Chapter Twenty-ONE

Valour

I’m woken by the sound and feel of my chain being unlocked. I’m elated at first, wondering if we’re being broken out, but it’s one of the Fae. Oddly, they do not look as gleeful as I expect them to. They merely unchain me, stand me up and start walking me out of the cell.

“Where are you taking her?” groans Murrey, trying to rise.

The Faerie uses his boot to force the Vampire back into a sitting position. “None of your business. Dryad, you come, too.”

Alona follows us dutifully and I scowl at her for doing so. I try to pull against the Faerie’s grip, but they give me a shake, silently advising me against it. They lead us up a narrow staircase and their speed is not what I would choose for myself. I trip and stumble and curse them under my breath.

“I’m not good with stairs,” I finally snipe. “Take
it easy.”

When we reach the top, we are led into a large underground court. A great hall with an endlessly high ceiling and an expansive floor.

All of this, buried beneath Arthur’s Seat. I wonder what Mr Ishmael would make of it all. Not that I will ever see him again. I also wonder how Portia’s spell has affected him.

Portia is sitting in a large chair on some sort of dais in the northern part of the hall. She has the Druid, another grey-looking man, and some Fae around her. They are discussing something. The Druid looks as though he wishes to speak but every time he opens his mouth to do so, someone else cuts across him.

Then I spot Freddy, sitting with his head on his knees on the edge of the little platform. I resist the urge to shout his name.

“Ah, you’re up and about,” Portia says, looking at me over the files she is reading. “Feeling peaky?”

“Feel like smashing your head in, actually,” I say conversationally. “Thanks.”

The Faerie shoves me, but Portia holds up a delicate hand. “That won’t be necessary. She likes to show off how spirited she can be. It’s one of her charming little toxic traits.”

“I’m not joining your council,” I say loudly. “So, like I said. You might as well kill me.”

“Ramya!” Freddy interjects, panic emanating
from him.

“It’s all right, darling,” Portia tells him. “I’m not giving her what she wants just yet. She’s not fulfilled her use to me.”

I frown. “I said, I’m not joining—”

“Why,” Portia says slowly, rising to her feet, “would I want an impulsive, green, untrained little witch on my council? What use could your bad temper and shaky hands offer me? Is that why you think I wanted to lure you here?”

I feel very small all of a sudden. “Then why?”

“You’re just the little worm on the hook, sweetheart. I’m trying to catch a much bigger fish. You’re not even a shadow of the witch I really want.”

I realise who she means and my eyes flash to the Druid. He looks confused, like I was, but I can spot the exact moment when understanding hits him. He goes pale and his eyes begin to dart around the vast space, as if looking for a way out.

And I start laughing. Then the laughter becomes a guffaw. I can feel their bewilderment, but the screeching sound I am making doesn’t stop.

“Madam,” the grey-looking man next to Portia looks from me to the high ceiling. “It is… raining. Inside.”

Little droplets of water start to fall and swirl around the room, creating an elusive indoor cyclone. I can’t stop. The water twitches and turns each time I take a breath between laughter.

“All right, I can take a joke,” Portia shouts. “What’s so funny?”

Freddy is suddenly at my side, holding my elbow. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” I snort, still hysterical. “It’s just… no, I can’t.”

“Careful,” Freddy whispers to me. “That guy next to Mum? His name’s Malachi. He’s a warlock, and completely brutal.”

“Oh, Freddy,” I gasp, between laughs. “I don’t care anymore. They can do what they like.” I address the Druid, still snorting through my nose. “Do you want to tell them or should I?”

I have to admit that I enjoy the little dollop of power I get back upon seeing his frantic worry about this new information. He clearly was not in Portia’s inner circle, and wasn’t aware of Opal or her reputation when he…

Remembering what he did sobers me, and my laughter dies out.

“You’re hoping I’ll be bait to draw in my Aunt Opal,” I say to Portia.

“That is the dream,” she replies sardonically, casting a lazy look around the enormous chamber. “Turn the water off, please. We are underground. Unless you want to drown or flush out all the Hidden Folk locked away downstairs.”

So, Murrey is not the only one chained up.

