Page 16

Shy

My blood threatens to run cold as the wizard looks us over.

This is Myrddin Emrys. The man who killed my family. He’s standing right there, and the desperate urge to reach for a blade and tear out his throat is almost overwhelming.

“Don’t,”

Rhys whispers. “He’s not alone. Can you feel them?”

His hand slides against mine and he moves slightly in front of me, shielding me with his own body. He’s right. I do feel something. There’s something here. Something we cannot see.

“My uncle could do it. He kept a hidden guard with him,”

Rhys whispers. “Be careful. You won’t see them until they slit your throat.”

One of the rebels hoists his bow up, aiming at the king, but the space around him twists and turns and he’s pulled into…nowhere.

“I’ve never seen my uncle do that before,”

Rhys whispers.

“Would anyone else like to try me?”

the king asks, his lips turned up in a cruel approximation of a smile.

“Z?”

Neil stares at his queen, his best friend, but he has to be thinking of Cassie and Brendan. His children. There’s a tortured look in his eyes.

Go, Zoey mouths, and in an instant, he’s a wolf again, running past the guards at breakneck speed.

“Leave him. He’s incidental. We’ll take him out later. Everyone important is here with one exception. I told you it would work,”

the wizard says, putting a hand on the king’s shoulder like they’re old friends. “I told you I could return her to you. Though you’ll have to take care of him first. I suspect he will object to you taking his wife.”

Devinshea already moved to stand in front of Zoey, his clothes tattered and bloody. “You will not take my goddess.”

“Your goddess?”

The king looks her over, his gaze stopping on her neck. “Is that the Goddess Chain? Then you are exactly what Myrddin says.”

“Devinshea, they are no threat to us.”

Ostara stands, her gentle voice tremulous. She puts a hand to her chest as though speaking from the heart or trying to work her will. “They are not here to harm us. They simply want to get back to their own time.”

“Oh, they won’t allow that, golden one.”

Sasha stares at her with an intensity I rarely see on his face. “They are the ones who sent us here, and that means they will know who we are and how to kill us.”

The Fae guard who had come with Lee all stand at attention, their bodies tense and weapons out. It’s obvious they’re not sure what to do. It would seem like Myrddin and King Devinshea are outnumbered, but we can all feel the wrongness of this room, the unseen threat.

Lee, however, stands and stares his father’s way. “She is not my mother. Not the Zandra you knew.”

The king of this land cannot seem to take his eyes off her. “She will do, son. She is the payment I required from the wizard for aiding him with his plans. And for being an excellent teacher. Shall I show you what he taught me?”

The wizard holds out a hand. “Not yet. I told you we must find the vampire king. He is more dangerous than you can imagine. This is why I insisted on the wards and spells we placed on the palace. They will weaken him. He should already be feeling their power. The Deiniol you knew was weak and gentle. This is a version of him unlike any other. Do not underestimate him.”

“I can handle any Deinny who comes my way,”

the Fae king promises. “And any weakling version of myself. I wish to be done with this. I don’t like seeing his hands on my concubine. I want to kill him.”

“I told you we can’t kill him so easily.”

A tinge of irritation seeps into Myrddin’s tone. “Like your fiancée, he is an ascended god. We must separate the god from the vessel and then we can feed from both. Their mortal souls are nothing compared to the gods inside.”

And now I know why there are no dead here.

The king of this Seelie sithein has turned into a soul eater. It’s something I’ve heard of but never believed in. A soul is sacrosanct. However, if anyone could figure out a way to do it, it is Myrddin.

It makes my stomach roll.

“Rhys, we have to get away. We have to get everyone out of here,”

I whisper.

I don’t know what he’s doing with the souls, but we can’t risk it. If he’s found a way to truly destroy a soul, they won’t merely kill us. They will harness our souls to feed their magic. I’m not sure if he wants to destroy the soul or shackle it, tormenting it for power. Either way, I want to avoid it.

Did he do that to my family?

