Through the Ether (Force of Nature Book 5) - Amber Lynn Natusch Page 0,68

tore through the fey king’s flesh as his vise-like grip held him in place with a little help from my winds. Merc’s eyes glowed like silver ice as he sucked the fairy dry.

The witches and warlocks fanned out and held the perimeter with a wall of magic that kept the king’s army of wolves hemmed in. But as Phineas grew weaker, his thrall over the pack broke. They stood motionless and watched as their de facto leader fell to his knees when Merc released him, blood trickling down his chin.

Phineas struggled to stand, but Merc clamped those massive hands around his face and held him still. “You tried to take her from me once,” he rumbled. “You will not have the chance ever again.”

The fey king’s eyes went wide just before Merc tore his head from his body and threw it into the brush behind us. The witches burned it immediately and made quick work of the rest of his corpse, reducing it to ash. With a hard exhale from me, the winds I called carried those ashes off into the woods, scattering them so far and wide that no magic could ever reunite them.

One royal down. One to go.

I looked up to see the queen step out of the tree line, expecting her to make her move now that one problem was out of the way, but she didn’t move. She didn’t attack. She didn’t even look my way, as though there were no threat before her. Instead, she just stared in annoyance at where his body had been as she waited for God only knew what.

Etherian did the same.

Then slowly, like a faintly burning coal, a shimmer of magic wafted up from the ground and danced in the air. It hovered for a moment, as though hesitating—as though it were a sentient being. It spun in a slow circle before stopping. Then, in a flash, it shot across the yard and slammed into Knox. He stumbled back into Foust, gasping for breath.

“What the fuck was that?” Knox wheezed as he clutched his chest, eyes blazing yellow with power.

Larken let loose a scream that shook our combined realms. “NOOO! It should have been mine!”

“What’s happening?” I asked anyone who might have had an answer.

Etherian turned his deadly, beautiful face to me, rage sharpening his features. “Knox is the heir to the fey king’s power,” he said calmly—too calmly. “It has chosen him.” His anger at this revelation could not have been more apparent. Before that moment, the reigning royals and I had been the only obstacles in his quest for the throne. But he’d once again been denied what he wanted—the very thing I’d promised him—and I looked on as his rage began to boil over. “You lied,” he seethed, calling forth whatever magic he possessed that I had yet to see. It was bad enough when he’d had no vessel to channel it. I wasn’t betting that having one would tone it down. “You lied!”

I steeled myself against his anger, just as a ruler of Faerie would. “You said it yourself: the fey lie.”

A roar of anguish escaped him just before stony javelins shot up from the ground into the air and hurtled toward our army at a speed that my mind could barely comprehend. By the time I shot my hands out to thwart his attack, he’d speared two warlocks and a witch and narrowly missed the vampires nearby, thanks to their superior reflexes.

Larken’s unstable laughter rang out over the din, and her troops lined the woods, prepared to strike once she grew tired of the show. “What a pleasant surprise he is,” my mother said with a laugh. “Looks like he knows who the losing side in this war will be and is keen to ally with the winner. Something you will never be…” I caught a glimpse of her satisfied smile as she advanced toward us, slow and confident, like she had all the time in the world. Like nothing could stop her now. “There is no escaping the inevitable, Piper. This war will only end one way. My plan was set in motion long ago. Neither you, nor the fey king’s heir, nor the vampire king, nor your pathetic army can stop me.” She clenched her fist and I felt the air around us compress, making it almost impossible to breathe. Unable to speak, I mentally called to the elements around me, a silent scream for aid. The air shuddered, as though caught in