Magic once more shuddered outward, slicking my limbs with slit throats and phantom blood. I cried out. This time, I was not alone in my distaste—below me, the Folk host finally rose tooutrage. They shoved against the dais and screamed at the sky. Warriors armed with steel appeared among the trees, and hope rose in my chest. But Eala stood straighter, triumphant in the new power wreathing her petite frame.
“Fiann of the Ivy Gate, you belong to me.” Eala’s voice rang across the clearing. The warriors hesitated. “Guard me. Guard my maidens. Kill anyone who tries to get past you.”
Mayhem exploded around us as the Folk fénnidi newly bound by Eala’s bloody magic clashed against the revelers swirling angrily toward the dais. Taking advantage of Eala’s inattention, I reached my awareness toward my fiann of stone monsters waiting in the trees. But my Greenmark was scattered; my strength, sapped. I could barely feel them. Panic rose inside me, shattering what little composure I had left. I tried to free myself from Rogan’s unyielding grip, stomping my heel into his instep. Twisting, I shoved my elbow into his solar plexus. But he barely moved—the pain that must have been coursing up his leg and abdomen didn’t register on his face.
Slowly, I calmed. Rogan had always been taller, stronger, faster than I. But there was a reason Mother and Cathair had forged me into a weapon of vengeance. There was a reason I was here, tonight, gowned in black feathers beneath the Ember Moon.
The one thing Rogan had never liked—neverunderstood—about me. My Folk blood. My Greenmark. My unknowable, impossible origins. I had always thought thatmydefect. Tonight, I knew it to be his.
I closed my eyes. Forced my breath to slow. Reached for the cool, soothing rush of green leaves and dark earth and creeping roots.
I didn’t turn my Greenmark on Rogan. I turned it on myself. Like I had in the graveyard of monsters, I let the full force of my innate power burn through me. Emerald veins branched over my skin, then burst with thorny vines. Greenery rippled up my arms and lapped over my shoulders, tangling in my mantle of black feathers. Flowers of dark red and blinding white burst along myneck and twined in my hair. Twin bracelets circled my wrists—bracelets of brambles and nettles. Of hemlock and poison ivy. Only now they pointed outward.
Blood burst from Rogan’s palm. Lesions crept up his wrists. His face didn’t change, but his grip slipped. I wrenched my arms free, backed away from him. Without a direct command from Eala, he made no move to follow me.
I scrambled across the dais and threw myself toward Irian. I flung my arms around his neck, burying my face against his shoulder. His arms were bound, so he couldn’t embrace me, but he leaned into my touch as I tangled myself around him, heedless of the thorny vines still twining my skin and hair.
“We are running out of time, colleen.” His voice was urgent. “The Heartwood—”
“I understand why she needs Rogan,” I interrupted him, terse. “Ruling Bridei and commanding its powerful fianna lends her significant power in the human realms. But why the Gates? What is she hoping to accomplish?”
“This must have been her plan all along.” Irian’s voice was grim. “With control of only a few Gates, she will be powerful beyond measure. She could wage war—hold domains hostage against each other. If the Sword is not tithed, she could gain dominance over both realms, human and Folk. She could control the flow of wild magic. She could become queen of everything.”
“We have to stop her.”
“The best way to stop her is for me to tithe the Sky-Sword to you. The Ember Moon rises toward its zenith. You must free me from these bonds. Wemustmake haste to the Heartwood.”
But I barely heard him. The weight of attention scraped my neck. Eala’s gaze was fixed on me. And Irian. Her eyes flicked to Rogan, standing like a statue, with lacerations on his palms and flowers strewn at his feet. Her face grew pitiless. She lifted an imperious, bloodstained hand toward her maidens. She crooked a scarlet finger.
“Chandi, my love,” she said. “It’s time.”
“No.” Panic burst through my body. I rose to my feet, even as Chandi reluctantly climbed the dais above the heaving, turbulent Folk host. “Chandi, no!”
Her feet slowed. Hope burst through me. I turned to Eala, pressing my advantage.
“You made me believehewas my enemy.” Irian glowered from his bonds. “Yet all this time, it wasyou.”
“I am not your enemy—I have never been your enemy.” Eala’s face warped with sudden emotion. Adoration, consternation, betrayal. “When Rogan first told me he had come to Tír na nÓg in the company of my adoptive sister, I had such high hopes. That I might finally have a true ally, bound in love and in blood, more powerful than any other alliance I could claim.” She controlled her expression, gripped the knife tighter in her bloody fingers. “Together, we would have been powerful enough to stand against any who defied us. But you betrayed me. You sided with my captor, instead of me. You let the love of a man overcome the love of a sister. And because of that, I was forced to take more-drastic measures.”
“But why?” I raised my voice to be heard over the melee below us. “We could have freed you with less bloodshed. It didn’t have to go so far.”
“Can’t you understand?” Eala’s expression was grim. “All my life, I have been used and traded like a coin. Admired. Bartered. Stolen. Desired. Hidden. But I am no coin. I am a weapon, and I am sharper than anyone has ever given me credit for. I want what I’ve never been allowed—power. My own power. I’ve waited my whole life for someone—anyone—to deign to give it to me. But no one ever has. So now I have to take it.”
“By slaughtering your sisters?” My voice was incredulous. “By stealing the Gates from the bardaí?”
“Whoever controls the Gates controlseverything.” White feathers floated around her like a halo. “Once the Sky-Sword is destroyed, all the magic the Septs once claimed will be free. Butif I hold the Gates, I will decide who comes and who goes. Who trades what, with whom. Who goes to war. Who lives, who dies. I will be more powerful than the Septs. Than the bardaí. And once I use Rogan’s fianna to conquer the human under-kings, I will be more powerful than Mother as well. And she will bow to my will, as she once made me bow to hers.”
Cathair’s voice shivered through me.Eithne wished to forge Eala into her own image. Eala felt each blow of the hammer and hated her mother for it.
I shifted my attention to Chandi.
“And you?” I asked softly. “What do you gain from this power grab? Other than death?”
“Once wild magic is freed, Eala will find a way to resurrect us,” Chandi told me, with tortured certainty.
“That’s not possible.”
“She has sworn it.”
