Chapter 1
One
Elora
I dreamt of the forest tonight.
Of the lush pine trees and familiar birdsong. I dreamt of the dizzying crows cawing overhead. A sound I often took for granted, now I’m desperate to hear.
Every night is the same. The forest and the trees and the birds. An occasional nightmare and muddied images I can’t quite place.
But no matter how hard I try, my mother’s never there.
I haven’t dreamt of her in weeks, and I’m scared I’m forgetting. Forgetting her voice. Forgetting her touch and the magick only a mother’s comfort can provide. Squeezing my eyes shut, I try again.
Dark hair.
Silver eyes.
But that’s all I have.
Descriptors I’m not entirely sure are true. I wish I could see her. I’ve even tried to dream of the Wicked Wood, of the moment I got that final, false glimpse of her. But no matter how many attempts I make, she doesn’t come.
Rolling my shoulders, I move from my bed and slink onto the cold floor, stretching my legs out in front of me. I rub my shackled wrists together, desperate for a bit of reprieve from the iron.
A hint of wetness has gathered in the cracks between the stone walls. The rainy season must have started. I’ve been here already much too long. Sighing, I close my eyes.
“I should just tell Galen about the Stones,” I say aloud.
No .
“But Loxley—” I bite my bottom lip to keep myself from screaming. Galen’s threat to burn Loxley feels like a direct failure on my part. So many people are at stake and for what? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve failed to keep my loved ones safe.
It isn’t over yet, Enchantress.
I sigh again, resting my head against the wall.
I refuse to think too deeply about the voices I hear now. I fought them for so long in the Trinity Forest, and now that I’ve accepted them as a part of me, I don’t allow myself to debate how sane it is to have conversations with myself.
“How can it not be over? His men are near Loxley. If Alaric brought Sam the Stones?—”
Unless he’s bluffing.
I chew the inside of my cheek, careful not to bite so hard as to break skin. But fatigue outweighs my anxious thoughts, so I close my eyes and picture a face instead. One that has no resistance coming forth in my mind. His strong jaw. His dark hair and heavy lids after we’ve kissed.
I miss you , I want to say, but I don’t get the chance before the door at the top of the stairs swings open, and two pairs of boots come bounding down.
“Wake up.” Galen’s voice cuts through the thick silence that fills the darkness.
I’m already awake, but I may as well have been sleeping. There’s nothing else to do in this Mother-forsaken cell.
“This is your last chance, Elora.” He unlocks the cell and steps just barely inside. “I’m sure those in Loxley will be disappointed to hear their lives could’ve been spared had you cooperated.”
A feral growl releases from deep inside me, and if it weren’t for the restraints around my wrists, I would’ve found comfort in wrapping my hands around the delicate skin of his throat.
You need to keep it together, Elora.
A deep chuckle gurgles up my throat as I stare into the empty vats of Galen’s eyes. I force myself to stand, then hobble toward him. My knee, while mostly healed from the night on Kirsgaurd Mountain, hasn’t quite been the same.
He winces at the sound of my laughter. It’s slight, but it’s there, and I ready myself to bite.
“What’s wrong, Galen?” I grit through my teeth. “Guilt eating you up? You know where Loxley is. You don’t need me to?—”
The sting of his knuckles across my cheek is a nice distraction from the throbbing of my head.
“Do you think I haven’t checked Loxley myself? Haven’t had hunters stationed around its ward? The Stones aren’t there.” He glances over his shoulder and gives a gesture to the guard behind him.
My heart races as I spot the small vial placed between his fingers, one I’ve become all too familiar with.
“Make this easy on yourself this time.” Galen exits, leaving only me and the guard and the poison that will null any bit of strength I may have left. As if the iron around my wrists isn’t already doing a great job of that.
Coward.
The guard’s hands shake as he reaches for me. I smile, wide and feral, at the indent my teeth made on his hand the last time he came.
The guard moves swiftly, capturing me and forcing my jaw open. The tasteless tonic slides down my throat and when I try to spit it out, he holds my jaw tightly until I’m forced to swallow.
“Good girl,” Galen says from safely behind the bars. “Now let’s go, no time to waste.” He whistles a tune as he skips up the stairs. The guard drags me behind him, and my head lolls.
Do not give up, susi.
The room is the same as it was before. Sterile and cold, despite the oil lanterns lining the white walls. There are several metal work benches pushed against the walls. Each one is filled with glass vials and liquids of all colors.
The guard straps me to the metal bed, the iron stinging against the exposed skin of my neck. Galen whistles the same tune as he mixes various liquids together, a pungent sting hits my nose.
My heart races as the guard leaves and it’s only Galen and I. The straps around my wrist rub against the open wounds from the shackles.
Galen stands over me, his icy eyes calculating. “Ready to cooperate?”
“Do I have a choice?”
He smiles, and the sight of it makes my skin crawl. “There’s always a choice.”
He props himself onto the table, crossing his arms over his chest. “When my sister was sick, the Healer had a choice.” He pulls the enchanted blade from the belt on his waist. “They chose not to help her. They chose to let her die because what good was she to them?” He wipes the blade on his shirt, polishing it only for it to get dirtied again.
“She had no magick,” he says. “Not an Enchantress, just a girl with a faulty heart.” His eyes meet mine and for a moment there’s something there. A small flicker of emotion that reminds me that despite the cruelty of the last few weeks, he was a child before all of this. A person with a family and hopes of his own.
“I have said it before”—I keep my eyes locked on the blade—“I’m sorry for your sister. But perhaps there was noth?—”
“Don’t,” he snaps. “Don’t defend them to me.” He shakes his head. “She was everything to me.” He runs the tip of the blade up and down my arm, carving a small line into my skin.
“You know,” he says, “Rose was the only good thing in my life until one of you took her away.” The blade hovers over the wounds on my wrists.
“We had a deal, she and I.” He sighs, closing his eyes for a moment. My heart races, my eyes watching the knife. “We were to run away together.” His eyes snap open. “I was finally going to be free of my father. We were finally going to be free of him.” He shakes his head again. “But of course, that didn’t happen. And I spent years and years under his scrutiny and fists alone.”
The blade slides against my skin without warning, digging deep into my flesh. I cry out in pain, blood spilling onto the table. “Galen, please!”
He digs the blade farther and the enchantment it’s laced sets to work.
Its poisonous magick seeps into my blood. Rooting and searching. Looking for something to take with it. I scream again as he angles the blade up and under my skin.
The tonic he’s given me has silenced my magick but under the pain and the potion, something slithers inside of me. It retracts further into my being with every push of the blade.
After a few more moments, a few more desperate pleas, the pain sears through me and I’m tumbling into a pit of nothingness as darkness overtakes my vision.