by Amy Sumida
Killian's face fell.
“Exactly.” I nodded. “I'm not a fool, Killian. I listened to her words with skepticism. I will consider them a warning but rely on my judgment in all things. Which is also what she told me to do.”
“Fine. I suppose that's all I can ask for.” He sighed.
“Well, I have one request in return,” I said hesitantly.
“No.”
“Killian.”
“I know what you're going to ask of me, and the answer is no,” he said. “Have you forgotten my vow? I said I would turn into a snake and eat our attackers if we get cornered. I can't do that if I'm running away.”
“I don't want you to run away.”
“Good,” he said in relief.
“I want you to lead our group to safety.”
“Fuck you, Seren!” Killian growled. “There's no way you'd leave me, and I'm not leaving you. Ask the blue-haired boy wonder to abandon you; he might do it.”
“Killian.” I sighed.
“I will lead them, Your Highness,” Conri said as he strode up.
“Conri, you fucking asshole,” Killian snarled. “You'd abandon her after all she's done for you?”
“No; I would trust her,” Conri shot back. Then he turned to me. “I will trust you to save yourself and us if it comes down to it. Just because you burn, it doesn't mean that you die, Your Highness.”
“Good point, Conri.” I gave him a smile.
“What the fuck kind of bullshit is that?” Killian snarled. “You ever been burned, dog-breath? One second of fire, on one small piece of skin, feels like your flesh has been flayed open. And you think she can survive being consumed in flames? You're a moron.”
“Conri, thank you,” I said. “If I need you, you'll know it. Now, can you give us a minute?”
Conri nodded and left the room.
“Do what you gotta do, Twilight,” Killian growled before I could speak. “And I will do what I have to.”
“Killian.” I shook my head.
“You die, I die, remember?”
“I remember,” I whispered and then hugged him. “I love you, Kill.”
“I love you too.”
“Great; that's sweet,” Ainsley said as he rushed into the room. “But we have a situation in the street that needs your attention right now.”
I went to the boarded up window and peered through the slats. The team we'd left on the road was being attacked from both sides of the road by a host of fairies. The attackers were a ragtag group of several races and sizes. Magic blared across the distance between forces, and battle cries echoed off the buildings. Trolls and ogres ran down the road, sending tremors through the structure around me. Shapeshifters in all forms raced among them, winding through the trunk-like limbs with ease. Yips and howls were added to the music of warfare. Leanan-sidhe—the White Women—dashed and slashed with teeth and talons, dwarfs waved their axes over their heads, and suparnas flew above it all on feathered, falcon wings.
“Fuck that hag!” Killian growled and started to head downstairs. “She gave them our location.”
“Killian, hold on,” I called to him. “Ainsley, tell the guard members who have projectile magic to find windows and launch an aerial attack. The rest can join the fight below.”
“Yes, Your Highness,” Ainsley ran off.
“Killian, help me get these boards free,” I said as I used my human telekinesis to start prying the wood off the window.”
“Can't you do that teleporting thing?” He asked as he started yanking on the obstruction.”
“Apportation,” I corrected him absently. “Not if the item is nailed down or being held by someone.”
“So, no apporting swords out of hands?” He asked.
“No apportating them,” I corrected again as I confirmed.
The boards came free quickly, and I went to the unobstructed view as Killian headed downstairs. He didn't have a magic he could launch from a distance. I gave him one last, love-filled look before he disappeared through the doorway. Then I focused on the fight below and targeted the most dangerous adversaries I could find. You might think they were the trolls or redcaps, but no; the most lethal fighters on the opposing side were the leanan-sidhe. I cast my firethorns over the ones I could reach, and a new shrieking was added to the chaotic chorus.
Their screams shook me. I thought of what Killian had said; how agonizing it was to burn. It was hard to do that to people I considered to be under my protection. But they had chosen to attack my team, and I needed to show them the consequences of such an action.
As soon as the leanan-sidhe were incapacitated, I withdrew the flames and left them in a cage of thorny vines. The charred scent of burning flesh rose to me, and my stomach turned. It was enough to prompt me to attempt something less violent. I held my hands out and blew dream dust over the battle. A few fairies nearby fell in their tracks; fast asleep. I tried it once more, but it was slow going, and most of them were out of my range. I'd have to get closer, and doing that would give my opponents a chance to reach me before the dust settled, as it were.
So, I went back to the firethorns. It was rough; a harrowing experience. I've been to war before, and I've used my firethorns many times, but it was always in the thick of things, where it felt more defensive than offensive. I had met magic with magic, and blade with blade on the battlefield. I had even cast out burning vines as I was chased across the ocean, but to stand above a fight, like a sniper, and take out combatants while I stayed safe; well, that was a difficult thing to do.
But our aerial attacks bolstered our people on the ground, and my Guard and I were able to take out a third of the enemy all on our own. All of the suparnas were downed, the leanan-sidhe as well, and the trolls were falling to the blades of hunters and extinguishers alike. I saw Daxon directing his magic with deadly precision, sending screaming fairies running away from the battle.
