“I will not be part of this,” I said. I would not stand on the pentagram, and I would not join in their chant.
Maura positioned her own feet on the third point of the pentagram before she acknowledged that I’d spoken.
“Very well. Then I will create a water-bound witch as well. Your familiar would have been helpful. She makes you stronger. That is why you have not lost your power, you know. There is nothing special about you.” She smiled, the gold flecks in her eyes sparkling with menace. “But any water-bound witch will serve just as well. I will make another.”
I couldn’t lie to myself anymore. Reality crashed in around me. The fae onlookers were silent, but the chanting. Dark God, the chanting burrowed into my brain and made it difficult to think. Or maybe I did not want to think, because if I did, I would have to acknowledge the horrible reality of what came next. Maura would not just kill Alize. She would make her anew.
Every word was abhorrent as it left my mouth. “You are making witches.”
It was a violation. Witches were granted their power based on their manner of death, but Maura was not waiting around for a woman to die and then resurrecting her. She was actively murdering women so that she could resurrect them for their power.
Water-bound and air-bound.
This was because of me. I’d killed McKean, and now Maura did not have an air-bound witch. If I refused to participate in the resurrection, I would refuse to consecrate and charge the talisman. So, Maura would create another water-bound witch.
This was all about the talismans.
Two were charged. Two remained. She needed all four.
But they were in my possession. If Maura saw that they were, she would have to stop. There was no reason to murder Alize for talismans that did not exist. I could destroy them.
I reached for Garrick’s pocket to pull out the talismans.
The king saw the motion.
All at once, my muscles locked up. My blood still rushed through my veins, my lungs expanded and contracted. But Icould not move my arms or legs. I’d felt this once before, at the Memory Gate. The fae king compelled me.
Garrick snarled beside me. The king had compelled us both.
Maura walked along the straight line of the pentagram from the point to the center, positioning herself behind Alize.
But Garrick was not the only person in Balar Shan who loved Alize. Flames punched through the crowd, Edmund sprinting in their wake.
I saw the moment that the king’s compulsion took over Edmund’s body. The flames died out instantly. His body contorted horrifically. He fought—somehow, he was able to fight the king’s magic. I turned my attention inward, searching for any weakness, any place within myself where a finger might twitch.
“Why?” Edmund groaned, his limbs twisted so that he was on his knees with arms behind his back, too, a distorted mirror of his sister. But his father held him at the edge of the pentagram instead of in the middle of it.
“You thought your clandestine meetings with your sister were secret? Balar Shan is mine. There is nothing and no one here who hides from me.” He flicked his hand and Edmund fell forward on his face. The king did not even allow his son to brace the impact with his arms.
Edmund’s chin cracked against the orange bricks, his head snapped back, and then he fell sideways. Bones crunched, but not a single person moved to help their crown prince.
None of the courtiers dared. And those of us who might have dared were trapped. The fae king held four of us in place. It must take an immense amount of effort. There had to be a way out. If Edmund fought him, so could I.
But I was too late.
Maura did not waste time. She reached into her voluminous black robe and removed a braided rope made of pale brownfibers. A creation of Auri’s that I’d seen many times. It was nearly unbreakable.
What better way to ensure the creation of an air-bound witch than to cut off the air supply of a wind-gifted fate?
Maura looped it around Alize’s throat and twisted until it began to cut off her airways.
Maura strangled Alize to death in front of the entire fae court, and I was powerless to stop it.
“Syleris, please.”
CHAPTER 51
GARRICK
