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She nods. “Okay.”
Shane whirls and clamp-hugs me. “Please find my dad.”
“I’ll do everything in my power to find him.” I pick the boy up and hug him. “I promise.”
He makes a face like he isn’t sure I’m going to be much help, but doesn’t protest. I hand him off to my sister, who carries him inside. Shane yawns again. He starts to let his head rest on her shoulder, but looks back at me through the closing glass door.
Poor kid’s bravado is collapsing. The thought process of beginning to accept his father’s gone forever is obvious on his face. If he wasn’t so exhausted, he’d likely be asking a million questions about what’s going to happen to him, is he going to end up in an orphanage, and so on.
Screw secrecy. I can’t let Shane cry himself to sleep. Any hope I can offer him I will.
I give him my most reassuring little smile, then let my wings out before mouthing, “I’ll find him.”
Shane gawks at me. I wave and leap into the air.
Chapter Sixteen
Panic Can Wait
On the wings of the eagle spirit, Tammy raced along after Maple.
Within seconds of starting to approach the imprisoned Annie, dark faeries began streaming out of the openings in the giant roots, their intentions clear: to cut her off. At this point, the evil ones had to know they were here to break Annie out. Absorbing Annie’s power would give them the ability to destroy the light faeries, and they wouldn’t relinquish that chance easily.
The first few dark faeries to come at Tammy with spears or tiny swords learned what angry eagles did to smaller birds. She tore the tiny, malicious sprites to pieces in her talons one after the next, while resisting the instinctual urge to bite them. While a beak large enough to swallow these little demonic things whole would certainly prove to be a deadly weapon, biting them had the unfortunate side effect corrupting her body.
Can’t have that,she thought.
Meanwhile, Maple had gone straight to the edge of the writhing mass of thorn vines to channel her magic into disrupting the ritual. Tammy’s attempt at distraction worked: the fairy queen had managed to slip past the dark ones unnoticed.
With her job done—and as the aerial fight began to feel more and more like she fell under assault from a hundred thousand wasps—Tammy flipped over and dove for the relative safety of solid ground. Screeching tiny sprites zoomed after her, throwing magic, spears, and curses one after the next.
Tammy shifted back to her human shape when she got near the ground. Itchy tingles spread over her from the dark ones trying their standard (and sometimes silly) curses. Luckily, Allison’s defensive spell protected her from the sneezing curse, the laughing curse, and probably an endless dancing curse as well.
She glared up at the cloud of little black-winged monsters. The dark faeries seemed to shift their attention off her and onto Maple. Most of them gasped upon realizing they’d been too fixated on the human to notice the faerie queen interfering with their big, evil ritual.
Before they could attack Maple, Tammy flung bolts of pure nature energy into the swarming faeries. Two beams of green light cut openings in the cloud of flitting darkness, disintegrating any dark faerie they touched. Alas, like swinging a baseball bat through a cloud of mosquitoes, she only killed a small fraction of the mass.
However, unlike mosquitoes, the dark ones possessed an instinctual fear of life energy and a pronounced lack of bravery. Another two bolts proved enough to send all thirty thousand or so of them running for the cover of the giant root homes they came from. Screams like a million tiny balloons slowly leaking air filled the sky.
Allison jogged up to her, out of breath. “Damn, I wish I could turn into a bird. That’s so freakin’ handy.”
“Yeah. Can you cover Maple on one side? I’ll get the other?”
“Yep.” Allison faced left. “Think they’re going to come back?”
“Definitely.” Tammy squeezed her hands into fists. “Soon as the panic wears off.”
Suddenly, the ground between where they stood and the vines attacking Annie’s bubble swelled upward.
“That can’t be good,” said Allison.
“How much longer?” rasped Tammy.
“Minutes.” Maple’s response came delayed and raspy, as if she spoke from within a trance.
A small mound grew over the course of several seconds into a hill as big as a single-family home. Seconds later, three-foot-long roots abruptly stabbed upward out the top of the mound in a strange single-file line. Wait, not roots—fingers from an enormous hand. Next, a titanic semi-humanoid monster made of black-stained wood tore its way out of the earth. Swirly runic carvings all over its body glowed from the same violet energy infused in the standing stones. The behemoth rose to stand to its full height, towering over them.
Tammy didn’t even stand as high as its knee. Unfortunately, she had a fairly decent idea what it was. Maple had taught her well.
