Despite his words, I could see Muiredach was already losing interest in the topic, a look of boredom settling on his face. He froze as he caught sight of me. Something other than apathy moving across his features.
Desire. Relief. As if I’d just handed him the greatest gift of his life.
“Magic breaker,” Muiredach breathed on a sigh.
The shock on Vitus’s face was almost worth my secret being exposed.
I didn’t have to ask how the king had figured it out. After the last few hours, I was changed. The things I couldn’t see before coming through in high-definition technicolor.
Like recognized like.
They’d failed to warn me that the Summer King was a magic breaker. Though his power was a touch different than mine.
There was also something wrong with it. Somewhere along the way, it had been corrupted and was now rotting inside him. Its metaphysical stench overpowering. As if the sins of his deeds had permanently stained him all the way down to his soul.
This was why magic breakers had become so rare in recent history. Because he’d been hunting my kind down in search of a cure.
You see, there was a flaw in his power. For one thing, his enthrallment ability wasn’t natural. Likely, it had been absorbed the same way mine had absorbed a piece of Ahrun’s madness.
After which, he went through a becoming. Much like mine.
His was a cautionary tale of what my fate might be if I survived this day. Not all metamorphosis left you renewed. Some of them turned you into something frightful.
He’d become a different sort of vampire. His sustenance—magic. Particularly magic like mine.
Just how many of my kind had he killed over the centuries?
Thousands, likely. Many of whom probably met their end in this very same meadow. Their bodies now trapped just a few feet below its surface.
None of those lives had given him the thing he wanted. Mine might though.
“This changes everything,” Muiredach crooned.
At that, Vitus jerked. “You can’t. We had a deal.”
“That was before I knew what she was.” There was no mistaking the look of delight on his face as he scanned me up and down. As if I’d just handed him his heart’s desire. “You don’twaste something as rare and precious as her on a petty thing like revenge.”
Anger twisted Vitus’s features. “This plan has been in the works for centuries.”
The Lucies blocked Vitus’s path. Their swords were suddenly out of their scabbards and pointing at his neck. All without a single change of expression from the Fae involved.
“Careful, vampire,” the king warned without drawing his greedy gaze from me. “A tool is only useful as long as it is obedient.”
See, that was why you had to be choosy when selecting your allies. Otherwise, they’d stab you in the back.
Ahrun should have taught him that.
A giant wolf slipped from the forest. His head lowered and his tail down but not quite between his legs as he slunk over to the king’s side.
Icy blue eyes met mine briefly. The intelligence and self-awareness there difficult to believe belonged to anyone under an enthrallment.
Muiredach frowned at the wolf as it edged toward me. “What are you doing here? I didn’t call you.”
Brax finished crossing the last few feet of the meadow. His jaw opened. Fangs pierced my skin as he closed his mouth around my hand.
It was like a circuit being completed. A current flooded my veins as Muiredach roared behind him.
The corner of my being where my magic had curled in on itself to prevent being siphoned away by the oak erupted. A geyser that shot to the surface.
