Page 114 of Faerie Fate
Stop! Please.
I squeezed my eyes shut until the glow receded and my next inhale came easier than the last one. But when I forced my eyes open?—
The space was empty, the silence louder than a scream, and my heart galloped. I’d mowedeveryonedown, literally. Our pixie allies, my own friends, everyone. The horror threatened to split me in two.
Then a small spark popped in my periphery, followed by another, and another.
I glanced sharply to the side and my vision cleared. The pixies were all there, safe and flying like a wave of dozens of fireflies on a summer night.
“Tavi?”
Poppy’s voice shook as she said my name. My body didn’t falter, my legs held firm when I turned in her direction.
Mike, Bronwen, and Poppy were standing. Even Noren was visible across the room. He sniffed the air, his gaze meeting mine with unnerving accuracy; his was the only warmth pushing past the layer of ice in my blood.
All the fae were down. And the wave of magic hadn’t stopped, wasn’t done. It detached itself from its center point and fanned out from me.
I sprinted to the window in time to watch it barrel through the fields like the initial crash of a tsunami. All that power, every last bit of magic I’d sent out, snowballed and grew. Not only putting out the fires…
But restoring the morsana flowers. The flames blinked out and the black ashen ground flaked away in a brisk breeze. Small tender green buds popped out of the earth behind it and their stems uncurled, searching for light.
At the end of each stem was a blue bud.
Surprise flickered through me and the terror slowly receded as I continued to watch. The stems grew thick and fat, filled with vitality, the fields verdant green. The impact of my spell cast out over the hundreds of acres like a shadowy dragon wing.
It was one of the most beautiful pieces of magic I’d ever seen.
I did that.
My gut tilted but not out of fear or nerves this time, but pure joy, strong enough to prick the corners of my eyes with fresh tears.
The fields were restored. EverRose was safe and the first battle at the palace restored to what it should have been—a pixie win.
They were the first to regain their wits and start to check the bodies.
“Dead,” one of them called out in their sweet, high pitch. “The ones over here have passed. The bodies will need to be disposed of soon, though.”
I jerked in alarm. “What do you mean, dead?”
“The fae over here are dead as well,” someone called from the rear of the foyer. “Our enemies are gone!”
Surprise felt obscene in the moment, something I wasn’t entitled to. It was selfish of me to be shocked that the fae were dead. What had I expected? That I’d just knocked them out momentarily?
I turned away from the window, from the new life growing and thriving outside to the destruction left behind from the wild magic. The blossoms might be restored and my friends alive, but the fae were dead.
I’d just wanted them to go away.
The pixies began to cheer and I dropped to my knees. A mass murderer. That was what I’d become. There wasn’t a big difference to my power, apparently, betweengoneanddead. I hadn’t made the distinction.
Crumpling, my hands lifted to my face as I sucked deep breaths into shriveled lungs. There was no coming back from this. Whatever I’d done to restore the flowers had killed every fae in the palace and maybe beyond. Every fae except for me and my friends. What did they think of me now? How would they look at me when I finally managed to meet their gazes?
Reproach made me sick, and I swallowed back bile before it erupted.
Murderer.
This went beyond changing things. I’d panicked, acted rashly. Mike warned us not to kill anyone and what had I done? Mowed down an entire fucking army.
I sniffed, straightening and swiping my eyes clear. As the blur receded, I focused on Elfhame and the glistening gold object beneath her. TheAugundae Imperium. She lifted a hand and the artifact rose from the dead fae clutching it. The commander. He must have been the commander.
