Nina stood still, watching Lylah descend the stairs and stop next to Eli, who was still on the floor. She touched the top of his head, and he flinched away violently, flinging himself to the stone floor so that he was lying flat on his stomach.
Lylah laughed, tossing her mane of white-blonde hair as she threw her head back. “My God, what a performance. You’d think I’d never touched you before.”
“What do you want?” Pryce said gruffly from the couch.
He climbed to his feet, but Nina saw that he was still shaky from being forced back into his human form.
“What I wanted last time,” Lylah said sweetly. “To stop you. Only this time, it’ll work.”
“Did you bring her here?” Nina asked Eli, her voice barely a whisper.
“No,” Lylah answered. “Everything he said was true. Including the fact that I’m fucking Osrik.” She shot Eli a look. “He’s a lot rougher with me than you were. I like it, actually. He’s a brute, but he gets the job done.”
Eli looked like he was going to be sick.
“How did you get in?” Rachel asked harshly.
Nina noticed that her brown eyes were rimmed with red, like she’d been holding back tears.
“I followed Eli when I saw him come looking for me. Your lovely parents welcomed me into their community center,” Lylah said, nodding in her direction graciously. “Of course, they wouldn’t let me down here, so I had to use my energy to immobilize them.” She smiled widely, and no warmth spread to her eyes. “I think I’ll leave them there after I kill you. I’ve always wondered how long it takes witches to starve to death.”
Rachel let out a noise of rage that got caught in her throat as she tried to launch herself at Lylah. Nina stopped her with one arm, shooting her a look of warning that did little to calm Rachel, but at least convinced her to sit back down. Lylah was trying to goad them, she knew—but if Nina could catch her unaware, they might be able to make it.
Nina forced herself to make eye contact with the blonde dragon. “Everything Eli said was true?”
Lylah nodded. “Everything. I don’t know why you thought I would be, but I wasn’t interested in anything incidental to your journey. Just the journey itself.” She narrowed her eyes, and Nina felt a wave of red-hot energy roll toward her. “Just like your parents, you’re trying to tarnish the realm. I won’t have it, Nina. I may not have been responsible for ordering your parents death, but I knew it was the right thing to do... just like I know this is the right thing to do.”
Nina blinked, confusion stirring in the midst of her fear and rage. “You weren’t responsible for their deaths?” she repeated. The wheels of her mind were spinning furiously, trying to make sense of what was happening. “So if you really weren’t trying to kill me... then who was?”
“I don’t care!” Lylah snapped. “And you shouldn’t either. You’re about to die, Nina. It doesn’t matter who tried to kill you. All that matters is that I’m going to be the one to kill you.”
Lylah started to concentrate her energy, and the room began to feel humid and muggy. Nina looked for a way to stop her desperately, casting around in her mind for questions that may delay her attack.
“Wait!” Nina shouted. “Please, just help me understand who ordered my parents to be killed and why. I know you know everything, Lylah, you’re too important to the Council to not be clued in on most things.”
Unbelievably, Lylah paused and relaxed. She looked thoughtful as she responded, and a gentle smile was playing on her lips. “You’re right about that, Nina. All right, I’ll tell you.” She sighed. “I still can’t tell you who ordered their deaths, because it was kept hidden from all but Eka for security reasons, but it was someone on the Council. It didn’t matter to me who it was, actually. When they told us your parents had found the Heart of the jewel and planned to make off with it, there was no reason to know anything else. They’d committed an unforgivable crime. That heart belongs to all of us.”
Nina felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. “My—my parents had the jewel?”
“Oh yes,” Lylah said, amusement dancing in her cold black eyes. “They had it for a while, actually, and were keeping it on a remote island until you were about three years old. Then they finished their despicable project in their hometown and decided to bring it back with them. We’d been on to them thanks to a plant, and we were able to retrieve it from them before they boarded the plane back home... which, as you know, never made it to California.”
A sheet of ice was surrounding Nina’s heart. She’d never felt so numb in her life. “Why did you kill them if you already had the heart?”
