“You have nothing natural in your world,” Micah murmured, rousing me from thoughts of past betrayals. I glanced toward him and saw his temporarily brown eyes tracking a drone as it hummed across the horizon. “Everything is a machine.”
I laid my hand on top of Micah’s and grazed my thumb across his knuckles; all too often, I’d felt cut off from nature, imprisoned in a life dominated by timers and alarms. “The government told us machines were safer than nature, and we believed them,” I explained.
He harrumphed at this, and I smiled in spite of myself. Micah just might be different than all the rest. He hadn’t known about my family when he’d sought me out. He’d wanted me for me.
No, he’d just wanted to get some
.
“When we met,” I began. “In the parking lot. Do you do that a lot?”
“Dreamwalk?”
“Hop into cars with strange women.”
Micah chuckled. “No.”
“Then, why me?” He leaned close, caressing his fingers down my neck. “I couldn’t help myself.”
I downshifted, and Micah moved aside to allow me room; the action also hid the shiver that radiated from where his fingertips had just rested. I pulled onto a street that bordered the office lot and parked behind a decrepit hardware store. Only fools went there expecting to purchase hammers and nails; the place was really a front for an herbal tincture supply ring. In the modern world, midwives and Peacekeepers didn’t exactly get along.
“Why are you leaving the mechanical here?” Micah inquired.
“The office lot has cameras,” I explained. “If they see me pulling in with someone who isn’t an employee, I’ll have some explaining to do.” We got out and, when I looked across the roof, Mike was gone and my Micah once again stood before me. I felt a surge of warmth, as if the missing part of my soul had been returned to me after a long absence. He looked quizzically at me, but I just shook my head. I wasn’t quite ready to admit what I was feeling, consort or no. Then he took my hand, and after a short walk through the trees, we stepped out of my world and into his.
In a far shorter time than I needed to mentally prepare myself, we stood before a towering iron edifice. Maybe it was just the color, but the sight of the cruel spires and jagged, toothy gates chilled me to my core. It was a metal palace like Micah’s home, but the similarities ended there. Micah’s silver palace radiated warmth and happiness, but the structure before us was cold and gray, as if cold had transitioned from a sensation to one of the more tangible elements. I wanted to run and hide from the emotions stirred up by this iron palace, but I couldn’t. My way to Max and Dad lay within.
“Is it always like this?” My earlier uncertainties forgotten, at least for the moment, I laced my fingers with Micah’s. His flesh was warm, and likely the only bit of comfort I’d find here.
“Yes.” He squeezed my fingers as he led me through the massive gray archway. It reminded me of the entrance to a fairyland dungeon, replete with grotesques and gargoyles set about the roofline and a wickedly pointed iron gateway poised to impale any trespassers below. On either side of the entrance stood iron footmen, a bit rusty about the lower joints but formidable nonetheless. The sight of their gnarled, pointed teeth was enough to stop my heart.
“Ignore them,” Micah muttered as they leered at me. The footman to my right leaned closer, whispering the many things he’d do to my fragile form once Micah was distracted. I did as I was told and tried to ignore him, but this only made him mad. Saying he’d teach me a lesson, the footman’s hand shot out, quick as a snake, and grabbed at my wrist. Before I could scream, Micah’s hands were around his neck, and the footman’s head was rolling away from me.
“Sara!” I blinked, realizing that Micah was repeating my name. I tore my eyes from the severed head and looked at Micah. “Did he harm you?”
“N-no.” I looked at my wrist; Micah had moved so quickly that the footman hadn’t even touched me. “Is he dead?”
“Ferra will repair him, or not,” Micah said flatly as he ushered me inside the iron palace. I could hardly believe that Micah had so easily separated an iron guard’s head from his body, or that the guard wasn’t permanently dead—and wait, was Ferra seriously the Iron Queen’s name?
But then we were in the atrium of the Iron Queen’s palace, and I thought it best to leave off such musings. The interior gleamed with polished iron, accented here and there with ornate gold scrollwork supporting fat candles; it seemed like, if I looked closely, I could make out what appeared to be bones set amidst the gold, so I didn’t. As I glanced away, another vision caught me, this time the opening to an oubliette. A stench wafted upward along with pleas for clemency, and I wondered what they’d done to be thrown down the forgotten hole.
