“I’m going to bring him back like I did with you and Reyla,” I said softly.
“I’m still stunned by all this,” Reyla said. “If collars like Brodine’s exist, why isn’t everyone talking about them?”
“Because they aren’t freely available,” I said. “The last thingthe fae lords and ladies want is for their collared Nullens to slip out of their grasp.”
“Where did you get the collars?” Airia asked.
“From Vexxion, though he didn’t tell me where he got them.” He’d traded away something vital to obtain them, though he hadn’t shared what it was. I sensed it would soon come to haunt us. If only I knew how to prepare.
“I heard the Lieges create all the collars,” she said. “Maybe he got them from a Liege.”
“If Kerune killed them all,” Brodine said, “how will they get more collars for the Claiming?”
A good question. Maybe they had a huge stock of them somewhere inside Bledmire.
“We’re basically food to the fae,” Reyla said with a twist of her lips. “And in between the random draining they subject us to; we work as their servants.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way any longer,” I said.
Reyla swallowed hard. “If they catch us, it will be.”
Or worse.
“That’s why we’re going to escape, regroup,” I said. “And come up with a plan.”
“It’ll need to be a good one,” Brodine said. “I’ll help.”
Airia and Reyla nodded.
“Thank you,” I said. “All of you need training in how to use your magic.”
Brodine snorted. “It wasn’t long ago you reminded him,” he jerked his head toward Vexxion, “that we’re Nullens, incapable of doing magic.”
“It’s a lie. Our magic was suppressed.”
“Well, fuck them,” he snarled. His gaze tracked to Reyla. “You were doing magic before the Claiming. I saw it.” Rubbing his nose, he sent me a rueful look. “You too. About that . . .”
“It’s in the past.” I took Vexxion’s hand. “He’s my fated mate.”
Brodine’s attention fell to the mark on my wrist and traveled to find its match on Vexxion. “That means you’re fae.”
“I think we all are.”
“What?” Reyla shouted. “We’re Nullens. Suppressed magic, I’ll believe, but—”
“I think Nullens are actually some sort of lesser fae. They knew it at one time, but it’s been forgotten.” Or they were forced to forget.
“This sounds like something from a story.” Humor shone in Brodine’s voice.
Maybe it was a story.Ember’s Shadowcould be fiction, tales made up to entertain whoever read them, though they hadn’t seemed that way to me. I’d used a spell from the book to bond with Madrood. No one could deny that. This suggested that everything else in the book could be factual.
“So we have magic, huh?” Brodine held up his finger, narrowing his gaze on it. “Light up for me, would ya?”
Nothing happened.
“You need the spell,” Reyla said, sharing it with him.
Soon, he and Airia were spinning their glowing fingers around and laughing. It felt good to join in with them, to let some of my tension slide.
