Page 46 of Twisting Twilight (Homesteader Hearth Witch #9)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Water and air answered my panicked plea.

The wind off the sea snatched Faebane and the tourmaline crystal that had fallen from my hand, and the sea swelled into a colossal wave to catch me upon its crest. The iron rapier and the crystal floated into my hands as the wave sank instead of breaking, pushing me onto a beach of glittering black sand.

The dead shore stretched perhaps half a mile in either direction like a scar upon the earth.

Rubble—boulders or even the petrified remains of fishing boats—littered the sand.

Shadows populated the rocky beach so thickly it was impossible to catch sight of the sea from land.

They wriggled like translucent eels in the sea breeze, and the whispers, wails, and crying I’d heard before my fall returned, louder.

“Meadow,” Sawyer yowled down the bond.

“Please tell Kian that the throne room no longer exists,” I informed dryly. Then, turning to examine the cliff for a way up, I added, “And either the Ouzel was more successful than the history books let on, or he was right about the muirdris treasure hoard.”

The sea or a Blight-resistant stone troll looking to install obsidian countertops in his cave had reclaimed much of the ruined castle.

What had proven more resistant to the elements or renovation theft stuck out of the heaps of black sand like the skeletons of giants long since rotted away.

Pillars, archways, great chunks of stonework with weathered details.

Beyond—and out of reach of the sea, for now—gold and silver and so many jewels were all a-glitter in the sunlight.

“But you’re okay?” the little cat demanded.

“Didn’t even twist an ankle in the fall.” I quickly patted myself down, making sure everything from Arcadis’s ring to the Hunting Spell monocle were still in their correct places.

“You fell ? Kian said that cliff is over a hundred feet high!”

“Don’t tell Kian about the fall,” I said quickly. “Tell him I slid. I don’t want him to know I can use magic here.”

“Why not? Wait, was that what you wouldn’t tell me before?”

Though he couldn’t see it, I scrubbed my face with my free hand. Good going, Meadow.

“Why would you keep that from me?”

The cat was already out of the bag, so… “Because I told Thistle I wouldn’t. Not yet. But don’t ? —”

The bond muted as the tabby tomcat shut me out so he could have a word or two with the faelene. Well, that was new. I guess we’d both changed here.

If I was lucky, Thistle wouldn’t tear me to shreds for sharing my magic hadn’t been affected here. I hadn’t divulged the why , after all. Which I didn’t entirely understand myself.

Focus .

This time it was my inner voice reminding me, not Grandmother’s. Not Violet’s.

Faebane at the ready, I hurried inside the sea dragon’s treasure cave at the base of the ruined castle.

Oddly enough, there were no shadows here.

I still slashed around with the iron sword a few times, just to make sure.

The shiny black sand rustled like snake scales against dry leaves as I pushed the sword into the ground.

The land was already dead, after all, and I could fill up Ler’s sack faster if I used both hands.

The bleached tourmaline shuddered, magic draining at an incredible rate.

Smoke rose violently from the Blighted ground, hissing like I’d just startled Fiachna awake from one of his naps.

I yanked the rapier free with a yelp and waved a gust of wind at the smoke before I could inhale.

When the vapor cleared, there was a three-foot circle of matte black sand where the rapier had pierced. The twinkling obsidian was gone. Cautiously, I crouched down to examine what Faebane had done. The earth looked no different than the charred remains of a bonfire. And it was warm .

Unlike anywhere else in this entire forsaken court, this circle had heat. My whole body shivered with the instinctual desire to dig my hands in deep and steal some of that warmth for myself. Instead, I stuck my hand in my pocket and fished out the last larch seed.

“Could it really be true?” I whispered.

My heartbeat was wild as air magic swirled a shallow hole in the ground. I deposited the larch seed and drew water from the sea spray. Then I chewed the bottom corner of my lip, knowing this next bit would be risky. With so much at stake, should I even try?

But an ancient secret was hidden in this earth, and while I had no bottle of Riesling, I knew I couldn’t resist.

After a silent prayer to the Green Mother, I pressed my hand against the mound of soil and poured primal magic into it.

The dead earth took so much more than I’d been prepared to give, but there, buried deep, Elfame answered.

The magic at the heart of the world bubbled up like water from a tapped spring and met me at the seed. It was only a thread—so much of the surrounding land was barren—but life found a way.

I fell back with a surprised cry as a sapling sprouted three feet into the air. Branches sprang from its trunk and shiny green needles unfurled. It was tiny, but it was alive.

That spark of awed disbelief and triumph alerted Sawyer, and his consciousness shuttled down the bond. “You found the mirror?”

“I, uh, think I eradicated a patch of Blight and grew a baby tree.”

“You did WHAT?”

“I don’t think anything about what I just said was unclear,” I replied, still stunned at its truth.

Scrambling upright where I’d fallen on my cloak, I shook off my shock and touched the larch’s needles with a tentative finger.

Smooth, prickly, supple with moisture. Yep, very much alive.

With so much of the surrounding land dead, I wondered how long it would survive.

Enclosing its slender truck in my hand, I sent my perception into the sapling.

