Institute of the Shadow Fae Box Set

by C. N. Crawford

  Then we’d return to London together. As a team—as a family—we’d figure out how to rid the world of Baleros’s malignant presence. This would happen.

  Right?

  I wouldn’t let myself think about the nightmarish vision of my old home in the shadow hell. I refused to entertain the idea that that I might find everyone dead. That I’d be standing over a grave for my mum, or that my father had lost his mind. I would definitely not think of him mad with grief, his shoulders slumped, dark wings drooping behind him as everyone he ever loved abandoned him—

  My legs felt weak.

  “Clothing,” I blurted at Ruadan. “We need clothes.” I gestured at the Tower walls. “My entire mist army will stay here to guard the Tower. I’ll command them to surround the Institute.”

  Ruadan nodded. “Tell them that if they see anything amiss, they should report to Aengus.”

  “Yes. Sure. Can we go now?”

  I needed to go before the terrifying images claimed my mind. Before I lost my nerve completely.

  In Ruadan’s room, I pulled a shirt on over my bare chest.

  “Are you all right?” Ruadan asked.

  “I’m fine. Almost ready.”

  As if it had traveled with me from the shadow void, sharp emptiness spread between my ribs—a chasm that could eat me alive. I took a deep breath as I slipped into a pair of black leather trousers. My hands shook a bit as I buttoned them.

  Fully dressed now, Ruadan closed the distance between us. His healing magic brushed over my skin, soothing my fears. He leaned in and pressed his forehead to mine. Silky magic kissed my skin. “I can go first,” he said. “I can see what it’s like before you join me.”

  I closed my eyes, marshaling my resolve. He understood I was afraid of what I’d find there. He’d be returning to the place where he saw his brothers die—but he was thinking of me.

  “You can’t go alone,” I said. “If Adonis is there, you might not make it out alive. If anyone should go alone, it would make more sense for it to be me. I’m the one who can convince him.”

  Still pressing his forehead against mine, he shook his head no. “It’s better if I go with you. Eden has been sealed for ten years. I don’t know what we will find there.”

  “I’ll be fine. Death angel, remember? I’m very hard to kill.”

  He straightened. “I don’t think that you need me to survive. I just think I should be with you.”

  I nodded. So maybe he wanted to protect my heart. Maybe he was imagining the same things I was—a landscape of dust and gravestones.

  I sucked in a sharp breath. “Mike, the demented fae I brought back, was from my village. I killed him, and he’s been in the shadow void this whole time. I think I must have put our whole village in the hells.”

  Ruadan brushed his knuckles over my shoulder. “He can reverse death magic. He can reverse the Plague. That’s why we’re going to find him. Maybe that ability was strong enough to bring some of them back. We could be returning to a thriving village in Eden.”

  My chest unclenched. Ruadan was right. I should not underestimate Adonis. I smiled at him. “Okay. You’re right. Let’s do this.” I glanced at the sword slung around his waist. “Do you really think we should go in armed? It’s a family reunion, and it might take a moment for them to recognize me. Going in with weapons might send the wrong message.”

  “I’ll keep it sheathed.”

  “Fine. And let me walk in front.” Then, I pulled on my headlamp. I had no reason to bring the headlamp or the bag, but I just felt better with them. I felt like myself. “Right,” I said. “Open the portal before I lose my nerve.”

  Without another word, the floor opened up in front of us, a watery fissure in the stone that widened.

  Ruadan took my hand, his violet gaze on mine. I nodded at him, and we leapt in.

  Chapter 112

  The freezing vortex pulled us under. I clutched Ruadan’s hand as we sank deeper into complete darkness. I found a brief moment of peace in here, a respite of purity in the blackness.

  After a few moments, moonlight pierced the water. Eden.

  I was home. Still holding hands, we started to kick our way to the top. By the time we reached the surface, I felt like my heart was about to explode.

  We pulled ourselves out at the same time, and I gaped at the world around me—the dark forest, silvered in the moonlight. The clearing just a hundred feet away. With my head out of the water, I gasped for air. Clutching the portal’s mossy edge, I stared at the silent oaks around me. We’d emerged in the woods.

