27. Chapter 27 #2
“You must understand.” Lily’s voice is drizzled in so much madness that it causes her pupils to expand.
“If I don’t get this ring onto your finger by the end of the evening, she’s vowed to remove their heads.
They’re only six.” A tear slips down her cheek, wedging itself into my memory for all eternity.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I gasp for breath beneath the weight of her body as she pins my hands against my chest with her bony-ass knees. I briefly wonder whether I’ve been swept into another lucid dream, this one featuring Lily losing her ever-loving goddamn mind on top of me.
“The queen has threatened to kill my little brothers,” Lily cries out as she clutches my wrists for dear life, her words a flurry of spit in my eyes.
“I must make sacrifices in order to save them. You must understand!” As she attempts to pry open my closed fists to gain access to my finger, I headbutt her in the forehead, sending her tumbling to the floor with a resounding thunk.
“You don’t have little brothers,” I recall as I sit up, rubbing my forehead in agony. “You lived alone with your grandmama, who died in the spring. Your house is abandoned. Which means your mind is poisoned by that damned ring.”
“You know nothing about me!” Lily screeches as she lunges for my legs. She bites down on my calf, sending a zinger of pain sailing through my tendon as I tumble to the ground beside her, desperate to pry her teeth out of my muscle.
“I know everything about you,” I reel in pain. “You have yet to stop blabbering about yourself since the day we met. The ring is warping your memories!”
“Stop pretending you’re my friend!” Lily releases her bite to say.
Quickly, she entangles her limbs in mine, yanking on my arm so hard that something crunches under her weight.
“I’m the only one who has abided by the laws of the gods,” she adds, her breathing strained.
“I’m the only one who has fulfilled the requirements of the Curse of Love.
And yet the queen might still punish me for your actions.
You must put on the ring, Shadow. I implore you at once. ”
Pain. Mind-blowing, back-bending, heart-wrenching pain. It courses through my veins and stifles my senses, causing me to reel with betrayal.
Groaning through a broken gasp, I use the combined weight of my legs and my adrenaline to hurl her body off me.
That’s when I remember my sword, which is still lying in its sheath on the end table, sharp enough to stop this conversation very short.
I ignore the searing heat ripping across my shoulder blade and the throbbing pulse in my calf as I roll to a stand.
Then I whisk up my sword and unsheathe it.
It sings through the air before meeting her neck, drawing a droplet of golden blood from her skin, as tiny as a papercut.
“Checkmate,” I say.
Lily stills against my blade.
There. Much better. Perhaps now she’ll have some manners.
The muscle in her jaw feathers. “You’d be perfect together, you know,” she says, ignoring the droplet of golden blood sliding down her neck.
“What are you talking about?” I ask.
Lily tilts her head away from the blade. “Isn’t it obvious?” she whispers.
“Isn’t what obvious?” I involuntarily loosen my grip on the blade’s hilt.
“He loves you.”
Her words catch me so off-guard that I’m ill-prepared for the leg sweep she delivers next, sending my body sailing to the floor and my sword clattering out of my grasp.
Thud. Taking advantage of my bewilderment, she throws herself onto my back and puts me in a guillotine chokehold.
“Admit that you love him back!” she shouts.
I buck her off me with a thrust of my hips, then I lunge for her hands, pinning them over her head to prevent her from attacking me again.
Finally feeling somewhat in control of the situation, I shoot her a look sired from unadulterated heartache as I say, “This is not you speaking, Lily. This is the ring.”
“You must put it on,” she whines, her hopelessness punching a black hole straight through my cold heart. “To save my brothers.”
“You… don’t… have… brothers,” I enunciate.
“Yes, I do. Their names are…” She trails off as though she’s forgotten.
I’m about to shake the sense back into her, until a sensation of listlessness tugs at the bottom of my spine.
It sinks deep into my limbs and renders me weightless, loosening my muscles and buckling my thighs.
The feeling of grief is so overwhelming, it drops me to the ground, where black spots deluge my eyeballs, and I’m bombarded by the piercing shrieks of a woman’s voice.
“Raven, take the key! You must fight!”
“Mom!”
Lily gives me a firm smile, ripping me back to reality. “One day, I hope you’ll be able to forgive me.”
“How do you—” Have magic right now? A bludgeoned groan floods my throat as Lily looks down at her hands, which are glittering with golden sparks.
