At that moment, I see something waver in the prince’s eyes. Perhaps he finally realizes the danger he’s in.
The moth flutters upward.
Oak’s expression changes, neither smiling nor grim. He looks blank, empty of emotion. I wonder if that’s how he appears when he’s scared.
The ogre strides across the circle, holding his thin sword like a bat. “Don’t be shy, boy,” he says. “Let’s see what you’ve got.” Then he swings his blade toward Oak’s head.
The prince is fast, ducking to the side and thrusting the point of his rapier into the ogre’s shoulder. When Oak pulls it free, Noglan roars. A dribble of blood trickles over the ogre’s bicep.
The crowd sucks in a collective breath. I am stunned. Was that a lucky shot?
But I cannot continue to believe that when Oak spins to slash across the ogre’s belly, just below his chest plate. The prince’s movements are precise, controlled. He’s faster than anyone I’ve seen fight.
There’s a gleam of wet pink flesh. Then Noglan crashes to the floor, knocking other faeries out of his way. There are screams from the spectators, along with astonished gasps.
The prince steps to the other side of the circle. “Don’t get up,” he warns, a tremor in his voice. “We can be done with this. Cry off.”
But Noglan pushes himself to his feet, snorting in pain. There is a bloodstain growing on his pants, but he ignores it. “I am going to eviscerate—”
“Don’t,” the prince says.
The ogre runs at Oak, slashing with his sword. The prince turns the slim rapier so that it slides straight up the blade, the sharp point sinking into the ogre’s neck.
Noglan’s hand goes to his throat, blood pooling between his fingers. I can see when the light goes out of his eyes, like a torch thrown into the sea. He slumps to the floor. The crowd roars, disbelief on their faces. The scent of death hangs heavily in the air.
Oak wipes his bloody blade against his glove and sheaths it again.
Queen Annet would have heard the story of Oak not defending himself against Noglan. She’d come to the same conclusion that I had, that there was no fight in him. That there was nothing sinister hidden behind Oak’s easy smile. That he was the coddled prince of Faerie he seemed, spoiled by his sisters, doted on by his mother, kept in the dark regarding his father’s schemes.
I had supposed he might not even know how to use his sword. He’d acted the fool, that his enemies might believe he was one.
How could I have forgotten that he’d been weaned on strategy and deception? He was a child when murders over the throne began, and yet not so young that he didn’t remember. How had I not considered that his father and sister would have been his tutors in the blade? Or that if he was a favorite target of assassins, he might have had reason to learn to defend himself?
Queen Annet’s expression is grim. She expected this match to go her way, with Noglan knocking around the prince, her honor restored, and us imprisoned long enough for her to get a message from her contacts at the High Court.
Tiernan turns a fierce look on me and shakes his head. “I hope you’re pleased with what you wrought.”
I am not sure what he means. Oak is clearly unharmed.
Seeing my expression, his only grows angrier. “Oak was never taught to fight any way but to kill. He doesn’t know any elegant parries. He cannot show off. All he can do is deal death. And once he starts, he doesn’t stop. I’m not sure he can.”
A shiver goes through me. I remember the way his face went blank and the awfulness of his expression when he saw Noglan spread out on the ground, as though surprised by what he had done.
“Long, I wished for a child.” Queen Annet’s gaze goes to me again, then back to Oak. The shock seems to be wearing off, leaving her seeing that she must speak. “Now that one comes, I hope mine will do as much for me as you do for your sire. It pleases me to see a Greenbriar with some teeth.”
I assume that last is a dig at the High King, well known for leaving the fighting to his wife.
“Now, Lady Suren, I promised to return you to the prince, but I don’t recall promising you’d be alive when I handed you over.” Then the Unseelie queen smiles without amusement. “I understand you like riddles, having solved so many in my prisons. So let us have one more contest of skill. Answer, or suffer the riddle’s fate and leave Prince Oak with only your corpse: Tell a lie and I will behead you. Tell me the truth and I will drown you. What is the answer that will save you? ”
“Queen Annet, I caution you. She is no longer yours to toy with,” Oak says.
But her smile does not dim. She waits, and I am without any choice but to play her cruel little game.
Despite my mind having gone blank.
I take a shuddery breath. Queen Annet posited that there was a solution to the riddle, but it’s an either-or situation. Either drowning or beheading. Either lying or truth. Two very bad outcomes.
But if the truth results in drowning and a lie results in beheading, then I have to find a way to use one of those against her.
I am tired and hurting. My thoughts are in knots. Is this one of those chicken-or-egg questions, a trap to seal my doom? If I were to choose drowning and it’s the truth, then she’d have to do it. Which means beheading is the fate of a liar. So . . .
“I must say, ‘You will behead me,’” I tell her. Because if she does it, then I am a truth-teller and she ought to have drowned me. There’s no way to execute me properly.
I let out a sigh of relief—since there is an answer, whatever she might have wanted to do, she must now let me go.
Queen Annet gives a tight smile. “Oak, take your traitor with the blessings of the Court of Moths.” As he takes a step toward me, she continues. “You may think that Elfhame will look ill on my attempts to keep you here, but I promise you that your sister would like it far less well to find I’d let you leave with Lady Suren, only to discover she sliced open your throat.”
Oak winces.
Annet notes his reaction. “Exactly.” Then she turns away with a swirl of her long black skirts, one hand on her gravid belly.
“Come,” the prince commands me. A muscle in his jaw twitches, as though he’s clenching his teeth too hard.
It would be safer if I hated him. Since I cannot, perhaps it is good that he now hates me.
They release Jack of the Lakes outside of the hill. His face is bruised. He slinks toward us, swallowing any witty comments. He goes to his knees before Oak, reminding me uncomfortably of Hyacinthe when he swore to me.
Jack says nothing, only bowing so low that his forehead touches Oak’s hoof. The prince is still clad in his armor. The golden mail glitters, making him seem both royal and remote.
“I am yours to punish,” says the kelpie.
Oak reaches out a hand and cups it lightly over Jack’s head, as though offering a benediction.
“My debt to you is paid, and yours to me,” Oak says. “We will owe each other nothing going forward, save friendship.”
I wonder at his kindness. How can he mean it when he is so angry with me?
Jack of the Lakes rises. “For the sake of your friendship, prince, I would carry you to the ends of the earth.”
Tiernan snorts. “Since Hyacinthe spirited off Damsel Fly, maybe you should take him up on his offer.”