35
Lara’s ball gown was a masterpiece.
Delicate evergreen skirts floated over a thick froth of petticoats that rustled with every step. The dress had been embroidered with tiny trees and animals, an entire forest in miniature. Sparkling sapphires highlighted hidden ponds, and rubies and diamonds formed clusters of wildflowers. Her train was a waterfall of blue silk that flowed behind her as she walked.
I’d outdone myself with her hair, too. I eyed the elaborate braided updo with satisfaction. It had taken six months, but I’d finally become an expert at hair and cosmetics. I’d never suspected I had it in me to be pleased by such a stereotypically feminine skill, but there it was. I was proud.
Lara smiled at me in the mirror, but I could tell she was nervous. “You look wonderful,” I assured her.
“But will I be judged wonderful?”
I sank to my knees in front of her, and my blue skirts pooled around me. I wore the inverse of her colors—my gown was light and airy, the blue skirt covered by a shimmering overlay that made the color beneath ripple like water. Dark green shapes sprouted at random like islands in a mighty river. I’d never felt finer.
I gripped her hands, looking up at her with respect and affection. “You will succeed. You passed every test.”
“Only because you helped me.”
“That doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is the result.”
“Kenna…” She chewed her lip and looked down at our clasped hands. “I wouldn’t have succeeded without you.”
“I think you would have. You’re stronger than you realize.”
“But what if you hadn’t been here? What if I had tried and failed? Sometimes I wonder if I deserve to win.”
Deserve to live , she meant. “You deserve everything,” I said fiercely. “You’re not like the others, but that’s not a bad thing. You’re kind. You have heart. Faeries like Garrick and Markas do well in competitions, but they don’t make the world a better place. You will.” Once King Osric was overthrown, there would be room for Lara’s compassion.
“You’re a good friend.” She squeezed my hands before releasing them. “Oh, before I forget—I have something for you.”
I was astounded when she pulled an enormous emerald pendant from her drawer and pressed it into my hand. “I can’t take this. It’s too precious. I’m just a servant.”
“You’re not just a servant, and if you give it back I’ll throw it in the fire. Just take it.”
The stone was perfect, a round cut with beveled edges that glittered in the light. On the back of the ornate gold setting, four simple words were inscribed: For my best friend.
The jewel blurred behind a veil of tears. “Thank you.”
“Oh, stop it.” She looked towards the ceiling and pressed her fingers just below her eyes as if willing her own tears to stay at bay. “You’ll make me cry, and then you’ll have to reapply my makeup and we’ll be late for dinner.”
I laughed and slipped the jewel into a hidden pocket in my skirts. Someday I’d wear it proudly so all the world could see.
Best friend . I hadn’t called anyone that since Anya had died. I still mourned her, but life had moved on anyway. I’d met new people and experienced unimaginable things, and somehow, in a court suffocated by fear and oppression, I had found another best friend for my aching heart to love.
The ball was held in the throne room because the Shards were too precious to gather together anywhere besides the heavily warded space. It was an exclusive event—only the candidates and the most important families from each house attended. The house heads and Kallen sat on the dais near King Osric, clad in their most radiant attire. The assembly below shone just as brightly, with jewels sparkling from hair, ears, fingers, and the scabbards of ornamental swords.
I barely managed to restrain myself from gaping at the opulence. Glass orbs containing dancing pixies floated overhead and more pixies performed aerial tricks, so many of them that the air shimmered like a hive of bees. Gauze-clad sylphs and asrai twirled between fire jugglers. Even the silver walls rippled with magic, like captured rainbows trying to break free.
Then Osric raised his hands, and the room went away.
We were in the middle of a grassy field, surrounded by the hum of insects and the chirp of birds. Snowcapped peaks rose in the distance, and flowers bobbed their heavy heads at my feet. The smell was heady in my nostrils, and the sun sank warm into my skin.
The sky transitioned from dawn to midday to dusk to night so quickly I only had a few moments to appreciate the beauty of each. When the night sky was darkest, explosions of color and light burst against it in radiant starbursts. Each pop was met with cheers, and as the sparks fell to earth, they chimed like glass.
The world flipped. I was standing on a cloud, and the ground hung high above me, a far-distant patchwork ceiling. Then I was falling, the wind whipping at my face as I stifled a scream. Right when it seemed I would bash my head against the sharp rocks below, the vision changed.
