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24

24

W e led Mira to her room. Part of her crumbled when Bay passed, and I wasn’t sure how to help ease her pain, other than to ensure Cyril hurt no one else.

After checking my room for any unusual mail and deeming it safe, Brecan promised to find me after he changed clothes. All three of us were salty, sandy, and still damp.

I heard his door close across the hall.

As soon as his door clicked, the scent of smoke immediately filled my nose. I followed it out of my room, down the hallway and outside. After a thorough examination, I was relieved to find the palace wasn’t on fire, although I alerted the guards to make sure all the rooms were cleared. Word quickly spread, but the smoky scent’s origin couldn’t be traced.

I found myself standing in the Night Garden. In the distance, Brecan called my name. Before I could answer him, the Son of Night’s billowing smoke appeared beside me. I raised my palms, ready to defend myself, and Arron’s slitted eyes narrowed on mine.

“I take it you know about the Priest and Priestesses.”

“Are you my mother’s pawn?” I asked pointedly.

“I’m no one’s pawn.”

I narrowed my eyes at his answer. “Are you bound to her?”

“No,” he asserted. Arron sat on the swing, backing up a few feet and then soaring forward as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “But she believes I am.”

“Why does she think that?”

He blinked slowly, tilting his head to the side as if to size me up. “Because I didn’t correct her. I never, however, pledged myself to her. I’m always careful to avoid such unfortunate entanglements.”

Enough semantics. “Why did you write to me? What did you want to discuss?”

“She wanted me to bring another message. She wants to meet with you, and she also wanted to warn you never to trust Fate. She did, and ended up being bound because of it. She says that you can trust her, though. She is your mother and wants you to come home.”

Did Fate help the Priestesses and Priest bind my mother in the soil? Had he somehow weakened her from within? Or was she bound after she cast him out of her – or so she claimed?

“And if I can’t return home? ”

“Can’t, or won’t?” he asked curiously, abruptly stopping the swing and standing up, still clinging to the ropes.

“Take your pick.”

He stepped toward me, flicked his midnight-blue hair out of his face, and shoved his hands in his pockets. “You must defy Fate or defy your mother. Either way, you will face consequences. The choice is yours.”

“How is she holding the witches in the Center?”

“An ancient spell. One that can be broken only by another Fate witch…” he offered. Which is why my mother wants me to visit so badly, I surmised. She wants to bind me so I can’t break the spell.

“Are you saying I can break it?”

“Easily.” He looked into my eyes, unblinking. If he was lying, I couldn’t tell. “With a brush of your hand, the spell would be extinguished.”

“Can I kill her?” I boldly asked.

Arron pursed his lips. “I’m not entirely sure you could, unless you used dark magic. That’s how she killed Bay, Ethne, and Wayra. But, if you choose not to go down that path, you may be able to bind her with your power.”

I didn’t want to bind her; I needed Cyril dead. I wouldn’t unleash her on an unwitting generation once my power faded with my death unless it was the only way, and I could hold her in stasis until I figured out a way to end her for good.

“There’s more to her message…” the Son of Night dangled, like a carrot.

“What else is there? ”

“She plans to burn a witch every hour on the hour until you and your entourage return to Thirteen.”

With his words, the smoky scent that hung in the air turned to ashes in my mouth.

“What you’re smelling is the burning of the Priestesses and Priest right now. The stench will only become stronger, the smoke more invasive, as time passes. Ethne whispered some sort of protection spell before Cyril lit them on fire, so the flames haven’t consumed their bodies yet, but I suggest you hurry.”

There was no hope. I felt the wind die and saw the stillness of the sea.

The thought of the horrors they’d endured turned my stomach.

“Tell me how to sneak back into the Sector. I have to enter without her knowing.”

“Spirit yourself in. I think she believes you’ll arrive in a royal carriage. She’s hoping for cameras and fanfare. Spoil her plans.”

“You could be lying,” I accused him.

