The Iron Knight

Our exit from the Bone Marsh was far more harrowing than our journey to find the witch. True to Grimalkin’s prediction, as the sun sank beneath the western horizon, a mad howl arose, seeming to echo from the swamp itself. A shudder passed through the land, and a sudden wind stole the late afternoon warmth.

“Perhaps we should move faster,” Grimalkin said, and bounded into the undergrowth, but I stopped and turned to face the howling wind, drawing my sword. The breeze, smelling of rot, stagnant water and blood, whipped at my face, but I held my blade loosely at my side and waited.

“Oy, prince.” Puck circled back, frowning. “What are you doing? If you didn’t know already, the old chicken plucker is on her way, and she’s gunning for Winter and Summer stew.”

“Let her come.” I was Ashallayn’darkmyr Tallyn, son of Mab, former prince of the Unseelie Court, and I was not afraid of a witch on a broom.

“I would advise against that,” Grimalkin said, somewhere in the bushes. “These are her lands, after all, and she will be a formidable opponent should you insist on fighting her here. The wiser course of action is to flee to the edge of the swamp. She will not follow us there. That is where I will be, should you decide to come to your senses. I will not waste time watching you fight a completely useless battle based on ridiculous pride.”

“Come on, Ash,” Puck said, edging away. “We can play with extremely powerful witches some other time. Furball might disappear, and I do not want to tromp all over the Nevernever looking for him again.”

I glared at Puck, who shot me an arrogant grin and hurried after the cat. Sheathing my weapon, I sprinted after them, and soon the Bone Marsh was a blur of malachite moss and bleached bone. A cackling scream rang out somewhere behind us, and I leaned forward, adding speed and cursing all Summer fey under my breath.

We ran for an hour or more, the cackle of our pursuer never seeming to gain, but never falling behind. Then the ground began to firm under my feet, the trees slowly gaining breadth and height. The air changed as well, losing the acrid odor of the bog and turning to something sweeter, though mixed with the faintest hint of decay.

I caught sight of a gray stillness in one of the trees and skidded to a halt, so suddenly that Puck slammed into me. I turned with the impact and gave a little push. “Oy!” Puck yelped as he careened off and landed in an ungraceful sprawl. I smirked and stepped around him, dodging easily as he tried to trip me.

“Now is not the time for playing,” Grimalkin said from his perch, watching us disdainfully. “The witch will not follow us here. Now is the time for resting.” Turning his back on us, he leaped higher into the branches and disappeared from sight.

Settling against a trunk, I pulled my sword and laid it across my knees, leaning back with a sigh. Step one, complete. We’d found Grimalkin, a task harder than I’d thought it could be. The next task would be to find this seer, and then …

I sighed. Then everything became fuzzy. There was no clear path after finding the seer. I didn’t know what would be required of me, what I would have to do to become mortal. Perhaps it would be painful. Perhaps I would have to offer something, sacrifice something, though I didn’t know what I could offer anymore, beyond my own existence.

Narrowing my eyes, I shut those thoughts away. It didn’t matter. I would do whatever it took.

Memory trickled in, seeking to slip beneath my defenses, the icy wall I showed the world. I had once thought my armor invincible, that nothing could touch me … until Meghan Chase had entered my life and turned it upside down. Reckless, loyal, possessing the unyielding stubbornness of a granite cliff, she’d smashed through all the barriers I’d erected to keep her out, refusing to give up on me, until I finally had to admit defeat. It was official.

I was in love. With a human.

I smiled bitterly at the thought. The old Ash, if faced with such a suggestion, would’ve either laughed scornfully or removed the offender’s head from his neck. I’d known love before, and it had brought me so much pain that I had retreated behind an impenetrable wall of indifference, freezing out everything, everyone. So it had been shocking and unexpected and a little terrifying to discover I could still feel anything, and I’d been reluctant to accept it. If I dropped my guard, I was vulnerable, and such weakness was deadly in the Unseelie Court. But more important, I hadn’t wanted to go through the same hurt a second time, lowering my defenses only to have my heart torn away once more.

Deep down, I’d known the odds were stacked against us. I knew a Winter prince and the half-human daughter of the Summer King didn’t have much of a chance to be together in the end. But I had been willing to try. I’d given it my all, and I didn’t regret any of it, even when Meghan had severed our bond and exiled me from the Iron Realm.

