Page 40

Tessa

SEVEN YEARS AGO

“Ican’t believe they’re letting us have axes.” Nellie stood beside me, watching a few of the village boys haul chopped logs over to the new building at the edge of our small, bustling town. After decades, our numbers were growing, and we needed more houses. Oberon, in an unexpected display of generosity, had sent down some axes to help. He’d sent some soldiers, too, but all they did was stand and watch with their swords at the ready, just in case a mortal decided to rebel.

Things were changing in Teine, but some things would always remain the same.

Val, on my other side, elbowed me when Aidan stopped to wipe the sweat off his brow and remove his tunic. Muscles gleamed beneath the oppressive light of the eversun. “How are things going between you two? Have you spoken to him since you kissed?”

“No.” I turned away from the sight. “He’s a nice enough boy, I guess. I just…well, it wasn’t very exciting.”

“Maybe it doesn’t need to be exciting.”

“It does for me.” I hooked my arms into the crook of their elbows and steered them toward the village square. A few of the women had set out cakes and pastries to celebrate the momentous occasion. New homes meant growing families, which meant hope for the future of our village. We were more than surviving now. It was time for us to thrive.

When we reached the dirt-packed square, my eyes were drawn to my uncle. He vanished into the pub. Val’s parents followed soon after, along with a few of the boys around my age. I frowned and slowed my steps. The day had only just begun and already they were seeking solace in their tankards? That wasn’t like my uncle.OrVal’s parents.

I nodded toward the sagging building that had seen so many better days. “Your parents are starting early. Are they not happy about the build?”

Val pressed her lips together. “They’ve been acting strangely for a few weeks now. Every time I turn around, they’re always going to that damn pub, but the weird thing is…they never stink of ale.”

“Maybe they’re having council meetings.” Nellie tugged my hand to pull us over to the tables of cakes near Oberon’s statue in the center of the square.

I plucked a square sponge cake topped with strawberries. A rarity here. We’d had a good harvest this year, but most of the time, lack of rainfall killed any berries we tried to grow. Only the river winding down from the mountains beyond the border kept us going.

Val frowned down at the cakes. “My parents aren’t on the council.”

“Maybe our uncle brought them on board,” I suggested, though that made little sense. Any new council members had to be voted in by the village, according to our laws. Of course, the council didn’t hold any true power. Oberon allowed us to play at self-sufficiency, but he was the only authority in Teine. His soldiers were present at every meeting the council held, to ensure the mortals weren’t planning a revolt against him.

“There are too many fae in the village today for them to be doing this. We need to tell them to stop.”

“To be doing what, Val?” Suddenly, the aftertaste of the cake was far too sickly, far too sweet. “Is there something you’re not telling us?”

“No, I don’t know what they’re doing. Maybe they’re just…taking a break from the build.”

Val did not sound convinced, and truth be told, I didn’t have a good feeling about it, either. But I wasn’t going to chase my uncle inside the pub and bring attention to it. Maybe they really were planning something, but what? There was little we mere mortals could do against the fae. They were as tough as nails, and it took more than just a stab in the gut to kill them. We needed to chop off their heads or burn their bodies. Anything else…and they’d just heal.

It wasn’t as if we could escape this place even if we did kill them all. We were trapped on this side of the Great Rift by the mists that plagued what had once been the rest of the Kingdom of Light, lands that now belonged to the monstrous Mist King. We had nowhere else to go.

“Sure,” Val said tightly. “They’re just having a rest. There’s no cause for alarm…”

Two dozen fae soldiers marched into the square, their boots thunderous against the packed ground. My stomach roiled at the glint of their deadly swords beneath the eversun. They strode right past us with their eyes set on the corner pub. Val snatched my hand and squeezed so tight that my bones ached. Nellie dropped her cake, and it splattered on the dirt, a smashed pulp of sugar and flour and blood-red icing.

“What’s happening?” my sister whispered, not daring to speak too loudly. We didn’t want the soldiers to notice us hovering nearby like terrified ants beneath the boots of giants.

“I need to do something,” Val said, her voice unsteady. “They’re going into the pub. My parents are in there.”

I clutched her hand and held her back. “You can’t. They’ll kill you if you try to stop them.”

My father drifted into the square, saw us frozen by the cake stand, and rushed over. The haunted look in his eyes shook me to my bones. “You need to go on home, girls. Get out of here. Now.”

Val pleaded with my father. “Mr. Baran, you have to stop them. My parents are in there.”

“So is our uncle,” Nellie whispered.

Father frowned down at my sister and reached for her arm, but she flinched away. “I’ll take care of it, but you can’t be here. Go home. Now.”

I met my father’s gaze. “Take care of it? But—”