(Skeleton Key) Into Elurien by Kate Sparkes

than anything else I had to offer.
    I didn’t ask more, but waited until he was ready to speak again.
    He frowned. “It goes deeper, though. I’m not their leader because of a brilliant military career. They needed me because I knew the palace well, and knew Verelle better than anyone. She hid behind her magic and her walls for hundreds of years, but she had a few weaknesses. One of them was that she grew bored with human company after a dozen or so decades.” He hesitated over the word company . “She chose monsters as her personal attendants. Always those with more pleasing human-like faces or bodies. We all knew about it, and our parents tried to protect those of us who might be vulnerable.”
    “How bad was it to be chosen?”
    “It was a death sentence. Verelle couldn’t afford to have her secrets get out. When she grew bored of her servants and playthings, she had them beheaded. Whether it was the young centaur who drew her bathwater or the masked gorgon she kept as a symbol of her power and control, no one lasted more than a few years in the palace. And depending on what games struck her fancy at any time, death might have been a mercy.”
    He dragged his claws lightly over the scars on his right cheek. “She spotted me when she passed through a forest where I was hunting, and liked what she saw. When they came for me, I tried to tear my face off. I hoped that she might leave me alone if she found me hideous.” He smiled sadly. “She had me beaten for defacing her property, but forgave it soon enough. Gave me a place as her personal scribe. Among other things.”
    I wasn’t sure what to say, except…
    “I’m sorry.” I thought I understood what his other duties might have involved, and wouldn’t pry more into that. I felt my cheeks flush slightly as I considered my own response to him as I’d got past the whole monster thing. I’m not like her, I swear.
    He stood and walked to the bookshelf beside the fireplace, where he ran his fingertips gently over the spines of the books. “I got used to life here, and as I got to know Verelle better, I thought perhaps I could change her mind about monsters by making her see me as more than a rebellious beast.”
    He clenched his hands into fists. “So I stopped fighting her. I obeyed willingly. And for a long time, it appeared to be working. She seemed genuinely fond of me, and she let her guard down. Gave me a little freedom. Even if I couldn’t return her affection, I tolerated it.” His brow furrowed. “I gave up my pride and dignity in an attempt at peace.
    “She never grew tired of me, never took a second companion while I served her. And her personal servants were treated well while I was there. I heard less talk of war. I was keeping everyone safe by making her happy, or so I thought. ”
    “And she chose not to kill you, obviously.”
    He turned back to me. His skin had lost some of its colour. “She would have, eventually, yet I stayed for the sake of the others. Then one day I found her in the dungeons. A male centaur stood chained to the wall as a human woman whipped him and cut him with knives. A female centaur lay in the corner, already broken and half dead, sobbing. The floor was red with their blood. I learned later that they were lovers, torn apart to work in separate mines and reunited in that dungeon after years apart. Verelle had promised them they would leave alive and together if they watched each other’s torture without attacking the humans who kept their mate chained, and without screaming.”
    “My God.” My stomach filled with ice as I listened, and gooseflesh covered me.
    “Verelle wore a white dress, splattered with blood.”
    I glanced down at the dress I’d borrowed from her closet and wished I had chosen another colour. Zinian didn’t seem to notice. “She’d stood that close to watch. Her eyes were so bright, her cheeks flushed, like when…” He bared his fangs. “It was all a lie. I was never enough, and was