I’d expected to die that day. I had been ready. Being ordered by my True Name to walk away, leaving Meghan to die alone in the Iron Kingdom, had nearly shattered me a second time. If it hadn’t been for my oath to be with her again, I might’ve done something suicidal, like challenge Oberon to battle before the entire Summer Court. But now that I’ve made my promise, there is no turning back. Abandoning my vow will unravel me, bit by bit, until there is nothing left. Even if I wasn’t determined to find a way to survive in the Iron Realm, I’d have no choice but to continue.

I will be with her again, or I will die. There aren’t any other options.

“Hey, ice-boy, you okay? You’ve got your brooding face on again.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re so full of crap.” Puck lounged in the cradle of a tree, hands behind his head, one foot dangling in the air. “Lighten up already. We finally found the cat—which we should get a freaking medal for, the search for the Golden Fleece wasn’t this hard—and you look like you’re going to engage Mab in single combat first thing in the morning.”

“I’m thinking. You should try it sometime.”

“Ooh, witty.” Puck snorted, pulled an apple out of his pocket, and bit into it. “Suit yourself, ice-boy. But you really should try to smile sometimes, or your face will freeze like that forever. Or so I’ve been told.” He grinned and crunched his apple. “So, whose turn is it for first watch, yours or mine?”

“Yours.”

“Really? I thought it was your turn. Didn’t I take first watch at the edge of the Bone Marsh?”

“Yes.” I glared at him. “And it was interrupted when you followed that nymph away from the camp, and that goblin tried to steal my sword.”

“Oh, yeah.” Puck snickered, though I didn’t think it was very amusing. This sword was made for me by the Ice Archons of Dragons’ Peak; my blood, glamour and a tiny piece of my essence had gone into its creation, and no one touches it but me.

“In my defense,” Puck said, still grinning faintly, “she did try to rob me as well. I’ve never heard of a nymph being in league with a goblin. Too bad for them that you’re a light sleeper, huh, ice-boy?”

I rolled my eyes, tuned out his incessant chattering, and let myself drift.

I ALMOST NEVER DREAM. Dreams are for mortals, humans whose emotions are so strong, so consuming, they spill over into their subconscious minds. The fey do not usually dream; our sleep is untroubled by thoughts of the past or future, or anything except the now. While humans can be tormented by feelings of guilt, longing, worry and regret, most fey do not experience these things. We are, in many ways, emptier than mortals, lacking the deeper emotions that make them so … human. Perhaps that is why they are so fascinating to us. In the past, the only time I had dreamed was right after Ariella’s death, horrific, gut-wrenching nightmares about that day I let her die, the day I couldn’t save her. It was always the same: I, Puck and Ariella chasing the golden fox, the shadows closing around us, the monstrous wyvern rearing up out of nowhere. Each time, I knew Ariella would be hit. Each time, I tried to get to her before the wyvern’s deadly stinger found its mark. I failed every single time, and she would look at me with those clear blue eyes and whisper my name, right before she went limp in my arms and I jerked myself awake.

I learned to freeze out my emotions then, to destroy everything that made me weak, to become as cold inside as I was outside. The nightmares stopped, and I never dreamed again.

Until now.

I knew I stood at the center of Tir Na Nog, the seat of the Unseelie Queen, my old home. These were my lands, once. I recognized distinct landmarks, as familiar to me as my own face, and yet all was not well. The jagged mountains, rising up until they vanished into the clouds, were the same. The snow and ice that covered every square inch of the land and never really melted, that was the same.

Everything else was destroyed. The great sweeping forests of Tir Na Nog were gone, now barren, wasted fields. A few trees stood here and there, but they were corrupt, twisted versions of themselves, metallic and gleaming. Barbed-wire fences slashed the landscape, and hulks of rusted metal vehicles lay half-buried in the snow. Where an icy city once stood, its pristine crystal towers glittering in the sun, now black smokestacks pumped billowing darkness into the overcast sky. Skyscrapers of twisted metal towered over everything; glittering, skeletal silhouettes that vanished into the clouds.

