Through the Ether (Force of Nature Book 5) - Amber Lynn Natusch Page 0,80

close—or she was.”

“Your actions should draw her out.”

“I have a better idea,” Knox said, determination in his stare. Before I could say a word to stop him, he ripped his shirt over his head and scrubbed his face clean. The second his shirt hit the ground, a portal appeared and Etherian emerged.

Which meant my mother couldn’t be far away.

“Where are your friends?” the rogue fey asked, eyeing Knox keenly.

“Inside, killing your new allies.”

Etherian barked out a laugh. “I have no allies. I have only self-interest.”

“She’ll have you killed if you succeed, you know that, right? She’ll keep killing anyone with Phineas’ power until it’s hers.”

“She will try,” he replied with confidence he shouldn’t have had.

“Maybe...if you can get it from me first.”

Reinhardt grabbed my arm and turned me toward the trees at the back of the mansion. “There,” he whispered. “She’s there.” I looked at where he pointed in the distance and saw her in all her crimson-clad glory. “I have a wrong to right, Piper,” my father continued as the man-bear snarled behind me. “It is time I do that.”

Grizz and Reinhardt bolted toward the tree line where the queen watched the battle between Etherian and Knox, still unable to see the rest of us. Kat, Foust, Jagger, and Brunton weren’t far behind. I started to follow, then ran right into Liam as he appeared before me from a portal. Enforcers spilled out into the middle of the yard; enforcers not marked with my blood and Sherry’s spell. Merc caught my arm and looked at me, so many unspoken words in the depths of his eyes, but the moment was cut short by the sound of Sherry screaming as though she were being torn apart.

“I can’t hold it any longer!”

The cloak of invisibility snapped, leaving us all visible to the fey queen. I could practically feel her anger as we came into view. My mother and her army flashed through a portal and converged on us seconds later. Chaos ensued as the fey guard slammed into us like a tidal wave. The witches and warlocks threw up a barrier, shielding everyone behind them from the onslaught, but my father, guardian, and friends were near the tree line, outside that bubble, and I watched as the queen turned her attention to them. Her hand raised, and all I could see was Drake’s plucked and dying body in my mind—my mother’s promise to destroy everyone I loved, one by one.

I screamed for them to take cover as I whipped a storm of gravel and debris her way, but not quickly enough. Lightning shot from her hand, headed right for them, and all I could do was look on in that split second that felt like an hour and watch as it struck.

When the smoke cleared, I couldn’t see them anywhere.

I turned to find my mother smiling at me, the joy at what she’d done apparent on her face.

“You fucking bitch!” I screamed. Fire blasted from my fingertips as I charged her. I couldn’t hear the battle around me; couldn’t see the mounting carnage. All I saw was the twinkle in her eyes and challenge in her stance as I ran toward her, rage and sorrow fueling me.

She pointed her longsword at me, and I saw the glint of magic shining off the tip, but rational thought was gone at that point, so I charged on.

“No!” a voice shouted, cutting through the haze of vengeance clouding my mind.

Then my mother disappeared, and I was standing in the field where my friends had just died.

Except they weren’t there.

“Jase and Dean got them out just in time,” Merc said, his dark eyes staring back at me from only inches away. “They are alive, Piper, and they will want you to be at the end of this, too.” He grabbed my chin and turned my face toward the battle in the yard. “They need you to be smart. They need you to win, and you cannot do that if you let your mother manipulate you. She knows you can beat her, Piper. That’s why she’s doing this. You have to think like her. You have to be the princess of Faerie right now.”

His words rang through my mind like a gunshot, drowning out everything else. It was the mental slap I needed.

He smiled at me, the act grounding me as it always had.

Then his face disappeared as he flew across the yard, ghosting at the last second before he crashed into the fray. My mother