Page 51 of Rebel Fae
Was it dead?
I flew closer and lower. This was one of thoseunreasonablethings that I sometimes did when it was clear I shouldn’t. The closer I got, the louder my heart hammered.
It’s trapped, Tally. It can’t get you.
Of course, this wasn’t true. The beast had more tendrils than a millipede had legs. Not all of them were tangled.
I flew closer still. Now, I was about six feet away from its body. I stretched the stick forward, slipped it through a clump of matted hair, and pushed it aside.
My breath caught at the sight of the beast’s face.
“No,” the word escaped through my lips in a hot whisper.
It was Sinasre.
But how...?
His eyes sprang open. I gasped and dropped the branch. Like a whip, a tendril of matted hair rose from below and wrapped around my waist. My wings beat behind me, and I rose for two feet, but a tendril yanked me down, squeezing me as if to cut me in half.
I pleaded with my cousin. “No. It’s me, Tally. Please stop.”
The pressure intensified. His face gave no sign of recognition. Whatever they’d done to him, they’d taken away his ability to recognize me, too.
“Please, Sinasre.”
At the sound of his name, the tendril let go. I bobbed erratically in the air and flung my arms out to regain my balance. Hovering, I waited for a second attack, but it never came. Instead, a slight whimper issued from my cousin, a sound so heartbreaking it made me feel as if my insides had turned to dust.
“Melthelel.”
Without thinking, I flew closer and desperately pushed the matted hair aside to reveal his handsome face. He was pale and had purple circles under his eyes, but it was him. Underneath the disarray, his eyes were squeezed shut and his face pinched in what looked like an inner struggle to remain in control.
“What have they done to you?” I ran a hand down the side of his face as hot tears slid down mine.
He trembled and clenched his teeth. “Get… away… from… me,” he sputtered one word at a time.
“No, I’ll cut all of this. I’ll set you free.” I would go back to the cave and get Vaughn’s knife, then I would—
“NO!” He shook his head, still squeezing his eyes tightly as if he never meant to open them again. “Leave me… here.” He started breathing in and out quickly, the ball of matted hair around his chest moving up and down.
“I can’t do that, Sinasre.”
“LEAVE!” he growled, shaking harder still, making me fear he would lose control and kill me. But I couldn’t abandon him.
Without thinking, I pressed my forehead to his and clasped his face in my hands. “I won’t leave you.” Tears pooled in my eyes. “Forgive me. I should have known it was you.”
I should have known. I should have recognized his magical hair. He always could control it and use it like a whip when he fought. He could make it longer and shorter at will, twisting it into tendrils that could trip or lash a foe. Though there had never been so much of it. How had they done this to him?
I caressed his face gently. He stopped trembling and started keening like a lost child.
“I will figure out a way to fix this,” I managed even as my heart broke. “And I will make them pay for what they’ve done to you.”
“They… their experiments… changed me. I don’t know who... I am... anymore.”
My heart shattered into a thousand pieces. I didn’t know what to say to that. All words would sound like a lie. I didn’t understand what they’d done to him, how to get him back to normal. I didn’t even know where to start. They had taken Vaughn. Bael and Ronnie were hurt, unable to help. If only Ronnie could perform magic, maybe there would be something he could do for Sinasre.
“Let’s start by setting you free. I’ll get a knife and cut all of this off,” I said.
He shook his head. “It will just… grow back when I get in… the fountain.”
