Page 81 of I Summon the Sea

I didn’t expect the shadows to wrap around forks and knives and send them thudding into the walls.

I don’t think anyone did.

I jerk as plates go flying, smashing on the floor, and goblets roll. The guests scream, and chairs are pushed back screeching as the fae scramble to get away from him, the humans following suit.

Images form and reform in the air above us—dragons, winged Eosphors, serpents with open mouths, eyes watchingfrom everywhere, fanged mouths opening, faces contorted in agony, so much pain?—

“Athdara!” the king roars. “Control yourself! Phaethon, control him!”

The shadows pulsate, then tear like great swaths of dark fabric, ribbons curling against the table and the walls.

And Jai is on his feet, fists at his sides, chest heaving. His dark eyes are wild, his hair lifting in an invisible wind. He’s looking right at me. This time, there’s no doubt about it, because it isn’t the king’s cold gaze. Jai’s is burning, burning like fire.

My heart is hammering, cleaving a hole out of my chest. Darkness edges my vision.

Barely able to keep the bile down, I gather my long skirt and run out of the hall.

You Are the Thorn, not the Flower

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Thankfully, the massive doors of the hall are ajar, having been thrown wide open by Jai’s shadows. Stumbling through them and out of the dining hall, kicking the damned shoes off in the process, I walk blindly down another long hall I’d barely noticed on my way here, ornate chairs and tables of dark wood framing the walls.

I don’t know where I’m going, having lost all sense of direction. All sense of reality.

That unleashing of shadows, that unexpected loss of control…

The shock has thrown my mind for a loop. My head is stuck in the past, and no matter how fast I walk, I can’t pull it free of the dark memories.

I hurry out of the hall and into another. It’s a chain of halls, one after the other, like a chain around my neck, choking me.

Faster. I have to go faster to outpace the horrors, but I have to slow down because I can’t breathe. My heart is pounding too fast.

I stumble to a halt. I can still see the shadows writhing, splashing against the walls, the open mouths, the pain etched on every face he painted… So much pain, and my mind is replayingit over and over. It struck me to the heart, where my wounds are, the ones I hide. It was a strange echo of my own pain, and having it come from the king’s favorite… it guts me.

This whole situation guts me. I shouldn’t feel such empathy for him.

That show of shadows reminded me how much I hate the king, and the memory of his cold gaze across the vast table chills me.

But it also reminded me of how I failed those I loved, every single one of them. I can’t fail again. This is all I have left, the only reason I’m still here. This revenge, this ending of the culprits.

This shift in our fortunes, all of it resting on my shoulders.

I start walking again, heading vaguely in the direction of my room.

“We recall the last Reversal, when the gods finally smiled upon us… Welcome, also, humble children of the earth, magicless and powerless humans. Your sacrifice is treasured…”

My hatred for the fae king founts up from a place so deep in me that I can’t staunch the flow. I want him dead, dead, dead, I want?—

“Rae! Wait! I said, wait!”

I spin around, a hand pressed to my chest. I had expected Tru or Arkin perhaps, or one of the king’s guards to come and drag me back to the banquet.

Or to the dungeons for leaving the king’s presence without permission.

But nothim.

Jai catches up with me in a few long strides. There’s a hectic flush to his cheeks under the black swirls, and his eyes shine too brightly. “Rae.”

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