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He didn’t smell like a Fae, his mud-colored hair was scraggly, his face aged and worn. Not a Fae, but something…
Not the sharp tang of a Requisite or the gentle lull of a Catalyst. It was more something that perhaps was not as dreadful. If there were such a thing as a good Fae, perhaps. Except there was no such thing.
All Fae were monsters.
Hoisting the bag further up my shoulder, the heavy head of the beast I had killed slapped against my back as I turned. The wagon was off in the distance now, leaving myself and the four other Wave Walkers who had exited to make our way to our destination.
Each of the Qits were linked to small land villages with the same name, the towns tended to be bustling ports that took the wares from the Qits and transported them Goddess knew where. The large road the wagon had dropped us by forked up toward Waide, the small port town that was more taverns than shops. The smaller foot trail that broke off from the rocky road wound its way down to the water, and to the ferry that would take you to Waide on the Water. That was where everyone was heading, and where I followed. The others were further up the road as they kicked up dust and laughed about who knew what. Probably fish or women. It was always one of the two.
They were carefree, happy to move from Qit to Qit. Oblivious of what this world would become with the roads flooded with black-clad Fae soldiers; when the flags of white snakes and prison wagons filled with the dead and dying would line every road.
I would never let myself forget, because forgetting would take me from my goal.
So, I walked, the sharp salt breeze from the ocean tugging at my cloak as I listening to the bits and pieces of the conversation that floated back to me. They laughed endlessly about fish, and women, and something about the family in the house of Spryv.
Fish and women I expected, but the royals in Spryv I did not. I tried to pick up what I could, but was too focused on the feel of that man, like a Fae, but not. The prickles still ran over my skin in the ghost of a warning as I walked onto the shore by Waide, the ferry with the other Walkers still shored.
“Take a lift!” One of the men shouted, having clearly asked the ferryman to wait for me. I gave him a nod and a grunt in thanks, the old wooden ferry rocking under my feet as I boarded.
“A coppa” the tow man said, his old weathered hand outstretched. Old man Tayln had run this ferry ever since I was a boy, and he was one of the few that would recognize me even with my hood up. Thankfully, the people of Waide knew me for the child I was, not the killer I had become. Tayln nodded and pocketed the gold coin I pressed into his hand, the single mark more than triple his usual price and payment for all the other times he wouldn’t let me pay.
“Good fishin’ to ya,” Tayln, mumbled, giving me a look that said he knew what I was doing as he lifted the salt covered anchor rope and began the long laborious pull over the breaking waves to the open water where the Qit floated.
“Do you think the’r gonna marry tha’ man off, then?” One of the other Wave Walkers said, clearly going back to whatever conversation that they had been having before.
“Dunno. I jus’ saw tha’ line o’ wagons. Wha’evr they doin’ thar be a lot of em.”
“If it doze happen, maybe we will see that lit’le girl, so sick.”
“Didn’t tha say she be dead soon?”
“Yeah, poor li’le Princess.”
My head shot up, I had only been partially listening until then, but hearing that brought me right back to attention.
“What did they say about the princess?” I asked in a rush, forgetting to put on the accent that allowed me to travel with the walkers. The ferryman coughed and I added, “she still be livin’ ain’t she be?”
The three men exchanged a look and I dropped my head down, making sure my hood was still over one eye. It wasn’t.
Shit.
“Light be bright on dem waves today,” Tayln said, lifting his hand to block the sun that was partially obscured by clouds. “All da blue be brigh’.’”
I would owe him more than a gold coin if that worked, which it seemed to. The other three nodded and went back to leaning against the rail as the drenched boat rocked laboriously on the break, salt spray flying everywhere.
It would be too easy to kill them all, but that would also mean ending the old man, which I really didn’t want to do.
“Ya,” said one of the men, looking at his companion again. “I hear’ abou’ it when I be up near da Turin, in Callay Bay. She be dyin’ not long left dey say.”
The world could have stopped.
I had arrived in this time on the day Princess Elara was born. Years later it was announced that her Catalyst had died, which had confused me as I had heard so much of her odd Catalyst in the stories Da had told. Ever since then rumors, announcements, and updates from the palace had swirled through Okivo about the health of the little girl. They all said she was sick or dying. Neither should have been possible given the histories that I had known of Elara had said she was powerful, one of the most powerful. I had heard so many stories of the princess and her Catalyst and how they had battled Queen Dalyah at the start of the Red Wave. Sick and magicless did not fit that.
It was the only thing about the world I knew that didn’t fit. It had never been enough for me to be concerned about, rumors were rarely true after all. But these had lingered for nearly twenty years, and now to hear she was on death's door when nothing else about her fight with the Queen had presented… nothing about her impossible magic, or her Catalyst. She had seen eighteen seasons now. The time for her stand was close, too close.
“‘Haps that be why de be doin’ the weddin’,” another of the men said, their conversation returning back to the caravan of wagons they had seen. At that, everything they had been talking about clicked together.
The prince was getting married. That I knew occurred. If the stories were true it would only be months before Queen Dalyah would rise to her power and Elara would challenge her mother. Elara who was apparently on death's door.