I force myself to settle, picturing things that can ground me, and the water dissipates before vanishing altogether.

“Very good, Ramya,” Portia remarks. “You do have a little control, it seems.”

The Druid has edged a little nearer to one of the doors, which I take for an exit. I lock that piece of information away. He looks deeply uncomfortable and is clearly formulating a plan of escape in his mind. Alona is behind me and when I throw a quick glance
at her, I can’t help but feel sorry for her, just for a fleeting moment.

She looks absolutely destroyed.

I shoot my gaze back to the front of the chamber. I take in Malachi. His eyes are deadened, and he doesn’t appear to blink. Warlocks, according to Opal’s books, are male witches who lean into darker magic. He certainly looks the part. He is fiddling with what looks like a coin and he seems distracted.

“Murrey needs blood, badly,” I mutter to Freddy. “He’s in the cell they took me from.”

I see his eyebrows raise as he processes my words. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Freddy, get away from her, please,” Portia suddenly calls over.

Freddy does not move. The Fae glance between him and his mother. The warlock doesn’t react and the Druid edges even nearer the exit.

“You’ll be waiting a very long time for Opal to come,” I tell Portia. “Firstly, how would she know that your creepy secret layer is beneath Arthur’s Seat?”

“I would have thought that little fortune teller you met told you, and you told your family,” Portia says smoothly, and the words chill and disarm me. “Oh, yes, we found her. Hiding in plain sight, quite clever. She’s in one of these cells.”

I feel anger and indignation rise in me but, once again, I shackle it. “Still. There are other things keeping her from coming.”

Portia puffs out a sigh and rolls her eyes. “Go on then. What else?”

My eyes must be shining in the candlelight. I stare straight at the Siren. This Siren who has heaped so much misery on me and my family, and so much suppression on this incredible town. “She’s dead.”

Portia’s smile slips. “What?”

“She,” I spit, “is dead.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “You’re lying to buy
her time.”

I wish that was the truth. “No.”

She is utterly still and staring at me as if I have stolen air from her lungs. She looks briefly to Freddy and then back to me.

“What are you talking about?”

I point to the Druid, my blood heating with hatred. “Ask him.”

Alona gasps and Freddy steps closer to me. The Fae and the warlock turn to look at Alona’s maker, while Portia slowly rises to her feet. Every inch of her is quivering with rage, barely contained fury, and it’s enough to frighten me let alone the man on the other end of her attention.

“What is the little witch talking about?” Portia asks the Druid, her voice as calm as Blue’s loch but every bit as dangerous. “Would you care to explain to me why you’re thinking of running to that door?”

The Druid stumbles forward and I can hear Alona’s panicked breathing, behind me.

“Madam,” the Druid speaks with thinly veiled terror. “I…when I was trying to retrieve the Ripple…the other witch attacked me, the elder. She was powerful. And—and there was a dragon!”

“What,” Portia advances on him slowly, like a leopard to its prey, “happened?”

The large room is silent. The only sound is Portia’s heels on the ground as she continues her menacing approach. I’m confused by this reaction. There is something missing from my understanding of the situation. Portia is vibrating with rage, that’s obvious. That I can understand. Someone has gone rogue and deviated from her plan.

However, there’s something else. Her face seems to have a touch of fear in it. I stare at her profile, fascinated by this questionable reaction.

“I killed the witch,” the Druid finally admits, and I close my eyes to shut out the memory. “I hit her in the ribs. She fell. She’s gone.”

At first, there is no reaction at all from Portia. She is completely still and completely silent, her face a mask that I can no longer read. Then suddenly, she reaches out and grabs the Druid’s chin. He naturally flinches but her nails dig into his skin, causing him to freeze and whimper. It is a pathetic sight to witness. The Siren roughly jerks his face to the right.

“That cut,” she says softly. “That was her?”

He is almost hyperventilating as he nods. “Yes.”

I stare in astonishment as Portia reaches out with her other hand to touch the mark, almost a reverent caress.

