The Absinthe Underground, page 19
By the end of the tale, Lucien’s mouth was hanging open, though he promptly closed it, hauled himself to his feet, and paced a loop around the cell. Esme stayed tucked into one corner. “So,” Lucien said, “you’re telling me Sybil is somewhere out there, running around Queen Mab’s castle, with the Moonshadow Court’s crown jewels in her pocket?”
“Well, not exactly in her pocket. . . .”
“In a magical leather bag that expands to fit them,” Lucien corrected.
“Yes.” It sounded ridiculous when put like that, but it was the truth. “Unless she already made a door back to our world, which I don’t think she’ll do because . . .”
“Because you’re here,” Lucien said softly. His warm hazel eyes met Esme’s, and the look was so full of understanding and compassion, it made tears rise in her own.
Of course, Sybil wouldn’t leave without her, would she? But how was Sybil supposed to help Esme? She was a thief, yes, but Esme was in the dungeon of a Fae queen. It was very possible she might never see Sybil again. As tears ran down her cheeks, Esme bowed her head, putting a hand to her mouth to hold back the sob that filled her throat, taking away her air. Swallowing once, she inhaled raggedly.
“Can I tell you something, Esme?” Lucien stopped his pacing.
She nodded.
“Maeve is a liar. A good one—a beautiful one—but a liar nonetheless.”
“What do you mean?” she asked roughly, swiping at her tears. “I thought the Fae couldn’t lie.”
Lucien blew out a breath. “That’s true, in a way. They can’t lie directly, but they can dance so wildly around the truth, it’s nearly impossible to make sense of where a lie begins and the truth ends.”
Esme took that in, trying to separate the tangled threads of Maeve’s story. Was it true? Or was Lucien lying?
“Let me try to explain another way,” he said. “Did you ever wonder why Sybil was able to open a door into Fae?”
Esme nodded again; of course she had wondered that. “She just said the key was from her mother—your mother—”
Lucien gave her a long measured look. “Did she ever tell you anything about our mother?”
“No.”
“Ahhh.” Lucien started pacing again. “I suppose that’s her story to tell, but you know our mother left us keys that open doors into Fae. I used one after I left home and ended up in the woods surrounding the Moonshadow Court. I met Maeve there, and we fell in love—or at least I thought we did. I was wild for her, absolutely willing to do anything she said. I stole things from all over Severon, and we built the Absinthe Underground together.”
“How did you end up here?” Esme gestured to the dungeon.
Lucien ran a hand through his beard. “We were running out of Fae gems to make absinthe with. That part of Maeve’s story is true. So I agreed to come into Fae and steal more. Maeve didn’t want to come with me, saying she was needed to run the business, but that wasn’t the entire truth of it.”
“What do you mean?”
“When I got here, I learned Maeve hadn’t been telling me everything about herself. Yes, she’s a green faerie, but she isn’t just a forest Fae, living in the woods on her own. She’s one of Queen Mab’s daughters—”
“She can’t be!” Esme gasped. Or could she be? Esme thought back to Maeve and the way she’d seemed to hold court in the Absinthe Underground.
“I felt the same way when I found out,” Lucien said. “I overheard some Fae talking about it in a tavern, and I asked them some questions. They told me the story of Queen Mab’s fourth daughter, an ambitious, unloved thing, who was banished by her mother to the far reaches of the Moonshadow woods for some petty crime or another. Her six sisters—the other princesses, Iris, Amaryllis, Beryl, Jade, Luna, and Hyacinth—were forbidden from seeking her out, and Queen Mab erased Maeve’s name from all the histories, at least until the sentence was lifted.”
Esme tried to make sense of all this. “If she’s a princess, why is she in Severon? Wouldn’t a life in exile in Fae be better than a life in the mortal world?”
Lucien raised an eyebrow. “Think about the opportunity our world offers. There’s a whole realm to be seen and enjoyed there.”
Esme wasn’t sure about any of this. Was Lucien telling the truth? Maeve had seemed so terrified when she’d told them about being trapped. Esme had felt tremendous empathy for her—she knew what it was like to be stuck somewhere and willing to do anything to get free—but was Maeve really a scared being trapped in their world? Or was she what Lucien said, a princess in exile? Or was Lucien himself the person who’d trapped her?
