The lid began to creak open, allowing a soft glow within. Griselda covered her chest in feigned modesty and practiced her most frightened expression. The man would see her vulnerable and either pity or desire her. She would use her wiles to break free then have her revenge on everyone: her niece, the arrogant prince, the meddling witch, and Elusion.
The stinging and scuttling infestation receded from her body as the lid fell away, washing her in greenish, hazy light. The scent of feathers and wind drifted to her nostrils, slamming her with nostalgia—almost as if the mention of his name had conjured him.
She sat up in the stale air and smiled smugly. “Of course. At the sentencing, you were playing a part, pretending to hate me. All so you could save me here, where no one could see.”
Before Elusion could answer, she leapt into his arms.
Quietly, he forced her to stand, her bare feet still within the box. He removed his jacket. His orange eyes glinted in the dimness—not hungrily as they once had when he looked upon her in a nightdress. They glinted cold as ice, a foil to their fiery color.
Griselda shook off a bout of insecurity. “Now that you have your wings back, you must be grateful I took such good care of them.” She raised her welted arms, expecting him to help her into his jacket. Instead, Luce folded it into a square and used it to dust the remaining few bugs from her body without crushing them or touching her.
“Such good care, indeed. I can’t get the scent of smoke out, no matter how high I fly. But anything is better than being human, tied to an inescapable, aging form.” He cocked his chin at her pointedly, then shrugged into his jacket, his crimson wings sinking through the fabric and reappearing to arch high behind him like feathery mist.
Griselda fumed, feeling exposed in her human body—every sag and wrinkle on full display. “I thought you preferred haggard and hideous, considering your attachment to the harrower witch.”
The sylph bared his pointed teeth in a vicious, chest-deep growl. “Speak of her again and I will rip out your jugular and devour your bones.”
Griselda withered at the threat, but refused to let him see her fear.
He straightened his lapel, regaining composure. “I didn’t come to relive old times with you. I didn’t come for you at all. Who would? You alienated or murdered everyone who once might’ve cared.” He shook his red head in pity and helped her step out of the box, pointing to a tree with a thin layer of ash surrounding it. “Stand over there, would you? I need room to gather up these little darlings. My queen was concerned for their well-being. She feared her black widows and scorpions might suffer contamination should they be too long exposed to your toxicity.”
Anger spiked anew in Griselda’s blood, but she could only lean against the trunk—her limbs heavy, her stomach nauseous, and her head light. She’d been stung countless times and the venom was spreading. “So, you are her errand boy now?” She snarled, trying to stay focused. “Does your ‘queen’ know of your past? Does she know how you killed her mother?”
“We killed her, Glistenda.”
The name made Griselda stiffen with fury. But even as her spine ate into the tree, the bark grew smoother, softer, as if it gave beneath her. Hallucinations. Her vision wavered, though she managed to stay standing.
“And no, Queen Lyra isn’t aware of my hand in her fate. I’ll not confess simply to soothe my guilty conscience. The gnawing ache within the pit of me will be my burden to bear. Something I’d never expect you to relate to.”
“Of course. For you know who I am. Just as you know you’re the reason I have no remorse.”
He flapped his wings restlessly, as if bored by the conversation. “I once blamed myself, but no longer. I didn’t influence your decision . . . used none of my sylphin gifts on you that day. Mistress Umbra looked within your heart and saw the truth of your desire. You chose to give up your conscience all on your own.”
Griselda pressed deeper into the tree, her skin feverish and chilled. “As if your choices are so noble. Choosing to protect your scabby hide by lying to ‘your queen.’”