“Fine,”

the king of the Seelies says, command in his voice. “Guards, take…myself, I guess. Take this thing with my face to the dungeons.”

“He will find me hard to separate, my goddess.”

Bris has taken over the body, his eyes fully emerald. “It will take days. Daniel will find you. We will stay alive. We will survive.”

“Well, he’s not wrong about the days of torture part,”

Evil Dev agrees as two guard wind their way out of space and time. One minute there’s a whooshing sound and the next there are two large Fae guards, reaching out to bind Bris’s hands behind his back. “But I will break him, and I will take his power as my own. It is time I am allowed in my own bloody temple again.”

Lee looks my way. Or rather our way. I think his words are truly meant for Rhys. “Yes, my father’s temple is alive. It stopped allowing him in when he started eating souls.”

“Is that how you got in, you little shit?”

Evil Dev’s eyes roll. “I should have known. I would burn the place down but it won’t let me.”

So that’s where we run. To the temple.

“It keeps them all out,”

Lee promises. “The temple is a living being. It knows how evil you are.”

“And I will use the power from this entity to take it over again. I will trick it with Ostara’s power and then destroy it with the energy I get from myself.”

The king walks over to Bris. “And you should know that while my guards peel the god from your soul and serve him up to me on a silver platter, that I will be winning back the woman who should have been at my side.”

“I think I might enjoy being a queen,”

Zoey says quietly. “My Devinshea wouldn’t take the crown no matter how much I argued. I thought we should. I thought he should be stronger. I knew he was stronger than Miria. Than Declan.”

Rhys gasps behind me, his fingers tightening on me, but I know exactly what the queen is doing.

And so does Myrddin. “She is lying, Your Majesty. Do not believe a word she says. She is already plotting.”

But it’s easy to see the king wants to believe. When Zoey moves to his side, his shoulders come down, he softens. He takes her hand. “I would love to hear about your life, Zandra. I would also love to show you the kind of life I can give you.”

“Her name is Zoey,”

Bris says.

“Her name is whatever I say it is,”

the king announces and then turns to Ostara. “Take her as well. I never intended to marry you, you worthless fleck of womanhood. I shall eat your weak goddess and then raze your dying plane to serve my friend. Myrddin will use all I give him to free us from this so-called balance.”

“I am sorry, my lord.”

Zoey’s tone is soft, though I know the tears on her cheeks are real, I also know she’s shifted into a role.

All the books and plays, the stories the rebels told of the history of the royals, served more than to entertain us. While the royals and Kelsey were gone, many works about them were written. Plays and songs as well. To keep them with us. Those tales taught us. Zoey Donovan-Quinn was in this position before. She allowed herself to be taken into custody with the belief that her husband would come for her. She did it to save the people she loved, as she hopes she is doing now. She knows she can manipulate the king. She is buying us all time.

Rhys must know that as well since he stays calm when the evil king takes his mother’s hand.

“You would betray me to save yourself?”

Bris asks.

I hope he’s acting because he sounds so forlorn.

“You know I always take care of myself first,”

she says quietly.

Oh, she does not. That woman never left a person behind if she wasn’t forced to.

Two more guards show up to take Ostara into custody.

She looks pale and fragile as they place her in chains. And then her eyes change and for the first time I truly believe she is ascended. Her goddess takes control of the body.

Searing green eyes find Sasha, and I feel a wind whip against me, the promise of a storm. The whole room smells of rain and electricity.

“I charge you, Oleg Federov,”

she says in a deeper voice than before. “I look deep in her soul and I see you there. You. Oleg. Save her. You couldn’t the first time. You lost her and…”

She seems to think, to hunt a mind that is not her own for some knowledge she needs. “You lost her and Natasha. Marta. Her name was Marta. She dreams of you at night but cannot quite remember. She did everything she could for you, for her husband. She gave her life for your daughter. Save her. You might have found other soulmates, but you owe her. I will keep her alive. Come for her.”

