Page 40 of A Flame of the Phoenix (An Heir Comes to Rise #6)

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

Faythe

A gloomy gray had begun to darken the white whorls of her subconscious essence, and it started to chase more of the gold away.

Faythe didn’t feel comfort here anymore. She wanted to escape the creeping burden her own mind was becoming. Heavier by the day.

At least she had awoken here and not fallen into some torturous nightmare when Zaiana knocked her unconscious. Faythe was sour about her methods, but she couldn’t be mad when it was exactly what she needed.

“Mine used to look like this too,” Nyte said, his voice a gentle silver disturbance in her quiet void.

She found him standing a few paces away, lifting a hand to swirl it though the gray and gold clouds.

Seeing him here and knowing what she was about to attempt, her nerves began to doubt this plan. Granting the son of her greatest enemy the ability to walk her world as Marvellas did. It could be a trick. Rainyte Ashfyre could instead become a weapon with his mother, and they wouldn’t stand a chance against them both being reunited.

“You doubt me,” he said, feeling her emotions more acutely in here.

“I don’t have much to trust you with. This is all a leap of…faith,” she said.

“Then all you can do is trust you’ll fly this time.”

Faythe had taken a life-risking leap before. Literally. Off the side of the Fire Mountains, with nothing but pure belief that Atherius would catch her. Deep down, Faythe could feel a similar inkling toward Nyte, but it didn’t make the decision to trust him any less terrifying.

“Do you really think you can kill your mother?”

“I don’t know,” he said honestly, and she believed him. “I haven’t met her, and all I know are stories of her from her enemies.”

“Every villain has their own story that justifies their evil actions.”

“I agree. But does that mean they shouldn’t be heard?”

“So, what if you hear her side and decide to turn on us?”

Nyte took a few steps closer. “My war isn’t with you. All I want is to get back to my Starlight. I need this body you will give me to start looking for a way back. Whatever I learn of my mother and my origins here in the meantime matters naught to all I have waiting for me. So you see, you could never be an enemy worth my efforts even if I come to sympathize with Marvellas.”

That consoled some of her terrible anxiety to give power to one who could drastically shift the scales of her war against the Goddess of Stars for better or worse.

“Then let’s give this a try,” Faythe said, taking a deep breath and squaring her shoulders.

Focusing on the viscous Captain Daegal, Faythe gripped the thread to his mind, which was exposed to her through a web of endless subconscious roads she could follow. With all her focus, Faythe hoisted the anchor keeping her there and let go to project into Daegal’s subconscious instead.

She landed with a familiar weightless grace, immediately wrapped in the presence of Daegal’s thoughts and feelings. His subconscious was dark, with streaks of bloodred—a sinister contrast befitting of his personality.

“Do you ever wonder which minds are born so vicious and which turn this way?” Faythe asked Nyte, scanning the void that brought on a chill.

“I don’t think any are born this way,” Nyte said. “Whether things happen to people to give them a thirst for violence and a scarred moral compass or they simply build a desire out of sampling such things, I don’t believe a cruel mind like this was always inevitable from birth.”

Faythe agreed with him.

In a mind that didn’t harbor the Nightwalking ability, Faythe would usually have to be vigilant. Any wrong move in their subconscious could cause irreversible damage to their brain when they awoke. This time it was Faythe’s objective to drag Daegal’s awareness here with her. She’d schemed various methods to achieve their task with Nyte while they were in the cells; his skill and knowledge of the Nightwalking ability surpassed even what Nik knew and had experimented with. The ability could be conveyed simply as an invasion of a person’s sleeping mind, but there were far more layers and chilling possibilities no one could imagine the extent of.

Like the concept of what Faythe was about to attempt. Killing a person’s consciousness and implanting another’s.

“You’ll only get one precarious chance at this, which could end badly for us if you make a wrong move,” Nyte rehashed.

Faythe shivered. “A boost of confidence would be better right now.”

“You don’t need that. You know you can do this. You’re just as much her heir as I am—the origin of this ability. You are strong enough, and your potential is limitless.”

I am strong enough, and my potential is limitless.

Faythe repeated those words to herself over and over, gathering the strength she needed to put her plan into practice.

