Page 14 of Beyond the Mountain (Fae's Captive 4)

“We can be whatever we want to be.” Taylor’s words float through me, melding with my own.

“I can hear her in there. But she’s you.” Selene taps my temple. “Confusing. But all will be one soon enough. Now answer my question. What shall you be?”

“I can’t go home. I mean, back to earth.” Leander’s voice resonates in my heart. “I am your home.” I rub my eyes. “I don’t want to.” I realize that neither of us do. “I’m not a changeling. Maybe I don’t know what I am or what I should be. But I feel this desire to destroy. It’s so strong.” I close the ball of death in my fist, and it disappears, then open my palm and watch it ignite again. “I want to take it all and rule.”

“Your father. That’s him in there.” She taps my temple again. “It’s you but not you. Locked away for so long by the soulstone, it came roaring out. Ready to tear the world to pieces and feast on its bones.” She grins as if she likes the taste of her own words. “This feral form you’re in is Shathinor’s blood, his soul as black as night. The wings, the hair, the red lips.” Her eyes dart to my mouth. “Makes me want to relive my college of magic days. Tempting feral.”

I ignore her poor come-on. “Delantis said that the feral is the same as the fae. She could call hers forth in the form of a gryphon, but its name was Delantis, and it was her. They worked together. I feel like I’m at war with whatever I was before the stone was removed. She wants to overtake me, to push me back down into darkness again and lock me away.” I grit my teeth. “Never again.”

“Delantis was correct. Very smart fae, that one.” She picks at her teeth. “Who’s Delantis?”

“Doesn’t matter.” I sigh and sit up. “None of this is getting me anywhere. Besides, I’ve chosen my path. War. I can’t change what I am, whatever that is.”

“I know what you are.” She pats me on the head. “I’ve known since I tasted you in the Greenvelde.”

“Then what am I?”

“A child of many worlds.”

“You mean the prophecy.” I toss the black sphere into the air and catch it. “That’s not helpful.”

“Not helpful? It tells you everything you need to know.”

“It doesn’t even make sense. ‘She alone can start the war and be victorious, win or lose.’ How can anyone be victorious if they lose?”

“Depends on what they lose and what victory means.” She cackles. “Prophecies are always so tricky. Maybe the seer was hedging, eh? Not wanting to say one way or another, so she twisted it into a knot.”

“One I can’t untangle.”

“No need. What will be is already set in motion. Choices have been made whether you know it or not.” She rises and strides to the dress. “Nice. Perfect for tonight.”

“Tell me what happens tonight.” I itch to know where my father’s keeping Leander. The bond between us is alive but dimmed.

“No, no, no. TMI, my dark beauty. T-M-I.” She claps her hands, the slap of stone jarring. “Besides, I can’t see the future.” She lifts the dress and holds it up to her body, then dances around the room. “I can only taste the blood in the air, sense the hate that echoes along these stone walls, and covet the bones that are soon to be stripped from their owners.”

A knock at the door draws my attention, and Cecile returns, her gaze down as Selene waltzes around her. “Your father summons you.”

“Fine.” I wave her away. “You can go.”

She glances at Selene and shudders. “I-I’m to accompany you.”

“Why?”

She shrugs.

“Whatever.” I strip and grab the dress from Selene as she eyes my body.

Slipping it over my head, I roll my shoulders and let it fall in all the right places, my wings free through the open back. Before leaving, I take the obsidian blade, the haft always warm in my hand, reminding me of Delantis. She’s still here—at least some part of her is—living inside the black sword.

Selene runs her fingers along the phylactery at my throat and licks her lips. “Blood.”

“Not for you.” I smack her hand, and she grins.

“Again?” She holds it out.

“You have issues.”

