Page 3 of Dark Master's Redemption

His gaze flicks to me, then, and I feel a deep thrust inside my mind. It’s Master Ilyov’s massive Dark Winter Fae magic, which he can use to read minds in an instant and compel others to do his will even faster than that.

Before I know it, I’m rolled by that fast, ice-cold lance of power. I’m reaching inside my dress, pulling out the small Florentine Box I stashed in my couture as we came through Eiseth’s portal tonight.

Compelled by Master Ilyov’s power to show Ilyov Quinn’s cage so he can see the box and the Vampire Revenant that roils within.

Quinn—lost to his own worst darkness.

“Quindici DaPonti. What have you done?” Master Vasily Ilyov says as he sees the box. Quinn’s Revenant seems to sleep until Ilyov speaks; in a whirl of wrath and darkness, furious red eyes pierce out from the box now, vicious beneath the bright light of the moon.

Ilyov’s narrow gaze pins the box for a very long time. It’s so long, my heart pounds in my throat as our one hope of salvation evaluates Quinn’s Revenant.

Then he pins me with his formidable, wintery gaze—no compassion anywhere in him.

“He is almost gone,” Master Ilyov says now as he regards me, then Lucca. “You both would do better to turn around, Animante and Courante Dark Fae, and cut ties with him, seeking a new dark Master elsewhere. He has gone deep into his Revenant to escape the horrors of his past. Some undying lives are too brutal, and some Master Vampires have endured too much. To go Revenant is a blessing for them, to escape what has gone before. Though Quinn is a Mentale Dark Fae, he is like a Master Vampire. And the result of his tortured inner darkness swamping him… is the same.”

“Is there nothing that can be done for him?” Something dies inside me at Master Ilyov’s words. I had such hope from seeing Quinn’s flashes of gold and crimson Summer Fae Light inside his box earlier tonight, along with his dark onyx eyes, when he asked for my help.

I feel empty now as Master Ilyov’s pronouncement hits me like a death knell. Woe takes me as I dive into the endless void that lives deep inside my Dark Fae power.

Terrible black rainbows boil from me, dark as death in the moonlight as they surge around me like a never-ending sea. It’s Lucca who holds the Light for us, and hope, as he steps solidly behind me now.

Though his Light is exhausted from everything that’s happened tonight, I feel his luminous power flare all through my veins as he wraps his arms around me. As his Light blazes all around us now, startling in its intensity, his auric wings emerge from his spine like sunlight searing through the darkness. Cuddling me, he calms my empty annihilation, even as we both still shiver from the cold.

Stalwart in the face of utter darkness—and keeping hold of the Light.

“We will not abandon Quinn,” Lucca says, as he holds me, insistent. “We will do everything in our power to get him back. I don’t care how far gone he is. He’s ours. And we will reclaim him. With everything I am, I swear it.”

“A brave heart.” Master Ilyov’s gaze is piercing as he takes in Lucca’s power in the night, then Lucca himself. “I can see why your Light is the balance to Quinn’s Night, both so strong in your powers that I could barely sense you were Dark Fae at all. For you have formed the Ascendant’s Triad—a triune bond, with a Cuorante Dark Fae that holds but a single whisper of Night, and a Mentale Dark Fae that holds but a single blaze of Light. Such extremes can hold only the strongest Animante—like geysers, they catapult her to the endless stars with their power. And her power is supreme, the Ascendant Animante, vaulted between them. But she is still sleeping, isn’t she?” Ilyov studies me now as something thoughtful comes into his gaze. “Sleeping like a dreaming knight who has yet to awake… and understand how she can truly fight the empty dream that assails her.”

Those cryptic words hang in the crystalline air, as Master Ilyov’s pale blue eyes pierce my very soul. It’s not lost on me how accurately he’s described the strange Vision of a Knight painting by Raphael that I evaluated on the very same day I first met both Quinn and Lucca.

I have a moment to wonder if he knows about that painting, and if all of it relates to the Gold Eyes and his unknown agenda with my trio’s power—but then Ilyov waves his hand. The barrier before him dissipates, leaving only a shimmering swirl of ice crystals blowing away upon the midnight breeze. As its vast spread of magic flashes out, Master Ilyov inclines his head to me.

Pinning me yet again with his intimidating, ice cold stare.

“Welcome to Novakitsk, Ascendant’s Triad,” he says as he watches me. “Bring the caged Revenant third of your trio inside my domain. And we shall see what can be done with Quinn, who never learned that those who seek ultimate power pay ultimate prices.”

At that, Master Vasily Ilyov opens his hand, gesturing our group into the incredible ice fortress. At Curio’s nod that it’s safe, we move forward—though the cold look he gives his father as they pass could freeze diamonds.

Master Ilyov is stalwart, emotionless under his son’s chill rage. As I tuck Quinn’s Florentine Box back inside my gown and take Lucca’s hand, I wonder what bad blood exists between them—and why Curio thought he could help us win his father’s favor, if they hate each other so much.

As we finally enter the hidden city of the Dark Fae to get our beloved Master back, the ancient doors of ice grind closed. Master Ilyov does not accompany us, but watches us enter the fortress until the closing of the doors nearly shuts him out—then whirls away on a wind of snow, disappearing elsewhere.

The towering doors of ice boom shut, sealing us inside the black hallway. As sorcerous blue-white torches light in glittering ice sconces all along the walls now, illuminating our way through the long darkness, I notice the temperature inside the vast hallway is many degrees warmer than it was outside.

It’s so warm now from all those torches giving off a wonderful, radiating heat that I’m nearly done shivering. As Curio sets out, leading us down the long tunnel, I stand taller beneath Lucca’s arm. I realize we’re walking not into darkness but towards light, as the color of the ice walls fades from black to charcoal, then to a far lighter grey, then to a vivid blue-white.

Brilliant light shines throughout the tunnel now from both the torches and ancient magic, as Winter Fae images and ornate script write themselves into being upon every wall. From a forbidding tunnel, the long hall has become almost impossibly ornate; vast icy vaults and hallways branch off our main tunnel now, each more lovely than the last.

Staircases of ice curl up on every side as enormous ice chandeliers hang down from the vaults above. Everything chimes with a delicate sound now, like icicles falling in a light wind. What I thought was going to be a terrible, forbidding place has achieved a mystical wonder as we reach a blazing brightness at the end of the tunnel. As we step out into the moonlight, I see we’ve come out from beneath the enormous outer wall of the fortress.

And into a city of such splendor, that it makes my heart beam.

Before us and all around, pinnacles of ice soar into lofty buildings beneath the bright, full moon. Made of such beautifully-wrought ice that it looks like a Tolkien elvish city, frozen on the glacier in the deep night, this ice does not hold death, but life.

All around, Dark Fae of many varieties pass beneath the high moon, not just Dark Winter Fae. As they go about their business in the massive, ancient city, glowing blue-white globes accompany them, lighting their way.

Fountains burble in the night, crystal-blue water jetting up from diamond-bright ice, sculpted into fantastical animals and towering, regal Fae. Trees and flowers grow everywhere beneath the moonlight; like nothing I’ve ever seen, their strange silver-green or blue-white leaves chime in the night, or shiver under the full moon as they tremble in the breeze.

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