We were deep underwater, standing on a silvery seabed in the middle of a kelp forest. Currents eddied around me as schools of glittering fish flirted with my fingers. The shadow of something enormous passing overhead blotted out the distant sun.
When the light returned, we were back in the throne room.
My heart raced. I knew Illusion’s powers could force others to see and hear things that weren’t there, but I had never imagined how real the visions would seem. How I would feel them, too.
Aidan chuckled at my expression. “I’d say you get used to it, but you don’t.”
After the demonstration, the music began, an unearthly symphony played by unseen musicians. Aidan and I watched the dancing, quietly gossiping and admiring Edric’s and Lara’s elegance.
As the ball stretched on, though, I felt more and more unsettled. It seemed cruel to make the candidates wait so long for the results. If I felt sick with nerves, Lara must feel so much worse, though no one would know it looking at her. Aidan kept tugging at the collar of his orange velvet tunic, fidgeting with his own worry.
Osric finally clapped his hands just before midnight, making my breath catch and my heart launch into a more frantic pace. All movement stopped as the Fae faced the king. “Bring the Shards,” he commanded.
At last I would see the stones the Fae worshipped, the most magical artifacts in the world.
The moment the Shards entered the room, carried by the house heads and a few nobles, the air grew charged with power. My skin tingled, and a faint vibration thrummed against the soles of my feet.
The hand-sized stones were beautiful. They were smooth on one side and jagged on the other, as if they had been struck from the same large orb, but the power roiling within each crystal differed wildly. Flames licked up the inside of Drustan’s Shard, while a maelstrom of water, leaves, and dirt swirled in Oriana’s. The Void and Light Shards were inky black and blazing bright, and the Shard an Illusion lady carried was flooded with shimmering rainbows. The final Shard was a deep, liquid red. The Illusion lord carrying it winced with every step, and blood poured down his palms.
He is not meant to hold it , Caedo said.
Apparently, like every other Blood artifact I’d encountered so far, the Shard bit.
The bearers placed the Shards in six golden stands that ringed the center of the room. When the last one was placed, each crystal began to glow, and then light shot from them and collided at the center of the circle. A force thumped into my chest as the beams met, and my hair blew in a sudden wind. Where the six beams had joined, a whirling cyclone of magic stretched from floor to ceiling.
A reverent hush fell as Osric began speaking. “Long ago, there was a great war between the gods of another world, far past the stars. When it was done, there were none left but six, all injured and dying. To protect the memory of their world, these gods bound their magic into pieces of crystal. These Shards fell from the stars to our earth, and when they landed, the magic burst free to create a new world. The magic chose the Fae, drawn by our beauty and strength, and so six houses were formed to honor the six types of power.”
The loss of the sixth house felt tangible and wrong, like a gaping hole in the universe. That bloodred light tangled with the rest, but nothing anchored it in this room.
“Now the Shards determine which faeries are worthy of power, which aren’t, and which deserve only death,” the king said. “These are the three fates that await our candidates today.”
Sweat beaded Lara’s hairline, and her fingers were clenched in her skirts, rumpling the gorgeous embroidery.
“Stand before me, candidates,” Osric commanded.
The six surviving candidates faced him in a line, the maelstrom of power at their backs. Their hair and clothes shifted in a mystical wind.
“You will enter the combined magic one at a time. When you emerge on the other side, you will either be immortal…or dead. If you live, you will possess magic…or not. Mistei has no use for the weak.” Osric clapped his hands. “Let the judgment begin.”
The candidates had lined up in order of where they’d been sitting: Markas, Karissa, Edric, Talfryn, Lara, and Una. Markas stared at the magic nervously and didn’t move an inch.
Una cast him a judgmental look before speaking. “I’ll go first.” She walked confidently into the circle of Shards, and the whirlwind grew stronger, the colors brighter. Without hesitating, she entered the churning column of magic. She emerged less than a second later, smiling. Kallen had risen to his feet to watch, and when she lifted her hands to show the shadows coiling around them, he grinned and collapsed back into his seat.
“Una has been found worthy,” the king announced. “May you bring honor to Void House and my kingdom.”
The dark magic wisped away once Una stepped out of the circle—presumably her power was now subject to the wards protecting the throne room. As she joined a group of applauding Void nobles, Markas took a deep breath and stepped forward. The maelstrom intensified as he disappeared within it, and I found myself hoping he wouldn’t emerge.