  I pulled myself out, and I sloshed onto the rich earth. I breathed in, taking in the smells of moss and ancient trees, the faint aroma of honeysuckle and blackberries—the ones I used to pick with Mike. Home.

  Ruadan rose, too, and his hand instinctively hovered by his sword. His muscles were tensed, and he looked ready to kill.

  “Simmer down, Ruadan,” I said. “It’s a family reunion, remember?”

  “I know.” He motioned for me to go on toward the village itself.

  The silence here felt heavy as a grave, broken only by the groaning of the wind through the tree branches. It wasn’t that late at night, was it? Maybe nine?

  The wind rushed through the trees, making the boughs creak above us. Among the oaks and rowans, I squeezed out my wet hair, then started walking toward the forest’s edge. Except there were no lights like there should have been. The village should have been lit up at this time of night, but we had only the moonlight lighting our way.

  Here, the trees’ boughs seemed to arch protectively above us. I glanced at a gnarled oak—just by the spot where I’d hidden the day Ruadan had invaded.

  I reached for Ruadan’s hand, taking comfort in its warmth. The breeze toyed with his pale hair. An ancient fae prince like him belonged in the forest. Just not this forest. The image in my mind of his invasion felt so vivid here. He’d been terrifying. A god of war.

  At the forest’s edge, my heart was racing out of control. Dark buildings all around, not a sign of life anywhere. “There should be lights,” I whispered.

  I swallowed hard. Through the trees, I had a view of Eden. Timber-frame houses crowded narrow roads, just as they always had. A temple to the Old Gods stood in the center of the village, and I could see its elegant stone roof from here, the tallest building in Eden. Everything was just as it should be.

  Except life was completely absent from this place. I couldn’t even sense a blackbird’s heartbeat. Chilly wind whipped over my skin and hair.

  As we stepped into the clearing, a heavy weight pressed on my chest, and I stared at the darkness before me. I released Ruadan’s hand and broke into a run for the nearest building, just on the village’s edge.

  A thin layer of dust coated wooden shutters. I unhooked the shutters, then pulled them open. They creaked apart to reveal dark windows. I cupped my hands to peer inside the glass. This had been the bakery once, but now dust and cobwebs coated the furniture. My throat went dry.

  “There’s no one here,” I said to Ruadan.

  “But Adonis will be here. Even Adonis couldn’t get out of a locked world.”

  He had a point. But what sort of state would I find him in?

  I turned to survey the dirt road that wound into the center of Eden, where the temple stood. Just like in the shadow void, the buildings were dark and shuttered.

  Ruadan’s fingers twitched at his hilt, and he sniffed the air. “Something isn’t right here.”

  I swallowed hard. “Yeah. Well, I mean, I did kill everyone, so that is probably the thing that feels a bit wrong.”

  He shook his head. “No. I feel magic here. I just don’t know where it’s coming from.”

  “What kind of magic?”

  His brow furrowed. “Fae magic, I think.”

  Hope lit in my chest. Fae magic. My mother had powerful fae magic. Was she still around somewhere?

  Quietly, we followed the path deeper into the village, and I gripped Ruadan’s hand
hard. The dirt path wound around the buildings, toward the village green. The temple stood on a gently rolling hill.

  And before the temple, I found piles of rocks—silvery light streamed over dozens of them, in little crooked pyramids. Dried floral wreaths rested on top of the piles. The sight of them was a punch to my gut. These were fae grave markers.

  One of the wreaths caught my eye—dried honeysuckle and crimson anemones. My parents’ favorite flowers, intertwined. My legs felt weak, and I gripped Ruadan’s arm to steady myself.

  Where was my dad? Someone had buried the dead, which meant he couldn’t be among them. Not to mention the fact that my powers wouldn’t kill him.

  “Where would we be most likely to find him?” asked Ruadan, trying to keep me focused.

  The tremors in my hands had returned. “We should look in my old house.”

