Our element of surprise had been totally fucked.
Chapter Twenty
Before they could move, a hand fisted in my shirt and dragged me to my feet, but I knew the jig was up. Our cover had been blown at the worst possible time, and a part of me wondered if I hadn’t just signed all of our death warrants with one tiny misstep.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered as Knox spun me around in his arms.
Etherian let loose an unholy sound that rattled the barrier cloaking us from those ready to unleash the fury of Faerie upon us. And then, just like that, the guise fell, leaving our paltry army standing metaphorically naked in the middle of the fey.
“Remember what we came for,” Merc said, voice unwavering under the pressure building around us.
Knox’s hands were heavy on my shoulders, and I felt my power surge. Combined with my connection to my mother’s lands, I felt like I might explode at any moment, which, given how the fey guard shifted into an attack formation, was likely a good thing.
“Don’t leave her side,” Merc told Knox, and I looked over my shoulder to see the two share a glance and a nod that meant everything.
Then all hell broke loose.
The crackle of magic rent the air, and a sonic boom sent us flying through the air. I quickly called what magic I could to break our fall, and the ground undulated like a grassy wave to pluck us from the air and set us down. The wolfish fey grins fell as something like astonishment flashed in their pale grey eyes.
“I guess Mom didn’t warn them about me,” I said as I steadied myself.
“And you killed all the others when we came to get Merc, so they couldn’t give the rest a heads-up.”
“Looks like they’re gonna learn today.”
I took Knox’s hand and cast a glance to Merc at the far end of the group, keeping far enough away so as not to interfere with my abilities in any way. He nodded once, his silent sign to bring them all down.
“I’ll give you one chance to tell me where the king and queen are,” I yelled at the wall of near-clones, their emerald-green cloaks as saturated in color as the backdrop of our soon-to-be-war. They stood in silence and stared at me, their blank expressions giving nothing away. In unison, they drew their swords and pointed them in our direction. “I’ll take that as a pass…”
“Reinhardt,” Merc called. My father stepped forward, a handful of his warlocks, including Kingston, at his side. Beyond him stood the coven queen with her reunited witches. Together, they began to chant in a foreign tongue, and the weapons of the enemy began to shake in their hands. I saw them grip their hilts tighter and realized that the witches and warlocks were trying to call the metal to them.
“Now!” Knox shouted. A collective howl echoed in response. The wolves, in various stages of change, charged the line of distracted fey warriors, the enforcers at their sides, the witches and warlocks casting magic from behind them. Though their numbers were fewer, they crashed upon the fey in a wave of claws and teeth and terror. Blood rained down upon them, staining their skin and fur red.
“Are you just going to stand around—”
“—or are you going to put those kickass powers of yours to work?” Dean finished Jase’s question as he stepped to flank his brother. “Can’t let them have all the fun, so…” He ribbed me gently with his elbow. “Let’s go start some shit.”
Knox growled his approval.
The sound of steel ripping from its sheath sounded from either side of me as the brothers drew their weapons, and I smiled at the thought. Maybe this was going to go better than I had thought. Maybe, just maybe, we had a chance to bring the royals to their knees.
“Stop them,” I whispered, as the rage I felt at the thought of Phineas and Larken entered my mind. The ground rumbled at my command, and roots the thickness of Merc’s thigh shot out of the dirt, sending grass and debris everywhere. They snapped like whips around the torsos of the fey army, holding them in place. Their swords were useless; their bodies immobilized. They were sitting ducks. Kat shot me a look over her shoulder from where she fought nearby. Her face was spattered with blood, her shirt stained red, and she smiled with victory and vengeance as the wolves ripped through the fey like a pack of wild dogs.
Suddenly, in the distance—far from the massacre taking place in her homeland—I saw my mother standing there smiling at me, Phineas at her side. I bolted toward them, emboldened by the possibility of ending it all, but I’d only made it a few yards before she and her husband both disappeared into a portal. Seconds later, a whoosh of magic swept across the field, sending my hair flying wildly. Everyone paused, including what was left of the fey army, and in that moment of silence, I heard a familiar voice calling for me in the distance.
“Piper!” Liam screamed. I strained to locate where the sound had come from, but Knox had clearly heard it and turned to the east. There, cresting a hill, ran his fellow Original, bolting toward us as though his life depended on it.
I could see the tension in his expression from where I stood, and ice snaked down my spine at the sight.
Then, just like the royals had, the entire fey army disappeared into thin air.
I cannot sense them, Etherian growled in my head, and I struggled to process everything that was happening, but I lacked the bandwidth to do it.
“Where did they go?” I shouted to anyone and everyone.
“It was a trick!” Liam yelled back as he neared. “We have to go now—”
Just as those words left his mouth, I felt a shift in my connection to the magic in the ground beneath me. A rift. A change. The earth began to give way, and for a moment, I wondered if it was about to swallow us, as Alaska had swallowed Kingston and his crew—if karma had my number and she’d finally come to collect.
I whispered multiple pleas for aid, but there was no response.
My eyes met Merc’s across the field just as the ground sucked us in like a vacuum and everything went dark.
***
I opened my eyes to the familiar sight of Central Park. I scrambled off my belly to stand while I looked around frantically for the others, only to find them nearby, each one looking as confused as I felt. The magical tang of Faerie was everywhere, as it had been in Mack’s club, but a hundred times stronger. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought it was all an illusion; a trick of the fey king. But I could feel the pull of Earth’s elements, so my confusion and disbelief only grew.
Then, out of the shadows, stepped the fey army, cloaked in a shimmer of sorts—an iridescent aura that shone like diamonds in the light of the moon. And in the center of them stood Phineas with Larken on his arm, the royal couple looking as regal and confident as ever.
“Piper,” Knox called as he inched up behind me, his hand tight on my lower back.
“I feel it,” I replied, slowly putting everything together, though the final picture was enough to break my mind.
“I have to thank you, Piper,” my mother said, smiling down from the slight hill she stood upon, “for being so painfully predictable.” Her smile melted away to display her true feelings; the loathing she felt for her only child. Her heir. “With you in Faerie, we were free to come here to finish the final step in our plan.” Her finger traced the edge of the king’s jaw, and I felt the fey magic in the air strengthen even more. “You were right that Faerie was a fractured land—that Phineas’ lands were tapped of magic, even after I used the amulet to heal them. But I knew exactly where we could find more. A place with infinite resources by comparison.”