He walked out, laughing as opalescent light shimmered around him. I suppressed my disappointment as the king repeated the exhortation to bring honor to his house and to the kingdom.
Maybe everyone passed and the entire trial season was the Shards’ idea of a joke. Markas had performed well on most of the tests but not all, and even Una had likely failed the Fire trial.
Cheered by the success of the others, Karissa tossed her red hair, winked at Talfryn, and walked into the magic with a smile. Moments later, she emerged, but something was wrong. Her limbs were loose, her eyes vacant. She collapsed to the floor and didn’t move again.
Silence fell.
Osric snapped, and Pol rushed forward to examine her. The king’s steward shook his head.
They didn’t move Karissa’s corpse. She looked so small and alone there on the floor, with her body curled and her hands beside her head as if she were sleeping. The swirling magic behind her no longer seemed beautiful but brutal.
Edric must have been terrified, but he stepped forward boldly and bowed to the king before entering the magic. It held him longer than it had the others, and Aidan gripped my hand when he failed to reappear within a few seconds. I squeezed his hand, knowing no comfort would be enough should Edric fail.
Then Edric emerged, grinning. A crown of flame hovered above his head.
“Oh, thank the Shards,” Aidan muttered, leaning heavily on me.
Talfryn was next. Lara touched his shoulder before he left, smiling in encouragement, but he didn’t smile back. He faced the maelstrom grimly, like a prisoner who had been condemned. I recognized that look from when I’d slain Garrick—the horrible realization that death was inevitable. He and Karissa had performed similarly; he must know that if she had failed, so would he.
He pressed a hand to his chest, on top of three embroidered birds that circled his heart. Then he stood tall, took a deep breath, and walked into the magic with more courage than I had ever seen anyone display.
His corpse fell out, landing half on top of Karissa. Their eyes stared blindly at each other.
Where did the Fae think they went after death? Did they believe in an afterlife? I had never believed in one, but now I found myself praying to the Shards that Talfryn would end up somewhere better than this.
Lara was the only one left. Tears glittered in her eyes as she stared at the two corpses. Talfryn had been her champion and a friend.
I held my breath as she steeled herself, but before she could step forward, Pol hurried to the king’s side and whispered in his ear.
“What?” Osric demanded.
Pol whispered again, and Osric’s face turned white with rage. “Bring it.”
Lara still hesitated before him, but Osric barely seemed to see her. He tapped his fingers on the arms of his throne, visibly seething.
Pol returned bearing a burlap sack.
One look at it and I knew whatever was inside would be unpleasant. It was dripping, leaving a trail of red spatters behind.
“I have been betrayed.” The room seemed to shudder with Osric’s rage, and I flinched, worried the ceiling would come down. It couldn’t, I reminded myself. It was only an illusion. “My guards apprehended soldiers on their way here.”
Gasps met this pronouncement. Kallen shot to his feet, staring at the bloody sack with a burning expression I couldn’t identify. Drustan remained as nonchalant as ever, but his knuckles were white on the arms of his chair.
My heart tripped in my chest. Had Drustan decided to start the revolution now, or was this something else? Why wouldn’t he have warned me? He’d said he’d take action after the trials were over so they could recruit the successful candidates, but I’d been thinking weeks after, not immediately .
Osric gestured to Pol, and the steward upended the sack. A severed head tumbled out.
It belonged to Lothar, Roland’s younger brother and Drustan’s coconspirator.
I gagged at the gruesome sight, feeling an accompanying surge of panic. Drustan’s rebellion was truly happening tonight. Or it would have happened tonight, but something had gone terribly wrong.
Roland gaped. “What is the meaning of this?”
“It seems you and your brother betrayed the throne,” Osric said in vicious, biting tones. “He was leading a squadron of Light soldiers in this direction.”
“No. It isn’t possible.” At Osric’s implacable look, Roland dropped to his knees. “My king, I have always been loyal to you. You know this. If Lothar truly has plotted against you, then he has brought everlasting shame to our house.”
“Be silent. We will speak of this later.”
Roland retreated, still staring at the severed head.
I dared a glance at Drustan, who no longer looked quite so calm. Exactly how many soldiers had Lothar been leading? What did this mean for the attack he had planned?
“Ten other traitors were supporting him,” Pol said, “all low-ranking nobles from either Fire or Light House. Each led a squadron of twenty-five Underfae. All have been slain.”
