The Glass Queen (The Forest of Good and Evil #2) - Gena Showalter Page 0,157

I struggled to tell one from the other.

Ashleigh and Leonora were fighting for control. In that moment, I realized the truth. Ashleigh had been right. She never would have been truly happy with Leonora buried inside her. The phantom needed to die.

I tried to speak, to tell her I loved her one last time, how sorry I was that I’d failed us both so many times, but I only made choking sounds. A greater weakness than I’d ever known invaded my muscles...my bones.

“If you do not agree,” she continued, eyes blue, then green, blue, green, “Do not agree. I will let you die. I can save you, just give me a chance. Then I’ll kill the girl. Me not her.” Two women speaking from one mouth elicited pure confusion.

I wasn’t at my best, my thoughts as dull as my eyesight; I probably couldn’t think my way off a floating log. Deciphering what they’d said was beyond me.

Once again, Ashleigh reached for the dagger—drew back—reached. I was just coherent enough to remember Ashleigh had wanted to touch me before Leonora had begun speaking through her. If Ashleigh wanted to touch me, Ashleigh got to touch me.

With the last remnants of my strength, I bowed my back to the best of my ability, lifting my chest the next time she reached for the dagger... Contact. Her fingers brushed the hilt of my sister’s dagger, and the weapon...just...melted, and...and...what was happening? Excruciating.

I threw back my head and roared. I thought the metal might be cooling to form a thin layer of metal where my heart had been cut. Internal armor?

I wheezed every breath, my veins on fire. My vision blurred, clouded by the smoke that curled from my flesh. Sweat trickled from my pores. But...my heartbeat normalized.

I was healing? The metal had truly fused—bonded—to my heart, the two working together? Because of Ashleigh’s magic? The ability Ophelia had mentioned?

My princess is stronger than all of us.

Soon, my heartbeat steadied. The smoke thinned, my vision clearing. What I found worried me. Ashleigh’s eyes were flashing blue so swiftly, I could barely detect a hint of green anymore.

A roar more ear-piercing than Ashleigh’s suddenly cut through the air, and nearly every occupant in the room became paralyzed with terror. Thick tension filled the room, silence descending—until Pagan and Pyre burst through what remained of the windows, entering the palace.

I heard a chorus of gasps and screams as the beasts flew over the masses, blowing targeted streams of fire to form a wall. Raven and Tempest rolled out of the way before the flames could consume them.

I clasped Ashleigh’s trembling hand. She’d paled, her skin waxen, the fight with Leonora weakening her.

“She’s decided...to kill you and...start over. Won’t let her.” Eyes flashing faster, Ashleigh wrenched free of my grip and scrambled back. She stumbled to her feet, and I lumbered to mine.

“It’s all right, Asha.” I reached for her. Noel’s forever-ago prediction that all would be settled by midnight filled my head. That what would be, would be. Ashleigh had saved me. What right did I have to condemn her to a life with Leonora? Her happiness meant more to me than my own. What she wanted, I would provide. Always. “We’re going to kill the phantom together, love.”

She lurched back before I could say more. “Don’t come any closer. She’s winning.” Then she grabbed her crossbow, turned and ran.

“Ashleigh,” I shouted.

She didn’t look back. One of her boots snagged on a fallen body and slipped free. She kept going, running on broken glass, leaving a trail of crimson in her wake. Too soon, she moved through the flames and vanished into the panicking crowd.

I picked up a fallen sword. As I cracked the bones in my neck, I scanned the room. People running. Bodies motionless on the floor. The avian who had followed my sister and mother fought Roth’s men, and they were losing. The king and Dior remained on their thrones. While Dior kept her head down and rocked back and forth, obviously terrified, the furious king twisted this way and that.

He fights for freedom. His stepdaughter had turned his feet into gold. That gold was so translucent, it appeared glass. They must have been heavy because they held him in place as surely as pitch.

Pagan landed next to me and licked my face before her massive, scaled body heaved once, twice, thrice, and she spit out Noel.

Covered in slime, the oracle rolled across the floor. She climbed to her feet, shouting, “I said