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“Thank you,” Kerrigan said.
She sniffled as she stepped away and headed into the water. It wasn’t chilly; it was cold. It didn’t make much sense, considering it was the middle of the summer. The temperatures had been alarmingly high with humidity that felt more like drinking than breathing. Even in Vera’s isolated hillside retreat, it was still hot. And yet the water brought goose bumps to her skin, and she shivered as she got in up to her hips.
“Here?”
“A little farther. Try to be even with Cleora and Danae,” Keres told her.
Kerrigan glanced left and right before pushing farther into the cold water. It pooled around her stomach. She bit her lip and moved deep, up to her breasts. Being on the shorter side had rarely done her favors.
“Okay,” she said, still shivering. “This is even.”
“Then, we’ll begin.”
Kerrigan turned around to face her mother at the point of the star.
“Together, we are here for a daughter of Alfheim,” Keres said, reading from the translation that Fordham had carefully rendered. “Her power was stolen from her, against the gift of nature, and we come together to ask for a release of her star energy.”
The water grew colder. Almost frigid. Kerrigan began to shiver as the moon rose higher on the horizon and midnight crept over them. It struck their makeshift star like a knife on target. As if the stars and the moon were connected with them so far below, preparing them for what was to come.
“We are but five of those blessed by your divine right,” Keres continued. Her words came out in puffs of cold. The temperature in the clearing had dipped dramatically. “But we five are full of strength to commune with you.”
Keres reached her trembling hands for the Alfheim crystal. The gentle glow had dulled until the purple hue was almost extinguished.
“Release what was taken,” Keres commanded.
Then, she set the crystal on the edge of the water, and the world split in two. The glow turned into a brilliant, shining light, directing its energy heavenward. Kerrigan had to shield her eyes to look at the purple light emitting from the tiny object. The light had to be seen for miles upon miles. No one could ignore what was happening on this hillside as the crystal seemed to touch the moon itself.
A second later, the light evaporated. Leaving only spots on the backs of Kerrigan’s eyelids in the wake of its disappearance. She blinked several times, trying to get her vision back. The water was warming again. Her friends and family were blinking and looking around, bewildered as well.
“What happened?” Danae whispered.
“Is that it?” Kerrigan asked.
Keres’s eyes were still on the crystal. The purple core had burned out, and it was now black and smoking faintly. “I … I don’t know.”
Fordham crossed his arms and said what they were all thinking. “It didn’t work.”
And he was right.
Nothing had happened.
It hadn’t been enough.
44
The Release
Kerrigan brought her wet hand up to her eyes and swiped away the treacherous tears. All of her hope had been put into this ritual. The Star Release hadn’t done anything. It had been false hope. Or they had done it wrong, and all the reasons it shouldn’t work were the ones they had been ignoring. They needed thirteen. They needed a star alignment. They needed … something else.
“We’ll try again,” Vera said confidently. “I have some ideas …”
But Kerrigan wasn’t listening to what anyone said. The ideas they all tossed back and forth, as if they would solve this problem. She had no magic. How could she save her people without her magic?
Her dad had sent her here to find her mother. Keres should have been able to fix this. And if not, then maybe she’d come to Alandria with her. Could she even leave Domara for long with the tether between her and Vulsan? So many questions. No answers.
Her mother hadn’t promised her anything. She hadn’t been able to even ask. Where did that leave her? A Fae-touched demi-Doma was nothing more than a half-Fae, half-human when she had no magic. No mating bond. No dragon bond. Nothing.
Kerrigan took a deep breath and dunked her head under the water, pushing her way down to the bottom of the pond. Maybe the waters would wash away the ache of disappointment. Leave her clean and whole once more instead of the broken shell of a girl she truly was.
She’d been under long enough, her lungs burning, her skin chilly again, when she pushed up from the bottom. Except when she reached the surface, her hand touched ice. Her eyes flew open, wide with panic, as she stared at a sheet of frozen water that now covered the pond. Kerrigan banged against the underside. Blood mingled with the water as she battered her hand, trying to force an opening in the underside of the ice. But there was nothing. Her air was almost gone. Little bubbles escaping her mouth like a ticking clock, ready to reach zero.
