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I escaped this place once, and I managed to get Raz and Adele out too.
At least there was that. If today went horribly wrong, if Carex killed me, my friends weren’t still trapped below in the prison. Raz and Zorander would find some way to liberate my mother, Tavion, and Tristan from the Oracle.
They wouldn’t stop, not until everyone was free.
“I should thank you.” Carex’s pointed feet snagged on the fine wool carpet as we ascended the grand staircase, the deep silence swallowing up the sound. “Releasing the prisoners added greatly to the amount of blood spilled yesterday, the amount of wild magic gifted to me by the gods themselves. Caladrius is restored, as I soon shall be.” His sharp, pointed teeth flashed in the dark.
Same old story, a male taking credit for something a woman accomplished.
As if the Fae King was the one who’d orchestrated everything.
As if his head wasn’t on the same chopping block as mine. But perhaps he didn’t know the Oracle’s plans…or he imagined once he took his magic back, she couldn’t touch him.
I wanted to laugh but stayed quiet, hanging there, limp in the soldier’s hands, letting them think I’d given up.
But deep inside me, magic was a roaring inferno. There was so much of it drenching the stale air of this place, seeping up through the cold stone—burrowing into me through every pore of my body.
An hour ago, I’d had nothing to fight with except a knife.
Not enough magic to light a candle wick, but now…
Power—the kind I’d only ever dreamed of—wasfightingto get inside me, and I didn’t know what to make of it, especially when everyone else seemed oblivious.
My father sneered down at me. “For eighteen years, I cursed your very existence. But today, you have given me almost everything I have ever wanted, daughter. And now I shall take the last piece owed me, then we shall be finally even.”
He was a cruel monster; his world had been filled with corruption and death and pain.
But Caladrius no longer belonged to Carex.
Hanging like a sack of potatoes between the two guards, I groaned softly, the pressure building as more and more magic flowed in. As if I was calling this ancient power home. As if the Fae magic I’d stolen from my father was only the tip of the spear.
I’drestored the balance.
I’dcalled the wild magic back.
This realm belonged to me, and every moment I spent here made me stronger. The cuts from the Reapers were gone, my ankle mended, my body stronger than I’d ever felt.
Just a little bit longer…and I would be powerful enough to level this city to the ground, my father right along with it.
The Mistress’s creeping smile widened in anticipation of what she imagined would be hours spent watching me scream for mercy, tied down to that stone altar.
Then I stopped fighting altogether, letting my bare feet drag through broken glass and shards of stone as magic poured into me so fast my vision blurred, the smile on my face growing wider.
Once we reached Torin’s chamber, there would be screaming, but it would not be mine.
40
RAZIEL
Anaria was gone.
Deep within me, a chasm cracked wide open, my soul wailing.
Anaria was gone.Taken.
By a cloud of fucking Soul Reapers heading north.
“She has no magic,” Zor panted. “None. She can’t protect herself.” We raced through the forest, the trees blurring.
