Gray refused to let me drive myself to fairy when I stumbled for the third time on the way to the Jeep. He was barefoot and shirtless, carrying most of his clothes in a bundle around the sword under one arm and holding me upright with the other.

“I’m going with you. But we’ll go back to camp, get Penelope to drive. You close your eyes and try to find some inner magical reserve, and we’ll face your father together.”

I was almost too tired to argue. Almost. “People are in there with that thing, Gray. I made it, and it will simply roll over anything in its path and devour it. Mixed magics are dark and unpredictable, and I did it anyway. I did this. I’m everything they say I am.”

“You saved dozens of Fae tonight, Morgan.” His voice was soft, but his hand tightened painfully around my arm. He laughed, a staccato of shock and amazement that burst from his chest as he leaned me against the car and opened the door for me. “Did you really just bind an ancient magical Fae sword to you?”

I shuddered at the reminder. The sword had been quiet since it landed in the grass, but instead of being relieved, I had the distinct impression that it was pouting. I’d never held an item of power before. The stories only tell of the victories won by those who could wield magical weapons. Never would I have suspected that it might have been the weapons wielding the hero.

“I won’t touch that sword again.”

Wisely, he didn't ask why. He helped me up into the passenger seat, and I struggled to connect the seatbelt, letting him take it from me and click it into place.

“You can’t go back and face them like this, you know that.”

“I can’t afford to wait. The golem moves slowly, but whatever people are there are literally trapped, like mice in a snake cage, just waiting to be found.”

An insidious whisper sounded in my head, "Take me up, and I will give you strength that you need to conquer the unbelievers who have stolen the magic of the land."

“Oh Goddess, Gray, the damn sword is talking in my head. I can’t shut it out.”

He exhaled slowly. “Well, I guess that’s one answer to the question of why the heroes of old disappeared so soon after taking up their power. They probably went mad.”

“I hate you, Xenos.”

“Do we have time to try to…disengage the damn thing?”

We didn't. Even if I'd known how I might not have had the time or the tools to do it. "I need to hold it again, but I don't want to touch it with my bare skin just yet."

He hesitated, then reached behind us and pulled the sword out of the bundle and laid across my lap. I shivered where the cold steel touched my leg through a rip in my once-favorite jeans, but the extra voice in my head stayed quiet.

Slowly at first, then building when I dared to lay the flat of my palm on the hilt, I felt my strength and my magic return. I couldn’t tell if it was real or if I was being taken over by this power I didn’t understand, but I accepted the power and focused on building a wall between me and the power that I felt in my head, the way my Aunt Portia had taught me. Not Fae magic, but powerful and pure.

She hadn’t loved me, or always even tolerated me. But she had undertaken her duties as my teacher as seriously as with any of the young witches. More, because she saw my Fae side as a threat that needed to be quashed forever.

So I shielded my mind like it was the old children's games I'd played as a child, hiding my secrets and weaknesses behind a wall, not of ice or stone, but cold iron, smooth and seamless and impossible for the Fae to tolerate or penetrate.

All my life I'd thought she taught me to protect myself from the Fae. I couldn't even imagine what she'd be thinking if she knew I was sitting with a legendary Fae weapon in my lap, using her teaching to protect my will from its seduction.

"The sword called me ‘life-giver, life-taker.'" I sighed as Gray patted my free hand.

“You took lives to save lives, Morgan. Don’t let some old sword affect you. You know the truth.”

The quiet voice of the sword in my head seemed amused. "I have no conscience, I am not good or evil. You are a fit for me because you are powerful because you have power over life and death. I have never belonged to a green witch before."

I killed warlocks who attacked Gray's pack and my mentor, and it had stained me. What if taking those lives had made me weak to the control of the sword? Or maybe it was as the blade had reminded me. A normal blade was neither good nor evil, only its wielder was. Perhaps the same was true of this one. But I felt a darkness in it that I would not let touch me. Then again, it was no ordinary blade, and the true nature of the old weapons had been lost from our history since the bindings.

“It wants me to believe it’s merely a tool, and that only I control whether it is good or evil.”

Gray laughed. "I'm sorry, I'm still wrapping my head around ‘the sword wants,'" he laughed again. "The sword wants you. How is this a good thing either way?"

It was a sobering thought, and I checked my psychic warding again. “I guess my father will be able to tell me. Maybe he’ll stay my execution long enough to explain.”

Neither of us spoke again until we pulled up in front of the manor. As Gray came around to help me, the sun rose over the trees, lighting the gates and making them shine as if they were made of solid gold. Gray gasped as he stared, so entranced he forgot he was blocking my way out of the car.