Two hundred and sixty of Drustan’s troops massacred. The loss was staggering. My heart sank at the bleak expression that settled on his face.
He had lost.
He had lost before he had begun, because even with Nasties willing to attack the king, the soldiers had been needed to protect them. Now if the Nasties appeared at all it would be to a room full of Osric’s soldiers, with any element of surprise long gone. Illusion reinforcements were already filing in, bristling with steel.
Osric turned slowly to Drustan, and a howling void filled my chest. No, not him. I couldn’t lose this passionate, enigmatic prince who had admired me for my very humanity. I watched numbly as two soldiers shoved Drustan to his knees before the throne. His sheathed sword still hung from his belt, but it would be useless against Osric. The maelstrom whirled behind him, faster and faster, as if furious with what he had done.
Lara had stepped aside and stood watching from the edge of the crowd, looking frightened. She hadn’t yet faced the Shards’ judgment. By the time she did, the floor would be stained with Drustan’s blood, and all my hopes for a better world would be dead with him.
“You were often seen in Lothar’s company,” Osric said with chilling fury. “You enjoyed visiting the brothel together, didn’t you?”
“We did, but I was not aware of his treason.” Drustan sounded remarkably collected.
“How can you claim that? You were frequently seen with him, you have already been accused of treason once, and half of the fighters slain tonight belonged to Fire House. You are guilty.”
“Please, your majesty. Listen to me. You already know Lady Edlyn was plotting against you; perhaps she was working with Lothar. She must have known that if he was caught, suspicion would fall on me.”
“This is ridiculous.” The voice belonged to Prince Hector, who now stood at Kallen’s side. Cruel glee shone in the slash of his smile. “There have been rumors about you for years, Drustan. Do you truly think we’ll believe that sniveling fool Edlyn was capable of plotting a revolution?”
“Only a fool would try to attack the king,” Drustan shot back. “And my own blood is in the ward that protects him.”
“Silence,” Osric commanded. His fist slammed onto the arm of his throne. “Prince Drustan, my patience with you has reached an end. Unless you can provide me with tangible proof that you haven’t plotted against me, you will be put to death.”
Please, no .
“I promise I’ll prove it,” Drustan said. “Just give me time.”
Hector smirked and muttered something to Kallen before stalking off. Kallen kept watching Drustan, his expression perfectly blank.
“You will prove it now or you will die.”
An axe-wielding executioner stepped forward, and Drustan glanced around wildly. “I know of another traitor.”
What? My mind was racing frantically; I couldn’t think who he meant. Was he using this opportunity to eliminate some unknown enemy?
“I found out today and meant to tell you in private,” he continued, “but you have forced my hand.”
Osric raised a skeptical brow. “Go on.”
“I overheard Lord Selwyn of Earth House speaking with his manservant about overthrowing you.”
Drustan’s words hit like a punch. I barely heard Lara’s cry past the buzzing in my ears.
No.
Please, no.
I stared at Drustan, at his handsome face and lying mouth. At the person I’d cared for, the one I thought I’d known.
I had told Drustan about Selwyn’s sympathies. I had encouraged him to speak with the teenager, and Drustan undoubtedly had. And now…
Drustan had betrayed him to save his own life.
Whatever happened to Selwyn would be my fault.
“He’s a child,” Osric said dismissively. His rings glittered as he tapped his fingers in a restless cadence, eyes narrowed on Drustan. “His house is neutral.”
“He is close to adulthood and well-known for sympathizing with servants. And he’s been seen with Lothar recently.”
Osric looked to Kallen for confirmation. Kallen clenched his jaw and nodded with obvious reluctance.
Princess Oriana approached the throne. She cast Drustan a look of burning hatred before facing the king. “Your majesty, my son would never do this. Please—”
“Silence. Have him brought here. We will let the boy speak for himself.”
We waited for long minutes while Oriana’s servants went to fetch Selwyn. There was nothing else to be done. If Oriana refused to bring him, it would seem like confirmation of his guilt.
Lara kept looking at me, but I couldn’t meet her eyes.
When Selwyn arrived, he was dressed in a simple blue tunic adorned with his signature yellow rose, and his golden-brown hair was mussed. He glanced around warily.
“Step forward,” Osric commanded.
Selwyn joined his mother, jolting as he noticed Drustan still kneeling on the floor. I winced. He hadn’t yet learned how to hide his feelings or lie convincingly. If he really had been working with Drustan…
“You have been accused of treason,” King Osric said.
