by Sarina Dorie
The Raven Queen smiled, each tooth as sharp as a blade. “I have given you what you asked for. I will now take the Red affinities in your possession.”
The Raven Queen nodded to Khaba. “Kill Clarissa Lawrence as my first wish. Kill everyone who isn’t a Red affinity as my—”
Time slowed. My mind sped up in a burst of adrenaline mixed with a cocktail of caffeine and competency magic. I knew what had to be done. I reached for my wand, but it was gone. I needed a stick to focus my energy like a lightning rod. My hands moved quickly, tearing the witch hat from my head.
Like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a top hat, I performed the ultimate magic trick. I yanked the vibrator out of the hat, the water bottle coming out with it. The plastic bottle flew through the air, the wide arc projected toward the Raven Queen. Terror filled her eyes as she ducked to avoid being struck.
There was nothing worse than Morty-made plastics and synthetic materials.
Except for electronics. I raised the vibrator toward the Raven Queen, who was too distracted by the plastic bottle to notice what I now aimed at her. She was still holding little Aubrey. Anything I did would harm them both.
But Aubrey was already dead.
The queen wasn’t.
Now was the time to strike.
Khaba turned toward me slowly. One hand lifted as if to snap his fingers. Elric lunged in front of me to protect me. Thatch lashed out with lightning at Khaba.
Odette leapt from her seat, projecting herself toward the queen. Either she was compelled to protect the queen out of duty and magical obligation or it was for her own survival. When the queen died, she would die.
The arc of light I propelled out of my fingers toward the queen snapped and crackled in the air, sizzling through protective wards. The queen saw it coming. She flinched back. Her elbow struck the bong she’d placed on the armrest of her throne. It tumbled onto the floor. This time it split open. More smoke fumed out.
The all-powerful djinn had been released. A little late.
Odette lunged. Not to protect the queen, I saw too late, but to snatch the baby out of her arms. I couldn’t stop the lightning.
The other Reds in my rank pushed their affinity down into the water at their feet. Hailey wasn’t a full Red affinity yet. She’d only been given electricity once. There wasn’t much she could do but produce a spark. Maddy and Lucifer were untrained. Their magic was weak. Gertrude Periwinkle circled a Celestor ward around the others in our group who had no means to shield themselves from the electrical magic. Or she tried to, anyway. As skilled as she was, even she couldn’t protect everyone.
Khaba grew in size and power, his laugh rumbling like thunder around him. Wind and fire whirled in a frenzy at his feet. His destruction swept outward.
Vega sat languidly on her throne, watching it all with a sly smile on her face. Khaba’s wind didn’t even ruffle her perfect hair.
Elric raised his fist toward Khaba, the ring with the Seal of Solomon glowing red as he incanted in Hebrew. His words stretched out like taffy.
My lightning struck Odette’s back. The baby was already in her arms. She toppled over, cradling Aubrey. My affinity kept pouring out of me, striking the place the queen had been. But she was no longer whole. She was quick enough to fade into mist and disperse.
Mist was made of water. Water conducted electricity. I pushed more energy into her, following each particle. I projected my energy along the tether to her soul, decayed and corrupted as it was. The ice of her essence repelled me, but I kept reaching for her. My will was white-hot. The energy inside my core spun faster, charging and exploding out of me. I propelled the magic into the mist, along the tether to the Raven Queen’s soul, and into her blackened heart.
It struck the Raven Queen where she attempted to solidify behind us and where part of her essence remained before us. She reformed before me once again, lightning crackling through her face. Her spine arched. The mist exploded. She smoldered like a log, cinders exploding outward. Black feathers drifted down like blackened snow.
I couldn’t stop the magic crackling out of me. It wasn’t just the Raven Queen I’d struck. My concentration had been so fully fixed on the Raven Queen, I hadn’t noticed how much power I’d released. A vibrator didn’t make a good lightning rod. The plastic had melted and dripped onto the floor. What I still held oozed and bubbled against my blistered flesh.
