“I don’t know you,” Nyx said flatly, even as we all glanced at her. “I don’t know anything of Evenfall, and your king is not mine. I serve a different king.”
“You will remember,” the voice whispered ominously. “Soon. This world’s anger is at its peak. The Veil has never been thinner, and Evenfall has never been closer. And when the king awakens, we will take our revenge against those who erased us from the memories of the world.”
“No, you won’t,” Meghan said, stepping closer. “It doesn’t have to be war between us. We don’t have to be enemies, but if you threaten the Nevernever, we will have no choice, and Faery will rise up to defend itself. Please, reconsider what you want to do. A war with the Nevernever will only bring chaos and death to everyone involved. If we have to stop that here, we will.”
“You will not stop us,” the voice hissed. “I will wake the king, and you will all suffer. Do not think that I am unprepared. You will never reach the site of power. We know your fears, your innermost nightmares. Do you think you can stand against us?” It flickered into view, raising a bone-thin arm. “Here is but a small taste of what awaits Faery when the king awakens and we all return.”
The voice, and the Evenfey, disappeared, fading into that other reality and vanishing behind a stone pillar. But a new sound began filtering through the corridor. Dozens of small, shuffling feet, coming down a side passage where the hallway branched off several paces ahead.
“Uh-oh,” Puck muttered, and drew both his daggers. “What is that? It sounds like an army of babies coming at us.” He gasped in mock alarm. “Oh, no, maybe it’s an infantry.”
Ignoring the terrible pun, I drew my sword, as the Unseelie within smiled in cold anticipation. An army of enemies meant more things to kill. More creatures to unleash my rage on. It didn’t matter if it was a horde of giant insects or nightmare babies, as Puck had suggested. If they attacked us, they would die, and I would feel no regret. Survive, or be slaughtered; that was the way of the Unseelie.
The shuffling noises got louder. And then, spilling around the corner, came dozens of small, pale bodies. They were goblin-size, and had the large, tattered ears of the goblins we knew in the Nevernever, with subtle differences. Their skin was gray instead of green, and their eyes were huge bulbous orbs peering out of their lumpy heads. But their mouths... Their fang-filled yellow grins stretched literally from ear to ear, and when they opened their jaws, a second mouth, as tooth-filled as the first, could be seen inside.
“Oh,” Puck remarked, his voice slightly breathy. “Great. Nightmare fuel. I didn’t want to sleep for the rest of the month, anyway.”
With piercing shrieks, the army of goblin creatures charged. Their jaws gaped open as they ran, giving the impression of an army of mouths coming down the passageway.
I unleashed my winter glamour, sending a blast of frigid air down the corridor. Snarling, the goblins at the head of the charge ran straight into a storm of deadly spikes that pierced through them. They collapsed, and burst into a writhing mass of oily smoke, scattering teeth and fangs over the tile with sharp clicking sounds. The smoke dissolved into nothing, but the teeth remained, glittering dully under the fluorescent lights.
“Ew, ew, ew!” Puck danced back, wrinkling his nose, as a pair of yellow fangs clicked to a stop near his feet. “That’s disgusting. Hey, ice-boy, remember when we stumbled onto that tooth-faery lair? With the wind chimes hanging outside, made entirely of molars? They would love this place.”
Meghan pulled a face. “Now I’m creeped out,” she muttered, and sent a strand of lightning flickering down the hall. More goblin things exploded into smoke, scattering teeth over the tile floor. “Keep moving,” the Iron Queen commanded. “The sooner we find this center of power, the sooner we can go home and forget this place ever existed.”
We pressed forward, into the swarm of tooth goblins. They hissed and chattered at us, gnashing both sets of teeth in their lumpy faces. Fangs clattered to the floor as they died, and I crushed them under my feet, feeling nothing but vicious glee as they fell before us.
Shrieking and gnashing their teeth, the goblins retreated, scurrying around a corner as they fled. We followed, but came to an immediate stop at the edge of the corridor, gazing at the new obstacle before us.
A door, bright red and made of steel, stood at the end of the hall. A creature stood in front of it, its bulky frame filling the entire hallway. It towered over the throng of goblins, a pale, ogre-type thing with stumpy legs and long arms, one claw holding a gnarled, tooth-studded club. But it had no face, just a gaping maw filled with those double sets of jagged teeth, shiny and glistening in the sickly light. Its pale skin was covered in what at first looked like bone shards jutting from its arms, shoulders, and back. A moment later, I realized they, too, were teeth, poking up from its flesh like razor blades.
“Ugh,” Puck muttered. “It just keeps getting worse.”
The ogre thing took a step forward, and its large belly split open, revealing another tooth-filled mouth below its chest. The belly jaws bared their fangs and roared, and the goblins around it cackled, emboldened by its presence.
Nyx shook her head. “Why is this so familiar?” she almost whispered. “I feel like I’ve seen this creature before. Or something like it.”
I narrowed my eyes. “It’s just another monster,” I said darkly. Raising my arm, I gathered my glamour into sharp, frozen knives. “It’ll die like everything else.”
I hurled the ice shards at the ogre, expecting to see it stagger back and fall, peppered with frozen daggers. Instead, the giant mouth on its stomach snatched the ice shards from the air as they came in, crunching through them like it was eating a mouthful of hard candy. I set my jaw against the sound of grinding glass as the ogre munched down the ice, swallowed, and let out a belch that echoed down the hall.
“Terrifying and rude,” Puck sniffed. “Also, I think I saw a whole chicken drumstick back there. How many times a day do you floss, my friend?”
With a bellow, the ogre tooth thing charged, lumbering down the corridor with the goblins swarming around it. Raising my sword, I watched the giant creature stomp closer, feeling the ground tremble under my boots, and I breathed in the terrible glamour swirling through the hall.
“Here it comes,” Puck announced, raising his daggers. “What’s the game plan, guys?”
“I’ll clear a path,” Meghan said, sparks and energy strands snapping around her. Her calm, determined gaze met mine in the flashing lights. “If I take care of the smaller ones, can you three handle the big guy?”
I nodded, and the Iron Queen sent a bolt of electricity down the corridor, making everything flicker like a strobe light. Fangs clattered off the walls and bounced across the floor as the goblins died in large numbers. The tooth ogre flinched, stumbling to a halt for a moment, as the goblins at its feet thrashed and split apart, scattering bone fragments through the corridor.