“I’m protecting her. She’s had too much loss in her life as it is. I refuse to take away another person—or place or thing—she needs or cares for.” Elusion opened the bag at his feet. “But there’s a penalty for my dishonesty—an obligation. Though I’ll never be her errand boy, or a white knight, or any honored member of her court, I’ll spend the rest of my ageless life tied to one portion of the sky, tethered to her.” Elusion laid out several jars, then crouched to tenderly separate the bugs into each one before replacing their mesh lids. “Should she call, I’ll always return. There are tasks she’ll need done that only a sylph can provide.” He tucked the jars into the bag. “Such as coaxing a corrupted regent into thinking she has the upper hand when all along she’s been given the final nail for her coffin. A nail in the form of a boxful of memories. It’s fitting, don’t you think? Me tricking you the same as I once tricked Eldoria’s queen for you.”
Griselda howled and lunged, only to find herself stuck to the tree, unable to budge. The tree branches had hold of her antlers . . . but they weren’t branches at all. They were illusory arms and hands and fingers. She wrestled to get free, freezing when a cluster of formless silhouettes slipped from the trunk, their white eyes blinking.
Griselda’s heart quailed. “No!”
Mistress Umbra skimmed into view and Griselda screeched louder.
Elusion lifted his bag, then took out a box. He looked from the mother shroud to the collective surrounding Griselda. “Crony’s debt is paid. As is mine.” He tossed the box to Griselda’s feet, stirring a puff of dust. “Our business is ended, and I’ve a wedding to attend. See you on the other side of the moon, Mistress Umbra.”
The creature released a hissing laugh. “Charming as ever, Elusion. Good to have you back to your old self. And may today be the beginning of Eldoria’s night.”
“Wait! Don’t leave me!” Griselda screamed as the sylph drank a smoky mixture from a vial and vanished.
The box at Griselda’s feet rattled. Even had her name not been scripted across it, she would’ve known those contents belonged to her, would’ve recognized the sounds within . . . the clangor of wings and wails that called out on the voice of her many crimes.
“No, please! I don’t want to feel!”
Mistress Umbra’s beakish mouth turned on an appalling smile as she began to rip away Griselda’s gown. “Didn’t I tell you, little princesss? That you would come again to seek our company. Didn’t I predict you’d need a place to hide those sins that twist and twine like the branches of a tree?” Her beady gaze shifted to Griselda’s bald head.
Sobbing, Griselda slumped, held up only by her antlers now . . . by the prongs that jutted like twigs from her skull.
Mistress Umbra’s scraggly, creaturely fingers opened the box and released the teal-feathered starlings. “And did I not vow to show you the same mercy you practiced throughout your life? No more . . . no lesss?”
Inky black lines crept into Griselda’s flesh, taking the form of spiders and scorpions. They scuttled beneath the surface, engulfing her arms and spreading through the rest of her body until her hands were no longer the only things infested . . . until all of her was.
Griselda shivered beneath the intrusion. Her antlers came free and she fell to her knees. Her body grew weightless and her skin sheer, offering no barrier to the starlings slamming into her bones. Their claws and beaks scraped along her organs and innards, embedding the anguish and remorse within every piece and parcel of her being: poisonings, destructive potions, broken childhoods—her own daughters forced to pay the penalty for her wrongs with their lives: past, present, and future. The beasts she murdered, the niece she tortured, the brother she slayed after killing his wife. And Kiran’s loyal first knight . . .
“Ah, and here we are,” Mistress Umbra baited, viewing Griselda’s thoughts and pain as she walked inside her mind. “At last we see him . . . Sir Nicolet, this knight you murdered who was the boy you once loved. You came here to make him return your love that day, so long ago. Well, it had been a needless trek, it would seem. Crony shared his final memory with us. Should you like to know it now?”
Griselda couldn’t answer, for her bones were splintering. She coughed up blood, then watched it sink into her translucent skin to form black contusions.
“He loved you always. As the boy, as the man. He wanted to prove himself worthy of you, so he waited until he became a knight to court you. But then, you’d already married another. So he waited again. He intended to ask for your hand on the day you had him killed. That was his final memory, thinking of the life he’d wanted to live with you and your daughters, heartbroken over your betrayal. Your name upon his lips with his last breath.”
Griselda wept then, the agony and regret too great to bear.