by Emma Savant
We’re in this together, she seemed to say. Her eyes glimmered with deepest blue.
“I can’t do this without you,” I said.
“I know,” she said, low enough that only I could hear her. “You’re useless without me. Always have been.”
I squeezed her hand so tightly that I expected bones to break. Every muscle in my body yearned for a hug, but her eyes were already on Kelda.
The Oracle’s face twisted in rage.
Imogen pulled me a few steps back from the cage.
“You’re going to have to act quickly,” she said, voice still low, but fast now. “She’s powerful, but her endurance is what’s really going to test you. She’s taken on the energy of the Fountain for years, and fountains just recycle their water over and over and never run out. Her magic’s like that. You’re going to have to hit her strong and for longer than you think.”
“Stay with me,” I said again.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Imogen said.
I felt the fear and loss that hit her as she spoke. This choice would take everything from her in an instant.
I promised myself in that moment that Imogen Dann would never feel like “just Imogen,” no matter what it took. If I was going to be the Faerie Queen, I was going to give her the world on a silver platter.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you about Amani,” I said.
She swallowed, but waved me off like it didn’t weigh on her every second.
“We’re cool,” she lied. “But we should probably talk about it later.”
I nodded and turned back to the cage.
Again, I raised the wand and pointed it at Kelda.
Take it, I thought, and the magic rushed hot down my arm.
In an instant, pain ripped through me, blinding me with a burning white. My heart was being ripped out of my chest, tearing through bone and sinew, and being twisted and wrenched apart. I felt as my magic touched hers, felt as she cried out in agony, and felt as my soul lost its cohesion.
I was no longer me. Instead, I was a beast that should never have existed. I was Olivia and Kelda, a sick creature twisted from two into one, threaded up and down with Kelda’s rage, Kelda’s pain, Kelda’s power, Kelda’s ambition, Kelda’s grief, Kelda’s hate. In between the threads, I was nothing: just Olivia, a pathetic child of a faerie who had overstepped her strength by being in this garden at all.
I was an insect, crawling in the dirt. I was the smudge on the heel of a shoe. I was nothing, nothing, compared to the all-powerful faerie whose magic I had dared to invade. I fell to my knees and cowered before her.
All around me, the world burned white and blue, shimmering like a star combusting with a violent heat I couldn’t even comprehend.
Through the fire, all I could see was her face. She towered above me, her black eyes flickering white like glowing coals and her wild beauty shoving me further into the mud at my feet.
Who the hell did I think I was? I was nobody, nothing, a shadow that should never have existed.
Pressure landed on my shoulder. It took what felt like entire dizzying minutes to figure out what had happened. And then, I recognized the touch, and the person attached to it. Imogen stood next to me, glaring at Kelda and tethering me to the world with her hand.
I lifted the wand higher and threw my anger toward the caged faerie.
And then they were all there, their attention crowding into my mind: Imogen, Isabelle, Haidar, Daniel, Lucas, Amani—far too many of them all standing far too close, their thoughts and their energy as vivid in my mind as if they were my own. It was like the first time I’d fully sensed other Glims, at Imogen’s sister’s wedding, but this was a thousand times worse. Every complex emotion in the garden rushed in on me at once, and I winced and drew in on myself.
“Everyone step back,” a voice said.
A flash of silver surrounded me. The voices faded. I shuddered and looked up into Amani’s eyes as her protective shield shimmered around us. On my finger, Mom’s ring was a single spot of ice amid the fire. I felt it trying to protect me, trying to cool me and take away the burn of Kelda’s magic. But what could it do against fury like this?
Amani crouched in front of me, her face drawn and gaze intense.
“Are you okay?”
I nodded. It was the biggest lie I had ever told.
She put a hand on my arm. “They can’t help you,” she said, loud enough for everyone to hear her. “You can do this. You have to believe in yourself.”
“I need Imogen,” I said.
My voice was nothing, not even a full whisper. It cracked out of my throat like dust.
“Imogen will stay close,” Amani said. “But even your best friends can’t do this for you. There are some days that no one can help you through but you.”
I had become so focused on the words coming out of Amani’s tight lips that I’d stopped thrusting magic toward Kelda. I saw Amani stiffen and fall forward as Kelda’s spell hit her in the back. The magic enflamed the air around us. Amani tumbled forward and caught the fall with her arms.
In a second, Isabelle was on her feet. She threw herself at the cage and grabbed Kelda by the throat.
“Get away,” I ordered her, before I’d even realized I’d spoken. This time, the words rang through the garden.
Magic crackled up Kelda’s body. Isabelle pulled her hand away just in time.
She crouched next to the queen. Her magic wove a shield out of leaves and grasses, translucent and pale as they hovered, wide enough to cover her and Amani.
Haidar shifted, and Kelda’s cage grew deadly thorns.
I turned to the Oracle again, and I pointed the wand at her and braced myself.
But there was no bracing myself.
There was only pain. There was only terror. I had never felt them fully before. Now, they crashed over me, a torrent of agony as if all the water fell at once from her Fountain and onto my trembling shoulders.