Daxon's Elite was just as efficient as he was. Desmond tore into fairies with half-shifted hands, while Ro pulled weapons from his skin to do the same. Matvei bulldozed anyone who came at him, using his antlers to impale them. Sanna simply touched her opponents, and they turned black as they fell to their knees, vomiting. Then there was Gatik, who was a different kind of snake than Killian, but who had nonetheless been drawn to Killian's side. My fiance was in full, monstrous snake form, towering above the battle and diving in at his victims like a living whip. But Gatik was still human-sized; he'd simply shifted his head into that of a hooded cobra. He may not have Killian's size, but every fairy Gatik bit, went down screaming.
It was over far sooner than I expected, and I never had to stand firm and burn.
When the remnants of the attacking force ran off, I breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe that hag had been wrong, or maybe the others were right, and she had been misleading me the whole time. Whatever the case, I'd take this win gratefully and hope that I had sidestepped a horrible fate.
I hurried down to the street to see how many of our people were injured or had been killed. I'd already counted my loved ones from above and noted that there had been no losses among them. But I'd seen others go down, and I wasn't shocked to find that two extinguishers and five of Daxon's soldiers had lost their lives. We took the bodies into one of the buildings and laid them in an empty room. Cyrus barred the door with a ward so that no one would disturb the dead while we continued our mission. We had to go back for them later, but there was no way I was leaving their bodies in the Underground.
With grim faces and clenching fists, our group headed up the street once more and returned to the task of clearing every building. The attack wouldn't deter us. In fact, it was a clear sign that we were on the right path. With so many forces invading the Underground, it would be a better tactic for Barra to keep fighters in reserve until they were absolutely needed, or until there was an opportunity where they were assured the upper hand. Since the street had given us the upper hand, and not our enemy, I was assuming that it had been the previous reason, and it was absolute
ly necessary to attack us. Barra had probably sent his soldiers out to delay us while he tried to escape. But Barra was going to quickly realize what I already knew.
There was no escape for him.
Chapter Fifty
We continued methodically, and that should have been to our advantage, but in the Underworld, things were topsy-turvy. Sticking to the process of searching four buildings at once, while we kept most of our team on the street, had made us predictable. That first attack hadn't been just about delaying us; it had been about learning our strengths, our patterns, and—in general—what we were up to.
While we searched, Barra's soldiers launched a new form of attack. They quietly began picking us off. It was done so well, and so furtively, that we didn't realize we were losing people at first. They weren't going after those of us conducting the searches either; they went after the ones we left on the street. It was brilliant in its boldness. We counted heads every time we left a building—to make sure we didn't leave anyone behind—but we never thought to do a headcount of the group on the road. We assumed they'd be watching each other.
But they weren't. They were watching the buildings around them as good soldiers do. They were scanning for threats. Except it was dark down there, and as much as we had used that to our advantage, in the beginning, Barra's soldiers were using it to their advantage now.
They came in under a glamour of invisibility and the cover of darkness. Auras are harder to spot in the dark, so it was difficult for even the extinguishers to see death creeping up on them. Barra's men took down the soldiers at the edge of our herd, just like a predator would. One by one our group dwindled until someone realized that a fellow soldier was missing. Then we stopped and started counting. We were down nine people. Nine! I was enraged that we had let it get so far. But even knowing to expect another silent attack, we still lost two more before we caught one of the assassins in the act.
Instead of showing fear, the fairy—an abbey lubber (huge, hairy, and with a tail)—smiled and shouted, “Now!”
A rain of elements came down upon our party; separating us into smaller groups. I had been standing with Killian, Daxon, Ro, Ainsley, and a few extinguishers; all of us gathered around the abbey lubber. It had been an extinguisher who he had tried to kill. A wall of water went up between the rest of the group and us. It gushed so fast and so wide that merely touching it could take your skin off. We could just barely glimpse other barriers through the translucent liquid; walls of pelting rocks, blasting air, and fire were being used to divide our team into smaller groups. The water wall left only one path available to us, and it made sure we took it by waving inward.
The abbey lubber began to laugh, but it was cut off abruptly by a scream. I jerked around and saw the abbey lubber staring in horror at Daxon's darkly glowing hand. Daxon's eyes were narrowed, and with one twist of his fingers, the abbey lubber stopped screaming and fell into a coma at our feet. Daxon drew his sword and sliced the abbey lubber's head off.
“This way, Your Majesty,” Daxon said grimly as he led us away from the curving wall of water.
There was no enemy to fight—only the water—and none of us had a magic that could stand against it. My flames just sizzled out, Ainsley's mór was more of a mental attack—like Daxon's, Killian's snake wouldn't help, neither would Ro's creation magic, and the extinguishers had no magic to use at all. So, we couldn't make a stand.
I saw flashes of light and heard Conri howling as other groups tried to battle their barricades with magic, and I threw wall after wall of burning vines up between us and the pursuing water. But Barra must have had several fairies shoring up the water magic because it crashed over everything I threw at it. Ro made a stand using a beag and summoned a blast of air to drive the water back. The wall broke into tiny droplets, and we all paused hopefully. But within seconds, the drops pulled back together, and the wall rushed onward.
“You get the feeling that we're being led?” Killian asked casually as he ran.
