Chapter 42
CHAPTER 42
I s this it?
“I promised you the power to spare one life,” Talan says, his voice cutting through the hush of the forest. “I assume you want to use it now.”
I close my eyes, silently thanking the gods. Relief washes over me, flooding my chest. I let out a shaky breath, releasing the dread. “Yeah, now would be a good time.”
“And truthfully, Nia, I’d rather meet you on the battlefield someday than watch you die here. Get on Tarasque.”
I don’t open my eyes again until I’m sure I’ve blinked back all the tears.
At last, I open them. “So, I can leave here?”
“Go back to Corbinelle. Find your way home to Camelot.” His gaze is sharp and cold as a glacier’s edge. “Tell your Pendragon friends that I’m coming to kill them.”
The dragon lowers her head again, resting her long neck on the earth for me in invitation.
Only once I start to awkwardly climb on Tarasque do I realize that he was never going to burn me, was he? Not after what happened to his mother. He loathed fire more than anyone.
And now, I’m more certain than ever that he wasn’t to blame for Brittany, either.
Talan is playing the role of the beautiful monster like he always does. He could have ended it all so much faster if he really was one, and maybe this would have all been much easier. Maybe that would have been the less painful option.
That whole time we were fighting, he could have slammed my brain with a nightmare and ended it all. But he was testing me. Trying to learn the truth. How strong I was. How scared I was. He was trying to find the real Nia under the bullshit.
I could have done the same to him with my magic. I could have invaded his mind for the first time. But somehow, even as we slammed our fists into each other, that was a line we didn’t want to cross.
Clumsily, with my wrists bound, I clamber into position. As I slide my legs over the dragon’s scales, Talan cuts the vines from my wrists. Breathing out sharply, I slump forward, grabbing Tarasque’s spikes.
Hope flickers weakly inside me. “You’re not coming with me?” My voice cracks.
“The next time you see me, Nia,” he says, his voice low and soft, “we will once again be enemies, and you’ll be standing on the wrong side of my battlefield.”
His words send ice cracking through my chest.
He narrows his eyes at me. “Morgan’s heir,” he repeats.
I shrug. “Well, that’s the thing, Talan. You’re not. Your father is a fucking liar. He made up your lineage to steal the kingdom. You come from Merlin.” I shake my head. “But if you don’t believe a word I say, then why am I wasting my breath?”
Talan is no longer looking at me. He’s done with me.
He shouts a command to Tarasque in the dragon’s tongue, and she starts to walk forward.
I swallow hard, my throat tight. My eyes sting, misting. This is the end.
“I was the voice,” I call out. “All those years. The voice in your head. The scorching, oppressive sun, the rivers of pavement. I heard you, too. Long before I ever heard of Avalon Tower.”
He’s still not looking at me.
Tarasque spreads her wings, which shimmer under the sun, terrifying as ever. She starts to lift into the air, and the world falls away under me.
Hours pass that feel like lifetimes. It’s cold beneath the stormy skies. The deep chill settles into my bones, and I’m sure it will never leave. The only thing that keeps me from freezing to death on the flight is the occasional gout of flame from Tarasque that heats the air around us. She knows, somehow, that I need it.
The first half of the flight is absolute white-knuckling chaos. I grip Tarasque’s spines, buffeted by the wind. Lightning cracks close to my head, and the rain hits me sideways.
I wonder if Talan is doing that on purpose.
The second half of the flight, I’m numb, frostbitten down to my marrow.
We near Corbinelle, close to the portal that will take me home. Except that it’s not really home now, is it?
All I can think about—because what else is there to think about when you’re riding through a storm on the back of dragon?—is Talan .
The Dream Stalker who could have easily killed me, but didn’t. Who could have let those orphaned children starve to death, but didn’t. He’s not who I thought. He’s not who anyone thinks he is.
I don’t know what his plan was for Scotland, and I’ll never forget what happened to Viviane. But a small, reckless part of me wonders if even that battle had a reason, and if I will ever get the answers.
I’ll probably never get over him, and I hate myself for it.
But the way he’ll remember me? The thief. The assassin who got caught. The pretty little liar.
Tarasque swoops lower toward the Lost Palace, and my teeth chatter wildly. I’m emotionally spiraling like the whorls of snow around us. And here, in Perillos, it’s even colder.
I don’t yet know how I’ll get past the portal guards, but I imagine they’ll be easier to handle than Talan.
Damp snow slides over my skin as we swoop toward the glittering Fey city. Every hollowed-out part of me is now ice.
Through the snow and darkness, it’s hard to see the castle’s outline, but I glimpse the lights in the windows. Tarasque seems to know what she’s doing, and she lands outside the Lost Palace.
I’m shaking with the cold, and I stumble off her in a daze, bruised and mud-streaked. As I walk to the portal, I hug myself. Everything hurts, and my dress pretty much froze to my skin on the flight here.
Talan is sending me home. Except it’s not my home anymore. Avalon Tower is ruled by Wrythe Pendragon now. He tried to kill me. And that word— home— is a hollow carved between my ribs.
At least I have Serana, Tana, Darius. Raphael. People who can stop me from losing my mind completely.
My teeth chatter wildly as I walk. I’ll arrive at Avalon Tower looking like hell, but at least I’m alive. He let me live.
And that’s why I’ll never be able to forget him, and I’ll keep chasing the ghost of that burning ember. He should have killed me. He knows it. I know it. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it.
Nivene’s already back in Camelot. I don’t know what she’s told them. Maybe the truth—that I fell for the man we were supposed to kill. That I wanted to protect him, and I couldn’t leave him behind.
As I approach the guarded portal, I try to refocus my thoughts.
My cover is already blown. I don’t need to pretend anymore. I don’t have to simper and flirt and fall into their arms.
Strangely freeing, really.
Moonlight streams over the portal. It cuts across the snowy earth, casting sharp-edged shadows across the ground.
Four guards stand around the tree, shivering miserably at their posts. They turn to watch as I march closer.
With each step, I summon the power of the three. The magic rises from the earth, coiling through my veins, thrumming through my bones. Morgan’s strength, Nimu?’s magic rippling through me. Cold as the snow, the tattoos pulse on my wrists.
One of the guards steps closer to me. “Good evening, Princess,” he says. “Are you…? You’re not dressed, Princess. Is everything all right?”
I don’t need to kill them or hurt them all. I only need to touch the stone.
A guard lifts his hand to bar my path. My lip curls, and I shove him hard into the nearest soldier. As they topple into each other, they grunt, armor clanking.
I summon my Sentinel powers and reach for the rough, cold stone.