He gave a half-smile. “I can show you, if you’d like.”

I swallowed. “Show me what?”

“What’s happening in the Center.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it. Things might be as bad as I imagine them, or they might be worse.

“What is happening in the Center?” Brecan asked as he appeared behind me, Mira standing opposite him, flanking me.

Arron swiped his hand across the air, making dark clouds form. Within them, a murky scene emerged. Ethne, Bay, and Wayra were burning. Their arms were wrenched behind their backs and their chins drooped against their chests. More stakes were being erected surrounding the three to which they were tied.

“They’re clearly dead – why keep the fire going?” Brecan fumed.

“At first I thought Cyril was preserving them to inflict fear, or to manipulate and deter those who might challenge her authority,” Arron mused. “But, as I told Sable, Bay and Wayra were unable to fight back using their affinities once Cyril used fire and dark magic to nullify their gifts. However, she could not prevent Ethne from using hers, and Ethne whispered an incantation before the flame took hold of her. It was her last stand against Cyril.”

Ethne’s incantation was a final stand, all they could do before she killed them. I could almost imagine Ethne trying to keep the flames away from Bay and Wayra. Used to the flame, she would’ve been the last to die. But the horror of being alive but powerless to stop someone from harming the people you loved, and the horror of knowing you would die by your own affinity, was too much.

“Why are the witches huddled in the middle of the Center?” I asked.

“Cyril won’t step near it. She hovers on the Circle’s borders, afraid to get too close to the spot of soil that bound her for so long. She literally shudders at the sight of it.”

“We could use that fear to our advantage,” Mira suggested, iron resolve in her tone.

Brecan shifted his weight. “We need the element of surprise. If we try to stroll into Thirteen, we’ll end up like the dove or the gull. ”

“I could get you in,” Arron offered casually.

Brecan answered quickly and without hesitation. “No.”

“Who are you to speak for the Daughter of Fate?” Arron inquired, as if he actually wanted to know. Brecan was my best friend in The Gallows, and here, he was more than an escort. He was the voice of reason.

“You don’t know him any better than you do your mother, Sable,” Brecan proposed sagely. “This could be a trap. We’ll find another way in.”

Could we find a better way, though?

As I called on Fate to help me choose, I closed my eyes. Can I trust Arron, Son of Night?

A warm feeling filled my belly.

“Fate says I can trust him,” I confirmed. Brecan uttered a curse. “Fate wouldn’t lead me into danger, Brecan. If he says Arron can be trusted, I believe him.” That much I was certain of.

Mira’s attention was fixed on the image still projecting in the smoke cloud behind Arron. Tears welled in her eyes. Without warning, she let loose a guttural cry and stomped out of the garden, straight to the lake far across the lawn.

We followed closely.

She kicked her shoes off and removed her pants and shirt. Wearing only her bra and underwear, she stepped onto the water’s surface, chanting something I’d never heard before. She commanded the water, called it her own, and demanded that it obey.

And suddenly, it did.

It lifted her high into the evening sky and swirled around her, an inverse whirlpool encasing her body in a watery gown. It crowned her its own, and when she commanded, the water sat her gently down again. Arron grinned at my side, and then knelt and put his fist over his heart.

“Priestess of the House of Water,” he said proudly.

Mira strode from the lake, robed in a glittery, watery gown.

“Brecan,” I muttered. “The position for the Priest of the House of Air is open.”

“I don’t know how to claim it.”

Mira’s eyes snapped to him. “You have to want it. You must make the wind understand that it needs you. And it does, Brecan. Right now, it really does. Don’t give it a choice to cast you aside and claim another. You are its choice. Its only choice.”

Having claimed its new Priestess, the lake sprang to life. The water that had laid stagnant, coated with leaves and scum, cleared and became like a sheet of crystal glass. Frogs began to croak, and water spiders skidded across the calm surface. Even the vibrant backs of gliding goldfish were highlighted by the rising moon.

