‘See, those of us who were there’—I indicate Cillian standing next to Rose and Aiden, with Sean behind them—‘we know that’s not true. One of the men, Ed, recognised you at the time. Implied you’d been lovers– yet you claimed not to know him.’
‘I didn’t remember him,’ Vittoria snaps.
‘It’s funny, Cillian knows everyone who works for him, even the humans. He remembers their names. Rewards loyalty. And yet you—’ I pause and smile at her. ‘Well, I can understand why Cillian doesn’t feel you’d make a good queen, don’t you?’
The man who spoke earlier laughs, and the one who gave me a thumbs-up leans forward almost gleefully.
‘None of this changes the fact that in that lane you lifted a Kinfolk knife from the ground, held it up and stabbed a man, Kin, right through the throat with it.’
‘Kin who were attacking me. Kin who had drugged us earlier and planned to rape and kill me.’
There’s an energy in this place– I can feel it in the way the ground trembles under my feet, in the way the torchlight around the walls is growing incrementally brighter with each passing minute.
‘You’re human!’ Vittoria yells. ‘You cannot be allowed to kill Kin!’
‘I did not intentionally kill anyone, Vittoria,’ I state calmly. With every passing statement, I feel more sure about myself. ‘I can’t be guilty of murder if there was no intent to kill. Four years ago, you told me that you would never need a lawyer like me. But I think perhaps, you do.’
‘The videos show you buying the drink that drugged Rose.’
‘Buying them fromyourbarman. Inyourestablishment, Vittoria. I was not the only person to touch those drinks and you know it. There was another man, too, behind the bar. The one sitting behind your father now, in fact. I’d recognise that smile anywhere.’
I regret my words as soon as they leave my mouth. Mocking a scar is not something I’d normally condone but standing here, facing the woman who tried to kill me more than once– well, I suppose anger is a very normal, human response.
Something shifts in my head even as I think it, and a memory flashes into my thoughts. The washerwoman by the stream. A feeling I had then of familiarity. I spread my hands out in front of them and look at them, and for a moment they don’t really look like my hands. I shrug off the ridiculous thought and catch Rose’s eye. She’s staring at me, her lips parted, her brow furrowed.
‘It’s funny, that in the alley, I don’t even remember picking up the knife. I looked at it, it was lying on the ground, just out of my reach. Then Frank attacked me, and it was just suddenly in my hand– like magic.’
Vittoria smirks. ‘And how are you going to prove that?’
‘It’s a pattern, though. Isn’t it? And you said it yourself?—’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘When we arrived. You said that it had been four years of you trying to kill me.’
Cillian’s head jerks towards her, and he glares at her. ‘What?’
‘What did you expect?’ Vittoria snaps at him. ‘From the very first moment you set eyes on her, you didn’t want me anymore. Me? When I have so much more to offer.’
‘The night my parents died,’ I go on, ‘a car followed them.Yourcar.’
‘I wasn’t anywhere near the accident.’ She sounds so sure, so confident, I almost believe her. But she must be lying. I know she’s behind it. ‘And all it did was push him closer to you. Until the next day, at least.’
‘You made a mistake, Vittoria.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous. The only mistake I made was in not killing you myself. But you always seemed so inconsequential and pathetic. So easy to forget about until… Until something would happen, and then he’d notice you again. Even a few weeks ago, when he finally proposed, it was the night he saw you at your graduation party. He asked me because he wants so very much to be king that he can’t allow himself to be tempted by you. And I knew that even if I was his wife, he would still want you more.’
‘You think you have so much, Vittoria, and yet you keep taking from me. My parents, Cillian, my necklace.’
‘This?’
She pulls it from her pocket and flings it at me. It hits the column and explodes in a storm of bright red light. Those outside the column of light cover their ears, cowering from the explosion and the noise that follows. A cacophony of voices all screaming, but the screaming fades until all I hear is many voices holding a single note in a beautiful harmony.
The light in The Unseelie Court grows brighter, and one of the dark alcoves starts to gently glow as the room begins to spin. There’s still no sign of Matt, so I’m alone, spinning inside a column of light. The faster I spin, the more the lights fade until the chamber falls into pitch darkness. I feel cool air on my face, the gentle touch of rain and look up to see that the hill above my head has opened to reveal a night sky full of stars.
Power prickles across my skin. It passes over me and through me. In front of me, I see my mother’s face. As she smiles at me, her eyes grow brighter, her hair deepens into a richer shade of chocolate, and her cheeks take on the colour and texture of the most delicate of pink roses. My father puts his arm around her shoulders. He smiles at me, then kisses my mother’s cheek. They are both glowing– the same glow I have seen all around me here in The Unseelie Court. No, not the same. Not quite.
I reach out and touch the column, feeling the pulse of power within it. So much of what I’ve witnessed around the Kinfolk and in the Underworld has been all about deception. Glamour. Truths that cleverly masquerade as lies, and vice versa. They all consider themselves experts in deception, but none of them has seen the truth that was right in front of them. None of them has truly seen me.