“They weren’t going to just lie down and accept what had happened,” Lylah said as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. “They were going to try and get it back. Your parents were warriors, unconventional types that weren’t afraid to cavort with filthy Outcasts and witches.” Her nose wrinkled in disgust. “The Heart actually belonged to us until it was stolen from us again.”
Nina’s heart leaped. It was still out there!
“But the tracker we’d embedded in it was shattered,” Lylah said in a disappointed tone of voice. “Meaning the jewel was lost, too. Too bad, it was a beautiful chunk of stone. But as I said, we have other ways to clean it. We can actually use your blood to cleanse it well enough for another thousand years,” Lylah said with relish. “I saw it in a book on Imelda’s desk.”
Eli sat up straight in his place on the floor. “Imelda? Eka’s personal guard?”
Lylah nodded. “The weirdly silent Spanish one, yes. There was always something I didn’t like about her, but she’s head of the Council Guard and there’s no getting rid of her.”
Eli’s face was frozen in a look of extreme confusion. Then understanding dawned in his eyes, and he caught Nina’s gaze and tried to communicate something to her. Nina, who was already slipping into despair, couldn’t bring herself to care about deciphering messages now.
Lylah raised her hands and stirred her energy up, warming the space around her again. “Ready now?”
There seemed to be a landslide taking place in Nina’s mind. Every bit of hope and optimism she’d managed to hang on to was being buried under a mountain of ice-cold defeat. It was crushing her and seeping through the pores in her skin to rest in her muscles. She could feel it spreading through her veins and stopping her organs, shutting down the movements of her nervous system and clogging her neural pathways.
Everything has been for nothing. We’ve already lost. Nina looked at Eli, whose eyes were closed as tears slipped from beneath his long lashes. Rachel was sobbing quietly, holding on to her hand as though it were keeping her grounded to Earth. When she turned to look at Pryce, he took her hand, too, and kissed her lips with such tenderness that Nina nearly cried.
“How sweet,” Lylah simpered. “A kiss goodbye.”
Pryce was gazing into Nina’s eyes like they held some sort of coded message. It occurred to her that his gaze wasn’t mournful or fearful or loving—not entirely, at least; like Eli, he seemed to be trying to tell her something. What was it? She prodded at his energy with her own, trying to taste what he was feeling. Terror, panic, fury... and, chiefest of all, determination.
What can I do? Nina wondered desperately. And why? What’s left for me if we fight? A Council that punishes people for defending themselves? A Council that protects whoever killed my parents? A Council that doesn’t care about its dragons as much as its power?
Your life, a small but firm voice said then. You’re left with your life, and the love that lights it.
Nina felt like something that had been bound inside her had started to unravel. She took a deep breath and let herself feel every bit of frustration she’d been suppressing, feeling her emotions turn into pure, usable energy as she concentrated on the center of her being.
“I’m ready,” she said, looking straight into Lylah’s eyes.
The woman smiled. “Good.”
She twisted her hands in the air and shot twin bolts of energy at Nina. They twisted in midair and soared in an arc above their heads, visible only in the way they made the air shimmer as the energy moved forward. Before it got to her, Nina could feel the triumph in Lylah’s energy, the excitement and sense of gratification she was already riding high on. Nina let her have her moment. She knew it wouldn’t last long.
Stop, she thought.
Lylah’s energy froze, and the laughter on her face died, replaced by confusion and the beginnings of fear.
“What the hell?”
Nina focused on taking ownership of the energy, wrapping her own around it like a sleeve covering an arm. “Are you ready, Lylah?”
“This is impossible,” the blonde dragon hissed. “How did you stop it?”
“Eli,” Nina continued calmly. “Would you like to say goodbye?”
Eli, whose mouth was hanging open, shook his head slowly and turned his gaze to Lylah. “Not at all.”
Lylah’s mouth twisted in fury. “You little—”
With a massive dose of concentration, Nina reverted the direction of Lylah’s energy attack, sending it swirling back right where it came from.