“What happened between you two?” Esme asked. “I thought you were in love?”
Lucian grimaced. “I did too. But, as the Absinthe Underground grew, so did Maeve’s ambitions. I found myself more her errand boy than her lover. I promised myself I’d go on one last trip to Fae, to steal more jewels. The money was flowing in, and I confess I love the adventure of it all.”
“That’s something you and Sybil have in common,” Esme said. There was a sound of footsteps in the dungeon hallway and a scratching sound at the cell door. Esme forced herself not to consider what it might be.
Lucien looked surprised. “Really? Sybil? The girl who’d rather paint landscapes or play the piano than ride a horse or jump off a cliff into the sea?”
In these words, Esme had a perfectly clear portrait of her best friend, a wild thing trapped in a rich lady’s world. A girl desperate to escape to Severon. “She loves adventure,” Esme said. “In fact—”
Esme was cut off by a loud clanging on the cell door. She leaped away, pulling the now-filthy scarf off the floor. Lucien stood behind her, gripping the book.
“If they try to give you any faerie food or drink, don’t take it,” he whispered. “It will let them do whatever they want to you. . . .”
Before Esme could reply, the cell door slammed open.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Spring Equinox
Sybil
Sybil had never been so happy to see a stinking, filthy jail cell in her life. Not that she’d ever seen a jail cell, though she’d imagined one—something full of rats and piss buckets and spare wooden cots. But the one in front of her was far worse than what she’d imagined.
The dungeon beneath Queen Mab’s palace was a low-ceilinged, clammy place. A pair of torches sat near the front, their light flickering off the mildew that streaked the stone walls and pools of rank water covering the ground. The stale tang of urine blended with smoke from the torches, the damp, and other unsavory underground smells. Rusted metal rings with chains attached hung along the walls. There were only three cells—Chloe had said this was because Queen Mab kept few prisoners, preferring to make offenders compete in trials or executing them outright, a fact that made Sybil’s skin crawl. The cells were carved into the belly of the mountain, and each had a thick wooden door on it. One guard was posted in a guard room near the front of the dungeon. While Chloe and Hyacinth distracted the guard, offering her liquor from the queen’s own table, Sybil tucked Oliver into her coat pocket and grabbed a set of keys from a hook on the wall, then snuck into the cell area. She’d stood on her tiptoes to peer into each cell. Two were empty, but she could just make out the outline of Esme’s head and back through the third.
“Esme!” she hissed, as she unlocked the door and rushed into the cell where her best friend waited. Oliver gave a happy meow.
“Sybil?” Esme’s eyebrows flew upward. “What are you—”
Sybil didn’t let her finish. She grabbed Esme into a tight hug, squeezing everything she couldn’t say into it: I’m so sorry for leaving you. I missed you. I need you. Please don’t be mad at me. I love you. . . .
Sybil gripped Esme’s back, clinging to her, then Oliver, who was squished between them, made a loud noise of protest. Esme and Sybil broke apart, laughing.
“I wasn’t sure I’d see you again, Ez. I’m so glad we found you.” Tears rose in Sybil’s eyes.
Esme reached out a hand, taking Oliver and snuggling him close.
“Sorry to interrupt this touching moment,” someone said in a rough voice behind Esme. It was heavy with barely restrained merriment. “But we should probably save reunions for after we’ve escaped.”
Sybil would’ve known that voice anywhere. But it couldn’t be. Could it?
Releasing Esme, Sybil turned to the figure behind her. He was stooped, stinking, and covered in a beard that looked more like an enormous lichen than anything else, but she’d know him anywhere. “Lucien?”
What was her brother doing here? In the cell with Esme?
Sybil had hoped—in the far-off part of her mind that wasn’t focused on the theft of Queen Mab’s jewels—she might run into Lucien in Fae, but the world was so big and the chances so small, she hadn’t really given it much thought. Now here he was. Grinning at her like a dog happy to see its fellow lost puppy. She flung herself into his arms, not caring that he reeked. He wobbled at the impact and then hugged her close.