Faeries roamed across the darkened landscape, swarms of them, but they were not my Unseelie brethren. They were of the poisoned realm, the Iron fey; gremlins and bugs, wiremen and Iron knights, the faeries of mankind’s technology. I gazed around at my homeland and shuddered. No normal fey could live here. We would all die, the very air we breathed burning us from the inside out, from the Iron corruption that hung thick on the air like a fog. I could feel it searing my throat, spreading like fire to my lungs. Coughing, I put my sleeve to my nose and mouth and staggered away, but where could I go if all of Tir Na Nog was like this?

“Do you see?” whispered a voice behind me, and I whirled around. No one stood there, but from the corner of my eye I caught a shimmer, a presence, though it slid away whenever I tried to focus on it. “Look around you. This is what would have happened had Meghan not become the Iron Queen. Everything, everyone you knew, destroyed. The Iron fey would have corrupted the entire Nevernever, were it not for Meghan Chase. And she could not have succeeded had you not been there.”

“Who are you?” I searched for the owner of the voice, but the presence slipped away, keeping to the very edge of my vision. “Why are you showing me this?” This was nothing new. I was fully aware of what would’ve happened had the Iron fey been victorious. Though, even in my worst imaginings, I had not pictured quite this much destruction.

“Because, you need to see, really see, the second outcome for yourself.” I felt the presence move closer, though it still kept infuriatingly out of sight. “And your judgment was impaired, Ash of the Winter Court. You loved the girl. You would have done anything for her, regardless of the circumstances.” It slid away, behind me, though I’d given up trying to search for it. “I want you to look around carefully, son of Mab, and understand the significance of your decision. Had Meghan Chase not survived to become the Iron Queen, this would be your world today.”

The burning inside was growing unbearable. Each breath stabbed like a knife, and my skin was starting to blister as well. It reminded me of the time I’d been captured by Virus, one of the Iron King’s lieutenants, and had a sentient metal bug implanted in me. The bug had taken over my body, turning me into Virus’s slave, making me fight for her. And though I’d been fully aware of everything I did, I was powerless to stop it. I had felt the metal invader, like a hot coal in my mind, burning and searing, making me nearly blind with pain, though I couldn’t show it. This was worse.

I sank to my knees, fighting to stay upright, as my skin blackened and peeled from my bones. The pain was excruciating, and I wondered, through my delirium, why I hadn’t woken yet. This was a dream; I realized that much. Why couldn’t I shake myself free?

I knew with a sudden, grim clarity. Because the voice wasn’t letting me. It was keeping me here, tied to this nightmare world, despite my efforts to wake. I wondered if it was possible to die in a dream.

“I’m sorry,” the voice murmured, seeming to come from far away now. “I know it’s painful, but I want you to remember this when we meet again. I want you to understand the sacrifice that had to be made. I know you don’t understand now, but you will. Soon.”

And, just like that, it was gone, and the ties holding me to the vision were released. With a silent gasp, I wrenched myself out of the dream, back into the waking world.

It was very dark now, though the skeletal trees glowed with a soft white luminance that left them hazy and ethereal. Several yards away, Puck still sat in the branches, hands behind his head, chewing the ends of a grass stalk. One foot swung idly in the air and he wasn’t looking at me; I’d learned long ago how to mask my pain and remain silent, even in sleep. You don’t show weakness in the Unseelie Court. Puck didn’t know I was awake, but Grimalkin crouched in the branches of a nearby tree, and his glowing yellow eyes were fixed in my direction.

“Bad dreams?”

The tone of his voice wasn’t exactly a question. I shrugged. “A nightmare. Nothing I can’t handle.”

“I would not be so sure of that, were I you.”

I glanced up sharply, narrowing my eyes. “You know something,” I accused, and Grimalkin yawned. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“More than you want to know, prince.” Grimalkin sat up, curling his tail around himself. “And I am not a fool. You know better than to ask such questions.” The cat sniffed, regarding me with that unblinking gold gaze. “I told you before, this is no simple task. You will have to discover the answers for yourself.”

I already knew that, but the way Grimalkin said it sounded ominous, and it irritated me that the cait sith knew more than he was letting on. Ignoring the cat, I turned away, staring into the trees. A stray sod emerged from the darkness, a tiny green faery with a clump of weeds growing from its back. It blinked at me, bobbed its mushroom hat, and quickly slipped back into the undergrowth.

“This seer,” I asked Grimalkin, carefully marking the place the sod had vanished so as to not tread on it when we left. “Where is it located?”

But Grimalkin had disappeared.

