Invincible Read online

  Joy’s limbs went numb. “You mean... I was in Folk Heaven?”

  “It’s not as if we have worlds within worlds at our fingertips, Miss Malone,” the Bailiwick said. “There were few options available to the King and Queen in order to avoid human persecution and, given no human can cross into the afterworld, asylum in Faeland was the logical recourse.” He sounded matter-of-fact. “This is our world as well, and we have access to our afterlife just as you have with yours, theoretically speaking, although there is no magic there save that of the word of the King and Queen.”

  Joy squeezed the back of the chair like a shield between them as she digested the news. “Your King and Queen escaped this world with the majority of your people and took them to Heaven?” Her voice broke a little on the sacrilegious notion. “You mean to say there’s a doorway to the Folk’s afterlife inside your body?” Her thoughts were jumbled and fractured, cracking against themselves. “But...they’re in Heaven! Why would they ever come back here?”

  The Bailiwick looked disappointed. “We gave our word to protect this world’s magic and honor the bonds to those whom we owed allegiance,” he said. “We, as a people, shall always keep our word and our integrity as well as the magic of this world intact. Always.”

  This was clearly an absolute. Joy nodded dumbly. The breath lodged in her chest came out with a whoosh. “Well...” Her sentence dissolved into silence. She tried again. “Wow.”

  “Indeed,” Graus Claude said. “So you understand the gravity of our predicament and Master Ink’s conundrum?”

  Joy tried to gather the threads together, but the pattern still eluded her. “Um, no.” She loosened her death grip from the chair back. “I mean, I get that I probably shouldn’t have stepped into Faeland, but I have no idea why Ink would be more freaked out than I was after what happened, and what any of that has to do with wild Elementals...”

  The Bailiwick rested his head in two of his hands, the other two smoothing the edges of the towels with exaggerated calm. “Miss Malone, it is difficult to comprehend how you can be so adept at maneuvering through many of our subtlest societal niceties and yet be so grossly inept at grasping our most obvious taboos. Have you failed to understand anything I have labored to teach you?” He lifted his head and spoke through shark’s teeth. “You stepped into the Folk’s most sacred territory and it physically rejected you. The King and Queen themselves named you the Destroyer of Worlds.” He struggled to keep his composure, his face flushing olive gray with the effort. “I suspect that you, Joy Malone, are descended from Elementals—the sworn enemy of all the peoples of our world.”

  She stared at him, dumbstruck.

  “But—no,” Joy said slowly. “I’m one of the Folk. You said so yourself!”

  “Yes, well, while it is true that you were obviously not entirely human, what other conclusion could I have drawn?” Graus Claude said in his defense. “The Elementals were purged from this world aeons ago, and no one would have suspected they would interbreed with humans. They quite despised your lot, save as base amusement.” He snorted. “If you think the Folk can be cruel, you cannot fathom the depths of the Elementals’ depravity.” One low eye ridge quirked. “Then again, perhaps we can.” He shook his shoulders as if ridding them of a chill. “If your lineage originates from one of the most primal sources of magic...it might explain much.” He leaned back on his haunches. His tone grew professorial. “It would account for your heritage going unremarked in our annals, as well as your latent magics coming to bear once you came in contact with the Twixt. It might also explain the Sight itself—the ability to see those in the Twixt would be an advantageous inherent defense against the Folk. That might also cause your proto-signatura to be misshapen or malformed since an Elemental would never accept the yoke of the rules that bind us...” His eyes grew wide. “By the Swells, an Elemental taking on a True Name, bound by oath to the King and Queen?” He gaped. “It’s unheard of!”

  “So I am one of the Folk,” Joy said. “I swore my oath and sacrificed my armor for my True Name. Our word binds us to the rules, right? I am one of you!”

  “Yes! No. That is—no!” Graus Claude squeezed his hands into fists. “It is imposs—” But he couldn’t finish the sentence, because he knew it wasn’t true. He gave a long-suffering sigh that ended in an almost smile. Almost. “You never cease to amaze me, Miss Malone.” He adjusted himself on the mattress. “However, this latest riddle is not a passing game for intellects—it is likely to get you killed.”

  “Why?” Joy said. “What did I do?” She refrained from adding, now?

  The Bailiwick stretched his spine, eliciting deep pops and cracks. He exhaled tightly. “It is not what you did or did not do,” he said. “It is your ancestry. It is what you are. The very nature of your being flies in the face of the Accords, the Edicts and the rules that shaped our world. No wonder that the King and Queen did not come with you!” he murmured. “The Elementals represent our baser instincts, the primordial chaos from which we evolved, and yet we needed to be rid of them in order to leave that world of anarchy and destruction behind, to forge a new path within the human world, one of culture and compromise and a commitment to live in peace. The Elementals are no more...” Graus Claude gestured toward her with a genteel dance of many hands. “Theoretically speaking.”

  Joy crossed her arms protectively over her chest. “That means you could be wrong, theoretically speaking.”

