Page 147 of The Forbidden Fae King

There are four other towers with plinths along the fortress, where my people are stationed in the same manner. The protective wards are at their weakest at the seams between plinths, where water trickles through the barrier and reveals our vulnerabilities.

We don’t have nearly enough warriors to keep them powered.

I place my hands against the warmth of the aquamarine plinth and Cyprien grunts as he makes space for me. His drenched hair is heavy against his face and steam rises from his hands.

I can feel the wards through the plinth like an extra limb. Boots run across it, the vibration of their impact an echo running through my hands. I push my consciousness down the trail of magic andfollow its path across the wards, counting the number of assailants. Ten upon the wards, examining our positions and weaknesses.

Thunder rumbles high above us, and a second later the sky is lit up by a great flash of forked lightning. I count another five figures clad in billowing robes of inky shadows, base jumping in the open air above the wards.

It astounds me how long the Assassins of Belladonna can maintain that kind of magic, but no fae can do it forever. Just as we won’t be able to sustain the wards against their attack indefinitely.

The night sky becomes brightly illuminated, then a different kind of rain falls upon us. One of silver needles of pure light, as sharp as any knife. I am blinded by that wall of radiance cascading down and shattering upon our barrier, creating spots of weakened magic.

I focus on the area of the ward serviced by the plinth beneath my hands and channel in raw power to patch those holes before they grow.

Last night, a single assassin made it through a small breech and wrecked absolute mayhem on us before we killed him. It was almost enough to force us to drop the ward. If we had, we would have surely fallen.I feel the floods of Cyprien and Lilly’s power patching other growing holes.

This is an exercise in blind trust. Each team at the separate plinths work in ignorance of each other, assuming the others aren’t overwhelmed. We don’t have the numbers to come to each other’s aid or probe the wards beyond our designated sections.

All we can do is defend. To pour all of ourselves into the wards, because we don’t have the forces to spare any on attacking the assassins.

Except for Odiane.

She materializes as a pure white silhouette from the water sleuthing down the domes of the wards, like a thing of nightmares. Her fingers are long claws, her mouth filled with rows of sharp teeth an inch long and her eyes pure black with no white. Jagged ridges climb up her bare back and spikes jut out of her shoulders, elbows and knees.

I wonder what Keira and Caitlin would think of her, if they saw her like this.

The Lake Maiden screams and the pools of water around her violently undulate. Pain slices through my ears, but the sound is diminished by the wards. The two closest assassins grab their ears and fall to their knees on the barrier, the water dripping from them tinged with their blood.

An assassin leaps toward her and slices a sword of pure, rippling starlight straight through her figure. Odiane cascades into a puddle, but a moment later two of her forms materialize out of the water. She is a queen, and we are merely squatting in her palace.

Her arms whip up from her sides, and a column of ice spikes cut out of the water, reaching three feet high. The assassins dart out of that brutal path, the jagged points of the icicles narrowly missing him.

Odiane dances with the assassins the entire night, throwing her spears of ice at them and laughing with exhilaration. They dodge her attacks and dissipate her form, if only to give themselves a few minutes of respite.

My high fae warriors are merely fleas on the back of a dragon, gripping on for dear life. My people channel all that is left of themselves into those wards, while the assassins break their blows of light and shadow against it, trying to shatter our last defense.

With great pain, I spilt my channels of magic in two, sending half into the plinth and the other into attacks. I gather a tidal wave from all the water falling from the sky and running down our defenses, building it and building it, until its huge form curls over three assassins and crashes down on them, washing their bodies from the ward like ticks from my back.

I tighten my fist and force a crushing blow into the mass of water, slamming them into the frozen river below. One cracks upon a thick sheet of ice, and the other two are plunged into the water’s icy depths, where I hope to the gods that Odiane’s court will dispatch of them.

Agony splits through my temples, but I cannot stop.

I grasp of all those trees that should never have been allowed to grow around the fortress, thrusting my power into them until theybecome colossuses that whip and strike at the assassins that dart around impossibly fast. It is a crude technique, clapping immense branches together while they narrowly dart out of the way. Whipping at them with thick tendrils of roots.

It is like trying to catch a fly in my hand, but I manage to crush a few.

My head spins, my hands shake, and I don’t know if my legs will hold me for much longer. I focus my efforts into the plinth, pouring all my essence into it, while Odiane continues to fight above us. I will join her with my magic again, as soon as I catch my breath.

Beside me, Cyprien has his eyes squeezed shut and his teeth gritted, as though in pain. He is on his knees, elongated fangs and tusks peeking out through his lips and his fingers the same blackened claws as my own. When his eyes open, they are completely black, with no whites.

It is rare that Cyprien reveals his more primal form. Unlike how I lose my grip on it with the first flicker of rage. Only the strongest of us still connect with the original forms of the Tuatha Dé Danann.

Lilly mutters urgently below her breath, with her forehead pressed against the hot stone. Thick, curled horns erupt from her bald scalp. Her usual cap of golden runes are now black and colonize the entirety of her caramel skin.

They are both stretched thin and fading.

A sudden clarity hits me. I know this is how it will end for us if I remain here. We will collapse at these plinths, and the assassins will not only kill me, but my loyal followers who will throw themselves in front of me.

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