“Is this the right one?” Zed whispers from behind me.
“Yes.” I recognize the interior of the sitting room.
“Let me go first,” Dash says, stepping past me. “We may need to use magic.” I notice that sparks of light still dance around his hand. Seems he’s managed to hold onto the stunner magic he was gathering earlier.
He creeps inside. I follow him, ready to duck at the first sign of magic. But the room is empty. “The portal is through there,” I say in a low voice, pointing to the door leading into Roarke’s bedroom. Dash walks ahead of me into the next room, then looks over his shoulder at me in confusion. “The bathroom,” I whisper as Zed and I follow him. He nods. I slip past him and stop beside the bathroom door, which is slightly ajar. I look back at Dash. He raises his magic and nods again. I take a deep breath, then kick the door open. He and Zed rush in—and stop.
“There’s no one here,” Dash says. “But—holy freaking ferret-whistle.” His eyes widen, along with Zed’s. “That’s a portal.”
I stride into the bathroom after him. “Yes. That’s it. All we need to do is walk through—”
The bathroom door slams shut. Against the wall, standing in exactly the same spot I stood in when I hid here, is Roarke. “Going somewhere?” he sneers.
Thirty
The scuffle is so quick, my eyes barely follow what happens: Dash flings his magic; Roarke twists away while hurling a crackling mass of power at me; Zed launches himself in front of me, cries out, and drops to the ground. By the time my useless gasp is out of my mouth, the action is over. Dash now holds a protective layer of magic in front of the two of us, and Roarke’s raised hand suggests he’s doing the same thing. Zed, who took the full force of the magic Roarke tried to attack me with, lies unmoving at our feet.
“Is … is he—”
“Not dead,” Dash says, his eyes trained on Roarke. “Stunned.”
“Yes,” Roarke says. “And the two of you will soon be in the same position.”
“I don’t think so,” Dash answers. “We have the portal right behind us now, and it’ll take you far too much time to gather enough magic for another two stunner spells. We’ll be gone long before you can carry out your threats.”
Roarke lifts one shoulder in an unconcerned shrug. “You’re welcome to go through that portal. My guards are waiting on the other side, ready to knock you out the moment you appear. And unlike you and me, they haven’t yet used up the stunner magic they’ve been gathering.”
“Well, thanks for telling me exactly what to expect on the other side. Now that I’m prepared, I have no doubt I can stop them all.”
Roarke snorts. “Guardians have always been over-confident. I can only hope it gets you killed.”
“My over-confidence has served me well so far.” With the hand that isn’t holding up the shield, Dash pulls me closer to the portal.
“Emerson,” Roarke says, directing his hard gaze at me. “Why don’t you tell me what all this silliness is about. I thought you and I had an agreement. We both want something, and our union will get us what we want. If you’ve changed your mind, you’ll never get your mother back the way you want her.”
“Em, don’t listen to him. He’s just wasting time so he can—”
“I’ll never get what I want from you anyway,” I say to Roarke.
“Oh? Is that a lie your guardian friend has told you?”
“I know what you plan to do. I know the meaning of the words you’ve been making me memorize, and I know you’re planning to take every bit of my magic and make it your own.”
Several beats of silence pass as Roarke’s cold gaze grows icier. “Interesting,” he says, slowly grinding the word out. “However did you discover that?”
I wish I could tell him it was his own sister who shared this information, just so I could see the look on his face. But I won’t give Aurora away. Whatever her motives were in going behind her brother’s back, she doesn’t deserve his wrath. “Everyone’s been so insistent that I stuff my head with as much knowledge of this world as I can,” I tell him. “Wouldn’t want your future wife to be an embarrassment to this court, would you? Well, guess what? In all that reading, I stumbled across the one piece of knowledge I needed more than anything else—the words of a particular witch spell and their meaning.”
“A coincidence?” Roarke spits. “You expect me to believe that you stumbled across this spell by chance?”
I force a laugh out. “Funny, isn’t it? You thought it was silly how much reading I was doing, and yet reading is what ended up saving me.”
