“My uncles will take turns keeping watch,” he says when he rejoins us. “They’ll howl if they hear anything or if anyone gets a little too close for comfort.”
“Water?” I reach for a bottle and offer it to him. Cole takes it, then guzzles a few sips as he looks around the camp. I feel Frederick’s gaze on my profile, but I don’t dare meet it. I’m too afraid he’d see the victory shining in my eyes.
“How’d you get all of this?” the shifter prince asks, signaling to the pile of food.
“Nymia,” Ella says nonchalantly.
Cole cuts his gaze to Omorose and arches a brow. They speak without needing words, but thinking back to my time in their village, I know what their silence whispers. While his people were struggling, living in tents and trying to rebuild after their homes were destroyed, I could’ve helped. I could’ve grown foods. I could’ve made beds. I could’ve done a lot of things, but I didn’t.
Cole snorts, as though he expects nothing more of me.
Omorose just sighs.
Clearly, there’s no love lost between us.
Yet even as I think it, I know that’s not necessarily true. Yes, I’m still the faerie who wrecked Cole’s life, but I’m also the faerie who put Omorose’s back together. I saved her sister. I reunited her family. I can already feel her softening toward me, and if I tried, eventually he might too. I could redeem myself, if I wanted to. I could return to the village. I could work with his people. I could help them. But I won’t.
I’m the villain of their story.
Because it’s the only way to be the hero of mine.
“I’m tired,” I say to no one in particular, then lie down on my bed, closing my eyes with my back turned. If I feign exhaustion, it might not seem so odd to them when they all succumb to the serum slowly spreading through their veins. It takes a little while for the medicine to absorb, but as soon as it does, the effect is fast and hard. They’ll drop, one by one, into unconsciousness.
Ella goes first, which makes sense—her body is the smallest. Omorose falls next. Cole and Frederick talk for a little while longer, but eventually their voices fade. The world becomes little more than deep breathing and the soft rumble of snores. Before my eyes have the chance to grow heavy, I roll to a seated position and turn around.
All four of them are fast asleep.
The full moon overhead provides more than enough light to watch the steady rise and fall of their chests, peaceful and undisturbed.
I clap.
The smack echoes across the forest, but none of them move.
I clap again.
They remain still.
It’s time.
I take a deep breath and focus on the magic as a single rose erupts from the ground, green, then pink, then a deep red as the bud unfurls. It’s not the petals I need—it’s the thorns. I snap one off and rest it in my palm, then urge it to lengthen and sharpen. The magic is much the same as for weaving clothes, a simple twisting of nature into the thing I need, which is, in this case, a knife. Gripping the blade in my hand, I crawl across the moss, as silent as any predator in the forest, not stopping until I find my prey.
Ella’s on her side with her fingers cupped beneath her cheek like a pillow. I roll her gently onto her back so her chest is exposed. A slight frown wrinkles her brow. I lean down so my lips hover over her ear.
“Shh.”
The sound of my voice soothes her. Just as quickly as it came, the unease vanishes. I stare down at her, gaze roving the slopes of her face, illuminated by the moonlight. Her hair glitters where it catches the starlight. A slight rosy hue spans her tan cheeks. A soft smile curves her lips. Even in sleep, she oozes life.
A drop of water slips down my cheek, so I glance to the sky, but there’s no rain.
It came from me.
I rub the tear away and focus on why I’m here instead of what I’m doing. I try not to see an innocent girl asleep on the grass. I try not to feel the knife in my hands. Reaching out with my magic, I search for Aerewyn beneath Ella’s skin. Deep in her core, I sense my sister, her fists beating on the bars of her prison, her power fighting for release.
Help me! she cries. Save me!
I will.
I must.
Taking a deep breath, I lift the makeshift blade over my head. All I need is one good thrust, one moment of strength, and I’ll have my sister back.
I tighten my grasp.
Aerewyn, I think. Aerewyn.
But all I see is Ella.