Brecan wanted to claim his place, but was unsure of his right. I saw it in the lines that formed around his mouth. So, I decided he needed a little push.

I called on the dark magic he hated so much, calling for storm clouds to race toward me, knowing they would drag the wind with them.

“Sable, stop,” he gritted.

My lips trembled from the energy I was pulling. “Claim it.”

My eyes closed, and I felt the earth beneath my feet shift. I sensed the life force of every tree around me, where the roots plunged into the deep, loamy earth. I recognized the energy of the lake, the cloak of the midnight sky, and every star that twinkled overhead. I filled the air with turbulent clouds and drew them toward the opposite ends of the magnet I’d become.

The turbulence from the clouds streaking across the sky created wind. It filled the valley and poured over the land like a whispering caress.

Brecan sighed when the wall of air hit him, and like Mira, something in him shifted.

“Remember what she did to Wayra,” Mira demanded.

Brecan’s lavender eyes filled with rage, desiring revenge and the power to make Cyril pay for what she did to his Priestess. He spread his arms wide and called the wind to him. It poured around and through him, a violent tunnel that knocked me flat on my back. I had to shield my eyes to see him, but what a sight he was.

Brecan’s wind pulled the night clouds from Arron and took them swirling to the sky, and then gentled and soared in wisps as delicate as thin, spun sugar.

He took in the air, becoming it. And when he commanded it to calm, it listened.

Arron again knelt and held his fist over his chest. “Priest of the House of Air.” He shifted his attention to me. “Guardian of the House of Fate.”

“Why isn’t she considered a Priestess?” Mira asked, almost outraged at the title he’d spoken on my behalf.

“The House of Fate belongs to Fate, and she is his daughter. She is charged with guarding it now that she is of age. And right now, she needs to be its defender and champion.” Arron extended his hand and I clasped it. “I pledge myself to your service, Daughter of Fate, Guardian of the House of Fate.” He squeezed my hand tightly. “You told me to make a decision, and I have. I know now it is the right one.”

He hadn’t given my mother a vow, but offered it to me instead.

“Why are you pledging yourself to me? I thought you avoided such unfortunate entanglements .”

“Because you are the only one worthy, as well as the only one who can save our kind from your mother.”

Brecan stood behind him, and Mira beside Brecan. Something had changed in them. There was a spark in their eyes that wasn’t there before; the magic that poured off them was visceral and potent.

“Tell us what you need, Sable. Name it, and it will be done,” Arron promised.

“Miss Sable?” a guard shouted across the Night Garden.

The urgency of his voice told me the guard needed me. I ran toward him, leaving my friends behind.

“Here!” I cried out.

A look of relief slid over his face when he caught sight of me. “The King needs you.”

“Is he okay?” I asked as I reached him.

“Yes, Miss. He said he needed to speak with you about an urgent matter.”

I followed the guard to the King’s bedroom. Four other guards stood outside, ensuring the safety of their king.

Stepping into the room, I took him in. The effort of just walking to his study this morning had depleted his energy. He slumped in his bed, the pillows stuffed behind him unable to prop him up. “King Lucius,” I greeted.

“You must go,” he rasped. “Tauren told me that the witches are in trouble. You have to go to them and help them.”

“Who will protect Tauren if I leave?”

“He agreed to double or triple his guard – whatever you think is best. Name it, and it will be done.”

Those were the same words Arron had just spoken outside.

Fate straightened my shoulders. It is almost time to defend my House.

I blinked rapidly. “Quadruple his guard, but I’ll send someone to watch over the palace. And Tauren.”

The King blinked tiredly, weakly gripping the edge of his blanket. “Thank you. For all you’ve done.”

My muscles went rigid, fingernails biting half-moons into my palms. I shook my head in frustration. “I haven’t done enough. I wasn’t able to find the ones who tried to hurt him.”