“No!”
Lylah’s body began to vibrate, and her knees buckled as she collapsed to the ground. Her black eyes were widening as the pressure inside her body increased, and a high, thin scream was lashing the air around her. Nina expected her to die horribly, but she didn’t expect what was happening right then.
“Nina?” Rachel said distantly.
Nina was being pulled inside Lylah’s mind. Like the day she’d discovered her clairvoyance, she felt every sensation and emotion that passed through the body she was visiting, except this was no vision of the future—it was a window into what was happening to Lylah right then. Nina heard herself scream and was aware of her body collapsing to the velvet couch, but she couldn’t extricate herself from Lylah’s mind. No matter how hard she pulled and twisted, she kept flitting from memory to emotion and back to memory again, feeling like she was riding an out-of-control roller coaster.
Focus, a voice in her own mind said. Focus. You can be in the mind and not of it.
As soon as she thought it, the crippling pain and fear that had been choking her faded away, leaving with her drifting in the strange ocean of Lylah’s essence. Nina still couldn't pull back, but at least she was no longer in pain. She could view Lylah’s feelings without feeling them, and that was the most important part.
What am I doing here?
Nina let her curiosity get the better of her. She started moving around Lylah’s essence, aware that the dragon’s entire life had been laid bare before her. It seemed that time was frozen while she was inside of her thoughts; Nina had no idea how long it would last, so she started to move faster, suddenly aware that she was moving with purpose.
What am I looking for?
She saw that Lylah had been jealous of she and Eli, but that wasn’t it. She saw that Lylah had planned to take Eli away and torture him unless he’d agree to be her sex slave. She knew that wasn’t it. She saw that Lylah had always wondered who ordered the hit on Nina, and though she had her suspicions, she didn’t know for sure. Was that it? Nina looked more closely, trying to see who Lylah thought it was. She tried to dive deeper into her energy, but it only made her more confused; it seemed like Lylah had a lot of suspects, and the one she suspected most was someone who she was trying very hard not to think of.
Who is it?
Nina, who had no body inside Lylah’s mind, felt her energy shudder. It occurred to her that it felt like she was being watched. Lylah watched us through Eli’s mind, she remembered. Maybe someone is watching Lylah.
Or me.
Who could be watching me?
Without hesitation—remembering how much hesitation had ruined her journey so far—Nina turned to find the intruder. It was astoundingly easy; the energy was so calm and still that it was like whoever it was had been accompanying her the whole time. It was a familiar energy, and Nina moved closer to it to see if she could taste a little of their memory, too. The energy receded a little, feeling nervous now, but Nina was too fast for it. She brushed against the energy and latched onto it—and was pulled right into its center.
Nina’s energy was bucking frantically as the new energy tried to shake her off; she was having trouble hanging on, but something told her she couldn’t let go. As she sank into its center and let a river of images and thoughts wash over her, Nina tried to string together a cohesive picture of the dragon who had been watching them.
She saw everything from inside the dragon. She saw them ordering someone to pick dragon’s bane and grind it into a paste.
“It’s sure to stop her. Even Queen Adama couldn’t heal from a wound like this.”
She saw the same figure sending Anders to her apartment with a fairy bomb.
“This will be sure to stop her. We don’t have blood left to cleanse the stone, but we’ll find another way. She’s too dangerous alive. Be careful—I know you’re not too practiced at drawing boundaries. You may accidentally set it off.”
Anders smirked and assured the figure it would go smoothly.
She saw the figure speaking to Joey, urging him to be on the lookout for Eli and Nina, and possibly an Outcast who would be helping them.
“She can’t find the Heart, Joseph. It will make her infinitely more powerful, and then we’ll never save the realm.”
She saw the figure talking to Imelda, the short Spanish guard, in fluent Castilian Spanish.
“We may let her get to the Heart, and take it before she can use it. That would be ideal. We’d still have to kill her, but that’s no great loss.”
