Fear; I was right. He hid it behind the anger, but I could see it as plain as day. He seemed to think I had a choice in this, when the truth of it was that neither of us had a choice. If Faerie was so damn terrifying, we had to stop Samuel at any and all cost. “Then don’t fight me, Reign. Help me.”
He let me go, growled low and deep at the back of his throat and strode down St. Martin’s Lane, toward the church. I jogged to keep up, the tightness in my chest still pulling at my breaths.
Kael waited at the rear of the church, daggers in his hands.
“General,” Reign said, surprisingly without adding a growl.
Kael’s eyes barely narrowed, but I’d witnessed that expression directed at me enough times to recognize contempt when I saw it. “Are you going to run again, Sovereign?” he asked, a razor’s edge to his words.
“Depends. Are we all about to die because our general doesn’t know his arse from his elbow?”
A twitch passed through Kael’s entire body, and for a second I thought I was going to have to get between them. Reign did his usual cursory glance, the one that makes you feel an inch high, and made his way to the corner of the courtyard where he stopped to get a look over Trafalgar. “Seems you have a talent for getting your ranks killed, General. How many FA have already died here tonight?”
Kael ground his teeth and briefly closed his eyes. I knew that feeling; Reign seemed to bring out a murderous desire in people.
“If we’d had the hound that day … ” Kael began, and left the sentence wide open for Reign to fill.
An explosion on the other side of Trafalgar spewed a cloud of flame into the sky. Reign turned and regarded me and Kael standing side by side. “Have you found your ally in Alina, General? Or perhaps you’re about to release two monsters in London?”
“Reign,” I spoke before Kael could. “You see what Samuel’s doing out there. This has to end now, before he’s finished weaving that path.”
“You have no idea, Alina. How can you?” Reign pointed at Kael. “But he does. He wants you to be just like the queen he’s lost. He’ll use what’s inside you to protect the fae, and if that doesn’t work, he’ll use you up and throw you away, the same as Samuel did.”
I’d been where Reign was, despising the general, blaming him for everything. I might have believed Reign’s words, once. But so much had changed and at that moment, the general’s motives—whatever they might be—didn’t matter. None of us could change what I was, and perhaps that was how it was meant to be. “Reign, you don’t need to protect me.” He laughed, but I saw the wince, real this time. “I’m ready.” I moved forward, lifting my hands. He retreated, backing against the church wall.
A slight shake of my head seemed to be enough to settle him. I knew the fear; I could feel its bite too. His or mine, I wasn’t sure. I stopped in front of him and hovered my hands beside his face.
“Control it, Alina,” he whispered, eyes widening. “Please. Don’t let it win. Be strong, strong enough for both of us.” The tension melted from his shoulders, and he lunged forward, slipped a hand against my cheek and bumped his forehead against mine. “Don’t forget the American Girl,” he hissed. Sparks snapped through my cheek, my jaw, and down my throat. Pleasure, pain, dark and light. I gasped, at least I think I did, but already the world had drifted far away to the edges of my thoughts. His eyes. I looked into his beautiful butterfly eyes, looked into him. Hungry. You and I. His pupils bled red and were spilling into the whites. Forever hungry.
“Bring me back … ” he whispered against my lips.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Reign dropped to his knees. Draíocht spiraled from his shoulders, his back, and wove around him, building wave upon wave, until his outline faded, blurred, and warped.
Kael might have been calling me, I didn’t care. I only had eyes for the beast taking shape. I’d seen it before, quickly, in between moments. But this was different. I looked into Cu Sith’s blazing glare and watched the dark emerge from the light. Like the lytch, the hound gathered the dark around it. It placed a paw forward, black half-moon claws clicking on the ground. Fear trickled down my spine. The hound lifted its vast head and howled. The call shattered the sounds of the riot and the background din of London. I flinched, struggling not to cover my ears and drop to my knees. When it was done, silence rushed in to fill the unnatural void, and London held its breath.
