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The first strike of her mace to the side of his face was a shock. The second to the other side was a staggering insult, his ears ringing as he stumbled.

“You think you’re the only one who’s lost? The only one hurting?” she hissed, delivering an uppercut to his aching jaw before using his head as a stepping stool, launching herself up and behind him. “I don’t know my own name, and I still wouldn’t take the pain of it out on those who don’t deserve it. Least of all the people who saved me.”

Bam, bam, bam! One hit after the other, right between his shoulder blades, knocking him to his knees.

“So what kind of creature does that make you, hmm?” She planted her feet before him and shook her head. “That this is your answer, your choice, in the face of misfortune?”

Shame coated him like a film, his breaths sawing in and out as he stared at the blurry, wooden floorboards of his chamber—a floor that was too rough. Too new. Not his.

“That’s why you’re a coward, Your Highness. You’re letting it win, when you’re supposed to be better than all of us.”

It didn’t feel like a choice when a grinding laugh crawled past his lips. When his hand shot out and wrapped itself around her throat, as if that had been the plan all along. When Fern managed only a single shriek before he grinned and squeezed her tighter, cutting the sound off at the same time he wrenched that damned mace from her fighting hand.

A paltry weapon. Beneath him.

He tossed it to the ground, and stood. “I am what I am, little Fae. No more, and certainly not less. You’ll see soon enough.”

Fern flailed in his hold, her teeth flashing in the dim light. “I’ll…fucking…skin you,” she choked out, her nails raking down his arm.

“Mmm, as I said—prove it.”

With his vision reduced to a pinprick, he felt more than saw the Sorcerit arrive to rescue her guard dog. Her colossal power battered against him as her touch landed, searing all the way through to his bones. That agony was his final blinding, and the world went black.

White.

Black.

Flashes of light and swaths of dark took turns, waging their ancient war within him. It burrowed and lashed, fled and hunted. Back and forth, both sides tumbling violently into the depths of his mind. He was helpless against it. An onlooker to things he couldn’t hope to understand. He tried to follow, to see what was truly taking place, but⁠—

White. Tree bark rasped against his back, his knife flashing as the first curl fell from a block of swirling blue and evergreen wood.

Black. Yellow blooms swayed in a putrid breeze, a lifeless hand beneath them, his stomach turning.

White. A river rushed around him, his heart pounding as he locked eyes on the stunning glow beneath its surface.

Black. He raced across an obsidian wasteland. Blood. So much blood pouring through his fingers, his lips begging anyone who would listen to save⁠—

Like the sunstar breaking the horizon at dawn, a final blaze of iridescence wrenched him to the surface. No matter how tightly he tried to hold on to them, those little snippets faded to nothing once more, lost to the abyss.

Brand’s lungs fought for air, the cloud of a blackout episode dissipating with nauseating speed. Each gasp was too hot, too dry, and it was everything he could do not to gag at the foul taste coating his tongue. Aches and burns throbbed into existence, his muscles stiff like he’d been in battle. He was all too aware of the floorboards beneath him, the rafters and glass dome overhead, and the fact that he hadn’t the faintest idea of how he got there.

He tried to sit up, but the bloodied Fae had her mace planted on his chest, seething above him. Confused, he craned his neck and found Magnus crouched on the far side of the chamber, helping Lunara to wobbly feet as she gripped her head.

The shifting emotions on his brother’s face—tenderness and disappointment in turns, depending on who he was looking at—killed him.

“It happened again, didn’t it?” Brand whispered, closing his eyes and ignoring the painful crawl of Lunara’s power over his body.

The Fae scoffed. “What do you think, arsehole?”

“Fern.”

Burning, fucking Solyrian. Why was her voice harsh as nails and soft as silk at once?

“I know, I know. I’m supposed to be nice and understanding. Trust me, Lunara, this is as good as I’ve got right now. He broke my fucking nose and is conscious. Take the win, eh?”

Brand wished he wasn’t bloody conscious. He couldn’t bear to open his eyes again, to see any more of their judgment.

Lunara sighed. “Come on, Fern. Let’s get you fixed up.” A pause, then quieter, “You know where to find me if I’m needed.”