Page 32 of The Unseelie War
“That’s bullshit and you know it,” she shot at him. “You’re scared! Scared that if you face Valroy, you’ll have to choose between your stupid revenge fetish and—” She stopped.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Oh, fuck.
Serrik’s expression said nothing and everything all at once. “And there it is.”
“There’s…what?” Lysander blinked.
Ava felt sick. She wanted to cry. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to flip the board and start over. She wanted to smash a bunch of realities together out of desperation and fury. But, hey, she’d already done that once. She didn’t get to pull that stunt twice.
“He’ll have to pick between his revenge and me.” She walked over to one of the seats, folded it down—now with bonus legroom since row BB was a theatre-seat centipede—and sat. “Because he knows that I’ll try to stop him.”
“There is only one way to end Valroy. Onlyone.And it is to pull up his corruption by the roots and to burn and salt the ground upon which it grows. Tir n’Aill will be destroyed. The Maze will be destroyed. They will all be destroyed.” Serrik’s words were clinical. Simple. “I will turn my rage upon them all, Seelie and Unseelie alike. You will be forced to destroy me. It is this, that I am attempting to spare you.”
“Valroy kills everyone, and I kill you to save his life. Or I let you kill all the fae.” A deluxe genocide that involved all the humans and the Seelie, or a fae genocide.
“Your love for me would fade along with their lives. And Valroy, despite his claim that his purpose ends with the Seelie and the humans? He is a burning fire. It must be fed. It will not stop.” Serrik sighed. “The only logical course of action is to retreat—gather our own strength. Brace yourself for what must be done. Allow me to stand against Valroy…and commit myself and my people to the grave where we belong. Once Tir n’Aill is destroyed, you will have an easier time separating the Web from Earth and righting the worlds, or finding a way to ease this chaos without impending war.”
The stubborn, self-defeating logic of it made Ava want to scream. Here was a man—creature, being, whatever—who had spent two millennia convinced he was irredeemable, and the moment he found something worth redeeming himself for, he was prepared to throw it all away rather than risk proving himself right.
She did everything she could to keep her frustration from bleeding into her voice. “You're so convinced you're a monster that you're willing to act like one just to prove your point.”
“This is who I am. This is who I have always been. And this is the path I was destined to walk.”
“No, it isn’t.” Ava pointed up at the ceiling. “The man who spent hours creating that beautiful web just to keep us safe?—”
“Created to trap prey,” Serrik interrupted harshly. “Just like everything else I do. I am what I am, Ava. A predator. A killer. A creature of darkness and entropy. The sooner you accept that, the better.”
“The man I made love with under the aurora lights isn't a monster,” Ava continued, ignoring his interruption. And the fact that they had company. Whatever. Fae. “And the man who's so terrified of losing my love that he'd rather push me away than risk it—he's not a monster either. He's justfuckingscared.”
“If it convinces you, so be it. Perhaps being ‘scared’ is the wisest course of action.”
Nos, who had been listening to this exchange with growing alarm, finally spoke up. “With respect to both of you, we don't have time for this. Every moment we delay gives Valroy more time to gather his forces. If we're going to act, it has to be now.”
“We are not acting,” Serrik said firmly. “I have made my position clear.”
“Then I'll go without you.” Ava stood. “I caused this mess. I'm not going to stand by and watch innocent people die because you're having an existential crisis. I don’t care.”
“You'll be slaughtered. Or worse.” Serrik's composure finally cracked completely, raw fear bleeding into his voice. “Valroy has had millennia to master his power. You've had days. You cannot face him alone. He will capture you. Torture you. Wield you.”
“Then come with me,” Ava challenged. “Help me stop him.”
“I cannot.” Serrik's hands clenched into fists at his sides. “Ava, you don't understand what you're asking of me. You don't understand what I become when?—”
He was interrupted by a sound that made everyone in the theater freeze—a soft rustling, like leaves in a gentle breeze. But there was no wind in the opera house, and the sound was coming from the wall.
As they watched in stunned silence, vines began growing from the marble wall beside the stage. Not the twisted, thorny things that had overtaken the building's exterior, but delicate climbing things with red blooms that seemed to capture and hold light. The vines spread rapidly, forming an archway in the solid stone, their flowers releasing a fragrance that was both familiar and otherworldly.
“What the hell is it now? I really hope—” Ava’s words died as a figure stepped through the impossible doorway.
The woman who emerged moved with a grace that seemed to make the very air around her dance, her presence filling the theater with a warmth that had nothing to do with temperature. Her hair was a cascade of red waves that seemed to hold spring sunlight, and her eyes were the deep green of forests.
She wore a dress that appeared to be woven from flower petals and morning mist, and when she smiled, Ava felt something in her chest respond as if recognizing kindred magic.
Abigail. Queen of the Seelie Court.
