Roundtable Redcap by D.R. Perry

Author:D.R. Perry [Perry, D.R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: LMBPN Publishing
Published: 2021-06-09T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

Irina

“Welcome to the jungle,” I said over the eighth and final chime. “Oh, no. We only have five hours now?”

“The wall and the maze must have taken more time than I thought.” Fred headed down the path, his strides twice as long as they’d been before and during our time in the maze. “Come on, let’s go.”

I jogged to keep up, my stomach sinking as I glanced around at the underbrush. It was all fine and well for Daryl the Spite to roam around a jungle in the Under, for me not so much. Fred’s words when we entered the Under pounded through my brain along with my hurried footsteps: “Stay on the path.” Damn skippy, I’d stay on the path. Wild brownies couldn’t drag me away.

Fred glanced over his shoulder, adjusting his stride so I could keep up with him better. I nodded, unable to even give him a breathless word of thanks by that point. I understood the need to hurry, agreed with it, too. The sun in the vision of the queen’s courtyard stood at high noon. The sun at the portal had been early dawn. Here, it looked to stand maybe at seven. I'd heard that it didn't move here and you could chart a course by it. We could be as much as an hour behind where we needed to be in order to save Ed. The queen’s threats and cruel words still twisted in my gut, driving me even harder to rescue the kid from her clutches at any cost. I shivered.

“It’s a jungle, Irina.” Fred gave me a look that could have gone from a security guard to a shoplifter. “Subtropical. Why are you shivering?”

“Seeing that woman, how she treated your brother. The queen’s just awful.” I wasn’t about to give him even the short version of a story I’d only ever told to Grandpa, especially not here.

“Yeah. Not what I expected from what I heard growing up, though.” He scratched his head. “She’s supposed to follow the rules. Faeries aren’t supposed to take mortals to the Under without their express agreement. So how and why did she manage to get Ed in the first place?”

“Probably told him she had you here, or your mom or dad.” I slapped a hand over my mouth. The last thing Fred needed was more to worry about. If I kept spouting off like that, he’d start asking questions about my past again.

“But she can’t lie if she’s asked a direct question. Ed knows better than to take any Seelie’s word about something like that.” He turned on those suspicious eyes again. “Why did you smack yourself?”

“Um.” I gulped. “Flies like the jungle. Anyway, she can tell as many half-truths as she wants. That’s probably what she did. Made it seem like she had someone Ed cares about here, or maybe made a threat. She has no problem making those as we got to see.”

“She sucks.” He shook his head.

“Yeah, that she does.” I shuddered again but wasn’t sure why.

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