But when the creature slept, all I saw was a darkness so profound that I oftentimes forgot my own name. I forgot there was a world beyond the night.
She slept after touching Orla with the gemstone. I supposed the ritual had made her tired or that she was still growing accustomed to this new body she’d stolen. Either way, she slept and I screamed, and then I forgot again. When she opened her eyes sometime later—it only been hours, I knew, but it felt like decades—it all came flooding back.
The creature stood and stretched. Pink and orange streaked across the sky to signal the end of another day. For a moment, the creature watched the sunset. I could feel the awe in her. The grass whispered against her bare legs, and a light, summery breeze rustled her hair. Strands danced across her shoulders. The creature breathed in the fresh air. She savored it, tasted it.
It was as if she had not felt a breeze for a very long time. Understanding dawned.
“So, that’s why you’re doing it,” I murmured, more to myself than to her. “You’re desperate for a world and for a body to experience it. That is why you came here. That is why you changed me.” A sadness stole through me at the thought of my sister. “And there are others just like you. Look at my sister. I want to see what you’ve done to her.”
As if answering my command, the creature turned. It took me a moment to understand what she was seeing. A form huddled on the ground, right where my sister had slept. But Orla did not lie there now. In her place perched a creature unlike any I’d ever seen. It resembled a wolf in part, with its long snout, monstrous claws, and dark gray fur. But it was nearly three times the size of one, and there was a madness in its eyes. A rage so deep it made me stumble back—madeherstumble back.
“Oh no,” the creature whispered. “Andromeda, you idiot. What have you done?”
Andromeda was the creature’s name. I wanted to scream at her. My hands were desperate to fight. But all I could do was watch as she crept closer to the wolf beast and place a trembling hand on its maw. The beast growled and showed its teeth. They were massive, monstrous things that could cut through flesh like it was nothing but air.
Andromeda sucked in a breath and stepped back. “I see. As you are only the darker side, there is nothing to keep you whole. You have corrupted the body and mind and have created this beast. I see, I see.”
Andromeda started pacing while the wolf watched. I didn’t understand what she meant. All I knew was my sister was stuck inside that beast’s body. And she would see and feeleverything. The pain and fear would be overwhelming, like it was for me. I could do nothing to comfort her. Nothing to avenge her.
Andromeda was no god. She was a monster.
“Well,” Andromeda finally said. “We must try something else.”
She knelt before the beast—my sister—once more and pulled the gemstone from her skin. Instantly, the beast collapsed, her body thumping hard against the ground. I cried out. What had she just done? Where was my sister now? Had she killed her?
Time passed slowly. Andromeda placed a blanket over my sister’s body. The sun rose and set again while Andromeda waited motionless. At long last, as darkness consumed the sky, the beast stirred. Andromeda frowned and pulled back the blanket.
The beast blinked. I relaxed. She hadn’t killed her. My sister was still alive in there—just trapped, like me.
Andromeda held up the gemstone. That dark crimson light flickered faintly within it, just as it had before.
“Hmm,” she said. “Very odd. The fae didn’t transform back from this beast form, even though you’re no longer in there. It seems the transformation is permanent when a fae is imbued with death and death alone. You always were so strong, weren’t you?”
“What?” I asked, panicked. “Imbued with death? What does that mean? Have you killed my sister?”
Andromeda rubbed her thumb across the surface of the gemstone. “I had hoped to avoid this. I know you will overpower me. My light cannot fight against your rage.” The creature loosed a heavy sigh. “Is there any alternative?”
A moment passed in silence. If the gemstone answered back, I could not hear it.
“Very well.” Andromeda stood. “I will do this, but youmustagree to coexist with me. Do not push me too far down. You know what must be done, and we will not succeed unless we work together. I’m the only one who can bring life.”
None of this made any sense. Life and death and beasts from other worlds. Was this nothing more than a cruel dream? A nightmare? Or had something happened to steal my sanity? I tried to close my eyes against these visions, to block out the voices I clearly must have conjured. None of this was real. It couldn’t be real.
But the nightmare persisted. Try as I might, I could not close my eyes.
Andromeda placed the cool stone against her forehead—myforehead. Power rumbled against my skin. Horror and pain and rage crashed down on me. It felt like the weight of a thousand ships crushing my bones. My entire body shuddered. The rage slammed harder and harder against me, knocking me further into the deepest recesses of my mind. I struggled against it, desperately clinging on to the person I’d once been.
To Fiadh McCain, the girl who loved running barefoot in the grass. The girl who’d once dreamed of dancing on a stage in front of hundreds.
The girl who loved her sister fiercely.
But that girl was gone.
Twenty-Seven
Tessa
PRESENT DAY