The King offered a weak smile. “You did something far more important, Sable. You kept him safe, and you showed him true love in the process.”

A knot formed in the back of my throat.

“I’ll always watch over him.”

This was it. I knew when I left the palace, I wouldn’t return. Either Cyril would win, or I would take my rightful place among my people. But I couldn’t stay here.

The King offered a sympathetic smile and reached for my hand. I placed it in his and he brought it to his lips, placing a kiss on the back of it. “I know you will. Now, go. Save my people. Save your people.” His grip tightened with each word.

I strode from the room and headed for mine. I shrugged on a pair of black-as-night pants, the white shirt and leather vest I’d worn during my archery lesson with Tauren, and filled my pockets with black salt.

Walking back to the Night Garden, I was shocked to see Tauren there.

“Where are Brecan, Mira, and Arron?” I asked, breaking the awkward silence.

“Were you going to leave without telling me?”

“I have to go.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. “Brecan filled me in on what was happening in Thirteen. The smoke…”

“That’s why I have to leave.”

Fate was antsy. I could tell, because suddenly I couldn’t stop fidgeting. He hadn’t given me the order to leave yet; he’d said it was almost time. So why was he writhing beneath my skin?

“What’s the matter?”

“Fate. He’s uncomfortable.”

“Do you trust him?” Tauren asked, watching me carefully.

“Implicitly.”

“Arron said something about your mother warning you not to give yourself over to him. That he longed to remain corporeal, and that you would be trapped within, unable to resurface.”

“My mother is burning my brothers and sisters. Forgive me for not trusting her advice.”

He steeled his shoulders. “I want to come with you. ”

“No.” He tilted his head and got that look like he might order me to do it anyway. “No, Tauren. I cannot keep you safe if she is near.”

A throaty laugh came from behind me. “You’re right about that much,” a woman said, slipping out of the shadows.

I looked so much like her it was frightening. From my long, dark hair and straight nose, to the almond shape of my eyes. We even had the same build and height. But there was something deranged about her. Her appearance was harried, the glimmer in her dark eyes wild.

I put myself between her and Tauren.

Slowly, she stalked toward me. With each step, I backed Tauren away. He pulled his dagger from its sheath, ready to battle her with me. But this was a battle he shouldn’t fight, and couldn’t win.

It was mine. And Fate’s.

Cyril never let me out of her sight, approaching carefully. Was she afraid of me?

“I want you to come home, Sable. We have much to discuss.”

Fate roared inside me, gnashing to be released.

Cyril didn’t look at me as much as she looked through me, as if she could see Fate himself. She didn’t fear me. She feared him.

Brecan, Mira, and Arron appeared behind my mother. Cyril’s eyes flashed with anger. She glanced from Tauren to me. “You will hear me out before choosing sides.”

“I’ll never let you harm him,” I warned. Tauren is mine .

Fast as a viper, she spirited to Tauren and grabbed his wrist. Then she grabbed mine, and together, we vanished. I barely registered Brecan’s anguished roar as we faded away.

I stood alone in the House of Fate.

Where was Tauren?

I turned in a tight circle. My heart thundered, pounding as I searched for him in every direction. Cyril had hung an enormous mirror in front of the purple couch. The dappled, aged glass stretched from floor to ceiling, casting a hazy reflection back to me. Fate urged for me to watch.

A scene emerged, a moment I lived but was too young to recall.

I hid behind Mother’s skirts. Grandmother Ela’s face was pinched tight as a fist. “Who is responsible for this?” Ela demanded, pointing to a circle of smoking, split trees behind the House of Earth.

I looked up into Mother’s proud face. Mother smiled at me and smoothed her hand over my hair. “She was responsible.”

“You are teaching her dark magic?” Ela blustered. Her hair was the color of a fawn’s, tawny and thick. Grandmother was beautiful. Her beauty was natural, not sharp like Mother’s or mine.

“I will teach her many things, Priestess. All of which she has a right to know.”

