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As it winks out of existence, all the windows implode, sending shards of glass flying through the room.
My stomach drops. I crouch into a low ball, whimpering as the debris slices through my skin, and crawl under the table. At its center is a tiny sphere of magic that’s supposed to offer protection against storms.
The air fills with a rumble, and the ceiling collapses, sending huge lumps of plaster to the floor.
As the cottage crumbles, my last thought before I fall unconscious is that I hope the Boogie Man won’t suffer the same painful fate.
ChapterTwenty-Seven
HENRY
I claw and slash through the magic encasing my body. It is weak compared to the power I absorbed from the ash tree and from Alienor’s dead suitor, but this enchantment is so attuned to my power that fighting it is futile.
Each time I carve open the magic, the glowing flowers form a seal.
“Alienor, what have you done?”
Regret washes through my veins like spoiled wine, souring the last vestiges of my heart. I should have courted her like an honest gentleman and not stolen intimacy from her as a hound.
The magic flares, bringing with it the high-pitched sounds of breaking glass. Invisible restraints seize me around the neck, just as the flowers recede.
Every window of Alienor’s cottage shatters, showering her with glass.
Lurching forward, I try to reach her, but an invisible force pulls me from the human realm, through a void of darkness, and back into the ruins of my palace.
I fall onto my outstretched wings, bringing up a cloud of plaster and dust. The throne room’s crumbling walls loom over my fallen form, and for the first time since becoming immortal, I realize that I have wasted so much time seeking revenge.
My heart shatters.
Alienor couldn’t survive the explosion. Not after sacrificing so much of her blood. My mind replays the explosion over and over until the memory tears a hole through my insides and seizes my soul.
Alienor cannot die.
Her life has only just begun.
I could save her. If I transferred some of my immortality into her injured body, the way the Barghest revived me from my deathbed, then she would survive.
Perhaps in time, she might even open her heart and forgive my transgressions.
Determination thrums through my veins, and I push myself up to standing. If Alienor hasn’t made the banishment spell permanent, I have power left to travel across realms and come to her rescue.
But I need to reach her.
Now.
I stride through the empty throne room and into a hallway filled with rubble, only for my steps to falter as the shadows gather to form the Barghest.
He stands as a ten-foot-tall canine with a mass of green magic pulsing from within his skull. Matted fur clings to his shoulders, but there’s no flesh on his neck or breast. Instead is a rib cage filled with broken bones that barely keep out the magic.
The Barghest has deteriorated.
And he’s taking up the entire hallway.
My jaw tightens, and my insides twist into painful knots. Of all the times for him to appear, why now, when I need to rescue Alienor? Why now, before our bargain is complete?
“What do you want?” I ask from between clenched teeth.
“You have returned,” says the Barghest.
