So. A year between updates I'm an awful, awful person, and I'm sorry. Truly. Maybe I can get the next chapter out in a more timely fashion.

Chapter 6

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The first thing that Corny noticed as he descended was the smell. It was earthy, musty, and moist. The air felt cool and soft against his face and hands. He realized, for the first time, that he had forgotten shoes; his bare feet were traveling down worn stone steps and he could feel the hollows left in the rock by countless other feet that came before him. His heart, which had been clamoring for attention a few moments earlier, steadied, until he couldn't even feel his heart beat anymore—it had been overtaken by a stronger, faster beat that shook the soil and air around him.

The beat was getting louder, and as he went deeper and deeper down, he recognized it as music—fast paced music, sound diving and twirling frantically through the air. Violins and tambourines, and of course, that deep beat of a drum. He was unsure whether he wanted to dance or to freeze, trembling.

He looked up toward the shrinking spot of light above him. Morning had come; the hole in the ground showed the faint orange light of the rising sun. David was behind him, his eyes large and face white. His eyes found Corny's for a moment, then darted away, as though it was Corny he was afraid of.

At the precise moment that the last view of daylight was cut off by the curve of the tunnel, Corny was able to see the world of the faeries. Flickering light filtered into the tunnel from below. A few steps further, and he could actually see the huge underground room filled with faeries—faeries flying among stalactites above tables full of faeries both ugly and beautiful, graceful and lumbering. Faeries dancing drunkenly to the music, and faeries leering at them over plates of food and tankards of wine. The scent of the place, thick and intoxicating, reached his nose. The Unseelie Court was exactly as he remembered, and it took his breath away for a moment.

Ryne paused before stepping off the stair to fix Corny with a stare full of graceful eyebrows and indifferent warnings. Elisabet hovered behind him, her eyebrows pulled together in worry, her child's face anxious. Then they turned, and as Corny watched, they disappeared into the sea of moving color.

He was not worried by their disappearance. He was smiling, intoxicated already by simply being there. He took a step forward, stopping when he felt a tug on the back of his shirt. He turned, puzzled, and was startled to see another human face there before he remembered the events of the past hour. David.

David was frightened, his eyes wide and his adam's apple moving under the thin layer of skin of his throat as he swallowed multiple times before finally getting the words out. "What is this place? We can't go in there."

"The Unseelie Court," Corny replied impatiently, shaking David's hand off of his back. "And, yes, we can go in there. I have been trying to get here for a year. I'm going. You…. Do whatever you want." He stepped off the stair, and was immediately surrounded by bodies on all sides.

"Wait!" He heard David yell behind him. "You're not leaving me alone!" A moment later, the other man had clamped his hand around Corny's wrist in a death grip that was evidence of how frightened he really was.

They pushed their way through the crowd. "Don't eat or drink anything!" Corny shouted back to David as a small winged faerie hovered in front of his face, dangling plump purple grapes invitingly.

"What are we doing here?" David asked, a little hysterically, once they had made their way to the relatively quiet side of the room.

"Looking for someone," Corny answered. His eyes hadn't left the room, they were scanning the crowd carefully. Everywhere he looked, though, were dozens of moving faeries, flying, running, fighting, blending into shifting colors that were impossible to recognize.

" Who?" David was asking, over and over, but Corny ignored him.

He had thought, originally, that the court was exactly as he'd remembered. Now, he realized that he had been wrong. Movements were more frenzied, eyes that had been cruel, frightened, lustful, on his last visit were now just manic. It was troubling.

He tore his thoughts back to the present. He was not sure what to do, where to start. He had no name for the stranger he was seeking, no title, nothing but a half seen shadow of a face in the dark. He can remember when he lay on the dark hill all night, hoping to gain access to the world of the faeries. Then, all he had wanted was an escape—a night, or a lifetime, of getting drunk on faerie wine, of a stranger's hands on his body, of drugged complacency with life.

Now, he thought that he could still get lost in that if he tried to. But the face that he had seen haunted him, made him reluctant to lose his head to wine and sex and give up on this chance.

He was trying to think about what to do, plans racing around half formed in his head, when he saw him. The faerie he had come here to find was right in front of him, although far away, standing on the raised platform at the front of the room. Behind him were the two golden chairs of the king and queen, standing empty. The same sneer that graced his lips in Corny's memories of him was on his face now as he looked out over the crowds. Standing there by the thrones, dressed in clothes of deep red and black, he looked like a prince.

Corny's first impulse was to fight his way over to the dais, but as he started to take a step, he realized that he had no plan for what to say or do once he came face to face with his quarry. He paused, then decided the time was right for a smarter approach.

He scanned the room, looking for a suitable candidate. Nine or ten feet away from him, a light haired pixie leaned against the wall. Her eyes registered boredom as she gazed out over the festivities. He sidled over to her.

She looked up, surprised, when he got close. Her features distorted into a sneer. "A human?" she spat. "What are you doing here, ironsider?"

Corny decided honesty was the best policy, if any policy was going to work in this case. "Looking for him." He jerked his head toward the dais.

The pixies eyes followed his head, and as soon as she saw who he was gesturing at, she burst into peals of delighted laughter. "Him? Have a little bit of a crush, hmmm? Pinin' away after him, is that it?"

Corny shrugged, unwilling to rise to her bait. It struck him that he could use her amusement to his advantage. "He's… beautiful. I wish I knew his name, knew more about him." All true, but the love struck tone in his voice and his attempt at big-eyed human innocence was contrived to make him laughable.

"You're shooting high, ironsider," the pixie cackled. "That's royalty there. Not in power, no more, but he was the nephew of the queen. Kaylychyn." She paused to look straight at Corny, smirking. "You don't have a chance, boy." She laughed again, taking a swig of the liquor that she held in her hand.

Corny was not discouraged. He had a name. Kaylychyn. The name was all hard sounds, the 'ch' spit out like a 'k', the three syllables harshly staccato. Yet, it rolled off his tongue easily. He had a tie to the face in his memories. Faeries guarded their names jealously, and he'd already found this one's out. It seemed a good omen. He smiled and leaned against the wall to create a plan.