I wrap an arm around one child and then the other. My power wavers, the shield I have wrapped around them threatening to dissipate, but I need more. Just a little more.
I focus on shadow and darkness and the cool, soothing night until the back wall is nothing but shadow and flame. Then I heave and thrust the children through to the other side with the last of my strength.
Like the string of a bow stretched too tight, my power snaps and retreats to just beyond my grasp.
I collapse, flames licking my legs.
I’m coming for you, Princess. Don’t let go.
Misha’s voice forces my eyes open. The flames around me are too close.
No! I shout the word in my mind. I can’t let my friend come in here. I can’t risk him being trapped, can’t risk more devastation to save my life.
I reach for my power again. It feels like swimming through sand, but I keep reaching, gathering up every little bit I can until the wall ahead of me gives way to shadow and I can crawl through to the other side.
I take a deep breath of blessedly cool air. It’s a balm on my lungs.
A black-cloaked figure lunges for me.
“No,” I cry, dodging. But I’m too slow, and I feel a needle slide into my arm, the burn of the toxin racing through my veins.
I grapple for my power, but it’s like tipping over an empty cup. There’s nothing there.
I know this feeling.
Then I’m lifted into someone’s arms and carried away from the flames, away from the desperate cries for help. I’m belly-down on the back of a horse and riding fast.
“Heal her now!” someone shouts. “Before we lose her. Orders were clear—she lives.”
“Calm down,” a softer, more feminine voice says. “She’s going to be fine.”
I don’t recognize the voices, and when I try to talk to Misha through that connection in our power, it’s like hitting a wall.
I’m dizzy and drained. Weak. I need to know where I am—to see where they’re taking me—but my eyes refuse to cooperate, and unconsciousness grips me.
Chapter Fifteen
When I come to, the sky is pitch-black. The moon is hiding behind clouds and there are no stars in sight, but my eyes adjust quickly. In the distance, a modest temple’s been built into the side of the mountain.
We’re still riding. I’m slouched in front of a large body—male if I had to guess. I count three males and a female around us, but hear others close by.
These are the people who rescued me from the fire. The ones who healed me. The ones who want me alive. But I know with every inch of my being that they are not allies. I try to move and wince. My wrists are bound, and my muscles ache.
“I think she’s sore,” the male riding behind me says. His meaty palm gropes my thigh. “I can make you real sore, honey.”
“Back off,” the female riding beside us says. She sneers as she looks at my riding buddy. “The queen wants her alive and unscathed.”
The male behind me grunts but moves his hand from my thigh. “I’d only leave a few marks—just enough to show the girl what we do to traitors.”
These people healed me to take to Queen Arya. Was the fire a trap? A way to make me drain my power so I’d be easier to capture?
Misha. I think his name as hard as I can, but I hit that wall again. Our connection must rely on my magic on some level, but they injected me with that toxin when they snatched me from the capital, and until it leaves my system, my power is gone.
In the far distance, the thunder rolls, and just beyond that . . . hoofbeats. Someone’s coming.
Sebastian? An ally of my captors?
The female beside us perks up in her seat and glances toward the trail behind us. I’m not the only one who heard it.
“We have company,” she announces, squinting off into the distance.
“How far?” a male in the front asks. He’s tall and has the same white-blond hair as Sebastian. I bet he’s part of the queen’s Golden Military. Maybe they all are.
She shakes her head. “The storm makes it hard to tell. Less than half an hour.”
Her friends stand and peer back in the direction we came. “Who else would be this deep in the mountains at this time of night?”
“Could be anybody, now that the unclean ones have their power back. Whole world’s gone to hell.”
I narrow my eyes on that temple in the distance, closer now. Can these fae see in the dark like I can? Can they see the ravens circling the temple steps? When they chose this path, did they know they’d be riding through a pack of Sluagh? I doubt it. Sluagh are too powerful to risk in the dark.