Page 100 of A Dark and Lovely Devastation

“What do you mean, gone? You mean you succeeded at the bog? That they’re under your control?”

I stared at her, my lips pressed in a grim line.

Mina swore. “You failed, didn’t you?”

Nellie’s jaw dropped. “You—”

“Where are they?” Mina demanded.

I lowered my hands. “Not in this world.”

“You left them in the Otherworld? When you knew Badb wanted your throne.” Illya must have told her quite a bit. Her clothes were large and slightly dirty and smelled of smoke. She started pacing as she put the pieces together. “And then just, what? Ran home as if everything would return to how it once was? As if she wouldn’t cause devastation in the Otherworld—”

“They look exactly like me. I need you to warn Dagda.”

That stopped her rant. She gazed at me, blinking as she realized the direness of the situation. She swore and raced over to a black bag in the car's trunk. Tearing it open, she lifted the glass ball out.

“Come on,” she said. We followed her into the house, where she plopped down onto the carpeted floor of the living room, settling the ball next to her.

For the first time since arriving home, my dread dissipated a little.

She’d tell Illya, and he’d get a message to Dagda. Then I’d have done everything I could.

“Well?” Mina snapped. “Are you coming?”

I stared at the mystical, my brows drawing together. A magical pull tended to accompany the glass ball. But I felt only emptiness.

“I don’t sense it.” Like with my faerie guardian, the draw of the mystical had disappeared.

“What? All faeries sense it,” Mina said.

I shook my head. “I feel nothing.”

“Her faerie guardian doesn’t work either,” Nellie said.

Mina’s eyes narrowed on me. “Stay here. I’ll talk to Illya.”

“Yeah, okay,” I said.

Mina pressed her palm against the glass and closed her eyes. When the scowl smoothed from her face, I knew she’d entered the ball.

“Do you think you’ve lost your powers?” Nellie asked.

I frowned. “I’m not sure.” Something must have happened when Badb, Macha, and I split. Like they’d each taken a piece of my faerie guardian and who I was with them. Like I was only part faerie now.

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Nellie stared at me. “You hate your powers. You want to be more human.”

Despite the truth in her words, for some reason, I only felt nauseous.

I watched Mina in the ball, wondering what she was thinking. What she must be feeling with me dropping unexpectedly back into her life when she thought I was gone for good. “In the Otherworld, I had something to give,” I murmured to Nellie. “In the human world, I only take. I’m only an inconvenience to our parents, to Mina. They had given up everything.” And they would again, so I could selfishly live some semblance of a life.

“You gave too. You allowed them to restrict you. Kept their rules to keep us safe…” Her expression grew solemn. “Refused to have serious relationships to keep others safe.”

I bit my lip. So she’d figured it out. I’d only slept with Mark on the stipulation that he didn’t commit. That neither of us committed to each other.

In this world, I’d always be dangerous. I didn’t even need my sisters. Members of the Fomori or others would always be trying to exploit my vulnerabilities to get to me. As the queen of the faeries, I held the very Otherworld together.

Of course I was dangerous in the Otherworld, too. But at least there I might give something in return—here I’d only ever be a burden to those around me.

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