“Cuff her. She’s not a guard and she’s very powerful,” the queen ordered the guard as she watched Kailani.
The guard scrambled to get the cuffs off his belt and that’s when Kailani went berserk. She rushed towards the queen, puckering her lips and sucking the air from the room. I didn’t understand what was happening, maybe this was her power? But either way I was going to rush the queen with her. Both of us could definitely take her to the ground. Even as a human with my hands tied behind my back, I was still a powerful fighter.
One second I was turning in Zaphira’s direction and the next a funnel of wind picked me up and threw me against the far wall. Oslo screamed as I cracked my head on the stone, slinking to the ground in confusion.
The queen held her hands out, a wind funnel filling the room as she laughed madly. She had fae power? Kailani was on the floor beside me and the guard was affixing the cuffs to her hands. It all happened so fast I barely understood what Zaphira had just done. She had thrown a wind bomb at us.
The Nightfall queen smiled. “You know I realized it wasn’t that I wanted to expunge the realm of all magic users,” she said and then it started to snow inside the room. She was displaying her variety of powers and I felt sick knowing she’d stolen this from good people. “I just wanted to be one,” she added and then a blinding flash of light pulsed in the room, causing my eyes to squint shut.
Footsteps neared and then I smelled her right beside me but my vision was black. She’d blinded me, hopefully temporarily. “But there is one gift I have been waiting to acquire,” she whispered in my ear then stroked my cheek, pressing her warm fingers against the side of my face. “A powerful alpha wolf.”
I snapped my head to the right and took in as many fingers as I could into my mouth, then I bit down.
Hard.
Warm coppery blood gushed over my tongue as my canines severed one of her fingers and then the queen’s blood-curdling scream rang throughout the room.
I spat the finger onto the ground, laughing manically in the hopes that she would fear I was mentally unstable. Cyrus would approve.
“My finger!” she bellowed in a guttural scream. “Get me a healer.”
Shapes started to dance before my eyes as my vision slowly returned, and I prepared myself for her retaliation. Some dark shape sailed towards me and before I could decipher what it was, there was a crack to the side of my head and once again, blackness overtook me.
NINETEEN
“Zara.” Oslo’s sweet voice pulled me from my unconscious state and I opened my eyes, blinking rapidly. My vision had returned but a deep headache throbbed at the base of my skull.
My little brother peered down at me in fear. “There’s blood coming out of your head.”
Kailani swam into view then, looking worse for wear. Her hair was messed up, like someone had tried to rip it out, and her lip was split.
She probed the back of my skull with her fingers and I hissed. “It’s stopped bleeding,” she told Oslo. “She’ll be okay. Your kind naturally heal. No need for healers most of the time.”
He nodded, seeming more assured.
Then she looked down at me, grinning like a fool.
I peered around us to take in our surroundings. Maybe there was a reason for her gleefulness. Nope. We were locked up inside a cell. People from the other neighboring cells stared over at us with curiosity.
“What could you possibly be happy about?” I asked her.
She tried to control her smile but when she pulled it back down, it just popped right back up. “You bit her finger off!” she finally blurted and then burst into laughter. “Are you insane? I mean it was amazing. You should have seen her. ‘My finger! My finger! Find it!’” Kailani mimicked and now I was grinning too.
I looked over at Oslo and he too had a slight lift to his lips.
“You got her good,” he said.
I sat up slowly, assessing the damage. Other than the head injury, everything else seemed to be in working order.
“But, Zara, you made her mad. She could have killed you,” Oslo added.
I shook my head. “She showed her hand. She wants my power. She won’t kill me until she has that.”
Kailani nodded. “Your sister is right. She wants both of our powers: she won’t kill us.”
“Zara,” Oslo’s voice cracked. “I have to tell you something.”
I couldn’t do this right now. Not with him. “I know,” I said and reached out to smooth his hair. “And we can’t think about it right now because we have to stay strong, okay? Cyrus would want that.”
Oslo’s eyes filled with tears at the mention of our big brother’s name but he nodded. I would fall to pieces later, both Oslo and I would, and Axil would help put us together, but right now I couldn’t think about anything but getting my brother to safety.
“Psst,” someone from the cell next to ours pulled our attention.
I looked up to see a lithe-looking female fae with long blonde hair, pointed ears and dirt-crusted nails. She seemed like she’d been here for a while.
She motioned that I come closer and so I stood, waiting a second for the dizziness to abate and then approached her.
Kailani stepped over to her as well and when we were only a few inches from her face she pointed to the metal bars between us. “When they first pulled me and my little sister in here, they didn’t have any more of the magic suppression cuffs like you have on.” She indicated to our hands that were bound in front of us.
I nodded but was wondering where she was going with this. She looked around at the center of the room where two guards were chatting happily and not paying attention to us.
“I was able to use my dragon-folk fire magic and winter fae ice magic to snap one of the bars off here.” She pointed between us and I looked down as she pulled the bar away to reveal a decent-sized gap. She then quickly replaced it in case a guard was looking. Now that I peered closer it was simply wedged between the top and bottom supports but not attached.
“And I did another at the window.” She tipped her head to the opening at the upper end of her cell, her cuffed hands hanging in front of her. “My little sister is the same size as your brother. She got free and they haven’t noticed.”
My breath hitched as I realized what she was saying. The gap wasn’t large enough for a full-grown man or woman, but a small child could fit through with some help.
“You’re half dragon, half fae?” Kailani asked her.
The woman nodded and that explained it. Fire and ice. Fire and ice enough times throughout the night and it would snap metal like the blacksmiths did.
“Thank you.” A lump formed in my throat as I was overcome with emotion.
“Your sister was in this cell?” Kailani asked.
The woman bobbed her head. “We did it at night when the guard was asleep but I fear you don’t have that long if the Nightfall queen wants your magic. They will torture him to get you to agree.”
She was right. And very smart.
“What do you suggest?” I asked her. She’d clearly been here longer than me and was quick-thinking.
She eyed the cell behind her. “I’ll ask the people locked up across the room to create a diversion in ten minutes’ time. The guards will rush to that side, and then your brother makes his move.”