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“Go, Most Powerful Lady Gwynn!” Starling’s voice hooted out.
“Will the contestants take their pedestals?”
I stepped up on mine, Darling on the sand beside me. Walter was screwing around with his headdress.
Three minutes.
The waves crashing on the rocks outside the castle sounded like thunder, but the sun shone bright in the cerulean sky. In my heart, I fomented energy, the cat rising with interest. I shook my head and the lily earrings swung, reminding me of Rogue and his dark kisses, the lust swirling up, sparking red and black. Ruthlessly I cut aside the worry, the sorrow, the bitter sense of betrayal, and instead concentrated entirely on the sexual desire that fueled so much of my magic, blending it with the cat’s slicing physical edge.
One minute.
I drew the quiet around me. The dead silence Marquise and Scourge had ground into me at such a dear price. I wrapped all my feral anger, my unrequited desire, in a seamless container, ready to be directed.
Walter sensed it, leaving his outfit alone and stared at me, nostrils flaring.
Ten seconds.
Five seconds.
“Go.”
Darling took off running, straight for Walter. He was lifting the staff, ready to level it at me.
Noon.
My wish hit Darling with an instantaneous boom—all the more powerful for echoing his own wish. Suddenly he stood two stories tall, his paws the size of sports cars. More than halfway to Walter when he changed, it took only one stride for him to reach the wizard, seize him in his great mouth and shake him so the staff fell from his nerveless hand.
A bolt of sky blue and Thumbel—Athena—using her dragonfly girl magical speed, caught the staff and brought it to me. I took it and she whirled, dagger ready to defend me if need be.
The staff resonated in my grip like a tuning fork and suddenly the entire arena lit up in radiating lines, a shifting topographical map of magic. Darling, supernova bright, shook his head and Walter wailed.
A gong sounded and one of the fae nobles, Blackbird serene and elegant at his elbow, declared me the victor.
The duel was over. I loved a simple plan.
Chapter 18
In Which I Learn Something aboutDragons
‡
Never meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good withketchup.
~Big Book of Fairyland, “Flora and Fauna” (and remembered T-shirt)
“Put him down,Darling.”
The cat’s lime-green eyes, the size of beach balls, gazed back at me in fierce disappointment. He shook Walt again, dangling him like a hapless mouse. Athena stalked over to stand between them and the audience. She wasn’t as tall as one of his paws.
I sighed. Maybe not so simple. “You are an amazing and mighty hunter, Darling, but it’s time to put the poor guy down.”
“In truth, Lady Sorceress Gwynn, it’s within your rights to kill him, as he would have killed you,” the fae noble called out. The others enthusiastically agreed. For the enemy side, they seemed very much the same as our nobles—capricious and whimsically cruel.
“Isn’t he your ally? Do it now, Darling.”
He informed me that he wanted a new name. A battle name, now.Thenhe’d put the nasty Walt thing down.
“Well.” The noble smoothed his elegantly embroidered sleeves, checking them for flaws. “He’s not a terribly effective wizard. Really his death would be no great loss. Go ahead and kill him.”
