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“Go to the house, lock the doors, and do not come out until I tell you it’s safe.” He grabbed Nellie’s arm, and she hissed at him. “Don’t make me drag you there myself.”

He let go of her, and she stumbled away from him, her face pale. Val slowly shook her head as tears streamed down her cheeks. Meanwhile, all I could do was take slow steps down the path leading away from the village square. Something was happening. Something terrible.

Deep down, I knew we’d been right to worry about the mysterious meetings in the pub. My uncle and Val’s parents were planning something. A rebellion against the fae. I wanted to be a part of it, but if I stayed, Nellie would stay. When blood sprayed, she needed to be safe.

“Come on.” I grabbed her hand, and Val’s, and tugged them toward the path. “Let’s go.”

Val took two strides back in the opposite direction. Her eyes were as wide as the eversun. “I’m staying here.”

My leg muscles twitched with the urge to run. It was as if a rift had suddenly cracked open in my heart. On one side stood the rebellious girl with eyes full of fire, desperate to stay with Val and watch the fae burn. But on the other side, a girl trembled with fear, her hand entwined with her sister’s.

I had never been a fighter. The fae were far too strong for us to hope we could win a battle against them. All my life, I had fallen in line. Sure, I whispered about them, cursing the king and his loyal fae subjects. But I’d never dreamed of turning my words into actions.

What kind of hope did a mortal have against a fae? That was the core of it. If I stayed, I wouldn’t witness the triumphant victory of the Teine mortals against their fae overlords. Everyone who fought would die a gruesome death. That might include witnesses. Anyone Oberon deemed a traitor.

“Val, you can’t stay,” I pleaded with her before turning to my father. “Neither can you.”

Nellie frowned at me. “Why are you—”

Screams rent the calm morning air. The fae charged the pub with swords raised, shouting at the mortals gathered inside. Val cried out and raced toward the building. Blood sprayed from the open door and soaked the front wooden steps.

“Val, no!” I ran after her with tears burning my eyes. If she went into that pub, they’d kill her, too. Dirt dusted around me. My bare feet pounded the ground. I kept my gaze on Val’s stumbling form and blocked out the savage chaos.

A male grunt sounded in my ears as two strong hands grabbed my waist and tossed me into the air. I landed on my father’s shoulder and kicked out my legs, trying to twist away from him so that I could get to Val.

He tightened his grip on me, carried me across the square, and dumped me far from the screams. Far from Val. My backside hit the ground hard, and my teeth slammed together. Pain lanced through me as I stared up at him in shock, blinking at the alien look on his face. His smile was gone, and so was the laughter in his eyes. In its place sat a mask of cruelty that could rival the fae’s.

“How dare you?” I whispered as I climbed to my feet. “You can’t stop me from trying to help Val.”

“You’re more important than she is,” he said flatly. “And it’s too late now for you to help her. She’s already inside the pub.”

“How can you be so heartless?”

“Go to our house, Tessa.”

“No.”

He grabbed my arm and shook me. My teeth knocked together. “You have to get out of here. Oberon will come. You can’t be anywhere near him when he does. If he finds out—”

I blinked up at him. “If he finds out what?”

“You areprecious.”

Something within me broke at the look on his face. Father had been distant the past couple of years. He’d spent a lot of time in that damn pub, and he stumbled home reeking of ale most nights. He never talked about why. I’d overheard Mother ask him about it, but he brushed her aside, too. Every now and then, I saw the pain in her eyes when she looked at him. He was drifting away from us. We all knew it. And so the swell of emotion I saw in him now knocked past the flimsy wall I’d erected to protect myself from the pain of losing him slowly.

But still, it wasn’t enough to shove it all aside so easily. “Val is precious too.”

I turned away from him and walked toward the pub. He started to follow, but Nellie stepped into his path.

“Let her go,” she said.

“I’m trying to protect her.”

“Val needs her. It’s over. Look, the fae have left the pub.”

And so they had. Inside, I found carnage. Carnage and a broken Val, sobbing, her hands covered in her parents’ blood. I knelt beside her. She leaned against me, and she swore to me that one day we would kill them all.

And I swore right back.