King of Diamonds is the third and final story of the Tales of El’Anret trilogy.
One
ANOTHER GIRL WAS SCREAMING.
Hazel Leigh Mac Tíre could hear her blood-curdling cries as they bounded off the walls of the cavern, and she knew that Alexandria was hard at work. She kept her eyes on the iridescent threads in her chapped, dirtied hands, braiding them together in an infinite weave.
A sudden silence overtook the halls, and Leigh knew she had gone too far.
Lex rounded the corner, licking her lips of stray blood, and tossed the girl’s limp body to the side. She returned Leigh’s untempered stare. “What are you staring at?”
Leigh didn’t speak a word, but her eyes held fire.
“Yeah, didn’t think you had the spine to say anything,” Lex spat, with a dark laugh.
Just because Leigh could no longer speak, didn’t mean she couldn’t think, her mind hurling insult after insult at the heathen Queen who had stolen her throne. It had been so long ago now, but time had only steeled her intentions. One day, she thought to herself as she eyed the opalescent thread, I’ll get my voice back, and get my throne back.
One day, I’ll strangle you with this.
***
THE CRYSTALLINE VOID faintly sparkled around him, more darkness than shine after so many years.
In that darkness, his eyes stayed closed, his body still, just as it always had. But this day, his mind perpetually raced, his consciousness flickering on as if a switch had been flipped. He relived every memory, heard every song he had ever known.
And then, as if the channel had been changed, the scope of his visions switched. In short bursts, he watched the passing of time, eons and eons stacking upon one another, timelines and clans and wars all intertwining, skipping, back and forth. Life. Creation. Death.
And just as quickly, it all stopped. A single image stuck in his psyche: his mother, cuffed and chained, being dragged away from Mount RuClane as it burned, besieged by monsters.
Besieged by allies and foes both.
His mind wrestled with pain that his body could not show. He had been kept safe while his only family struggled against the ravages of war. But why?
Prince Jack of the Twilight Court, a voice said plainly. Jack Mac Tíre, often called.
Jack struggled to look around, his eyes fluttering wildly against closed lids.
A figure approached, stepping into the blurry vision of his mind’s eye. Closer and closer it came, until Jack could see that a man now stood before him, within him. Lavender hair. Golden eyes. The young man stood with one foot crossed over the other, propped against nothingness, his dark tunic as bloodied and dirty as his skin. He seemed to study Jack’s mind in a way that made him feel vulnerable.
Glad I am finally able to meet you, the man finally said. I have waited such a long time.
Jack struggled to move a long-stilled tongue. He wanted to yell at the man, to ask what he was, who he was…
No need to yell, the intruder added, tapping a ringed finger against his temple before actually opening his mouth to speak. “I can hear your thoughts. What am I? A being of long-forgotten memory. A figment of history, one that was past and is now also present. I am—”
Long-winded, Jack thought, his patience and royal refinery long gone, his nerves on fire.
The man laughed. “All Fae are, Jack. Storied as the worlds themselves. And now, you’ve seen all of those stories, those worlds. You’re more powerful than I ever could have dreamed of being.”
I’m trapped in a lifeless body, trapped inside a crystal. Jack’s voice was bitter, even in his head.
“Not for long, and not for always,” the man replied. “That power will soon free you. And that is why I’m here, Jack: to set you upon your path, just as I did to another before you. You must save your mother—”
Jack noticed a hitch in his voice at those words.
“Save Leigh and the rightful Queen of El’Anret, and upright our world. You are the Stag King, just as your grandfather was; the Breaker of Chains. History is yours to write.”
They’re alive…? How do you know all this?
The man smiled, bowing his head as he began to disperse, a thousand particles scattering on a nonexistent wind, until only the echo of his voice remained. “I’ve watched you and I’ve watched her, for so very long now. This is the only gift I have left to give. Save her, Jack. For me.”
But wait! Jack cried. Who are you?!
There was little else but silence, until he heard his mother’s voice whisper: Gideon.
***
“GIDEON,” SHE WHISPERED in her mind, over and over again as tears fell. It was midday, but Lex was asleep, ensconced in the royal chambers, sealed in the dark. It was also the only time that Leigh got to rest, though she fought the opportunity.
Queen’s Barrow was quiet, even as the Diamondguard swapped positions and shifts. Leigh’s tired eyes watched them from the Stocked Hollows that she called home— the place that many of the faithful royal court had called home before losing their lives, one by one.
Stocked Hollows sounded much kinder— lighter— than torture galley, which is what Lex had made of the stocks and holding cells. Where Leigh had made it a civil area, a respectable space for those awaiting justice or sentencing, Lex had added every measure of hurt and pain she could find.
The stench of blood no longer left the halls.
Leigh locked eyes with a passing guard. Cahl was his name— he had served under Kristain, who had served under Holt. And his eyes said I’m sorry even as he marched away from her.
Holt. Leigh hadn’t seen him since Mount RuClane. Or Adelay. Or R’haetgan.
Or Jack.
Her heart broke all over again, just as it had for so many days now that she lost count. Even as she cried, she was silent, the wails stuck in her throat and chest and in all the little spaces between the cuts on her body.
She would never believe them to be dead. Not until she saw it with her own eyes… assuming she could still trust them. She fought sleep, not wanting to relive that day, watching her brother dragged away in shackles, screaming her name. Not wanting to see Jack, sealed in a crystal as war waged all around him. Not wanting to watch her life be snatched away.
