Beyond the Mountain (Fae's Captive #4) - Lily Archer Page 0,28
homicidal, and full of rage.” Her tone turns dreamy. “A deadly treat you are, wearing your darkness on the outside.”
“So, I can change back?”
“Can you?” She cackles, and I realize I’m not getting any more straight answers from her. I glance at the dress and try another avenue. “What sort of stupid ceremony is he planning for tonight? Gloating over Leander and his pals?”
“You didn’t answer my question. Who will you be? Death? Or, you could go back to being that little waif in the woods. The girl I met, the one who wanted to go home.”
“We can be whatever we want to be.” Taylor’s words float through me, melding with my own.
“I can hear her in there. But she’s you.” Selene taps my temple. “Confusing. But all will be one soon enough. Now answer my question. What shall you be?”
“I can’t go home. I mean, back to earth.” Leander’s voice resonates in my heart. “I am your home.” I rub my eyes. “I don’t want to.” I realize that neither of us do. “I’m not a changeling. Maybe I don’t know what I am or what I should be. But I feel this desire to destroy. It’s so strong.” I close the ball of death in my fist, and it disappears, then open my palm and watch it ignite again. “I want to take it all and rule.”
“Your father. That’s him in there.” She taps my temple again. “It’s you but not you. Locked away for so long by the soulstone, it came roaring out. Ready to tear the world to pieces and feast on its bones.” She grins as if she likes the taste of her own words. “This feral form you’re in is Shathinor’s blood, his soul as black as night. The wings, the hair, the red lips.” Her eyes dart to my mouth. “Makes me want to relive my college of magic days. Tempting feral.”
I ignore her poor come-on. “Delantis said that the feral is the same as the fae. She could call hers forth in the form of a gryphon, but its name was Delantis, and it was her. They worked together. I feel like I’m at war with whatever I was before the stone was removed. She wants to overtake me, to push me back down into darkness again and lock me away.” I grit my teeth. “Never again.”
“Delantis was correct. Very smart fae, that one.” She picks at her teeth. “Who’s Delantis?”
“Doesn’t matter.” I sigh and sit up. “None of this is getting me anywhere. Besides, I’ve chosen my path. War. I can’t change what I am, whatever that is.”
“I know what you are.” She pats me on the head. “I’ve known since I tasted you in the Greenvelde.”
“Then what am I?”
“A child of many worlds.”
“You mean the prophecy.” I toss the black sphere into the air and catch it. “That’s not helpful.”
“Not helpful? It tells you everything you need to know.”
“It doesn’t even make sense. ‘She alone can start the war and be victorious, win or lose.’ How can anyone be victorious if they lose?”
“Depends on what they lose and what victory means.” She cackles. “Prophecies are always so tricky. Maybe the seer was hedging, eh? Not wanting to say one way or another, so she twisted it into a knot.”
“One I can’t untangle.”
“No need. What will be is already set in motion. Choices have been made whether you know it or not.” She rises and strides to the dress. “Nice. Perfect for tonight.”
“Tell me what happens tonight.” I itch to know where my father’s keeping Leander. The bond between us is alive but dimmed.
“No, no, no. TMI, my dark beauty. T-M-I.” She claps her hands, the slap of stone jarring. “Besides, I can’t see the future.” She lifts the dress and holds it up to her body, then dances around the room. “I can only taste the blood in the air, sense the hate that echoes along these stone walls, and covet the bones that are soon to be stripped from their owners.”
A knock at the door draws my attention, and Cecile returns, her gaze down as Selene waltzes around her. “Your father summons you.”
“Fine.” I wave her away. “You can go.”
She glances at Selene and shudders. “I-I’m to accompany you.”
“Why?”
She shrugs.
“Whatever.” I strip and grab the dress from Selene as she eyes my body.
Slipping it over my head, I roll my shoulders and let it fall in all the right places, my wings free through the open back. Before leaving,