For the first time since I have known that vampire, tears fill his eyes as they cart out Ostara. He takes a single step toward them but Zoey holds out a hand, and a slight shake of her head makes Sasha stop. His jaw tightens, and I know it’s taking everything for him to be still.

But Daniel Donovan is out there, and that means we have to stay alive. It means we have hope.

I feel Rhys’s ear against my lips. “If he is the same as my uncle, he can only hold ten. We will only need to deal with six more. I will get you out of here and then we will find my dad and save them.”

I nod, praying Rhys remembers his way around this palace.

“I thought she meant Daniel,”

Zoey says. “When she asked about the vampire, I thought she was talking about Daniel. It’s why she thinks you have soul mates. She doesn’t understand how long you have been waiting.”

“Well, I didn’t expect that.”

Myrddin watches Sasha warily. “Did you find her again? How very sad for you. To look all this time only to find her soul again right before I devour it.”

A low growl comes from Sasha’s throat, and it’s easy to see he’s ready to attack. It’s also easy to see that would be a mistake.

The room feels tense with anticipation of what awful thing will happen next.

So I pull the focus to me. “Do you destroy the souls or do you keep them somewhere as fuel for your magic?”

Rhys goes stiff, and the whole room turns. Out of the corner of my eye I see Ostara and Bris being taken from the room, magical bindings holding them tight.

Myrddin stares for a moment, pinning me with those pitch black eyes of his. There’s a long moment where I swear he’s trying to look into my soul. “Fuck me. I missed one. How did you get away?”

“I wasn’t home that night.”

I don’t pretend to misunderstand. We’re past that, Myrddin Emrys and I. “The night you torched my home, I was at a friend’s house.”

Myrddin’s head shakes. “It was a school night. You should have been… I will kill the dark prophet. I will eat his soul and that of his children. You. He saved you. Guards, take her into custody. I will speak with her in the dungeon. Devinshea, take the rest out and kill them. We need to find the King of All Vampire and his wolves. And then I want to talk to your witches. No one told me there was a seer in the group.”

The words threaten to turn my stomach.

He did it. He torched my mom, my sister, my aunts and uncles and cousins, and is mad he didn’t get us all.

Something dark opens inside me, and I feel power roll through me for the first time. Not a medium’s power. This is ancient. This power inside me is as old as the hills. As long lived as the oceans.

It feels right. Like waking after a long slumber.

The wizard turns, and his eyes widen. “No. No, it can’t be. Kill it. Kill it now.”

He’s pointing at me.

Six guards form, all male and sidhe, with long swords or bows.

Sasha takes his shot and jumps the one closest to me.

All of Lee’s guards begin to fight, and I hear the clash of swords and whips of crossbows.

The king hauls Zoey out, even as she screams Rhys’s and my names. He simply picks her up and walks out, leaving the rest of us behind.

I feel one of the rebels die, his soul lifting up from his body even before it falls to the ground under the guard’s sword. I see the spirit, shock on his ghostly face as he is pulled toward the wizard.

He doesn’t even have to try. He simply reaches out a hand and drags the soul into his body, light flashing as he is absorbed.

My body aches as I reach out, trying to drag him back, but I don’t know how. The impulse is there. It rushes under my skin, but the knowledge is far from me.

I should know. I did know. Once I was this magic and this magic was me.

Swords clang and I’m surrounded by the grunts and groans of battle. Rhys tackles me, taking me to the floor.

I feel his power trying to flare but it’s dampened. Myrddin is working some mojo, and I would bet they took out all of the rebel’s witches. Myrddin knew about Rhys and his powers, so they are ready for him.

What he isn’t ready for is me.

The trouble is I’m only now starting to figure out I have power at all. It’s right there. Right in my fingertips, but I can’t quite make it work. Terror thrums through me because I can’t watch this happen to him. Not to Rhys.

I held back for so long. So long, and now I’m here and I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that if I lose him, I lose the best part of me. I lose the us we can be. I can’t.

“We have to go.”

