75. Caspian
Caspian
And just like that, my mother has immobilized all the most powerful fae in the Vale with a single move.
I pride myself on being ten steps ahead of everyone else, but my mother always has one more on me.
But not this time. Rose or not, bargain or not, she will answer today.
“Don’t move or I’ll kill her,” Sira purrs.
She stills us all with a look, then sweeps her gaze from me to Anya.
“How sad,” she continues. “My two little pets have flown the coop. You do realize you still belong to me.”
Anya’s face turns into a vicious snarl. “Even rotting in the white bark of the Evergrove would be too good a punishment for you, Sira.”
“You’ll never take my wife again.” George steps protectively in front of Anya, who puts a hand on his shoulder.
Sira gives a dark chuckle. “Bold words, human, figuring you are the cause of her imprisonment. You and that unnaturally long life. But alas, all things must end.”
“Don’t threaten my family,” Rosalina snarls, twitching against Sira’s grip. “The Green Flame’s reign is over. You have no god or army to help you.”
She leans down, her voice a soft whisper. “But I do have an army. One your own father helped me gain.”
My ribs feel too tight. She has the rose, which means when she took control of Kairyn and Heidigog, it was part of something greater. All those creatures I recruited as the Prince of Thorns… She’s truly done it.
They could be marching now, on Castletree, on the realms, on all the Enchanted Vale.
Nausea roils in my gut.
I can’t let that continue.
“The Green Flame isn’t gone, Mother,” I say as I step forward, letting fire dance along my arms. “Let Rosalina go, return the rose, and perhaps we’ll allow you to live out your miserable existence back in the Below. Yes, you can command me, but remember, you only have one. Choose wisely.”
“Oh, my darling boy.” Her smile widens. “I only need one command. And it’s not even for you.”
A pit drops in my stomach, and I feel twenty steps behind.
“Aurelia.” She turns to Anya, then gestures to me. “Turn that wretch under my control into a human.”
Into a human.
Into a human?
The years I cried myself to sleep wishing for that. The hours I pleaded outside Anya’s prison for her to turn me human. All so I could rid myself of the Green Flame.
But now I have mastered it, along with my thorns and shadows.
“No.” I throw a line of emerald flames up to protect myself.
And I’m not the only one. Keldarion raises a shield of ice, Ezryn a wall of rock, Farron a torrent of fire, and Dayton a barrier of water.
The queen’s magic bursts through them all as if they were as thin as a butterfly’s wings.
A beam of light strikes my chest and throws me to the ground. The other princes fly back, slamming into the pillars.
“Caspian!” Rosalina screams.
Light explodes in my vision, and I make out the queen, hands outstretched, tears running down her face. She’s screaming at George and Justus.
And then I can’t concentrate on anything more. It’s like I’m being struck by the sun itself.
I try to summon my magic, but it’s no use. This isn’t something I can fight. Not with shadows. Not with thorns. Not with flames.
It sears straight through me, slicing open everything I am. My ribs burn, my blood turns to ash, and there’s a sound—gods, a sound like a dying animal.
I think that’s me screaming.
My magic writhes, snarling, trying to hold on. But it’s being pulled from me, one thread at a time.
I rise to one knee.
“Anya,” I manage. Her name scrapes my throat like broken glass. She’s crying. Stars above, she’s crying. But she doesn’t stop. Her hands tremble, but the magic doesn’t falter.
The light tunnels deeper. I can feel it now, what it’s doing. Twisting the core of me into something…less.
“No,” I rasp. “No, no, no—”
I’m unraveling.
Everything that makes me fae—my thorns, the shadows in my soul, the pulse of distant flames—is slipping away. Being scorched clean.
It’s like being flayed alive from the inside out. Not just pain. Loss. Someone’s carving out who I am and leaving a hollow shell behind.
There’s chaos around me. Distantly, I hear Rosalina’s voice.
And then—
I can’t feel the briars anymore. The veins I’ve dug into the earth surrounding Castletree, all leading here, weaving through its halls, strengthening its bones, protecting the home of those I love…
I can’t feel them.
My golden bracelet falls to the ground.
Castletree trembles.
The briars at my feet wither and turn to dust. My connection to them is severed. For over twenty-five years, I have been holding this castle up…and the connection disappears in an instant.
Aurelia isn’t yet strong enough to keep Castletree standing. She told me so herself.
My briars drop off the walls, raining down in a shower of purple dust. The tree groans and shakes.
Castletree is going to fall.
“Don’t cry, my darling boy,” Sira says. “Isn’t this what you always wanted?”
I scream.
And it sounds human.