The Fae King's Ruin

The Princess and the Shattering

Aislin didn’t get to sleep for long after all. The coordinators for their engagement party came right after lunch to show her the plans that they have already drawn up for the event. Thankfully, all looked good considering they were not given a lot of time to work on it, if a little too much culturally Seelie. While some of the preparations such as the catering and the venue were already set, Aislin’s input on the color scheme and the decorations had been gracefully accommodated.

The guest list was remarkably small, or at least in terms of their social status. The coordinators said that the King had only given them a list of names that absolutely had to be given invitations, the roster only going as high as a hundred and fifty people. He’d said that the rest was up for Aislin to fill.

And so she took the chance to invite as many of her friends from Cetha as she could. There was a slight worry about how the invitations would get to them and she would have to ask Avery or Res about how they’d actually get to Alfheim, but the coordinators assured her they would be part of the guest list.

After they had left, Aislin worked on a formal proclamation to make her cousin ‘regent’ of Mhoryga as soon as she was crowned. She’d sought the help of the royal librarians for wording and patterns in similar declarations since she wasn’t technically well-versed in making official statements that her brother made when he was in power.

Actually, now that she had come to think of it, Drakos never had any such official document. His word was law. Everyone knew that, and word did travel quite fast around their realm.

She was just going back to her suite, the roll of parchment in her hands waiting to be sealed with her coat of arms when she spotted Lord Elrin quietly talking to a few other Unseelie delegates from the Great Court in a short and narrow hallway to her right. Aislin paused in her steps and before they could spot her, pressed her back flat against a wall.

Straining her ears, she tried to get a better sense of their conversation but their voices were far too hushed for her Fae ears to pick up.

And hushed conversations could only mean a small number of things when it came to her uncle. 

Deciding not to push it, Aislin quickly backed away and turned around, where she was met by black eyes with pupils ringed in silver.

She grabbed Aelthrys by the sleeves and hauled him to the first empty, lockable room she could find, and turned on him with a glare.

“Were you on your way to meet with them?” she asked, unable to keep the anger from her voice. “And don’t you dare lie to me!”

Those silver-cored eyes flashed. “Don’t worry— I had no intention of lying. Yes, they called to see me.”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Why?” A dim memory suddenly resurfaced in Aislin’s mind. “I never did ask you about that first meeting you had with the Unseelie nobles. But you all should have stopped meeting in secret! The noble lands have been restored. All frozen holdings and accounts as well. The Court of Magic had even relinquished its hold throughout the realm!”

“I am working on it,” was his only tight reply. Aislin glared at him.

“No. You should have been updating me about it!” Anxiety building up inside of her, Aislin began to pace. “Do you know what would happen if they found out that you’re plotting something against the King? We would all be hanged for treason! Our people would lose Mhoryga completely and they’d be scattered all over again. You are a general. The highest ranking officer in my artillery. But you don’t see the risks of what you’re doing?”

He raised a thick brow. “Don’t you think that as my cousin and closest relative, I would put your safety above all else? That it is the sole reason why I keep meeting with them? Keep foiling their plans?”

That gave Aislin pause. She had no idea about any of the dealings going on with her court members, and while she had long known that Aelthrys dealt with the brunt of the cases, exactly what plans had he put a stop to before they became a problem she had to fix— if she could fix it at all?

When she found a chair, Aislin sat and looked up at her cousin. “Tell me everything.”

Aelthrys eyed her, long and hard, searching for any sign of doubt in her eyes that would convince him that she could not handle what he knew. But Aislin had to know despite the obvious notion that ignorance, in this case, was bliss. How could she stay in the dark when those only masquerading as her allies could very well implicate her in the eyes of a Seelie judge?

Crossing his arms, however, Aelthrys began to talk.

“Their original plan had been to return Mhoryga in the dead of night and seal off the realm permanently so no one could ever visit or return to Earth ever again,” he murmured quietly. “We had no standing army, no other allies than the few Fallen that had split off from Zachary’s command, and though they hated the coward’s way out, it had been their only plan. But it would have left the Unseelie village that had set up here in Alfheim, just on the outskirts of the village over the bridge. Thankfully, they found the conditions of the Great Council as a means for a larger opportunity.

“I didn’t have to do much for that first ploy, and to be honest, I wasn’t even against it. But the second plot was a bit trickier to go around. I knew they wouldn’t like the fact that there were only three Unseelies in the Great Council. A lot of the more power-hungry nobles wanted to be there. Though Elrin wasn’t much of a problem since he was clearly given the only other seat because of our blood ties to him, I had to convince the nobles that you were in the process of bringing balance to the representation on the Great Council.”

Aelthrys chuckled once, a sound that was void of all amusement, staring at his feet that were firmly planted on the red carpet. “I was counting on you to make the bold move. Though I didn’t expect that Avery would make you co-chair so soon. Neither did the nobles, and that made them all the more excited.” He shook his head. “Soon, ploys started to appear left and right. All of them to undermine the obvious power that the Seelie court primarily had over the Great Council. The greedy bastards couldn’t be satisfied with the control you already have. And then talks of your betrothal surfaced.”

Aislin’s blood immediately grew cold. When Aelthrys looked back up at her again, there was a warning in them that had not been there earlier.

“They are playing a long game, Aislin. One where you will be ultimately named as Queen of the two Fae courts. And I am doing everything I can to make sure all their plans fall short of achieving what they want.”

“They…” Aislin trembled as a shiver went down her spine. “They want to kill Avery?”

Her cousin’s answer was a mere nod.

All thoughts from Aislin’s head flew out the proverbial window. In her mind was a blank sheet— a canvas of the purest white, with a small, red stain that slowly crept outwards. It filled her mind’s eye until even her vision was tinged in the violent hue.

Avery might die at the hands of her kind, and the mere thought of him as a cold, lifeless body shook Aislin like a mighty and terrible earthquake. 

She did not notice as the room they were in shook along with the foundations of the diamond palace. There was a ringing in her ear that reached a high pitch. She hazily heard her cousin call out her name before all the tall windows in the small drawing room they were in shattered in a hailstorm of broken diamonds.