected he might be. His heart was thrumming, and his body felt cold, but it didn't feel like the other times he'd caught a cold or a fever. But there must have been something wrong with him. Even hours later, Shion could still feel the phantom weight of the knife in his grasp, could smell the metallic tang of Nezumi's blood.
"I'm fine," he said a moment later. "Just had a rough night."
Safu didn't answer for a moment. Shion heard shuffling on the other end of the phone, and then a door clicked shut. Safu had retreated to her bedroom. His heart rate spiked. If she was moving to her bedroom, it meant she didn't want to risk her grandmother hearing their conversation.
"Did you see something that freaked you out?" Safu asked.
"No." The word left his mouth too quickly, and Shion winced. Not suspicious at all, Shion. Good going. He quickly amended it by adding, "I mean, no more than usual."
"Did the charm help at all?"
The charm. Shion looked down at his wrist in alarm. It had been sitting there—and then he'd tossed it aside when the stench and sting of the iron made Nezumi uncomfortable. Shion's heart clenched. He needed to find it before he saw Safu again. He couldn't tell her that he'd gotten rid of it to help the very thing it had been designed to deter.
"Yeah, it did." Shion's chest ached as the lie made its way across his tongue. He'd never lied to Safu. He'd never had a reason to. But admitting the truth to her—admitting to her that he'd completely ignored her grandmother's teachings and put himself at risk—was more than Shion could bear.
"Oh, good. I'm glad." Safu exhaled with relief. "I thought that silver-eyed faerie might have shown up again."
Shion frowned. His memories of Nezumi were slowly fading with the rising sunlight. But the silver knife still sat on his windowsill. No faeries had come by the snatch it up. After Nezumi's attack on the faerie girl in the cafe, Shion wasn't surprised none of them had come by to steal his knife. He must be alive, then. The ache of relief that washed over him was strange.
Shion's skin itched; what was happening to him?
"Hey, so, listen," Safu said, her voice shaking Shion from his dangerous thoughts. "You remember Anne and Roy, right?"
"I do." Safu had several close friends she'd made at school, other than Shion. Anne and Roy were a couple, and her friend Betty had moved to another town to live with her father. Shion didn't know them well, but he'd spent time with them the few times Safu met up with them. Both of them were pleasant enough.
"Anne asked if we wanted to have coffee with them tomorrow."
Shion blinked. "With us?"
"She and Roy are talking about moving into an apartment together now that school's over. They thought it would be fun for the four of us to catch up."
Shion pressed his lips together. Anne and Roy were completely normal. Neither of them had ever been plagued by the strange creatures that stalked outside. Sometimes it was difficult to be around them because it meant Shion had to pretend not to notice the horrific things that passed by.
But sitting at home with a faerie blade, waiting for monsters to crawl in through his window wasn't healthy. If Nezumi hadn't come for his blade last night with Shion leaving it for him to find, then the chances of him coming to hunt it down were slim to none. Clearly leaving it out on the window ledge posed no real risk.
"Sure," he said, forcing a smile on his face. "That sounds fun."
"Great! I'll let Anne know. They said about ten o'clock. We could meet up around nine, if that works?"
"Yeah." Shion's shoulders relaxed. Getting together with Safu before meeting with Anne and Roy would allow him to get all the stress out beforehand. He and Safu came up with signals for each other, on the off chance something happened in the invisible world that unsettled them and they needed to leave immediately.
"I'll see you tomorrow, then. Bye, Shion!"
"Bye," Shion said softly, and then the phone clicked as Safu hung up.
Shion clicked the phone off and dropped it on the mattress. He curled his toes into the carpet. Now that he had a moment to breathe, Shion could feel the stress of the previous night clenching down around him.
He'd helped a faerie, and there were no consequences. Real life didn't work like that. Safu's grandmother had woven tales of vicious faeries wrenching Sighted human's eyeballs from their skulls and wearing them as jewelry. Unaligned Folk were dangerous in their own right; court fey were far worse. If Nezumi did, in fact, serve a king, then Shion had expected to wake up bound in chains and sprawled on the ground before a throne.
But none of that had happened. His dreams bled from his mind beneath the waking sunlight, but he had enough sense to remember that they hadn't been nightmares. Dreams of brilliant green fields and beautiful silver eyes guided him into the dream world, and though the tension had tormented his body, it hadn't plagued his mind.
Shion pursed his lips. Something was wrong. Nezumi could have murdered him. According to the stories, he very well might've under different circumstances.
Instead, he'd given Shion a debt. A single favor. The promise of a rescue, though Shion prayed he'd never have need of it.
He took in a steady breath and let it out.
He headed to the bathroom and stepped into the shower. The warm water worked the tension out of his back muscles, washing the stress away along with the handful of shampoo and conditioner Shion lathered into his dark hair.
You helped a faerie.
And he let you go.
Perhaps Nezumi had abandoned his knife in Shion's care because didn't want to run the risk of letting his monarch know he'd let a Sighted human go. Perhaps he was as confused by his own actions last night as Shion felt.
Shion toweled off, already feeling better. The next time he saw Nezumi on the streets—he ignored the nasty voice that sneered, If you see him again—he'd pretend not to notice him. If a chance to return the knife presented itself, then Shion would hand it over without a fight.
For now, he needed to get dressed and get ready to help his mother in the bakery.
Shion ducked back into his bedroom and hung the towel off the back of the door. He fished a pale blue button-down from his closet, pairing it with a comfortable pair of black slacks. There was a hole in the right knee; Shion needed to go shopping sometime soon. Safu liked window-shopping. Shion smiled as he sought out a fresh pair of socks.
A dark flash caught his eye.
Shion glanced out the window, his blood chilling.
Standing on the sidewalk outside the bakery, hands jammed in the pockets of his black leather jacket, was Nezumi.
To Be Continued...