“I’m not fae,” I whisper, blurting out my revelation, finding it easier to speak the truth than I thought it would be.
Evander slowly draws back, a smile tugging the corner of his stern mouth. “I can see that.” A light of hope enters his eyes. “Does this mean you’re released from the Law of Champions?”
I shake my head. “I’m afraid not.”
His hope vanishes, his paleness returning.
“I didn’t kill your mother,” I say, gripping his arm urgently. “I didn’t kill the humans during the final battle. I don’t have time to tell you everything, but I need you to believe me.”
“I do.”
His response is so immediate, so certain, that my glow flickers. Warms. I’m slowly becoming acquainted with the new sensations inside my chest. The variations of warmth and light that tell me whether I’m happy, sad, afraid… or hopeful.
Now, some of the tension leaves my body. When I last saw Evander, Imatra announced that I was responsible for the death of his mother. I didn’t want to live my final hours with the weight of Evander’s grief on my shoulders. “Thank you, brother.”
Evander switches his attention to Nathaniel for a brief moment, giving him a firm nod, before he turns back to me. “It’s not safe here. The glitter field has been sending out bulbs all day and now the field has gone dark. There’s magic at play—”
I take his arm. “The glitter field is gone. It’s safe now.”
“What? How?”
I give him a regretful look. “It’s another thing I’d explain if I had more time—I want you to know that you don’t have to worry about defending Bright against the bulbs anymore—but I also need your help.”
After a moment’s hesitation, Evander refocuses. “What do you need?”
“Actually… I need Talsa to tell me where Nathaniel’s weapon is.”
Talsa’s thunderbird has drawn closer to us during my conversation with Evander, its wings swishing in time with Cadence’s, a synchronized movement that allows them to fly close together. All three thunderbirds appear to be deep in silent conversation and I’m relieved for Treble. The other thunderbirds shut him out before. Now, I’m sure he’s telling them everything he saw in Fell country—everything that happened. Because Talsa is a Dusk fae who can commune with animals, Talsa’s thunderbird will be able to relay everything to her after we leave.
Talsa becomes very pale as she considers my request for information about the halberd. “Aura… I don’t think it’s a good idea…”
I sense her reluctance to give me information, but I won’t accept evasion. She’s one of the few fae whom I trusted before Nathaniel entered my life—especially after I found out that she and Evander had decided to commit to each other. I try to soften my voice, but I can’t keep the hard edge from it. “Don’t keep the truth from me, Talsa. I’m done accepting lies.”
She presses her lips together. “Nathaniel’s weapon is being stored beneath the Inner Sanctuary. I only know this because…” Her gaze flicks to Evander, who is suddenly tense beside me. “I was trying to find out what happened to Crispin.”
“Crispin?” My question is sharp. The last time I saw my adoptive father was after Nadina threatened him at his home in the western mountains. He and the Springtime fae had spoken up about the boys in the mountain community who were allowed to die from the Ebon Rot. When the men in the mountain community spoke up, Imatra threatened their homes and their lives.
I now suspect that Imatra was draining the boys’ bodies to feed her dark magic—not in small, collective amounts like Cyrian does, but in a concentrated, targeted way that quickly killed the children she drained.
“What has Imatra done to Crispin?” I ask.
“The Queen imprisoned your father beneath the Inner Sanctuary,” Talsa says. “He disappeared, but nobody knew where he was. Then I overheard a conversation between Nadina and the Queen last night, and I followed Nadina into the Sanctuary. There’s a hidden panel at the back, similar to the one between your room and the Queen’s. The Queen doesn’t dare kill Crispin before the fight in case you hear about it and retaliate. Her future rests in your hands.”
Anger rises inside me. I recognize it in the sudden heat within my chest: sharp, biting flickers. “She continues to play games with me.”
“Nadina caught me while I was trying to free Crispin,” Talsa says, her shoulders hunching. She gestures around the group. “We’ve all failed or disobeyed the Queen in one way or another. So she sent us out here to die protecting the border. Now that night has fallen… Evander, Calida, and Serena will weaken. I don’t think we would have survived the next batch of glitter bulbs.”
I scan their faces as they glide down and draw level with us. Serena, the former champion, is a Solstice fae who failed to kill Nathaniel on the first day. Calida, also a Solstice fae, failed to defeat me in the arena to become the new champion. That was in addition to the constant trouble her family was causing the Queen. Mia is the Captain of the Queen’s Night Guard, but she spilled secrets about the Queen to me at the celebration ball after the Winter Ascending.
Finally, I turn to Evander, not certain what he might have done to anger Imatra. The last time I saw them together, Imatra had declared her intention to marry him.
“Brother?”
A small smile softens Evander’s expression. “I helped heal your thunderbird. A decision I haven’t regretted for a second.” He shrugs. “I may also have declined Imatra’s offer of marriage.”
“Forcefully.” Talsa gives Evander a smile that shines in her eyes, chasing away her appearance of fatigue. She and Evander are very reserved in their outward affection for each other, having concealed it for a long time, but I see their love shining in both of their smiles. “With a strong slap of ice.”
Evander grins. “Imatra’s Frost power is not as strong as mine.”
“Because she never had it,” I say, making them both startle. “She uses dark magic to make it look like she controls the other elements.”
“How?” Evander asks.
“She learned dark magic when she was a girl. The boys who died—she drained them. And probably many more before them. They would have been strategically chosen from families who didn’t have the power or status to speak up.”
Talsa stares at me. “But how could she possibly get away with it?”
“I’m guessing a few very public demonstrations of her power when she was younger,” I say. “Once she gained a reputation for controlling all of the elements, it would only take carefully staged uses of magic after that to maintain her status. I don’t know which power she was really born with.”
“It has to be Solstice power,” Serena says, her thunderbird drawing closer. “Firelight is her strongest power, the one she calls most quickly, and I can absorb it into my body like normal.”
Fae of the same class can’t hurt each other. Solstice fae simply absorb the heat of their brethren’s power. Firelight was the power Imatra instinctively used against Tobias in her moment of panic at the burn site when she missed cutting out my heart the first time.