Chapter 41
41
When awareness returns, everything hurts.
Bloody threads of pain weave through every muscle, every fractured bone. I force my eyelids open just a sliver and slam them shut again with a hiss as the dim light lances straight into my skull. With effort, I take stock of injuries, each screaming pain in turn—the tender knot at my temple, the gashes shredded into my palms, the way sharp debris bites through my tattered clothes to scrape skin raw.
Panic flares, hot and visceral. I try to shift my leaden limbs, but a weight crushes me down, pinning arms and legs in place. Helpless. Defenceless in ways that shred every carefully constructed defence until only fragile nerves remain.
“I didn’t say you could move,” a male voice hisses.
The words pierce my skull like shards of glass, vicious and mocking. Each syllable comes wrapped in power, commanding submission. The invisible bonds constrict tighter across my battered body in warning, crushing me.
Panic closes my throat. I want to fight, to scream, but my traitorous limbs refuse to obey. Nails score the delicate skin of my inner arm, just deep enough to draw pinpricks of blood.
A promise of pain to come.
You lost , a whisper slithers through my mind. Now you’re mine .
Darkness drags me under once more. Nightmares wait there, filled with blood and fang. I drift through twisted dreams, unable to cling to consciousness. Fragments surface—the fae army bearing down on us, weapons wet with crimson. My desperation as I raced to repair the failing seal, knowing each wasted second brought ruin closer. Kiaran’s mangled body after the shield detonated between us. My ragged screams demanding he wake up.
Wake up. Wake up!
The memories splinter, and awareness floods back.
The throbbing ache at my temples has faded to a muted pound, and the fog in my mind clears just enough to allow coherence through.
Assess the situation, adapt and overcome. Anything else is for later.
When I open my eyes, it takes long moments for the scenery around me to make any sense. I blink hard, but the bizarre landscape remains. This can’t be right. Can it?
I’m lying on a slab of glossy black stone split off and suspended over a deep valley. Jagged crags and sheer cliffs plunge into fathomless darkness below. Scattered fragments of land drift through the immense space like leaves caught in an invisible current. Each bears structures that glimmer in the wan light—lofty towers and crenellated keeps of smooth opalescent stone, attached by precarious bridges arched over the abyss. In the distance, a breathtaking castle with spires like glittering crystal spines towers over all like jagged teeth.
It’s beautiful, in that cold, desolate way ruins often are. Like intricately sculpted bones long since picked clean.
Suspended below the soaring stronghold, other buildings have their own hovering fragments. Some are topped with domes of metal, others shimmering rock as if hewn from sapphires. But all are crumbling, bearing scars of violence and decay. Just like the fractured landscape itself suspended over the endless abyss.
I brace my injured palms on the icy slab and gingerly push upright. The frigid bite of stone against my skin feels real enough. Which means this nightmare vista exists outside my head.
I ease closer to the edge of the platform and make the mistake of looking over the jagged rim. There’s only endless blackness below. No light penetrates the abyss, no handholds if I slip—just an infinite plunge into darkness.
The enormity of my predicament threatens to crush me. I’m trapped here, wherever here may be. No apparent means of escape. Alone and weaponless, balanced over a lethal drop. My armour is gone, and my thin shift offers no protection from the elements. Helpless, despite all my years of ruthless training.
This is a prison. Designed to display a prize captive.
“Good. You’re awake.”
I whirl, pulse leaping. Lonnrach gazes back at me from a smaller hovering slab a short leap away. His ornate armour is replaced by simple trousers and a tunic to complete the illusion he’s almost human. Elegant and magnetic as any nobleman, not an ancient fae warlord. With that patrician charm, he could ensnare countless lovelorn ladies in a crowded ballroom.
But I know better. I see the monster lurking beneath the genteel surface.
I fight to keep my voice steady, clinging to the tattered remains of my composure by bloodied fingernails. “If you’ve brought harm to my city, I’ll kill you. Without hesitation. Without mercy.”
Lonnrach tilts his head. “Will you now?”
And when I do end your life, it will be slow. Creatively thorough. I’ll carve the heart from your chest sliver by sliver and smile as I watch you suffocate on your blood.
But first I need information. Pretending indifference is the only shield I have now.