“Fate bade you introduce her to the darkness?”

Cyril smiled. “Fate no longer controls me. I cast him out.”

“You couldn’t,” Ela argued, but her voice wavered .

“I told you I would be stronger than he, stronger than you all one day,” Cyril said sweetly, but there was something in her tone that made the hair on my arms raise. My belly started to burn. I clutched it with my hand.

A voice inside my head spoke gently. “Be still, little one.”

Grandmother’s eyes snapped to mine. She stared at me until her eyes went blank. “He lives in Sable,” she whispered, her fingers raising until they covered her mouth.

“What?” Mother asked. Her brows kissed as she crouched down and looked into my eyes – the way Grandmother had.

“She is only a child, Cyril. How could you?”

“Have you been keeping secrets, Sable?” I cowered from the look Mother gave me. “I didn’t send Fate to her, Priestess. I would never have wished such a future for her, but perhaps it is fortuitous.”

“Fate will do nothing but twist her, as he’s twisted you. The Circle will not allow that to happen. We must protect our home, our Houses, and the witches within them – from Fate, from you, and now from Sable.”

“Do as you must, Priestess, but know that I will protect my daughter from you as well.”

Mother called upon the sky. It turned dark, much darker than I had made it. The ground shook underfoot, vibrating the smooth pebbles beneath my pointed boots. I didn’t understand all her words, but knew what she’d done. Her spell had created a divide between the Priest, Priestesses, and me. A magical circle was rooted around me, preventing their magic from being used to harm or influence me. I could feel the dark power radiating from it.

My grandmother looked horrified. “Recant the spell,” she demanded .

“Never,” Mother snapped. “I will protect her from you. I will protect her from this kingdom, and I will find a way to cast Fate out of her as well. I’ve found that I might need his favor again to achieve the goals I have in mind…”

The voice in my mind spoke up. “Do not fear her, little one. She cannot force me away.”

Fate was speaking. Grandmother said he was inside me, and now I could hear his voice. I felt the knot of him in my stomach.

“Cyril, if you continue down this path, you will be banished. Both of you.”

Mother threw a laugh over her shoulder as she took my tiny hand in hers and began to lead me back to the House of Fate. “And which among you is strong enough to cast us out?”

My mother was the one who drove the wedge between my grandmother and me. Grandmother feared Fate, and Cyril driving him out only sent him looking for a new witch to inhabit. For some unknown reason, he chose me.

She lived in terror of me because of his influence, combined with that of my mother’s. She knew that even though she bound her own daughter, she would never be able to bind me.

And now Tauren was at the mercy of my mother, a woman who didn’t know the meaning of the word.

Fate clawed at my insides. “Where is he?” I begged him. “Tell me where Tauren is.”

Focusing, I heard voices. Many distressed, quiet voices. I walked to the front door and threw it open, my eyes landing on the witches gathered in the Center. They huddled together away from their priest and priestesses, who still burned. I looked for his tall figure, but couldn’t see him among the crowd.

“Tauren!” I called out, searching for him among the hundreds of familiar faces. When the witches saw me, they began to shout, begging for help.

I would help them, but first I had to find Tauren. She hadn’t killed him yet, or else I wouldn’t be here.

My stomach sank the moment I found him.

He was bound and gagged, a noose cinched tightly around his neck, standing on the trap door of the gallows.

Cyril suddenly appeared in front of me, stopping me on my way to him. I sucked in a startled breath. My heart began to thunder. I wasn’t afraid of her, but I was terrified she would hurt Tauren. For a long moment she stared at me in silence, taking me in from hair to pointed heel. And if I wasn’t mistaken, she found me lacking. The feeling was mutual. She was beautiful at first glance, but at second, I could see the hatred she harbored, clinging to her like a parasite.