“Why does she get to use gold?” I mumbled, trying to make out the symbols etched into the golden ring edging the oubliette. Micah’s home was floor to ceiling silver, without so much as a speck of any other metals. Well, none except for me.
“She once captured a number of Gold Elementals, and stripped them,” Micah responded, startling me. For one, I’d been asking a rhetorical question, and two, what, exactly, did he mean by ‘stripped?’
“You mean, she took whatever metal they carried,” I said, a bit desperately. Micah’s grim eyes told me otherwise, and he nodded toward the oubliette. “Weapons and jewelry.”
“Everything that was of their element, she took,” he said. I clenched his arm so tightly I knew I’d leave a mark. Even I, intentionally kept ignorant of my power, knew that stripping one’s element left one a pathetic shell of one’s former self: powerless, hopeless, less than Mundane.
“Why didn’t the gold king—the gold queen! Why didn’t they stop her?” I demanded.
“Whose essence do you think decorates Ferra’s throne?” Micah countered. “Who do you think calls to us from the oubliette?” The room was warm and humid, but I shivered.
“What is this place?” I gasped, my eyes sweeping around the room, again coming to rest upon the oubliette.
“My queen’s home.” I must have looked well and truly panicked, because Micah leaned close and whispered against my ear, “Be strong. Your audience will be over quickly, and then we will leave at once.”
I nodded and offered him a reassuring smile; I knew it was weak, but what else could I do? I would try my best to remain aloof and ignore the obvious corruption pervading the Iron Queen’s palace. There was none of the softness of Micah’s home, no colorful tapestries or silky cushions. Even the floor was bare metal, but it was scuffed until it was little more than a murky puddle. I hated being here, hated everything about this horrible, wretched place. If it weren’t for the slim chance of learning vital information about Max and Dad, I would have turned and fled.
We pressed on and, upon reaching a massive set of rusty doors, Micah murmured a set of instructions to a footman. Quickly, he hurried off, and a few moments later he escorted us to the front of the atrium with alacrity, all the while referring to Micah as Lord Silverstrand.
“Why are we moving past the rest?” I wondered aloud.
“My name carries some clout,” Micah replied, with a wry grin.
Silverstrand. His surname was Silverstrand, he lived in a silver castle…
“Are you the lord of
all silver
?” I blurted in an almost reverential tone.
“I am,” he confirmed. “Though other metals are compliant as well,” he added, lightly touching the copper combs in my hair.
“I had no idea.” Micah looked as if he would say more, but another of the metal attendants stepped forth, this one rust-free. After a few curt instructions, we were ushered before the Iron Queen.
The queen’s hall was polished metal, not all scuffed and dull like the outer rooms,, though it had a long way to go before it would reach the reflective sheen of Micah’s home. Or maybe iron just doesn’t reflect as nicely as silver. Not to mention that the hall was packed shoulder to shoulder with, I don’t know, supplicants. Or petitioners, or whatever you call people who hang out in a glorified dungeon. There was every sort of beastie imaginable, from the innocuous gnome to what appeared to be the mythical Cyclops. Of all the critters to turn out to be real, it just had to be him.
Micah was unmoved by the press of bodies, and he strode purposefully toward the Elemental monarch. A gleaming gold pathway snaked through the hall like a ribbon, leading us toward a raised golden dais. There were four shallow steps, atop which Ferra, the Iron Queen, sat on a golden throne.
My breath caught in my throat at the sight of the metal queen. I’d never been in the presence of royalty before, and she carried herself as if she’d been born to her position. While she wasn’t beautiful, she sure wasn’t ugly. The queen’s jaw was square and her brow wide, her long steel-colored hair restrained by a narrow gold fillet before cascading down her shoulders. I wondered if that fillet was all that was left of the Gold Queen’s hair.
As my eyes traveled down her form, I gasped again; perhaps it was due to her status as Iron Queen, but whatever the reasoning her upper body was clad in a rather sheer chain mail shirt. Then, she shifted and my suspicion was confirmed: there was nothing beneath the mail. She also wore a mail skirt, though thankfully she was seated so I could at least pretend her lower half was covered, and a long crimson cloak shielded her back. My cheeks grew hot as I struggled to maintain my composure, and I hoped Micah would be called upon to speak first. I didn’t know if I could converse with half-naked royalty while maintaining a straight face.
