Page 43 of The Fallen Kingdom

Kiaran leans in, turning his head so Sorcha can’t hear him or read his lips. “She’s trying to get a rise out of you. Sorcha doesn’t respond well to pity.”

“What would you suggest?”

He puts a finger under my chin so I’m forced to meet his eyes. I can’t help but wince. Those beautiful lilac irises are never going to be the way they once were. Never as clear. They’re a reminder that the Unseelie inside him is always there, barely contained. “Don’t let her see your weaknesses. Find out what she wants.”

I tighten my jaw and glance over at Sorcha to find her watching us with unabashed interest. “How soft you’ve become, Kadamach. Talking to your pet as if she were an equal. She ought to be crawling at your feet like the worthless animal she is.” Her gaze rakes me over. “Unless she’s one step above a pet. Which would make her your whore.”

Kiaran’s hand grips mine in a silent message:Don’t dignify that with a response.

I squeeze his hand and release it to take a step toward her. Sorcha raises her chin, as if waiting for a blow that won’t come. “You make the mistake of defining me by his ownership,” I say softly. “You don’t seem to understand that he’s mine every bit as much as I’m his.”

Sorcha drops her arrogant smile just long enough for me to see something vulnerable in her expression. Something that longs forhim.

As if she realizes what she almost showed me, she clenches her jaw. “Is there a reason you’re here, Falconer? Unless you’ve come to triumph over my misery. Let me assure you: I would rather be tortured here for a thousand years than listen to you for another moment.”

“The Book of Remembrance,” I say, voice tight. “Tell me how to find it without the usual cynical commentary. Now.”

Sorcha goes still, as if she’s surprised by the question. If I hadn’t been watching for her response, I might not have noticed the fleeting emotion in her eyes. Even so, it’s gone so quickly I wonder if I imagined it.

Her armor of smug indifference is firmly back in place. “Oh. That,” she says, in the same casual tone one might use to say,Oh that old thing. “I understand it was lost a long time ago.” Her slow smile is no doubt deliberately meant to anger me. “But I might be persuaded to help you find it. For the right price, of course.”

I will tear you apart limb from limb andmakeyou help me.

Maybe when the Cailleach revived my bones and gave me her power, a small piece of her lived on inside me. Or maybe she made me less human and more fae. That’s the only explanation I have for what I do next: I grasp Sorcha by the throat andsqueezeuntil I know she can’t breathe.

Behind me, I sense Kiaran step closer. “Kam—”

“Don’t,” I say sharply, without looking away from Sorcha. “We’re running out of time and options, and I’m losing my patience. You said to find out what she wants. So let me do this.”

It’s my turn to smile smugly. It’s my turn to have the power.

It’smyturn.

“Do what?” I can hear the uncertainty in his voice.

This time, when my power leaves its cage and the darkness takes me over, I let it consume me. I let it wash away my emotions, my concerns, my worries. I let it take my compassion, too. If compassion is for humans, brutality is for fae.

And I’m both.

My eyes meet Sorcha’s. “Nothing she hasn’t already done to me.”

CHAPTER 21

IKNOW SORCHAsenses my power thickening in the air, sharp as electricity. It gives off the heady stench of iron and ozone.

She’s afraid of me. I see it in her eyes; I can taste it.Good.

When I touch my fingers to her temple, she struggles, as if she knows what I’m about to do. Her throat convulses in my grip as she chokes for breath, pricking at something human in me. Something that forces me to remember Derrick’s harsh words to me in the forest.

The friend I knew had someone break into her mind, day after day, for months. If you were her, you wouldneverhave done that to anyone.

I can’t be that Aileana anymore. I can’t be her and find the Book. I can’t favor my humanity when my realm is crumbling to dust and so many lives hang in the balance. Compassion won’t help me right now—Sorcha doesn’t give a damn about pity. She’d use it against me.

A part of me still doubts.Do this, and there’s no going back. You’ll be the dark creature Derrick saw in the woods, and this time you have no excuses. Your memories are intact. Do this, and you’re no better than her. No better than Lonnrach.

Sorcha looks at me and I see how much she hates me. I make my decision.So be it.

I tear into her mind like a sword ripping through flesh. She’s so surprised that she puts up no resistance. I catch the first glimmers of color in her thoughts, similar to Derrick’s. Only hers are all red-rimmed with sharp black edges, thorny branches of ivy that cover her memories in a protective shield.

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