AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Nuwin and Ilara were right behind me, activating their air elements in the same manner as my guards ran faster than the wind, their affinities blurring their legs.
I burst through the top door, my stomach in my throat.
The large tower chamber spread before me. Dim winter sunlight poured in through the windows. A cold fireplace lay vacant in the room. No servants were about, and my mother lay on her bed listlessly, her body bruised and broken, her wings slashed. Blood covered her. Everywhere.
My lungs seized.
“Mumma.” In another gust of air, I was at her side.
Her chest rose shallowly, her breaths rattling. I leaned closer to her to listen, and the telltale sound hit me.
Death wheezes.It was what the Solis Guard called them when a soldier was close to entering the afterlife.
“No,” I whispered just as a choked gasp came fromIlara.
Given the horrific sounds, my mother’s lungs were filling with fluid, her ribs likely broken and her innards bleeding. Nuwin was right. Her death was imminent.
“We have to take her to Murl.” Ilara grasped my arm, her nails biting into me. “Now.”
“We can’t,” Nuwin whispered. Tears choked his words.
“What do you mean,we can’t?” Ilara snarled.
Nuwin’s eyes dimmed even more. “Our mother was forced into a fairy bargain by our father many winters ago. If she seeks a castle healer after my father’s beatings, she forfeits her life.”
“What?” Ilara yelled.
A howl of rage worked up my throat, battering against my insides, demanding to be let free. The need for vengeance against my father’s brutality ate me up until I could barely breathe.
But killing the king wouldn’t save my mother.
Hands vibrating, I clasped them tightly to stop from tearing the realm apart and forced myself to stay at my mother’s side. I wouldn’t leave her on her deathbed.
Ilara slumped beside me, her expression bewildered. “I don’t understand.”
Nuwin’s wings slackened, drooping down his back. “The king forced it on her, saying if she didn’t agree to the bargain, he’d beat Nori and me too every time he beat her, but if she agreed, he’d spare us from his hand, so she made the bargain to protect us. We were only children at the time.”
I drew in a ragged breath and cupped my mother’shand in my own. Her skin was cool and dry. Blood caked the back of both of her hands. Even there, my father hadn’t spared her. Lacerations littered her body, ugly cuts carved into her flesh. They were done brutally. Ruthlessly.
I wanted to rage. Wanted to roar. Wanted to burn the realm.
But I couldn’t.
“Mother?” I whispered.
No response.
“Mother?” I said louder.
Nuwin kneeled at my side. “She’s unconscious and has been since I found her this morning.”
“That fucking tyrant!” I bolted to a stand, my wings spreading as magic heated my blood.
All four of my guards gazed at me sympathetically, yet the sharp scent of their anger and need for revenge wafted around them.
“There has to be a way to save her.” Ilara wrung her hands.
I met her gaze, then shook my head. “There isn’t.”