“That’s new,” he sighed. “What do you think it means?”

“Either it’s an attempt to lure us in, or Fairy is responding to the freed wee folk.” I slid the sword into my belt at my hip. “Either way, we’ve got to try to save the nobles, too.”

“Your father will think the golem was on purpose, to force his hand.” Gray laughed. “If it were true, it would’ve been a great plan.”

He was right, it would’ve been. But instead, I’d ignored sound teachings and set something loose in the Fae prison that I had no idea how to stop, and when I’d tried, I’d bound myself to a bloodthirsty sword that wanted me to conquer all of Fairy. Aside from facing execution at the command of my own father, I couldn’t really think of a way that things could’ve gone any worse.

The shining gates swung open as we approached, and we walked through, me hesitating more than Gray, who stared at wonder at the transformations that had taken place inside. The fountains in the garden ran with silver water, and naiads sang from around the reflecting pool.

"Wait here." He didn't seem to hear me, so I led him to a stone bench, and he sank to the seat, his eyes on the carved fairies in the fountain as they danced behind the water.

One hand on the pommel of the sword, I made my way to the reflecting pool on the edge of the garden. Three naiads sat on the water’s edge, combing their long hair and splashing one another as they sang.

“Good ladies, it is good to see you, finally. The garden is so much more beautiful in your presence.”

One of the sprites giggled and dove into the pool, while the others stopped preening and watched me cautiously.

“You are the one who freed the pixies and the wood nymphs, aren’t you?” She giggled again and waved to her sisters. “We’ve been hiding from the beast who kidnaps the wild folk. The wisp said you trapped him with a great beast who never tires and devours all in its path.” Her red eyes glowed with hatred for the Fae who had taken her cousin sprites.

"My conjuring was accidental. Many Fae are still trapped in the oubliette. I must go and…make my father free them." I had been going to say ‘beg my father,' but I felt the words twist in my mouth, as the sword pressed against my mind.

“You freed the dryads, and the wisp call you their champion. You will have the service of the naiads whenever you need.”

I started to go, but realization dawned on me, and I turned back. "Did freeing the wee folk make the garden change?"

“She shrugged, lifting one pale, narrow shoulder as she looked around. “The garden is the path to Fairy. Without wild magic, it slowly wasted away. You freed the magic, and it came here to grow.”

It hadn’t occurred to me that magic could grow, or that the garden was a literal patch to cultivate it. I’d been taught that magic was finite, and when I finally used the last of mine, I would die. But if magic could be grown, then the gradual wasting of Fairy had to be on purpose. Someone was actively trying to destroy the Seelie Fae.

I glanced down at the water one last time, and a glimmer caught my eye. I leaned forward, and hands grabbed me, pulling me in and down under the surface and pinning me there. I struggled to free myself, but a light appeared above me, and I saw my father in the ripples of the water. He was bent over his throne, despair and grief plain on his face as he knelt, his back turned to the figure behind him.

Fortunato.

Fuck. Not only was my cousin not dead, I watched helplessly as he plunged a knife into my father's back. No one else in the room moved to his aid. Rage welled up in me, and I grabbed the sword, the blade flaming to life with a red, wicked flare as it cut through the leather of my belt and I slashed at the hands that held me.

I broke the surface of the water and gulped in air as the naiads watched me, wringing their hands.

“Did you see? Did you see what transpires? The beast is not dead, and now he claims the throne.”

I stumbled out of the water and held the sword out, pointed at the weeping sprites. “Next time you have a message for me, just fucking tell me. I am part mortal and cannot be held under the water for a vision safely.”

But the water sprites were beside themselves, clinging to one another and wailing. I couldn't punish them for using the power they had to warn me, but my lungs burned, and my legs wobbled as I made my way back to Grayson, who sat, still hypnotized by whatever he saw in the fountain of dancing fairies.

“Cut him, and he will wake," the sword whispered.

"Or you'll steal his life, and his death will be my fault."

“He dies already, lost to the magic. He will sit there, quite happily, as he slowly starves to death and dies, his life force to be added to the wild magic.”

Shit. The garden was growing again, but it was searching for sustenance. I grabbed his hand and nicked his palm with the sword. As blood welled up in his palm, the sword jerked in my hand, just far enough to touch the fresh blood. As though it was drinking, the blood vanished from Gray's hand, and the sword flared just a little brighter for a moment, singing in my head that with the blood of the high Fae of the court, we could be too powerful to be stopped.