Page 291 of A Flame of the Phoenix

“Since Faythe got it from Reuben,” Jakon said. Everything about him was so cold and detached. There was a part of her that sympathized with his loss, but it had made him thoughtless.

Zaiana cast a glance over the others, who watched her with question. “Marvellas has known since then that her ruin is still intact. She’s known since then exactly where it is. I’ve felt its power in pulses too, though I didn’t realize what it was until now.”

The silence that fell slammed with realization.

Izaiah said, “Then why hasn’t she come for it yet?”

That was the question that raced Zaiana’s heart. Why indeed.

“We need to deal with this attack,” Reylan said. He looked around the room, realizing Faythe wasn’t here.

“She went to retrieve the ruin. She’ll panic when she finds Marvellas’s missing,” Zaiana said.

They’d been training with Aurialis’s ruin and had kept both of them separate.

“I’m going to her,” Reylan said, leaving the room.

Izaiah asked Jakon, “Why did you do this?”

“Marlowe left the blueprint. I figured it had to be done, though it wasn’t easy.”

Why would the Oracle leave instruction to turn the ruin into a blade? For ease to plunge it into the Spirit’s heart? Their fae strength could have achieved it without the point.

“We don’t have time for this right now,” Zaiana said. Before she left for her station, she warned the others, “Marvellas doesn’t need an army to infiltrate this place. If this attack is partof Dakodas and Mordecai’s planning, she might very well use the distraction to slip in and retrieve that ruin dagger.”

CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

Faythe

Faythe hurried down the hall, bursting into the library with the intention of heading down into the underground, where she’d given Aurialis and Marvellas’s ruin to the Dresair for safeguarding.

She didn’t get as far as the passage behind the hidden door.

Shock stumbled her steps to a halt with the bold, lone sight of Marvellas standing in her path. The Spirit didn’t wear the same cruel malice on her face. In fact, it was chilling how little she showed at all.

Faythe firmed her stance. Magick pricked her skin in anticipation, and her hand inched toward Lumarias. Marvellas just stood there, no ruby gown. She wore black attire more fit for combat. Her hair wasn’t as perfect as usual, with flyaway hairs and a dull flatness to it now. She’d always been as proud and blazing as the sun, but now it was like an eclipse had masked her brilliance.

“Hello, Faythe,” she said. Even her tone was jarring, not the song of taunts she was used to. There was a broken note now.

“Have you come to take me?” she asked as the only conclusion she could draw.

“No. I see now there is no world where you and I will be together. Nor me and my son. I see now…there is no world worth saving at all.”

They’d spent weeks preparing for the inevitable confrontation with Marvellas. They’d trained their minds and bodies, ready for a catastrophic fight to kill her.

Yet this was far from what Faythe expected.

“What is your plan now?” Faythe asked carefully, not dropping her guard for a second.

Marvellas wasn’t armed with any weapon, but she didn’t need mortal steel. Still, nothing about her demeanor threatened an attack. Her golden eyes weren’t as blazing—they were…sad. So terribly sad.

“I’m going to fix everything,” Marvellas said.

“What does that mean?”

“That I failed. As a guardian of your realm. As a mother. Then as a savior. I know what Dakodas has done. I know her ruin is broken, not mine. I should have seen her betrayal coming, even long before she joined me on land. She has been working toward a new Dark Age. That is my failure, and Aurialis was right in trying to stop me…to stop her.”

Faythe couldn’t believe what she was hearing. It wasn’t quite an admittance of wrongdoing, but it felt close to a surrender.

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