Chapter 11
Chapter
Eleven
Sy
The impact knocked the grin right off my face as pain bloomed in my bones.
I blinked, rolling into a crouch. Shit. I’d crashed into a palace hallway.
My braids were singed at the ends—volcano diving tended to do that—and I could still taste ash and lava.
One heartbeat, I was in the Underworld; the next, I was surrounded by fancy architecture and paintings of hunting.
Battle sounds swelled—clashing blades, pounding footfalls, shouts, and screams. And among them, Rowan’s enraged cry. He was in the thick of it. They were surging toward the corridor where I’d landed.
I broke into a sprint, needing to see him safe, needing to fight by his side, until I saw him standing amid the massacre, silver hair dripping with blood, his and others’. His sword cut through guard formations. Seven bodies already decorated the floor, while a dozen more still lunged at him.
His white tunic hung in ribbons, the fabric slashed open to reveal deep gashes smearing his shoulder in fresh red. His leather pants had gone from fashionable to biohazard.
Shit. Someone had spilled his secret.
“Sugar, hold on!” I shouted. “Here I come!”
Rowan’s silver eyes swept toward me as he parried another wave of guards. Pure, devastating joy flashed across his face before terror snuffed it out.
“Beloved, flee!”
“Flee? Flee?” I challenged. “To where, sugar?”
“Anywhere but here,” he yelled back, his blade sailing toward another foe. “I’ll find you!”
“You already found me,” I said, launching at the nearest guard, every muscle singing with giddy violence. I never shied from a fight. Battle was in my blood, honed by decades of protecting Barbie.
My claws extended mid-leap. A guard wheeled toward me, mouth open, an insult already forming. “You don’t deserve to be a fae lady, insurgent! The king will strip your noble title!”
“And give it to you?” I asked, baring my fangs. “I’m no fae, stupid. I’m more. Much more. And you’re nothing but a footnote in my history."
“Don’t tell them, little monster,” Rowan called while fighting like a whirlwind.
He was still trying to protect my secret identity, but I was done hiding.
It was time to step into the light and shine.
After two decades trapped inside Barbie, only able to talk to her or my fae lover during brief escapes, I was finally free, completely and permanently.
And I was in a chatty mood, no matter the audience.
Four guards lunged at Rowan from all sides. He moved, blades flashing, and three were down before they could blink.
“Don’t worry, sugar,” I called over the clash of steel. “Barbie’s not with me. She went to see Killian and his dragon.”
For a second, Rowan’s eyes widened. Good. Now that he knew Barbie and I had separated, he could have me all to himself. I hoped that lit a fire under him, something fierce enough to burn through his battle fatigue.
My limbs stretched longer, talons already slicing through a guard’s throat before he could take another step. I was still a chameleon, deadly and adaptable. His cartilage gave way, blood spraying as his eyes flared in shock.
Fae ladies usually played pretty in court, all seduction and perfume. He hadn’t expected this.
“Thanks for underestimating me, douche,” I said, yanking my claws free.
“My sister likes to play dumb and fly under the radar, but that’s not my style.
” He was dead before he hit the ground, so my explanation fell on deaf ears.
Not cool. I raised my voice to draw the others away from my mate.
“Yes, I have a sister! Proud to say she’s the infamous ugly Barbie! ”
“Kill that annoying bitch along with the bastard!” roared a giant guard—their ringleader, clearly.
“Stupid oaf,” I shot back. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve been the silent sister? And don’t you call my mate a bastard. Now beg for death, starting with a please.”
I missed having Barbie beside me, as she was always more destructive. Her dark flame could’ve roasted these guards in one strike. Since our separation, our magic had diverged: mine leaned toward creation, hers toward annihilation.
Two guards charged, one from five o’clock, the other from eleven. Fae guards had brute strength and cold hearts. Their blades sliced toward me, one low, one high, leaving no room to duck or leap. So I went horizontal, hand outstretched. A mist swirled, and Deathsong slapped into my palm.
Aloha, the evil blade chimed.
I swung, and Deathsong cut through their swords. At the same time, I lashed out with my leg, ramming my foot into Guard A’s jaw. Bone cracked. Deathsong kept going, burying itself to the hilt in the second guard’s gut. Instead of just bleeding out, he went up in flames.
Barbie only used the evil blade on Shriekers, a dark weapon forged by an evil god. When Deathsong tasted immortal flesh, it laughed gleefully.
You came, I said to the blade in silent thanks.
I’d thought it only obeyed Barbie.
Of course, sidekick mistress, Deathsong giggled. You’re in luck—Barbie hasn’t summoned me yet. If she does, I’ll have to abandon you and go. But don’t get your panties in a twist. Bloodbaths are my thing. I love fae blood! So nice to have variety.
“What abomination is that sword?” another guard demanded.
“The evil kind,” I said honestly, and threw Deathsong.
It flew straight into the space between his eyes. He burst into flames, and I was already dashing toward the guards surrounding Rowan, my claws sinking into the spine of the nearest one.
“Behind you, Sy!” Rowan shouted, his silver eyes blazing as he fought his way desperately toward me.
