by Eva Chase
My fingers clenched around the reins. Words clogged my throat. Let’s race our way out of here, I wanted to say. Let the horses run until they’re ragged. Until we’ve left the watchers far behind.
But as happy as our army was, it was exhausted too. I felt the dark fae marking our passage all down the road, too many to easily pass by. We’d beaten one enemy, but another one was still waiting to bring the battle to us.
And when they wanted to, there would be no outrunning them.
Chapter Five
Darton and I stumbled into the house and shoved the door closed. The thump shook me completely out of my memory of that long ago ride.
Our three friends stood at the edge of the living room, staring at us. Darton lowered his sword, his knuckles white. “What do we do now?”
“To the fae?” I grimaced. “Nothing. Not yet, anyway. They’d probably like it if I started wearing myself out throwing spells at them. They’re following the same M.O. as their master. Stirring up fear and pain. That was all they wanted—to taunt us.”
To taunt me, mostly. The fae on both sides had always seen me as something of an abomination because of my father’s light fae blood mingling with my mother’s humanity, but the dark found it particularly repulsive. Totally contrary to the sense of order they were so fond of. And my soul’s habit of leaping from one new human body to the next struck them as even more unruly.
Well, too bad. It wasn’t as if I was looking for their approval.
“What the hell happened out there?” Keevan said.
“Dark fae,” Darton said. “All around the house. They said a bunch of stuff, but they didn’t come at us or anything.” He froze up. “I need to call my sister.”
He took out his phone and brought up his little sister’s number. My arms twitched. I dropped my wand into the basket. Too much dark power, too close. The oath’s hold was tingling through me more sharply than before.
“Hey, Audrey! How’s it going? Ah, come on, can’t I check in on my little sister now and then? Yeah, yeah. So everything’s been fine there? Okay, good. Good. I know. I’ll see you at Thanksgiving.”
Darton lowered the phone looking only partly relieved. He was more protective of his sister than just about anyone. Maybe because he’d already had to save her life once, though not for fae-related reasons. When we’d first been getting to know each other, he’d told me the story of how he’d had to drag her out of a pool when he was twelve and do CPR to restart her breathing. A moment like that stayed with you.
But all the moments he and I had shared weren’t enough to calm the oath’s demands. I stepped away from him, toward the kitchen. Distance. If I could just get a little distance from him, let the sense of the threat fade...
“I don’t think the fae will bother us while we’re in here,” I said to our friends, fighting to keep the strain out of my voice. “But if you all want to leave... or if you want to stay the night so you don’t have to go out there while they’re lurking around, it’s up to you. We can put you up.”
“Yeah, it’s no problem,” Darton said. To my dismay, he followed me over to the kitchen island. The closer he was, the more my nerves jittered through my limbs. Urging me to turn on him, to snap out a spell or slash the knife in my back pocket across his neck. To end his life before the Darkest One could use it for her own ends.
I grabbed a glass and kept my hands busy filling it with water. What if we weren’t safe even tonight? I didn’t think the Darkest One had started the journey from England across the ocean yet—did she really have enough power to keep that storm raging without being present? But I could be wrong. The dark fae might be expecting her to make her appearance before the sun rose.
What in light’s name would I do then? Swine crud and cattle sod. I wasn’t ready. I didn’t have any idea how to become ready.
My hands started to shake. “Emmaline?” Priya said gently.
“I’m okay,” I said. “Just thinking it through.” I gulped the water and set the glass down before I could spill it. The cold liquid pooled in my stomach.
I had my wands, my knife, and all my other supplies. Every magical protection I’d ever used or imagined was in place around and inside the house. There was no building more secure in the universe.
If we had to make a last stand, there was nowhere better to do it.
The thought of the Darkest One appearing in a gust of magic on our doorstep sent another tremble through me. “Em,” Darton said. He stepped closer and touched my shoulder.