TIME HAS NO MEANING in the wyldwood. Day and night don’t really exist here, just light and darkness, and they can be just as fickle and moody as everything else. A “night” can pass in the space of a blink, or go on forever. Light and darkness will chase each other through the sky, play hide-and-seek or tag or catch-me-if-you-can. Sometimes, one or the other will become offended over an imagined slight and refuse to come out for an indefinite amount of time. Once, light became so angry, a hundred years passed in the mortal realm before it deigned to come out again. And though the sun continued to rise and set in the human world, it was a rather turbulent period for the world of men, as all the creatures who lurked in darkness and shadow got to roam freely under the lightless Nevernever skies.

So it was still full dark when Puck and I started out again, following the cait sith into the endless tangle of the wyldwood. Grimalkin slipped through the trees like mist flowing over the ground, gray and nearly invisible in the colorless landscape around him. He moved swiftly and silently, not looking back, and it took all my hunter’s skills to keep up with him, to not lose him in the tangled undergrowth. I suspected he was testing us, or perhaps playing some annoying feline game, subtly trying to lose us without completely going invisible. But, with Puck hurrying after me, I kept pace with the elusive cait sith and didn’t lose him once as we ventured deeper into the wyldwood.

The light had finally decided to make an appearance when, without warning, Grimalkin stopped. Leaping onto an overhanging branch, he stood motionless for a moment, ears pricked to the wind and whiskers trembling. Around us, huge gnarled trees blocked out the sky, gray trunks and branches seeming to hem us in, like an enormous net or cage. I realized I didn’t recognize this part of the wyldwood, though that wasn’t unusual. The wyldwood was huge, eternal and constantly changing. There were many places I’d never seen, never set foot in, even in the long years of hunting beneath its canopy.

“Hey, we’re stopping,” Puck said, coming up behind me. Peering over my shoulder, he snorted under his breath. “What’s the matter, cat? Did you finally get lost?”

“Be quiet, Goodfellow.” Grimalkin flattened his ears but didn’t look back. “Something is out there,” he stated, twitching his tail. “The trees are angry. Something does not belong.” His eyes narrowed, and he crouched to leap off the branch.

Right before he vanished.

I glanced at Puck and frowned. “I guess we’d better find out what’s going on.”

Goodfellow snickered. “Wouldn’t be any fun if we didn’t run into some sort of catastrophe.” Pulling his dagger, he waved me on. “After you, your highness.”

We proceeded cautiously through the trees, scanning the undergrowth for anything suspicious. At my silent gesture, Puck stepped away and slid into the trees to the right of me. If something was lying in ambush, it would be better if we weren’t together when it pounced.

It wasn’t long before we started seeing evidence that something was decidedly out of place here. Plants were brown and dying, trees had spots where they had been burned, and the air began to smell of rust and copper, tickling my throat and making me want to gag. I was suddenly reminded of my dream, the nightmare world of the Iron fey, and gripped my sword hilt even tighter.

“You think there’s an Iron faery here?” Puck muttered, poking a burned, dead leaf with the point of his knife. It disintegrated at his touch.

“If there is,” I muttered, “it won’t be here much longer.”

Puck shot me a glance, looking faintly unsure. “I don’t know, ice-boy. We’re supposed to be at peace now. What would Meghan say if we killed one of her subjects?”

“Meghan is a queen.” I stepped beneath a rotting branch, pushing it away with my sword. “She understands the rules, just like everyone else. By law, no Iron fey can set foot in the wyldwood without permission from Summer or Winter. It would be a breach of the treaty if the courts found out, and at worst it would be seen as an act of war.” I raised my sword and hacked through a cluster of yellowed, dying vines that smelled of rot. “If there is an Iron faery here, better we find it than scouts of Summer or Winter.”

“Yeah? And what happens then? We politely ask it to go home? What if it doesn’t listen to us?”

I gave him a blank stare.

He winced. “Right.” He sighed. “Forgot who I was talking to. Well then, lead on, ice-boy.”

We pushed deeper into the forest, following the trail of dying plants, until the trees thinned and the ground abruptly dropped away into a rocky gorge. The trees in this area were blackened and dead, and the air smelled poisonous and foul. After a moment, I realized why.

Sitting against a tree, his armor glinting in the sun, was an Iron knight.