“Didn’t expect to meet you here, sis,” Lucien said, his voice craggy. “Truly thought we’d meet next in a drawing room, not a dungeon.”
Sybil pulled away, staring at her brother in astonishment. “How? How are you here?” It was a question that contained others within it, and she stumbled over the words.
“The very short answer to that question is that I got caught.”
Ahh, so that was why he hadn’t returned to their world. “How long have you been in this cell?” she asked, taking in his dirty, emaciated appearance. “Maeve said she hadn’t seen you in weeks.”
“Far too long,” Lucien said. “They brought food at first, and then I think they forgot me down here. I’ve lost track of how long I’ve really been gone.”
Sybil looked between Lucien and Esme, trying to put it all together. “How did you two end up in the same cell?”
“Good luck?” Esme said. “Or laziness? They just threw me into the first one.”
“Same,” Lucien said, nodding. He held out a hand to Oliver. The kitten sniffed it, then licked it once, making a surprised face. Lucien grinned. It was that same easy, confident smile Sybil remembered so well.
“Esme told me all about your job from Maeve,” Lucien said, petting Oliver again.
Sybil shot Esme a look. “You told him about Maeve?”
Esme shrugged, still holding Oliver close. “We talked about a lot.”
Sybil didn’t like the strange note in Esme’s voice. What had Lucien told her? What would Esme think of Sybil if he’d revealed the truth about their mother?
“Ahem.” Someone cleared their throat behind Sybil. She turned to Chloe, who leaned against the doorway of the cell, watching the hall. “Hyacinth is still drinking with the guard, but I’m not sure how long she’ll be able to hold her attention. We should go.”
Sybil nodded. She wasn’t entirely sure how Chloe had managed to convince Hyacinth to help or what she must have said or promised—though she’d certainly left out the part about the stolen jewels—but thankfully Hyacinth had agreed. And the guard had been all too happy to see a princess bringing her wine, which Hyacinth had claimed was a “gift of gratitude from the royal family on this Equinox.”
“Right,” Sybil said. “Let’s go now. I’ll use my key to open the door between worlds, and we can get out of here.” She started to close the jail cell door, but Lucien reached out a hand to stop her.
“Don’t be so quick to lock us all in here again, sis. This door only opens from the outside, and you can’t open a door between worlds within Queen Mab’s palace.”
Sybil paused, catching the door before it slammed shut. “I thought I could use any door for this?”
Lucien shook his head. “That’s what I thought too, on my first trips into this world, but don’t you think I would’ve escaped already if I could open a door from this cell?” He pulled his own key—identical to Sybil’s—from under his shirt.
“You’ve had that with you the whole time?” Sybil couldn’t keep a note of accusation from her voice.
Lucien nodded. “Like I said, it doesn’t work on any door in Queen Mab’s palace. When they caught me, I’d made the mistake of drinking Fae concoctions in a tavern. They’re about a thousand times stronger than the absinthe we make, and I was totally ensorcelled. I suppose I was making an ass of myself or trying to steal something, because one minute I remember drinking something frothy and blue green, and the next I woke up in this jail cell. The first thing I did was try to open a door between worlds, but I couldn’t.”
“That would make sense,” Chloe said, glancing at the keys Sybil and Lucien wore. “In the times before, when all the doors between the worlds were open, I suppose the Fae monarchs wouldn’t want just anyone to be able to open a door into their homes.”
Lucien nodded. “Exactly. Imagine you’re Queen Mab, in your bath, and a door appears, and out stumbles a mortal magician, looking for some answers to his scholarly questions. From what I have gathered from my research, the doors back into our world are built into natural formations—trees, hillsides, things like that. From our side, with our keys, we can use any door and open it to Fae, but here, we have to use a door that’s built into something already.”
Sybil knew then where they had to go to escape. “Lucky for us, we know exactly that kind of door.”
“Not so lucky,” Chloe amended. “We’re going to have to go through the Equinox garden party to get there, and he smells terrible.”