I close my eyes, drawing the image of my sister with my mind—hair the color of fresh roses, skin rich with the glitter of magic, eyes as bright as a perfect spring day. I hear her laughter in the breeze gently brushing against my cheeks. Even as my heart fills with the sound, another part of it shatters.
My arms tremble.
I squeeze tighter.
My blood pounds in my ears. In that drumming I hear two names, Ella, then Aerewyn, then Ella, then Aerewyn, louder and louder, drowning out the rest of the world.
My hands burn.
My heart is on fire.
Their faces merge behind my closed eyes. Bright green eyes turn to ones with a golden shimmer at the core. Chestnut hair uncurls to vibrant scarlet. A girl runs away from me, across a flowery meadow, and every moment, her features shift, fluidly changing from one sister to another, until she stops at the other end and turns.
It’s Aerewyn.
My sister. My choice.
She has to be.
I hitch my arms, preparing to strike, but the dream shifts. Aerewyn stumbles. Red blossoms on her chest, and now she’s Ella, crying out in pain—not from the wound, but from the betrayal as her eyes pin me to the spot, silently pleading why.
My eyes fly open and I gasp.
The world rushes back.
Ella is asleep beneath me. I’m poised to strike. Then all at once, the truth hits.
I can’t do it.
I can’t kill her—not even for Aerewyn.
The blade slips from my grasp and my arms collapse, falling in my lap as my spine hunches over in defeat. It’s only then that I notice the slits in my palms where my milky blood seeps out. I cut myself, but I don’t feel any pain.
I’m numb.
I will the ground to open up and swallow me whole, but it doesn’t listen. My magic is as dead as my heart. Nothing works. My head falls back with the will to scream, but no sound passes through my lips. Instead, I stare at the stars in the sky, close enough to taunt but too far to touch, filled with so many souls I’ll never see again, though my mind can only focus on one. I’m alone. I’ll always be alone.
Except I’m not.
When I lower my chin, Frederick’s eyes are open, watching me. He saw everything. I can tell by the mix of sympathy and relief flickering in his gaze. He knew I wouldn’t do it. He knew I couldn’t. All this time I thought I was lying to him, when really, I’ve been lying to myself, trying to convince myself that when the time came, I’d do whatever it took to bring my sister back.
He’s always seen exactly who I am.
A weak girl trying to convince the world she's strong.
It’s who I’ve always been.
Frederick opens his mouth to speak, but before he can mutter a word, a wolf charges into our camp and snarls as it bites down on the shifter prince’s arm, trying to shake him awake. In the distance, a howl rises to the moon. Another wolf runs in and jams its skull into Cole’s chest. But their prince doesn’t stir, doesn’t wake. A gunshot cuts through the forest and one of the wolves lifts its human eyes to find mine. In them I see a single word.
Run.
For a moment, the whole world slows in a way that’s at odds with the situation. I glance to Frederick as he rolls to his feet. I cut my gaze to the wolves, still tugging on their prince’s coat. I turn to Omorose, curled against his side and fast asleep. Then I look down to Ella, my knife glistening silver by the side of her head, wet with my faerie blood instead of hers.
It’s not over.
The words whisper across my thoughts, slithering like a snake through the void my failure opened. They’re lined with fire, scorching the darkness back to life.
It’s not over.
The humans must’ve felt my magic when I called the rose from the ground. They must’ve been closer than I realized. They’re coming—with their guns, and their fury, and their might. They’re looking for someone with magic, and that someone doesn’t have to be me.
I could disappear.
I could call the cloaking spell around me and fade into the night.
I could watch from the sidelines as someone else does my dirty work for me, putting a bullet in Ella’s chest and bringing Aerewyn back to life.
It’s not over.
“Nymia!”
I snap my head up, finding Frederick’s eyes.
He freezes.
Time does too. The space between us stretches, filling with all the unspoken questions in his gaze, and all my unspoken answers. His head gently tilts to the side as his brows come together. It takes me a moment to understand the expression written across his face, because I’ve never seen it there before—disappointment. I was afraid he’d look at me like a monster when he learned the truth of who I am, but somehow this feels worse. For the first time in my life, I truly feel the coward the other girls always said I was.
