Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
I stormed through the edge of the forest, taking my anger out on the flora around me. The scent of gingerbread followed me strongly, but I couldn't find it in myself to care. I wasn't sure when my magic started leaking, but I was surprised it wasn't still exhausted from healing Anneliese. I mean, I was able to get a nap, but still... an exertion like that should take days to recover, not mere hours. I would know.
I shuddered and pushed away the memory.
Then I took a deep breath and stopped stomping, turning back behind me to view the destruction my furious steps had caused on the forest floor. I winced.
Yikes. I should have stopped sooner. A wave of shame swept over me as I looked at the consequences of my temper tantrum. The flora had done nothing against me, and yet I was treating it as cruelly as I had been treated.
I knelt down and righted a small mushroom I had just trampled. Fortunately the stem hadn't broken, only bent. I looked over the rest of the trampled fauna and let the sight sink in. Closing my eyes, I took in a deep breath and let the peace of the forest soothe the sharp angles of my anger, letting it seep out of me.
As I opened myself up to the magic of the forest, I started. It felt - off. I opened my eyes and really looked at the forest around me, looked for the birds that should be twittering up in the boughs of the trees. Looked for the gently swaying branches as the wind played through their leaves, listened for the sound of the insects as they danced their way through the forest. Yet, there was none of that. The forest was silent. Bereft of life.
There was a wrongness about the forest that was pressing into my skin. Now, it truly felt as the villagers always described it - foreboding.
And that foreboding feeling began to echo in my own heart.
Anger forgotten, I picked up my skirts and ran. Ran for my house, my safe haven, and Waren’s arms.
Fiach lifted from my shoulder at my mad dash and took off for the trees. I didn't waste my breath in saying goodbye as I dashed off. I knew he'd find me again.
My feet flew over the bumpy terrain, and I leapt over twisted roots and dodged reaching limbs, desperate to reach home. It felt like the forest itself was trying to keep me away, and my heart stung at the betrayal. Twice betrayed today. Tears filled my eyes, blurring my vision until they tracked down my face.
The sense of wrongness only grew stronger with each frantic pounding of my feet and my breath came in heaving gasps. I couldn't slow down to catch my breath, my panic riding me hard.
As I gulped down great lungfuls of air, I began to taste the smokey flavor of ash, and I looked above the trees to see billowing black smoke. The shock caused my feet to stumble, and I caught myself with effort.
That... That was in the direction of - of my house. Waren!
If I thought I was running fast before, terror gave me an extra boost of speed. The gossiping women's words came back to me as I pumped my arms for all I was worth. "The Dark Fae was seen not too far from the woods by Katharina’s place."
"The very next morning is when Ebbe Bergman went missing.”
“...ritual sacrifice…”
“It was the Dark Fae’s doing.”
The words clanged around in my head like a bell, the truth of them sinking into my soul.
No.
It couldn't be, I wouldn't let it.
I’d beat death once today, I had to do it again.
I burst through the clearing and to my house and stopped dead.
My house was no more.
There were no more gaily dancing flowers lining the front porch. There were no more gently fluttering curtains covering the windows. The proudly stacked logs that Waren and I gathered and fitted together were now pitted and black, falling over one another in disarray.
My eyes took in the smoking remains of what, for the last ten years, had been my home, and my feet felt aimless. Rudderless.
I slowly walked forward, seeking for something, anything, that had survived the fire. I dragged my unwilling feet closer, and the heat singed my cheeks. With one hand I pulled my clothes closer, avoiding the errant flames still sporadically flickering, unwilling to die out completely. The other hand plugged my nose, the acrid smell burning my nostrils. It made my stomach churn.
Nearing the front door, my feet stopped, refusing to go further. I peered at the dark lump in the doorway, brain trying to make sense of what my eyes were telling it.
No.
It couldn't be.
My gorge rose into my throat, and I dry heaved off the pathway, my stomach empty but still trying to purge my body of the sight. The convulsions shook my frame. As the dry heaves eased off, the sobs took their place. Great heaving sobs rose up from the depths of my soul.
There, in the doorway, was the blackened body of Waren. My lover, my confidant, my safe haven.
The pain radiating through my body was too great to contain. My tears filled my sight, yet the image was forever burned in my brain, forever etched in my soul. I had just seen him, just kissed him. I cast back in my mind, trying to remember if I had told him I loved him before I left? Had my last words to him been spoken in irritation? I couldn't remember, and my outrage rose up higher, choking me.
I fell to the ground, headless of the heat searing my skin. Higher my wrath grew, clawing at my insides. I clutched my stomach as it ate at me, filling my mind with pain. Nothing but pain.
Upward, still further upward my fury grew, pain and fury blending together in a maelstrom of rage until it burst out of me in a scream. Throwing my head back, I let my voice give sound to the pain encompassing me. The pain that was now defining me. I screamed until I had nothing left. No breath, no pain, no heat.
Nothing but resolve.
For I knew, I knew to the very fiber of my being that he would pay. The one who killed my Waren would pay for the atrocity he had caused. And I would be the bearer of that retribution.
I vowed the Dark Fae would pay.