She hugged me tightly, before her body went ridged. She stretched out straight across me, stiff as a board. Her head tilted back, the roots of her hair went as black as night, then spread down the length of her rainbow curls. When not a strand of color remained, she wailed. My blood set on fire as the sound berated my ears.
Then all at once it was over. She went limp and Jax was quick to dive under her head before it hit the ground. Kneeling beside me, we watched our daughter’s hair return to its natural rainbow of curls. Then she opened her eyes.
“Mum, what happened?”
“I don’t know, where were you before you portalled in?”
“I went to see the banshees,” she said, pulling herself up to sit across from Jax and I on the grass.
“What the hell did you do that for?”
“I wanted to see they were okay, that the potion was still working.”
“Ava, they said we would be trapped there if we ever went back without an invitation. They could have kept you there forever.”
“I was invited.”
“You were?” Jax asked, placing a hand on my lower back. His touch had its usual calming effect. “By who?”
“Caro. She invited me to return as often as I like.”
“When?”
“When, what?”
“When did she invite you?”
“Oh, she sent me a message.”
I raised a brow. The last time Ava received messages they were from voices in her head, and not all of them were friendly.
“No, Mum, it was a flame note. A message sent on ashes through the breeze.”
“I know what a flame note is, Ava. So, what went wrong? Why were you screaming?”
“I don’t know. I was talking to Caro, saying goodbye, then I opened the portal and then...” A deep crease formed across her forehead as she looked off to the side.
“Then, what?” I asked.
“I don’t remember.”
“Ava?”
“No, really, Mum. I don’t remember.”
Jax stood and held out both his hands. “Come on, let’s go inside.”
“Jax, we need to know what happened.”
“I agree, but if she doesn’t remember then there isn’t a lot we can do about it.”
“Jax!”
“I’m series, Des. Ava is not like other fey, there are going to be things we can’t explain. Maybe it was a vision, and it will come back to her if we just give it time.”
“I hope not,” I said, taking his hand. Ava took his other hand and he helped us to stand.
“Well, I feel great now. A little hungry, though.” Ava said, looping her arm through her father’s. “Can we go get something to eat?”
I linked my arm through Jax’s free one. “How can you be hungry all the time?”
Jax stifled a laugh.
“What?” I asked, turning my neck to look at him.
“Nothing,” he said through an escaping giggle.
“Oh, shut up!” I pulled on his arm so we could walk together into the house.
I had just stepped onto the hall rug when I remembered I was supposed to be going to see the yowies.
“Crap.”
“What?” Ava and Jax asked together.
“I have to go. You two go get something to eat. I’ll be back soon.”
Jax leaned over and kissed me before Ava wrapped her arms around my waist, squeezing me tight.
“Come on, Dad,” she said as she released me, and took off at a jog down the hallway.
“Like mother, like daughter.” He winked, then took off after her.
2
AS JAX AND AVA HEADED to the kitchen, I headed out the way I came in. The entrance on the fey side to the opal caves was deep in the back mountains, not too far from the crack in the wall to the outer reaches. When I reached the entry, two female fey stood guard.
“No one enters, council’s orders,” the older of the two said, though they both looked no more than twenty. She had short, cropped blonde hair and some kind of glittery pink eyeshadow.
“I’m Desmoree, a member of the council, and I’ll be entering the caves.”
“We know who you are, it’s just...” the other squeaked out, fluttering her lashes as she avoided looking at me directly.
“But, what?”
“The order states no one enters,” the other finished for her. I held out my hand for the order.
Unrolling the scroll, I reached back into the satchel, invisible to them in my fey form, and slipped free a pencil.
I might not have been able to change the order with the same cast I had used to create it, now that it was signed by the council with an imbued pen. But I could alter it the old fashioned way.
I found the spot that stated no one would enter the caves under direct order of the council of the Feydom. I drew an arrow up after the word one and scribed, except a member of the council itself, should they choose to enter.
I slipped the pencil back into the satchel and handed the scroll to the sterner one. After I created the council, I tried to let them be, let them lead, but the more and more I was called to break ridiculous ties, the more I came to realize that being a part of the council wasn’t so bad. I could at least make sure they kept the whole fey in mind when making decisions. Upside, I got to call votes. Down side, I had to actually attend meetings—the official ones anyway. The general day to day stuff I still left happily to them.
She unrolled it, raised a brow at the addition I had made, then with a slight upturn of her lips, she stepped aside. The quieter one followed.
“Thank you,” I said, walking past them and into the cave’s entrance.
The hum of energy around me immediately swelled stronger. My head dipped to the side as the weight of the opal’s energy bore down on me. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t focus. I stumbled and stupidly leaned against the wall, the direct contact with the opals within the rock surging through me. I fell to my knees, wiping my hands on the fronts of my pants, breathing past the pounding heartbeat drumming in my ears.
