The Twilight Kingdom

Prologue

In the dimness where night gives way to dawn, two fey monarchs met in the center of an oak-encircled clearing. The starlit grass shimmered with magic, cold and bright, as the pair faced one another.

IDeep shadows stretched behind the Dark Queen. Stars tangled, icy and brilliant, in her midnight hair, and her eyes were black as an eclipse. Things better left unseen in the bleak hours of the night crept beside her on disjointed limbs. Their feral eyes glowed as they crouched in the clouded tatters of her gown.

The Bright King carried midday in his wake, his hair shining with remembered sun, his golden armor aglow. The small fire of pixies hovered at his shoulders, wreathing him in a crown of light.

The creatures of their courts watched the fateful meeting. Fantastical forms capered in and out of the trees or perched, moon-pale, wizened, and gnarled, upon the branches.

“Greetings, brother,” the Dark Queen said, her dusky voice filling the silence like smoke.

“Well met, sister.” The Bright King inclined his head. “Have you an answer to our troubles? Troubles which, I recall, you worsened with your obvious meddling in the mortal world.”

The queen’s eyes narrowed, glittering. “You failed as well, despite your trickery. Despite your promises and enticements.”

Her tone was edged with ice, and the creatures nearest her shifted away.

“The mortals are clever,” the king said. “Much as it pains me to admit such a thing. Fair Jennet and Bold Tamlin—”

“Speak not those names to me!” she cried. “Your pain cannot compare to mine. It is a constant coal burning beneath my breast. Yet we must lay aside our differences and work together. The entire Realm suffers, Unseelie and Seelie both.”

At her words, the watching fey folk muttered and hissed. The bright lights trailing the king dimmed, and the cold midnight of the queen faded. A bitter wind stirred the grasses at their feet, bringing with it the scent of decay.

Glancing over his shoulder, the king lowered his honey-rich voice. “It is dangerous for us to do so. It upsets the balance. We do not want to wake them.”

them“When have they bothered themselves with the Realm?” Frigid anger rolled off the queen. “We are dying from lack of mortal sustenance, and they pay no heed. Perhaps, when we break through into the human world, they will stir. But by then, it will be too late.”

theytheyFrom the shadows, a tall, antlered figure raised his eerie head. The red-eyed hounds at his feet howled, their spectral cries wavering through the air—the Wild Hunt, always eager to be loosed.

“Leash your hounds,” the king said, his voice tight.

“I will not wreak havoc upon your court, if that is what you fear.” The Dark Queen laughed, the sound like ice cracking on a winter lake. “At least, not yet. So, brother, are we in accord?”

“Little good our rivalry does us, if our entire land is imperiled.” The king frowned. “It forebodes me, but I see no other course. We shall strive together to restore our kingdoms. But mark me well—when strength returns to the Realm of Faerie, I shall spare you no mercy.”

“Nor I you.” The Dark Queen sent him a knife-edged smile.

The watchers in the shadows stirred again, their eyes bright and menacing. Blades and teeth shone in the silvery light and a band of redcap goblins hissed, eager to battle their long-standing enemies.

“Be still!” the Dark Queen cried, her voice slashing the air.

The goblins subsided, but restive tension hummed through the clearing. Brightness clawed farther above the horizon, and the dark creatures of the Unseelie Court drew back into the dimness beneath the trees.

“A truce, until the Realm is secure,” the king said. “Together we will open the gateway to the mortal world. Now seal the bargain—in blood.”

The queen raised an imperious hand, and one of her willowy handmaidens approached, a pewter bowl cradled between her hands. The faerie maid knelt on the soft grass between the monarchs and held the bowl up, her pale head bowed.

From her gossamer sleeve, the Dark Queen drew out a long, black thorn, the point sharp and deadly. The king nodded and produced a shining golden needle. The monarchs extended their hands over the bowl, each one poised to prick the other’s palm to the bone.

The wind ceased and the fey folk held their breath. Silence descended across the Realm. In the dark bogs, Phoukas rose, lifting their eerie horse-heads. Hobs huddled in their bracken hovels, and even the most frivolous of pixies dimmed.

“By this blood, the Realm will live,” the king said.

“By this blood, the Realm might die,” the queen countered. “Seal our fate, brother.”

The king’s golden needle plunged into the queen’s palm. She let out a sharp cry, quickly swallowed. A trickle of blood, dark as midnight, fell into the bowl, and the faerie maiden holding it trembled.

Quick as dusk descending, the queen stabbed the king’s hand with her black thorn. He hissed in pain as a trickle of blood, glowing like distilled sunlight, fell into the bowl.

The instant the blood touched blood, a vortex of light swirled up, red flame and cold blue fire, heat and darkness, flooding the clearing like a visible scream. The monarch’s faces lit with eldritch color as light clashed against dark. Around them, their courtiers fell to the ground, turning their gazes away from that terrible light.

The tall oaks bowed and swayed, bending like grass as the land carried the magic deep into itself.

The maiden holding the bowl cried out, high and shrill. It was the sound of a hawk descending; it was the cry of its prey as cruel talons pierced to the heart. Radiance spilled from her body, then coal-black cinders as she turned to ash. The bowl tumbled to the grass, empty.

The Realm shuddered. Stilled.

“It is done,” the queen gasped. “Seelie and Unseelie are united.”

The king dipped his head, his face lined with strain.

“My court will linger no more in this place.” She glanced at the sky. “Already it grows too light. We shall meet again.”

She lifted a pale hand and swept back into the midnight half of the Realm. Her retinue followed: banshees with hollow eyes, sharp-toothed goblins, a silent-helmed knight encased in black armor, and all the varied dark denizens of the Unseelie Court.

The king beckoned his own court into the noontime brightness of his domain. They streamed into the light, pixies and hobs, sprites and faerie maidens, the clear notes of a harp shimmering behind them. Then the clearing was empty; only a charred circle on the grass bearing testament as dawn brightened the sky to pale gold.

Something stirred between the oaks, and two figures stepped from the shadowy trees. The taller one seemed nearly human, though dressed in faerie raiment. A battered guitar was slung across his back, and regrets and secrets lined his face.

His companion was a nut-brown sprite garbed in a tatter of leaves and dreaming, his hair tangled around his sharp features.

The two exchanged somber looks, a wealth of worry in the air.

“So, Bard Thomas,” the sprite said. “It is as we feared.”

“Aye.” The man shook his head in a weary gesture. “The way forward is almost too difficult to contemplate.”

A chill breeze shivered the leaves of the trees, and he pulled his cape more tightly about himself.

The sprite floated up until he could set one long-fingered hand on the man’s shoulder.

“Hold fast,” he said in a high, piping voice. “The balance will be restored. It must be.”

Thomas nodded, his eyes deep with sorrow. “Yes. But at what cost?”