Page 108 of Beneath the Flames
You deserve to live.My mom’s words repeated in my mind.I loved my family so much, but maybe my momneededme to be gone.Maybe that was the only way she’d step up and fight back.I’d been enabling her to hide in her fear for years.Maybe my absence had been for the best.
Maybe Mom wouldn’t need me anymore.
But Rhydian did.He couldn’t break the curse without me.Without my help, he would perish, Eroth and Nico along withhim.If it was within my power to help stop it, I couldn’t turn my back on them, could I?
“You’re a terrible daughter for not going back to your family,” Carrow chastised, as if it were his last resort to getting me to give up on Rhydian.
“You’re right,” I said.“But I was also a terrible daughter for enabling all that I did.”A breath shuddered out of me.The words were difficult to say, but I managed to add, “My mom can handle things now.”
Carrow’s silver eyes flashed with fury.“Why would you want a broken, dying prince of a dead kingdom when you could stand by a Fae with all the power you could ever desire?”he asked, holding his arms out and releasing a display of his violet magic.It swirled and arched in the air.While it was impressive, I wanted no part of it.
I looked Carrow dead in the eye.“Rhydian has all the power I desire—none.”
Violet light engulfed me before I could move, and I was suddenly weightless, the air violently leaving my lungs as I slammed into the wall again.
“You’re a fool,” he snarled in my face.
Though I had every reason to be afraid of this Dark Fae, I saw his display of rage for what it was: rejection.
“Am I the first to deny you,PrinceCarrow?”
His fingers returned to my neck and squeezed.That was answer enough.
I wasn’t sure if the curse prevented him from killing me, or just sending me home against my will, but I took a chance at stoking his anger.
“I would never choose a monster like you.”
Silence fell, like the calm before a storm.Then violet light engulfed the room.
Something wasn’t right.
My magic was weakening by the day, withering in time with the cursed Magmara, but I still felt a niggling that something wasn’t right.There was a feeling, a presence that didn’t belong.It was faint.I probably would have missed it if it hadn’t flared for a moment, but there was no mistaking it.
Another flare.
Dread mixed into a deadly cocktail of terror.Maren.
Summoning every amount of strength in my bones, I ripped open the door and raced back to the room that should have been protected, the one room that Maren had been spending all her time in.The one room she should have been safe in.
My Fae speed allowed me to reach the room in a few mere heartbeats, and I burst through the door, calling for Maren before halting in my tracks.
My cold, nearly-dead heart stuttered in my chest.Maren was suspended in the air, grasping at her throat with desperate fingers, surrounded by swirls of violet magic.Carrow stood next to her, his hand outstretched, forcing his magic to drain the life from her.
“Carrow,” I said, lacing the single word with all the fury and threat I could muster.If it came to a fight, my magic was in no state to win against the Prince of Nefaroth.In a physical fight, I maybe had a chance, but why would he fight me when his magic was available?
“Ah, Rhydian.How nice of you to join us.”Carrow’s teeth flashed in the moonlight, those silver eyes flaring just as bright.He still held Maren aloft, and she was clawing in vain at her throat, trying to escape the grasp of his magic.
“Let her go, Carrow.”
“Now why would I do that?”he said, mock innocence in his expression.“Things were just getting interesting.”
“She doesn’t concern you,” I replied.“Put her down.”
“Or what?”he sneered.“You’ll fight me?”He gestured at me.“In your current state?Do you really think that’s wise?”
My teeth clenched so hard that shooting pain engulfed my jaw.
“And anyway, you’re wrong.She does concern me.”
