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“That was a lie,” I growled, “Icanheal… but I can also dothis—”
I raised my hands higher, projecting a column of flames from my palms, chased from my core by anger and hatred. I screamed my fury until the release was over and it left me breathing hard and fast.
“Andthis,” I hissed through clenched teeth, forming twin blades of the strongest ice in my grip. I spun, slicing at a wooden training post stuck in the ground behind us. Reduced it to splinters.
Before the splintered wood could fall to the ground, I flicked my fingers. My Grace of air whirled through me like a vortex, spinning out through my fingertips to send the chunks and bits of wood spiraling in to the air above us. There I held then in a spinning torrent of wind.as though the ability had been there all along. It hadn’t ever left me. It was innate. A reflex.
“And this.”
Propelling the wind from me, I tossed the pieces through the air, sending them flying to land crashing into the woods behind the village. The moment I let go of the Grace, my head spun, and my breathing became more shallow.
Spots of blue and black danced in the corners of my eyes. But I bared my teeth, planted my feet to the ground and stood tall. They couldn’t see me weak. They had to think me strong, Unbreakable. Fearsome and more powerful than any queen they’d followed before.
As my eyes struggled to focus and my healing Grace tried and failed to repair whatever damage I’d just done, I saw them. The fear of the unknown was plain on their faces.
Alaric’s hand closed around my upper arm, pulling me back from them. Fear led people to do foolish things. But they were smarter.
They were denizens of Night.Mypeople. I had more faith in them than that.
Aclang! rang out from the group. The jarring sound of flesh and bone on metal. I found her face in the throng of warriors. With her closed fist and eyes gleaming with wild devotion she pounded on her breastplate. A sign of respect.
And then another joined her.
Another.
Until the cacophonous rattling of metal and impassioned roars filled the village. My head. The world. I clutched Alaric for support, my chest sofullit was near bursting.
With wonder in his gaze and mouth parted in awe, Silas didn’t take his eyes off me as he raised his sword high in the air, “Move out!”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Alaric
She’d slept most of the day after we’d sequestered her away from the prying eyes and jabbering maws of Silas and the other Fae in the village. She’d fallen onto the bed and drifted back into sleep within seconds. Her breathing shallow and skin paled.
Finn said we should send for a healer, and I wanted to agree, but I knew she wouldn’t want that. And there wasn’t a healer in these parts of her court—and Loris wouldn’t be arriving until the following morning to set up the infirmary.
She shouldn’t have used so much power for something as rudimentary as a display for the Horde.
When Liana finally awoke it was night, and the camp was bustling with life again. The next group of soldiers had arrived, and the smell of meat roasting on an open fire had my stomach in knots with hunger. All of us had been too afraid to leave her side—afraid she’d slip into the kind of sleep you didn’t wake up from…
She sat up with a hand to her head, averting her gaze from us—a blush crawling up her neck to bloom in her cheeks. Arrow cawed loudly from his new post atop the coatrack in the cabin's corner.
“Yes, I see you. Hello, Arrow,” she whispered in a raspy voice, and the falcon came to land softly on the fur next to her. She patted his back, ruffled the tiny feathers on his breast.
I cleared my throat, turning to pour a glass of water.
A tickle in my mind alerted me to her gentle probe of my emotional state. I smirked. But her Grace seemed to recoil all at once and I felt the strain. Like a rubber band pulled too tightly—stretched too thin.
“Quite a show you put on,” I said, kneeling next to her.
Arrow snapped at me, screeching before he took flight, landing back on his post.
She peeked up at me through her lashes, and then lifted her head fully, seeming to calm at what she saw. “Are you—” she started, swallowing, “Do you think it was a mistake?”
I shook my head, “No, I don’t think it was a mistake. Word is already spreading, and the Horde is rallying for battle. They have a renewed sense of hope and a thirst for the blood of their enemies.”
“But?”
