28. Chapter 28

Chapter twenty-eight

Luci

T he clock is ticking loudly. Each click announcing Drew's lateness. The table has been set perfectly. George is standing with perfect form, waiting to serve dinner as soon as my husband joins us.

But where is he? Drew is normally very punctual. Has he lost track of time? That's not like him at all.

My gaze flicks back to the clock. Ten minutes late. I look at George. He shrugs.

I sigh. My mother would have fired him on the spot. George should have quietly stepped outside and asked someone to look for his lordship. It's a shame it is the butler's day off. Not that he is much better.

Nevermind. I'll look for my husband myself. It will be better than sitting here twiddling my thumbs.

As I get to my feet, George has the sense to open the door for me. I thank him and head for Drew's study. It's chilly out here in the hallway. I wrap my cardigan tighter around myself and try to pretend that it is only the cold that is making me shake. Drew is fine. He has to be.

His study is empty. As is his sitting room, drawing room and bedchamber. I check his bathroom too. Then the ballroom, in case he has gone back to glare at the broken chandelier.

Nothing. Nothing but empty rooms and an eerie silence.

Katy finds me by the grand staircase .

"Have you found him?" she asks.

I shake my head and fight back my tears. Crying really will not help the situation.

"Okay, I'll get the staff to sweep the house and the gardens," she says. Her tone is calm but there is concern in her blue eyes.

"Have you tried calling his mobile?" I ask.

Maybe I do need a new phone after all. I barely used my old one. But now I have someone I want to call. And it's not like Drew can be by my side all the time.

"It's just ringing out," she says.

And my stomach fills with dread. I watch as she hurries off to organize the search party. Everything is fine. It has to be. He has gone for a walk or to run an errand and he forgot to tell anyone. He will be back any minute now and scoop me up into a big embrace and apologize for scaring me.

I hurry to the garage and count all the cars twice before I'm forced to admit that they are all here. My lungs feel tight and my eyes are prickly and hot. He still could be walking around the grounds somewhere. In the dark. At the very tail end of January.

Perhaps he has fallen. Had an accident.

A distraught whimper bubbles out of me. I need to find him.

Drew is my everything. He is my entire world. The other half of me.

Of course. That's it. How am I so stupid? Claiming he is my other half is romantic nonsense, but for us, it has some grounding in reality. I am his vessel, he is my mage. Magic that once was mine, flows through him. I should be able to sense him.

I close my eyes and reach out. And out. And out some more. My magic senses sweep all around the house and grounds. They linger by the front gate where a spike of his essence still swirls. Along with an echo of his sudden fear.

A scream pours out of me. It's true. The thing I was dreading and denying since the moment he was late for dinner can't be denied any longer. The truth is laid out before my magic senses, as clear as day.

They have him. They have taken him.

Revivalists have my Drew.

T he sun should not be shining this brightly. It's not fair. My world has ended, life should not cheerfully go on without a care. The sun should no longer shine. Everything should be as dark as my mood.

"Is there really no one you trust to help?" asks Katy yet again.

I sigh and rub my eyes. I haven't slept. Neither has she. Now we are sitting in her office in the bright morning sunlight, still trying to think of a plan.

"I mean, you know who is a Revivalist and who is not?"

Her words make me wince. Part of me is horrified that I folded and told her everything. But most of me understands that I need all the help I can get, and Katy can't help if she doesn't know what the hell is going on.

Nevertheless, talking openly about being a Revivalist feels so unnatural. A lifetime of secrecy and shadows is not so easy to shrug off.

"Unfortunately not," I say. "Revivalists are not one homogenous group. There are factions. Factions within factions. In fighting. Power struggles. It's a mess."

Katy's eyebrows rise and she nods thoughtfully.

"Truthfully, I think that's why they haven't succeeded in bringing the fey back. Too busy stabbing each other in the back."

They. I referred to Revivalists as they. I like the feel of that on my tongue. I'm not one of them anymore. Not in my heart. Despite what the future is teasing.

"And the Council is definitely out?" she asks .

I nod. "Riddled with Revivalists."

Katy sighs heavily and I quite agree. We are screwed. So screwed. There is no way we can get Drew back. We are entirely at their mercy.

But I think we will hear from them today. They will let us know their demands. And I will trade myself for Drew in a heartbeat. If that's what they want.

But I know in my heart that it's not.

I shiver and wrap my cardigan around myself tighter. The bitter truth is hard to deny. It's staring me in the face and it's time to acknowledge it.

It's Imbolc. The first day of spring. The turning of the seasons. Midway between solstice and equinox. A powerful day for spell casting.

It's also the end of my honeymoon, and the irony of that is almost enough to make me laugh. Even though I've never felt further from laughing in my life.

The stark truth is, they have my Drew. They have me trapped. Trapped with a very well preserved portal, and a very powerful fey dagger.

I know what they are going to demand in exchange for Drew.

And I'm going to give it to them.

Drew is worth the world. The fey can have it, I don't care. As long as I have my husband, nothing else matters.

I'm out of options. There is no other path. Yet again, my life has boiled down to doing as I'm told. And I don't care. If obedience is my life's calling, then so be it. It's the only way to get Drew back in my arms where he belongs. I need him. I can't live without him. He is my rock and my anchor. My only defense against the stormy sea that is my life.

The fates have taken me full circle. I'm back at the beginning. I'm attempting my sacred task. As I was always meant to do.

"We need to find the dagger," I say to Katy.

"Are you sure that is what they want?" she asks .

I nod. I feel awful for lying to her, but it has to be done. I gave Drew the dagger and told him to hide it. I'm not sure I can open the portal without it, so it has to be found. I need all the help I can get.

"Is giving them such a powerful tool a good idea?"

I meet her gaze evenly. "If it gets Drew back safe and sound, then yes."

