Page 82 of Defy the Fae

Cypress reads my mind and spells out the problem. Yet again, Cove and Juniper’s theory about shifting terrain is correct.

Cerulean saunters backward. “I can fly there.”

“No, you can’t,” I hate to say. “The fern trees are spread wider than a faun’s legs, and the canopies shield the flower so thickly, it’s impossible for even a dragon to breach them. Risk penetrating one, and you’ll bust a wing, Cerulean.”

“Can’t any of you just manifest?” Lark insists.

My brother shakes his head. “We need to know exactly where we’re going when we manifest.”

“To the fuckingtop.”

“In Faerie, it’s more complicated than that,” Foxglove sighs.

“When you manifest, either you or someone who’s directing you needs to know the destination precisely,” Cerulean clarifies. “It’s a force that guides, and it’s tedious, but magic is hardly straightforward.”

“None of us in this band have ever visited the flower,” I finish. “We’ve never had a specific reason to pay it homage. In general, most Solitaries haven’t made the trek here.”

“Not even to bloat your magic muscles?” Lark balks.

“Not even then,” I say. “However arrogant and vain Faeries are, to enhance yourself with the Blossom would topple a Fae’s pride. Most of us have only ever been aware of the Evermore Blossom from history.”

“I know few centaurs who have made the journey, purely to offer tribute to its existence,” Cypress divulges. “Regretfully, I am not one of them.”

“Then how the hell did Scorpio manage to get up there?” Lark broods.

I grunt. “A woodland Fae could have played gopher for him, or Scorpio mounted the zenith himself. Though I doubt a merman shifter with sea legs is capable of it. Water Faeries aren’t the best climbers, unless the incline was stable when he was here. Who the fuck knows or cares?”

We trade bleak looks. Seems there’s only way to reach it.

Cerulean is a no. Likewise, Cypress and Sylvan are out of the question. Not that I’m eager to stand around mulling this over.

I stalk forward, but a hand shoots out and snags my elbow. “You won’t make it,” Lark protests, her mortal accent as twangy as her sisters’. “You’ve got too much weight and width on you, handsome. Even if you didn’t, those hooves wouldn’t grip a damn step, much less a nodule. Without knowing how the pinnacle is shaped higher up, there’s no guarantee you’d find the right brackets or recesses to brace yourself.”

“Ask me if I give a fuck,” I growl. “Juniper is my woman.”

“And she’s my sister. This job is mine.”

“No,” Cerulean snaps, his pupils dilating with fear. “Not you.”

“You see the vegetation packed up there? I’m the only one besides Foxglove who can fit through. But unlike her, I know my way around a bluff.”

The nymph raises her palms in surrender. “Not arguing with that.”

“Do I really need to point out how I scaled your labyrinth and won?” Lark reminds my brother. “I’m going.”

His face cinches, torn between protecting her and backing off. “Lark…”

Seeing my brother’s compressed features, she cups his cheek and murmurs, “Try and stop me, pretty Fae.”

But he won’t. Cerulean has never told Lark what to do, she would never listen anyway, and I can’t argue any more than he can. She has as much right to save Juniper as I do.

Cerulean’s mouth tightens, then tilts in amusement. “Mutinous thing, indeed.”

She plants a quick kiss on his lips, then surveys the cliff before locating two rifts. Tightening the whip to her hip, Lark clamps on and hoists herself up, then glances over her shoulder at us. “Anyhow, I can climb better and faster than you magic fuckers.”

Cerulean grins. I can’t help my snigger.

We crane our necks as she scales the rock slab like a critter, her feet and hands catching on places I’d failed to notice. Clouds of white hair tumble down her back. Her dress flaps around her limbs. The skirt’s multiple splits allow her to move spryly and flashes a cuff around her upper thigh.

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