Lucien grinned, making Sybil’s heart warm to see it. “We’ll figure it out. And when we’re back in Severon, I’m going to bathe for at least a day and then eat everything on the menu at my favorite café.”
“That sounds like an excellent plan,” Sybil said, returning Lucien’s smile.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Spring Equinox
Esme
Esme glanced between Sybil and Lucien as they hurried down the long torchlit corridor of the dungeon. They looked so much alike, it was uncanny. She slipped on a slick patch of stone and stumbled, catching herself against a wall. Oliver meowed from inside her coat pocket.
“Esme?” Sybil turned, frowning. She offered a hand, but Esme pushed off the wall, ignoring it. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, keep going.”
Why had Sybil not told her more about Lucien? Something else whispered at Esme’s mind, some missing piece, like the last gear needed to finally make a clock start ticking. What was it Lucien had said? That Sybil’s secrets were her own?
At the main door of the dungeon, Chloe paused, glancing both ways as she peeked outside. There would be time for questions and answers once they got back to Severon and had given the jewels to Maeve. Because, no matter what Lucien said, Esme wasn’t just willing to take his word on everything. What if he was lying and Maeve really was trapped?
“Hyacinth and the guard are over there,” Chloe said, nodding toward one side of a long room. Esme glimpsed a uniformed woman at a rough wooden table, holding a bottle while Hyacinth stood nearby, laughing at something the guard said.
Chloe pointed toward a staircase. “Go up that way. Now!”
Esme didn’t need to be told a second time. Head down, she ran toward the stairs that led out of the dungeon. They were the same stairs the Nightshades had dragged her down what felt like hours ago but couldn’t have been that long. Injuries from her tumble out of the tree and rough treatment by the guards slowed her down, and she stumbled over a step.
This time, Sybil caught her arm, saving Esme from a nasty fall.
“Are you hurt?” Sybil whispered. “What did they do to you?” Concern was written all over her face.
Esme wanted to sink into that fretfulness and just let herself be fussed over and cared for, but she wasn’t in the habit of letting someone else take care of her. Plus, Sybil had left her once already. Esme could walk on her own.
She shook off Sybil’s hand. “Keep moving.”
Sybil nodded tightly, looking as if she wanted to say more, but Lucien urged them forward.
They ran up the dungeon steps, ending up on the far side of the palace, opposite the door hidden in the mountain. It was full night now, and the moon rose on the eastern horizon.
Chloe glanced at the stars. “It’ll be midnight soon,” she said. “Which means Queen Mab’s ball will be starting. She’s got to be frantic to find her jewels.”
“Let’s not dally here any longer,” Lucien said. “Where’s this door?”
“Across the lawn and through the garden labyrinth,” Chloe said. “Follow me and stay close. The night is wilder already.”
Esme shivered at her tone, but she didn’t need telling. She could taste ecstatic unruliness in the air. Fae creatures—human-sized foxes in well-tailored suits, beautiful faeries with lithe limbs and glittering wings, High Fae with ice-blue lips and bloodred eyes, stout gray-haired crones with mushroom-shaped hats, almost-human-looking people with feathered wings and sharp gazes, trees with the faces of women and long green hair, and so many others—spilled out of the garden and onto the palace lawn. Some of them glanced at Esme and the others, but their gaze quickly moved on, as if they were too ordinary to actually pay attention to. They hurried through the garden, only stopping when they got to the door that was built into the mountain.
“Isn’t this part of the palace?” Lucien asked, looking up at the castle looming over them. “Can you even open a door here?”
“I don’t think it is,” Sybil replied. “We had to go through many underground passages to get to a stairway.”
Chloe nodded. “It’s built into the stone itself, so not technically part of the palace like the dungeons or stables are. I think it should work.”
Lucien nodded. “One way to find out, I guess. Sybil, would you like to do the honors?”
Sybil pulled out her key. Esme exhaled, excitement lighting her nerves. This was it, time to go home.
Suddenly, a loud feminine voice sent Esme’s heart plummeting into her stomach.
“Where are you all going?” Hyacinth called out, making them pause right as Chloe pulled back the vines hiding the mountain door. “Chloe, wait!”