She stares at me for a moment and then she nods. I bite back my sigh of relief. She cares for Drew, just not as much as I do. She wants him safe, but I don't think she'll burn the world for him.

Not like I will.

I 'm on my knees again. This is my least favorite way to be doing so. Kneeling in Drew's closet, desperately searching for a fey dagger so I can destroy the world.

And save my husband. I must remember that part.

That has to be worth some forgiveness? Wanting to save the only person I've ever loved doesn't make me evil. Does it? Do I even care if it does?

This world is cruel and dark and lonely. Drew is a shining light. It's not a difficult choice. Perhaps a selfish one. But why should I care for a world that has never cared for me?

Katy runs in all breathless behind me and hope flares to life. Has she found it? I turn to face her. She points at her smartwatch.

"The bell at the front gate," she explains. "They are here."

I flow to my feet. "Keep looking, I will talk to them. Buy us more time."

She nods and turns frantically away.

I hurry outside.

It's only when I'm more than halfway down the driveway that I remember I'm wearing a dress. The red one Drew liked most out of all the things I tried on. The dress I was wearing when he spun me around the ballroom.

Was that really only yesterday? It feels like a lifetime ago.

The gravel crunches as I quicken my pace. I have much bigger problems than giving a fuck about people's reactions to my fashion choices.

I stomp down the driveway and stop a few feet from the gate. One black car and a man I don't know.

"Where is Count Felford?" I demand sternly.

The stranger cocks his head towards the car. The windows are tinted and I can't see a thing. My heart is pounding, but I cannot let it distract me.

The man's gaze rakes over me, taking in my dress and probably my shimmery tights. I think my hair is still in bunches, though very disheveled ones by now.

"If Felford is not alive, we have nothing to discuss!" I snap.

The man grins. The car door opens. Gregory climbs out. He turns around and drags someone out. Someone in crumpled clothes with their hands cuffed behind their back. Someone with blood all over their face and down their front. Someone with eyes swollen shut and a head that lolls like a ragdoll.

I suck in a breath.

My Drew.

Rage coils within me. I wish I was a mage. I'd flay Gregory alive. How could he do this to someone who was once his friend?

But Gregory isn't even looking at me. He is too busy trying to hold Drew up.

"So, I bet you can guess what the deal is?" drawls the stranger.

I nod. "Open the portal or you will kill him."

The stranger grins. "Close. Open the portal or we won't kill him. We will keep him alive for a very, very long time. In a state worse than this."

It feels like something is clawing at my heart. Digging in and shredding it to pieces. My poor, sweet, kind Drew. He doesn't deserve this. It's not his fault he was tricked into marrying a Revivalist and caught up in all my mess.

If I had any doubts before, they are gone now. Ground to dust by the sight of Drew's broken body.

I nod sharply and turn on my heels. The gravel crunches. Leaving Drew with those monsters feels so wrong. But I'm no match for them. This is the only way I can help him.

A loud wolf whistle cuts through the air, and my shoulders hunch. Mocking laughter rings out, and it feels like it is chasing me.

Assholes. For fuck's sake. Why did I have to show any reaction at all? I wish I hadn't flinched. I wish I was strong enough to hold my head up high and ignore them. Damn them. Damn them to hell.

As I reach the front steps of the house, Katy runs down them. A gleam of silver in her hands. I snatch it from her. The power flares and soothes my heart.

"Where did you find it?" I ask. Not that it matters.

"Under his bed," she wheezes.

That's almost funny. If only there was time to laugh.

I stride towards the shrine. Katy hurries after me.

"Where are you going? I thought the plan was to give them the dagger?"

I grind my teeth and quicken my strides. "The plan has changed."

I reach the walled garden. Katy gasps. She has figured it out.

"No, Luci! You can't! Drew wouldn't want you to!"

I heave the hidden door open and step through. Katy chases after me. Her blue eyes are wild and frantic.

"I can't let you!" she says.

I lift the dagger up high and snarl all my rage at her. "Don't make me hurt you!"

All color drains from her face. She stumbles back. The look of terror and dread in her eyes is going to haunt me forever. As will many things about this day. But it will all be worth it in the end. Drew will be safe, alive, and able to put his arms around me and hold me.

I glare at Katy for a moment longer. I think I have defeated her. I'm acting like this dagger gives the power to do terrible things to her, and she seems to believe me. Good. I don't want to have to hit her over the head with it.

I draw a fake rune in the air.

"Step any closer and your insides will turn into mush," I say.

And then I turn away because I cannot look at her anymore. The devastation on her face is too much to bear. However much I deserve it.

Three more strides and I'm standing right before the sleeping portal.

For hundreds of years, people have been trying to get to this moment, and here it is.

A relatively intact portal. A tapped vessel who has been raised for this. A fey dagger of extraordinary power. All coming together on Imbolc. A day of great alignment.

Four things. And now they have all clicked into place, it seems so ridiculously easy.

I plunge the dagger into the ground by my feet. I close my eyes. Open up my arms.

I let the magic of the dagger pour into me. I fling it at the shrine. I am the siphon. The conduit. The catalyst. Magic flows through me. It passes through my being so quickly it is not trapped. This magic does not need a mage to free it from my body. This magic is merely passing through.

I feel the runes carved around the portal begin to smolder and stir towards life. They are hungry after their long sleep. The dagger is not going to be enough. Luckily, there is raw power everywhere. In the trees. The earth. The air. It's all around me. I draw it all in and feed it to the portal .

The runes ignite. They flame to life. The ancient magic weaves and spins like cogs of a machine clicking into place and turning.

The portal forms in a blaze of shimmering light. It's open. It's done. A doorway between realms has been born.

The fey can step through and conquer this world.

And I'll have my Drew back.