I tried to release the molten lump, but it was stuck to my fingers. It was burning me, but I was too far gone to feel it.
My electricity danced over the water, snapping at the leering figures of the Raven Court. Some had turned to run, but they’d only made it a step or two. Others stood transfixed, eyes still on the place their queen had been, their brains not yet registering what they’d seen.
I no longer felt the reassurance of Felix Thatch’s hand. He was on his knees, falling onto the floor away from me. Elric lay on the floor. Then I felt it, death crushing me. Khaba loomed colossal and powerful. Death swept out from him, destroying all in his path.
Except for Vega. She remained seated on the throne, electricity crackling around her in a protective bubble that looked part Celestor, part Red affinity.
I pushed the remaining lightning I had toward Khaba. He was the most powerful of Fae, but he still was weakened by electricity—and I was projecting more electricity at him than most Reds could handle. Horror crossed over his face. He shrank and shriveled up into himself. His flesh sizzled, and he fell over.
My magic spent, I fell over. I tried to push myself up, but my ruined hand lanced with pain. All around me the floor was strewn with the dead. My enemies had fallen, but so had my friends. The air was thick with steam and smoke. The putrid stench of burning flesh made me choke.
Thatch’s chest rose and fell, but each breath was labored.
I removed my awareness from my body. He’d been drained again. He was barely hanging on. I was barely hanging on.
I closed my eyes, ready to die. I hadn’t gotten what I’d wanted. I hadn’t succeeded in healing and rescuing, but I had destroyed the most evil Fae in all the land. Goodness would be restored to the world.
A crunch stole my attention. High heels grinding onto cinders told me someone was still alive. With my last remainder of magic, I took in the sight before me. Vega flicked a feather off the seat of the Raven Queen’s throne before sitting there herself.
“The queen is dead.” Vega grinned. “Long live the queen.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The Dead Queen. The Red Queen.
Every breath was a struggle. My vision dimmed to a tunnel, narrowing around Vega. She wore a crown looking like oil slicks melted into dripping icicles, a spindly creation that matched the iridescence of her gown. It was the Raven Queen’s crown.
“You may now call me Vega Bloodmire, Queen of the Raven Court, Ruler over Ravens of Day and Night, Mistress of Darkness and Forbidden Delights.” Her lips curled upward. “And Witch of Your Worst Nightmares.”
Silence greeted her.
Vega leaned languidly against the throne. “Any objections?” Her eyes darted across the expanse of the dead.
I tried to speak, to tell her not to become like the Raven Queen. There once had been goodness in her. Evil could be temporary. Thatch had thought the Ruby of Divine Wisdom would taint my soul if I used it. Instead it had corrupted Vega’s.
I wanted to tell her to throw the ruby away. But I was too weak to protest.
Thatch’s breath no longer came beside me. I didn’t feel his presence anymore. I struggled to touch his fingers one last time, but I couldn’t do it. The effort was too much.
I closed my eyes.
The next thing I knew I was being rolled over by gentle hands.
“Not so fast. I still need you,” Vega said.
That sounded ominous.
I just wanted to die. I wanted her to let me rest.
Through slit eyes, I watched as Vega uncorked a bottle and dippe
d her finger to touch the iridescent liquid within. She wrote on my forehead. The liquid was cold and tingled.
“Did Thatch bring the unicorn horn?” she asked.
Thatch? I thought she was the one who had taken it. He would have told me if he’d had it. Unless he hadn’t wanted me to use it while he’d been at work.
She left me, crouching next to Thatch’s still form. She turned out his pockets and withdrew the horn from his breast pocket where he’d magicked it away. She touched the horn to my forehead.
I gasped at the suddenness of the magic surging into me. It tasted of rainbows and healing. I smelled sunlight and twinkling stars, Celestor magic intertwining with the magic of the unicorn horn. Wrapping up a rainbow of affinities, binding them together, was a kind of Red magic that sounded like music and felt like swing dancing.
This was Vega’s affinity.
