Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices #2)(76)

"The one with the beard is Prince Erec," said Mark. "The King's favorite. The other is Prince Adaon. Kieran says that Adaon does not like to see people hurt. But Erec enjoys it."

It seemed to be true. Erec produced a rope of thorns and held it out toward Adaon, who shook his head and walked away toward the pavilion. Shrugging, Erec commenced binding Kieran to the tree trunk. His own hands were protected with thick gloves, but Kieran was wearing only a torn shirt and breeches, and the thorns cut into his wrists and ankles, and then his throat when Erec pulled a strand of the vicious rope tight against his skin. Through it all, Kieran slumped inertly, his eyes half-closed, clearly beyond caring.

Mark tensed, but Julian held on to him. Cristina had rejoined them and was pressing her hand over her mouth; she stared as Erec finished with Kieran and stepped back.

Blood welled from the lacerations where the thorn bindings cut into Kieran's skin. His head had fallen back against the trunk of the tree; Emma could see his silver eye, and the black one as well, both half-lidded. There were bruises on his pale skin, on his cheek and above his hip where his shirt was torn.

There was a commotion atop the pavilion, and a single blast from a horn shattered the murmuring quiet in the clearing. The gentry looked up. A tall figure had appeared beside the throne. He was all in white, salt-white, with a doublet of white silk and gauntlets of white bone. White horns curled from either side of his head, startling against the blackness of his hair. A gold band encircled his forehead.




       
         
       
        
Cristina exhaled. "The King."

Emma could see his profile: It was beautiful. Clear, precise, clean like a drawing or painting of something perfect. Emma couldn't have described the shape of his eyes or cheekbones or the turn of his mouth, and she lacked Jules's ability to paint it, but she knew it was uncanny and wonderful and that she would remember the face of the King of the Unseelie Court for all her life.

He turned, bringing his face into full view. Emma heard Cristina gasp faintly. The King's face was divided down the middle. The right side was the face of a young man, luminous with elegance and beauty, though his eye was red as flame. The left side was an inhuman mask, gray skin tight and leathery over bone, eye socket empty and black, mottled with brutal scars.

Kieran, bound to the tree, looked once at the monstrous face of his father and turned his head away, his chin dropping, tangled black hair falling to hide his eyes. Erec hurried toward the pavilion, joining Adaon and a crowd of other princes at their father's side.

Mark was breathing hard. "The face of the Unseelie King," he whispered. "Kieran spoke of it, but . . ."

"Steady," Julian whispered back. "Wait to hear what he says."

As if on cue, the King spoke. "Folk of the Court," he said. "We have gathered here for a sad purpose: to witness justice brought against one of the Fair Folk who has taken up arms and murdered another in a place of peace. Kieran Hunter stands convicted of the murder of Iarlath of the Unseelie Court, one of my own knights. He slew him with his blade, here in the Unseelie Lands."

A murmur ran through the crowd.

"We pay a price for the peace among our folk," said the King. His voice was like a ringing bell, lovely and echoing. Something touched Emma's shoulder. It was Julian's hand, the one that wasn't clasping Mark's arm. Emma looked at him in surprise, but he was staring ahead, toward the clearing. "No Unseelie faerie shall raise hand against another. The price of disobedience is justice. Death is paid with death."

Julian's fingers moved quickly against Emma's skin through her shirt, the age-old language of their shared childhood. S-T-A-Y H-E-R-E.

She whipped around to look at him, but he was already moving. She heard Mark's breath hiss out in a gasp and caught at his wrist, preventing him from going after his brother.

Under the starlight, Julian walked out into the clearing full of Unseelie gentry. Emma, her heart pounding, held tight to Mark's wrist; everything in her wanted to rush out after her parabatai, but he had asked her to stay, and she would stay, and hold on to Mark. Because Julian was moving as if he had a plan, and if he had a plan, she owed it to him to trust that it might work. 

"What is he doing?" Cristina moaned, in an agony of suspense. Emma could only shake her head. Some of the faeries on the edge of the crowd had spotted him now and were gasping, drawing back as he approached. He had done nothing to cover the black, permanent runes on his skin-the Voyance rune on the back of his hand glared like an eye at the Fair Folk in their gaudy finery. The woman in the dress made of bones gave a screech.