  “Indeed,” Graus Claude agreed. “And yet here you are, against all odds and precedence, cloaked in half humanity and bearing a True Name.” He shook his head ruefully. “Whatever the truth of it, I can feel My Lady’s hands upon both our backs.” The Bailiwick straightened both pairs of shoulders. He was known as Fortune’s Favorite—his auspice was luck. “May we be guided toward the light that presages a new dawn and not, as I fear, an oncoming train.”

  He threaded his hands together and cleared his throat. “Now then, let us suppose Master Ink is correct and that you are a descendant of Elementals. Perhaps all those with the Sight could, in fact, trace their lineage back to those primal creatures. Well, what then? It might explain our long-standing traditions to eliminate those with the Sight, if not out of fear of human interference, then out of an instinctual sense of self-preservation against our ancient foes. Then, also, such a rationale might explain why those such as Sol Leander would not lay claim on those with the Sight who had been victims of an unprovoked attack, regardless of its outcome. He might not be compelled to claim them nor acknowledge their qualification.” He raised his chin. “Hmm. Interesting. For no one would claim an Elemental under their auspice—they would have to stand and protect them under their Name.” He snorted. “Ridiculous! Preposterous! No one would agree to give succor under our laws to those who refuse to obey them.” He eyed her again sharply. “Grimson would be quite put out.”

  Joy rubbed her shoulder, the spot where she’d been marked. “I’ve never met him.” Inq had marked Joy as a Scribe in Grimson's stead when she’d erased the Red Knight out of existence.

  “Pray you never do,” Graus Claude said. “He is a humorless sort behind that black cowl and scythe.”

  Joy wondered if the Bailiwick was joking. “So...that disproves it, right?” she said. “Grimson would never have claimed me if I were an Elemental.”

  Graus Claude sniffed. “I would never presume to guess another’s motives, but perhaps that is why Grimson accepted this as his auspice, marking those who murder one of the Twixt, for the Elemen
tals would have surely qualified and the mark might have served as a warning to the Folk. A Grimson’s mark does not so much brand those who are under his protection as those who are considered criminal. Interesting.”

  “Fantastic,” Joy said, getting up from the chair. She wrung her fingers around a twist of leotard. “Well, I don’t see why it matters what type of Folk I’m descended from or what any of that has to do with Ink.”

  “The Elementals are not Folk, Miss Malone,” Graus Claude said patiently. “They are two entirely different things—”

  She stopped her pacing. “How?”

  The Bailiwick’s eyes darkened from icy blue to gray. “They were barely more than animals, Miss Malone. Lawless, ruthless creatures who lived to destroy.”

  Joy thought about their escape from the rampaging mobs of costumed Folk Under the Hill. “Doesn’t sound so different to me.”

  “Miss Malone—”

  Joy crossed her arms. “Well, that doesn’t make them a different species.”

  “Neither does the color of skin, but human history has long claimed otherwise,” he said with deep rebuke. “But if you are indeed an Elemental changeling, then the change must be stopped.”

  “It can be stopped?” Joy said incredulously. “But that’s what I’ve been trying to do since you first told me about being a changeling! You said it couldn’t be done!”

  “Stymied, then. Repressed.” Graus Claude’s gaze slid aside. “You must not be permitted to become an Elemental!”

  Joy was way ahead of him. She had planned to rescue the princess, return the King and Queen and then ask them for a boon as reward—namely to stop the change and stay human or, at least, half human. Being an immortal enemy of the Twixt made that less likely. She bit back her own bubbling anxiety. “Okay. How?”

  “I am not certain,” he said. “Although I know it can be done.” He slapped his hands against his knees in a chord of finality. “I will need access to my not-inconsiderable resources before I can sufficiently answer that question.” He coughed politely into one fist. “And, first, we will need some confirmation of fact.”

  “What does that mean?” Joy asked.

  “It means—” Graus Claude sighed as if loathe to admit defeat “—that such mysteries lie beyond my ken and that you will have to seek out answers from one who presides over the appropriate domain. You are a claimant, after all, fairly acknowledged, whose favor was undeniably witnessed by hundreds of Folk at the gala—”

  Joy knew he was babbling. “Graus Claude?”

  “Maia,” he said abruptly. “You must go ask Maia.”

  “Maia? The Council’s High Earth Seat? The head of the Court of Earth? The one who’s in a private game of one-upmanship with you?” Joy pressed down on each of her fingers. “The one who claimed me at the Naming? The one whose jeweled hair comb I destroyed? That Maia?” she squeaked. “She’ll kill me!”

  “Not if you manage to swear her to the oath to which Master Ink bound me,” the Bailiwick muttered. “You are still of Earth, acknowledged and witnessed, and therefore she should abide by House rules and grant you sanctuary. She knows more about Elementals than I, being one of the original members of the King and Queen’s Council.” He straightened his spine and glanced around the room. “The trick will be in getting you there.”

  Joy fidgeted. While she did not like the idea of seeking out Maia, who would no doubt be seeking her along with the Head of the Council, the dragon, Bùxiŭ de Zhēnzhū, she liked the idea of leaving the warded condo even less. “Don’t you think I should have Ink come with me?”