The words of the hag rose in my mind, but I couldn't see how my burning would help matters. Though, I did see how us standing together might. If it worked for our enemies, it should work for us.
“Stop!” I called to our group after we turned a corner and put some distance between us and the wall of water. “Everyone join their beags with my mór. I'm going to try and blast this thing with fire again.”
Those of us with fairy blood formed a line and held hands. Then we lifted our clasped hands and pointed them toward the tidal wave that was just coming around the bend. Instead of forming a wall, I created a ball of burning vines. The fairies who stood with me poured the power of their fire beags into my magic and magnified the burning tumbleweed into a monstrous sphere of flames. It went rolling down the street, burning everything in its path and then hit the water.
The wall burst apart, and the droplets steamed away.
“Yes!” Ainsley shouted.
The extinguishers cheered.
“Hold!” Daxon held up his hand.
We all went quiet as the sound of pounding feet carried to us. My muscles tensed as the noise neared. Then an army of what had to be thousands of fairies, came roaring around the corner. The water hadn't just been a way of separating us; it had been a way of herding us to the slaughter.
“Run!” Daxon shouted.
And we ran.
Chapter Fifty-One
“This was planned,” Killian growled.
We were hiding in the basement of an art deco apartment building. Daxon was staring out the small rectangle of a window that looked out on the street at foot level. It had taken us twenty minutes to evade our pursuers, and another two hours hiding down in the dark—behind a wall, no less—before we felt safe enough to emerge into the basement. We had lucked out by finding a few loose boards at the back of the filthy basement in the apartment building. Behind the boards, the earth had been eroding, and there was just enough room for all of us to slide in, standing in a line behind the wall. We could have glamoured ourselves invisible except for two problems: we had extinguishers with us who couldn't do that, and we were being hunted; which meant that they would be trying to sense any magic use as well as searching with their eyes. Fairies knew their own tricks.
But often the most simple tactics were the best, and the wall had worked. It had been a study in stamina to stand behind it, breathing shallowly as our enemy searched the basement, then waiting long after they had left before we ventured out. My body ached, and I was covered in dirt, but that was all background pain to the worry in my heart. Most of my Star's Guard were still out there, and I had no idea where they were or if they were even still alive. I had been about to scry them when Killian stopped me, pointing out that if they were hiding, and I scried them, the resulting chime could give away their location. So, I waited and worried while Killian raged.
“That's obvious,” Daxon said in response to Killian's outburst. “The question is; who planned it?”
“What do you mean?” One of the extinguishers asked. “Obviously it was Barra.”
“It could be,” Daxon agreed. “But Barra's army should have been thinned out, dealing with invaders all over his underground.”
“That water was nearly unstoppable,” I murmured. “The amount of fairies it would take to keep that kind of magic going is mind-boggling.”
“There were too many of them,” Killian murmured. “You're right. Either we seriously underestimated the size of Barra's army, or he knew that Seren was in our group, and he decided to go after her directly—”
“For leverage,” Daxon interrupted with a weighted look my way. “He either wants you dead or for a hostage.”
I nodded, acknowledging that Dax was in the clear, as far as I was concerned. That had been too much firepower to be an elaborate way to make Daxon look innocent. Daxon could have easily been hurt in that attack, and Barra wouldn't have risked that if Daxon were truly in league with him. Unless he had turned on Daxon and decided to take all of the pie for hi
mself. But no; that didn't feel right to me. If Daxon were guilty, he would have pulled his people out as soon as they started getting hurt; he lost soldiers in that first attack.
Killian came to the same conclusion as I and gave Daxon a grudging huff that was his way of admitting when someone was right without actually saying the words. “Or,” Killian went on, “it was someone else entirely.”
Those words hung in the heavy air. My gaze dropped to the golden shafts of sunlight seeping through the little window. We had stayed behind the wall for so long that the sunstrips were on when we came out. But it was a pale light, without warmth or comfort. Dust motes glimmered in it nonetheless, somehow making our situation seem even bleaker.
“Either way,” I decided to be the one to say it, “we were betrayed. We were provided false information, or we were led into a trap. Neither situation changes anything. We are miles underground, surrounded by our enemies.”
I went to the window and stared out at the street. The grime was so thick on the glass that it made the view hazy, but it didn't matter; I wasn't really looking at it. My thoughts were focused inward as I tried to work out a way to turn this tragedy into a triumph. I just wasn't built to give up. If I had been, I would have twilighted away when dawn came—something I was hoping my Guard had been smart enough to do. Even as I thought it, I knew they hadn't left; there was no way a royal Guard would ever abandon their charge, especially not my Guard.
“I think I know where we are,” Extinguisher Sam Murdock said. “There's an exit to the surface a few blocks away. We can get you to safety, Ambassador.”
“Safety?” I asked in surprise as I turned away from the window. “Do you think that I would leave without the rest of our team?”
“Don't you dare!” Killian pointed a finger at me. “Don't you dare say that you won't leave when you asked me to do the same.”
“I wanted you to lead our people out of here if it came down to a choice of one of us dying or all of us,” I corrected him. “This is not the last stand, Kill. This is a setback.”