“Where are we?” I keep my tone lethally soft.
Location, situation, threat assessment. Survive first. Bury the pain away to be dealt with after. Don’t let him see how close you are to shattering.
Lonnrach’s too-bright gaze sweeps the jagged ravines and ruins surrounding us. “The Si?th-bhru?th. What remains of the Unseelie kingdom.” His mouth presses into a hard line. “Just ruins now.”
“Well, forgive my scepticism.” I force lightness into my tone. “But I can’t rule out deception or trickery. All this could be an illusion.”
Closing the gap between us in three swift strides, I halt at the very edge of the platform on quivering toes. Poised precariously, muscles burning with effort. One careless move would send me over the brink, plummeting through the endless dark below.
I fix the impassive fae with a glare. “Shall we test my theory? If this place is real, the fall will kill m—”
Impact drives the breath from my lungs in a painful rush as we crash to the ground. Lonnrach’s body pins me down, his shoulder crushing brutally into my chest. We skid perilously near the platform’s opposite crumbling rim. For one dizzying instant, I fear we’ll tip straight into open air.
But his grip clamps around my upper arm mercilessly, wrenching us back from the precipice. His fingers dig into my skin. I grit my teeth against the blossoming ache.
“You foolish girl.” Irritation flickers in Lonnrach’s eyes now.
A fracture in his armour. This monster needs me alive.
“You need me for something. That’s why you haven’t killed me.”
Lonnrach’s expression shuts down.
When he doesn’t respond, I press harder. “I have knowledge you lack. Or access to something you want but can’t reach. What is it?”
“Finding an object I require,” he says flatly. “That’s your sole purpose.”
The admission lands like stones, sending ripples of unease through me. I’m a hostage then, trapped here as leverage until I relinquish whatever he seeks—a commodity rather than a captive.
And once I serve him, my life becomes meaningless. Expendable.
“And where exactly is this mysterious object located?”
“You want answers? Play nicely, Falconer. Start beg—”
I spit in his face.
Lonnrach recoils with a snarl, swiping saliva from his cheek. Before he can retaliate, I buck my hips and twist with every ounce of strength. I bring my knee up sharply.
Satisfaction flares hot when it connects with Lonnrach’s groin. He grunts in startled pain. I aim a vicious kick at him, but he deflects it with his forearm. Lonnrach surges upright, rage twisting his elegant features.
I bare my teeth in challenge. In a blur of preternatural speed, his hand clamps around my throat. He slams me onto my back, driving the air from my lungs. I’m pinned, his weight an immovable force. I claw at his wrists, but it’s useless. Gray fuzzes the edges of my vision.
Just as suddenly, he releases me. I gulp oxygen while Lonnrach rises to his feet in one smooth movement. His casual demeanour has slipped, replaced by eyes gone hard with anger. “Look at you. A hellion even now.” Lonnrach circles me. I mirror his movements, throat still raw. “Most humans would weep and plead. But not you.”
I curl my lip in a sneer. “If you want begging, you chose poorly with me. I was taught not to break before blades or teeth. Now, where is Kiaran?”
Lonnrach’s smile is cutting. “ Kadamach is gone. His sister rescued him. No one’s coming for you, little falcon.”
Liar.
Lonnrach’s fingers find my chin, forcing me to meet his stare. “He made you feel wanted. Special. I can only imagine how intoxicating it must have been for you.” His thumb digs into my jaw. “Tell me, did you spread your pretty thighs for him? Or does he continue denying you? Because the truth is, Kadamach doesn’t care for anyone. That glowing mark means nothing. You were just another human pet to him. One he’ll discard and replace.”
Rage descends hot and red over my vision at his dismissive words. Something dangerous unravels inside me, snarling and snapping its jaws.
Before reason can reassert control, I smash my clenched fist into that hateful, lying mouth. Lonnrach reels back, more startled than pained. I follow it up with a vicious knee to his abdomen that doubles him over. I angle my elbow high, fully intending to drive it through the elegant column of his throat. To crush the breath from his lungs the way his vile words crushed the air from mine.
But quicker than my eyes can track, his hand seizes my arm. His punishing grip threatens to splinter the delicate bones of my wrist. I bite back a gasp as pain ricochets through the joint.
