in the living world, and in the divine realm. His disappearance is just a symptom of a much more insidious and widespread disease that could bring both toppling down.”
“But surely the other gods must know something?” the three-headed woman said, sounding more agitated. “And is the death rate of potential heroes another symptom?”
The Horned God gave a derisive snort that I felt could scrape flesh from bone. “Heroes? So having divine blood automatically makes someone worthy of adulation and song? I think not.”
“The same can be said for the sons of kings,” the left head said. “Their blue blood automatically puts them above the rest. It’s no wonder many royal lineages claim descent from one god or another, to add divine right to their entitlements.”
“Throughout history, how many pivotal figures were the spoiled spawn of kings?” He tilted his macabre head at all of hers, dancing his fingertips over the handle of his silver bident. “Being born with a title doesn’t mean anything. It’s what you do with the one you achieve.”
“And you would know all about that,” the middle head said with a mirthless huff. “Has anyone caught on to you yet?”
“That depends on what our eavesdropper has to say.”
And he looked directly at me.
I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t even think with the Horned God pinning me with his eyeless stare.
He moved towards me, purple light shining within the endless depths of his sockets, a pale, elegant hand reaching out. I stumbled back, shaking, and mumbling nonsensical prayers and pleas, begging him to spare me.
It wasn’t my time to die. It wasn’t. I had to leave. Had to return to Robin—had to see him, tell him…
A heaving gasp tore out of me as the Horned God almost touched me,—then I was sucked out of the Underworld again.
Chapter Thirty
Next breath, I found myself back within proximity of my friends.
We were, once again, in a vastly different place.
The floor seemed to be made of crystal, as did the walls and the staircase near the hall we stood in, with a lot of broken mirrors all around.
I’d seen this place before, in those first out-of-body visions.
Robin stood by an ajar double door with Will, Meira, and a tall, blond man with pointed ears and a beard. Meira was crying as if her world was ending. Will held her close, trying to comfort her.
“What happened?” I croaked, voice wavering with the reverberating shock of my hair-raising encounter and narrow escape.
Meira swung around with a hiccup, let out a cry of anguish as she rushed towards me, arms held out. She stopped before she went through me, swayed unsteadily, and I saw she’d been crying for a while now. She cried harder now.
“What happened?” I asked again. “Where is Agnë? How is Jon?”
“Jon is being treated by the court healer, and Agnë’s with him.” Robin approached, cautiously, like he would a deer who would scamper off at the first movement. “Did you go to the—same place again? You really scared me—all of us.”
It warmed my frozen heart, how worried he sounded. But he looked more than worried. He looked horrified. I raised my hand to him, and found it totally gone, along with my entire arm.
A desperate moan escaped me. I was deteriorating too rapidly.
“Did you find the Winter King?” I asked dully when I could speak again.
“The king is visiting a nearby city,” said the bearded fairy, Agnë’s brother by the looks of him. “He is due to return soon.”
Meira let out a howl of a wounded animal. “We were too late. He’s engaged! And his curse was broken by the girl he’s marrying. We were just a few days too late! The days we wasted in the Summer Court!”
I just stared at her, too worn out to even care that I’d lost my last chance of being saved. I’d somehow known it would be like this.
I felt the intensity of Robin’s concern singeing me, and raised my eyes to his. I lost myself in the planes of his face, calming myself by counting his freckles. I could trace constellations on them if I could just reach out and touch him.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered hoarsely. “I really thought this would be it, that you would be free.”
Strangely unmoved by the dire reality I was mired in, I smiled at him and Meira placatingly. My arm was missing and oblivion was staring me in the face. Soon my whole body would join my arm and I would cease to exist. I would return