“He tells me we can trust you,” Jude says to Wren.
“Hold,” Wren tells the falcons, her voice shaking a little. He can see in her face that she, despite everything, expected to find one of their blades to her throat. “Lower your weapons, and the High Court will do the same.”
“Get away from her!” a voice comes from one of the tents, and Bex steps into view. She’s soaked through and shivering, and when she sees them, her eyes go wide. “Wren?”
Horror clouds Wren’s expression as Bex steps out of the shelter of the canvas into the rain. One hand goes to cover her mouth automatically, to hide her sharp teeth. Wren never wanted her family to look at her and see a monster.
Oak notes her swaying a little with nothing nearby to grasp to keep her upright. Wren has been drinking up far too much magic. She must feel as though she is fraying at the edges. She may be fraying at the edges.
“Bex,” Wren says so quietly that he doubts the girl can hear the words over the storm.
The mortal takes a step toward her.
“She’s actually here,” Wren says, sounding awed. “She’s okay.”
“Oh no,” says Bogdana. “That girl isn’t your kin. You’re my child. Mine. And you, boy—”
Lightning arcs down out of the sky, toward Oak. He steps back, lifting his sword automatically, as though he could block it like a blow. For a moment, everything around him goes white. And then he sees Wren lunge in front of him, her hair wild and wind-tossed around her head, electricity flashing inside her as though fireflies are trapped beneath her skin.
She caught the bolt.
Her lips curve, and she gives an odd, uncharacteristic laugh.
Bogdana’s lips pull back in a hiss of astonishment. But she’s accomplished this—Oak no longer has his sword to her throat, and even Jude has taken a step back.
The storm hag shakes her head. “You imprisoned the prince. You threw him into your dungeon. He tricked you. You can’t trust him.”
Wren slumps to her knees, as though her legs collapsed beneath her.
“This is done,” Oak warns Bogdana. “You’re done.”
“Do not think to choose him over me,” Bogdana snaps, ignoring him. “Your sister is a game piece. He’ll use that mortal girl to manipulate you to do exactly what he wants, rather than use her, as I did, to help you take what is yours. And she is in more danger from him than she could ever be from me.”
Wren’s hands still spark with the aftereffects of the bolt. “You keep telling me that others will do to me what you have already done. I know what it is to want something so much that you would rather have the shadow of it than nothing, even if that means you will never have the real thing. And love is not that.
“You could have trusted me to choose my allies. Could have trusted how I would decide to use my powers. But no, you had to bring my unsis—my sister here and show her all the things I was afraid she would see. Show her the me that I was afraid for her to know. And if she spurns me, I am certain you will glory in it, the proof that I have no one but you.”
Wren looks across the mud at Bex. “Prince Oak will make sure you get home.”
“But—” the girl begins.
“You can trust him,” Wren says.
“No, child,” Bogdana snaps. Thunder rumbles. Dust devils begin to swirl around her, sucking up sand. “We have come too far. It’s too late. They will never forgive you. He will never forgive you.”
Oak shakes his head. “There is nothing to forgive. Wren tried to warn me. She would have given up her life to keep from being your pawn.”
Bogdana remains focused on Wren. “Do you really think you’re a match for my power? You caught one bolt of lightning, and you’re already coming apart.”
The falcons move toward their queen, turning their weapons on the storm hag for the first time.
Wren gives a wan smile. “I was never meant to survive. If we went through with this battle and the one that would inevitably come next, if you forced me to annihilate all the magic thrown at us, there would be nothing left of me. The magic that knits me together would have been eaten away.”
“No—” Bogdana begins, but she can’t say the rest. Can’t, because it would have been a lie.
“You’re right about one thing, though. It’s too late.” Wren opens her arms, as though to embrace the night. As she does, it seems that the whole storm—the spiraling wind, the lightning—recognizes her as its center.