The Fae King's Ruin

Arrival

King Avery morosely stirred his tea, hating the silence that greeted him this morning. He glanced at the handwritten note that Ola had delivered to him, pouting at the lovely scrawl written across it. Aislin had apologized for not being able to have breakfast with him. She had briefly explained that she wished to speak to his cousin privately, whom she trained with earlier. And, not wanting to schedule it later in the day and give Catteline the chance to renege on her, she thought breakfast would be best.

He did not want to sound like a child, but Aislin had been such an integral part of starting his day. Talking to her, seeing her face, and getting to talk to her always made his day brighter. And it wasn’t just him. His clerks had noticed that he was much happier coming into work when he started having breakfast with Aislin.

On the bright side, however, he wouldn’t miss her TOO much as the Princess’ note had also included an invite to lunch instead. He would only need to brave through the day and suck it up.

He finished his breakfast and cleaned up after himself, eager to get plenty of work done in the morning as he fully intended to stretch lunch for as long as possible. He greeted the guards on his way out, meaning to attend his first meeting for the day, but paused at the top of the stairs in pleasant surprise.

“Res!” he exclaimed happily, jogging down the steps to meet him on the landing. “Why is it that I have not seen your face since the New Year’s Ball?”

The Hand of the King frowned at his best friend, a look that Avery pointedly ignored as he scanned him from head to foot. His cerulean eyes had soft, dark shadows underneath them, his jawline smattered with stubble. He was also wearing riding clothes and britches, his leather boots caked with mud as if he had been out riding.

Wait, has he? Rifling through his brain, he tried to think back on the schedule that Res had after the New Year before slowly realizing exactly what his Hand had set out to do.

His mouth popped open in a mix of horror and surprise. “Are you meaning to say you’re only getting back?” he gasped. “Just now?”

Res continued to be unamused by him. “Yes,” he bit out, stomping angrily as he stalked for Avery’s suite.

With an angry ‘bang!’ of the door, Res stormed in and began taking off his royal blue cloak, unbuckled his sword from his side, and turned on Avery who’d been quietly shadowing his footsteps.

“I have sent word two days ago, Avery!” he huffed in frustration. “Have you not been reading your mails?”

“I got nothing!” Avery insisted with earnest. “I swear on my crown, Res, I would never ignore a missive from you that is of importance.”

“Well, on our way to Cetha, we had been ambushed,” he stressed, fuming. “It wasn’t personal, I think. Just some bandits who wanted what we carried. Apparently, fu*cking live chickens are a hot commodity in that Ilyn-forsaken realm and they were ready to rip our heads off if we didn’t give it to them.”

The air in his lungs left him as Res’ words hit him like a punch to the chest. 

When he arranged for his Hand to coordinate with local authorities in Mhoryga about their visit to Aislin’s childhood estate in the following couple of weeks, he had never anticipated that something as horrible as this could happen during their travel. This was the angriest he had ever seen Res which only added to his shock and guilt. His friend usually took everything in with humorous lenses, but the fact that he was spitting mad now due to the difficulties they had faced and the absolute hell of luck they had to contend with probably meant that he was taken by surprise as well.

After all, while these things happened sometimes in their own court, no noble had ever stumbled across the misfortune of being targeted. 

“Ambushed?” Last he remembered, the Seelie Fae's magical abilities were effective in Mhoryga. “How were you ambushed?”

Res rolled his eyes. “How does one get ambushed, Avery? Gods!” he burst in frustration, beginning to pace. “They had pouches of purple powder and blew it in our direction until we were coughing it up. After that, we couldn’t summon our powers. Roots sprung forth from the ground and started binding us helpless to the ground while the little fu*cks ransacked the trunks.”

“What happened to your escorts? You were supposed to have guards accompanying you.” It had been his agreement with the delegates in the Great Council that he found also came from Cetha. “Did they not show up?”

He shook his head. “It was too late when we realized we arrived at the wrong drop-off. We had to find the nearest village just to be able to point us in the right direction. About seventy miles from the city proper was when we were robbed. And by the time we actually did arrive in Cetha, we were a day late and no one was expecting us to show up anymore 

“I sent word because our powers still had not returned by the next morning. By then, none of us trusted the Unseelie to actually get us to the right drop-off here in Alfheim. So, we had to wait.”

Res ended his retelling with less steam than when he first started, his shoulders already drooping as a sign of the exhaustion that only Avery could imagine. His own powers had only been taken away from him once, but that was only for a few minutes. But Res and the others? They had to deal with hours of crippling fear from being unable to feel that swell of magic always just right at their fingertips and wondering whether it would even ever come back.

Avery took his hand and placed it on Res’ shoulder. “I am so sorry for what you have gone through. I will make this right, I promise.”

“You better,” Res grumbled before his expression darkened even further. “Could you ask General Aelthrys to come here? I have news from his home that he needs to hear.”

He frowned. “Of course, but what’s happened?”

Res sighed. “Hopefully, nothing comes out of it. But he needs to know that the rebellion that he had been trying to silence in the South had been taking back several key locations in Cetha.” He shook his head sadly. “I think Aislin is in the middle of an uprising and she does not even know.”