The fucking shield, I thought as I tried to push it out. It faltered slightly at first, then the Tanzieth’s magic came alive and shot through my veins like lightning. With a little more focus the shield appeared to hold true and clung to me like a thin coating over my entire body.
I climbed to my feet and glanced back the way I came, breathing a sigh of relief that the guards weren’t laughing at me from the opening.
Making my way through the caves from this end was slightly easier. The mining had made clear paths, with engraved maps along the way. The path I was on should lead me to the central well, which I hoped was the watering hole where we had met them earlier.
Their murmurs grew stronger as I neared. As soon as I was through the end of the final tunnel, I was gripped by a massive furry hand.
“Intruder.”
“What? No, I’m not an intruder.”
“You have come to steal more of our opals, slimy fey.”
“No, I’m here to apologize, please. My name is Desmoree.”
A growl rose from somewhere in the back. Then, silence. Every sound ceased. All eyes moved to land on me. Then those in front stepped to the side, clearing a path through the middle. A large female—distinguishable more by her fur than anything else—began to walk between them. She had thinner, fainter fur on her arms and legs, her torso fur far thicker, but without the usual male bulge. Her fur was the color of clay, a sign she was older—younger yowies more regularly resembled straw. She shimmered as she took each heavy-footed step closer.
“Desmoree, your pact has been undone. They broke your deal and stole our opals.”
The hand on my arm didn’t shift. “I know, I have had them sign a bound decree, they cannot go back on our arrangement again. I’m so sorry.”
The female nodded to the one gripping my arm and its grip loosened, then released.
“We shall see. For now, no fey are permitted in the opal caves, so why are you here?”
“I�
��m here to ask for a favor.”
She laughed and the fur on her whole body shimmered. “You dare ask for something from us, after what your kind have done?”
“I do. I can’t give it back without your help.”
“Give what back?”
“The magic of the Tanzieth. They gifted it to me to defeat Traflier, but I need to give it back.”
Whispers erupted from around the cave.
“How do you know our fur can help you?”
Crap.
“There were a few strands left after I closed the portal. I used them to return the magic to a few of the fey.”
Teeth bared and snarls came from several of the yowies. The cave walls shook as numerous others dropped down from ledges above.
“You were told to use it all.”
“I was, but you gave me so much, I didn’t need it all. It was only a few strands.”
“It was the deal you made. Yowies do not take lightly to broken promises. The others, they didn’t agree to your offer and so can be excused for not upholding it. But you...”
The snarls increased to growls and stomping.
“I didn’t think it would be a problem, it was only a few...”
“It’s the deal that matters, Desmoree. You knew the price, you made the pact. You broke it. You are no longer welcome here. Leave, or suffer the consequences.”
“I can’t, I need more. If you will allow me this, one more time, I’ll never ask again.”
Something hit me from behind and I fell to the stone floor. My shield faltered. The intrusion of the opal’s power sent the Tanzieth’s magic inside me alight. It swelled as I struggled to return the shield. My own magic rose and then exploded outward in a ball of energy, the yowies close enough were sent flying backwards.
“Get out!” the large female yowie screamed at me, as the ones thrown backwards got to their feet. Others began filing into the area, all of them snarling. “Leave, and never come back!”
I held out my hands in surrender and began walking backwards, but I stumbled and my back hit a vein of opal on the cave wall. A surge of power rushed through me and burst free in another explosion of magic.
The yowies knocked down by the force of the blast, began to climb to their feet as the walls of the cave started to shake.
I pushed my shield into place, it wavered, as if it wanted more of the opal’s effects. There was no way the yowies were giving me anything right now. I needed to get out of there before they decided not to let me leave. I would just have to try again, after they saw that the fey would keep their word this time.
The walls of the cave shook harder.
I turned to leave, but rocks began to crumble down from above. They hit with a dizzying force and I fell to the dirt floor. I pushed up onto my hands but was shoved back down by crumbling rocks littered with opals. The younger yowies screamed as they were shielded and ushered out by the older ones.
I tried again to push myself up and crawled free of the falling debris. I stumbled against the shaking wall. The energy boost from the opals blurred my vision and I closed my eyes to try and regain enough sense of mind to hold my shield in place.
It went up, but wavered when I opened my eyes and saw half the cave covered in crumbled rock. I focused again and it held a little stronger. As each second passed, the relief from being protected from the intoxicating magic made it easier to keep the shield in place. My wings were aching behind me. I looked back and could see the damage they had taken in protecting me from the cave in.
The walls still shook. If this was an earthquake, it was the longest I had witnessed. I half ran, half stumbled through the tunnels. The carved maps stripped away by the damage. The path through became narrower and narrower until I had to slip sideways to get to the next section.
A flash of fur drew my eye as it rounded the next bend. I followed, hoping the yowies knew the way out. I just caught sight of the foot as it turned another corner. The walls cracked along the tunnel I ran through. Just as I rounded the last turn, I stumbled into the yowie child. He fell forwards crying out as he nearly tumbled over the edge of a gorge. I grabbed for him, and was just able to take hold and pull him back from the ledge.