Unfortunately for me, I hadn’t considered the possibility of this happening, which feels like a rather idiotic oversight as my head collides with the floor in an excruciating thump.
Why isn’t the ring limiting her powers?
What is going on?
“Well, well, well… what do we have here?” Solara’s voice pulverizes the room. I look up from my puddle of drool to find my sister cocking her head from the room’s corner, analyzing Lily like she’s a crusty old roach that she intends to dispose of.
“Don’t… kill… her,” I groan. “She’s my… friend.”
“Don’t kill who?” Lily asks, crouching down to survey me closer. “What are you talking about?”
Solara stalks toward us with a wicker basket of bruise-colored fruit in tow, then plucks one from the bunch.
“Did you know that Dreamshade fruit grows on ancient trees?” she asks, admiring the fruit in her hand.
“They say it soaks itself in hints of moonlight before ripening, evolving into a taste that is to die for… quite literally. A large portion of the population just can’t seem to digest the little devils for some reason.
” She tosses the plump fruit into the air and then catches it.
“It slips into the bloodstream like a disease, making its victim vulnerable to mind-control. Too much? And it stops the heartbeat.”
I claw at her. She steps away. “You’re right,” she sighs, shaking her head in shame.
“Lily doesn’t have any brothers. I looked up her familial history in the archives.
She was born a single child and orphaned at the age of ten.
She was left to live with her grandmama who recently died of Dreamshade poison. ”
“What… are… you… saying…” I sputter out.
“I’m asking you what you’re saying,” Lily responds, blinking at me in confusion.
“The queen has been poisoning her for a while, and her poor grandmama must’ve gotten swept up in the crossfire,” Solara goes on to say.
“Just look at the streaks of purple in her hair, and the rims of purple around her eyes. All the signs are there, if you look closely enough. But unfortunately, there is no cure for Dreamshade poisoning. Not anything that’s easily accessible to mortals, anyway. ”
“Shay, I didn’t hurt you, did I?” Lily asks, her eyes flickering with fear. “I just wanted to stop fighting and for you to put on the ring. I didn’t mean—”
“A swift and merciful death is the kindest thing that you can give her right now,” Solara informs me, chewing thoughtfully on the piece of fruit in her grasp.
“As her friend, of course.” I watch the juice dribble down her chin in ribbons of indigo as she continues, “The queen wouldn’t give her star pupil a real ring.
How else would she use her bloodmagic to attack you?
I fear that she will continue to attack you until you put her out of her misery. Pick up your blade, Shadow.”
“N-no…” I sputter out.
“It’ll only take a second,” Lily says as she lurches for my hand.
Solara steps between us and pommels Lily with a blast of wind, sending her sailing straight against the wall with a sickening thud that knocks her unconscious, the ring still in her grasp.
The moment she drops, all my nerve endings come roaring back to life.
I reach out and slide my fingers ever so slightly around the hilt of my blade, gripping onto it like it’s my lifeline.
“I can’t kill her,” I say, my voice laden in granite, “and neither will you.”
Solara growls, clearly offended by my lack of compliance. Her outline flickers away like a smudge of dirt as I approach Lily’s unconscious form.
A trickle of golden bloodmagic drips from the back of Lily’s head.
It’s not enough to cause real lasting damage, but it’s enough to make me feel bad.
I crouch down and study her heart-shaped face, noticing how her features soften as she drifts away into a sleepy escapade.
Her pale skin glows with an undertone of purple, just like Solara had claimed—a side effect of the poison pumping through her veins.
The queen has been poisoning her.
She’s not a traitor on purpose.
Her mind is compromised.
My sword clatters to the floor, this time of my own accord. I throw my arms around Lily’s still body and release a heart-wrenching wail. The poor girl never stood a chance. She was damned from the start.
“What’s going on?” Bella pedals into the room, her borrowed slippers squelching with every step that she takes. “I heard a crash…” One look at the blood dripping down Lily’s face makes her freeze in place. “What did you do, Shay?”
Maxine appears in the doorway next, surveying the wreckage between a few sips of tea. She spits it out and says, “Holy fuck. What happened in here?”
“It’s complicated…” I run a hand along the back of my neck as I try… and fail… to come up with some sort of explanation that makes sense.
“Feel free to uncomplicate it for us,” Maxine says, her teacup still poised in her hand.
“Lily’s been eating too much fruit,” is the first thing that tumbles out of my mouth.
Maxine’s brows collapse in confusion. “Come again?”