“They’re searching all the dark-haired couples,” I breathe.
But as I speak, they wrench at a tall brunet dancing with a blonde fae woman.
“Any dark-haired male.” Thiago’s eyes narrow, and then he looks down at me. “Go. They won’t stop you if you’re not with me. Not with that hair. I’ll slink into the shadows and follow you.”
Pulse pounding, I fetch another glass of wine. He vanishes in a swirl of his cloak, and I push between a pair of gossiping fauns, making my way casually across the clearing. The prickle between my shoulder blades itches, but nobody stops me. Nobody cries out.
And then I’m in the trees once more, and there’s a shadow flitting along through the woods beside me, like an invisible wolf that follows at my heels.
“Finn’s going to meet us by the lake,” Thiago whispers in my head.
I head in that direction.
The dancers are thinning out now, and though I nearly trample a pair of entwined lovers as I stagger through a thicket, we’re almost alone here.
Almost.
As I hurry around an oak, I see a tall figure picking her way through the middle of the clearing. The moonlight glimmers on her golden gown, and she clutches her skirts in hands that are bedecked with a half dozen rings.
I skid to a halt.
“The wards are not designed to rouse the guards,” my mother says, her cold eyes locking upon me. “But they will wrap themselves around any intruders like spider silk, so I can track them at my leisure. Hello, little thief. Step into the light and show me who you are.”
Chapter Thirty
“Stay hidden,” I warn Thiago.
There’s nothing but silence from his direction, but I know he’s there.
The thought doesn’t ease my nerves; this is what I’ve been trying to avoid at all costs. The last time these two were in the same vicinity, they nearly tore each other apart.
“Who are you?” she demands, flinging a hand toward me.
The mask is torn from my face, and the wig tumbles to the ground with it. My dark hair spills around my shoulders in an inky swirl, but as her winds rip at my skirts, I ward them away. I’m no longer entirely defenseless.
Her eyes flare wide with shock. “Iskvien?”
Good to know that when it comes to stealing her crown, I’m not even the first on her suspect list. She’s blamed me for everything else my entire life, so I was half expecting it.
“Hello, Mother.”
Armor jingles. Guards flood the woods, and torches flare to life as they surround me. Dozens of them by the look of it. But my mother holds up her palm, warning them not to move.
“Where is he?” she demands.
“Where is who?”
“You know who I mean.” Her voice drops into a snarl. “That filth you lay with.”
Interesting. Her wards cling to me, but perhaps they slipped from his skin when he became naught more than shadows. “Perhaps I came to enjoy your Imbolc celebrations. Perhaps I missed life at the castle….” I can’t keep a straight face. “Fine. That last one’s a lie. There’s not a damned thing I miss here.”
“You mock me?”
The alternative is to try and strangle her with my bare hands. “Considering what you did to me, you should be relieved all I’m doing is mocking you.”
“Seize her,” Adaia snaps at her guards.
“I think not.”
Wind stirs through the trees as I squat and press my fingertips to the ground. There. Far below us quivers the ley line, though the nexus point—the Hallow—is five miles to the north. Within its ringed stones I’d be invincible, but here, all I can do is pluck at the magic and feel it bubbling up through the ground as if the ley line has found a new nexus point.
Me.
Her eyes lock upon me. “I’ve been wondering how you did it.”
“Surprise, Mother.” I lift my head, feeling the wind stream through my hair as if something answers me. This is not Evernight, where I bound myself to the lands, but there’s something there. A little tremor in the ground where my feet touch, as though something recognizes me. “You’re not the only one with mysterious powers.”
The guards rush toward me.
Throwing up a hand, I send them all flying with an explosion of flame. One slams into a tree. Another crashes in a cascade of metal.
She sends a howl of wind toward me, but it’s the vines snaking over the grass that catch my attention as I stagger backward. One locks around my ankle, and I cross my arms and slash down sharply, parting her winds. Vicious thorns dig into my skin.
But the second my blood hits the earth, a tremor runs through the ground. Those thorns are suddenly mine, and I twist them back upon her, lashing them toward her with vicious speed.
My mother screams as she throws herself aside.
Scrambling to her hands and knees, she glares at me.
I hold my hands up. A faint light suffuses my fingertips. I can feel the lands whispering to me, calling out for succor. It’s a little like the night I bound myself to Evernight. They yearn to be touched, yearn to uplift a queen—
“No!” my mother screams, and then she grabs a knife from her belt and throws herself at me.
I’m caught in the land’s whispers, distracted by the thorns that beg me for command. A flash of light shears toward me, and only months of Eris’s training forces me to react in time. Twisting beneath the blow, I roll her wrist over the top of my forearm and drive my fist into her ribs.
She collapses into an undignified heap at my feet.
Several of the guards draw sharp breaths.
Nobody has ever seen my mother stumble, and I recognize the danger all too late.
Mother looks up with a gasp, but there’s murder in her eyes.