Light surged into me. I felt whole and complete. I was low on magic, but I was no longer weak. Feeling returned to my body. My hand throbbed where the plastic had melted over it. Vega touched her potion to my flesh and drew a glittering rune made of rainbows and electricity with her finger. She touched the horn to my hand. The plastic fell away. The blackened flesh vanished. My skin was left soft and smooth, even better than it had been when she’d used her flame-retardant potion on me.
She made magic look easy. All she used was a potion, a unicorn horn, and her affinity. In reality, I knew that potion must have been quite complex, using the rarest of ingredients, a variation of her do-anything spell.
It had required a dragon egg—the Ruby of Divine Wisdom.
She rolled Elric over next, cupping his face in her hand, her eyes sad.
I crawled to Thatch and felt for a pulse. There was none. I slapped his face, trying to fuel his affinity, to spark something inside him.
“Can you cure him?” I asked.
“Patience,” she said.
She kissed the glittering rune on Elric’s forehead. She touched the horn to his head. He didn’t stir. She shifted his collar and aimed the horn so that she could touch it to his heart. His eyelids fluttered.
She waved a hand at his feet. “Remove his shoes. His feet have been badly burned.”
I wanted her to cure Thatch, but he was already gone. Either he was dead, and she couldn’t heal him, or he was dead, and she would resurrect him—if that was what she was doing.
Carefully I removed Elric’s leather boots, noticing how hot they were. The fabric of his stockings stuck to his charred flesh. Black ashes clung to the burnt meat of his soles. I turned my face away from the smell.
Vega anointed him with her special potion, drew the rune while infusing it with magic, and used the horn again. I could see what she was doing now. The horn was a conduit like a magic wand, only it filtered her electrical magic into rejuvenating magic that anyone could process.
Elric stirred, but his eyelids didn’t open.
She kissed his cheek, the gesture full of love and tenderness. “Let my sweet prince rest. The electricity was quite an ordeal for a Fae.”
My heart warmed, seeing the spark of love and kindness in her. She did care about him. It had all been a farce to trick the Raven Queen.
I hoped, anyway. I couldn’t be certain. Thatch had said the ruby would corrupt her. I didn’t know that it hadn’t. She might be reviving us only to enslave us.
She raised an imperious eyebrow at me. “I suppose you’ll want me to resurrect Felix Thatch next.”
“Yes.” I watched her carefully, afraid she would go off like a bomb at any second.
She anointed Thatch. He sucked in a breath. His gaze flickered from me to Vega, apprehension in his visage.
Vega nudged me with the horn. “Kiss him or slap him or do whatever it is you kids need to do to rejuvenate yourselves. I’m going to need your hands in a moment.”
I leaned in to kiss Thatch but halted. That would be worse for him when he was already weak. I squeezed his hand. “Do you want pain? Will that help?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “Please.”
With as much love as I could muster, I slapped him across the face.
He closed his eyes and sighed. “Again.”
After a few more slaps, I switched to the other side. I knew he liked symmetry.
His arms were weak and tremulous as he wrapped them around me and pulled me in for a kiss. I dug my fingers into his muscles, massaging deeply. The red light in his core flared with yearning. His fingers wove through my hair. I felt my own magic returning as well.
I inhaled his scent of lavender and starlight. Dusty books and cyanide drifted around him.
He sat up, embracing me. “I believe I’m feeling quite revived.”
“Good,” Vega said from where she sat on the edge of the coffin. “I need your assistance. Clarissa, come over here and rub feeling back into Imani’s limbs. Thatch, go over to Maddy, Darla, and Hailey. Roll them over for me. I need access to their foreheads. Blood and cinders need to be wiped away if there are any.”
Imani was already awake but whimpering in pain.
“It’s all right, sweetie,” I said. I rubbed soothing touch magic into her limbs.
Her lips twitched upward. “Ms. Lawrence, I knew you’d come for me.”
“I’m sorry it took us so long.” Tears filled my eyes.
I wanted to apologize for not being able to prevent her suffering, but guilt lodged itself in my throat, making it difficult to speak. I wanted to be able to take away the pain and fear she must have experienced being tortured by the Raven Court. She would be traumatized for the rest of her life.
