WeareLow Fae.House Faronne boasts mainly youths under five hundred, uncouth and loud, few of usoutside the direct bloodline with any strong power. Some of us have our Skills, which are useful, but a Skill doesn't always equal sheer strength.
None of you have any dignity,he adds with a curl of spite.
Baba.
He is only one man.
True.
Tata Fatma and Murungaru too. But though they’re the best behaved of us all and related to me by blood, they’re considered wards by other Fae rather than actual members of Faronne, other than those who’ve sworn themselves to House service.
The other Houses mock you. Your humans are better behaved than Fae.
Also true.
The units proceed with caution to the meeting point our intel designated, slipping into the dense old-growth forest of lichen-covered firs the size of redwoods.
A cousin Skilled to manipulate shadows covers our approach to the campsite. We evade Montague's blue-and-silver armored warriors, and I recognize the colors of three other Houses. Two allies of Montague, including Labornne, one that claims to be neutral, and Sivenne.
A Faronne ally.
I hiss. Traitors. I’ll burn their House down around their ears.
Our House might be uncouth, rowdy and poor, but we are relentless. We have to be to make up for our shortcomings. Relentlessness is free; we’ve perfected our thorns.
Édouard signals to Numair, and the order spreads throughout the units. Once again I wish for the telepathy many Fae possessed back in the old Realm, but no one born on this soil after the original crossing developed that affinity—mymother hadn’t been certain why, except that perhaps something we need is missing in this Realm.
A trilling bird call whistles from the forest canopy. We burst forward, a battle cry in our throats.
I unsheathe a light double-edged blade designed for slashing instead of thrusting, balanced to avoid straining my slender wrists.
We brought six units expecting to interrupt a small, routine political meet guarded by a minimum of warriors because Montague assumed today is business as usual—Faronne typically only attacks military targets and supply caches.
In seconds I recognize the lack of surprise on enemy faces. The scent in the air is almost sweet, my silent vindication most certainly bitter.
More emerge from the trees, jumping lightly from high branches. We’re outnumbered three to one, and from Édouard's face he realizes the same.
We've been lured. I don’t have the heart to say I told you so, even internally.
A Montague warrior leaps in front of me; my height, but sixty pounds heavier with muscle under his armor. Tension flutters through my veins, tightening my muscles with a rush of adrenaline.
“The halfling Mad Dog of Faronne,” he says, the mingled delight and contempt in his voice edged with satisfaction. Right. He thinks he’ll earn a promotion by managing to kill Aerinne Kuthliele.
“She is I, and I am several of her,” I murmur, already dissecting his style of movement. My physical strength willnever be at the level of a full-blooded Fae, but I match their speed.
His sneer deepens. “We'll see if you’re as good with a blade as they say. I think it a lie.” We circle. “An unSkilled wretch can't hope to defeat me. You will die.”
Realms, he's one of those. A talker. And who said I was good with a blade? I'm slipping. I'm going to have to counter that rumor.
“Not if you don't stop talking I won't,” I say, though I shouldn't give him even that much of my dignity.
He feigns left, but I don't fall for the ruse, parrying his true strike. Eyes don't lie.
Stupid too, for assuming I’m unSkilled. Skills are unique to the person, wild magic we're born with if at all, an artifact of the individual's mind and we assume a genetic quirk, what the humans would call a random mutation. No one advertises their particular Skill unless they must, or they’re a non-combatant. It’s just good strategy to keep one's mouth shut.
No point in debating the walking dead, though. I don't flaunt my deck of Skills, so those whom I’ve taught some respect are mostly buried six feet deep. When I bother with a grave.
“Aerinne, stop fucking around,” Juliette says, sprinting past me, knives flying.
