the woods outside of WindWhisper Asylum.”
Well, fuck.
“That’s where…he is. That’s where he builds his army with his queen. And that’s the place I intend to get as far away from as I can, and you’d be smart to do the same.”
I dragged the bag off my back and handed it to him. He’d earned it, after all.
He gave me a strange look as he took it. “As a dark fae, I thought you’d just kill me.”
That’s probably what a dark fae would’ve done. “We had a deal.”
He started to walk away, and I ignored it when my phone began to buzz again. Then he glanced back at me. “It’s not just him now. You understand that, right? Rumors are that his queen is Bloody Mary herself. I just thought you should be warned.”
When he disappeared from sight, I staggered and caught the wall. Mae was his queen? Mae had been taken to that godforsaken place?
Oh hell.
3
Mae
I wanted to groan and curl into a ball, but I couldn’t. Every time I tried to move, I could feel something holding me down, and if I struggled, then it burned against my skin. I knew that, and yet every time I’d regained consciousness, I’d struggled.
“The fight has to be wearing out of her soon,” a male voice said from close by.
“Master wants to know as soon as she is awake,” another voice said. This one sounded old and scratchy though, like it hadn’t had much use. I knew what that felt like. At one point in the mirror realm, I’d almost lost my voice entirely because I hadn’t spoken to anyone in so long, not even myself. In fact, that was when I started talking to myself in earnest, because I was so scared of losing my voice completely.
“She’s coming around slowly, but every time she fights, the magic knocks her back out again, so it could be a while.” The owner of the first voice was younger, more enthusiastic and energetic. Life hadn’t beaten him down too much yet.
“Just let me know the moment she wakes and I will tell Master,” voice two said as it faded, and I knew that whoever it was had left, even though I hadn’t heard a single footfall.
After a moment, the second voice said, “You can open your eyes now. I know you’re awake.”
There was no point in pretending, so I cracked my eyelids open by the smallest fraction possible. The room I found myself in was very cave-like, making me shudder from memories of the mirror realms and the caves I used to try and hide in there. It wasn’t just that though, it was the terror that clung to the walls, the stench of death that coated my tongue as I took in a breath. Wherever I was it was no good. So many souls had lost their fight here that the place was saturated with their anger and fear.
“Welcome to my humble abode,” the voice said, and I turned to the sound, trying to figure out who or what was speaking, even though it was hard to make anything out in the dim light. My eyes traveled over rocks and outcroppings from the walls, but also over tables, and machines and tools that made my blood run cold. Finally, they landed on the man who had spoken, if he could be called a man.
His form was skeletal and couldn’t have looked closer to death if he was actually dead. His eyes seemed to be both simultaneously sunken in and bulging from his head, while his lips were pulled tight over his teeth, making me wonder how the hell he actually spoke. His arms were ropey, and his skin looked like it was barely hanging on. The sight of him made me queasy. What could happen to make someone look like that? It clearly wasn’t natural.
“Master was kind enough to give me this body to work in,” the man said by way of explanation. “I’m sure once he sees my completed work, he will provide a better body.” My mind finally caught up with the fact that his lips weren’t actually moving.
“How?” I croaked, my voice giving out before I could form the whole sentence.
“How am I alive? How am I talking? How are they going to make you fall in line? All these questions have answers, my dear, but I do need to know which you want answered.”
I folded three fingers down. His eyes tracked the motion, but the more they moved in