“We can’t get across, it’s the only way out,” the boy wailed as he buried his head under my arm.
“I can get us across, hold on tight.” I looped his legs around me and he gripped behind my neck tightly.
“What are you going to do?”
“Well, I’m a fairy,” I said, then stretched out my damaged wings. They stung and burned but they complied. Then in a single swoop, we were up and sailing across the gorge. I landed heavily on the other side, and the boy dropped from my arms and onto the ground.
“Thanks,” he said right before the walls shook again. The ceiling above him cracked and I dove forwards. I knocked him down to the ground and landed hard on top of him. My wings stiffened, and I screamed as the weight of the rocks falling from above hit against them.
My eyes squeezed closed as I tried to focus on the shield, on keeping the rocks from crushing us, but also on keeping the opal’s power out.
When the pounding stopped and only the pressure remained, I opened my eyes. The boy’s eyes were closed.
“Hey, little one?” I asked through gritted teeth, the pressure of the rocks was getting harder to hold back. “Little yowie, come on. Little yowie, open your eyes.”
There was a shimmer to the little one’s fur as his eyes squinted open.
“What happened?”
“There was a cave in, look I need you to help me, okay? So we can get out of here.”
“Out of here?” he asked as he craned his neck to try to see above where he lay encased by my wings. “Where are we?”
“My wings protected us, but they can’t hold. I don’t feel any strain that way,” I said nodding up and to the right. “It might be clear, I need you to move back the wing there and if you can get through. I need you to go.”
“But what about you?”
“I’ll be okay. I can blast my way out, but not with you here. You will get hurt so I need you to get to safety first.”
“I’m scared, I don’t want to leave you here.”
“I’ll be okay, but your parents will be worried sick.”
“My parents?”
“Your Mum and Dad.”
“Yes, they were in the cave, do you think they are okay?”
“I’m sure they are fine, come on, you can do it. Move my wing there and see if the way is clear.”
The moment the young yowie looked away I gritted my teeth against the strain again. He scooted up and lifted my wing.
“Is it clear?” I asked
“There is a small opening. I think I can fit through.”
“Great, go now before there is another cave in.”
He looked back. “Are you sure you will be okay?”
“I’ll be fine, now go.”
I slowly counted in my head. One, two, three, four, come on kid I hope you’re moving quickly. Five, six, seven... Please let that be enough.
I let the shield waver at my hands where they pressed against the ground, covered in dirt and opal dust. I took all of the magic of the opals into me. With a rush to my head, the magic in me instantly swelled and expanded, blasting the rocks against my wings away. The weight lifted and I drunkenly crawled forwards until I was overcome by the power and returned the shield into place. I fell back against the ground and wrapped my torn wings around me in case more rocks fell.
The rumbling ceased, and the cracking and smashing noises of the caves died down.
A soft hand stroked the outside of my wing. “Are you okay?” the young yowie asked, and I painfully forced my wings aside to see him smiling down at me, his fur covered in opal dust and dirt.
“I told you to go,” I said trying not to show the pain on my face.
“I know, and I did, but then I saw your light and I came back to see if you were okay.”
“Thank you,
I’ll be fine, are we trapped or is there...”
“No there is an opening to the fey forest up there.”
“Great, can you help me up?”
The young yowie reached out his little hand and I took it, not really using it to help me, but the pride on the young one’s face was worth the pretense. I stiffly stumbled, leaning partly on the cave walls to make my way with him out of the cave. Once we neared close enough that the light from outside could be seen, he stopped and released my hand.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, kneeling to be at eye level with him. “Are you hurt, I didn’t ask before. Are you alright?”
He smiled revealing his sharp yellow teeth, “I’m not hurt. I just thought of a way I can pay you back for saving me.”
“You don’t need to pay me back.”
“But I have something you need.”
I looked at him puzzled, then he twisted a bundle of his young fur on his leg and using his claw from his other hand he cut the fur free, wincing at its removal.
“What are you doing?”
“I want you to have it.”
“Are you sure? If your parents or the others find out, they might not be so happy about it.”
“It’s my fur and I can do what I want with it,” he said, matter of factly.
“Well, thank you. I promise I’ll use it for good.”
“I know you will. You are a good fey.”
“Thank you.” I felt around me for the satchel, fear gripping my chest when at first, I couldn’t feel it, then my wings shifted, revealing it resting against a numb part of my wing. I placed the fur inside and moved the satchel to sit more at my side.
“Where did it go?” the young one asked.
“I have a bag that’s hidden when I shift into this form.”
His eyes went wide. “That’s so cool.”
“I know, it really is, huh?” I said, smiling. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“Okay.”
We made our way out into the light, and waiting for us were a few fey and many yowies. The large female from before ran towards us.
“Cassius, what happened? Where were you?”
“I was stuck, Mum, but the fairy saved me.”
“The fairy?” She asked looking up at me through squinted eyes.
Destroying the Fallen Page 3
