One by one, they fall to their knees, until the entire arena is filled with faeries and other small folk like Duddon. Even the Redcaps are there, on their knees, mourning for their queen.
Bram may never have respected Lydia’s authority as queen, but it doesn’t matter—the residents of the Otherworld did.
The ground shakes once more, like it’s weeping alongside us.
The vines upon which Lydia lies ripple and writhe like green serpents. I shout in surprise, but Duddon stills my hand. “Just watch,” they instruct in their tiny voice, and I force myself to do just that. If Lydia is connected to the Otherworld in this way, then it seems only right I let it take her, no matter how it pains me to see her go.
The thick green vines snake over her feet, her legs, wrapping around her hands and arms until they reach her torso and cover her bloodstained dress and the place where the killing blow landed. The vines then wind up her neck, her face, her hair, until every inch of her is covered.
I turn away. I don’t want to look as she’s pulled under the dirt, but Duddon places their slimy hand on mine again. “Watch.”
Someone in the crowd cries out, “Long live Queen Lydia,” and it echoes from all around.“Long live Queen Lydia!”
It’s then that the vines begin to glow. First, a dull, sunsetpink, then vibrant orange, then sunny yellow, until Lydia’s body is covered in white light so blinding I have to squint to keep looking at her.
The earth shudders again, a mighty quake that causes the leaves around us to shake and the crowd to cry out in surprise.
Then it stops, as if exhaling in relief, and the vines around Lydia’s body retreat.
They ripple back, a perfect reverse of the way they moved before, until they reveal my sister, looking perfect and whole once more. Her curls fall around her like a golden halo, dotted with small white blooms, and her skin is flawless and glowing. She’s even got a dusting of rosebud pink along her lips and the tops of her cheekbones.
I brush my hand against the cool skin of her forehead.
Her eyes snap open and she gasps awake.
Chapter Thirty
“Lydia!” I shriek, and pull her into a tight hug.
She coughs sharply, like she’s just been saved from drowning, then takes a heaving breath.
“Ivy?” She blinks against the light.
“You’re alive.” I weep into her shoulder and grip her tight.
She looks down at her bloodstained gown and clutches at the place in her chest where the knife landed. “I died.” She says the words softly, marveling at them. “I was dead.”
“What happened?” Emmett asks gently.
Lydia blinks as if the memory is already slipping from her. “I saw Bram. I walked past him on a road lined with flowers, and then I was back here. Something—” She pauses and searches for the words. “Something gave me the choice, to go or stay, and then a tether of golden light pulled me back into my body.”
“The land, Your Majesty,” Duddon pipes up from behind Lydia’s head. “It didn’t like that you were gone. It brought you back.”
There’s so much about this place that I’ll never understand, but with my sister here beside me, miraculously whole and beautiful and perfect, all I can feel is gratitude.
“Long live Queen Lydia!” Duddon’s tiny voice shouts again, and the chant catches like wildfire until the whole arena is chanting for her.
Rhion offers his hand, but Lydia pushes herself gingerly to her knees, then her feet, and raises her hand to wave at the crowd. They all drop to their knees before her, even me and Emmett. A mighty wind blows in off the sea, sending the tender green leaves from the trees raining over Lydia, and I might not be connected to the Otherworld in the same way Lydia is, but it’s obvious, even to me—it’s happy.
The cheering continues, but I turn to Emmett with a sick turning in my stomach. “Mor?” I ask. I’m expecting her to barrel into the crowd at any moment to finish what her son started.
Emmett pulls me to my feet. “Come with me,” he says gravely. “I’ll show you.”
We push through the crowd until we reach the edge of the arena.
Bram’s marble observation box has cracked down the middle, and is half hanging off the stands, dangling into the coliseum.
Inside the box is Bram’s tipped-over throne, the remnants of Emmett’s shackles, and something else I can’t quite see.
