Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
“Now, feel my wrath,” Bastian cried.
Clover jumped to her feet with a gasp as he stabbed Helly. Her body crumpled sideways into the sand. Dead. She was dead. It was unfathomable. Helly should have lived forever. She should have outlived a human street rat by a long shot. The world was upside down.
“Clover, get down,” Hadrian shouted up at her.
The earth was still trembling beneath their feet. She should have taken cover. She should have surrendered to the hate in this world, but she would not.
Her father had fought for a new world.
He’d been killed for his vision. A place for humans and half-Fae to have their own magic. A right to live how they pleased. To not be subjugated behind Fae because of their lack of powers. All the reasons that Bastian had just spewed in his speech.
It was why she was an orphan. Why her world had ended in one night. Why she had nothing.
And now—now—when she finally had something to hold on to, when she had love and friendship and a life, they wanted to strip it all away again. She wouldn’t allow it. Not again.
Clover released the amulet from under her shirt. It pulsed, as if hearing her call. She had no idea how it worked. Since talking with Thea, she had tried multiple times to call it to action but had given up. Her father hadn’t finished his greatest invention. There was nothing to be done.
But she didn’t believe that. He wouldn’t have given her this for nothing.
So, she lifted her two loves to her feet. She laced their fingers together and felt the intention of her will push into the amulet.
“Never again,” she said.
Everything began to glow a bright, hot white. It was as if they were standing in the center of a star. But none of them wavered or tried to pull away. She wouldn’t lose them. Not this time.
Then, the magic flared to its brightest, and Clover, Hadrian, and Darby vanished.
52
THE RISING
Helly’s body fell lifeless to the arena floor.
Kerrigan’s ears were ringing.
There was still a fight. This wasn’t over. And yet she couldn’t move. She couldn’t think.
Helly.
Her Helly was … dead.
She couldn’t comprehend this. That this meant that Tavry’s beautiful life was forfeit as well. Tavry would never ride the skies again. Kerrigan would never find Helly in the mountain, talk to her, be healed by her, confide in her, love her. Helly had been her mother in everything but name. She had raised Kerrigan in the mountain and looked after her when her father was absent. She had been the closest thing to family until she and Kivrin made up.
It didn’t even make sense that she could be killed. For so long, it had seemed impossible. Fae could live for thousands of years unless they chose the abyss, and Helly had never seemed the type to choose the abyss when she had so much left to do and learn. Healing was a never-ending process. And now, she could never heal again. Or be healed herself.
“Kerrigan,” Fordham roared, pushing through the blank moment in her mind.
She reacted on instinct, bringing her hands up, and a shield formed in front of her. It stopped a guard’s blade as it came down toward her head. The sword lodged in her shield, and she shoved him back. It dropped out of his hand, and she slid across the arena sand to pick it up.
She was again on her feet in a second, slicing the blade down on his outstretched arm. He screamed in pain, pulling back the severed limb in terror.
Kerrigan wielded the blade like an extension of herself. Fordham had made her a good fighter, and Lorian Van Horn was the one who had shaped her into a deadly weapon. He might have hated half-Fae as much as Bastian did now, but he had been a thorough teacher. The same as Bastian in that regard.
In fact, Bastian had been the one to set up Lorian so that he would take the blame. Lorian had been hanged for that. Another thing that was Kerrigan’s fault, but it had been at the mercy of the machinations of Bastian. A thorough, detailed, and premeditated psychopath.
She intended to end him the same way that she’d taken Lorian down.
She just needed to get through the wave of guards heading her way. She wished more than anything that she’d had her last meeting with Cleora. In three days’ time, she was supposed to meet with the professor to learn how to work on her energy blasts. Kerrigan had only been able to get them to work twice, and both times, she had been beaten near to death. Her other spirit magic was of the defensive variety. And apparently, even the energy blasts could only be conjured to save her life. She sure would have liked to wield them to tear through the guards to clear the way to Bastian.