Page 76 of Crown of Darkness
Eris remains still.
There’s a woven web hanging above her bed—a six-pointed star threaded with iron beads—in order to keep Queen Maren out of the room should she attempt to reach for Eris again, but so far, not a single bead has broken.
“I keep waiting for my mother’s next strike. Elms Day means something, and I don’t like not knowing who is involved.” Pushing to my feet I pace to the window. “And as if that isn’t enough, we don’t even know what Angharad is doing in the north.”
She’s the true threat, though my mother cannot see it.
Or no, not cannot.
Will not.
Five hundred years of peace. And I am the catalyst for breaking it. I rub the bracelet that locks around my wrist. The fetch can’t see me while I wear this, though the bone-white imprint of its hand is still scarred into a manacle around my wrist from where it grabbed me.
“I need you back,” I tell Eris. “I even asked Thalia to use Theron and his assassins to help us. That’s how desperate I am.”
Nothing.
I know Thiago’s tried. I know Thalia’s tried. Even Finn, in his own manner.
But I’ve never tried.
My gifts from my fae heritage are negligible. Thiago thinks they’ll grow stronger with practice—my mother’s curse didn’t just take my memories of him, but everything I’ve ever learned about magic too.
But I’m not talking about my fae gifts.
It’s far too easy to reach out and pluck at the power of the ley line. Ceres was built right over the top of a nexus point, where several ley lines cross. Perfect for inter-Hallow travel, but also… the power of the lands is stronger here. It doesn’t just vibrate through me. It sings. It feels like a pair of warm hands curling around me, finally welcoming me home.
“Wake up,” I whisper, setting my hands on her chest. “Come back, Eris. Wake up.”
In my mind I see a glimmer of light deep within her, like a seed. Darkness surrounds it. The light remains trapped like it’s in a dark maze, with nowhere to go, no way out, except to twist and run through the shadowy hedges of her own mind.
There’s also something else there.
Something deep and dark and hungry. It doesn’t feel like an enemy. No. It feels like part of Eris herself. It turns into my touch, drawing in a breath as if it can scent me.
“Who are you?” it asks, turning its full attention to me.
Something about it feels wrong. It’s too hungry, and it captures my mind, nibbling at a delicate thread of my power. Instantly, the storm of darkness doubles in size, until the seed of light is lost even further. Sharpened hooks latch on to me, siphoning away my strength, and through them, the power of the ley lines.
“Free me,” it suggests. “Free me and she will wake.”
But the words are merely meant to stall.
I try to pull away, but it’s as if my resistance only encourages it. Its teeth sink into me, and it’s lapping at my power, drinking it down in hot, greedy gulps—
I lash out, cleaving straight through the darkness with my power, and it parts like smoke. And then I’m free, staggering back from the bed even as Eris cries out softly.
What in the Underworld wasthat?
“Eris?”
Her head writhes as if she’s suffering a bad dream, but then she slowly, slowly subsides. Silent once more. Still once more.
And I’m left trembling, feeling as though half of my soul has been gouged out.
A shaking fills me. I need to sit. Badly.
But even as I think it, I eye the chair and how close it is to the bed.