I lurched to my knees again, the jolt of the ground against my kneecaps nothing compared to the blinding anguish that ripped through my body and mind.
I couldn’t do this.
No one could do this, but especially not me.
The wand trembled before me. In the distance, past the rushing of my ears, I heard Kelda scream. Her magic flooded into me through the wand, but mine flooded back into her as well, stronger and faster. I felt my life draining from me, taking my energy and my will with it.
“Help her!” a voice screamed. I almost didn’t recognize it as Daniel’s. I’d never heard him panic like that.
As if through water, I heard their words rising and falling.
“She has to do this herself,” Amani said.
Kelda’s laughter bubbled up behind them. She knew she was winning. She could feel it as well as I could, the way my energy was being pulled back into her. I tried to feel for it and grasp the tendrils of magic that shifted between us, but they slipped away from me like mist.
“You’re the Faerie Queen!” Daniel said.
“That’s exactly why I can’t help.” Amani’s voice came out tight, afraid.
“Screw that,” Daniel shouted. He came closer. I couldn’t see him through the pain, but I could feel him. He was a tornado of desperation.
I heard his footsteps as he stood beside me.
And then, the last thing I had expected.
The sound of a violin pierced through the haze that surrounded me. For a moment, I heard it as clearly as if nothing else was happening: a single, high note that stretched through the air like a rainbow.
More notes followed. These weren’t the shrieks and squeals from before. Now, he played as if he’d been playing forever, his magic and his fear helping him coax notes from the instrument that I knew he didn’t know how to make on his own.
I latched onto the sound. The long, thin notes sounded like magic, the way they stretched and faded. I held the wand up higher and imagined Kelda’s magic as violin strings. I imagined looping the strings around
her wand’s tip and coaxing them toward me.
Her panic flared. She hadn’t expected this.
I pulled on the strings harder. Daniel’s music grew louder.
Kelda screamed. A wave of pain slammed into me. I shuddered and fell forward, and dropped the wand onto the soggy ground. The instant her wand left my hand, the pain began to clear.
No.
I grabbed for the wand just as Kelda threw out a hand to summon it to her. It twitched away from my fingers, but I threw myself forward and caught it. I fell back onto the ground. Jolts of electricity shot through my elbows, but I held tight to the wand’s slim handle.
I couldn’t sit up, but I could point the wand from here.
It wouldn’t be enough.
Hands gripped my body. Imogen knelt behind me and wrapped her arms tight around my shoulders, holding me up and pinning me in her embrace. I let myself fall into her and kept the wand leveled at Kelda.
The magic coming through it now was thick, crackling, and strong. Whatever layer of power I’d reached, it was different than the ones before, and it hurt even worse.
“You can do this,” Lucas’ voice said next to my ear.
Images flooded into my mind. The island where I’d stood and looked out over a sea of growing green things. The college dorm that would never be mine. The expansive sense of freedom that came from making my own choices in the world, and the terror of realizing there was only one path I could walk and still live with myself. I looked up and saw Kelda’s dark eyes boring into me.
“Hold tight, Olivia,” Amani said, her voice floating in from the other side of Lucas. “You’re almost there.”
The pain was unbearable. I fought the blackness that crept in at the edges of my vision. I had to stay long enough to protect my mom, to keep Elle’s Humdrum family safe, to shield Lucas’ mom, to make sure Daniel got to do whatever he wanted with his life.
There was no longer any question in my mind of whether I’d survive this. No faerie should have to do this to another faerie. The price would be everything I could pay.
The Oracle’s magic felt like mud now, the last dregs of something being siphoned from her. I had to fight for a few moments longer. Then I could let go.
“You’ve got this, Liv,” Imogen whispered in my ear.
Kelda shrieked, her voice like cold wind whistling around a house during a storm. And then, with a final, horrible throb of agony, the last traces of her magic were sucked into her wand and into me.
Suddenly, I could see.
I had just enough time to watch the Oracle’s white-blue light fade from her cage before the dizziness overtook me. Through the blur of my nausea, I watched the rose cage throb and tangle in a sudden wind. Its tendrils dissolved, flapping in the wind until they blew away as dust.
All that was left was a woman, curled up in a ball on the grass, her eyes closed and her breathing irregular and rough.
Amani stepped toward her. The sadness in her body made me want to fall apart.
I felt myself fading out. The pain was receding, but I was going with it. In a moment, I’d dissolve just like the cage.
“Here,” I said.
My voice was the tiniest breeze, but Amani turned. I held out the wand. She took it and knelt in front of me. Her eyes held more than I could process.
“Haidar,” I said. Daniel was next to me, Amani before me, Lucas beside me, and Imogen still had me wrapped in her arms, but I hadn’t seen the other two. “Isabelle.”
“They’re all right,” Amani said. She nodded toward where Haidar had been before. Now, he sat on the grass, Isabelle tangled up in him with her arms around his neck. They looked exhausted but safe.
Everyone was safe. Everyone would be okay.
I let out a breath and let myself slip away.
Chapter Thirty-Five
“Rise and shine, daffodil.”
The gravelly voice intruded into my consciousness. I didn’t know where I was or what was happening, only that I’d been resting in comfortable oblivion and the voice was interrupting. I tried to ignore it.
