THE DARKENING (The Divided Realms: Book 2)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

"They ain't in here," whispered Nox, voice shaky, eyes twin circles of panic. "I'm goin' back to the hidey-holes. Yer fadder finds out she wasn't with the others, we's all troll feed for sure." Lunk's terror mirrored Nox's. "I'm goin' with ya."

"Hey, wait a minute!" ordered Pitt. Too late. Nox and Lunk bolted like scared rabbits from the cell. Pitt handed the torch to Willow. "We'll be back," he called out. "Soon as I can find 'em."

Willow started to protest, but a big hairy troll hand reached through the cell opening and slammed the door.

All alone in the dank cave, she set the torch in a wall bracket and sank wearily to the floor. What next? Where was Brand? And poor Dacia and Theon? What would the goblin king do to them? Her head dropped to her knees. She was tired. So tired even breathing seemed like an effort. Her eyes fell shut. The darkness behind her lids suddenly dipped and whirled, and she plunged into it, as if stepping off a cliff.

Willow gasped, her eyes popping open. The cave cell was gone. In its place twined the familiar leaves and vines of the faeries' council room ceiling. She sprang up. The Fey Council sat before her, the ten Unseelie Court kings and queens in their robes of black and the eleven Seelies in white. Like chess, thought Willow – black on one side, white on the other. Willow herself was in her royal blue gown again.

A Seelie queen spoke first. "You set the rules, Jarlath. I see no reason to change them now, just because your daughter and this girl have found a way to beat you."

Beat him? Willow jerked around to stare at the beautiful Seelie queen. If she and Dacia were winning the Gauntlet Game it was news to her.

"They disrupt the Balance," said a stern-faced Unseelie king. "You have your pixies, your brownies, your sprites. We have our goblins. It has always been so."

Someone snorted on the Seelie side. "Disrupt the Balance? When has that ever been a concern of yours, except when it doesn't favor you?" One of the Seelie kings leaned forward in his chair. "I say she be returned to the Game and allowed to continue."

A clamor rose from the black side. "Nay. Nay," someone shouted out. An Unseelie queen stood up. "You are a fool Oberon Foxglove! Jarlath seeks only a way to save his son from the humans. If the girl wins, the way will be lost."

"Yes," added an Unseelie king. "Let the Balance tip toward us, Oberon. If she continues to pull thorns, you must release the goblins from the Compact. I guarantee if it means the goblins can do to her what they do to us, she will pull no more thorns."

Now the clamor rose on the white side. "It's a ploy! The Compact gives the Seelies power. You don't want to save a youngling. You want to rule over us!"

"Release only the goblins from the Compact, then," said the Unseelie king, "not the demon host. You will still have the Balance of Power on your side. And she," he pointed an accusing finger at Willow, "will not weaken our position further by pulling more thorns."

The puzzling exchange fascinated Willow. Did the faerie courts really think she could win the Gauntlet Game? Could even shift the Balance of Power?

The Seelie king named Oberon stood up, his face as tranquil as a summer morning. "I vote no to releasing the goblins from the Compact." All the other Seelie kings and queens stood up as well. "No. No. No," went down their shining line until all eleven of them had spoken. The Unseelie kings and queens stood next, each uttering a curt, pointless yes. Eleven nos to ten yeses. The Unseelies could never win.

But a surprising thing happened next. All eyes turned to Willow. "What is your vote, human?" said King Oberon. "Do you vote yes to releasing the goblins from the Compact, or do you vote no?"