He recoils from my touch, letting me fall helplessly in front of him.
“You lied to me,” he snarls, betrayal etched deeply in his beautiful features.
I want to counter his accusation.
To deny, to explain, to supplicate. To shout my truth, my love, once and for all.
No words leave my lips, however. My mind shuts down as numbing darkness pulls me under, and I fall into a desolate dreamscape of utter nonexistence. Oblivion greets me with its bleak hold, whispering, “Welcome home, Foretold One.”
EPILOGUE
Aimee
I’mtrappedinalucid dream, weightless yet unmoving, confused although my senses are on high alert. Flashes of broken images play on repeat through the hollowness of my mind. Depictions of a battle I’ve never witnessed, of forgotten times and places. A grief that is not mine sinks into my ethereal limbs, a foreign scream lodged in my throat.
Nine figures float in the darkness, hunched over a glowing parchment, whispering and scribbling. They seem so pained, so defeated—familiar yet completely unknown. One by one, the shapes straighten and wither away, transcending into higher planes.
Only one remains, its glowing silver eyes cast upon me, judging, pondering, and then smiling.
This new reality shatters all around me, like jagged mirrors dropping into a chasm. I fall endlessly, my sense of self losingall meaning, until I land, on hands and knees, in the middle of a wide circle of marbled statues.
They stand proud, gazes lost between the past and the future. The nine Fae Gods. The Wise Ones.
Alektriona—Fae Goddess of all life, of light, fire and rebirth.
Khalya—Fae Goddess of time, creation and destruction, chaos and order.
Dhabvar—Fae God of the heavens, winds and thunder.
Kreyos—Fae God of shadows, lies and deceit.
Reythia—Fae Goddess of love, passion, and lust.
Xeys—Fae God of war.
Modgor—Fae God of earth and the cycle of life in nature.
Llyr—Fae God of water, oceans and storms.
Ereshkygall—Fae Goddess of death, the moon and endless night.
I rise to standamid all the Gods that have forsaken me all my life, only to accept me in death. The cruel irony is not lost on me, and I shake my head in contempt.
Suddenly one of the statues blinks, moving its eerie argent gaze my way. Ereshkygall descends from her gilded pedestal and speaks in an ancient voice, laced with all the knowledge and suffering of the world.
“Welcome home, Foretold One. I’ve been expecting you since it all began.”
I rear back in shock and anger. “What do you merciless Gods want from me? Have I not endured enough? Why do you plague my afterlife? Have I not gained my soul’s freedom?”
Her lips curl up in the ghost of a smile, the tip of a silvered fang peeking through. “You Faes, and your drama. Fear not, my child. I mean you no harm. Only answers.”
I cross my arms defiantly, tapping my foot against the cold marble surface. “Then speak, or let me be. I have no desire to waste my eternity in your presence.”
She laughs, the sound so void of any emotion. “You’ve come so far, Foretold One, but your path is nowhere near its end. Come find me down there, my child. Bring him with you. All shall be revealed in due time.”
She reaches for my face, the tip of her curved nail touching my forehead, and pain explodes in my skull, the illusion disintegrating.
I jerk up in my bed, my head pounding and my entire body sore, as if I’ve been smashed by an entire mountain. I have a sinking feeling that I should remember something important, something vital, but I can’t really grasp what.