  I let go of Ruadan again, and I broke into a run, feet pounding on the dirt road. My parents’ home wasn’t far from the green, near the burbling brook. I was nearly there—nearly to my dad.

  I turned off the path, running in the tall grasses outside my old home, where wildflowers dappled the ground.

  It was too dark. Just like the others, it looked like an empty vessel. I ground to a halt, investigating it. Vines covered the house’s exterior like nature was trying to suffocate it, and moonflowers blossomed all over them. Where the hells could my father have gone if he wasn’t here?

  Our house didn’t have shutters, and I cupped my hands to peer through the dusty glass window. I couldn’t see much beyond the grime—but the Angel of Death did not live in grime. Clearly, Adonis was not here. Still, maybe I could find a clue of some kind that would tell me what had happened to him.

  “I’m going in,” I said.

  I shivered as I pushed through the door into the darkened cottage. Behind me, Ruadan chanted in Ancient Fae, and he called up a sphere of golden light that cast a warm glow over my house.

  The orb floated into the old living room, casting a dull amber glow over the dust. I coughed, my gaze sweeping over the table where we’d eaten dinner, and the chaise longue where I’d sat in my mum’s lap for stories.

  With a lump in my throat, I crossed to the ornately carved mantle. Among the carvings of leaves and flowers, I was searching for the moon and the word “Bug.”

  But when I drew closer, my heart constricted. The moon carving was there—but my nickname wasn’t. No “Bug.” I frowned at it, tracing over it with my fingertips. Everything was just as it had been, except that one little detail.

  The shock of it disoriented me, and it felt like I’d been erased from history. Now, the ground no longer felt quite so solid beneath my feet. Had I somehow imagined that detail of my life?

  Dizzy, I felt as if my spirit were curling into the air like fog. I wasn’t sure what was real anymore. The fae, the gladiator, the death angel—all the different Lioras vying for control, none of them stable, none rooted to the earth. Which one was real? I closed my eyes, overcome by the feeling that I was watching myself from the outside. Here was a woman who’d probably lost her mind long ago.

  For one wild, dizzying moment, I had the horrifying thought that I’d never left Baleros’s cage—that this was all something I’d dreamt up to make myself into a hero. It was the escape route of a broken spirit.

  My breath heaved in my chest. No, it had ended even earlier than that. Maybe I’d died that day, when Ruadan had come, that day I’d killed everyone else—

  “Liora?”

  Ruadan’s deep voice called me back to reality.

  His violet eyes surveyed me with concern. He must have read the sheer terror and confusion in my eyes, because he touched the side of my face, painfully gently. His magic snaked down my body—a firm touch that warmed me and seemed to fuse itself to the floor, steadying me. Tendrils of his magic wrapped around my ankles and feet.

  I’m here.

  “Thanks.”

  His magic had grounded me, and somehow he’d known to do it instinctively.

  With his magic helping to stabilize me, I looked up at him—at those violet eyes that were sometimes so cold. “I don’t understand what’s happening,” I said. “My dad engraved my nickname into that mantle a long time ago. I remember it really clearly. It should say ‘Bug.’”

  “While you were inspecting that, I was trying to get a read on the magic here. There is magic all around us.”

  I frowned at the mantle, then cocked my head. “Are you sure you took us to the right place?” I asked. “What if it’s a replica?”

  He shot me a disbelieving look. “Of course I took us to the right place.”

  I ran my fingertips over that moon carving. “Is it possible this place is glamoured? That the real world is hidden somewhere under this one?”

  “It’s possible. But it would take someone extremely skilled at fae glamour to pull it off.”

  “That’s why I asked. My mother was brilliant with glamour. Unfortunately, I didn’t inherit her skills.” I bit my lip. “Shit. Whatever is happening, Adonis isn’t here. And I promised the Shadow Fae I’d be fast. We may not have a ton of time until they succumb to the Plague.”

  “I think you could heal them.”

  I shook my head, still staring at the mantle. I frowned at it. I hadn’t noticed it at first, but on the lower ridge of the mantle, a line cut through the wood—nearly imperceptible at first among the intricate carvings of leaves and berries.

