Holly Black - Tithe

She looked up at him through her lashes. He smiled and rested his chin on the top of her head, sliding his hand over her back.

"You want to be?"

He laughed. "Verily, I do. Do you doubt it?"

"Oh," she said, mind unable to catch up with the stunning joy that she felt. Joy, that was, for the moment, enough to push the other sorrows aside. Because it was true, somehow, he was here with her, and not with the Seelie Queen. "Oh."

His hands made long even strokes, from beneath the wings at her shoulder blades to the small of her back. "And that pleases you?"

"What?" She tilted her head up again, scowling. "Of course it does. Are you kidding?"

He drew back to look at her for a moment, searching her face. "Good," he sighed, and pressed her head once more to his chest, stroking her hair as he closed his eyes. "Good."

They stood like that for a long moment. Finally he pulled back from the embrace. "Thankfully," he said, "we don't need the car to get into the Unseelie Court. Walk with me."

The tree was gnarled and huge, its knobbed and gored trunk giving it the impression of sagging under its own weight. The bark was thin and chipped, flaking off like dry skin. At its base, there was a gaping hole where the roots split.

Lutie buzzed up from the hole. "No guards," she said, settling her small self in the tangle of Kaye's hair.

"And this leads where?" Kaye was trying to control her trembling, trying not to let on just how not ready for this she was.

"Through to the kitchens," Roiben replied, inching his body, feet first, through the gaps in the tree. Finally, his head disappeared into the dark, strands of silver catching on the splintered bark. She heard a clatter as he dropped down to the floor.

Kaye pushed her boots against the entrance, feeling some of the softer wood give way, chipping off as she slid them in and pushed, burying her legs to the knees. Then, on her back, wriggling forward like a snake, she pushed herself through. It was a long drop, and she bit back a yelp as she landed.

The tunnel was hot and cloudy with steam. Beads of moisture dotted Roiben's face, and his hair looked damp and heavy when he combed it back with one hand. He cocked his head to the left, and she moved ahead of him through the billowing steam.

The kitchen was a huge room with a firepit in the center of it and no visible ventilation system. Faeries scuttled around in the smoke with large pots, piles of skinned rats, little cakes, baskets of silver apples, and rolled casks of wine. The reek of blood assailed her. Blood stained the walls and the floor, boiled in the pots and dripped over the plates of raw meat. Roiben walked behind Kaye, his hand on the small of her back, pushing when he wanted them to move and clutching her coat to signal her to stop.

They crept into the room, staying close to the wall. A withered old faerie sat on a nearby stool, skinny legs dangling off the side, tongue sticking out of his mouth in concentration as he painted black apples a shiny, nail-lacquer red. His white hair stuck up in wild tufts, and he periodically adjusted his small spectacles as they slipped down his nose.

Next to the apple-painter, a huge green man with small horns on his bald head and fangs protruding over a fat upper lip wielded a cleaver over a collection of oddly shaped animal corpses, hacking them into stew-size chunks. Tattoos of roses and thorns ran up both of the man's beefy arms.

Kaye crept as quietly as any time she had snuck in late to the house, as any time she'd left a store with full pockets. She concentrated on her feet, bowing her head slightly and walking slowly and quietly through the doorway.

Soon the narrow hallway sloped down and opened into a larger passageway, this one floored with grayish marble and studded with huge, carved pillars. The ceiling dripped with stalactites. Kaye could hear people up ahead, shoes clicking like beetles on the stone floor.

Roiben pushed them both against the back of the pillar. He drew his sword from the sheath and was holding it against his chest. She found the dagger he'd given her earlier and clenched the handle desperately.

But the footfalls turned down another corridor. Kaye let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding.

They crept along like that until they came to a set of black double doors.

"What's in there?" Kaye asked.

"Wine and the aging thereof," he whispered back.

The room was all stone, stinking of yeast, casks lining the walls and glass bottles filled with infusions of various flowers. There were rose petals, violet petals, whole heads of marigolds, nettles floating like organic space ships, and other herbs she could not identify.

"What are those?" she whispered. There was no one in the room.

"Wormwood, yarrow, cowslip, gillyflowers, agrimony, fennel—"

"I bet you drink a lot of herbal tea," she said.

He did not smile as he directed her toward the smaller of the two doors in the room. She wondered if he even realized it was a joke.

"Laundry," he said.

The next room was filled with as much or more steam than the kitchens. It wafted up through small vents in the ceiling. In the room were several large tubs filled with soapy water. One pale woman with dark eyes was wringing out a white cloth while another was stirring the contents of a tub with a long crooked stick. A man with long arms and a hunched back was adding some granules to the mix, making the water hiss.

It was a small space, and Kaye cast a glance at Roiben. There was no way they could get through the room without anyone seeing them.

"Maigret," Roiben said, grinning as he opened his arms wide.

One of the laundry women looked up, her grin showing she was missing a tooth. "Our knight!" She limped over and gave him a highly ordinary hug. Her feet were hidden beneath the long skirts of her dress, and Kaye could not glimpse to see if there was something actually wrong with them. Across the room, the man and woman looked up from their duties and smiled too. "You're one I thought sure never to see again."

"I'm looking for a boy," Roiben said. "Human. With your new King."

The woman made a disgusted sound. "That one… King indeed! Yes, there's a boy about, but I can't tell you more than that. I've learned better than to draw the eye of Gentry."

Roiben smiled wryly. "And I as well."

"They're looking for you, you know."

He nodded. "I made a rather spectacular end to my service here."

The old laundress cackled and bid them farewell. Roiben opened a small door and they emerged into a hallway of shimmering mica.

"How do you know they won't tell anyone they saw us?"

"Maigret thinks she owes me a debt." He shrugged.

"Is something wrong with her feet?"

"She disappointed one of the Unseelie Gentry. He had iron shoes heated red-hot before he made her dance in them."

Kaye shuddered. "Does that have something to do with the debt she thinks she owes you?"

"Perhaps," he allowed.

"What about through there?"

"There's the library, the music room, the conservatory, and the chess room."

"Chess room?"

"Yes, chess was well loved by the Queen. They gamble with it like mortals gamble with cards. She once used it to win a consort, as I recall."

"Corny loves chess—he was on the chess team in high school."

"We must go through the library to get there." He hesitated.

"What's the matter?"

"We've seen no guards. Not at the entrance and not even here."

"What if that means we're just doing really, really well?"

"Of a surety, it means something."

The door to the library was mammoth and elegant, clearly different from the plainer doors in the lower chambers. It was dark wood, banded with copper, carved with a language she could not read. Roiben pushed the door, and it opened.