Chapter 38
An enormous wolf leaps over me, landing on Cora before she can strike. Its teeth sink into her neck, but before it can rip her apart, she shoves it off her with a strength I didn’t know she possessed. But then again, I never knew her as the First Witch. She was careful to hide who she truly was.
She leaps up and places a hand on her neck. Her hand comes away bloody, but the wound is already healed. Behind her, a little girl screams in terror. I’ve had enough.
“Stop!” I yell. “Stop.” I place my hands up as if in surrender. “Enough. Let everyone else go, and then we can talk.”
“This isn’t a negotiation, Mae,” Cora spits.
“I have the entire court behind me and an army prepared to attack you. Even if you win this fight, your people will get hurt. Just let everyone leave safely, and I will hand the crown over. Besides, don’t you plan to rule these people? Protect them,” I plead.
Marik nods once, and relief floods through me. I didn’t expect it to be that easy, but they don’t have a choice. If they plan to rule, they can’t slaughter everyone.
People start fleeing, rushing to leave as quickly as they possibly can. Some look back as they run from us, but most don’t dare. While they file out, the wolf strides over to me, but its eyes never leave Cora. It sits beside me, the top of its head reaching my chest.
I reach out a hand to it and gently stroke its blond hair. As I do, it looks up at me, blue eyes meeting mine. August.
An equally huge black snow leopard slinks toward us. Its feet are silent as it makes its way to sit beside August. Its green eyes are locked on Asmo and Marik. Koa.
Finally, a massive grizzly bear lumbers over to us, each step sending a slight tremor through the ground. Barrett. He lets out a roar that shakes the ground, his yellow teeth dripping with spittle.
Koa and August sink down to their haunches, prepared to strike.
Marik glances at them briefly before his eyes land on me. He holds his hand out. “Give it up, Mae. You gave me your word.”
I cock my head and put my hand to my chin as if I’m in deep thought. “You know,” I say, “I thought about it. I think I changed my mind.”
Marik narrows his eyes, staring at me with utter hatred.
Cora rolls her eyes. “You always were stubborn. Let’s get this over with, Marik.”
Before she or Marik can strike, Asmo does. He hurls twin balls of black fire at the back of Cora and Marik, taking them by surprise. They drop to the ground, gasping at the pain. August and Koa see their opportunity and instantly sprint to attack them.
“Run, Mae!” Asmo screams at me as his father takes a sword of black flames and thrusts it toward Asmo’s gut. Asmo ducks, narrowly missing the sword. I scream as I watch Minerva aim a dagger at her son’s back.
I summon wind and hurl it in his general direction. My aim sucks, but the blast of wind knocks the dagger off course, but not enough. It catches Asmo in the tricep. Not a killing blow, but he grunts at the impact.
Arms grip me around my waist from behind, and I immediately start fighting, but the arms don’t let go. They’re dragging me back, away from the fight.
“It’s me!” Elle yells in my ear. “I’m getting you out of here.”
“No!” I scream, desperate to help, but she doesn’t let me go. She hauls me away as I watch my court attacking my husband and the only mother I ever knew.
“Would you shut the fuck up, please?” she mutters in my ear, her teeth gritted with the effort of pulling me away. “You are the High Queen. If you die, we’re fighting for nothing, and Marik gets everything.”
The thought sobers me. I stop fighting her and let her pull me away, but she stops almost instantly. “Fuck,” she mutters.
I whip my head around and freeze. A crowd of cambions faces us, hollow eyes fixed on us, sharp teeth glinting. There are at least fifty of them. Horror spreads through me. We can either fight them or turn around and take our chances against the First Witch, Marik, and his power-thirsty parents.
Elle steps in front of me, drawing a dagger from a hidden sheath attached to her thigh.
“Whatever you do, do not let them touch you. Got it?” she says, not looking away from the hollowed-eyed dead children that stand before us.
I swallow the rising fear and nod.
Elle holds the dagger out to me. “Rely on your magic first. If they touch you, aim for their heads. Be quick and efficient. Stab them in the head, then yank it out and prepare to defend yourself against the next—"
They sprint toward us before she can finish her sentence. I grab the dagger, gripping it in my left hand, while I reach for my magic. I use my free hand to focus and aim my magic toward the crowd.