My lungs seized. My hand leapt to my knife. The urging of the oath ran through my muscles and closed my fingers around the hilt. It whipped my arm back in front of me, my hand clutching the weapon.
No. I clamped my teeth together and wrenched myself to the side, fighting for control. Every nerve in my body was screaming at me to spin back toward Darton, to let the knife do the work I’d promised Cormag.
No, no, no!
“Em, what’s going on?” Darton said, oblivious. He started to move around me—toward the sodding knife. My hand jerked. I gasped, and my arm shot out.
I could only think of one way to interrupt the compulsion. With a heave of my muscles, I yanked the knife out of its arc toward Darton’s throat—and into the palm of my other hand.
The magic-enhanced blade sliced right through skin and sinews and out the other side. Pain lanced through my hand and up my arm in a sharp, searing bolt. It left my body shuddering, but it washed away the oath’s frantic itch. All I felt was that flare of agony.
“Emma!” Izzy yelped. Priya darted over. Darton had already caught me, his arms around my shoulders as I staggered. My head had started to spin. Possibly because of the blood streaming from my punctured hand to patter across the kitchen floor.
“What can I do?” he said, low and rough by my ear. “What do you need?”
“Is it really her?” Keevan asked. “Did one of those evil faeries get in her head like that one did to Priya before?”
“It’s me,” I mumbled. “I’m sorry. I need to clean this up. Come with me, Art?”
I cradled my arm against my sweater, the blood soaking into the wool fabric, as Darton ushered me to the main bathroom. There, I rested my wrist on the edge of the sink so I’d bleed into the drain. I eyed the knife warily. The pain had started to dull into a throbbing burn. But the blade needed to come out. That wasn’t going to be fun.
“Is there anything I can get from your rooms—all those supplies we brought back—” Darton said.
I shook my head. “Just hand me a towel. Whichever one you like the least.”
He laughed hoarsely and opened the cabinet. I took the towel he passed me and laid it under my hand. Gritting my teeth, I grasped the knife’s hilt and jerked it out.
A fresh spasm of pain clouded my vision. Darton flinched. I tossed the bloody blade in the sink with a clatter and tugged the towel tightly around my palm to stifle the flow of blood. Then I snatched a few twigs from my pocket and murmured a quick incantation.
“Seal the skin and flesh beneath. Stopper the blood that flows.”
I didn’t have the concentration to do a perfect job of it. I could feel even as the muscles knit back together that they weren’t perfectly aligned. This hand wasn’t going to work the same unless I redid the healing at some later time, with a clearer head. But at least it wasn’t emptying all the fluid out of my body anymore.
I could have said a few more words to numb the pain, but I wanted it to keep hurting. As long as it was hurting, I had control. I’d really prefer not to have to stab myself all over again.
“Are you going to tell me what happened back there?” Darton said quietly. He rested his hand on the small of my back.
I closed my eyes for a second. The dizziness and the pulse of pain set off jagged sparks behind my eyes.
If it had gotten this bad, I had to tell him. He had to know, so he could protect himself from me.
I inhaled shakily and looked up at him. “There’s something I didn’t
tell you before. I thought I could keep it under control—I didn’t want you to worry.”
Darton’s brow knit. “What are you talking about?”
It hurt almost as much as my hand admitting this. “When I went to my father’s old light fae enclave to ask if they’d summon the lightning for us... They didn’t want to. They were upset that we were even still in the country. They know that the Darkest One is particularly keen to get her hands on you, and they were worried... that you being here, her having the chance to kill you, might make things even worse.”
I still hadn’t told him about my father’s suspicions, about the hint of darkness even I had sensed woven into his soul. He’d had enough trouble keeping his confidence steady without having to worry about danger lurking inside himself.
“And?” Darton prompted.
“And so I swore an oath to them, in exchange for their help. I gave my word, with a magical bond, that if the Darkest One got free despite our efforts... I’d kill you before she could.”