Then she throws her head back and shrieks, a long and sustained note of anguish that is almost a whistle tone. The Fae react with yelps and Freddy dives to cover my ears. He shields me with his body, and we hit the floor, while Portia’s scream continues. When she stops, I look up. The Fae are clustered together in a corner, their teeth bared in a hiss. The warlock puts the end of one pinkie finger into his ear and clears out some gunk, shaking his head as if to dislodge echoes of the inhuman sound. Alona is crying quietly behind me.

“Fetch the Ripple,” Portia tells the warlock.

We all watch him saunter away to do so while Portia’s attention never wavers from the Druid.

“I want to cut out your tongue,” she murmurs. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

“I thought that you would be pleased,” the Druid tries desperately.

“Lock him up with the rest,” Portia tells the Fae, and they move to carry out the order while the Druid loudly objects.

I expect her to round on us, but she turns to face the wall, hiding her expression from the entire room. Her back and shoulders are stiff, and her breathing is shallow and uneven. The warlock returns with the Ripple. The creature transforms into a plethora of people before settling on doubling as one of the Fae.

Portia finally breaks free from her daze and moves towards the strange shapeshifter. While wearing the Faerie’s face, the creature looks afraid. I find myself softening just a touch at the sight. It doesn’t seem to know what or who it is underneath the multitude of masks it wears.

As Portia stares at it, it shifts. To the Druid. Then
to Freddy.

Then to Opal.

The resemblance is so uncanny, Portia takes a step back and I have to look away. It’s too painful. I can hear Freddy whispering to me, but I can’t process
the words.

“You certainly are disconcerting,” Portia tells the Ripple, and her voice sounds different. “You’ll do
just fine.”

She seems almost deflated. As if the news, and her resounding reaction, have robbed her of something.

I glance around the massive chamber, taking account of the different doors. Some leading to cells, others perhaps leading to nowhere. Behind me, about fifty metres away, are large wooden doors. If Camelot did once exist here, those doors are the only reminder, the only nod to the royal and regal.

I wonder if I can make it to those doors without getting hexed by the warlock or seized by the Fae or the Ripple. The idea of running up steep steps, that no doubt await me on the other side, is worrying.

I tick over escape plans in my mind, trying to figure out how to get Murrey and I out of here unharmed. Plus any other Hidden Folk she has chained up.

“So, now what?” I call to the Siren. “If this was all an elaborate scheme to lure my aunt here, sorry to disappoint you. One of your henchmen already got rid of her.”

I spit the words, my emotions unravelling a little. I try to imagine that my anger and pain is made of thread and that I have to bind it into twine. I cannot let the whole thing disentangle and fall apart.

“Yes. So, I suppose I don’t need you anymore.”

Portia speaks with such a detached voice, such a flat and empty tone. I blink. Even Freddy and the Fae
look a little puzzled. She sounds utterly defeated.
She falls into her seat by the wall and gestures limply
to Malachi.

The warlock steps forward dutifully and before I can fully gather myself, he throws a spell at me. I only just dive out of its path.

“Stop!” yells Freddy.

“Restrain my son,” Portia tells the Fae, staring off into space the entire time.

The Ripple, still looking like Opal, glances around at all of us. Confused and constantly learning, as ever.

“Shift into someone else,” Portia tells it, a hint of fury entering her tone. “Now.”

While Freddy is dragged to the side, I back up.
Alona watches in horror as Malachi braces to cast again. He is toying with me, completely unbothered
by my presence.

He doesn’t realise that being underestimated is the key to everything for me.

These last few months, when people have had faith in me, I haven’t known what to do. My entire life has been moulded and shaped around the knowledge of being discounted. I liked being discounted some of the time. When no one had any expectations, anything that I did was a bonus.

Now? Aunt Opal knew I could do better. She told me all the time.

I didn’t know what to do with that.

“You can run, I’ll give you a head start,” Malachi calls, as he builds some fire between both of his palms.

I didn’t know then what to do with Opal’s belief.

I do now.

I don’t need a head start. I do not need to run. I face down this dour, grey stranger and I wait. Everything in me is still and composed. The thread wound neatly, but not too tightly. My feelings are not in a box, they are laced within me. Placed inside of me with dignity and privacy because I don’t need to show other people my pain for it to count as real.