She dissolved the rampant thoughts of her mind one by one, steadily falling into a collected calm that focused on nothing but her magick, channeling it all through her Nightwalking. Reaching through Daegal’s mind wasn’t without pain and resistance. His confusion slashed into her, recognizing an invading force and trying to cast her out. She battled him for dominance only for a few seconds. It was too easy to take control. Faythe reached out a physical hand, grabbing his consciousness and dragging it to join her in this space.

She looked down at him, his brown eyes wide, terrified, and helpless. He couldn’t utter a sound. She only had seconds before his brain would shut down completely, killing him.

“Do it now!” Nyte yelled through the storm that raged. It was Daegal’s mind, fighting with all it had against her.

Her head throbbed with the countdown.

Faythe closed her eyes, straining to reach for the quickly fraying thread of Daegal’s mental being. She grabbed it in one hand, then she felt for the end of Nyte’s, which lived in her own mind. The pounding in her head amplified, slipping her control.

“You’re almost there,” Nyte said, but his voice was so distant now.

The danger of what she was doing wasn’t lost on her. Nightwalking was not without severe risk, and what she was attempting was against all moral code of the Spirit-given ability. Her magick rebelled in her veins, a scream tore from her throat, but Faythe pulled the threads together. Their frayed edges sparked against each other, each finite strand fusing together.

When it was about to finish, Faythe was slammed into by a force so great she propelled back endlessly. She gasped and flailed to catch herself from drifting into oblivion. The moment she saw her way back—a prominent gold fiber in the web of infinite mental connections—Faythe reached desperately for it.

As soon as she touched her mind link, Faythe was pulled back into her own subconscious, falling to her hands and knees and blinking down at the gold-and-gray mists weaving through her splayed fingers.

Had she done it?

Faythe couldn’t be sure. She had to wake up, but she was so tired, giving in to the weakness of her body as it crumpled in a heap.

Something was tugging her consciousness. The familiar pull of someone trying to wake her up. Faythe resisted for as long as she could, but they weren’t giving in.

With a deep inhale, when Faythe opened her eyes, she was back in her physical body, fully awake. Faythe heard a voice across the room, and her head lolled. She didn’t find the source of the conversation; instead her body stiffened when her eyes fell upon Captain Daegal, whose eyes fluttered open.

Faythe couldn’t move when their eyes met. She waited in anticipation.

He winked at her.

It had worked. Nyte now had full control of the captain’s body, and once he left it…Daegal would be dead.

Faythe couldn’t say she felt an ounce of regret for killing him.

Nyte pushed himself up, his expression turning frightening. He lunged for Faythe, yanking her up by the scruff of her clothing and slamming her to the wall. He was only upon her for a few seconds before he was ripped away. Nyte grunted when Zaiana instead pushed him against the wall, angling a blade to his neck.

Was his violence for show as the captain, or had she been a fool and Nyte’s aggression toward was genuine?

Her mind spun, and her heart raced, staring at the stand-off between Nyte and Zaiana.

They stared deeply into each other’s eyes. Zaiana’s brow twitched, and she scanned his face. Faythe’s pulse was erratic—it had to be her own paranoia that detected the confusion and suspicion Zaiana wore. One second she was ready to slice his throat; the next she’d pushed off him, backing a long step up as if he would burst into flame.

“You’re ruining the fun.”

That voice.

A searing white rage overcame Faythe in an instant, and the moment she saw Maverick Blackfair…all she knew was vengeance. All she saw was him standing behind her father, his sword plunged straight through him.

He took her father from her.

Faythe’s magick left her palms before any rational thought could intervene. Maverick’s blue fire exploded into it, but her light was stronger, blasting him right through the stone wall.

She lost herself to a state of mind she’d only felt once before. The moment Maverick had killed her father. This place sharpened every emotion to a weapon that made her feel unstoppable.

Faythe found Maverick retreating over a pile of rocks, and she didn’t think twice before sending another attack. Over the pulse in her ears and the electric blast of power, she thought someone might have called her name. That wasn’t enough to take even a fraction of her attention off her target. She destroyed another wall, taking them into the body of the castle, where ruins were made of glass and white marble.

She didn’t know how she was moving so fast to keep up with Maverick, who was still alive .

“You’re a coward,” she roared in anguish to him.

He ran like one. Killed like one. Faythe didn’t care about his life as the Prince of Dalrune, nor that Nik wanted to see him one last time. Faythe had to kill him.