Gideon, she said to herself, just one more time, just in case he could still hear her.
***
JACK FLOATED THROUGH the darkening void, no longer able to tell the difference between dreaming and awake. He had heard no more voices in the days— weeks?— since his last and only visitor, just his own thoughts bouncing around his mind. He watched them hit the walls, losing momentum with every bounce.
He was so tired.
He ached for the smell of flowers, the cool of dirt, the embrace of his mother. The wind in his hair, the warmth of his bed. He ached over the stupid things he might never be able to change.
But most of all, he ached for who he used to be.
In these long darknesses, he had become a man. An empty husk of a man.
He desperately desired to move, to be able to curl in on himself, to fold up so many times that he would eventually disappear.
But that simply would not do.
There, in the center of his darkness, a tiny movement began. A hint of wind, stirring dust up from an invisible floor. A soft crack. Bits of green peeking through the dirt, in small pushes at first, then an explosion of flora. The green vines spread like wildfire, engulfing the expanse of his mind. And all at once, it bloomed.
Flowers of every color burst open along the greenery, each of them four petals, each of them square.
They all reached for him at once, their little vines stretching, turning against themselves to move forward.
No, Jack realized, not squares. They’re diamonds.
He was surrounded by cascades of them, some dropping petals and instantly growing more, different colors rising out of the same bloom. One of the flowers finally touched his face, and in that moment between petal and cheek, he heard it.
Wake up, Stag King. The world is waiting.
***
THE FIRST BURST OF sunlight was painful. Jack’s eyes refused to stay open as the light beamed down on him, hot and dry and magnified by crystal. He wanted to shield his face. His arms did not cooperate. Oxygen burned through his lungs as he gasped for air, his mouth drying out almost instantly. He licked his lips.
I’m alive, I’m here and I’m alive, he thought to himself, willing the words through his throat and over his lips.
All he could do was grunt.
His body felt foreign; longer, more defined, bigger. He could see his hair along either side of his face, half chestnut and half lavender, all mixed together in long, straight strands. Jack tried to turn his head away from the searing light.
His muscles groaned and ached against his every shift. The crystal had preserved him alive, but not kept him fresh enough to move.
He strained upwards again, muscles and tendons bulging at his neck. His head met the top of the crystalline case with a crack. Surprised, he eyed its surface; massive antlers reflected back at him, occupying all of the space above his forehead.
No wonder he had a headache.
Numerous scratches and gashes covered the outside of the crystal, but the walls were still intact. Smears of what used to be blood had long turned brown and black against the clear. It was obvious that they had tried to capture Jack, too, and failed.
How am I going to get out of here?
He tensed his shoulders again, trying to push his arms forward. Each one lifted slowly— first, the shoulders, then the elbows, until all that lay still were his fingers. He worked at each of them gently, bending and flexing until he could lift at his wrists. As he reached upwards, one arm flopped down against itself. His upper body was on fire, but he had to persist.
One hand against the blistering hot surface. Then the other. Jack pushed with all the strength he could muster.
The crystal didn’t budge.
He pushed again, letting out a growl as he groaned against the weight. Push, he told himself, push! Tilting his antlers forward, he pushed with them, their pointed tips making awful grating noises against the surface.
Just OPEN!
With that, the crystal blasted open, its topper flying out of Jack’s field of view. He struggled to keep his eyes open against the blazing sun, pushing himself up to sitting, his every nerve on fire.
Was that… me? Did I do that?
He took in the view all around him: the crystal was raised up on a steep plateau, surrounded by busted rocks and ragged shrubbery. Boulders the size of houses were strewn all about, their surfaces smoothly eroded from Nature herself. Most of the ground around the crystal was black, eventually leading to the ochre tones of dirt at the plateau’s outer edges.
Where am I?
Jack struggled to think. He ran through the varied maps of El’Anret in his head, through the history he had seen, but nothing matched. Pulling his body against the sides of the crystal, he tried to stand.
Dirt flew everywhere as his body plopped to the ground unceremoniously. He coughed hard, the breath knocked from his chest.
Jack crawled toward the edge of the plateau. The dirt beneath his skin was hot and dry, some of the black matter staying clumped together in spots even as he pulled at it. In all honesty, as much as he wondered, he didn’t want to know what it was.
Reaching the very edge, he peered over.
Dozens of jewels scattered across the vertical rock face, most of them chipped and still partly embedded. Holes pockmarked the areas in-between, where gems had clearly rested before.
That’s when he realized it: This is Mount RuClane.
…or, what’s left of it.
The amethyst stone that once covered the only door inside lay half-buried at ground level, its corners busted off to where only a single point remained. Gears and ancient machinery lay rusted and strewn about, only a fraction of what Jack knew it took to move the massive door. This wasn’t part of the flashes he’d seen— he knew of fire and of war, but not this. Mount RuClane had been to reduced to rubble after his mother was taken. How could they topple a mountain?
And where, then, was R’haetgan?
Jack shuddered at the thought. If RuClane was in shambles, where else in the world might be, too? Did anything remain alive and untouched?
He stared up into the afternoon sky, watching the hazy blue blur with oncoming clouds. The sun beat down on him, and he knew he’d have to find decent shelter before long. A million thoughts chirped in his mind all at once, each one demanding attention he just couldn’t give. He had an idea of what he was supposed to do, but no idea as to its execution.
“At any rate, I’m here now,” he whispered to the world, “and I’m going to fix this.”
Melody K. Writes Words 