chapter twenty-three
LUNA
For thirteen nights I watched Aura sleep, hovering at her window. She’d used my own tricks against me. I couldn’t enter the palace because she’d used bone dust to block me, and I knew where she found some of that material. There were plenty of bones at her disposal.
Every day, she tried to enter my dreams and tear down the blood-slickened walls I erected. Every day, she failed.
I didn’t enter her dreams when I visited her. I didn’t force her nightmares to come alive, for two reasons. The first was that she could hurt Phillip to cause me pain, and I couldn’t bear to watch. The second was that there was nothing left to say between us. She slept soundly, even knowing that Phillip lay poisoned in the next room. His breathing was steady, but the toxin was still in his body. I could smell it.
If Aura wanted to calm me, she could have healed him and let the action speak for her.
But still she refused, and soon she would pay.
Malex came by the cottage every night to make sure I was okay, and I clung fiercely to the hope he gave me with each visit: Things are just as I said they would be. Aura hasn’t killed Phillip; she’s waiting to use him against you, and she won’t be the last.
He was my weakness. She knew she could wield him as a weapon against me and I would crumble. I would bow at her feet to protect him. I wanted him to live.
Phillip should be able to experience the life he deserved, the life he couldn’t have with me at his side. He should have a loving wife who could be with him day and night, who could bear children and grandchildren whom they could spoil rotten. He deserved to wear the crown of Grithim, proudly leading his people the way his heritage demanded.
Malex said he didn’t use his blood. He would have been able to tell if he drank it and transformed.
It was clear Phillip didn’t want this life.
But I would fight to give him the life he would’ve had if he’d never met me or my sister.
Tonight, the palace was empty. The servants who’d survived my sister had been sent away. The only sounds were of mice, spiders building their webs, and the softly beating hearts of Pieces, Phillip, and Aura.
Aura would never have dismissed her servants, but Phillip would have done it to protect them. He probably told them to leave last night, when the slumber claimed her. I bet my sister was furious when she woke up with no one to dote on her. The thought made me smile.
Phillip, even while he was sick, was a good man. Kind. Fearless. A born leader. I was proud of him for making that choice, and jealous that I couldn’t choose that life for myself. Because if I could somehow make myself completely human and erase all traces of my fae heritage, I would. I would in an instant if it meant I could be with him.
I wondered if Malex had a spell for that in one of the many tomes he had; a spell to take away a fae’s powers, or to turn a fae into a human.
I did notice that Aura had done something different to the toxin. His heart sounded stronger, and I hadn’t heard him cough in several nights. At the cottage, he was fighting a losing battle, but in the palace with my sister, he’d stabilized.
I wanted to gather him in my arms and fly away with him, but I couldn’t take him away while she slept. She might kill him when she woke and found him gone. So, like I’d done the past thirteen nights, I left him there. Each time I flew from the palace was harder than the last.
I walked into the cottage, placed my broom near the door, and caught Ember as she leapt into my arms. Then she tensed and hissed as she did every night since Phillip left and Malex showed up. And sure enough, I turned to find him on the porch.
“Are things the same?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
My sister had to know about the eclipse, which meant she had to know I was coming for her. And for him.
“If you can use your wind to disrupt the earth where you and Aura scattered the bone dust, I can slip through and help you.”
“This fight is between me and Aura.”
“I know that, but it might even the playing field.” He rocked back on his heels, his hands resting lightly in his fine suit pockets. “I can make sure she doesn’t use the Prince against you; keep things even and fair. I won’t get involved in the fight between the pair of you.”
I swallowed, nodding my assent, although a prickle of unease wormed into my mind.
If he knew a way for me to let him into the yard so easily, why didn’t he offer to retrieve the rose? I know he said I had to do it, but he didn’t say anything when I told him Phillip was the one who plucked it. Secretly, I wondered if he feared the roses or my sister for some reason. There were times he looked at me with unease, and when he spoke of how Phillip smelled of the toxin, there was disgust in his voice.
“We would have to keep it quiet. The fae aren’t supposed to get involved with the squabbles of other fae.”
“Well, we aren’t technically fae.”
He grinned. “You might as well be. You have all the powers of a full-blooded fae king split between you.”
“All the powers?”
“Mhmm.”
“How do you know that?”
He quirked an eyebrow.
“Oh. Of course you would know that... But a king? Are you sure?”
“I’m positive,” he asserted. “The sun’s almost up. You need to rest and mentally prepare.”
I was as prepared as I was going to get, but didn’t argue with him. “Thanks for stopping by.”
“When the solar eclipse begins, you’ll have to break through the two protective barriers surrounding the palace, and then I’ll enter and help by watching over Phillip.”