“Don’t.”
He doesn’t have to say what.
“Don’t do it.”
He lifts his palms out as though to stop me and takes a cautious step forward. I drop my gaze back to Ella, who’s still blissfully unaware of the chaos unfolding around her. It wouldn’t be a terrible way to go, asleep and surrounded by those you love. I’ve experienced worse.
A wolf howls.
A gun fires.
I flinch, and in that brief moment of darkness, behind my closed eyelids I see Ella—stubbornly defiant as she demanded to go to the ball, wide-eyed with wonder while I taught her about a world made of magic, brave in the face of all the danger we’ve met. She reminds me so much of Aerewyn. Of course my heart softened toward her. But it’s more than that, I realize, thinking of how she grew up bullied, alone in the world, without even a sister to rely on, yet remained strong instead of breaking. We’ve faced the same trials, she and I—losing our homes, losing our families—but where the years turned me bitter and ruthless, Ella somehow never lost the will to smile, to laugh, to see good in people’s hearts, even one as rotten as mine. She’s a bright light in a dark world, a bright light I don’t want to see snuffed out.
The truth in that thought shocks me still.
I pause as the realization hits. It’s not that I can’t kill her—it’s that I don’t want her to die, not by my hands, and not by any others. She’s a human with stolen magic, yet against all odds, I’ve come to love her. I don’t want to live in a place she’s no longer in.
My whole world shifts on its axis.
I stand and stumble, thrown off balance.
Frederick gently places his palm against my shoulder to steady me. His touch brings me back to the present, to the threat barreling down upon us. I spin as panic slices through me, and he holds me in his arms.
“You have to get her out of here.”
“We all have to get out of here,” he counters, but I shake my head.
“No,” I cut in before he has time to protest. “I did this, Frederick. Me. So I have to fix it. You take Ella. The wolves can take Cole and Omorose. You all have to go before the humans come.”
His grip on my arms tightens. “You’re coming too. I won’t leave you behind. We’ve been in this together from the start. That doesn’t end just because you say it does.”
“It’s not about us.” I let my gaze slide to the wolves, to their prince, to Ella. “It’s about them. They all have magic—magic we can’t let the humans see. And we won’t be able to outrun them, not here, and especially not while Ella is unconscious.” I think about the bookshop, about the escape we made while her magic blacked out their devices. We were lucky then, but our luck’s finally run out. “If they have their technology, there’s no getting away. So you all have to go. They need to find me alone. I’ll lure them away.”
“Nymia—”
“No, Frederick,” I interrupt and lift my palms to his cheeks, so he’s forced to look me in the eyes and see the truth swirling within them. “I destroyed their lives before, and I won’t be the cause of so much loss again. Cole will explain when he wakes up. Then you’ll finally understand who I really am, what I’m capable of, what I—”
I break off as the words lodge in my throat.
One of the wolves behind us whines softly.
“Promise me you’ll keep her safe,” I whisper.
Frederick squeezes his eyes shut and keeps his grip on my arms strong. For a moment, I think he’ll say no. Then his fingers loosen and he releases a long slow breath as he drops his arms limply to his sides. When he opens his eyes, they’re shadowed by a hopelessness that pains my heart, but still, he nods. “I promise.”
It’s done.
I step back and turn toward the wolves.
“I gave them a drug to put them to sleep. That’s why you can’t wake him,” I explain, forcing my voice to remain steady. Unlike Frederick, the shifters have no issues naming me the monster I am. Their jowls pull back and they snarl, flashing their teeth. Shame burns my chest, but I push through because it’s no more than I deserve. “Frederick had no part in this. I was acting on my own. And he’ll help you. He’ll carry Ella if you can carry Cole and Omorose between you. Call the rest of the pack back to help. I’m going to use my magic to call the humans to me. I’ll run in the opposite direction and create a distraction so you can all get away.”
Before I’m even done, they howl into the night.
