Windburn

I bent a knee and lowered my head. “I will not fight you.”

The Sylphs around us sucked in a collective breath. Cactus let out a single soft word. “No.”

Through my bond to Peta, I felt her concern. And her pride in me. That was enough to keep me where I knelt. I no longer cared what my father thought of me. I would follow my heart.

“Look at me,” Samara said. I slowly raised my head and lifted my eyes to hers. “Only because Aria spoke your sentence do I not kill you where you kneel. Leave from this place, Destroyer. Never return. Your life will be forfeit if you ever place foot in the Eyrie, wherever it may be.”

I stared up at her. “That’s it?”

Her eyes narrowed and every muscle in her body seemed to tense at once. “I will not go against her last words. I would like to take your heart from your body and cast it from the highest peak. But I won’t. For her.”

That was more along the lines of what I’d been expecting. I held the smoky diamond up to her. “A last gift from your queen.”

She frowned and took the jewel from me. She knew what it was, but her face gave nothing away.

My father approached from behind, and clamped his hand on my shoulder. “Take us home, Larkspur. The Rim awaits.”

Samara handed me the armband and our fingers touched for a brief second. Her eyes met mine and I saw all the emotions I too felt. Anger, fear, relief. She and I were too alike in too many ways.

“Good luck, Samara. You’re going to need it.”

I looked to Cactus, seeing how much I’d hurt him both in body and spirit. He was bruised and battered, blood trickled from his lip, and yet he stood there, waiting for me. “I’ll take my Cactus first, then come back for you, Basileus.”

Cactus’s eyes softened and he smiled. I’d called him mine.

“No. You will not.” My father pushed me down, and the ground softened to squeeze my legs.

“I love him and I am done leaving him behind!” I snapped.

“He is a half-breed who does not belong in the Rim!” my father roared, and I flinched as though he’d hit me. He might as well have.

“Lark, I’ll go with Shazer. Wait for me,” Cactus said. His eyes locked on mine, and the smile in them was enough. “It will be okay, Lark. Just go.”

With my hand on the armband, I paused for a moment. I felt as though I’d betrayed Cactus . . . again. Peta, once more in her housecat form, put her front paws on my bent knee.

“He will be all right. The Bastard will take him home faster than you realize.”

I looked at the armband. “This won’t get us home.”

My father put his hand over the band and took it from me. “It will tune to me. It is a secret of the bands. They always take a ruler home.”

He twisted the armband counterclockwise and the world dissolved around us in a rush of air.

And I was sent hurtling into my father’s memories.

CHAPTER 25

“Ahh, Ulani. My love, my heart. Help me,” he whispered. “I can no longer see clearly and my mind . . . it is not my own. I fear what will happen to Lark if I do not write this now.” Basileus put both hands on the rough wooden writing desk and lowered his head to the blank piece of paper.

The scent of eucalyptus curled through the room as Fern stepped through the door. Her belly bulged with their child and she cradled it gently. “Basil, what are you still doing up?”

“I am working, Fern.” He softened his voice. “Go to bed, I will be there soon.”

She smiled and ran a hand over his shoulders, her touch soothing some of the fear in him. Ulani’s spirit had been right, Fern had been a good choice. “Come to bed soon, the sickness has only left you. I don’t want it to come back.”

He nodded and kissed her hand where it lay on his shoulder. “Of course. You are right.”

Still smiling, she turned and left the way she’d come in. He waited until he heard the telltale creak of their bed as she lay down.

Picking up the feather to his right, he dipped it into the inkwell and put the tip to the paper.

Dear Larkspur,

The sickness you saw me carry was not a sickness of the body, but of the mind. It was as if Cassava had planted a booby trap in me, and when she could no longer manipulate my actions, she set it off.

I do not know how long I will have where my mind is fully functioning. I pray this will pass, but I fear it never will. I fear the damage done is irrevocable.

He paused and dipped the pen again, the sound of the tip scratching on the thick paper the only noise in the room.

I loved your mother, more than any other woman in my life. You need to know that. I knew she was a child of Spirit. I knew she would give me half-breed children. I didn’t care; I wanted both you and your brother. I loved you and your brother for everything you were. Beautiful, sweet babies who were mine in a way Cassava would not allow me with my other children. I tell you this because I remember the things I have done. The words I have said, and I see how they have torn at you. How they have broken you, and it pains me beyond all I can describe.

They were not my words, daughter. Never have I seen you as less than the rest of our family. You have always been the one I pinned my hopes on. Cassava believed Bramley was to be my heir, the one my throne would fall to.

But she does not know the truth.

You were the one, Larkspur. You were always the one with the fire in your heart, and the power in your soul. From the time you took your first breath, you were the warrior Fate decreed would change our world.