I couldn’t show it fear. I had to control it, for Reign, for the fae in the square, and the people of London.
Slowly—so slowly—I stretched out a hand.
It stalked forward, head down, eyes up. Saliva ran in streams from its lips. The muscles along its steaming flanks rippled as it moved. Power coiled inside its grace. I kept my hand out, fingers trembling. It would kill me if it found me wanting.
Kael said something from behind. The hound jerked its head up. A low growl rumbled through its body, so close I could feel the sound touch my face.
Damn it, Kael.
A lightning snap of power slashed through me. And not just me, the hound flinched and swung its head around, toward the square. Kael let out a shout, and the hound surged away.
“Alina! The path! It’s almost open.” Kael’s grip dug into my shoulder. He tugged me back, or upright, I wasn’t sure. The thoughts in my head didn’t feel like my own. Kael was snarling something, his face twisted in fear and anger, but it didn’t matter. I drifted in my own mind, free of fear of responsibility, uncaring and cold.
Kael’s warm hands gripped my face. His eyes filled mine. “Control it, do you understand, or you’re as worthless as I once believed, and we’re all dead. Control it, Alina.”
The hound.
The screams.
The path.
Faerie. I could smell apples and grass—wet with rain. The earthy smell of dying leaves and a world that wasn’t mine. Faerie was close, and so were the beasts converging beneath the streets. I could feel them too, stirring in the dark of the Underground. Hungry for freedom, for draíocht, for home.
Kael pressed his forehead against mine; his touch sizzled hot. “Arachne reigned once, as One of the Three. Find that memory, Alina. Find it and own it. For all our sakes.”
Kael snarled and shoved me away from him. He plucked his daggers free and strode toward the crowd, striding into what would likely be his death. I can end this. I have to. I have to let Arachne win. The time for fear was over. I had to act and hope that however much of Arachne lived in me, she wouldn’t devour what remained of Alina.
Like Kael striding into the crowd, I scaled the rear wall of the church—fear of heights buried along with the rest of Alina O’Connor—one foot after the other, hands gripping the decorative stones, and rose above the chaos.
Samuel stood below the steps leading to the National Gallery, hands raised, his body awash with green vapor. He was the fourth anchor point. And in front of him, where the draíocht poured inward, the path twitched.
So close, I can taste Faerie. Home. We—us—they just want to go home.
Kael emerged and immediately cut down any fae who rushed him. A howl rolled over the subdued crowd, igniting panic. They heaved and surged. And my heart pounded fast and loud in my chest.
I stood at the apex of the roof and pinned my sights on the hound tearing into the fae. It snapped its jaws around its victims, crushing them in a single bite and tossing them aside. Those that attacked were dealt with in a blur of teeth and blood.
“Stop!” But my voice was instantly lost amidst alarms, screams and the howling draíocht. “Damn it, Reign.”
I lifted my chin, closed my eyes, and reached for the cool, killing part of me. When the queen had pulled on my controls like the puppet master she’d been, I’d walked Under, a tool following her commands, and I’d seen the web of life linking all of the fae. The older fae had glowed like bright stars in a night sky. And now, with my eyes closed, the hound glowed in the dark of my mind, brightest of all. I reached for the thread feeding into the ancient spirit and
yanked it back.
The hound’s attention rushed full-force over me. Old words filled my head and with them came a deep, heavy dread. Its mind was cold and sharp in its ruthless wants. Reign had been right; the hound wasn’t something you could reason with.
“Samuel,” I said, the name leaving my lips as fae. Chaos swallowed my voice, but the hound heard. Its ears pricked. “Find Samuel.” It was a death sentence, and yet the words easily slid free.
The hound shook off an attack and lifted its mighty head, searching for the elder’s son among the crowd. It might have found him, had draíocht not slammed through us all. Life. Faerie. Followed by a complete and suffocating silence. In the center of it all, Samuel laughed.
It’s too late.