As I turn toward the woods, Frederick takes my hand. He doesn’t pull me closer, but he doesn’t let me go. He rubs his thumb over my wrist, and I look down, watching as my skin sparkles at his touch. Against my better judgment, my gaze glides up, over his hard chest, along the edge of his square jaw, pausing on his lips before finally rising to his eyes. His grip tightens. At first, I think he means to stop me or protest, but then he tugs me closer, lifts his other hand around the back of my neck, and digs his fingers into my hair, and I understand what this is—goodbye.
Passion burns in his gaze. He lowers his face closer to mine, slowly, deliberately, giving me the option to say no.
I don’t.
I lift onto my toes and meet him halfway.
We crash together—a faerie and a human prince, two opposites on a collision course. Power flares beneath my skin and he drinks it in. I greedily do the same, because there’s magic in his lips, an elixir unlike any I’ve experienced before. He tastes like the best part of summer, heat and sunshine and sugar, the ripest berries ready to pluck, pure life and joy and ease. But in my heart, there’s only the bitter prick of a winter frost, whispering the end. His kiss is pure pleasure, yet all I feel is pain.
I want to stay here in this moment, but I can’t.
I need to leave.
I need to go.
Time is running out.
Before Frederick can stop me, I throw myself out of his embrace and sprint between the trees, running toward the sound of gunshots. My magic sinks into the ground as I feel for the pound of paws on dirt. One set runs past me, then another, the final two wolves. Ahead, I feel the stomp of boots, then the weight of wheels. An engine rumbles and I cut left, banking deeper into the forest, drawing the humans away from my friends.
For a moment, I’m reminded of that night with the unicorn. Aerewyn and I ran to save ourselves, but now I run to save others. I was scared then, cowering in the dark. I’m not afraid now. If I’m going to die, I’m going to do it as myself—as a faerie, with all the glory of the Mother and Father flooding through me.
I lift my palms to my face and rub the makeup away as I call a storm from the sky, dropping rain to wash the powder from my cheeks.
Then I rip at the sleeves covering my arms, exposing my glittering flesh for all the world to see. I’m a beacon in the dark, daring them to follow. Wind surges around my ankles, lifting my feet, pushing them farther, so I sprint like a spirit through the forest.
On their motorcycles, the humans are still faster and eventually their headlights cut through the shadows before me, silhouetting my body on the dirt. I release my anger through the sky. Lightning bolts rain down and soil explodes all around us. A tree catches fire but I send rain to stop the flames and soothe the burns—my fight isn’t with the woods. Taking a different approach, I draw vines from the earth, draping them like a net around tree trunks. One motorcycle gets caught and a human grunts in pain as he’s thrown from the seat into a tree.
A bullet whizzes by my ear.
I hook a right and send a gust of wind behind me to slow their machines as I charge forward. A motorcycle jumps through the bushes before me, cutting off my path, and I bank left around a tree trunk, deeper into the woods as I drop a bolt of lightning to cover my tracks.
There are so many of them.
Five—no, six—sets of wheels race over the dirt. Three behind, two at my right, one at my left. I’m slowly being surrounded, corralled into a corner. I feel them pushing in. There’s no outrunning their devices. There’s only delaying the inevitable.
“Stop!”
The voice cuts through the woods, booming with the might of thunder, rattling my bones as it sinks into my skin.
Yet, I smile.
“Stop or we’ll be forced to shoot!”
Do it, I want to say. I dare you.
Their threats won’t work with me. I don’t fear death. It’s the one faerie advantage no human can take away. We’re immortal. They can shoot me all they want—I’ll just sink into the forest floor, reborn as a flower until the time comes for the Father to bring my soul back to life. Whether in this body or another, I’ll go on forever.
Too bad they can’t say the same.
I shoot my hand to the side, throwing a tornado into the trees, and grin as a set of wheels lifts from the dirt to soar away. Then I throw my other arm into a tree, sending a silent apology to Mother before the trunk crashes to the ground. Metal crunches in its wake. I dive as bullets whistle on the wind. While they soar over my head, I roll across sticks and leaves. The humans are close enough I hear their curses on the wind.
Chasing Midnight - A Cinderella Retelling (Once Upon a Curse Book 3) Page 18
