Page 71 of Faerie Gift

I couldn’t risk going along the halls and having someone see me. Not when another few feet would bring me to my goal. And Barbara’s prize.

Anticipating the pain had my stomach curdling, because I knew becoming one with the walls again would hurt. A lot. Although I didn’t have a tracking spell to take me to the direct location of the Augundae Imperium, I felt the tug of its magic by being this close to it. The students had been right. It was nearby.

I tried a small spell for light to get a feel for the disruption of magic in the area. And when I produced sparks instead of a steady stream of illumination, it gave me a place to start, a direction to turn. I rolled my shoulders and blew out a calming breath.

Briefly I wondered what my parents would think of my behavior, if they were alive. Would they be proud of me for getting into the school or furious with me for breaking all the rules to stay?

They’d both died when I was six. I’d never had the opportunity to really get to know either of them, and couldn’t speak for how they’d feel if they were here today.

Then again, if they were alive, I might not have had to come to the academy to escape Kendrick. I highly doubted either of them would have approved of the match, fated mate or not. I also highly doubted my uncle’s claim that the universe conspired to bring me together with Kendrick. Calling bullshit on that, for sure.

Mentally slapping myself, I walked across the empty classroom and placed my hand on the wall. Gathering strength for what I knew would come. Holding the image in my head and merging with the stone and sheetrock and plaster and wood until I lost my physical body for the second time.

It took a bit longer for me to come out on the other side this time.

Once I was through, I did it again. Each new room brought me closer to the Augundae Imperium, despite the agony, despite the toll it took on me.

With every merge, I became weaker and weaker until blood flowed freely from my nose and I couldn’t get it to stop.

Maybe it wasn’t so much transfiguring into thewallsbut the act itself. I’d been so focused on practicing my cognitive manipulation and keeping the transfiguration a secret that maybe, like any muscle, this second power just needed me to work on it. I may become better and better, the pain less, with each shift. It wasn’t like there was anyone around to ask for advice.

But I didn’t even know the rules for my secret power. What if, by transforming into the walls—or any inanimate object, really—I was actuallykillingmyself?

Could it be? I paused, everything inside of me drawing toward the Augundae Imperium on the other side. Was I really doing harm to myself,irreparableharm, by going through with this transformation?

I went cold and balked at the thought of the final wall.

“Okay, not to worry,” I whispered aloud. Slapping my cheeks to get some color back. To get myself to focus. “One more. Just get through one more and then see what happens.”

Arms loose at my sides, I shook my head. Twisted my neck and stretched my hands, arms, legs, feet. Loosening up the last of my muscles in preparation. Like a fighter before entering the ring, needing to be limber.

“Nothing to worry about.” My chest tightened.

It was nothing but another lame pep talk but it got me going.

Out of breath and shaking, I made it through the final wall, covered in plaster dust and cobwebs, hardly able to keep standing. One of my toes still might have been made of wood.

Yet…I haddoneit.

The last room, the final step, and ahead of me on top of a mirrored glass table—not dusty in the least—sat the Augundae Imperium, a squat and square and gold artifact everyone wanted to get their hands on.

From what I could see of it, anyway. My eyes weren’t working quite right and I lifted my hands to rub at them. Unfortunately for me, my hands didn’t move from where they hung limply at my sides.

Uh oh.

Being this close to the Augundae Imperium, magic zapped through me, and I recognized the power deep in my bones, power from some collective memory of all Fae, of anyone who had ever come into contact with the ancient item.

An object designed to siphon power from any source.

The room wasn’t large by any means, rectangular and empty except for the table and a locked door to the left. Gritting my teeth, I regarded the tiny box causing so much trouble, secured by invisible bonds. Bonds I would have to break to get it out of here and into Barbara’s hands.

Dammit, I’d done too much already. I’d gotten to the last leg of the journey only to be stopped in place by my own fragility.

Well, transforming into four walls and a door will do crazy things to a person, I told myself. The pep talk fell flat this time, too.

It really didn’t look like much up close. In fact, if I were full human without the ability to feel the magic flowing in waves from the Imperium, I’d think it a simple jewelry box. Like something I’d find in an antiques store and take home for a good polish. Besides the interesting gleam of the metals and runes making up the artifact, there was little else to draw the eye or advertise its importance.

Stepping closer—read:shuffling—I approached the Augundae Imperium on leaden feet. I didn’t need to have all my senses working at optimum capacity to sense the layers and layers of spellwork protecting the artifact. Somehow, I would need to crack through them one by one in order to make it out of here. Better Fae than me put the spells in place and I shuddered at the thought of how much work it would take to break them all.

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