She saw the figure handling stones from within a dark office, checking in on Eli and Lylah and even the receptionist in the entrance hall as he pulled strings. She saw that he’d been pulling strings for centuries—millennia, even. He’d been the one to rewrite history so that kings appeared to hold more power than queens, ensuring that Queen Adama’s tragic death would look like a tragic accident borne of a loveless marriage. Nina saw that this dragon had been the one to kill Adama after stewing in the knowledge that she planned to let all sorts of magical creatures coexist with them. He hated that the Rose Quartz she’d fashioned gave her such power over them all—power she declined to use, insisting that her dragons didn’t need to be controlled or monitored or punished. They needed love, she said, and the Quartz would bind them in the strongest love there was. The inclusion of other types of magic would see to it.
We can’t have that filth around us, she saw him think. She’s going to ruin our purity. She’s going to make us into nothing but jokes.
The dragon had been the one to cut a chunk from the stone after Adama’s death, predicting that they’d lose some of their power but be more dependent on a governing body like the Council because of it. They would be scared, lost—malleable. Then he could take over and tell him how he’d saved them all. He would bury the stone where no one would ever find it—in a remote, uninhabited island where the animals would have no use for magic.
Nina watched with horror as the energy constricted around her and started to choke her own essence, sending her into a panic as she drowned in a place with no water or air. She focused on her own aura of power and tugged with all of her might, not believing for a second that it would help her twist free—
—and feeling indescribably grateful when it did.
“Nina! Nina!”
The room was in chaos. Everyone was screaming and fanning her, tossing powders over her body and pulsing power against her skin in useless attempts to revive her. Nina sat up on the couch, feeling like the furniture was floating and turning in midair.
Rachel was crying hysterically as she hugged her.
“What happened? Lylah died and we thought you went with her!”
Nina couldn’t find her voice at first. Everyone was stroking her hair and looking at her with such relief that she almost didn’t want to tell them what happened. Then she made eye contact with Eli, and everything came rushing out.
“You were right,” Nina croaked. “Lylah hasn’t been trying to kill us.” She turned to Pryce. “And you were right, Pryce. The jewel is still out there.”
Eli stared at her, and so did Pryce.
“Where is it?” Pryce asked excitedly. “Where’s the Heart?”
“We can help there,” said a familiar voice.
An ocean of relief broke over Nina as she watched Nat and Desmond hurry down the stairs. Nina briefly wondered if she was actually dead and they were joining her in the afterlife; the next moment, she felt very solid as Nat flung herself at Nina and started to cry, sounding exactly like Rachel in her tears. Nina was too happy to question why there were there, but Desmond must have seen the confusion in her eyes.
“We both have chunks of serpentine,” he explained, withdrawing a small greenish stone from his pocket. “Once we knew that you were getting involved in some weird dragon stuff, we pulled out the tricks your parents taught us.”
Nina’s mouth was dry. “My parents?”
“Yes,” Nat said tearfully. “Your parents told us more than we’ve let on.” She hesitated. “They gave us more than we let on.”
Desmond had been clutching a box in his hands the whole time, and Nina finally looked at it closely. It had ancient letters carved into its dark brown surface, and heavy silver clasp held it shut.
“What is that?”
Desmond smiled, his one good eye twinkling. “It’s the Heart, Nina. Your birthright.”
The silence that filled the room was thunderous. Nina felt her heart shake off the icy shackles it had been wearing and start to soar; a laugh actually bubbled to her lips before she could stop it. We’re saved! We have the Heart after all!
“I hate to interrupt,” Eli said nervously. “But there’s another matter at hand. Nina, who had been trying to kill you?”
Her happiness deflated, disappearing as quickly as it had come. She raised her glance to Eli, preparing herself for the frenzy that would follow her words.
“It’s Eka. It’s been Eka the whole time.”
Eli’s face drained of color and he closed his eyes.
“I thought so, when I heard his guard was involved.”
Nina wasn’t finished, though. “He watched Lylah die, and he’d been watching us the whole time. He’s pissed, Eli.” She took a breath and said something she was only realizing just then.
“And he’s coming this way.”