He yanks me back against him. “So very predictable. Just like any other human.”
I bare my teeth at the condescension. “Go to hell.”
“You’ve been nothing but a belligerent waste of my valuable time since arriving,” he hisses. “But if you’re trying to bait me into killing you, it won’t work. You’re the key to restoring the Si?th-bhru?th, and I have no intention of disposing of you. But some reminders of your circumstances are in order, I think.”
Darkness crashes over me before I can tear free of his hold. The floating platforms and soaring towers of the Si?th-bhru?th vanish, replaced by a nightmarish scene. My dazed senses struggle to comprehend what I’m witnessing. The stench of scorched stone and charred flesh overwhelms me. Choking clouds of ash swirl through the air, reducing visibility to mere feet.
When the haze parts, my surroundings finally solidify. Or rather, what little remains of them. Once vibrant Princes Street is reduced to rubble, the shining shop windows I knew so well lie smashed and blackened. The Scott Monument is cracked and crumbling, dissolving into inevitable ruin beneath the unrelenting ash drifting down.
The devastation stretches as far as I can see along every street. Edinburgh has become an apocalyptic wasteland. Lonnrach’s army was thorough in their destruction. They smashed centuries of history and culture into debris.
The smoky air scorches my throat. I sway and fall to my knees, unable to remain upright.
In the next blink, I’m kneeling on the stone slab again. The Si?th-bhru?th looms before me in all its decaying grandeur. My chest heaves, lungs starved for air untainted by the memory of smoke and death.
With a shaking hand, I brush trembling fingertips over my temple, feeling for injuries. The wound a fae left on my head remains tacky and open, still seeping slow trickles of blood.
“This is a trick.” My raw words scrape over the shards of my composure. Lonnrach watches me, silent and assessing. But it has to be an illusion. The fae couldn’t have levelled Edinburgh that quickly. “My wounds are fresh.”
“Still in denial?” Lonnrach asks. “I suppose it must be difficult accepting your failure. Had you forgotten that time works differently here? Hours in the mortal realm could mean days or weeks have passed while you remained my visitor.”
The implications crash through me. I clench my fists, nails biting into tender flesh. Watching crimson beads well up. The pain keeps me tethered. Grounded.
“How long?” The question tears itself free before I can restrain it. “How long have I been here? On the outside.”
Lonnrach gazes down at me, as detached as ever. “I don’t bother myself tracking the insignificant measures of human time. Days, weeks, months, years—they mean nothing to me.”
Nothing. He destroys my entire world and feels nothing. I want to slice him open. I want to smile as he gasps wet, ugly breaths through the wound.
But I force the dark desires down deep. Seal them away behind stone and steel. Emotion is the enemy now.
React, don’t feel.
“So months could have passed while I was unconscious. And you destroyed Edinburgh just to salvage your rotting kingdom.”
Lonnrach watches me, empty of anything merciful. “You say that as if I had a choice. As if I wouldn’t sacrifice a thousand mortal cities to save this realm. You kill without hesitation to protect your kind. As I do. We’re the same.”
“I’m nothing like you,” I spit out through clenched teeth.
“No?” Lonnrach smiles then, cold and sharp as an unsheathed blade. “You sacrifice and bleed to keep your family’s duty intact. I work to restore what was lost here. We only differ in scale. All I care about is recovering what I need from your realm. You’ll help me find it by choice or by force. It’s up to you.”
My gaze locks with Lonnrach. “By force. Because when I’m free, I’ll burn your kingdom to the ground myself.”
Lonnrach’s face goes hard, angry. “More threats. I can leave you here for as long as I want. Maybe I’ll shove you in a watertight box and throw you into the sea below until I need you. A thousand years could pass on the outside, and you’ll still be as youthful as the day I took you. You’re at my mercy.”
The sea below. So that’s what lies at the bottom of the cliffs. That’s why it sounds like it breathes; it’s the waves hitting rock, scraping stone against the base of the escarpment.
Before I can reply, Lonnrach is already on his platform, a leap that’s at least twenty feet—one I could never hope to attempt. “You have no choice, Falconer. If this place burns, you’ll die with us. Next time I see you, we’ll begin your first lessons in obedience.”
He leaves me there with no escape, surrounded on all sides by the abyss.