I looked back to Tauren, hoping I was strong enough to save him, and that if I couldn’t, the spell I’d used to bind us would save his life and Brecan and Mira would arrive in time to spirit him away and hide him from my mother. That somehow the two of them could bind her, in water or in the sky, so she couldn’t hurt anyone else.

The trapped witches’ cries grew louder.

Cyril threw a glance their way. “Do not pity them, Sable. They are what is wrong with The Gallows. The Houses are divisive. The Priestesses and Priest clamored for power they didn’t deserve.”

“And you deserve it?” I asked, raising my brow .

She stabbed a pointed nail in the direction of a clump of disturbed soil in the Center. “I spent seventeen long years being trodden upon. I deserve every ounce of power that’s due me, and I will make sure nothing like that happens to me again. I know how you’ve been treated, Sable. Like a castoff. Like nothing. How can you even stand to look in their direction? They mean nothing to you, because you meant nothing to them.”

“ You are the reason they treated me as they did. You turned my own grandmother against me.”

“I protected you!” she roared, taking a threatening step forward.

I matched her step. “I didn’t need you to protect me from them. The only one I’ve ever needed protection from is you. You are the only one who has ever managed to hurt me.”

She shook her head. “The only reason you weren’t bound with me was because of my protection spell, but even it didn’t cast Fate away from you as I’d hoped.”

“For that, I’m grateful,” I snapped.

She bared her teeth. “Fate hurts you every day, just by inhabiting you. He poisons your thoughts, makes you do things you otherwise wouldn’t, makes it hard to look at yourself in the mirror. He hurts you just by existing inside you. If he loved you, he would leave you alone. He would respect your wishes. He would honor your choices.”

Fate had never treated me like I didn’t matter. He came to me. He protected me. And he wanted to protect me now.

A frustrated, heavy tear fell from my eye. “And if you loved me, you wouldn’t be doing this to those I love. ”

Before she could respond, I spirited myself to the Circle and reached out to touch the barrier – to shatter it as I had the mirror she’d sent. Arron said that only a Fate witch could break her spell. I didn’t care how I’d been treated in the past or how divisive the Houses were, my mother was wrong.

Something lashed around my neck and tightened, jerking me quickly away and abruptly cutting off my air supply. Cyril held the other end of the whip.

“I, too, was Fate’s daughter. Don’t try that again, or I’ll hang you myself – on the gallows that I built.”

I tried to speak and couldn’t. My vocal chords wouldn’t allow even a squeak.

Mother let go of the whip’s handle and I collapsed to the ground, my fingers digging into the parched grass. I unwound the whip’s sharp leather from my flesh, gasping for breath.

Mira and Brecan appeared near the Center. A fierce wind blew across the pentagram, but even the gusts couldn’t extinguish the flames attempting to consume Ethne, Bay, and Wayra. Cyril started toward them.

I called on Fate, rising to my feet again. As I did, Cyril felt the shift.

“Don’t,” Cyril snapped, shoving me so hard I landed on my back.

It was strange seeing her hovering above me, because it was like looking in a mirror. She hadn’t aged during her internment beneath the soil, and now that I was of age, we looked like sisters, almost like twins. She grabbed my arms and shook me. Hard.

“Don’t unleash him. You will regret it.”

“I’d never regret ridding the world of you,” I spat .

She stiffened, her mouth gaping as if she’d been slapped. “I thought you would at least listen to reason.”

“If you were reasonable, I might have.”

Her expression closed off. “You have a choice,” she said coldly. “Save the witches, or save your prince.” Cyril glanced over her shoulder, her eyes narrowing at Tauren.

“If you hurt him…” I warned.

Tauren thrashed, trying to break free of his bindings, but they were likely spelled, and even if they weren’t, it was nearly impossible to do.

Brecan spirited himself across the lawn to stand in front of the gallows and our prince. He nodded once to me, then called on his wind to push upward against the trap doors beneath Tauren, while Arron appeared beside him, loosening his noose.