Selwyn paled. “I—I don’t know what you’re talking about, your majesty.”
“You were heard plotting to overthrow my rule. You were seen consorting with Lothar.” The king gestured at the severed head, and Selwyn jumped as if only now seeing it. He looked like he might be sick. “Do you deny it?”
“I spoke with him, but not about anything treasonous.”
“You’re a sixteen-year-old boy. What reason would you have for meeting with a lord of Light House?”
“He was kind to me.” The words sounded almost like a question. “We liked the same books.”
I closed my eyes in despair. Selwyn would never succeed with such a feeble defense.
“Lothar hated reading,” Roland said grimly from the king’s side.
“Oh.” Selwyn flushed. “Well, uh, I didn’t realize—”
“Lothar implicated you before he died,” the king lied.
So clever, and so cruel. If Selwyn was guilty, he would assume the king knew everything and the game was over.
Selwyn’s ragged breaths were loud in the still air. He looked at Lara with frightened eyes. She clasped her hands to her chest as if pleading with him to deny it.
Selwyn nodded once, then threw his shoulders back and faced the king again. “I did plot with Lothar.” His voice quavered. “But my mother and sister were ignorant of it.”
“No!” Lara dropped to her knees. “No, please…”
My eyes stung. Selwyn had surrendered to the king, but not for his own sake or to plead for clemency. He had confessed to spare his mother and sister any punishment.
“How long have you been plotting against the king?” Roland demanded.
“Since before the summer solstice.” With every word Selwyn’s voice grew stronger.
“Who else did you plot with?”
He didn’t even glance at Drustan. “No one. Lothar approached me. He wanted me to rally Earth troops to fight in an uprising.”
Tears streaked down my cheeks and spattered on the bodice of my fine gown. This sweet, noble boy had done what Drustan could not. He had sacrificed himself for the sake of his family and allies.
Drustan didn’t even look ashamed as he watched the drama from his position on the floor. In that instant the love I felt for him twisted in my chest, warping into something horrid and hateful. Drustan had chosen his own life above everything else, and now a true idealist would pay the price.
I had been a fool.
The king continued to question Selwyn. How did they plan to defeat the wards? Did Lothar have assistance? Had Selwyn gathered any troops?
Selwyn answered with remarkable composure. Lothar had an unknown plan to remove the wards around the king, and he had been working with a dead Fire lady. Selwyn had failed to gain support within Earth House and had finally told Lothar he wouldn’t be able to help. Since the massacred troops had belonged to Fire and Light, he undoubtedly spoke the truth, which meant he was about to be convicted on intention alone.
The king asked one final question. “Do you regret it?”
It was similar to what the Blood Tree had asked me, but I felt certain Selwyn would answer differently than I had. He would tell the king he did regret it and beg for forgiveness. Perhaps, since he was a child and had failed to rally support, he would be allowed to live.
Selwyn looked the king directly in the eye. “No.”
Surprised exclamations filled the air. Lara keened from her position slumped on the floor, but Oriana seemed frozen, as if encased in ice by her tragedy.
“Why not?” Again the room seemed to shudder as Osric’s anger blew through it.
“Because you are cruel. Because you are unjust. Because everyone in Mistei deserves to be free, from the Noble Fae to the humans.” Selwyn’s eyes burned with conviction, and his cheeks reddened as he spoke the traitorous words. “And even if I won’t see it, I’m happy to know you will not rule forever.”
King Osric snapped his fingers, and a guard shoved Selwyn to the floor so hard his head cracked against the marble.
As the executioner raised his axe, the king stood. “Wait.”
The entire room held its breath as Osric approached the supine figure. He prodded Selwyn with his toe, and the boy flinched.
“I don’t want to execute him the normal way.” The words were precise, cutting. “I want him annihilated. I want him undone by the realm he claims to love.” Osric’s hands shimmered with magic as he pulled Selwyn to his feet and shoved him backwards towards the whirling cyclone of magic. “Let the Shards rip him to pieces,” the king said, voice rising. “Let them tear his life from him. It’s what a traitor deserves.”
Selwyn stood inches from the killing vortex, sweating and trembling as his fear made itself known at last. He had been so brave, so good, and as he looked at Lara and his mother one last time, I sobbed out loud, unable to keep it in any longer.