“Em, we need to—”
“Saving you?” Roarke’s quiet laugh chills me. “You think you’re going to get away from me? Just like your idiot guardian friend thought he was going to get away from this palace?” He looks at Dash. “You really thought I was going to let you leave in that carriage, didn’t you. You fool,” he hisses. “Did you think you could sneak into my betrothed’s bedroom and there’d be no consequences?”
I suck in a breath. “How did you—Wait, you have been listening in on me. You disgusting—”
“Of course I’ve been listening. My father and I make it our business to know exactly what everyone says and does beneath our roof. We have untraceable enchantments almost everywhere.” His gaze returns to Dash. “I could hardly allow a filthy guardian to continue sneaking around with my future wife once I knew about it.”
“We were talking—”
“Em, let’s—”
“Ah, but what if talking turned into something else? Something far less appropriate and far more … intimate. I couldn’t have someone sullying my bride-to-be.”
“We were talking about my family’s funeral, you sick bastard,” I shout, even as my face burns at the thought of what he’s implying.
“Yes, and then he was going to sneak around my home and hunt down information he could use against me. Therefore, he needed to be removed from the palace.”
“Em!” Dash says, putting more force behind the word this time. At our feet, Zed moans. Clearly there wasn’t much magic behind Roarke’s stunner spell. “We’re leaving now,” Dash says. Invisible magic raises the half-conscious Zed into the air, where he flops over Dash’s shoulder with a grunt. I look immediately at Roarke to see what he’s going to do to stop us.
“I’m not worried, Emerson,” he says with a smirk, reading my unspoken thoughts. “My men on the other side of the portal will stop you from getting away.”
“They won’t,” Dash tells him. He takes my hand and pulls me toward the portal. “Get ready to throw some magic as soon as we get through,” he whispers to me. “Whatever you can handle. I’ll do the rest.”
I make my decision then, not giving myself even a second to consider all the things that might go wrong. I tug my arm free, shove Dash and Zed through the portal, and swing back around to face Roarke. He drops his shield of magic, a wicked grin spreading across his face.
But before he can do anything, I open my mouth and speak. I release the final bit of my Griffin Ability, and I say the one thing I’ve wanted to say since the moment I got here. The words I repeated endlessly the other night: “Tell me every single thing you know about my mother and how to help her!”
Roarke goes rigid. His hands rise to clasp his throat, as if he could possibly stop the words from escaping his lips. Then his mouth twists into an evil smile as a single sentence is ripped magically from him. “I … don’t know … anything.”
My shock silences me for several moments. “What?” I finally manage to say. How can he lie like that? How is it possible for him to disobey my Griffin Ability? “That isn’t true. You do know things. You told me things about my mother and her past. You—”
“No.” He lowers his hands and rolls his shoulders as he recovers from the magic’s effects. “I told you things about the woman who raised you and then lost her mind and ended up in a hospital. I didn’t tell you anything about your mother.”
I blink.
The full meaning of his words takes its time making its way to my brain, but when it finally gets there, it almost knocks me to my knees. I swallow, shaking my head, refusing to believe him. I’ve been down this road, and I will not travel it again. “She is my mother. Everyone thought she was human, but she isn’t. We both have magic. We’re both faeries, so—”
“Oh, stop,” Roarke says in a tone that almost sounds bored. “That’s the stupidest logic ever and you know it. Just because you’re both faeries she must be your mother? Ha! She could be my mother then, and we both know that isn’t true.”
“But … then—”
“No, no, silly girl. It’s too late now.” Roarke takes a step toward me. “You should have asked the right question while you still had some power in your voice. You should have thought about what you were asking. You should have mentally focused on Daniela Clarke instead of simply blurting out words without putting any true intention behind them.” Another step. “Besides, it wouldn’t have helped for me to tell you how to heal your mother. I have to do it myself. You might have learned the history of Daniela Clarke, but you would not—” one more step “—have learned how to help her yourself.”
