Chapter 3 #2
The words broke as they left Serenna’s mouth. Sharing blood hadn’t stopped Saundyl. It wouldn’t stop Taryn.
Taryn gasped, hand flying to her chest. “Oh, you’re right. He’s my brother.”
She drifted a step closer to Fenn, appraising him like damaged steel—measuring what remained, what might still be reforged. Her attention lingered on his limp wings, the fangs bared through pain, the blood blackening his scorched armor.
“Which makes him a pure-blood,” she said to Ayla. “Born to one of the oldest elven lines.” Her mouth curled. “You could make him useful.”
Ayla’s eyes narrowed. She adjusted the diadem at her brow, and Serenna braced as she watched contempt morph into calculation.
Taryn lifted Fenn’s Starshard again.
His wings flared wide, blood pulsing fresh along the torn membranes.
“Cleanse him of his wraith form,” Taryn said. “Let the king see what your artifacts can do. Keep a pure-blood beside you as proof that even a rebel wraith can be brought to heel.”
“Don’t pretend to grasp the intricacies of our courts,” Ayla snapped. “I gave you an arch elf’s power, not a place among us. The stench of the wilds still clings to you.”
Taryn’s smile thinned before she lowered her gaze.
Ayla let the silence punish her. Then her attention roved to Fenn, disgust tightening her lips. “If he’s to be useful,” Ayla said, “I’ll turn him myself.”
Serenna’s chest burned with each shallow breath. She tried to straighten, but the Starshard held her on her knees.
Ayla lifted her chin, then crooked a finger at the armored figures lining the wall.
Two soldiers stepped forward, eyes glazed and unseeing. Their movements matched too perfectly, boots clipping stone in a single rhythm.
Coerced.
They halted before Ayla in unison, obedient to the marrow.
Ayla shoved her palm against the first soldier’s chest. Essence erupted in a plume of light.
The soldier remained silent, hollow eyes fixed ahead, obedience holding him still while unimaginable agony gathered behind his sternum.
Serenna recoiled as he finally screamed, the sound striking the tunnel walls.
His body distorted, limbs elongating, joints cracking as talons burst from his fingertips. Chestnut hair darkened to midnight black, green eyes kindling crimson.
Four globes of Essence spiraled free from his chest, each one glowing with the color of a plundered ability. They circled Ayla’s outstretched hand, stolen stars dragged into orbit.
The wraith gave a strangled gasp before crumpling to the stone. No blood followed him down. Only the last thread of his scream, unraveling into silence.
Ayla never glanced at the body. Her attention had already moved on to the second soldier.
Six talents ripped free from the female’s chest in a blaze of wild color. The globes whipped into the first four, colliding with their twins. Pressure rolled through the corridor as Ayla merged the duplicate abilities, bursts of light flaring bright enough to sting Serenna’s eyes.
When the second body struck stone and the light settled, eight spheres circled Ayla. A full arch elf’s spectrum of power, plundered from two Wells.
Satisfaction curved Ayla’s lips as she turned toward Fenn.
Serenna’s throat closed around Fenn’s name as Ayla crossed to his cell, stolen light revolving around her hand.
Fenn shoved to his feet and backed away. He managed one step before Taryn tightened her grip on his gem.
His legs locked, wings snapping shut, their talons clenching hard enough to shake.
“This is a gift, brother.” Taryn’s voice softened as if for him alone. “In time, you’ll see.”
Fenn bared his fangs as the talents tore from their orbit and hurled toward him in a storm of light. They struck his chest and shattered, brilliance sinking through scorched leather.
Serenna knew there’d be no pain with power given, yet being turned to an arch elf wasn’t what Fenn would’ve chosen.
But choice was the first thing Ayla had taken.
Serenna still hadn’t cried for the children Ayla had weaponized her lightning against, their bodies left blackened in the arena sand. Their screams still rang in her skull, sealed where grief couldn’t yet reach.
But for Fenn, tears blurred her sight as she watched him transform.
His fangs retracted first, vanishing completely. His claws followed, folding back into fingers. Limbs shortened, inches lost like ground surrendered. He staggered, a sound tearing from his throat as the fire in his eyes flickered once, then froze to glacial blue.
He stood panting, wings trembling, fury carved into every line. When he lifted his head, he looked past Ayla. Past Taryn.
Straight to Serenna.
Her chest seized.
The braids she’d once helped weave lost their darkness strand by strand, night bleeding into a gilded lie. The storm-dark glow of his skin paled, erasing the wraith body he’d always worn with pride.
The face staring back at her belonged to an elf she’d never met.
But Fenn was still there, trapped behind different eyes. In the way he held himself motionless, every instinct leashed because she would pay for any mistake. In the way his wing claws twitched toward her, straining across the corridor.
“I’m sorry,” Serenna whispered.
The words fell between them, small and useless.
Taryn’s attention slid to Serenna. “And what do we do with her?”
Ayla scoffed. “We don’t waste power on a half-breed.”
The word struck the oldest bruise, the one that never healed. As if Ayla hadn’t been born with human blood herself, no matter how fiercely she denied it. As if that tainted blood hadn’t made her useful to the king in ways no pure-blood could be.
Heat climbed Serenna’s throat, bitter as lingering smoke.
She spoke before caution caught up.
“Is that why the king chose you?” Her voice held steady as she straightened on her knees, the burn across her chest pulling viciously with the movement. “Because you can carry his spawn while a pure-blood can’t?”
Ayla’s hand flew to her middle.
Then jerked away, too late.
For one instant, her nostrils flared, the mask slipping. Fury split the court-bred polish before she sealed herself again and crossed the distance to Serenna in three clipped strides.
Ayla’s backhand cracked across Serenna’s face, snapping her head sideways.
Pain burst through her cheek. Her teeth cut into her lip, and copper flooded her mouth as she swayed on her knees, held upright by spite.
Serenna laughed then, breathless and half-mad, blood trickling down her chin. Ayla had given her all the confirmation she needed.
“They stay tethered,” Ayla ordered Taryn. “Until their compliance is absolute.”
The laugh died in Serenna’s throat. The metal collar sat cold against her skin, smothering both her magic and the bonds.
Vesryn would feel their absence, but he wouldn’t know where to hunt.
Ayla flicked her wrist, and a portal split the air in a whirl of darkness.
“We’re returning to Centarya,” she said. “And you’re going to give me everything you tried to save.”