Then the king gestured, and Selwyn’s hands flew up to protect his face from something unseen. He stepped back.
It was hard to describe the sound the vortex made when he fell into it. A screeching like claws on glass, perhaps, or like the dead crying for release from their icy tombs. The sound of plans gone horribly wrong as the Shards protested the presence of someone who did not belong there.
Selwyn collapsed on the other side, his wide brown eyes staring sightlessly at the ceiling.
Lara screamed.
I collapsed, sobbing for Selwyn and the loss of someone truly good, and, more selfishly, for what I had done to him and the revelation that the prince I’d cared for had been capable of this violence. Not by his hand but by his words, just as my words had damned Selwyn and, by extension, my best friend.
Hard hands grabbed me, and I was dragged to my feet and thrown to the floor before the throne. Disoriented, I shoved myself up, wiping away tears as I tried to see what was happening. A hard boot hit my back and pinned me to the black marble. In my peripheral vision I saw another gleaming silver boot—one of the king’s guards.
“It’s fascinating how deeply your daughter and her pet mourn, Oriana,” the king purred. I fought despair as I noticed Lara pinned to the ground as well. Her tear-flooded eyes met mine.
“My son said Lara wasn’t involved.” Oriana sounded preternaturally calm. How was she not raging and clawing out the eyes of everyone who had done this to her child?
Then again, we all fought with the weapons we had.
“Your son was a liar and a traitor.”
“Lara is incapable of something like this. She’s too weak.” The words were harsh, but I understood why Oriana had said them. Better to belittle her only daughter than lose her altogether.
“And yet she performed better in the trials than anyone but Una,” Osric said. “I begin to think Earth House is more duplicitous than I ever suspected.”
The guard gripped my hair and dragged me to my knees. I bit my lip, ignoring the stinging pain in my scalp.
“I do not believe these two were involved,” Drustan said. He knelt a few feet away from me, but I couldn’t read anything in his expression.
Osric turned on him. “And how would you know? Unless you have more familiarity with the traitors’ plans than you pretend.”
Drustan’s mouth opened, then closed. At last he replied. “Oriana is right. Lara is weak. Her handmaiden had to help her through the trials.”
The blood drained from my face. I stared at Drustan, reeling at this final betrayal. For it was a betrayal, no matter what his intentions were. Perhaps he meant to save us from being executed as traitors, but even if he succeeded, Lara would be ridiculed for the rest of her life, and I…
I would still be killed.
That had been Oriana’s promise, the same promise the Noble Fae gave to every human who entered Mistei. The ground would swallow us up, and we would never emerge from this hell again.
“How do you know this?” Osric asked.
“I sensed a token on the handmaiden after the Void trial, stolen while she aided Lara through the labyrinth. I pitied the girl, so I did not report her, but she undoubtedly continued helping her mistress.”
Osric’s shining black boots clicked against the stone as he approached. I kept my gaze on his knees, not daring to look at that awful, powerful face. “Did you help your mistress, human?”
I didn’t respond.
The guard fisted my hair and forced my gaze up. “Did you help her?” Osric repeated, his irises swirling with magic.
“No, your majesty,” I said.
Osric laughed. “You deny the word of a prince?”
“I deny any word but my own.”
“What filth.” Osric looked at me with utter contempt. “Throw her in.”
“Wait,” Lara cried.
The king turned on her. “Perhaps you would enjoy going first? As you wish. Let’s see what the rewards of cheating are.”
I trembled in the guard’s grip as Lara was dragged towards the column of magic. She had succeeded in every trial, which meant she would still be found worthy. Then what would the king say?
The guards pushed her in.
The maelstrom swirled as it had for every other candidate, but Lara stayed inside it for a long time. Too long.
At last, the veil of power parted, and she stepped through.
I clapped my hands to my mouth, tears springing to my eyes at the sight of her standing whole and healthy in front of me. She had succeeded.
Something was wrong, though. She was frowning at her hands. Then her face crumpled, and I understood.
Her magic was gone.
“You have been judged unworthy,” King Osric said with the delight of a spider winding silk around its prey. “Princess Oriana, what do you say to this revelation about your daughter?”
Oriana stood rigid, as if the slightest movement would shatter her. “She is no longer my daughter.”
There was a storm where my heart had once been, a swirling tempest of pain that battered me from the inside out. Lara had been right about her mother, and we had all been so very, very wrong about what was needed to pass the trials.