Cyril was livid. Her plans were slowly unraveling, and she did the only thing she could. She called upon the darkness. Murky shadows slid over the earth, cooling the grass beneath me and spreading frost across the dried blades of grass. My bones rattled within my skin from the power of their mist. Black fire burst from the ground, quickly spreading, outlining the pentagram and slicing through the worn trails. The witches enclosed within the Center screamed, huddling together in groups to keep away from the dark flames slicing between them.

If only I’d reached a little farther, and had broken Cyril’s holding spell.

Once Arron freed him, Tauren jerked the gag from his mouth. “Sable, get away from her!” Tauren yelled. He stalked forward, his golden eyes aimed at Cyril. “My father doesn’t believe in putting criminals to death, but I am not as good a man as he,” Tauren warned. “You will die for the terror you’ve inflicted.”

My mother smiled maliciously. “Will I?”

Everything that followed seemed to happen in slow motion.

Cyril spirited to Tauren before I could reach him. Arron was suddenly behind my prince, clamping a hand on his shoulder and preparing to flee.

I appeared behind my mother a second too late.

She screeched as she dragged a dagger from within the folds of her dress and stabbed at Tauren’s middle. The resulting tumult was concealed by the dark shimmers of clouds left in Arron’s wake. Tauren’s roar of pain was swallowed up as the two disappeared.

A sudden, blinding pain made me buckle. The bottom of my shirt was soaked crimson as the coppery scent of blood filled the air. I pressed a hand to my flesh, but it didn’t ease the pain or stanch the bleeding. I sucked in a sharp breath.

“Sable!” Brecan screamed from somewhere off to the right. He sounded far away. Everything did. Sounds were muffled. I blinked heavily, wanting nothing more than to tell Tauren I loved him before my life restored his.

I called upon Fate to help me, feeling his comforting darkness unfurl inside. His legs steeled mine. He stretched my fingers and then curled them into tight fists. His eyes saw through mine. My stomach stopped hurting and I floated somewhere inside myself, letting Fate consume me from within.

We started toward her.

Cyril .

The one who betrays.

The one who destroys.

The one who covets.

The one who kills.

Fate’s thoughts jumbled with mine. They slid over and around until I couldn’t tell whether they came from him or me.

Cyril was not concerned for me, but she was shaken, obviously struggling to make sense of what she was seeing. “I stabbed him , not you!”

“She bound her soul to his,” Brecan spat, approaching her from the other side, herding her closer to us.

“Sable, come back while you still can,” Cyril warned, reaching out to me while maintaining her distance. “You need help. Your body is dying.”

Fate chuckled darkly. His voice overshadowed mine, then I couldn’t hear mine at all. All that remained was his warning.

“No,” Cyril growled. She knew she couldn’t stand against Fate because she knew intimately how powerful he was. She’d had it inside her but foolishly cast him away; she regretted it every moment since. She pretended it was what she’d wanted all along, right up until the moment she tried to kill me to get it back.

She called on the dark magic she knew so well, the atmosphere trembling with magic so terrible, so powerful, even the earth itself vibrated underfoot. She lashed out with a powerful blow. The writhing darkness should’ve knocked me off my feet, but with Fate steeling me, it was no more than an annoying flick. Fear flashed through her eyes a split second before she lashed out again .

“Sable, he will not leave you if you don’t come back right now. Trust me, daughter.”

The one who lies.

Fate marched me toward her. He thrust his hand out and oozing darkness poured from his palm, knitting an otherworldly length of rope. The strand glittered as he used my hands to knot the end with practiced ease. It was almost as if he’d somehow stolen the dark umbilical cord of the universe itself and hidden it away until this precise moment, like it was the cord’s fate to protect me, to protect us all.

The rope ached and rejoiced in its freedom, encircling her neck and reeling her in until my steely fingers gripped her jaw. She thrashed and fought to free herself, panting and cursing and attempting every spell she could think of as she clawed at my arms. She tried to call forth more dark magic, but Fate would not allow it.

