And for a second I can’t breathe, before my mind catches up with me.
If I stay here I’ll die.
Fear gives my feet wings. There’s only one path forward. I sprint through streets, waving my arms as I see a group of fae scrambling on top of a roof.
“Go!” I croak. “Run!”
The house won’t be tall enough.
But there are more merchants here, as if they paused in their mad rush. There’s a bucket chain and one old lady holds a bucket in hand, gaping behind me as if she’s just seen the end of her existence glaring down upon her.
These people will die.
They’ll all die.
And I can’t stop it and I can’t run fast enough, and then I skid around a corner coming face-to-face with mayhem.
The Wayfarer’s Oak looms over us, but the streets are a warren here, and they’re a death trap for the hundreds of fae trying to escape.
A little girl stands in the street, crying for her mother as fae trample past her. Screams filter through the air. Incoherent cries. Some people try to reach for others in the swimming mess of fae bodies, but others merely shove them apart as they try to escape.
It’s the little girl that catches my eye.
Alone. Terrified. A blonde plait hanging down her back.
And pounding through my memories is every nightmare I’ve ever had of a baby crying.
Thiago said to get them out. There’s no time for this. No—
I shove through the crowd, darting a look at the shining curtain of water that thunders down the cliffs. It hits the streets, gushing toward us in an ever-churning wave.
It churns into shops, smashing glass, and sweeping tables and chairs along with it. Almost upon us.
One little girl. If I can save one little girl….
“Ayelet!” someone screams, and I catch sight of a woman reaching for us with horror written all over her face as she’s pushed into the crowd.
“Hold still,” I whisper hoarsely. “I’ve got you.”
Dragging the little girl into my arms, I close my eyes and try to will us away from there. I can feel the Hallow in the castle, plugged directly into the ley line. It’s a drumbeat that calls to me.
And maybe if I wish hard enough I can somehow get us out of here.
Nobody’s ever been able to travel without a Hallow portal.
But I have the blood of the Old Ones in my veins and maybe….
Maybe nothing. There’s no link to connect with. The Hallow’s too distant.
Water roars down the streets toward me. I can’t outrun it. I can’t channel it. I can’t evaporate it.
My magic is useless, and—
A little whisper of memory stops me.
The Gray Guild whispering about how Thiago wants to bind me to the kingdom.
A bound queen rules the lands. She gives herself over to them and they rise and fall with her blood. My mother bound herself to Asturia a thousand years ago, and she can wield the land’s hungry power like a whip.
“You want a queen, Mother?” I rasp. Dragging the knife across my palm, I slam my hand against the cobblestones, marking it. “Then let me give you a queen.”
This is not the way it’s supposed to happen. To bind a queen to the land is a cause for joy and celebration. Not one of desperation.
Nothing happens.
There is no great spiraling rage of power. There is no surge. The stone feels cold beneath my bare palm, and I withdraw my fist, clenching it against my chest.
It didn’t work.
I’ve never felt more unworthy in my life.
But then my eye falls on the Wayfarer’s Oak.
If the oak falls, the city will fall, they say.
It’s the type of prophecy my mother would like.
Even if the city stands, even if most people escape, if the oak falls then it will crush the heart and soul of these people. Symbols stand for a reason, and I grab Ayelet and fight my way toward it, determined not to let Thiago wear the burden of this loss.
I won’t let her win.
Not this way.
I’ve spent years polishing my anger until it’s a shining blade of retribution.
I want her to lose.
I want to destroy every plan she’s ever set in place.
I will not let her have this victory. I will not let her take my city—my kingdom, my husband—from me. Ceres is mine. Evernight is mine.
And Thiago is mine.
Water sweeps the woman and her friends away.
My bloodied palm slaps against the tree just as the first gush of water slams into my feet. Ayelet screams and throws her arms around my waist.
Maybe it’s a combination of fury and the desire to protect what I’ve come to cherish, but the second my blood marks the tree, it sets off an alchemical explosion within me. Something suddenly unlocks within my soul. I reach out and thousands of roots spear out from the tree, sinking my mind down, down, until the earth beneath my feet answers, the lands suddenly singing through my veins.
I can feel it all.
I am the city.
I am the lands.
I am Evernight.
“Vi!” Thiago screams in my mind.
Nothing can touch me right now.
Water parts around me, thundering past as I splay my fingers wide. The spray of it stings my face, whipping my hair behind me, but I can’t focus on the physical.
Hear me!
The earth groans beneath my feet. And then cracks begin forming in the cobbles as I clench my fist together. Water plunges between the cracks, gushing down into the sewers and caverns beneath it. I feel them snaking through the earth. Catacombs. Underground rivers. Hollows and nooks where the rats lurk. I send the water down, letting it pour through those hidden tunnels.
I am a woman standing before a flood.
I am a queen with the power of the lands shivering in my veins until I can barely see the world around me.
I am every inch of earth beneath my feet, every little earthworm creeping through the dark unknown, every bone in the ground, every stone that forms the numerous catacombs beneath me. I am water