Osric’s smile was oily and foul. “I’m sure I’ll find some use for her.”
“Mother?” Lara reached out a shaking hand, but Oriana turned away.
As Lara stumbled into the crowd, Osric returned to his throne. “Throw the human in. Let her die for what she did.”
“Your majesty,” Kallen said, “she was undoubtedly only acting on orders—”
“Silence!” Osric still seethed with rage. Tonight had been the most substantial challenge to his power in centuries, and even though Lothar and the soldiers were dead, even though Selwyn was dead, even though Lara had lost her powers, it wasn’t enough. The king would have blood from anyone he could, and no words of reason could sway him.
I met Kallen’s eyes, silently thanking him for defending me when no one else had. As the guards dragged me past Drustan, I looked at him, too. His gray eyes were unreadable. Either he felt nothing or he was concealing his feelings to protect himself yet again.
I didn’t care. I let him see my rage and contempt, and I didn’t look away until he dropped his gaze.
Then I was standing before a rainbow-hued cyclone. From this close I could hear singing, an impossibly beautiful melody that would be the last thing I ever heard.
They pushed me in.
I stood in the middle of a tempest.
The thunderclouds were of every hue imaginable, and the lightning streaking down sent crackling reverberations through my chest. I breathed in energy and exhaled my own soul. I started to dissolve, my body ripped to shreds by the howling wind.
You cheated . The piercing voice wasn’t male or female but somehow both, with echoes beneath it as if a chorus chimed in agreement. I felt flayed alive as an unknown entity peered into my mind, raking sharp talons through the memories of everything I’d done. You did not abide by the rules.
Another voice spoke, this one female, dark, and pulsing. She followed the rules. She passed each trial . The dagger on my disintegrating arm thrummed in time with every word.
She was not supposed to compete. This voice crackled like flame.
It was the Shards, I realized with an agonized, grieving wonder. The Shards were discussing me.
She had no choice , the throbbing female voice responded. The Blood Shard.
I agree . The lilting words sounded like the babbling of a stream over tumbled rocks as Earth came to my defense.
Of course you agree , the first voice argued. Based on the pain that chorus caused in my mind, I wondered if it was Illusion speaking. You wanted the other one to succeed as well.
And I accepted the group decision , Earth said . The lady had a choice. This one did not.
Not only didn’t she choose, but she performed better than her lady . I shuddered at the sound of this Shard: male and deep, with a cold edge that spoke of nightmares. The churning clouds pulsed black as it spoke.
I say no , Illusion said.
I say yes , Blood replied.
She did not wield magic during the Earth trial.
She did. She carries Blood House’s most sacred artifact. The magic did not come from her, but she did wield it.
She is not a part of your house , the Fire Shard interjected.
I claim her.
At the Blood Shard’s firm words, the others paused.
I say yes , Earth said.
No , Fire replied. This is foolishness.
It’s time , Blood said. The balance must be restored. That will be her task.
More silence as the Shards considered. Then the deep, chilling voice of Void spoke. Blood is correct. The balance has been gone for too long. I say yes.
My body was disintegrating further with every second that passed. I didn’t feel pain, just a strange sense of being stretched too thin. Soon the pressure would grow too great, and I would snap. The broken pieces of me would vanish into the storm, and I would no longer exist.
It is an interesting debate , a final voice interjected. Light, who spoke with ringing clarity. If she had been a candidate and cheated, we would have rejected her. But she was not. She participated because she had to, and because she cared for her friend.
Caring is irrelevant , Fire sneered.
Not always , Light replied. In this case it shows great courage.
I could barely comprehend the conversation anymore. My mind was drifting further from my body. Lightning struck in front of me, but my vision was dimming, and all I saw was a faint flicker.
For a moment I felt relief. Soon I would be free from Mistei, and it wouldn’t hurt at all. I would drift away and become another scrap of cloud on the wind.
Then I remembered Lara. She was still out there and in pain. She had not been released. They were all still out there—thousands of faeries and humans suffering under an evil so great I had never imagined its like. I would be free, but what if they never were?
I wanted to stay.
You feel that? Blood asked, her tone triumphant.
I do , Light responded. And so the decision is made. I say yes . I felt that great, echoing presence focus on me. Kenna Heron, you have been found worthy. Take this gift and restore the balance.
The wind swept me away, and I saw no more.