Destined

And Klea had lied to Yuki.

“Yuki, you have to listen to me — we’re not the ones lying to you. Klea is. After the fire she sent that red stuff in and it killed everyone it touched. Not sleeping — dead. She’s not what you think she is. She’s a murderer.”

Yuki blinked, but in her eyes, Laurel could see her decision was made. “She said you’d say that,” Yuki said softly, steadily. She turned and looked at Tamani. Then, so low Laurel barely heard, Yuki whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Roots erupted from the earth again, forming a dark, mossy birdcage around Laurel. Then the ground round David retreated, pulled back by a million tiny filaments of plant matter, forming a doughnut-shaped pit around him — too far to jump over without a running start, too deep to climb out of easily.

“Forget him!” Klea yelled. “He can’t do anything.”

Yuki turned and looked at her mentor and Tamani and, after a moment’s hesitation, clenched one fist.

“Tamani!” Laurel shouted, but thick roots thrust up beneath him, knocking his spear away and throwing Tamani to his knees, binding his wrists to the ground.

“Don’t hurt them,” Yuki said, even as Klea pulled a knife from a hidden sheath. “Let’s just go.”

But from the road, a familiar voice intoned, “I think you’ve gone far enough.”

Chapter 20

Everyone’s eyes went to the figure limping up the path toward them, leaning heavily on a beautiful ebony cane.

“Jamison!” Laurel cried.

His face was haggard and he seemed to be dragging his body as much as walking. Yuki and Klea were momentarily stunned into inaction. The pit surrounding David filled itself in and Laurel’s cage retreated back into the ground along with Tamani’s bonds. Tamani tackled Klea — her remaining faerie guards were confused, and one of them seemed to be trying to put his ruined gun back together despite it being clearly beyond repair. Laurel ran to Jamison and took his arm before anyone could think to stop her.

“You’re awake,” she breathed.

“As awake as I am going to get for the moment,” he said with a tired smile. He patted her shoulder. “But might I recommend that you stand back?”

Uncertain, Laurel took a step backwards as Jamison raised his hand, almost casually; a thick oak root stopped with a smack right against his palm. Laurel turned to see Yuki, arms outstretched, her whole body trembling. Laurel couldn’t tell if her expression was one of fear, fury, or sheer effort. Perhaps some of all three.

A crackling of leaves came from where Chelsea was hiding and Laurel knew she was about to step out.

“That’s enough!” Laurel yelled as loud as she could, and though no one withdrew, they all stopped. For a moment. “Everyone needs to just stay where they are,” she said, sparing a glance at the trees where Chelsea was, thankfully, still hidden. Even with Jamison back, Laurel wasn’t ready to give up her one secret advantage, though she knew how hard it must be for Chelsea to look on helplessly.

The time it took to get those words out was all she got. Klea barked a laugh as she managed to throw Tamani off and Yuki advanced on Jamison.

“It has always been my destiny to face you,” Yuki said quietly as David moved closer to Laurel, putting himself between her and the advancing guards with his sword raised.

“Subtle,” he whispered out of the side of his mouth.

“It worked,” Laurel retorted, returning her focus to Yuki, who was drawing closer and closer to Jamison.

“To face me? What kind of destiny is that?” Jamison asked calmly.

“I was created to avenge Klea,” Yuki replied. “It has always been my purpose.”

“You don’t believe that,” Jamison said, and Laurel marvelled at how the wizened faerie could be so firm and yet so gentle with every word.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Yuki demanded, her eyebrows furrowed. She pushed her hands out and the earth beneath Jamison opened in a wide crack, very nearly swallowing Tamani and Klea as each struggled to subdue the other.

Latticework blades of grass hissed to catch Jamison before he had fallen even an inch, weaving a seamless, impossibly solid bridge over the pit Yuki had opened beneath him. His voice did not even waver. “No person’s life should be defined by a single purpose, especially one they didn’t choose. Who are you, Yuki?”

Yuki’s eyes darted to Klea, but she had a knife out again and was busy lunging at Tamani.

“Yuki, you—”

But Klea’s knife touched Tamani’s throat, silencing whatever he’d been about to say. “You should have been dead the second you stepped into my Bender’s sight,” Klea spat to Tamani as he fought to keep the knife from cutting his skin. “Yuki could have killed you outright.”

“I decided to take a chance on her,” Tamani replied, flinging the blade away and reclaiming his spear.

“She’s a poor bet. You got lucky.” Klea’s knife met Tamani’s spear again and again, and Laurel realised that the erstwhile troll hunter was no longer trying to kill Tamani; she was trying to get past Tamani, to strike at Jamison. Abruptly, as if waking from a dream, her guards turned their heads as one and pivoted away from David and Laurel to go aid their master.

“Stop them, David!” Laurel called.

“I can’t hurt them,” David said.

“I–I don’t think they realise that,” Laurel whispered. There was something very wrong with these guards. David stepped in front of them, holding his sword out in a threatening posture. They hesitated and Laurel caught another wisp of Jamison and Yuki’s conversation.

“Don’t act like you care about me, Bender,” Yuki sneered, waving a hand above her head in a circle. “You pretended to care about Klea, and I know how that ended.” She brought her arm down, pointing at him, and something blurred through the air towards Jamison.

“Do you?” Jamison asked, passing his hand in front of his face distractedly, as though shooing a fly. But at his movement a hundred wicked-sharp splinters of wood dropped harmlessly at his feet. “Because I would be most interested to hear what Callista told you.”

“Shut up, old man!” Klea yelled, and Tamani grunted as the heel of her hand struck his cheek, reopening the cut she’d given him that morning. He cracked his spear against her broken wrist, eliciting a shriek of pain.

“She’s not Callista anymore,” Yuki said evenly, hardly sparing them a glance, her attention riveted on Jamison.

While David held Klea’s guards at bay, Laurel looked over at Yuki’s back and for a moment wondered if she could tackle her from behind. She glanced at Jamison, but he shook his head, almost imperceptibly.

“She will always be Callista to me. Do you know why?” Jamison said, his eyes on Yuki again.

Yuki hesitated, but Jamison didn’t wait for her to reply.

“Because Callista was well intentioned and full of hopes and dreams and, above all, brilliance,” Jamison says. “And I want to remember that — not the creature she has become.”

“You made that creature. And that creature made me.” One of the trees lining the road — thankfully, not the one where Chelsea had concealed herself — bent in two, shattering with a thunderous crack and falling, unnaturally fast, towards Jamison.

“Thank you, my dear,” Jamison said with a sigh as the tree trunk flew over his head. “I do need to sit down.” The mighty trunk crashed across what remained of the road to the palace, before coming to a stop right behind Jamison’s knees. He lowered himself on to it with a quiet groan. “I confess, Laurel and Rhoslyn were only able to throw off the barest portion of the potion’s effect. I am conscious, but only just.”

Yuki’s face screwed up in anger and she stretched her arms wide, swishing them forward. Laurel had to grab on to one of the trees beside her to keep from being swept away by the tornado of plant life that spun wildly around the two Winter faeries, sequestering them.