Book 1: Brutality

Manticore

31

"I really don't think you should put your hand inside the manticore, dear. You don't know where it's been." — Enid Healy

~Trigger Warning~

How can you be so calm about this? I demand one evening while I'm nursing Elora. My nipple slips from her mouth and she lets out a complaining howl. Hastily, I put it back in, and she sucks happily.

I stare at Valindra anxiously. It's all very well to be cold and calculating about faerie mortality rates when you're surrounded by faeries you'd gladly see drop dead. But I can't be impartial to Valindra's death. How can she be so sanguine?

"What's the point of making a fuss?" Valindra barely looks up from playing with Lindor. "It'll happen whatever I do or say or feel. Why waste my last few months being frightened?"

She has a point, I suppose, but still. Aren't you a little frightened? I ask timidly.

She pauses. "Yes," she says at last, slowly. "But I won't let it ruin the only time I have with my son. And knowing you'll care for him when I'm gone makes me feel so much better."

I don't reply. I'm glad she trusts me, and I fully intend to fulfill that trust. But I wish she'd let me tell someone. It's awful going around with this terrible secret hanging around my neck. Especially when I meet Gael, as he always asks how Valindra and Lindor are doing, and I have to smile and sign, Fine.

Elora finishes feeding, and I hoist her over my shoulder for a burp. While I'm patting her back, Lindor slips out of Valindra's grasp and charges across the room to yank at my pant leg and try to pull the blanket off the bed. "Alby! Alby!"

Elora coos with delight at his antics and burps up a milky stream over my shoulder. I sigh. It's overwhelming enough with two mothers looking after the babies. How will I manage after...?

I bite my lip. How can I even think such a thing? How selfish can I get? Here, Valindra is going to die, and all I can think about is how much work I'll be left with once she's gone.

But, it's hard not to, especially when Elora begins yanking my hair and Lindor climbs up to play with her, shrieking into my ear.

"Here, Lindor." Valindra comes to scoop him up. "Stay with Mama." A shadow falls across her face at this, and she holds the oblivious Lindor tight. "Stay here with me."

The timeless days of Faerie slip by, and nothing seems to change except Lindor and Elora growing bigger, stronger and more active. Valindra smiles to see Lindor so vigorous and healthy.

"To think he was such a sickly runt when he was born!" she says as he races by, waving a leafy stick and singing nonsense. "What a wonder you've done, Albia!"

I manage to nod and smile over containing the squirming Elora, who admires Lindor's game very much and wants to join in, despite being barely able to sit up. She lets out a yell, snatching at Lindor's branch, but he yanks it away.

"No! Mine!" With his free hand, he signs out the words, as he often does. This always fascinates me: how he'll speak aloud while signing at the same time. It reassures me that he understands my sign language, even if he often behaves as if he doesn't.

"Lindor! Behave. You have to share." Valindra reaches over to give him a light cuff—which causes him to wail in exaggerated agony—and snap off a piece for Elora to play with. She gurgles happily, waving her twig.

"Those kids!" Valindra says, partway between amusement and exasperation. "Do you think you can manage them for a bit tomorrow, Albia?"

Sure. Why? I sign around Elora awkwardly.

Valindra glances out the window. "It looks like there will be a good sunrise tomorrow. I want to be sure to capture some of the color. So I'll be leaving early." She shoots the babies an exasperated glance. "Hopefully these two should still be asleep. I'll try to be back soon."

I nod. I'll soon have to get used to looking after the kids on my own anyway, though a part of me still hopes that Valindra is wrong and nothing will happen. Please, let nothing happen. Let Valindra be safe.

Valindra sits down at her loom while I rock the babies to sleep in their cradles, and later I fall asleep myself, to the rhythmic clacking and shushing.

The next morning dawns bright and fair, sparkling through the canopy. I wake up with Valindra, and we get breakfast together, quietly, while the babies sleep. "Lindor's going to need a new bed soon," Valindra murmurs, looking at her son's feet hanging over the end of his cradle. "Maybe you can get Gael to—" She breaks off.

I lick my lips, nerving myself up. Valindra and I never, ever, discuss her relationship with Gael. It's as taboo as discussing my past.

It's grown to be such a rule between us that I can hardly bring myself to approach it. But if I don't ask now, I may never know. I raise my hands. Valindra, what—

"Ah! There it is!" Valindra retrieves her spindle triumphantly from the floor at the foot of the shelf. "Lindor must've knocked it down. Well, I'm off. Goodbye, Albia."

Goodbye, I sign.

With a final kiss on Lindor's brow, she heads out the ground-level door. The roses rustle aside for her.

Elora wakes and begins fussing for a feed. I pick her up and open my shirt. She nuzzles in, and I stand by the window, watching Valindra walk across the clearing. Helpful of the roses, to always stay clear of the windows—

It happens so fast.

A shadow leaps from the trees. Valindra looks up and screams—but it's the briefest of cries. The manticore is far too quick for her.

The clawed front paws knock her down, the scorpion tail flickers, and Valindra's body twitches, seizing up, before subsiding. Dead.

Elora begins to cry at Valindra's scream. Mindlessly, I comfort her, rocking her against my chest, while I stare out the window at the manticore. A lion with a scorpion's tail was how I always heard them described: but this is much more than that.

This is a vast lion, a monster with a reddish-gold coat and claws like knives, muscles rippling under its savage hide. And its face...it's a cross between a lion's and a woman's, twisted into a mask of savagery, the eyes golden slits.

The manticore is female. That's the first, inane, stupid thought that crosses the blank void of my mind. The manticore is female. And she's just killed Valindra.

~Fun Fact~

High heels were originally for men.

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