Lee is suddenly standing over us. “The wizard is held back by the wards, too, but he’s taking them down. It won’t be long before he’s at full power and can kill us all with a glance. I’ll take you to the temple. We’ll be safe there.”

Rhys hauls me up and barely avoids taking a sword to his shoulder. It comes down and hits the ground and Rhys whirls me away. By the time I can look over his shoulder, Lee is gutting the Fae with what I’m sure is cold iron. I see the man’s soul begin to leave his body and like the others, it’s drawn to the wizard, who doesn’t even look up from weaving whatever spell he’s working as the male’s immortal soul is sucked into his body. And that male was his ally. He doesn’t discriminate. He will take them all into his greedy soul.

Sasha makes his way to us, fighting them off with his bare hands. His fangs are out and there’s blood coating his tunic as he grabs Rhys’s arm. “We’re going now.”

Lee nods. “We take them to the temple. The king’s men can’t get in.”

I hear a cry and then it feels like the whole world goes still.

Neil. Fae Neil is in one of the last guard’s arms, and I watch as he drags a blade over his throat and bright red blood begins to flow.

“Uncle,”

Lee shouts, but it’s far, far too late.

Rhys grabs his brother’s hand. “You can’t save him.”

“I can’t…”

Lee’s face is pale, his eyes tortured. “They’ll eat his soul. They’ll exterminate everything he is and was and could be again. I can’t…”

Neil’s soul floats from his body, a confused look on his face, and then he’s searching for something. For Lee. He holds a hand out but he’s already getting sucked into the vortex that is Myrddin’s soul.

I can’t. I know him. I know I don’t know this Neil, but I know him. I know the beautiful, loving, funny variation of him, and I cannot let this pass.

Something opens deep inside of me, something warm and powerful. Like a fire or a boiling pot. Like warmth in winter. That heat flows through me. Strange. I thought any death power would be cold, but there is infinite warmth in this, a calling and longing. There is love in this power.

I hold out my hand, and Neil’s soul freezes as though caught between the two of us.

Myrddin interrupts his under-the-breath chanting. Lee said he was pulling down the wards that held magic from this space, but he stops because those wards aren’t holding mine at all.

My magic is older than any ward. Wards exists because of my magic. Everything exists because of this sweet heat and light flowing through my veins.

But I am small now. Where once I was infinite, I am now defined and trapped in flesh. I don’t completely understand the images flowing through me. They aren’t images, exactly. Colors and feelings and impressions of mist and time and a man weeping at what he must do.

Myrddin’s eyes glow as he directs his power toward the soul we fight over.

Neil’s soul jerks another foot toward him.

His power is greater than mine for the moment. I cannot do it alone.

But just because a soul is dead does not mean his will gone. I can give him a choice.

“Do you see a light?”

I ask. “Nothing can stop you if you choose the light. If you choose to move on. He’s trying to take you to a place where the light cannot touch.”

Neil frowns even as he is moving inexorably toward Myrddin. “I don’t see it.”

Damn it. For some, it takes a while. His death was so sudden.

“There is nowhere for him to go,”

Myrddin says with a smile.

But there is.

There’s me.

“I offer you my soul space,”

I say, opening myself to him. I offer that space where Harry Wharton lived for many years.

And Neil takes it. He reaches out, and I realize my power is a golden thread. He holds it and pulls mightily, dragging himself away.

I feel him slam into me and then it’s like the world starts again.

Rhys curses and hauls me up and over his shoulder, and then we’re running. I barely catch sight of Lee and Sasha covering us as Rhys leaps on the window’s edge and over.

We’re falling, and I think we’re at least three stories up. I brace myself for impact, but vines wrap around us, silky and strong, wresting us from our fall and delivering us gently to the ground.

When I look up, they are doing the same for Sasha and Lee, depositing them on the soft grass next to us.

“Get them!”

Myrddin yells.

“The temple is this way.”

Lee’s face is grave in the moonlight. “We have to move quickly. He’s almost got the wards down.”

We race off into the night.