Fate roared in her face and then, as if she weighed no more than an acorn, he threw Cyril toward the Center. The witches trapped inside jumped to avoid her and Cyril landed in the middle, sprawled on the heap of earth from which she’d recently clawed her way out. The instant she realized she was coated in the soil, she jumped up, screaming and rubbing her skin where it lay as crumbling dust. Bits of earth flew from her skin as she hurried to rid herself of it.

Her eyes glittering with malice and rage, Cyril lodged a burst of darkness toward me. It shattered against my chest, but didn’t break me. Fate again sent out his dark, viscous tendril. It coiled around her like a twister, tightening like a serpent who delighted in squeezing its prey until its bones snapped and it went slack .

Cyril grunted as her magic escaped her.

Fate used my body to march toward the Center, breaking through the magical barrier Cyril had erected. His presence alone extinguished the black fire, breaking the spell and setting the witches free. They spilled onto the lawns in mystified disarray. Some panicked, running into their Houses for cover. Others hovered, unsure what to do or how to help. Brecan and Mira shouted to them, but I couldn’t hear what they said. I could only feel Fate.

In this moment, he embodied the feeling he gave me when I stalked someone he wanted dead.

It was terrifying. It was wonderful.

Cyril saw his intention to kill her.

Her body deflated before she regrouped. Her eyes darted from side to side. She was going to make a run for it.

“Keep her in the Center!” I managed to fight past Fate to scream to Brecan.

He cast wind around the circle that spun faster and faster around us until everything beyond it was a blur.

“Sable. Take back control of your body,” he gritted. “I can’t keep this up forever.” His wind began to weaken, the tight funnel loosening like the strings of a corset.

Tauren fought his way through the fleeing witches and fell through the weakening wall of wind, calling my name, unaware of the tiger in his midst. Cyril grabbed Tauren, using him as a shield. His defiant golden eyes met mine as he screamed for me to run.

Deep within, I struggled with Fate, trying to thrust him out. He wanted revenge. He wanted Cyril to suffer. But his ire, his uncontrolled anger, blinded him to Tauren’s presence. And I would protect him, even from Fate.

“You promised,” I reminded him. “Let me do this. I trusted you; now you must trust me! I have to save him. I love him.”

Tauren needed me. I took in the small blood stain on his shirt, then looked at the crimson dripping from the white fabric of my own. “Please,” I begged again.

Fate paused, then slowly receded, tucking himself somewhere deep within me.

Cyril laughed. “You actually did it.”

The wound on my stomach pulsed. My legs faltered as I clung to Fate’s rope, whispering an incantation he fed me. As my lifeblood dribbled from me, in penance, her magic would bleed away from her. When Tauren and I locked eyes, I flicked mine to the side and he dipped his head in understanding. When I threw the rope, he dove sideways and the loop of Fate’s rope fell over Cyril’s neck. “Let’s see how you like it, Mother.” I jerked the cord. Hard. She lost her footing, clawing at the strand that I’d transformed into a slick, black serpent.

She croaked a spell, desperation lacing her voice as she repeated the incantation again and again to no avail. Her magic was nearly depleted, as was the strength in my legs.

As I dragged her into the Center to one of the empty stakes, Brecan appeared next to me, his wind dying down. The snake coiled around Cyril, wrapping around her quicker than she could move.

Cyril’s eyes snapped to Arron, who sauntered over as if he had nothing better to do. “You betrayed me,” she accused .

“I was never bound to you,” he informed her nonchalantly. “I am bound only to the Daughter of Fate.”

“I should have killed your father when I had the chance,” she grunted to Tauren as the serpent coiled tighter around her, squeezing the air from her lungs. Her eyes bulged from the snake’s insistent pressure. Her face mottled and contorted grotesquely.

I stumbled forward, falling to my knees. With a flick of my fingertips I conjured fire, reaching out and lighting the wood piled at her feet.

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