The blaze is thrown at me, and I release everything. I poise each muscle and ground my feet into the floor.

I cast. No hate or anger in my magic, just like Opal always said.

“I forgive you,” I whisper.

And the water comes like an avalanche.

It crashes against the warlock, throwing him against the wall. The Fae scream and scatter, releasing Freddy in the process. Everyone is drenched in magic, as the blue in the room not only extinguishes the warlock’s cast, but also covers all else in water and mist.

Only the Ripple approaches me. It wears my face as it looks at me and then, as if probing my mind for everyone I’ve ever loved, it flashes through many different appearances. My family, flickering in front of me like a strange dream.

It doesn’t move to harm me. It only tries to read me. I think of the first moment I met this odd creature. When I reached down to throw a stone.

It threw one back. Just as clumsily. Just as weakly.

“You’re not a ripple,” I say to it, quietly. “You’re a reflection. You don’t do something unless someone does it to you.”

This lonely creature, new to the world of magic, only knows how to imitate. And Portia wants to teach it violence and hate.

Its image once again lands on Opal. She must be
so present in my mind, the creature cannot read anything else.

I have no desire to cast stones now. I step forward and hold the shapeshifter, my head against its sternum. It doesn’t feel or smell like her, but I want this lonesome oddity to feel something other than fear and loathing. Though stiff at first, and perhaps deeply bemused, it eventually raises its arms to return the embrace.

It is a moment of peace, one I’ve been craving, and it calms the final pieces of the storm inside of me.

When I gently pull away, the Ripple has shifted once more, and I am looking at myself. Like a strange mirror image, only it doesn’t echo your every movement. At least not in real-time. I stare into my own face, and I decide to let go. I don’t need to retaliate. I don’t need to poison myself with dreams of revenge, when I could be living my life and making things better for the people I love.

I always stared at Opal and wondered why she didn’t carry more anger around with her, the way I did. I took it for weakness, or rather a lack of fortitude.

I was wasting time with all that red when there
was blue to feel. This warm, settled, and strong feeling of magic.

I’m not going to tell myself lies anymore. I’m quite good at magic. But I’m going to get better.

What she always wanted for me.

I shake my hands, stimming out little flecks of magic. I watch as Malachi rises to a standing position. He starts to charge me, building up to another cast – this one more personal and more intense. The same colour as the spell the Druid used on Opal. I brace myself, readying for it.

Until I feel hands on my left shoulder, pushing me. A shove that ejects me from the spell’s path. I hit the floor and have only a few seconds to look up and see what has happened.

Alona has physically forced me out of the line of fire and now stands boldly in my place. I scream in protest as Malachi is unable to divert the course of his spell. It hits Alona in the torso and her arms spread out like an angel’s wings. Her eyes look up and she begins to transform. Instead of hitting the ground, like Opal, her whole figure cracks and transfigures into a tree. Tall and grand, stood right in the heart of the hall. It is not her usual transformation. This oak tree does not teem with life the way she usually does.

Instead of a body, we have been left with a tree. One that is still and silent and solitary.

“Alona?”

I touch the trunk, my hand hot and wet against the bark. I hear Freddy running over to us, placing himself between me and the warlock. I hear raised voices, but I don’t listen. I don’t take in whatever is being said.

I feel what little is left of my heart starting to break.

“Are you happy now, Portia?” I say, running my hands over the roots of the tree, which are now dug deep into the ground. “What else do you want to take from me?”

I force myself to look at her. She still seems disillusioned. None of her infamous gleam is alive in her face anymore. It was something I used to fantasise about. I used to play scenarios in my head, over and over, where the smugly chaotic glint would be wiped out of her eyes.

There is nothing satisfying or glorious about any
of this.

“I could never be you,” I say softly. “This is hell. If you feel this badly inside, all the time. I could never
do it.”

Her eyes flit to me and we stare at each other. “You learn to let it keep you warm.”

The words fall between us, and I shake my head. The warlock is in my peripheral, too afraid to fire while Freddy stands between us. He awaits another command from Portia, but one does not seem to
be forthcoming.

I expect her to speak but we are all interrupted. We turn to face the large doors at the back of the hall.

Someone is knocking.