Prince of Air and Darkness (The Darkest Court)

He throws his head back and guffaws. A few of the Seelie sitting at the bar look down at their drinks and snicker, but the majority of the Unseelie who’d been surrounding Goodfellow look down or away. Some are brave enough to shake their heads disapprovingly. A troll I had a class with steps forward and tugs at Goodfellow’s arm.

“You’ve probably had enough to drink,” he tells Goodfellow. When the faerie messenger allows another faerie from the crowd to lead him back to the bar, the troll glances at me and says, “Sorry about that, Finny. He’s drunk.”

“Yeah,” I mumble, “’s fine.”

No one else stops me as I head for more familiar and friendly company. My satyr roommate, Herman, and his demi-Gorgon girlfriend, Sue, have already claimed our usual table on the quiet edge of the dance floor. Sue’s tucked against Herman’s side in the booth, contentedly reading a book despite the noisy chaos surrounding us. Herman pushes an empty chair toward me with his hoof. “What happened back there?”

“Goodfellow was being a douche canoe, as usual.”

Herman clicks his tongue and frowns. “I hate that guy. Don’t worry about heading over there again. Gumba already went to grab the beer.”

“Thank God.” I glance over my shoulder, checking for the bridge troll in the crowd. Like most bridge trolls, he towers over everyone, except for some of the giants and minotaurs, so it doesn’t take long to spot him. “If someone else gets it, I’ll cover the next pitcher.”

“Bad day?” Sue asks without looking up from her page.

“Not one of my best. Not one of my worst, though.”

Herman and I watch the roving tentacles and hands of the nearest dancers in comfortable silence while we wait for Gumba to return. It doesn’t take long. He uses his stony elbow to bump my shoulder as he rejoins us, rumbling a greeting as he sets down the tray filled with glasses and two pitchers of cheap pale beer.

I pour myself a glass and take a long swig before leaning back in my chair and grinning up at him. “You look good tonight. Any special reason?”

Gumba lifts a hand self-consciously to the thick layer of rich green moss covering his head, moss that looks carefully sheared. “No,” he says.

“Liar.” Sebastian, Gumba’s roommate, slides into the chair beside me. “He’s finally going out with Winnifred tonight.”

Sue, who’s already marked her page and set aside the book, smiles at Gumba. “That’s great!”

“Took you long enough to make a move,” Seb teases.

“Not all of us can charm our way through both sídhes.”

I shake my head and focus on my beer, amused by the familiar argument. Gumba and Sebastian are both Unseelie, part of Queen Mab’s Winter Court, but that’s the only similarity between them, in looks and personality. Gumba’s painfully shy and hyper-aware that his rocklike appearance can scare off others, despite it being proof of his specialized magickal talents. It’s taken him two years to work up enough courage to ask Winnifred, a Seelie dew sprite, out. Sebastian, on the other hand, is openly friendly to almost everyone and doesn’t take on the physical characteristics of his magick. Instead, he takes after the painfully attractive human appearance of other powerful faeries. Faeries like Roark.

Sebastian nudges me, derailing that train of thought. “You, on the other hand, look terrible. And it’s not from your disgusting workout clothes. Did you cut the sleeves off that shirt yourself?”

“Someone woke up early again,” Herman informs the table over Sebastian’s fashion commentary.

Sue sets down her beer and shoots me a worried glance. “Is everything okay? Hasn’t that been happening a lot?”

I shrug and rub at the back of my neck. “It’s fine. Had to get in some practice for class anyway.” Always look on the bright side, that’s what my mom says.

Conversation meanders around various topics as we settle in and get comfortable. At some point, Sebastian goes off to dance with William, a rot faerie from one of our agriculture classes, leaving the rest of us to continue jawing. Moments like this have a funny habit of catching me off guard. I never once thought I’d be sitting in a dimly lit bar, surrounded by beings I’d read about in fairy tales, talking about how much my Advanced Potions and Antidotes test sucked weasel balls, or how Herman’s Fundamental Circuitry with Cosmic Couplers is the most fascinating thing since he discovered tits, or how Gumba’s working on getting legislation passed to secure water rights for his clan’s watershed.

Before being invited to attend Mathers all those years ago, my life’s course seemed etched in stone. I’d have graduated from a local college I attended thanks to a football scholarship. I’d be back on the farm in Iowa, helping my dad. There wouldn’t be other options. There wouldn’t be much except a lifetime of hard work spreading out ahead of me.

The ley line awakening in me gave me freedom. It opened up doors to opportunities—to fucking worlds—I never imagined could be real. It made me unique, one of the few human hosts in history to have access to this kind of power, and my need to learn control over it is what pushed the world’s magickal governments, the Pantheons, to give me a full-ride scholarship until I finish my master’s.

No matter what happens in the future, no matter the irrevocable physical cost of channeling this kind of power, it will have been worth it if I can use the ley line to help my family before...well, before I can’t help anyone.

“Finny, seriously, what the fuck’s wrong with you?” Herman asks, forehead wrinkling in concern. “Did something bite the back of your neck?”

I drop my hand, surprised to be caught in the motion again. “No, I just... Something feels off,” I explain lamely. “Prickles and shit. It’s fine.”

And, upon uttering those fateful words, the door of Domovoi’s slams open. A dark, floating figure hovers in the doorway. Green flames blaze where its eyes should be and shredded cloth hangs from its lanky, decomposing form. Under the partially exposed ribs, a grey, shriveled pair of hearts beat arrhythmically.

A low whisper of adrenaline mixes with the flip of nausea in my stomach. This thing doesn’t look interested in doing body shots, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it’s also having a shitty night and is here to relax.

Domovoi’s goes silent, even Robin Goodfellow, who never stops bragging about his sucky middle-management gofer job.