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Caill and I glare at each other and in our glares is the raging storm. I don’t know what I’m doing or how. All I care about is saving Duncan. How do I do it? There must be a way.
You ask the wrong question, Dugald’s voice says in the back of my head.
A white flash and something like a bolt of lightning hits me in the face. I stumble back to the sound of Caill laughing. I wave a hand and black energy coalesces around my fist, flying free to strike at Caill.
The wrong question. What is the right one?
Caill and I struggle, but the fight isn’t with her. It’s internal. I’m fighting myself.
The right question.
Power crackles over my skin and then I know. I know the right question.
Why him?
I know why. Now. I would never admit it even to myself before but here, in this moment and in this place the truth is as raw and unavoidable as the rising of the sun. I’m not falling for him. I’ve fallen.
“I love him,” I say it out loud.
Caill closes her eyes, inhales deeply, then lets it out in a long, heavy sigh. The power of our dueling storms sizzles but they lessen.
“Aye, lass.”
We glare at each other as raindrops fall around me and huge snowflakes swirl around her. Neither of us are ready or willing to retreat but we’re at an impasse. I look past her and see the folks of the village cowering. They hide in their huts, under tables, some on their knees with hands covering their heads.
The glamour of the place is gone. The huts, which were awkwardly, haphazardly cute, aren't. They’re afflicted with rot. There are holes in them that weren’t there before. Weeds grow along the paths. The people aren’t beautiful; they’re haggard. Even Caill, who looked old and rather like a fairy tale witch, is worse in my new sight. She’s so thin she looks like it’s an effort of will alone that keeps her here.
And the tree.
The tree isn’t bright and silvery. It’s dim, barely lighting, with leaves that have fallen all around it. What leaves it does have are wilted and curled. Black veins run through its trunk and out its limbs. That same blackness that pulses and waits outside the ring of its light. The black void of nothingness. Hopelessness.
“I don’t understand,” I say, looking around with dawning horror.
The darkness that waits outside the tree's light is alive. It pulsates as finger-like protrusions probe and test the strength of the tree's light, seeking any opening. Some of those dark tendrils reach towards me.
“You can’t save him. The past can’t be changed,” Caill says. There’s an intense sadness in her voice.
I shake my head, rejecting her truth. The pain in my chest is so intense it feels as if my heart is rebelling. Pressure builds in my forehead as tears swell behind my eyes.
“Then what is the point? There must be a way.”
I reject the sadness even as I reject her statement. No, it can’t be. I reach for something and find anger. Then anger burns into rage. A surging, molten force that sears through my veins.
The dark tendrils reach out and touch my foot and in them is power. Power I pull on. As I do, I grow still bigger. I look down on the fae from above, towering over even Caill.
“Quinn, stop!” Caill yells. “Don’t do that. You don’t know what you're doing.”
“I can save him. I know it,” I say.
I’m certain that if I pull enough of this power in, I can do anything. The darkness sings as I accept its power, a siren’s song in my head. As it flows in, the image of Duncan dying changes. It’s so clear. I see exactly how it will happen. I will arrive before he is shot and with a wave of my hands the weapons of the Colquhouns melt. They’ll turn and run-in fear but I don’t have to let them go. I have no mercy for those who would harm what is mine. Mercy is not required of me for I am power.
“Enough!” a deep voice booms and something cracks.
The power filling me drains away like the gates of a dam have been opened. I shrink to normal size, breathing heavily. Dugald stands next to Caill, glaring. He leans on a thick staff that he twists his hands around.
“What are you thinking?” he barks. “You can’t change history. What is, is what is.”
“No,” I snap. “You’re wrong. I felt it. I could do it.”
