Chapter Thirty-Six
Joy
Footsteps crunched slowly through the underbrush, approaching my hiding spot with deliberate care. My heart threatened to jump out of my chest, hammering so violently I was certain whoever was out there could hear it. Terror flooded my veins like ice water as I whirled around, pressing my aching back against the rough oak bark.
Was it Ari? Had he tracked me through the portal, crossing into this world to finish what the queen had started? Or worse—had the queen herself come through, sword in hand and murder blazing in those cold silver eyes?
My shadows stirred restlessly around my trembling fingers, ready to defend me even though I was exhausted and hurt. I wouldn't go down without a fight. Not after everything I'd survived to get here.
A dark-haired man stepped into the moonlight filtering through the Spanish moss, and I tensed to strike. Crap, I recognized him! He was the man in the mirror. The man the queen told me was my father.
Hope flickered in my chest—fragile and desperate—but anger rose with it, hot and sharp. Where had he been? Why now? A lifetime of abandonment, and he shows up in the middle of a war.
He immediately held up his hands in a gesture of peace, palms open and empty of weapons. "Don't be afraid. I'm Morden Grimshaw. I'm an Unseelie—one of Keir's men."
My blood ran cold at the name Keir. Every wall slammed back up. My shadows stirred instinctively, responding to my suspicion. Brynn's words echoed in my mind—Keir had helped Cormac kill her parents—I couldn’t shake the feeling that Keir was working with Ari, feeding him information, playing both sides. And this man claimed to be one of his.
If he was in league with Keir, I shouldn’t trust him. My shadows tightened around my fingers, ready to strike. "Stay back. If you're with Keir, then you're working with Ari."
Confusion flickered across his face, and something else—pain, maybe regret. "No. You don't understand?—"
"I understand perfectly." I took a step back, wincing as my injuries protested, stabbing pain lancing through my back. "Keir was Cormac's High Chancellor and he forced a child to watch her parents be murdered. He's the one that used his magic to control the vines. He's a traitor."
Morden looked stricken, his face paling in the moonlight as if I'd physically struck him. His hands dropped slightly, and I saw genuine pain flicker across his features. "Joy, please listen. Whatever you think you know about Keir, you're wrong. He's not the enemy."
"That's not what I was told in the Elder Dimension." I glared at him, my shadows circling around my fingers in warning. "I know the truth about him. You've all been playing us, lying to Angelo Santi, to Enzo. Everyone."
He stopped moving completely and stared at me with an intensity that made me uncomfortable, as if he was seeing past my words to something deeper. His jaw worked silently for a moment before he spoke. "You’ve been talking to Brynn Whitveil, haven't you?"
How did he know? "It doesn't matter who told me."
"Actually it does,” he said. “Keir Rankin tried to counsel Cormac not to murder her parents, but he wouldn't listen. That's why Keir deserted him after the war. Cormac was a monster."
His certainty made me hesitate, doubt creeping in where there had been only conviction moments before.
I looked around for Enzo, but he was in the middle of the battle somewhere. I should have drawn on my shadows like he asked. “How do you know this?”
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, his calloused fingers rasping against stubble. The gesture was so familiar it made something in my chest ache, though I couldn't say why. "Tell me, in the Elder Dimension, did they talk about the Unseelie who could control shadows?"
Suspicion churned in my gut like a snake. Why would he ask that unless... My pulse quickened with a mixture of hope and wariness.
Come to me, shadows.
I held my palms down toward the ground, drawing on the nearby shadows that pooled beneath the ancient oaks. They responded immediately, eager and familiar, wrapping around my legs like loyal pets. "They said there were very few."
“Yes, that’s true.” He held out his palm.
I eyed it warily.
Shadows swirled around him exactly like they did with me—the same fluid grace, the same dark elegance, the same fundamental connection I'd thought was mine alone. Then theyjetted over to me in thick streams, moving with purpose and power.
I stepped back instinctively, my heart hammering with alarm. I held my own shadows up like a shield to push him away, creating a barrier between us. But his shadows didn't attack—instead, something warm and almost gentle slipped under the cursed silver bracelets still locked around my wrists.
Red sparks flew up around my wrists like angry fireflies, crackling and hissing. The bracelets suddenly pinched tighter, the metal constricting, trying to crush my bones. I cried out as white-hot pain built up around my wrists, the enchanted silver fighting against the shadow magic with vicious intensity.
"Break them now." Morden's voice exploded through the grove like a bomb going off, commanding and absolute.
The combined force of our shadows intensified, pulling at the bracelets with relentless strength. My knees buckled under the assault of pain and power, and I sank to the muddy ground. Tears streamed down my face as I felt the cursed metal straining, groaning, being forced wider against its dark enchantments.
