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But.
My limbs slow.
But what if this is how Cyrus is supposed to die?
I could save myself, let him fall to the beast, and it would just be a horrible accident. It’d give the Fates what they want. He needs to die anyway before summer’s end.
It’s so easy, so tempting—the smart, cruel choice to make. The efficient, necessary choice, if I want what’s best for myself. He wants me gone, and he said it himself: we would not hesitate to ruin each other.
But.
He protected me. Put himself between the beast and me. Let me escape, when he could have fled.
Isn’t that truer than words?
Swallowing my spite for another day, I scream at the top of my lungs,“Help! Guards! Anyone!”I’m going to regret this.
I hear a grunt behind me, closer than I expect. I do thefoolish thing and turn around instead of running across the bridge to the palace.
A second beast, its horns in full bloom, shadows overme.
“No—”
It slams me down to the ground before I can scream again, claw pinning my chest. One sharp talon presses into the soft underside of my chin. My body flares with pain—there’s too much weight. The scent of fresh soil fills my nostrils.
I scrabble at its claw and manage to get a hand underneath it, enough to block it from puncturing my throat as I writhe.
Images flash:
Curly-haired children running around a cottage on a hill, calling for their father.
A crowded Balican town gathering in a brick-built hall. They argue over mysterious attacks in the night.
Hatchets in hand, a group of men approaches a manor covered in vines.
I blink and there is only the glowing eyes of the beast and the maw of death before me.
Shouts of orders. A bone-crunchingthunk.
The beast stiffens; the glow in its eyes vanishes. Blood drips from a crossbow bolt in the center of its forehead.
It collapses. Fur and rose petals smother me. Everything hurts too much for me to think. Distantly, I hear the clatter of metal and pounding of footsteps.
Someone frees me from the crushing weight. He repeats my name until he is the only sound I hear in the dark.
Dawn creeps steadily over the misty land,cresting over hills of gold and green, dipping into valleys and through shuttered windows, up to the edge of the Fairywood, where all light comes to a halt. Black clouds roll through the sky, raining ashes. The woods are burning.
A nearby village is silent. Shriveled, torn-apart corpses litter the streets. Brambles crawl, devouring body and brick until the entire town is covered. Overhead, fairies flutter, wink out, and dissolve into dust.
From the shadows rise beasts. Skin furred with moss, fangs and claws dripping with crimson, two horns of blooming roses jutting from their bulk. They lumber across the countryside like heavy-footed soldiers, the rattling bones of a hungry forest.
I sneeze. My whole body seizes with pain.
“Eh—shoo!” Eina’s voice is clear and sharp.
I crack open my eyes. The nurse swats at a trio of fairies like they’re gnats. They fly out the door.
I recognize the gaudy decor: I’m in the palace, in one of its numerous guest rooms. This one is draped in too much crimson velvet, tinting the room in a bloody hue. A tray nearby steams with fish porridge and bread. My stomach pangs.