She didn’t expect the dark fae who’d killed her, then her father, to be so bold as to show his face to her again, so closely within reach. What enraged her more was how casual he appeared. His days went on with nothing changed, while her father would never see another. Would never get to spend another with her, rebuilding all they’d lost over their estranged years.

Faythe’s grief was the only thing to dampen the urgency of her pursuit. She lost sight of Maverick, but her power was screaming inside her to find him and make him feel what she was.

“You have to stop!” Zaiana called.

The darkest side of Faythe perked up at her voice. She turned, realizing she didn’t need to find Maverick—the greatest way to hurt him was by hurting Zaiana. When she met those purple eyes watching her with wary disbelief, the first sensation of doubt crept through her.

Faythe needed Zaiana. She didn’t know exactly why—maybe she would never figure that out—but even back when they had the dark fae captive in Rhyenelle cells, Faythe had never celebrated that fact as capturing the enemy but capturing the most unexpected kernel of hope .

“Why?” Faythe asked. “Why do you care for him?”

Zaiana’s mouth opened, but her words faltered. She didn’t know herself.

At the sound of a crack behind her, Faythe spun, catching a flicker of cobalt hurtling toward her. She managed to defend herself, her gold magick swallowing his fire. In the same breath she sent a spear of his own fire power back to him, striking his chest. Faythe used Shadowporting next. He was not getting away from her.

Appearing at his feet while he used the wall to push himself back to standing, Faythe swiped a shard of glass from the ground and lunged, cutting her palm, which bled crimson while the edge she pressed into his throat started dripping black.

“We have to stop meeting like this,” he groaned in pain.

“Do you regret anything you’ve done?” Faythe snarled.

Maverick was far too composed. Accepting. He didn’t stare at her with loathing or anger. There was nothing. Absolutely nothing in those onyx eyes.

“No,” he said calmly.

Faythe’s teeth gritted harder, the glass cutting them both deeper.

“Why did you do it? All of it? Marvellas and the masters took everything from you, and yet you did their bidding.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

Gods , she wanted to kill him so badly her whole body vibrated with violence. But something was making her hesitate. Perhaps a desperate need to know why . Staring into his eyes was like staring into the dead. Yet she refused to believe his actions were mindlessly evil. There had to be a reason, and if she killed him without knowing, she wondered if she would ever find closure over why her father had to die.

“I told you to stay away from her,” Marvellas’s sharp voice bellowed from behind.

Maverick’s jaw twitched in reaction, slipping his sight over Faythe’s head.

“It was an unfortunate crossing of paths,” he lied.

“I’ll take her back.”

Faythe stiffened at the sound of Captain Daegal approaching. Of Rainyte Ashfyre coming to retrieve her.

Faythe sliced Maverick’s neck before she felt the clamp of Magestone around her wrist, causing her to drop the shard of glass. Maverick clutched his neck, which spilled with black blood—not deep enough to kill, but she hoped it would scar.

“I hope you never rest a day knowing I’m going to kill you. Doing so now would be too damn merciful for all you’ve done,” she said venomously.

“I look forward to it,” was all he said.

Faythe couldn’t hate someone more than she did Maverick, but for now, she let Nyte restrain her other wrist and lead her away.

They stopped before Marvellas, and the Spirit looked down at Faythe’s hand bleeding onto the floor. Reaching for her, Marvellas examined her deep cut thoughtfully.

“Your anger is understandable,” she said calmly. Then her blazing gold eyes flicked up to Nyte wearing Daegal’s face. “Dress this properly and leave the Magestone out of her flesh. It seems she might be ready to try to break the ruin again sooner than I thought.”

Faythe’s heart was in her throat for the seconds Marvellas stared at her son, but not even a flicker of recognition disturbed her placid face. It was pure tragedy but a relief.

She couldn’t fathom what Nyte would be feeling.

He pushed her, keeping in character as Captain Daegal. They passed Zaiana, and once again Faythe couldn’t relax with the look she pinned on Nyte, as if he were a puzzle she couldn’t figure out.

Back at the cells, Nyte led her inside then locked the door, with himself outside it.

“What now?” Faythe asked him.

She was aware there was no telling what Nyte would or could do now. She’d made the choice to give him the power of a physical body, and what he did with it was entirely his own control.

“Now, you’re still trapped, and I’m free.”