I winced as I said it. How could he see my actions as anything other than a betrayal?
Darton stared at me. “I didn’t think we had a chance otherwise,” I barreled on. “I figured if we didn’t manage to contain her, we’d both be dead anyway. But we didn’t and we aren’t, and the oath... It isn’t happy that I’m ignoring it. Especially when the situation we’re in starts to feel particularly risky.”
“Like right now,” Darton said.
“With the dark fae. Yeah. The oath almost took over. But I figured out a way to cut off the impulse.” I held up my roughly bandaged hand with a crooked smile.
Darton leaned back against the sink counter, his head bowing. He rubbed his forehead. “You should have told me.”
Guilt pinched my gut. “Like I said, I didn’t think it mattered. I figured we’d either keep the Darkest One imprisoned and the oath would be moot, or she’d get out and kill us immediately. It’s not something I’m proud of. I didn’t want you thinking about it, about what I’d said I’d do, while we were fighting Rhedyn.”
“And after?”
I dropped my gaze. “And after I felt like swine crud for having taken the oath in the first place. I thought I could keep overcoming the urge. I didn’t realize it was going to get this bad with her not even nearby.” I paused. My throat closed up. “I’m really sorry. You know the last thing I want to do is—”
“Of course I know,” Darton said. He motioned to my bloody hand. “You’d always jump in front of a blow coming for me. Even if you were the one dealing it.” He didn’t sound all that happy about the fact. “I even understand why you didn’t want to talk about it, especially considering all the trouble I was having just getting that damned sword to work with me...”
Yeah. And the shamed look on his face right now was exactly why I didn’t want to burden him with any more troubles than I’d needed to. “Well, you know now. And I know... to be more careful.” My stomach twisted. I didn’t really think that was going to be enough.
My king must have seen that too. “Where do we go from here?” he asked.
My stomach twisted. I’d wanted to pretend the oath had never happened. To squash it down and keep going. But that didn’t seem like such a wise approach anymore. How could I ever confront the Darkest One if a little taunting from her minions could make me attack Darton?
If I was going to save my king, I had to tackle the oath’s sway first.
“There has to be a way to break the oath,” I said. “I’ll figure that out, whatever I have to do, and then we’ll be ready to take on the Darkest One.” Ha. Sure, it’d be that easy. But Darton’s stance relaxed slightly, as if he believed we could do it.
Maybe I could use some more confidence too.
“For now,” I added, “I think we’d better go out there and find a decent explanation to give to our friends, before they start to think I must have bled to death in here.”
Darton nodded. “Better not to tell them about the oath?”
“Maybe not in excruciating detail...”
He touched my face, tracing his thumb over my cheekbone. The intentness in his eyes washed away the lingering pain. My breath caught.
“I know we can get through this,” he said. “I know you’ll be right here beside me, and I’ll be right here with you.”
I leaned into his touch, allowing myself that brief moment of comfort. Wishing I didn’t feel even more terrified of what lay ahead of us than I had just ten minutes ago.
Chapter Six
For the first hour of the drive to Priya’s former enclave, Priya cranked bouncy pop music in the car. I was grateful to let it fill the space between us. There were too many things I didn’t want to talk about. She hummed along with it, tapping her fingers against the steering wheel. But not far from Seattle, she turned the radio down a few degrees and glanced over at me.
“So how does a person, or a fae, usually undo a magical oath?”
Not a question I wanted to contemplate. “They usually don’t. Generally speaking, the only way to get out of fulfilling a magically charged oath is to die before you have to.”
“Oh.” Priya’s eyebrows leapt up.
“I’m hoping to find a different strategy,” I said dryly. “With a little luck, your light fae friends will have some other ideas. I’ve actually never been bound by an oath before, so I haven’t done a whole lot of research into that area.” And the human databases of the present day? Pretty sparse on legitimate magical theory.
