Excerpt: True Faerie Tales: Changeling Enigma

Blair's heart completely stopped. She heard the king's words echo through her head. 'Kill Killian'. 'Find Bressal and have him kill Killian'.
She leapt from her hiding place. "No! Don't!" she cried. Every faerie in the court turned their gaze onto her. Blair took a step back, realizing her mistake. Killian stared at her. Not even his tail so much as twitched. He held completely still. Blair had just put herself in the worst situation she could be in. She stared at the faeries, which all stared back at her. She had to do something. She couldn't just let them kill Killian. "Uh," she stammered for a moment, trying to figure out what the hell she was supposed to say.
The Seelie King and Queen stood and stepped down from their boulders, approaching Blair. Blair stepped back. Killian hissed, his tail swishing almost violently again. "Keep away from her! She had nothing to do with it! She has nothing to do with my crimes!"
Blair took a step back. This close, she could see the elf like king and queen were slightly taller than she first thought. Blair felt like a young child compared to them, her eighteen years of life nothing compared to what they must have lived. "K-Killian was just helping me. I helped him, so he was helping me in return. He... He's a... good guy. You can't kill him," she tried, her voice sounding small.
The queen laughed. It sent chills up Blair's spine. "Do you even know what his crimes are, mortal child? Do you even have any notion as to what we want him dead for?" she asked, her cat like, predatory eyes focusing on Blair. Blair shook her head slowly. Killian had never told her what he had done to end up as a fugitive. "He murdered his own brother."
Blair looked at Killian. His expression was filled with pain and anger. "I did not! I never would have harmed my brother!" His tail behind him swished quickly from side to side, hitting the ground with a soft 'thud'.
"You did," the king said. "We arrived to find you covered in his blood. You held the weapon that took his life."
"I did not do it!"
Blair finally spoke up. "Wait! He couldn't have done it. Killian can't lie. None of you can, right? So if he says he didn't do it, then he couldn't have done it."
The queen looked at Blair, the king's gaze following suit. With both of their cold predatory eyes watching her, Blair felt smaller than one of the sprites that she had seen. "Stop defending him, mortal child," the king said. "He did do it. He can lie about it. He led his brother into Unseelie territory and killed him. He ended up bringing the wrath of knights from the Unseelie Court down upon us. He can lie about it because he stole an elixir from the Unseelie Queen that allows a faerie to lie."
"I never! I never entered the Unseelie Court and my brother was never killed by my hands! I am not the one that did it!" Killian snarled in rage. "I--" The king kicked Killian, silencing him.
"I will hear no more of your unnatural lies! You tried your defense once. We found you guilty. There was even a witness! Now you will suffer for your crimes."
Blair looked around the Seelie Court. Everyone there was watching with amusement on their faces. She had no help, except...
"Keely!" Blair called, turning around. Her sister looked at her, looking a little confused. "Keely! You believe me, right?"
Keely was silent for a long moment. "I... Do I know you? You're familiar from somewhere."
Blair felt herself go numb. She looked to the king and queen, then to Killian, blood flowing freely from the split on his lip that the king had inflicted on him. She couldn't take it any more. Rage, and frustration, and every other emotion she had felt during this whole escapade bubbled to the surface, becoming more than she could handle. Blair screamed in frustration.
"He can't lie! He didn't do it! Don't kill him for something he didn't do! Please!" she screamed. Tears ran down her face and blurred her sight. She could hardly see the king and queen clearly now. "He's the only one that's help me so far! Him and the phooka. You can't kill Killian!"
The king looked up to the phooka. "Is this true? Did you help this mortal child?"
The phooka lifted his head from his paws. "Let her say what she may, but I came for the show." He looked to Blair, his eyes holding wicked amusement. "I followed for an adventure... just thought you should know."
Blair stared at the phooka. "No... You--" she shook her head, trying to get her mind to work. It did not want to let her understand what the phooka was saying. "You helped! You helped me find Killian when we were lost! How can you lie and say you weren't helping? You helped us! You did!"
The phooka shook his head. "It is not a lie that I say, though you can believe what you may. I came for an adventure, my dear. But now it is my time to leave you, I fear, for I do not wish to die here. Even if it was for an adventure I longed, I can wait a few decades until another of your kind wanders along."
The betrayal hurt Blair. It hurt as much as everything else that had happened did. All of her hope dwindled away. Her feeling of accomplishment and her excitement of finding Keely all left her, leaving her feeling empty.
"Please," she begged. She dropped to her knees, her legs no longer being able to support her. "Please don't kill him. I beg of you... Don't kill him!"
If I lose him, then everything is gone. I won't have any one left to help me. Even Keely won't help me right now. He's the only one! I need him! I can't lose him. Blair looked at the Seelie King and Queen. "I beg of you. Don't kill him. There has to be a deal I can strike with you to save his life."
Killian fought the fox faeries that held him. "Blair! No! Don't do that! Do not make a deal with any faerie! Haven't you learned--" The king kicked him, silencing him once more.
He looked to Blair. "Go on. I am listening."
Blair thought that for something that was supposed to be of the good faeries... the Seelie King was not so good. There had to be something she could do. "What if... What if I could find out the truth?" The Seelie King remained silent, so Blair continued, "What if I could figure out what really happened? This forest is full of faeries. There must have been others that saw what happened. If I can find them and get evidence, real evidence, that proves Killian is innocent--"
"Or guilty," added the king.
Blair hesitated a moment, then nodded, allowing the king to have his word. "Or guilty, then will you release him if he is innocent and find the real killer?"
The king remained silent for a long moment. "Very well. But if he is guilty, then I am making sure that you are punished as an accomplice."