It sparkled in my second sight, a lone beacon in a sea of darkness.

And there, wound around its taproot like an anchor line, was that thread of primal magic linking this little life to Elfame’s heart.

Whoa.

Releasing the tree and my sparkle vision, I stepped away to return to my original task in the treasure cave. My mind could reel while my hands plundered.

Through the bond, I sensed the little cat was still flabbergasted and speechless. Yet had he been there in person, he would’ve pounced me, sat on my chest, batted at my cheeks with his paws, and demanded answers.

“Remember when I grew that sheath for Faebane and it turned it black?” I asked him. “Well, I stuck the blade into the ground to hold it so I could grab treasure for Shari’s ransom. The ground was already dead, so what’s the harm, right? Well, not dead enough, I guess.”

“How can you be more than dead?”

I paused in my collecting to snort. “We’re literally in the land of fairy tales, Sawyer. I don’t think regular physics apply here.”

“True.”

A glance over my shoulder rewarded me with a glimpse of the little larch tree.

Its branches wiggled in the sea breeze. “Faebane killed the Blight infesting the ground, not the ground itself. Remember how we’d throw down tarps or cardboard to kill all the weeds when we expanded the garden?

When we removed the coverings, the earth looked dead.

But there was still living soil there. Faebane restored the life to the ground. ”

“How is that possible? Iron kills everything in Elfame.”

“Maybe ‘life potential’ is a better term. The fae believe the Blight sucked the magic out of the land. But from what I just witnessed, it bound it. Like how pill bugs bind up toxic metals in their bodies. The Blight grabbed it so nothing else could use it. That’s why the land glitters—those are magic crystals, for lack of a better term.

Faebane killed the Blight and released the magic. The land turned warm again, Sawyer.”

“Since I haven’t extended even a claw into the Field of Black Stars, I take it that is a big deal.”

“It is. It’s so stupidly cold here. Anyway, after Faebane purged the Blight, the ground became empty soil. Had I touched it with Faebane again, I think it would’ve killed it for real.”

“Hang on. Empty soil? How did you grow anything?”

I tensed in preparation of his response. “I, uh, gave it a boost of primal magic. Maybe green magic could’ve been enough, but go big or go home, right? And, well, Elfame responded.”

Like called to like.

Sawyer didn’t reply the way I’d expected. “Don’t you dare say anything to anyone! If the fae find out our iron can purge the Blight and someone like you can restore life to the land, they’ll— They’ll ? —”

The little cat was too upset for words. Down the bond came a series of images of manacles and moonstone collars and moldy prison cells and sunless days. And me, gaunt and pale, a husk of my former self.

The depressing and fearful moving picture show made my skin crawl. I needed the Samildánach and I needed to get back home.

Cursing myself for not thinking of it sooner, I summoned a small tornado to expedite my plundering.

Gold ingots, coins stamped with a trident-wielding mermaid, jewels of every color, and an obscene amount of pearls lifted with the twisting wind.

The tornado funneled it all into the velvet bag quick as you please, and the red color turned purple then blue in a matter of seconds.

The sack bulged, coins leaking out the top.

I shook those loose and cinched the ties shut before fastening it to my belt.

“I’ll be extra careful, little cat,” I told my familiar. “What does Kian have to say about finding another route to the southeast tower?”

I already knew what I was going to do, but Kian couldn’t become suspicious. From what we’d all been through, I trusted him, but I also trusted his insatiable curiosity and patriotism to act within their natures too.

Before leaving the treasure hold, I extracted one last item—a muirdris scale.

In the wake of the treasure-whisking tornado, I discovered the cavern to be full of them.

The sea-green scale was the size of a dinner plate and just as thick.

It was exceptionally smooth, perhaps even coated in a kind of wax.

Silver lined its lip and sapphire edged the tapered edge where it had once been rooted in the muirdris’s skin.

“Kian says there should be several exits from the treasure hold—in theory. Find one and he’ll direct you from there,” Sawyer said. “And hurry up. The sun keeps setting.”

“I’m going, I’m going.”

As I stuffed the scale into my pack, I took another look around the remaining treasure for Kian’s mortal artifact that had allegedly stymied the Blight.

The Hunting Spell monocle only traced living creatures.

A Scouting Spell wouldn’t work, nor would a Seeking Spell if I didn’t have an origin point—like the bloodhound using a jacket to find a missing child.

If Sawyer had been here, maybe he would’ve had a spell to find it, like the time he’d tried to locate the toirchim glaze in Jakob Tabrass’s wagon.

Blowing out a raspberry, I sent a silent apology Kian’s way and turned to retrace my steps through the plundered treasure hold.

And walked straight into a shadow.

My tornado had loosened more than coins and sea dragon scales. A diadem had come free of its resting place, bringing the bound shadow along with it.

In the split second I realized my mistake, I flung up my arms in hopes my iron cuffs would save me. But the icy darkness swallowed my hands first before it encountered my cuffs. It was more than enough contact for the Blight to find a foothold.

A black flood crashed through my mind, plunging everything into darkness.