Prologue
Faux Pas
AN 1023 (AZ 1260) - Late Spring
Oberon's Palace, The Fairy Realm
The flow of time is not constant. In some places it flows quicker and in others it flows more slowly. It was said that for every day in the Fairy Realm, a hundred pass in the world of mortals. Some would say that the flow of time differs even from one person to the next.
By the reckoning of the Fae, fourteen years had passed since their king took a courtier to wife and named her the Second Queen of the Faeries. For Mab, the jilted First Queen, it seemed more like fourteen centuries had passed, every moment of it unbearable.
While the High Faeries tended to be an aloof breed, the Fae at large were frolicsome to a fault. It amused the King of Faeries to watch these japes and gambols, so the court was often gay with festivities. For the sullen Mab, however, the sight of others being lighthearted and glad only served to sour her mood further. Of course, it was more than just anyone being lighthearted and glad as it was one particular person.
Titania, that accursed upjumped courtier who now stood as Mab's rival for the attention and affection of their husband the King, could show the stately grace of the High Faeries when she so chose, but the way she won King Oberon's heart was by her unseemly ability to cast aside her dignity and prance about like a Pixy fresh out of the cocoon. She should have been ashamed, but she knew no shame and Oberon loved her for it. Nothing could be more detestable.
While Mab brooded on her throne, Titania danced along with the rest of the rabble. She spun and twirled, weaving through jets of Salamander fire and splashing along with the Undines. Perhaps next she would wallow around in the dirt with the Gnomes.
Through her dance, Titania worked her way up the dais so that she could take her dance directly to King. The display that followed should not have been before the eyes of half the kingdom. No shame. No shame at all.
Mab did not mean to watch. Indeed, she would rather have not seen any of it. She pretended not to be looking, but it seemed she was fooling no one. While Oberon and Titania were in the pitched throes of her dance, the King glanced at his first wife and gave a slight nod. Before Mab knew it, Titania was upon her, taking her by the hand and dragging her from the throne.
"Come, Sister," she said, "dance with me!"
Perhaps the only thing that rivaled Titania's marriage to her husband for hatred in Mab's heart was for Titania to call her 'sister'. To add fuel to the fire, now Titania was seeking to publicly humiliate her, all with their husband's approval. Mab was having none of it.
"Unhand me this instant!" she shouted.
Titania did not listen. Of course she did not listen. She pulled Mab down from the dais to the center of the floor, took her other hand and began skipping about in circles. The rabble laughed and joined in, circling in one direction or the other to make a grand performance that Oberon watched approvingly, clapping to the music.
"Put away your cares, Sister," Titania said breezily, "and dance for the pleasure of our lord husband!"
Something inside Mab snapped. It had been a long time coming. She could bear no more. Wresting one of her hands free, she slapped the impudent Titania mightily across the face.
"Never dare call me sister again, you worm!"
In an instant, the hall went still and silent.
"MAB!" the King of Faeries thundered.
The hall, which was awash in light of blue and green suddenly went red. The revelers quickly slinked away in terror, leaving Mab and Titania standing there alone on the floor. If Mab's anger was a flame, it had just been doused with water and chilled over with the ice of coldest winter. The King was wroth and Mab's anger could in no way stand against his fury.
"You have struck my Queen!" Oberon bellowed. He thumped his chest. "You strike my Queen, you strike me! This is treason!"
Somehow, foolishly, Mab remembered her outrage and her own anger rekindled.
"I am your Queen, Oberon! You shame me by taking this harlot to wife! You shame me this day by making sport of me before all our subjects!"
"Who is King?" Oberon demanded. "Am I not King? Is not my will Law?"
"Then judge between she and I with your Law, O King!" Mab spatted back.
Even as she spoke the words, she regretted them. What but grief could possibly await her for challenging her husband in the heat of his anger?
However, rather than bursting forth in his wrath, Oberon drew his passions back into himself and the red lights around them dimmed to a dull blue.
"You are proud, Mab," Oberon sneered, "too proud. I will break you of your pride so that you will not forget who is King in this land. I hereby banish you to the mortal realm for one thousand years!"
Banished? To the mortal realm? In that moment, Mab felt hollow, like a dried-out shell cast off after a molt. Her pride, her anger, none of that mattered. She was empty. She had just lost everything.
She fell to her knees. One of her wrists was still being held by Titania. She looked up on her rival. Titania's cheek was bruised and a drop of blood dribbled down from her lips, lips curled in a grin. She had won and she knew it. Mab's defeat was complete.
Just when all seemed lost, the dull blue brightened to a softer purple as Oberon rose from his throne and descended from dais. He walked over to Mab and took the hand Titania was holding and helped her to her feet.
"Mab, you have been from me since the beginning," he said. "In light of this, the thousand years of your exile will be by the reckoning of the mortal realm, not ours."
Mab could hardly believe what she was hearing. In all the exiles handed out—and there were many, many—, never had Oberon ever lightened the sentence. Had she misunderstood him all this time? Did he truly still love her after all?
Oberon turned to walk away, not with Titania by his side but alone. Her 'sister' did not expect that, so perhaps her victory was not so complete in the end. The guards led Mab away and as she approached the gate to the mortal realm, she wondered how Oberon would receive her when she returned.