“Malex?” I called out. He stopped just inside my front door and turned and looked at me, his dark hair spilling down his back. “Thank you.”
He gave a half-smile and tapped the door frame twice. “Don’t thank me yet.”
The battle hadn’t even begun, but he was right. I had to be ready. I needed to rest. I just hoped my sister wouldn’t claw at my wall all night.
I watched him walk into the early morning light and with leaden legs, made it to my bedroom and collapsed in exhaustion. Ember curled up next to me and both of us quickly fell asleep.
PHILLIP
It was morning, which meant Luna was sleeping. Tomorrow there would be a solar eclipse, according to Aura. It was the one time when Luna could come out during the day, which is when she would strike out at her sister.
“Malex has done nothing but stay in his cave all week. It’s so frustrating. Why wouldn’t a fae prince be in his palace? Why stay in a place so dark and damp and isolated?” Aura fumed. Pieces had watched him go into the cave, but he hadn’t emerged during the daylight hours. I wondered if it was because he was with Luna at night.
“Are we sure he’s still a prince? What if his father stripped him of the title?”
She pursed her lips as if thinking about it.
“That’s possible. If he wanted her or me dead for some reason, he could simply use the potion and kill Luna, which would leave only me to contend with. Much better odds. However, he hasn’t tried to hurt her. I would have felt it.”
The thought made my already roiling stomach lurch. “There has to be something we’re missing. He obviously wants you two separated, but why? You were sired by a dark fae. Could he be your brother or something? Perhaps he’s getting rid of his competition for the throne.”
Her eyes flashed at me, so much hatred in such crystalline blue depths. “We don’t want his throne. We have our own.”
“No, Aura. You have your own. Luna doesn’t.”
“So he’s pretending to help her just so he can kill her?”
“I think if he kills one of you, he’ll kill the other one, too.”
“Why?”
I looked out over her garden. “Because you’re both a threat as long as you’re alive. I’m not sure who he is or why he wants you dead, but I think he does.”
“He could just want you dead and out of the way. Have you ever thought of that?” Aura argued. “You’ve concocted this wild conspiracy theory based on me and Luna, but maybe it’s as simple as the fact that you came between him and Luna, and he wanted you out of the picture.”
“Maybe he wants Virosa, and wants you two princesses out of the picture. But if you really think he likes Luna...”
“From what I’ve seen through you and Peace, I don’t think he does. Not truly. He’s marked her and pretends to be her friend, and when he’s with her he gives her an inkling that he might possibly be interested, but it’s fake. His emotions are cold. He doesn’t love her.” She looked at me and I knew that she saw the way I felt for her sister.
“How did it happen so quickly?” she asked, leaning in to stare at me like I was a piece in a puzzle she could not solve.
“With William it happened relatively fast, but there was pushing on his part, and no boy had dared to even glance at Luna before. With you, it was natural, like the two of you fit together from the beginning.”
I shook my head. “I don’t know, but you’re right. It did happen fast, and we do fit together. Not that you helped in any way. She thinks your thrall is the only reason I have feelings for her.”
“My sister’s a pessimist. Always has been. Sure, I gave you a nudge here and there, but most of it was you, Prince.”
“No wonder she’s pessimistic,” I said pointedly, coughs racking my body.
“On the off chance that you’re right, and that saving you will calm her anger, I’m going to heal you now. But if you try anything to hurt me or my familiar, you will meet a worse death than your brother did. I’m choosing to trust you not to make a stupid mistake and force my hand against you.”
I took a deep breath, still holding my chest. “I’d appreciate… being able... to breathe.”
She walked to me and grabbed my arm, whispering a spell over me.
“Poison in your veins no more
From his skin you will pour
To former health return this man
All the toxin from him ban.”
Suddenly, it felt like slippery eels were writhing beneath my flesh, under her fingers. I pushed my sleeve up to see white, milky liquid pooling from my pores. With each drop of the toxin that dropped to the floor, my strength returned and I could feel the power in my muscles, bones, heart, and lungs.
I looked at her in awe.
She grinned. “You’re welcome.” Letting go of my arm, she pinched her lips together and then said, “Make sure Luna knows I did it.”
“I’ll tell her.” But I wondered if it would make a difference at this point. Luna was coming to use her spell and potion to separate them, and Aura was going to fight tooth and nail to keep her from tearing their bond apart. Only one would emerge victorious. I just prayed it was Luna.
Aura nodded and walked back inside, her enormous gown flowing behind her. She looked ridiculous and gaudy. “You plan on facing Luna in that?”
She stopped and turned around. “Of course not,” she sniffed indignantly. “I have a much grander gown than this for the special occasion.”