A violent tearing sensation ripped through my gut and shook my body, throwing me to the icy ground. My arms thrashed until I thought they’d split from my body, and the ripping in my gut deepened. A rending pain tore through my chest and scrambled out to my flesh. For the first time since my imprisonment, I wondered if I could survive the separation. Was this magic meant to bind me for the rest of my life? Brintontoven was more cruel than I’d thought.
Black filled the edges of my vision. My body shook and writhed, but then—
The pain stopped abruptly. I squeezed my eyelids shut as my arms shook again—the pain left my body trembling and exhausted.
My chest heaved as I tried to catch my breath and regain control of my limbs. It was a wretched, embarrassing position to find myself in.
After at least a minute, I pushed myself up to sit, leaning forward so my forearms rested on my knees. Heavy breaths still punctuated my breathing. I had not expected such an agonizing separation.
But I had survived.
When I finally brought my eyes up to the queen, I found her focused on the lamp. Grateful she wasn’t staring at my weakness, I staggered to my feet and approached her.
“Are you recovered?” she asked, lifting her attention from the lamp to me.
“Enough.”
She tapped the lamp. “I can feel the magic now inside the lamp. Before, I only felt power radiating off of you. But now, I see what you said before. It is… brimming with energy.”
I grimaced, a remnant of pain skittering down the side of my face. “We should destroy it.”
She tapped a finger against the side of the lamp again. “Or we could save it to use against our enemies.”
We.
Our.
This was dangerous language she used, especially when I intended to leave as soon as possible.
But the lamp was more dangerous. I shook my head. “Nobody deserves that. I would kill a fae slowly, dragging him through a torturous death, before I forced him to bind himself to that lamp. And I would consider it a mercy.”
She stared at me, longer than I liked. What was she thinking? Would she argue with me? Insist on keeping it for her vengeance? There were better forms of vengeance, even for Brintontoven.
“Plus,” I added, “it would allow others access to the magic.” She tipped her head, as if unsure what I meant. I explained. “You will not always have the lamp. Others will get it eventually, and they could turn the slave on you. I have…”
I hesitated. My list of crimes was long and disgusting, even to a monster like myself. “I have done the worst kinds of things to people who did not deserve them because my masters requested them. The lamp’sslave has no say in how the magic is used, no control. The power to literally reroute stars is in that clump of metal, and if it gets in hands of someone who would hurt you—”
I trailed off, unsure how to convince her. “It’s not worth it, Your Majesty.”
She stared at me again, and for an instant I saw Kalshana’s terrifying queen. The one that had frozen a band of musicians for annoying her. Was she angry? Upset? Thoughtful? Plotting? There was no way to know.
“Do you have your magic back?” she finally asked. “And are you free to use it as you will?”
I turned my thoughts inward, deep in my chest, where I’d learned to concentrate if I wanted to feel my magic. As if summoned, my power burst to life, filling my body and rushing out to my hands and feet so fast it left me nauseous. One hand drifted to my stomach subconsciously while I extended my other and held a fireball.
A satisfied smile scrawled across my face. “Yes. It would seem so.”
Her eyes flitted from my fireball to my stomach to the lamp. “And how would you suggest we destroy it?”
Then she agreed? My smile grew. “Perhaps we can both shoot it with the most destructive magic we possess and see what happens?”
A conspiratorial glint filled her eyes, and I felt another quick stab of guilt. Working with her to destroy the lamp would only serve to make her thinkwe were growing closer, collaborating to achieve common goals.
She set the lamp on the icy meadow twenty feet away and then stood next to me. “Now?”
I lifted an arm and pointed it at the lamp. “Yes, now.” I fired a glowing stream of molten lava, hotter than fire, at the cursed piece of metal.
At the same time, she shot an electric beam of ice, glittering with lightning. Our two rays of magic met at the lamp and erupted in an explosion of furious fire. Bursts of lightning and sprays of lava ejected from the glowing inferno, and we stepped back to avoid flying bits of fire and burning ice.