“Assuredly.” She turns to a terrified Cecile and takes her elbow. “Let’s away to the throne room. While we walk, we shall discuss ripe meat and flesh, the kind that’s rotted for weeks. Now, I like to strip the bones clean with my claws, then …”

They stroll ahead of me down the long, dark hallway, Selene’s voice growing quieter as Leander’s begins to swell inside me. He’s afraid. My steps quicken. But not for himself. For his friends. I break into a jog. Not just for his friends, for Gareth.

14

Leander

Brannon stalks into the throne room, Gareth in one hand and Beth in the other. “Your Phalanx needs a little work in the stealth department.” Brannon smirks and gut punches Gareth, who doubles over.

“Stop!” Beth tries to claw him, but he shoves her into the waiting arms of a changeling guard.

The iron door swings open, and Gareth joins us while the guard chains Beth to the wall.

“I’m too good to go in the cage?” She wipes her busted lip on her arm.

“You aren’t worth it.” Brannon slams the cage shut, and the changeling jailor locks it and pockets the key.

“You shouldn’t have come.” I kneel beside Gareth, his face bloody and broken. “Why did you come?”

“You are my king. I owe you my allegiance.” He spits blood as Valen goes to work on him. He can’t do much, not now that he spent so much magic to heal Thorn.

Cenet strides in, a wide grin on his face. “We have almost all of them. This is easier than I ever imagined.”

Beth runs at him, but her chains draw her up short. “You lying piece of—”

Cenet strides up and backhands her. “Shut your mouth, foul changeling.”

Gareth growls. She falls to her knees but gives Cenet a look so venomous I suspect it could kill a small child.

I would scold Gareth for bringing Beth, but I have no doubt she insisted on coming. She’s just as tenacious as Taylor.

Beth spits at Cenet, and he jumps back toward me. I reach through the bars and swipe for him, barely missing.

He darts away, his eyes going snakelike.

“You took my mate from me.” I pin him with a glare. “And sealed your fate.”

“I’m not the one in a cage.” Cenet’s smug face begs to be punched in. “And if you try anything, this changeling will be the first to suffer.” He grabs Beth by the hair.

She shrieks and tries to pry herself loose.

“One hint of winter from you, and she dies.” He darts his tongue out, licking her cheek.

“Don’t touch her!” Gareth struggles to turn over and crawl to her.

“Lie still.” I push him down. “You can’t help her like this.”

Cenet shoves her to the floor and re-takes his position across from the cage, his arms crossed and his gaze firmly on us.

Gareth grunts and closes his eyes. “I’m going to kill that bastard.”

More soldiers flow into the room, lining the walls with undead, lesser fae, and changelings. Something big is happening. I try to send a warning to Taylor, but the bond is quiet. Too quiet. Is something blocking her?

The murmuring dead create a low hum around us as Cenet and Brannon stand watch. More soldiers trickle in, most of them looking at me with surprise, and a few with satisfaction.

Selene’s cackle rattles around the throne room, and she walks in with Cecile on her arm, though the golden fae looks like she’s on the verge of vomiting or fainting—maybe both.

My mind buzzes, the bond like a bolt of lightning linking me to my mate. She appears in a gown of midnight blue, and her eyes meet mine immediately.

“Taylor.” I say her name like a prayer.

She walks up, her chin high as she peruses all of us. “This is the best the winter realm has to offer? All caught and imprisoned in iron like fireflies in a j

ar?”

“You rubbing it in, too?” Thorn tests his bruised jaw with tentative fingers. “We’ll never live this down.”

I put my hand through the cage. She takes it without hesitation, the bond snapping back into place.

“Something’s blocking our connection.” I squeeze her palm.

“I know. I think it’s my father.”

“He wants to use you.” I lower my voice. “He intends to control you, to have you win his war for him and then—”

“Kill me?” She laughs, low and husky. “He has plans, but so do I. I will take the realms, and you and I will rule them. We don’t need him.”

“Why do you want to run headfirst into bloodshed?” I move closer, peering down into her blue eyes. “Ruling the winter realm with me will have enough challenges. More than you know.”

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