Crap. My half-formed plan—to get right up to the portal while Roarke was telling me everything I needed to know so I could rush through it the moment he finished speaking—crumbles to imaginary dust around me. I twist around, throwing my body in the direction of the portal as Roarke lunges for me. He catches my arm, tugging me back and sideways, and we crash to the floor just in front of the portal. With my shoulder screaming out in pain, I scramble away from him. His hand lashes out, twisting in my hair and scratching down the side of my neck before grabbing hold of a clump of my hair and yanking me back toward him. I cry out, reaching up to claw at his arms. I slash my fingernails along his skin, and as he yanks one hand back, I squirm around, pull my legs up to my chest, and kick him as hard as I can. Then I scramble onto my hands and knees and dive through the portal.
I roll onto the ground in the shadow world to find the dull landscape illuminated by glittering, colorful magic whizzing through the air in all directions. Three guards lie motionless on the ground while Dash and Zed fight two other men. They kick, spin, punch, and dodge amidst clouds of sand, shrieking bats, and flying needles. Through their grunts of pain and cries of anger, I hear Dash yelling, “What the hell did you do?”
I know he’s shouting at me.
I scramble to my feet and whip around to face the portal. I need magic. Or a weapon. Roarke will arrive at any second. I look down at the rocky ground I’m standing on, searching for a sharp-edged stone—and wondering briefly why Roarke and Aurora transformed part of the grassy world they found into hard earth covered in pebbles and rocks. I spot a suitably sharp stone and bend quickly to retrieve it—
And pain collides suddenly, shockingly with my abdomen. I’m knocked off my feet and hit the ground hard on my left side. I curl in on myself, sucking uselessly at the air and getting nothing. Breathe, I tell myself. BREATHE! An invisible force tosses me into the air, and as I come to a halt, suspended somewhere above the ground, I see Roarke beside me. With a flick of his hand, I begin moving back toward the portal as he walks alongside me. I’m still gasping for oxygen, wriggling in the air, horrified at how powerless I am against Roarke’s magic, when a wordless cry reaches my ears.
A split second later, a blinding flash of white-green light strikes the portal—and the entire thing explodes into yet more light and sparks and spinning glitter. Roarke and I are thrown backward, though his magic seems to cushion my fall. My ears are ringing. My left side still aches. Somehow, though, breathing is becoming almost a possibility. As the flare of light fades away, I push myself up to see what’s left of the portal.
It’s gone.
Beside me, Roarke curses loudly. I scramble away from him. I don’t have time to find a sharp stone, so I aim for the heaviest rock I think I can lift. Without pause, I hoist it up and hurl it at Roarke’s head. It strikes exactly where I intended it to. In horror, I watch as he collapses to the ground. Blood begins to ooze from somewhere amidst his hair. “Oh crap oh crap oh crap,” I mutter.
And then, after one last thump, everything becomes quiet except for the sound of labored breathing. All the guards are knocked out, and Dash and Zed—covered in scratches and cuts, their clothes partially torn—gather their breath as they stagger toward me. I look back at Roarke, sickened by what I’ve done. “I didn’t kill him … did I?” I pant.
“No,” Zed says. “He’ll easily survive that.”
“What is wrong with you, Em?” Dash demands. “You were supposed to come with us, not make it easier for Roarke to catch you.”
I ignore Dash and keep my eyes fixed on Roarke. “Can we tie him up? And the guards. I don’t want them to get away. Roarke knows things. I … I need to question him still.”
“Haven’t you done that already? Isn’t that why you shoved me through the portal without you?” Dash replies. “So you could stay behind and question him?” Despite his frustrated tone, he crouches down beside Roarke as a glittering rope forms in his hands. Zed does the same with one of the guards.
“I did question him. Seems I asked the wrong question.”
Dash looks across at me, pausing with the rope partially wrapped around Roarke’s wrists. “You didn’t ask about your mother?”
“I did.” I focus on the ground at Dash’s feet. “I used the words ‘my mother.’ And that, apparently, was a mistake.” My eyes rise to meet his as an unbearable ache forms in my chest. “Turns out she isn’t my mother after all.”
