Page 101 of Faerie Fate
The glow unnerved me. The fields beyond the palace were burning.
A small garden space separated the base of the hill from the palace’s foundation. We caught up to the rest of our group at the top of the rise. EverRose looked like a stone sentinel lit by a backdrop of devastation. All around it, flames wreathed the ground. A flash of gold from the inside of the palace heralded the presence of the fae.
The closer we got, the louder the clang of weapons, the shouts of people, all ringing inside the walls. The sounds of battle.
“No.” Mike stopped behind me. “No, this isn’t right. The battle started an entire day earlier than history said it did!”
His nostrils flared and his unease set my teeth on edge. Nothing was going according to plan.
“I’m starting to think time is more fluid than we believed,” I replied.
I wanted to be shocked by the revelation, by the fighting. The best I mustered was a vague sense of doom settling inside me.
Elfhame belted out directions to her sons, ordering one of the older brothers to lead the children to a safe place nearby.
The pixies were raring to go and join the fight already happening inside the palace. Our group split off, the elderly and the young led into the surrounding mountains by the oldest son.
“I need to go, too,” I told Bronwen. “I have to see if there’s a flower to be saved in the field.”
“Youare staying here. I’ll be back,” Poppy said, already jogging ahead. “You three, don’t let her go anywhere.”
She wasn’t taking a chance with me. Not with my bad luck.
“Try not to die!” I yelled to her.
The sinking sensation turned my insides to lead. The fae got here before us. How?
Questions and answers didn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. They weren’t going to put out the flames turning the morsana fields to ash.
We knew it had happened. We knew the plants that hadn’t been used to extinction were burned at the Battle of EverRose.
Bronwen and Noren kept close to my side, Mike a constant presence watching me.
I wanted to help the pixies but it wasn’t a good idea. Poppy had to stay safe. She was the only one who’d be able to unlock my powers before we went back to our correct time.
We weren’t the kind of people to sit on the sidelines, though. Not when the crackle of hungry fire and gut-wrenching screams grew louder. The same feelings strung the four of us together.
“It’s a bad idea,” Mike said.
Bronwen blanched. “We can’t just stay here, can we?”
Noren huffed and, his steps light, jogged ahead of us. He checked the path and reappeared in front of me with a slight yip.
“Coast clear.” A horrible laugh made it past my lips.
We broke into a jog, then a sprint, rushing through the smoke toward the palace.
My muscles protested with every step along the rocky incline until I reached the bottom of the rock face and slapped into a wall of heat. The fields were aflame and every last acre of them merrily burning. The wind pushed the heat toward us, hotter than anything I’d ever felt before.
Bronwen pinched my elbow. “We’ll find a way around it.”
The roar of the flames obliterated her words, forcing me to read her lips. I bobbed my head and Noren took off, forcing his way along the slender path leading to the palace.
The pixies’ palace was only a quarter of the size of the grand structure King Tywin commanded in his city but no lessintricate. Twin spires rose on either side of the main building, twisting like delicate vines.
Then the fire pulsed and everything went blurry with heat.
Bronwen took off after Noren, and Mike waited for me to fall in line on the trail before he once again took up the rear position. We tread carefully down toward the base of the field.