There are so many of them. One cambion is scary. Twelve was downright terrifying at Willa’s—Cora’s—house. This is…downright spine-chilling.
In my frozen panic, Elle has already killed two of them. They’re crawling over each other to take her out, my only line of defense. Get rid of Elle, and they’ll get to me.
But I’m not as helpless as I used to be.
One of them races toward me, his hands outstretched. I summon fire and fling it toward him. It sprays too wide, nearly catching Elle’s right side. She doesn’t even notice, actively fighting off five cambions at once.
She spins, shooting concentrated balls of fire toward each one that rushes toward her. It doesn’t kill them, though. It slows them down, but it’s as if they don’t feel pain.
Asmo killed those cambions in the forest by decapitating them. With his magic.
Nobody ever taught me how to do that.
The cambion coming for me gets up, clothes melting into his pale body.
He sprints at me again, and I shoot another blast of magic at him.
But this time, I channel frigid wind and water.
The combination hits him straight in the chest, ice immediately spreading over his body.
Once it reaches his legs, he stops, unable to move.
He stops and stares at me, screaming in anger. It travels up his chest, to his neck, then finally to his head. His screaming stops.
I sprint toward him and stab him in the head with the dagger. Shards of ice explode as the cambion’s body disintegrates. I want to jump and smile at the kill, but another one comes screaming toward me. I spin, just managing to get out of its way before it can grab me.
Out of the corner of my eye, Elle is still fighting off multiple cambions, but corpses lay at her feet. Their heads have been melted off.
That’s one way to do it.
Quickly, I fire another blast of ice toward a small group of cambions running toward me.
It catches all of them, freezing them in place.
This time, they freeze instantly. I use the dagger balled in my fist to stab them all in one swoop, left to right.
They disintegrate as soon as the blade touches them.
“Mae!” Elle shouts.
I spin in time to see another cambion heading toward me.
I summon wind in a panic to get it away from me, buying me enough time to freeze it.
Instead of running toward this one and stabbing it, I summon one of the shards of ice lying next to me and hurl it toward the frozen cambion using my mind.
Luckily, my aim is good enough, and it shatters as soon as it makes contact.
Together, Elle and I have killed roughly half of the cambions.
But that still leaves so many.
And they’re getting closer and more frenzied with each one of them that we kill.
I hear laughter behind me, and I spin, dagger out and ready. A cambion runs directly into the dagger, but it reaches for me. It makes contact, and my magic flickers out instantly. I shove the dagger away from me, the cambion still attached to the dagger. My magic flares back to life.
With barely a thought, I freeze the cambion, but it freezes the dagger, too.
Fuck.
I rip my crown off my head and hurl it at the frozen cambion. It makes contact, shattering the creature to pieces. Well, that worked.
I dive for the crown, placing it back on my head, but stop when I see the branches interwoven into the crown. The crown was made to complement the throne. Small, delicate branches are woven between the rose gold branches.
I break off one of the wooden branches and summon my earth magic.
The delicate branch grows, turning into a thick, sharp dagger. I break off another piece, forming a second dagger. I turn and face the rest of the cambions, both wooden daggers in hand. But instead of coming after me, they all sprint toward Elle.
Horror, again, floods me as I watch them. I can’t fling my magic out and try to freeze them all. I’d hit Elle. The cambions surround Elle, climbing on top of corpses to get to her. She is a whirlwind of elemental magic and sharp weapons as she defends herself from all angles.
My mind is blank. I can’t think. I don’t know how the hell to help her.
Blinding pain shoots through my leg as my magic dies. I bite down a scream as I look down at my leg.
A little girl with holes for eyes stares up at me, her sharp teeth embedded in my ankle, but that’s not why I scream next. I watch, in utter horror, as a cambion jumps onto Elle’s back and sinks its teeth into her delicate neck.
She lets loose a blood-curdling scream, and the remaining cambions swarm her.
She goes down.
I erupt.