  I gripped the top and bottom of the mantle, jaw dropping as I slid a section away to reveal a hollow alcove. “This is new.”

  Inside the alcove lay a small, folded piece of paper. As Ruadan looked on, I unfolded it, my heart stuttering.

  Find Aenor.

  Was it my mother’s cursive handwriting? I think it was. And that meant she was alive.

  “What does it say?” asked Ruadan.

  “Find Aenor.” I met his gaze. “Any idea who or what Aenor is?”

  He pulled the paper from my hands, frowning at it. “Aenor. Flayer of Skins, Scourge of the Wicked.”

  “She sounds … nice. They want me to find her? Any idea why? Or where she might be?”

  “We can find out.”

  “How do you know her name?”

  “She’s on our kill list, but she wasn’t a priority.”

  “Of course. She has useful magical powers, which means you want to kill her.”

  “We don’t know that they’re useful.”

  “If my parents are sending us to her, she has useful powers. My parents knew that I’d check the mantle to see my name. They didn’t want anyone else to find this, but they wanted me to see it.”

  “You sound certain that your mother is alive.”

  I smiled, a weight lifting off me. “I think it’s her handwriting. I think my father brought her back.”

  “Let’s search the rest of the house and the rest of Eden as fast as we can. If we sniff for your father’s scent and shadow-leap, we can cover a lot of ground fast.”

  I nodded, though I already felt in my bones they weren’t here. I shadow-leapt through the house, finding it nearly exactly as I’d left it. Then, we whooshed through the abandoned town, through the homes and the cemetery on the green, through the woods and the temple. And as we searched, I clutched that piece of paper in my hand. Wind rushed over me as we moved swiftly around Eden.

  This was turning into a much more complicated recovery mission than I’d hoped.

  Once we’d sniffed out every building and scoured the forest, we were certain that Adonis wasn’t here. And I was sure this wasn’t the real Eden anymore.

  Near the cemetery green, Ruadan opened another portal. We were returning to the Institute empty-handed, and nothing had changed yet.

  But now, I had a tiny shred of evidence my mother could be alive.

  Chapter 113

  Sodden with portal water, we crawled onto the Institute’s Tower Green. A canopy of night still arched above us; the moon shone bright with Nyxobas’s power.
/>   As I stood, the air began to chill around us, the moon burning brighter in the sky. I turned to look at Ruadan.

  Except he was no longer Ruadan. Now, Nyxobas’s crescent of silver horns beamed from his skull. His body had grown, and night magic billowed around him like smoke from a bellows.

  I pushed my damp hair out of my eyes. “Hey, Nyxobas. Any chance you can turn up the temperature on your portal water? The knights are dying.”

  No response—just those eerie, silver eyes. A whorl of shadows consumed Ruadan.

  Beneath my feet, the earth rumbled. What the hells was happening now? We had to find Aenor. I desperately wanted to get to my parents as soon as I could, but Nyxobas was interfering.

  “You’re a god,” I grumbled. “You could just tell us who the traitor is.”

  In the center of the courtyard, the grassy earth cracked open, and I held out my arms to balance myself as the void gaped open before us. I backed away from it, not eager for another trip into a hell world.

  When I looked up again, Nyxobas had shifted. He now stood at the edge of the portal, holding Niall by the neck. In his other hand, he gripped a Shadow Fae named Turi. Both of them had pale lips, and they were barely able to keep their eyes open. They looked at me expectantly, hoping I’d brought back a cure for them. I just shook my head with a pang of guilt.

  The chokehold Nyxobas had on them probably wasn’t helping the situation. He really was an arsehole. These knights were his servants. They had dedicated their souls to him, and he treated them like this.

  Nyxobas threw both of them into the portal, and they sank deep into the darkness. The surface smoothed over once more, turning to ice.

  Nyxobas turned to me, his glacial gaze boring into me.

  I didn’t want to be with the remote god of the void right now. I wanted Ruadan back, and I wanted to find my parents. I was still clutching the tiny piece of paper that had held Aenor’s name, but the portal water had washed my mother’s handwriting away.