Page 90 of Fae Reckoning

“Wyn,” Xeno shouted.

Several of the others echoed my name. But the dead didn’t breathe, now did they? Still,contradicting laws of natureand all that…

I darted out of the way and crouched near Rush and Xeno, the path to them clear now that Reed had finished corralling the undead fae.

“Everyone, back up, back up,” Xeno commanded. “Her range’ll be a good fifty feet.”

The room wasn’t much larger than that. We scurried back, ducking behind the many undead contained by Reed’s magic.

The she-dragon opened her mouth at the top of her long inhale.

My muscles tensed.

She unleashed a stream of … smoke. Puffy, fluffy smoke incapable of searing the flesh from our bones.

Xeno groaned his relief and straightened, adjusting his grip on his blade to scratch his head with a knuckle. “The only good thing about them being dead.”

I stood too. “It’s all just sad, so terribly sad.”

“Were you able to reach them?”

“Does it look like I was able to reach them?”

“Nope,” Xeno said with a poppingp.

“Exactly.” My shoulders were heavy with defeat. “I don’t think I can connect with them once they’re dead. They didn’t react to me at all. Not even sure they were hearing me.”

“That makes sense,” Xeno said. But truly, what about any of this made any kind of sense at all?

“So … they look scary as, well, angry-ass dragons,” I continued, “but they can’t actually harm us?”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Ivar said.

As one, we looked at him.

He shrugged. “Talisa wouldn’t send them after us without good reason.”

“Is scaring the Ethers out of us reason enough?” Azariah asked in a shaky rasp. He tossed his mane nervously, and a puff of rainbow-tinted air spurted from his wide nostrils. “I don’t think my constitution will ever be the same after this.” The unisus stood so close to the ranucu that not even a ray of light wedged between their bodies.

“Ivar,” I said. “Do you have any ideas? What should we do?” As little as a week ago I would have never believed I’d be asking the male who’d defended Talisa at every opportunity for help—more so, that he might actually offer it.

He linked both hands behind his neck while he studied the dragons on the opposite side of the room. Eventually, he exhaled with a flutter of his lips that sounded like a bird taking off in flight. “I have no idea.”

“Oh great, thanks so much,” Ryder said with a scowl. “What a load of help.”

“Hey,” Ivar snapped. “I can’t know things I don’t know any more than you can.”

Ryder waggled his jaw back and forth but didn’t concede the point. I was also experiencing bubbling irritation that we were so unsure when the stakes were so damn high.

“There’s one thing I do know with absolute certainty though,” Ivar added. “Talisa is the source of all of it.” He gestured to the fae and magical creatures she hadn’t granted peace even in their deaths. “She’s behind whatever’s doing this to all of them. We find her … we kill her … and all this ends.”

I found myself nodding, feeling myself drawn to her instead of the dungeons as planned. “We get past whatever distraction she throws our way as quickly as we can. We only stop once we see her ugly mug.”

“I think so, El,” Rush said. His gaze went from me to the dragons and back again, his moonlit eyes a well of sorrow that I felt in my own heart.

I chuckled darkly. “Figures, the only time I’m here at the palace and want to see her is the one time she hides from us.”

“Fromyou,” Ivar said.

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