“Lord Silverstrand,” the queen greeted. “Twice in one day you grace my hall. To what do we owe the honor?”
“As I advised my liege during my prior audience, my consort desires a boon,” he replied, his voice low and sonorous. The queen shifted her gaze to me and laughed softly. I could not imagine what was more amusing than her attire.
“You call this girl your consort? There is no silver upon her!” A chuckle bubbled up around us, but Micah kept his face impassive. I almost told the queen that she was wrong, that I was wearing Micah’s silver token, when the full meaning of her barb dawned upon me.
“You see, she blushes like a maid!” Ferra laughed at Micah’s expense. “What sort of consort have you dredged up, Micah? You’ll never get an heir if you only call children to your bed!”
His ears pinked, but his tone remained respectful. “Our situation is unusual, yes,” Micah allowed. “About the boon, my lady?”
“Yes, yes.” The queen waved her hand, and all laughter in the hall ceased. “What would you like to know, child?”
“My brother,” I squeaked; Mom would be furious if she knew I had let this woman intimidate me, queen or no. I took a deep breath and squared my shoulders, and was still a little shocked that my voice held steady. “He was taken away by my government ten years ago. I want to know if he’s still alive.”
“And he is an Elemental?”
“Yes, ma’am. He is of copper, as I am.”
The Iron Queen regarded me in silence for long, arduous moments. “If I am to determine whether he is live or dead, I must first hear his name.”
“Maximillien Corbeau,” I replied readily. “Maximillien Laurent Corbeau.”
The queen’s brows peaked in interest. “Should I know of your family?”
“My father was—is—Baudoin Corbeau.” When I said my father’s name, a palpable hush rolled across the hall. Those who’d laughed at Micah and me now looked at us with a measure of respect. Yes, I silently told them all, my father is the patriarch of the Raven clan and yes, in my brother’s absence, I am the heir apparent. No one was laughing now.
The queen rose and descended from her dais, and my hope that the lower half of her wore somewhat more than a chain mail skirt was dashed. It was more of a loincloth, leaving her legs bare nearly to her waist. There was, thankfully, a strategically placed belt. She stood before me and placed her fingertips on my temples; Micah mumbled a protest, but we both ignored him. Her fingers were hard, hard as iron, and I swear they poked through my skull and directly into my brain. After a small eternity, she spoke.
“I could tell you many things, little Raven,” the queen began. “I could tell you that in every generation there is a singularly gifted wielder of each element, an Inheritor of Power. I could tell you that all such Elementals of this generation are known, save metal. But I won’t.” Her steely eyes glinted, cold and foreboding like a winter’s dawn. “What I will tell you is that your brother lives, though I cannot bring him to you.” She pressed her fingers harder into my brain, and frowned. “You father I cannot sense, but then, that was always his way. Likely, Baudoin still breathes as well. I certainly cannot imagine him allowing death to have its way with him.”
Relief flooded me. Max was alive, Dad was probably alive. “Thank you, mistress.” She graced me with a cold, calculating smile before sweeping back to her throne; at least the cloak covered the back of her.
There was a bit of ceremony as Micah and I were dismissed from the Iron Queen’s presence, but I hardly heard it. The fact that Max and Dad were alive had me so elated my feet barely touched the floor. My head swam, drunk with my newfound knowledge, and I wondered what I should do next. I needed to call Sadie and get her to come home from college so I could tell her and Mom together. Then, we’d go into the old basement, the one the Peacekeepers hadn’t found…
“This was a mistake,” Micah said, suddenly. “We should not have come.”
I grabbed his hand, walking backward as I led him out of the dour iron hall and into the fresh air. “But she helped me, just like you said she would. Max is alive!” Micah yanked me toward him, trapping me between a metal wall and his similarly unyielding body.
“Why didn’t you tell me who your father is?” he demanded.
“I… I didn’t think it mattered,” I mumbled. Micah’s silver eyes blazed, and he pressed closer to me, so close I could feel the cold of the wall seep through my thin dress. He opened his mouth to say more, but one of the iron guards tapped him on the shoulder. After a few lewd comments about what we were doing pressed up against the wall, he sent us on our way. Micah remained sullenly silent until we were out of sight of the queen’s palace.