Dash stares at me with the same kind of expression I probably gave Roarke. “Shoot,” he murmurs eventually. “I really thought—after she turned out to be magical—that she must be your real mother.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
“I’m so sorry, Em.”
“This world …” Zed says, looking around. “It’s an entirely different realm. This is just … crazy.”
“It is,” Dash agrees.
“Em.” Zed walks closer to me. “Where are the candles you spoke about? We need to get out of here. Once we’re somewhere safe, we can talk. I have a lot to—”
“Watch out!” I grab his hand and tug him down as a dark shape swoops over him like an undulating blanket with wispy edges. “Crap, I totally forgot about the ink-shades.” I press closer to Dash and Zed as ink-black shapes gather around us. I reach for my necklace—my protection—but my stomach drops when my fingers find no chain against my skin. All that remains are the stinging scratches left behind from Roarke’s fingernails scraping down the side of my neck. “Dammit. We need to get to the castle.”
“But you’re protected, aren’t you?” Dash says. “If Zed and I stick close to you, we can—”
“My necklace is gone. Roarke must have broken the chain when he attacked me in the bathroom.”
“Terrific,” Dash mutters. Then, as the ink-shades swoop closer, he adds, “I think it’s time to run again!”
I’m on my feet, racing beside Dash and Zed, hoping Roarke is wearing his amulet. If not, he won’t last long, and he’ll take all his knowledge of Mom with him. I toss a glance over my shoulder, but all I see are dark figures swooping through the air like misshapen bats. “Aim for the castle’s main gate!” I shout as I look ahead once more. “The drawbridge is down.”
I shriek in fright as a shadow sweeps right past me. Dash and I veer to the left, while Zed, on the other side of the ink-shade, swerves right. Separating themselves from the ground, a dozen more ink-shades join the one that just startled me. And for some reason, they gravitate toward Dash and me, forcing us further left. “Darn, they’re quick,” Dash pants. “We can’t get around them.
“The tower,” I answer between breaths. “The moat doesn’t … exist there yet … and the windows are low. We can climb up.” With an extra burst of speed, we aim for the tower. “Zed!” I yell to him, then wish I hadn’t when he almost stumbles as he look
s around for us.
“Keep going!” Dash yells at him. “Better for him … to go that way,” he adds to me. “He’ll make it to the gate.”
My feet pound the ground, and my chest begins to burn, but we’re going to make it. We’re fast, and the castle is less than a hundred yards away now.
And then, in a move that Val most certainly would not be proud of, I trip over a clump of grass and land flat on my face. Struggling for air yet again, I manage to turn over. A dark shape swoops down and settles over me, covering me completely. As I scrabble uselessly at the ground, I feel the sensation of cold lips on my neck. All strength drains from my body. My limbs become heavy and cold. My eyelids slide shut as bone-weary tiredness consumes me and a deathly chill pervades my body.
Thirty-One
Through the darkness and silence, a sizzling crackle reaches my ears, followed immediately by a piercing shriek. My eyelids spring apart, and I see the dull grey sky far above instead of a cloak-like shape. Adrenalin rushes through me. My exhaustion vanishes. “Come on,” Dash says, his hands already around my arms. He pulls me up. “My magic scared it off but didn’t kill it. I don’t know what spell to use, and—crap, they’re already coming back.”
We sprint the final distance toward the castle, and though I’ve always been fond of running, I’m fast approaching the point where I’ve had enough for one day. I kick off the ground the moment I reach the wall, and my fingers just reach the edge of the lowest window. Dash hauls himself up and takes a dive through the window. He jumps to his feet and grabs my wrists, pulling me the final distance. Once I’m through, he reaches up—but there’s no window pane for him to pull down. “What the heck? Where’s the rest of the window?”
“Not finished,” I pant, just as a dark shape separates itself from the wall and rises behind Dash. I tug him forward. “The towers aren’t protected yet. Need to get … into a room.”
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