Page 146 of Atop the Faerie Throne
The black mist wraps around their legs, thicker here than anywhere else. A creepy reminder of what remains at stake.
I hate what I have to do, and my beast hates it even more. He’d rather curl up with our mate to comfort her.
But this isn’t over yet.
“Rosie,” I cajole, trying and failing to keep the wolf from my voice. “Rosie, you need to close the portal.”
Her palms are slathered in green paste—likely the redcap’s doing—the blackness in her veins slowly paling as the medicine works. I risk reaching forward to take one of her hands between mine.
Shit. She’s cold as ice.
Shooting a dark look at the redcap that promises death should he intervene, I scoop her up against my bare chest, hoping my warmth will help.
Yes, Jare, because body heat is going to fix her blood loss and iron sensitivity. Idiot.
I try again after a few seconds, bringing her closer to the churning black smoke. “Rosie, the portal. Come on, it’s right there.”
“She needs a moment,” Bree murmurs, coming to stand at my other side.
I’d do anything to give her longer to process what just happened. Unfortunately, it’s not possible. That portal is a ticking bomb, and we have no idea when it will blow open and unleash an ancient Fomorian horror into the realm.
“We don’t have time.” It’s the brutal truth.
But whatever magic Rose and Kitarni have been working on to seal it is beyond her right now.
Swallowing, I think back to the last portal she closed. She was almost unconscious from restoring the Summer Court’s connection to Danu at the time, but she still managed it.
“Rosie, make a bargain with me.”
“What are you doing?” Lore hisses.
“It’s how she destroyed the last one,” I press, heart twinging at the memory. “Close the portal right now, sweetheart, and we’ll take you home.”
It’s the most simple, honest bargain I think I’ve ever made, but it works. Her chin dips in acceptance, and one of her black-streaked arms stretches lethargically, grazing the stone just like she did to that gate all those months ago.
Only, this portal doesn’t crumple. It implodes. The black mist is sucked back, the medallion dropping to clatter on the stone as the air around us heats until it’s unbearable.
Sparks fly, the stones crunching and crumbling as they too are drawn into the void.
Then it’s done.
The portal is gone, and all that remains is our battered, broken quintet in a room full of dead Fomorians.
Now that thebattle is over, there’s only one thing that matters, and she shivers in my arms as Bree crouches beside her and examines her back.
“It’s a clean cut,” he whispers, though I don’t think Rose hears it. “Redcap, she needs the healers in Elfhame.”
“Take Drystan, too,” I say. “Bree and I will rendezvous with our people above and sort things out there.”
My wolf snarls in my head at the decision, but it’s the right one. Rose needs to be tended to before any of us will feel comfortable drawing on her magic to heal ourselves. Lore is missing an arm up to his elbow. Drystan is a fucking mess, leaning heavily on one leg as he uses magic to cauterise a gash in his side. Bree and I are the best off, and the ones better able to ensure Praedra keeps her word when she learns what Caed just did.
And it’s better if the dullahan isn’t there when she’s told.
Still, it doesn’t make the animal inside me any less angry as the redcap clasps our mate’s limp hand and the weight of her disappears from my arms. He howls, fur abrading my skin from in the inside as I fight to keep him back.
When Lore returns, he chucks a pair of shorts at me before taking the dullahan.
I tug them on with a grunt of thanks, snatching the medallion from the floor a second before the cold stone room blurs, and Ifind myself beneath the portcullis of the fortress we ignored in our quest for Elatha.
