Page 61 of The Iron Flower

He draws back a fraction, his eyes full of silken darkness. “I don’t know that I want to, Elloren.”

A sudden clarity overtakes me.

This is it, right here. The lure of darkness.

I step back and slowly but firmly extricate myself from Lukas—from this power and its seductive spell. This isn’t something to be drawn into. This is something to fight against. Both inwardly and outwardly. Even if the only other alternative is to be powerless.

“Take me back, Lukas,” I tell him, shutting this down. “I think I’ve seen enough.”

* * *

Lukas flies me back to the barren, snow-encrusted field without a word.

A military carriage is waiting for me when we arrive. Lukas helps me down from the dragon’s back and gives me a reproachful look. Then he wordlessly mounts the dragon and wings away into the pitch-black winter night.

A soldier silently escorts me to the carriage. I climb inside, and we set off toward the lights of the University, the dark forest looming through the window as a cyclone of troubled emotion storms through me.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

IVORY WINGS

It’s well past midnight when the carriage finally arrives back at the North Tower. I trudge wearily up the hill toward my lodging, hugging the edge of the wilds, acutely aware of the trees drawing back from me.

Black Witch.

I slow to a halt, suddenly distraught. So many terrible things have happened already, and now, my very blood seems to be slipping into darkness.

And I’m powerless to stop it.

I roughly pull off my Snow Oak necklace, breaking the chain, and throw it to the ground, not wanting any part of this wretched power. I reach down and pull the wand from my boot, imagining it to be the true White Wand of myth. A pure force for good, bringing hope to all of Erthia.

Despair swells inside me.

Why don’t you help us?I rage at the wand, the stars, the sky.Why are you letting all of this happen? Why are you letting cruelty win? If there really is a force for good, where are you?

But the wand is quiet in my hand. It remains a smooth white stick, nothing more, in the silence of the night. I take a long, shuddering breath, a hot tear streaking down my chilled cheek.

It’s no use. We’re all alone.

I listlessly turn to continue up the hill, and my gaze is drawn up, instantly transfixed.

Two Watchers are flying in lazy circles around the North Tower.

They float on the wintry night air, the iridescent birds spiraling like gently falling leaves.

And then they simply disappear.

I slow to a stop, everything dark and still and silent.

Listen.

The word crystallizes in the back of my mind, like a hidden whisper.

* * *

I rush up the spiraling stairs to the top floor of the North Tower, filled with a nonsensical, amorphous hope. Hope in the face of the insurmountable walls of darkness. Hope borne on ivory wings.

I push open the door to our room and burst inside, lit up with anticipation. I carefully scan the room, expecting to seesomething.

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