I grinned without turning, flicking my wrist. Deathsong shot from its former victim and buried itself in the chest of the guard trying to sneak up on me. If I’d let him, his longsword would’ve split my skull. He wasn’t nice, so he deserved Deathsong’s brutal assault.
But more guards rushed us. There seemed to be an endless supply of bad apples.
I threw up my palms. Light exploded from every claw, merging into a single stream—pure creation magic, unseen for an eon.
The guards threw up their hands, cursing and screaming as their retinas fried. Every guard on this side of the corridor groped blindly, stumbling out of my way.
My light reached Rowan, wrapping us both in an unbreakable shield.
He blurred toward me, pulling me against him. Then shouts echoed from another corridor. More reinforcements were coming. I would’ve loved to keep fighting, but my sugar wasn’t in good shape, drenched in blood—his and our enemies’.
And then we were surrounded again, this time in the grand hall near the palace entrance. We pressed our backs together, retreating step by step. His body heat seared through my armor—too hot, his system working overtime from blood loss.
We’d never practiced combat together, but we’d had plenty of practice in bed—where I left claw marks down his muscled back and he left bite marks on my neck, claiming me as his. Our bodies knew each other’s rhythms, that intimate familiarity translating into perfectly coordinated violence.
He struck high; I went low, our movements flowing like one. He defended left with decades of training; I covered right with raw savagery.
We fought our way out, my light shielding us while Rowan’s thorny vines tangled our pursuers. He didn’t want to kill more guards than absolutely necessary. After all, they were still his people, even if he was no longer the legitimate heir.
Rowan’s free hand found mine, fingers interlacing with my bloodied claws. That simple touch sent a shiver of need through me.
“Sugar,” I breathed, pouring every ounce of sex appeal I had into that one word.
“I’d have torn through every realm to reach you.” His voice broke. “But you came to me instead, little monster.”
“You can show appreciation later,” I said, swallowing hard as I saw fresh blood seeping through his shoulder. The sight made something feral rise in my chest. “I should have killed them all. I still can.”
I raised my hand.
“Unless they’re a direct threat,” he said. “There’s enough bloodshed. Let’s go and figure this out later. The fairy ring to the academy is through the garden. We’ll have to fight our way there.”
The garden was vast. The fight would be long and hard.
“Hold on to me,” I said, wrapping an arm around his waist, taking part of his weight. “Don’t go anywhere.”
“Where would I go?” he murmured. “You’re my home.”
Warmth flooded my chest. “You and Barbie are my home too.”
I raised my palm, calling on my light to open a portal. After all, it was my and Barbie’s combined magic that had brought me here. I should be able to do it again. I willed a gateway to form, one that would drop us straight into Shades Academy.
A shimmer flickered in the air before us, then shattered into nothing.
Shit.
I needed Barbie for this. My power was still new, raw after our separation—untethered from a goddess’s might. Given time, my magic would grow strong enough to open portals on its own. But right now, I was like a newborn, one who’d literally been reborn in lava.
Guards rushed toward us, yelling, their waves of magic surging toward us, intended to maim, trap, or kill. My white light and Rowan’s earth magic shot out at the same time, deflecting the onslaught.
Rowan and I burst through the garden doors into a botanical nightmare.
“The fairy ring is in the deadliest part,” Rowan informed me.
“Shit.”
The fairy forest spread before us in carnivorous glory. Lethal flowers tracked our movement, petals peeling back to reveal rows of teeth. Branches coiled, roots twitching, ready to ensnare.
Rowan chanted in the ancient fae tongue, and the forest stilled, parting reluctantly for us.
“This way,” he said, tugging me toward a grove where silver bark gleamed under moonlight. “The fairy ring is close.”
Behind us, the shouts increased as guards followed the trail of blood Rowan was leaving, a crimson map, despite the healing I’d poured into him the moment our hands touched. He’d lost too much blood. I hadn’t had time to do more.
“Sy,” he breathed, labored. “If they catch me, leave me. I’ll hold them back. You’re what matters. You can’t fall into my father’s hands. Or anyone’s.”
“Not a chance,” I said, half-dragging him between grasping trees. “Together or not at all. And they won’t catch us—because if they try,” I flashed my fangs in a savage grin, “I’ll show them what happens when you piss off magic older than their entire civilization.”
“No one can know who you really are. Not yet,” he urged. “Only the heirs.”
“I won’t hide forever,” I warned.
“I’d never ask you to,” he said. “But wait. Until the realm is safe. Until Ruin falls.”
“There’ll never be a safe time,” I replied. “There will always be enemies.”
The fairy ring shimmered ahead, reality worn thin as silk. I could feel it calling to the magic in my blood. Power recognizing power.
“Almost there,” Rowan breathed.
An arrow sang past my ear, bouncing off my shield of light. Then a rain of arrows shot toward us. Rowan hurled his magic at the pursuers, sending them flying into the thorny trees.
I grabbed him and threw us both into the shimmering ring. Starlit night swallowed us whole. We spun through the space, refusing to let go, until we tumbled out onto the academy grounds.
“The heirs,” Rowan mumbled against my shoulder. “Need to find them…warn them…”
“We’ll go to Barbie and Killian,” I said, hauling him upright as I moved us toward the House of Chaos.