Blood Before Sunrise

eyes, which spoke of a sorrow too deep to express.

I could stop this if I played my cards right. Though, to be honest, I had no fucking clue what Faolan planned to accomplish by bringing the two halves of the hourglass together. A few feet would close the gap between us. I stopped, despite the urge to go to his side. “I want to know what you’re going to do,” I said, digging my heels into the earth. “And then, I’ll give this to you.”

“I am going to end this perversion.” He ground the words through clenched teeth. “I am going to heal the flow of time. There will no longer be two realms between us, but a single place. And our kind will not be forced to hide our true natures from creatures too narrow-minded and filled with fear to accept that which is extraordinary.”

“And you will kill all of humanity in the process,” Brakae whispered. “Please, Faolan, if you love me, you won’t go through with this.”

Hang on just a damned minute. “Do you mean to tell me, if Faolan puts the hourglass together, every human in the world is going to die?” Brakae gave me a look as if to say, Isn’t that just what I said? “What exactly is going to happen if he puts that thing back together?”

“In the realms, time runs parallel to itself, though at different rates of speed. Mending the glass will merge the realms. O Anel with the mundane world. The veil between us will be lifted, and that parallel line in the human world will have to accelerate to match the pace of time here. They will age, Darian. Instantaneously. Before our eyes they will turn to dust and be no more.”

Well, there was no way in hell I was going to let that happen. Sliced open and bleeding, zombie mind control or not, I could not allow Faolan to follow through with this insanity. “Listen to her,” I said, taking the diplomatic path first. “I can’t let you go through with this.”

Faolan laughed, though the humor did not spread to the rest of his face. “You have no choice. I’ve had your blood, and you are mine by right of the oldest magic. Now, bring me the glass.”

Could I drop it? Just smash it into pieces? If the sands of time itself swirled in the hourglass, what would happen if I dropped it? Whom would I kill? The inhabitants of this world? Mine? Both? It was too much to chance. I looked to Brakae. Her body quavered for a moment as the illusion of her young body grew to reveal the grown woman once again. Steel determination mingled with sadness, and I knew by the expression on her face that she would do what had to be done. No matter what she felt for him, she would kill Faolan before she would let him kill billions of people all in the name of his twisted version of love. Thank God she was on my side, because if she possessed even a fraction of her father’s prowess in battle, Faolan was shit out of luck.

Toe by toe, my foot began to slip toward Faolan. I fought for all I was worth, leaning away from him as my body rebelled against my mind. Anytime, Brakae, I thought, trying to give her a silent signal. Whatever you’re going to do, you’d better do it-now. No such luck. Either I was a piss-poor nonverbal communicator, or she just didn’t think this was the right time to act. Regardless, stalling had gained me nothing more than a renewed attempt by Faolan to control me. His power flooded my body and mind, flowing through my blood with every beat of my heart. And as my mind clouded with only one thought, my feet and legs responded. Go to him. Give him what he wants. Do. Not. Fight.

My arms reached out toward him, confusion swirling in my brain, and everything but Faolan blurred out of focus. He smiled, an expression of pure madness, and he plucked the second half of the hourglass from my waiting hands.

I looked at Brakae, her face shrouded as if by mist. An almost indiscernible nod of her head was all I needed. I knew what would happen if I gave Faolan total control. I’d blacked out at the hotel twice. Like a light switch was being flicked off and on again inside my brain, I’d awoken from a state of prolonged unconsciousness, only to find that mere moments had passed. Time would mean nothing once I surrendered to him. I’d have no memories from now until Faolan decided to restore my self-control.

But Brakae wanted me to do this, and I had to trust that she believed that giving myself over to Faolan was for my own protection. Standing on the precipice of losing myself completely, I looked into that dark abyss and smiled. No fear. No regret. You can’t win without losing. And so, with Brakae’s faith to support my decision, I stepped off the edge into the darkness.

Chapter 25

“You know what it’s like to be separated from your love,” Faolan said with all the fervor of the brokenhearted. “Imagine knowing your Jinn lived just beyond your reach, and you were stuck in a place you hated, forced to live there in order to protect the one thing you were forbidden to see.”

Blinking to clear my vision, I looked around, completely unaware of my surroundings. As though waking suddenly from the deepest sleep, I realized I’d been brought back from whatever dark place Faolan had cast me into. The last thing I remembered was standing in the mouth of the granite cave. And now I found myself in a darkened forest, lightless save the silvery glow of the moon overhead, while Faolan held his dagger against my flesh and prattled on like a preacher at his pulpit. “You cannot deny you have experienced the pain of separation.”

Thanks to you, I do know what that feels like, dickhead. But I thought better of lending my voice to the complaint. Faolan held me close, one arm wrapped tight around my waist. Though his words were for me alone, he gazed past me, toward the woman sitting beneath the swaying branches of a rowan tree. Brakae faced us, the two halves of the broken hourglass resting on the ground beside her, the tears in her eyes reflected in the swirling golden light as the sands of time rebelled against the inevitability of what would soon take place. What the hell had happened since I’d been out of it? Something magical bound her too, her helpless expression proof enough that she could force her way free no better than I. She looked at me and then at Faolan, a silent sob escaping her lips. She had loved him once. And that love had driven him to insanity.

“She is the most beautiful creature I have ever beheld,” Faolan said, his voice breaking with emotion. “I never wanted her here. Trapped. Bound to chaos for eternity. How do you think it made me feel to know that the next time I saw her, she might not be the woman I could hold in my arms? What was I supposed to do with a child? Protect her and nothing more. It disgusts me. Time is perverse this close to The Ring-and that perversion is tied to her. It doesn’t have to be, though. I could never stay as long as I wanted. Every visit was a gamble, and too, too short.” Faolan waved the dagger before him in a flourish, as if showing me a point of interest. “Just as you live in the mundane, Moira lives here with Brakae. Of course, Guardians can travel between the realms. She visits the mundane world often, as once I would come to O Anel at my pleasure. And why this rule of nature? I ask you. Why could I not live here with Brakae and Moira with her brother? How better to protect the one I loved than to be with her always? But no. That is not the way. We must maintain the balance.”

“Faolan,” I rasped through a too-dry throat, “it’s not too late to stop this.”

“I should have stopped this millennia ago,” Faolan snarled in my ear. “It is far too late to change course. I will take this hourglass to Kotja A’ma, and there I will merge the realms.” I stared at him, completely uncomprehending.

“You must understand how it all began, Darian,” he continued. “I was a warrior, once. The right hand of the goddess Badb. The Enphigmale were bred to fight, and we served our purpose, making war against Badb’s enemies. The blood of our foes pooled on the battlefield.” His shoulders slumped as if the weight of his past forced him down. “It was so long ago, the memories are like remnants of dreams.”

I knew how Faolan felt. I had only a century under my belt, and memories from my human childhood were hazy and without detail. I could only imagine what recalling the events from thousands of years ago would be like: lifetimes’ worth of memories slipping through the mental cracks.

“The humans kept their distance from the Fae. Soon their curiosity of the extraordinary turned to fear and hatred.” Faolan’s dreamy countenance faded, and the muscles flexed in his cheek as he clenched his jaw. “War broke out between the humans and the Fae, but they were weak and fragile, and our armies decimated their numbers until few remained. The gods had come to love their human children and could no longer bear to see them killed.”

“You sound bitter, Faolan,” I muttered. “Upset you couldn’t commit genocide when you had the chance?”

“I’d been bred to kill.” His voice was a low growl in my ear. “What do you think?”

“You’re not inherently cruel.” Brakae’s soft voice broke into our conversation. “Faolan, Badb would have never