Through the Ether (Force of Nature Book 5) - Amber Lynn Natusch Page 0,82
to see where my mother had gone—where my friends were. Where Grizz was. But all I could see were bodies and blood and magic and blades in the moonlight.
“My mother’s plan to get Phineas’ powers failed,” I shouted over the din, “so what will she do now?”
“Try with someone else,” Knox replied.
“Or draw you out,” my father added as he blasted a wall of water at a fey prepared to skewer Merc with a blade.
“Even without the fey king’s power, she could win, now that she has the amulet,” Liam said.
“And we aren’t exactly destroying her troops at the moment,” Knox added with a growl before going after another one of those troops.
Anger built within me, and I looked back at Merc, who dared a glance my way as though he felt my eyes on him. An eternity passed in those seconds, as though time itself had stopped to allow us that moment together—that moment to silently say all that could be said in the midst of a battle. That I loved him. That I couldn’t imagine my life without him. That I had to go, and to please understand. And what he said back to me was ‘I know’ and “I love you too’.
“We have to get her,” I yelled at Knox, and he never hesitated for even a second. “Liam, take us into the woods.”
With a brisk nod and the help of my father’s magic to cover us, he ripped us through a portal that opened near the rickety bridge.
“What now?” he asked.
“Now you go back and help the others,” I replied, “while we play Red Rover with my fucking mother.”
He hesitated for only a moment. “Fight well,” he said before ducking back through the portal and disappearing from sight.
Seconds later, my mother took the bait.
A portal opened on the far side of the bridge, and she stepped through it as though exiting a limo at the end of a red carpet. Her glorious cape flapped in the breeze, cloaking her in regality and authority and an air of strength.
“What’s this? Too afraid to fight your mother on your own?”
“Too eager to meet your end?” I replied, lifting my chin a notch higher, if only to meet her confidence with my own.
She took a step toward the bridge, and a glint of blue around her neck reflected in the night sky. The amulet dangled there like a warning, and I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. Then she smiled.
“Hardly.”
“Then let’s get this over with.” I took a step forward and spread my arms in invitation. “Mom.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Her laughter rang out across the gorge, and it raked down my back like a werewolf’s claws. I turned to see if Knox had done just that and found him staring at my mother, eyes glowing yellow with anger.
“You know something, Piper? In another life—another world—I might actually have been proud of what you’ve accomplished on your own. How you survived without your kind to help you.”
“But in this life, you just want me dead.”
Her smile widened, and her laughter grew. “That’s true, but you shouldn’t take it so personally. It’s a compliment, really. It means that I see you as a threat—not one great enough to defeat me, but a threat nonetheless.”
“I didn’t have to be,” I replied, my anger giving ground to the orphaned child lurking down deep inside of me. The one who used to cry herself to sleep. The one who always wondered what she’d done to deserve being abandoned. Why she wasn’t worth enough to love. If this was to be our final stand, then there was one question I wanted answered; one thing I needed to understand. “Why did you do it? Why did you give me to Knox to dispose of when I was a baby? I couldn’t have killed you even if I’d wanted to, so I know that’s not the answer.”
She cocked her head as she assessed me. “It’s simple, silly girl; because you’re just like me.” She took a step onto the bridge, the amulet glowing brighter. “Because you would do anything to be queen...just like I did.”
My mind raced with the implications of her words. “I am nothing like you—”
“But you are, Piper, except for one soon-to-be-fatal flaw: you are weak. Your emotions—your time here on Earth—have made you so. You have all that power, but you lack the will to use it when you need to most.”