I had always tried to protect her, but I’d failed her.
I tried to swallow the lump of guilt lodged in my throat. “Please forgive me.”
She squeezed my hand. “Ms. Lawrence, there’s nothing to forgive. You’ve always been there for me, looking out for me. More than my real parents ever did. I’m grateful for that.”
She shifted uncomfortably in the coffin. “I need to move,” she said.
She was a dancer. I imagined kinesthetic movement would fuel her.
I helped sit her up. She stretched and moved her feet.
“Thank you, Ms. Lawrence.” She hugged me.
Her love warmed my heart, radiating into my very soul.
“Will you two stop being sentimental over there?” Vega snapped her fingers at us. “I need more hands to help me massage feeling back into Hailey and Maddy. But Professor Morality over here feels uncomfortable touching unconscious young ladies who used to be his students.”
We assisted as Vega moved on to resurrect others. The more people she woke, the more hands she had to help her. If Bart had been alive to witness how many virgins he got to poke and prod with his horn, he probably would have been a happy pony. Then again, he might be rolling over in his grave in frustration that it was all chaste poking.
Vega was almost done resurrecting our coven by the time her movements started to slow. There was little liquid left in her jar. That incandescence in her burned less intensely than when she’d first begun.
“What is going to happen when you run out of magic?” I asked. “Are you going to be able keep all of us alive?”
She eyed me with disdain from where she rolled Odette over. “This isn’t a touch-magic spell like what you do that relies on proximity. And it isn’t the corrupted version of a spell that requires a continued source of electrical magic and a beating heart like Galswintha the Wise’s inferior understanding of magic.” She didn’t say what kind of magic she was using.
That was fine. Vega could have her secrets if she wanted them.
“You can heal any Fae or Witchkin with this?” Lucifer asked. “You can return Abigail Lawrence to her rightful form?”
Vega waved the horn of healing at the room. “I don’t see Clarissa’s mom present, so I don’t know. Let’s take care of this lot first.”
“Are Josie and Pinky dead too?” I asked. �
��Ludomil and Sam?”
Her supply of potion was dwindling. She still had Khaba, Odette, Aubrey, and possibly my fairy godmother to revive. If she needed to heal everyone, she might not have any potion. She might not have any magic.
“They’re safe. As I said before, Odette locked them up for safekeeping. Not before Pinky was able to start up rumors among the sasquatches and plant the seeds of rebellion. We’ll need their assistance persuading the other servants to weed out anyone who might still be loyal to the old queen.”
Vega crouched, her back turned to me. I left Ben O’Sullivan to Hailey to tend to and joined Vega to assist with Odette. Vega lifted Aubrey from Odette’s arms and smoothed the ashes from the baby’s face. She was a cute baby with chubby cheeks and red curls. Every part of me wanted to hold her. I reached out to take her.
Vega slapped at my hand. “Don’t touch. Wait until I’m done.”
She anointed the baby’s forehead and performed her little ritual before handing her to me. Aubrey squirmed in my arms. I cuddled her against me and rocked her. She was so perfect and beautiful. Tears swam in my eyes.
This moment was everything I had hoped for. Almost. Something was lacking.
Thatch placed a hand on my shoulder. He sank to his knees beside me and enveloped me in his arms. Now the world was perfect. Or nearly perfect.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
A Change of Heart
Vega healed everyone but Khaba and Odette. “I require something from Elric for them,” she said.
Her husband stirred as she searched his pockets. His eyes flitted open, and he touched her cheek. “My princess.”
“Your queen,” she corrected and touched her lips to his. “Did you bring the clockwork heart?”
He cracked a smile. “You know I always carry an extra heart wherever I go.”
She gave him a disapproving frown. “I specifically asked you in my letter in a very clear code to bring me Derrick’s clockwork heart.”
He laughed. “I told them there was a code.” He reached behind her ear. Like a magician, he pulled out a clockwork heart.
