“Corbin!” I yelled, but I was too late. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Corbin go down.
Several fae pile on top of his body. They held him in the dirt while they tied his wrists with a thick vine. I couldn’t see the others anywhere, but I could hear Flynn yelling and branches breaking as they crashed through the forest.
Arthur broke through the trees, bellowing as he tried to shake off an ugly fae whose sharp teeth latched onto his arm. Arthur lurched toward me, fumbling for his scabbard, but of course there was no longer a sword there. Five other fae piled on top of him, and he too went down in a fury of fists and teeth.
Remembering one of the wrestling tricks Arthur taught me, I sank against the fae who held me, letting him think I’d given up the fight. His grip loosened as he tried to drag me away, and I took the chance to sink all my weight into a kick to his knee.
The fae howled. It dropped me as it fell to the dirt, clutching its knee. My own foot stung, but I tried to ignore the throbbing as I flung myself toward Corbin. I grabbed the nearest fae and tried to tug its spindly arm from around Corbin’s neck, but for such a tiny creature it held on with surprising strength.
More fae swarmed on top of us. They tore me from Corbin, dragging me back, wrapping my wrists in the thick vines. I kicked and screamed and twisted my body, but there were just too many.
“Hello, Princess.”
My body went rigid.
I looked up.
Blake stepped out from the shadows of the trees. He wore the same black tunic and trousers as always, the long coat swirling dramatically around his legs. A great curved wooden bow rested on his shoulder and a set of arrows in a woven quiver sat diagonally across his back. He looked totally badass.
Hope surged in my stomach.
“Blake!” I cried out. “Help us. We have to get to the?—”
Blake snapped his fingers.
Sound fled from my throat.
I kept moving my jaw, pushing air past my vocal chords, but no sound came out.
He’s taken my voice.
But why would he do that, unless…unless he’s been lying to us the whole time.
My whole body went cold.
This was bad. This was very,verybad.
“Shall I finish them, Prince?” asked one of the fae, a tall, willowy guard dressed in a green uniform with the same flawless skin and crystalline eyes of the black-clad fae who first attacked up in the Briarwood meadow. “They have invaded our lands and spied on our rituals. Their deaths will be our greatest victory!”
“We can drink our nectar wine from their skulls!” another piped up.
I held my breath, but to my momentary relief, Blake shook his head. “These are the Briarwood witches. We cannot take such actions, justified as they are, without orders. I say that if they are so desperate to find out our secrets, we should indulge them.” Blake nodded to his sergeant. “Take them to the King.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
MAEVE
The fae dragged Rowan and Flynn from the trees, binding their hands with vines and throwing them down beside us. Corbin managed to tug a hand free and smacked one of the green-guards in the face. Hope surged within me as he swept out a leg and toppled another two green-guards.
The surge of triumph soon faded as the fae overpowered Corbin again and forced some kind of drink from a waterskin down his throat. A moment later, Corbin’s head nodded against his chest. He was sound asleep.
Rowan looked worried. “The fae have a powerful sleeping draught,” he whispered to me. “If we’re not able to wake him up soon, he might remain asleep forever.”
They threw Corbin on a makeshift stretcher made from gnarled branches and a bed of woven vines, and forced us to march behind him down toward the barrows. As we came out of the forest, I noticed tracks winding through the undergrowth – steps fashioned from stones and roots leading in all directions, lit with dangling lanterns that flickered in the gloom of the woods. Above our heads, platforms in the trees swarmed with fae. Baskets swung on vines between the platforms, carrying food and skins filled with liquid.
They marched us down between the barrows, along stone-lined dirt paths between dancing, jeering fae. Many held aloft platters of cakes and honeyed fruits, the cloying scent of all that sweetness mingling with the acrid smoke of a blazing bonfire.
The guards lined us up along one side of the bonfire and tossed Corbin’s body off the stretcher into a heap at our feet. Fae darted in to kick and bite him, and I tried to scream at them to stop, but whatever Blake had done to hold my throat was still in effect.
