27. Twenty-Eight Maeve

" I don't like this."

"What did you say?" Aline yelled over the wind. Her long wavy hair whipped around her face.

I shook my head. It didn't matter what I thought now. We were committed to this course of action. I didn't see any other choice.

We stood on the parapet overlooking the gardens at the side of the castle, and the meadow beyond. My foot slipped into the internal gutter running along the narrow ledge. I pressed my back against the slate roof, my eyes focused on the flickering torches along the boundary and the village of Crookshollow in the distance.

After Daigh disappeared back into the mirror and we'd gone back to my room, Aline and I fell into bed. I pretended to sleep, my ears prickling for any change in the noise outside. After half an hour, Arthur woke Flynn up and crawled back into bed. In a few minutes he was snoring, and Aline and I could get up and go to the bathroom again.

My stomach churned with guilt and disgust that I was deceiving the guys to break the wall. But Daigh was right about the fact that Liah couldn't be allowed to get her hands on our escape plan.

Shouts and cheers blew into my face. I gripped the edge of the crenulation and peered over the wall. Arthur was right – the tractors had made it half a length closer. The wall bent back under their onslaught. Soon it would break anyway.

"I hope this works," I yelled at Aline. "I hope Daigh's right."

She squeezed my hand. I couldn't hear her words, but I read her lips. "Me too, sweetheart."

Sparks of her spirit magic flickered against my hand. I closed my eyes and focused my attention on drawing up my power. My magic flared inside me, and I pushed it through my fingers, sending it to Aline so she could deactivate the charms.

After a few moments, she dropped my hand. "It's done," she mouthed, and picked her way back along the ramparts to the low-arched door leading back inside.

I dared a final look over the parapet. At the front gate, the tractor's wheels spun against the gravel as it crashed through the invisible barrier and skidded up the drive. A roar of triumph rose from the villagers, spreading along the wall as the lights moved through the trees and up the curling paths toward Briarwood.

It was downright Shakespearean.

I've brought this ruin upon my house.

Shouts echoed up the stairs. I raced down, slamming the door to the roof behind me. As I made my way across the first-floor landing, Flynn slammed the bathroom door open and screamed my name. Even the the gloom, I could see his face had gone pale.

"I'm here!" I cried, rushing around the covered porch.

"There you are!" Flynn crashed into me, his arms engulfing me in a tight hug. "I thought your tiny arse got sucked down the loo."

Flynn's silly words belied the raw panic in his voice. I clung to him, not wanting to let him go. I hated that I'd worried him and that I was still lying to him.

I hate this. I'm so scared.

The other guys crashed down the stairs. Rowan carried a struggling Obelix in his arms, and Arthur already had his sword strapped around his waist. "They're broken through the barrier," Corbin said. "Arthur tells me Aline remembered a secret passage in the cellar that leads out to the forest. Our best shot is to make it there."

Corbin flung open the door to the secret passage. It would get us downstairs quicker. "Last person through needs to pull this shut," he said, jabbing the secret door hidden in the panelling. I followed him as he vaulted down the narrow steps and pushed the small door in the pantry open. In front of the pantry was a small square wooden door cut into the flagstones. Corbin pulled it up, revealing a rickety staircase leading down into the gloom. He gripped my hand and led me down the steps, shining the screen of his phone in front of him to illuminate a tiny square of light.

"Meeoorww!" Obelix yowled from behind me. He didn't want to go into the cellar. That makes two of us, buddy.

A loud bang crackled through the castle. My heart leapt into my throat. Arthur shoved Rowan down the steps after me. "Hurry," he growled. "They're ramming the portcullis with that tractor. It won't take long until they're inside the castle!"