The path to Faerie rippled and glittered, like looking into a pool speckled with sunlight. Home. The ancient part of me ached to return. It was where we belonged. Not this stifling world, where the colors were dull and the life even more so. But it was a dark promise. Beyond that shimmering door, terror waited.
Then came the beasts.
They spewed from the light. Creatures, hundreds of them. Large, small, sleek and vicious, ugly in their hunger, their beauty, their efficiency. Fear nudged me into movement, but not my fear. That of the hound’s. It knew what this was. Faerie was coming.
I turned my back on the madness and climbed from the rooftop. Faerie’s whispers chased my thoughts, but I shoved them back. I was stronger now, I had control of the hound, control of myself. I skirted the edges of the restless crowd and ran toward the Charing Cross Underground entrance. Concrete steps descended beneath the streets. And there, in the dark, the creatures of Under waited.
“It’s time to go home,” I called into the shadows, the fae language spilling from my lips like promises. “Drive them back. All of them.”
Rivers of oily black flooded up the stairs. I staggered, reaching for the rail as the dark poured over me in one breathless surge.
Home? It questioned, wrapping me up in night.
“Yes,” I replied. “Take them all home.”
The lytch moved in one wave. It rushed over the nearest fae, leaving husks in its wake. More shadows poured from the steps behind me and swept over the crowd. They just wanted to go home. That was all they’d ever wanted.
“Alina!”
Shay …
She came through the crowd, moving like a ghost in her floating whites. The short sword in her hand glistened crimson with blood. When one of the red and black clad FA lunged for her, she wielded the blade as efficiently as Kael, striking low and fast, cutting her attacker down without even breaking stride.
She fought alongside the rebelling fae. Did that make her my enemy?
“Stay back!” I warned. The lytch would drink her down just like the others.
“They’ll be coming for you,” she called over the crowd.
“Who?” I freed my daggers, scanning the chaos.
“They’ll know what you are.” Her shouts faded, swallowed by the clash of blades and howls. “They’ll kill us all.”
I couldn’t see anything. Just hundreds upon hundreds of fae. Red and black colors flickered inside the chaos, and through it all, the lytch wove their hungry way toward the shimmering path.
“Who, Shay?”
Before the crowd blocked my view of her, she shouted, “The Hunt!”
Shivers spilled across my skin. The Hunt. The creatures who’d killed Samuel’s family and slaughtered hundreds during the purge. Quickly, I spun, searching for anything in the mayhem that might be the Hunt, but the crowd had flooded in, blocking my view of anything beyond a few feet. I couldn’t worry about something I couldn’t see. If the Hunt wanted a shot at me, they’d have to get in line. Until then, I had to drive everything fae toward the opening. The fae, the beasts, all of them.
The hound; I needed the hound to cut me a path through the crowd.
I reached for the ancient draíocht link within me and tugged hard. The hound would come.
Next; the FA. If I could find them, organize them, we might be able to do this. Alone, I’d fail.
The hound barreled its way through the crowd and padded up to me. Blood matted the fur on its face and dripped from its jaws.
Locking my gaze with the hound’s, I said, “Drive them back. All of them.”
The hound’s upper lip rippled in a snarl. I got the distinct impression from its blood-red eyes that it didn’t particularly enjoy being ordered to do anything. A mental tug on its reins and it jerked its head. Its snarl deepened into a growl. I glared back at it, my expression guarded, my fears buried. “Go.”
It ducked its head by the smallest of degrees and then turned and snapped at the crowd. Fae scattered out of its path. I walked in its wake, head up, daggers slick, but my mind—and that of the hound’s—clear. Two of the Three, working as one, while all around us London went to hell.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chaos surged across Trafalgar Square. Beasts churned among the crowd, killing, devouring. Fae blades flashed, cutting through the dark. I smelled blood, sweat, and fear while a howling wind tore overhead. That too seemed to be alive and hungry. People, fae, the beasts of Faerie, they would all die here. And the madness wouldn’t stop in Trafalgar. Faerie was hungry too. I could feel its pull, its need to devour. Faerie wasn’t just a world, it was alive, and it called me back with promises of all the draíocht I could ever need, ever want. Power, it crooned … I’d have it all. Perhaps, had I been entirely fae, I couldn’t have resisted its siren call. But I was more than fae, I was the American Girl too, and that part of me told Faerie’s whispers to fuck off.
