Page 171 of Crown of Darkness
“If you get to her in time, then she will survive.”
And I note how carefully Grimm phrased everything.
He said I would hold Amaya in my arms. He said the Horned One will rise. And Amaya will survive.
But he didn’t say that I would walk out of there alive.
Maybe that’s the price I must pay to keep her safe.
“Vi?” Thiago demands.
I slide my hand over his, squeezing gently. “If we go to Black Keep, then Amaya will be safe. She will survive.” And I look up at him and don’t tell him my suspicions. “Grimm says I’ll hold her in my arms. We will have our daughter back.”
I just don’t say for how long.
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Chapter Thirty-Four
Iclose my eyes as Thiago carries me back to the Hallow, trying to open the line between myself and the fetch. I’ve seen through its eyes before, but I’ve been trying to fight the link between us for so long, that it’s not until I touch the white hand mark on my arm—where it touched me once—that I manage to get through.
I thought I’d killed it when I blasted it with light, but it must have twisted into the Shadow Ways at the last moment.
I open my eyes to a dark hallway, and there’s a weight dangling at the end of my hand.
“Let me go!” the little girl screams, sinking her white teeth into our hand.
Pain jars through me, and I can’t stop him as he backhands her across the face. She slams into the wall, and I’m screaming in my head, trying to stop him from touching her, when he goes still.
He turns to look at the wall—toward my mortal body—and then I’m no longer in his skin. Instead, we’re staring at each other across the distance.
“You will die,” I tell him, “if you ever touch my daughter again.”
The fetch merely smiles and hauls Amaya to her feet.
“Too late, little bitch queen,” he whispers. “She is bound for the Horned One now.”
He makes a sharp cutting gesture, and the world drops away. I try to reach for her, my gaze meeting hers, but—
I jolt back to awareness in Thiago’s arms, gasping for breath.
“She was so close,” I whisper. “I saw her face. Her eyes. She has your eyes.”
“We’ll get her back, Vi.”
Heat floods behind my eyes. I promised I would protect her. I promised that all she would ever know is love.
But there’s no time for tears.
Only rage.
My mother never broke me. I won’t allow this to do so either. Amaya needs me.
He slowly sets me on my feet.
“Take me to the Hallow,” I whisper.
“We’re not ready,” he says. “Eris and Baylor are redistributing our packs and trying to—”