“Come on,” it said. “People are going to realize how lazy you are.”
I pried apart my eyelids. They felt sticky, like they’d much rather be shut.
Blearily, I blinked up into a world that was ten shades too bright. Haidar looked down at me, his face almost cheerful.
The expression looked weird on him.
“Good job,” he said. “Keep ’em open.”
He waved a hand at my bed. My mattress raised itself slowly to a reclined sitting position, like a Humdrum hospital bed but without all the whirring. He held out a small plastic cup filled with green liquid.
“Swallow this.”
I took it, getting the distinct feeling that I did not want that thing anywhere near my taste buds. But I could barely hold my head up. I wasn’t in a position to argue with anyone, let alone Haidar.
I knocked the liquid back. It tasted better than I’d expected, but still, it burned a trail down my throat and made me cough and sputter.
He took the cup back, nodded his approval, and went back to whatever he’d been doing before he’d woken me up. He had a small table set up near my bed and it was covered in tiny bottles and jars. As I watched, he added three drops of something to a small stone bowl and stirred it. Around us, the magic of the house thrummed soft and deep.
Slowly, my thoughts began to collect themselves. I remembered endless waves of pain, and Daniel’s music, and Imogen’s arms around me. I remembered Kelda’s frail body curled on the grass. The images came in disjointed bursts: a raindrop on rose petals here, the pulsing light of magic against the underside of the clouds there.
“Is everyone okay?” I said.
“They’re fine,” Haidar said. “City’s a damned mess, but if we’re lucky that will just keep the Council busy. I’m not the only one who’s fed up with them debating elf tariffs to kingdom come just to have something to talk about.”
I was sure Dad was losing his mind over the latest crisis. All I felt was relief that he was able to continue his dumb job for another day.
“How long was I out?”
“Better part of a week,” Haidar said, not looking up. He added a pinch of something glittery to the bowl. “Everyone’s been worried about you, but you’ll be fine.”
“Thanks to you?” I said.
He grunted, but there was a smile behind it. The house seemed happier, too. Its magic felt stronger than before and came with a sense of deep, steady purpose.
A soft knock sounded at the door.
Haidar slammed a tiny jar down.
“I said I’d let you know when she was up,” he called, his familiar scowl back.
The door creaked open. Lucas’ head poked in. He ignored Haidar completely. When his gaze landed on me, his entire face transformed with relief.
“Hi,” I said. I sounded like a frog.
He looked to Haidar. They scowled at each other for a moment, then Haidar rolled his eyes and waved him in.
“I need to go talk to her mother anyway,” he said.
Lucas rushed into the room, his dark hair a mess, like he’d been running his hand through it nonstop for a week.
“Your mom’s downstairs,” Haidar added to me. “Finally got her to eat something.”
Mom was downstairs.
Mom was safe.
Lucas sat next to the bed as Haidar left. I was in a different room than before, I realized. This one had sky blue walls, and my lap was covered with a bright blue blanket with white flowers embroidered on it.
I sat up. My body felt like it weighed a million pounds.
“How are you feeling?” Lucas said.
I shrugged. I had a feeling I looked bad enough to answer the question.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said. “Amani’s been worried.”
“What happened to Kelda?” I said.
He shook his head. “She’s not awake yet,” he said. “Haidar says it could be another week
. They’ve been enchanting her memory while she sleeps. They’re going to set her up with a good Humdrum life.”
I bit down on the inside of my cheek. That was something I would have given almost anything for a week ago. Anything except the safety of people like Lucas.
That life was closed to me now.
I wiggled my foot under the covers, suddenly restless.
“What about Imogen?”
At this, he smiled and leaned back in his seat a little.
“She’s out helping with memory glamours,” he said. “Most of Portland’s needed a once-over to get things back to normal. Aubrey had an entire team assigned to just her.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, like the very thought stressed him out.
“Amani’s formed a special task force to clean up the worst of it, and Imogen’s leading that. And they’ve got a Dark Forest Coalition going, which is supposed to open up discussion between Glims about the possibility of integrating the Glimmering and Humdrum worlds.”
It was beyond weird to hear all those words come from him. A year ago, he had no idea what a Glimmer was or that faeries existed. Now, he was chatting like he’d been raised as one.
“Kelda went about it the wrong way, but Amani figures if that many people were willing to join her, it might be time to re-evaluate,” he said.
“That’s a big move,” I said. “Good for her.”
I wasn’t sure I wanted to see Amani anytime soon. With any luck, she’d be too busy cleaning up to spend much time thinking about me.
But I didn’t know if I’d have luck. I could feel the future rippling in my veins. I hadn’t just pulled Kelda’s magic from her; I’d pulled it into me. It tingled down my arms and up my spine.
Somehow, in a way I didn’t yet understand, I was powerful.
“You okay?” he said. His eyebrows furrowed a little, just enough to create a line between them.
I leaned back into the pillows. They enveloped me. I got the impression that this bedroom, like the rest of the house, hadn’t been used much in a long time.
“It’s been a crazy couple of weeks,” I said.
“That’s an understatement,” he said.