The hound carved its way through the crowd, herding the beasts and fae toward the path. I had a more personal target in mind and fell back, setting my sights on revenge.
Those who blocked me, I cut down, my daggers finding their flesh easily enough. Samuel was the key. He’d opened the path, and he could close it. Everything else hinged on him. I needed to find Samuel, to drive my daggers through his heart. For the lies, for the bodies left to rot in that room, for Becky. For revenge.
I carved through the crowd, my thoughts serene, as I followed the glittering lifeline in my mind that would lead me straight to Samuel. Draíocht rippled overhead, and occasionally licked over me, and each time it did, the killing calm strengthened. Arachne lived in me. But she didn’t own me. I wasn’t afraid, not anymore. I knew what I was. One of the Three, made flesh. A construct who shouldn’t be alive. A walking manifestation of Faerie.
I gripped my daggers tighter. I had everything I needed clasped in my hands. Should I wish it, I could devour the shadows, take it all into me, and—
A shiver rippled through the crowd, and all eyes turned toward the path. Four fae stepped through, and I knew instantly who—what—they were. The Hunt. Refined. Lethal. Their shimmering images dissolved into ghosts as quickly as they’d appeared, but their presence had changed the air. Chaos turned to terror.
I had to get the path closed. Shay, Kael, and whatever remained of the FA would push the crowd back to Faerie. I wasn’t designed to save lives, but I could take them, take Samuel’s. I opened my heart and my head to the thing inside, and with each step, each cutting slash, the spirit of Arachne spilled into my veins. I wasn’t alone. I’d never been alone. She was there. And I was ready to embrace her. To let her fill me up but not control me. Never that. I had control. I was finally, and perfectly, complete.
The crowd parted to reveal Samuel standing beside one of the two huge Trafalgar fountains. Raw draíocht rippled off him. With his arms spread, draíocht vapor dripped from his fingers. And his smile, it was the smile of a man content. “You cannot stop this, Construct.”
“As a construct, no.” I flashed a slash of a smile right back at him and lifted my bloodied daggers. “But that’s not all I am, Sam.”
His smile gave a reluctant tick, a falter. He snatched his daggers free. “You’re not real. You’re the ghost of her. An imprint. Do you know wh
at I am?”
I started to circle around him. “Oh, I know you. You’re the same as all the other parasites feeding on the life of London.”
His lips curled in a snarl. “Elders are gods.”
I laughed, and the sound of it rattled across Trafalgar. Not entirely Alina’s, but not entirely Arachne’s either. Something new. My own. This new, complete me. “You do not belong here. None of these fae belong here. Return through the path you have woven or die.”
“Die?” His brow lifted. “And who’s going to kill me? You? Do you think you could, Alina?” He matched my strides, circling with me. “It was my idea to beat you. You deserved every blow. I was there. I saw you whimpering and weak. And then you turned to me with your pathetic human needs. So easy to ensnare. I couldn’t bespell you, but I might as well have. So desperate for love, you threw yourself at my feet.” He wet his lips, and green licks of draíocht danced in his violet eyes. “I used you, no less than I did the human girl whose journal brought you to me. But now, here, I am fae and you are nothing. Do you truly believe a worthless creature such as you can best me?”
Once, his words would have cut through me. But I found I barely heard them and certainly didn’t care what he believed. I knew him now. Just a forgotten fae, an elder’s son, seeking approval from those who’d tried to have him killed.
Cool mist from the fountain settled against my face, light and clean, like draíocht. “The Hunt is here. And I don’t think they’re here for me.”
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