“No!” a female fae with dark-blue hair and yellow eyes screamed as she rushed forward, but Marissa held her back. I flicked my gaze to the woman who had given birth to Fallon. Her head was cocked to the side, and she wore a slight grin. She was looking at me with…pride? I had just ashed a guy, sending him Light knows where, and she was proud? Of course she was—this was Fallon’s magic. She must take some kind of credit for this.
The ash had crawled up the fae’s entire body and was now about to cover his face. He screamed, a horrible, garbled sound, and then he was just a pile of dust. Vomit lurched up my throat, and I turned my head and spewed over the side of the ropes as the crowd cheered and laughed.
Oh Light, what had I done?
FIVE
FALLON
Eden was waiting for me the next morning with her backpack slung loosely over her shoulder. On our walk to school, I filled her in on everything that had happened since we’d parted ways the previous night. I started with my meeting with the queen and then launched into my fight with Blair.
“That bitch!” she roared when I told her about Blair and her friends attacking me. Actual smoke wafted from her nostrils, and I skidded to a stop.
“I’m okay.” I placed a gloved hand on each of her shoulders. The moment I touched her, even with gloves on, a massive headache slammed into me, and I winced. Yanking my hands back, I grabbed my skull, but then the ache disappeared.
“What was that?” she asked, concern etched across her features.
I frowned. “Nothing. I just had a massive headache for a second.”
Eden’s mouth popped open, and she took a step back from me. Her surprise shifted to a grin. “Holy Fae, Fallon, I’ve had a headache all morning. I think you…picked up on it.”
I stared at my gloved hands. “I did?”
It hit me then—this was what happened to Ariyon when he was near sick people. He’d said he had a compulsion to heal them because he couldfeeltheir pain.
A lump formed in my throat. I needed to find him. Things weren’t moving fast enough, and I worried about what they were doing to him down there.
“I guess I’m figuring out the healing powers.”
Eden nodded. “Which brings us one step closer to finding Ariyon. Listen, did Yanric remove Blair’s nose? That’s all I need to know.” Her hands balled to fists.
I chuckled. “No, but I’m pretty sure I broke it, and she’s missing some hair because of him.”
‘And half an eyebrow,’Yanric confessed as he landed on Eden’s shoulder.
She heard that too because she grinned and gave him a fist bump. “Well done.”
“So…there’s one final thing I need to tell you,” I said, hesitating.
Students passed by us on their way to The Academy as we lingered. Yanric flew for a nearby tree, no doubt giving me a semblance of privacy but still listening in.
Eden’s freckled face peered at me with concern. “What’s up?”
I chewed on my bottom lip. “The queen got back to me last night and approved my idea to give a public apology and pledge my allegiance to her.”
Eden’s face brightened. “Awesome. That will keep her happy and you out of a cage, right?”
I pursed my lips. “Yeah…”
Eden’s brows knotted. “But?”
I blew air through my lips and swallowed hard. “But it came with some rules.”
I rattled off all the rules, including the one where if I was going dark, I would be imprisoned in Bane Manor forever, andthe threat to my dad. I had to tell someone; it was eating me alive.
“We won’t be neighbors anymore?” Actual tears lined Eden’s eyes, and my heart sank into my stomach.
“I know.”
