He looks away. “Soon it won’t matter.”
I want to ask what he means, but then I feel a sharp pain in my abdomen. I barely manage to step away from him, then I empty my stomach on the sand.
Is it the night, or is my vision strange? My vomit is a viscous black liquid, and it’s moving like a worm. No, nothing’s moving. I’m the one who’s dizzy.
“Astra?” Azur’s voice sounds distant, muffled, fading like the sky above me.
Everything is wrong. Wrong with me, with my mind, my body. I might pass out at any moment.
I think about the golden strands connecting souls, but they’re so far, getting lost in darkness. And yet I try to pull, try to call my kindred soul.
Marlak, I need you.
MARLAK
Mirella uses her air magic to float over a small whirlwind, then lands in front of us, right in the middle of the plaza facing the Jewel, where guards with hands and feet bound with ice watch us with curious stares.
“So now you’re calling yourself king?” Her voice is sharp like a sword, and her blue eyes are cold.
I use my air magic to counteract hers and help my friends breathe, then say, “It’s what I am. Mirella…”
Words fail me. How can I convince her I’m still her brother? What can I do to make her change her mind? “I spent twelve years looking for you. I never gave up. There wasn’t a day that you weren’t on my mind.”
She rolls her eyes. “I didn’t ask you to keep me in your thoughts. You think you’re the king?” Her laughter is sinister and eerie. “Let’s see how kingly you are once one of the twelve bloodpuppets reaches you. You’re being hunted, Marlak. If I were you, I would—” She snaps her fingers. “—vanish.”
I can’t recognize the cold young woman in front of me. For a second, I agree with Ziven that she has the same blue eyes as that murderous, horrific bird from that prison island, as if the monstrous nature had never left her.
“Mirella, I’m still the same brother who practiced air magic with you.”
She narrows her cold, hateful eyes. “You think that will erase the target on your back? Bloodpuppets, Marlak. You won’t stand a chance.”
I scoff. “I can deal with bloodpuppets.”
Mirella raises an eyebrow and points to my friends. “Can they?”
I’m such an idiot. I was so focused on my sister’s words that I stopped counteracting her magic, and she’s again blocking their air flow, making them choke. Thankfully, she didn’t make them faint, so I unblock their air pipes, and in less than a second they’re breathing.
Mirella laughs like a toddler who just saw something amusing. “Time’s running out. Bloodpuppets are the least of it. So instead of proclaiming yourself king, you should run while you can. Oh, and don’t even try to return to the Crystal Castle, if you plan to stay alive.”
“Marlak,” Ziven mutters beside me. “We’d better go.”
Mirella widens her eyes. “Look at that. A voice of reason!”
I’m tired of running, tired of hiding, but I don’t want to fight my sister. And I don’t want to endanger my companions. My heart is cracking seeing her looking at me like I’m her enemy.
“I’ll disappear,” I tell her. “For now. But I assure you that I’ll findyour masterand kill him.”
Zorwal. It has to be Zorwal doing this, perhaps enchanting her.
“Do try.” She smirks. “I cannot wait. Now shoo. Go.”
I take a look around me. Most of the guards are still hidden behind ice walls, but the few remaining in the plaza are watching us with interest. Any authority I gained by putting on the crown, any power I claimed will be diffused now, even if my plan was to leave soon. I’ll look like a coward. Or maybe not.
“My job here is done,” I say with the loudest voice I can. “The lower fae are not to be hunted. My sister is not to be harmed, despite her senseless words.”
The reply I get from Mirella is a mocking laugh.
I turn to the others. “Let’s go.”