After a long night spent pouring over those internet resources, I’d decided visiting the fae was my best course of action, at least as a first attempt. They’d know more than anyone about how the oaths of their kind worked. And the trip would put a little distance between Darton and me if the compulsion hit me hard again.
Not that I liked leaving him on his own. But the dark fae hadn’t made the slightest move against us all night, so it seemed unlikely they’d try to breach the house now with the sun shining bright in the cloudless sky. Whatever the Darkest One had planned, if she’d even made a real plan yet, she was taking her time.
“How’s your hand?” Priya asked.
I ran my thumb over my palm. I hadn’t healed it well enough to avoid scabbing. A mottled line marked the center of my hand, front and back, where the knife had pierced through.
I couldn’t blame the knife, of course. I’d put it back in my pocket this morning.
“I’ve felt better,” I said. “But it’s only a little painful now.”
“I know what it’s like, having some other force take over your body. Making you do things you don’t really mean to do. If you want to really talk about it, not just that hand wave-y explanation you gave us last night, I’m happy to listen.”
I grimaced at the windshield. “It’s complicated. But I can promise you it’s got nothing at all to do with the dark fae.” Other than as a trigger. “The light fae can be just as cruel sometimes in their own way.”
Priya shrugged. “I don’t love all of the ones I’ve met, but I’ve never seen one call up a catastrophic storm over an entire country either.”
“Fair point.” I tipped my head back against the seat. “Generally speaking, the dark fae don’t do that either. This one’s just ‘special.’”
She drove in silence for a few minutes before she said, “You really don’t know if you can beat her, do you? Even if you figure out what she wants. Even if you’re really smart about it.”
My pulse stuttered. “No,” I made myself answer. “I don’t. Maybe I can’t.”
“Do you have to fight her at all? Can’t you just... I don’t know, find some really good hiding spot and hang out there?”
I had to laugh at that. “No. I don’t even like that I’m hiding away right now, just letting her get away with everything she’s doing. Standing back while she’s hurting all those people. If I thought I had any chance of stopping her right this moment... It’s my fault. I wasn’t fast enough dealing with Rhedyn. I didn’t stop t
he Darkest One from getting free.”
Priya shook her head sharply. “But you were the one who managed to shut her away in the first place! It’s not like you made her go around and do horrible things. She was already being awful back then, and you came along and gave the world, like, a fifteen hundred year respite. As far as I can tell, you’ve done more than your share.”
“She’d probably be a lot less angry right now if I hadn’t shut her away,” I pointed out. “Anyway, who else is going to step up? The light fae over there clearly can’t, if they’ve even bothered to try. Regular people don’t stand a chance. So that leaves me. And Darton with his magic sword. It started with us and her, so it only makes sense it’s going to finish that way.”
Priya sucked in her lower lip. Her voice came out quiet. “What happens if she just kills you two?”
I hugged myself. “I don’t know. I’m trying not to think about that.”
“Well, I’ll ask the elders here to help you any way they can. I don’t know how much they’ll listen to me, but I’ve got a little sway. Ohanko will be there. He’ll speak for us.”
She pulled off onto a grassy patch by the side of the road. Ancient trees loomed over us. Like every enclave I’ve visited, Priya’s adoptive one lay deep in a wild patch of countryside. The better to keep humans away without being too obvious in their repelling.
I could smell the light fae presence in the air as I got out of the car, like a faint sweetness lingering several hours after cookies have come out of the oven. Priya set off through the forest, picking her way over tree roots and around the underbrush. After just a minute, the canopy of evergreen pines and cedars closed overhead, leaving us in only dim, filtered sunlight.
Winter was nibbling at the edges of the atmosphere. I tugged my jacket tighter around me. The dark fae loved the coldest season. Shorter, darker days. Life gone dormant. So much of the world still and orderly. Nothing like the chaos of new spring growth. Maybe the Darkest One was holding off on her grand catastrophe until then.
