Page 163 of Curse of Darkness
We share another smile, even though the truth is killing me: I don’t know what has happened to Andraste since that one night we managed to connect through the flames.
“Enough!” Mother screams, and throws her arm toward us both. “Kill them!”
The Deathguard attack.
It’s what we were both waiting for.
“I’ll handle them,” Thiago tells me, spinning toward the thirty or so warriors who encircle us. “Finish this, Vi.”
Forging the Sword of Oblivion, he sweeps forward to fend a pair of them off. Steel shrieks, but it’s the scream from fae throats that makes me wince.
“Your little ploy is ruined,” I tell Mother, resting a hand on the sheathed sword at my hip. “You are done. You are brought down. And now, it’s time to end this.”
The ground trembles beneath our feet as she pulls on the power of the lands. Her laughter is chilling. “You little fool. You thinkyou’regoing to be the end of me?”
“It’s what you saw, isn’t it?” I can’t stop the emotion in those words as I reach for the lands too, all those little threads I’ve been laying in the past ten minutes surging to surround me. “It’s what you saw in your dreams from the moment I was born. It’s what the Crown of Shadows warned you about. A new queen, come to end your reign.” Unwinding the bandage around my palm, I show her the barely reknit slash there. “Well, consider this prophecy fulfilled.”
Bending, I slam my palm against the ground.
Power surges through me as I rip the lands from her.
My lands. Mine to claim. Mine to take.
It’s time to finish what my sister started when she burned Mother’s bonded oak.
One by one the oaks in her grove begin to topple as my power scythes through them, shearing right through their roots. The sound is astronomical.
Power surges up through the ground, using me as a conduit. There’s no Hallow here, but I can feel it not too far away, feel the leyline I’m standing over.
The earth buckles beneath our feet. Her warriors cry out and fall.
And my mother staggers off her makeshift throne, her mouth agape in shock and horror as her connection to the lands is torn from her.
Andraste weakened Mother when she burned her oak.
It was the tree Mother made her pledge to, watering it with her own blood. The tree she used to bind herself to the lands. The others in the grove have propped her up—supported her link—in those weeks since the oak burned, but now….
Now they’re gone.
Flames sear toward me as she retaliates. I wave them aside, and her eyes glitter with fury as I barely flinch. “Bow to me, Mother. And I may spare your life.”
“Never!”
More fire. I sweep it away, half-amazed at how easily it listens to me. Gesturing with my fingers, I twist it into a firestorm before letting it peter out.Mine.My fire. My magic.
I’ve spent the last year working my ass off trying to forge it into a bow and arrows, trying to control it. It fought me at every step, even though my memories were returning, even though I was no longer under her control.
And it makes me realize that while she planted the seeds in my head—fear of my magic, fear of my fire—I was the one who perpetrated the lie. I wanted to please her even as I feared her. I wanted to be what she wanted me to be—the perfect crown princess, much like my sister was. And so I let my flames flicker and dull, let them die down to sparks.
My magic was never gone.
I just did not believe in it.
“You took my fire once, Mother,” I whisper. “But it no longer burns me. I understand now. When you first held me in your arms, you saw in me the promise of yourself. A child with magic, just like you. A child who could make roses bloom and thorns grow. A child who could make flames dance, and in so doing bring a smile to your lips. And you loved me for that. You loved me for the parts of me that were you.”
Fire flashes before my eyes. Nanny Redwyne screaming. My mother’s guards tearing Andraste from my frightened arms. I remember it all now and close my eyes for a moment to ground myself. “But there were other parts of me that you could not bring yourself to love. My thorns began to tangle around your tower. My fire bloomed a little too hot. And I could hear echoes from the Hallow, whispers of voices no one else could ever hear. Instead of nurturing those darker shadows within me, you feared them.
“And so you stole my magic from me. You smothered my memories. You stole all those pieces from me until I was merely a shadow of you. And you locked me away from the world, from those who might have loved me.”