I paused, my fingers tightening around the hilt of my sword. I had to remind myself that the knights were not our enemies anymore, that they served the Iron Queen and followed the same peace treaty as the rest of the courts. Besides, this one was clearly no threat to us. His breastplate had been staved in, and dark, oily blood pooled beneath him. His chin rested limply on his chest, but as we got closer, he opened his eyes and looked up. Blood trickled from one corner of his mouth.

“Prince … Ash?” He blinked several times, as if doubting his own eyes. “What … what are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same.” I didn’t approach the fallen warrior, standing several feet away with my sword at my side. “It’s forbidden for your kind to be here. Why aren’t you in the Iron Realm protecting the queen?”

“The queen.” The knight’s eyes widened, and he held a hand out. “You … you have to warn the queen—”

I took two long steps forward and faced the knight, looming over him. “What’s happened to Meghan?” I demanded. “Warn her of what?”

“There was … an attempt on her life,” the knight whispered, and my heart went cold in fear and rage. “Assassins … snuck into the castle … tried to get to the queen. We managed to drive them off and followed them here, but there were more than … we first thought. Killed the rest of my squad …” He paused for breath, gasping. It was clear he wouldn’t last much longer, and I knelt to hear him better, ignoring the nausea that came from being this close to an Iron faery. “You have to … warn her …” he pleaded again.

“Where are they now?” I asked in a low voice.

The knight made a gesture over the rise, back into the forest. “Their camp … on the edge of a lake,” he whispered. “Near a tower …”

“I know that spot,” Puck said, standing several feet back from the Iron knight. “A woman with crazy long hair used to live on the top floor, but it’s empty now.”

“Please …” The knight raised dying eyes to me, fighting to get his last words out. “Go to our queen. Tell her … we … failed….” Then his eyes rolled up in his skull, and he slumped forward.

I stood, taking a step back from the dead Iron knight. Puck sheathed his dagger as he stepped up beside me, giving the Iron faery a dubious look. “What now, prince? Should we head to the Iron Court?”

“I can’t.” Frustration battled cold rage, and I gripped my sword hard enough to feel the edges bite into my palm. “I’m forbidden to set foot in the Iron Realm. That’s why we’re here, remember? Or did you forget?”

“Don’t freak out, ice-boy.” Puck crossed his arms with a smirk. “All is not lost. I can turn into a raven and fly back to warn—”

“Do not be foolish, Goodfellow,” Grimalkin interrupted, coming out of nowhere, hopping onto a stone. “You have no amulet and no protection from the corruption of the realm. You would perish long before you reached the Iron Queen.”

Puck snorted. “Give me some credit, Furball. It’s me. Did you forget who you were talking to?”

“If only I could.”

“Enough!” I stared coldly at both of them. Grimalkin yawned, but at least Puck looked faintly guilty. Frustration and anger boiled; I hated that I couldn’t be with Meghan, that I was forced to keep my distance. But I would not sit back and do nothing. “Meghan is still in danger,” I continued, gazing up the hill. “And the assassins are close. If I can’t go back to warn her, then I’ll take care of the threat right here.”

Puck blinked, but he didn’t seem terribly surprised. “Yeah, I thought you might say that.” He sighed. “And I can’t let you have all the fun, of course. But, uh, you do know they took out a whole squad of Iron knights, right, ice-boy?” He glanced at the dead faery and wrinkled his nose. “I’m not saying we shouldn’t do it, of course, but what if we’re charging into an army?”

I gave him a brittle smile. “Then there will be a lot of fallen soldiers before the day is done,” I said quietly, and walked out of the gorge.

ON THE BANKS OF A LAKE, the slim, crooked tower with its mossy gargoyles and faded blue roof stood tall and proud, easily visible through the trees. At the base, sheltered among broken rocks and crumbling stones, several sidhe knights milled around a smoldering campfire, unaware of Puck and me, crouched in the shadows at the edge of the trees. The knights wore suits of familiar black armor, long spines bristling from the shoulders like giant thorns. Though once sharp and proud, the faces beneath the helmets were now ravaged as though diseased; charred, melted flesh, open sores and naked bone gleamed in the flickering campfire. Some of their noses had fallen off, others had only one good eye. The breeze shifted, and the stench of burned, rotting flesh assaulted our senses, washing over us. Puck stifled a cough.