  “No,” Graus Claude said flatly. “As far as Master Ink is concerned, you are to remain here, with me, under his own protections until we can find a solution to your...predicament.” The Bailiwick fiddled with his buttons as he considered the rest of the room. “You know that the primary role of the Scribes is to be a buffer between the Folk and any undue risk, namely humans, who—at the time of their making—represented the greatest threat to our peoples’ safety. But it was understood that the Scribes were to safeguard us against all enemies, including our first enemy, those of the Wild. It was written into his being, his body, blood and blades.” Graus Claude turned his great head to one side. “I imagine that Master Ink is struggling with a conflagration of duty and emotion, of instinct and the heart.” He caught her expression and dropped his voice. “Have pity, Miss Malone. Master Ink had enough control to withhold his suspicions long enough to place you here, in my keeping, but I fear he cannot disobey his basic function—to protect those in the Twixt, which, in this case, might again include the likes of you.” Joy hugged herself miserably. The great frog attempted to soothe her distress. “He had the strength to resist blinding you at first Sight, did he not? By his own assertion, he has chosen to interpret his wards as both protecting you from the Twixt as well as protecting the Twixt from you until we can find an interpretation that will suit the rules enough to forgo his having to kill you.”

  “Great! So I’m safe as long as I stay here, but now you want me to go?” Joy said with an angry, hysterical tremble.

  “To remain here is to remain caged,” Graus Claude said. Having only recently escaped from his imprisonment, the Bailiwick was uniquely qualified to speak with authority on the subject. Joy bit the inside of her cheek, face flushed. “I sympathize with your distress, yet you fail to appreciate what your paramour has done for you—no one else in the Twixt suspects your true nature, and he has bound me by my oath. Otherwise, be assured, I would feel obligated to kill you myself, which I shall not,” he hastened to add at Joy’s look of horror. “I understand all too well that circumstances concerning your person are hardly ever what they seem and that, as you have noted on previous occasions, you often embody a rather exceptional exception to the rules.” He pressed sincerity into his words. “I have set aside many luxuries and amenities in my time in order to retain my personal integrity. To shelter you is to damn myself utterly, but look—” he glanced around at the walls of Stef’s bedroom “—it is you who have given me shelter, as well as my freedom, both from the spell of forgetting as well as the Council’s justice Under the Hill.” He raised a single manicured claw. “Therefore, no matter what else may be said, you have proven yourself a trusted friend and that fact, more than anything, countermands any theoretical debate.” He lowered his hands to rest in his lap, a Zen Buddha on a lotus of cotton towels. “I have never met an Elemental, so I must admit that my knowledge is based on hearsay and secondhand myth, but I know you, perhaps better than almost anyone else in my world. I ask that you trust me, as you once asked me to trust you.” He paused, his speech closing with finality. “I will help you, Joy Malone.”

  She ran up and hugged him, collapsing against his squashy body, and his many arms wrapped around her like an afghan. “Thank you,” she whispered. He sighed a bass rumble in his throat and gave an oof of effort as she let go.

  Joy winced. “You’re hurt.”

  “I am well aware of it,” he muttered, releasing her slowly with each of his hands.

  “But how can I convince Maia when I can’t convince Ink?” Joy said, looking at the lightening sky. “And I can’t leave you here. What about Stef? My Dad—?”

  “Calm yourself,” the Bailiwick said. “You know your father’s whereabouts, and your brother is in the company of the satyr lad. Both your family and your friends are still protected under the Edict as long as no one else discovers what we suspect. Your secret must remain safe.”
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  Joy avoided looking at him as she thought, Which one? Joy had a number of secrets that would likely get her killed. Graus Claude knew at least two of them, but there was still one more that he did not—the Red Knight—and Joy doubted that he’d still be helping her if he knew that she could erase Folk out of existence. She was the Twixt’s worst nightmare, the Tide’s proof of human evil.

  “As for Mistress Inq,” the Bailiwick continued, “she will remain incapacitated for some time, given what we know of Master Ink, and he will wisely be avoiding you until we come up with a credible solution.” Graus Claude tapped the side of the bed. It lacked the satisfying click-click-click of thick nails against his mahogany desk. “He should avoid all contact with the Folk, especially those on the Council. I suspect they are already overly eager to extract news of you and I.” He nodded to himself. “Let us pray that the Scribe’s bravado and chivalry do not eclipse his common sense. If he’s smart, he’ll busy himself by working in the field. He accrued an impressive backlog of assignments while he lay unconscious those few days.”

  Joy frowned. “You’re the one who knocked him unconscious.”

  Graus Claude looked pained. “Needs must, Miss Malone,” he said. “To be fair, he was going for my throat.”

  And it had all started with Joy accusing Graus Claude of being a traitor to the Twixt. She decided to drop the subject. “So what do you want me to do?”

  “It would be wisest to remain within the wards,” he said. “However, when have we limited ourselves to pursuing only the wisest course?” His browridge quirked. “Instead, I propose you visit Councilex Maia with all due haste and secrecy—thus requiring that you go without either Master Ink, Mistress Inq, young Filly, myself or the like—then report back here and we shall endeavor to concoct a well-researched strategy of next steps.”