Loki bites into his flesh and Luce doesn’t so much as wince, his eyes holding mine. “Do you want to go back?”
I swallow before nodding, the small movement making me wince.
“They’ll try to kill us,” Atlas warns, but as I meet Dorian’s watchful gaze, his eyes soften with understanding.
“Maybe,” he relents. “But it’s long past the time Cody’s ghost stopped haunting everyone. It needs to end...one way or another.”
Chapter 16
Cambria
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Idon’t feel bad aboutValdis and Apollo’s deaths, even though I know I should pity them now that I understand what drove their actions. But honestly? I don’t. They were shitty people that tormented me, haunted my dreams for all of these years even after I was finally allowed to move out. A sob story doesn’t erase all of the damage they did, no matter how tragic. It just makes it easier to understandwhythey were raging assholes.
Maybe that lack of closure for them is karma at work. They tortured me my entire life, then died before being able to see their son again. It’s a vicious cycle of cruelty, and no matter what way you look at it, it’s just...depressing. I can shoulder the guilt for hurting my brother, but I refuse to take on the added weight of those two monsters’ fates.
“This is without a doubt the dumbest idea ever.” Atlas glances around the charred remains that used to be the forest surrounding the ring they first arrived in Faerie in. “We should just let them all kill each other off and come back to pick up the pieces.”
My gaze is rooted to the last spot we last saw Rickon, staying behind to give us a fighting chance and becoming the traitor they accused me of being. With as many people as are coming back from the dead lately, I wouldn’t be surprised to find out he’s chilling down in Elorie’s dungeon, just waiting to be brought before the queen for sentencing. Fates know she always worked on her own schedule rather than what’s fair. But my life doesn’t work that way, with happily ever afters andgoodsurprises.
And though I might condemn my not-fathers, Rickon...I can make my peace with his behavior, as hypocritical as that may be. At least he was an asshole in a bid to protect the small amount of freedom I’d been given from being taken away, to give me a semblance of a normal life while trying to figure out a permanent solution. He was the first person that actually gave a shit about me, even if I didn’t know until it was too late.
“They’ll never be done killing each other.” Lucien’s voice sounds as tired as I feel, looking out over the desolate remains. “The cycle will just start all over again like it did all those centuries ago unless something changes.”
Licking my suddenly dry lips, I start walking, picking my way through ash and charred logs towards the city. “Goal is to save as many changelings as possible. The fae-” I pause, thinking it over “-we should probably care about too, I suppose. But I have a hunch they’ll just as readily attack us even after they see we can get the changelings to stand down. I’m not as concerned about keeping people alive that will stab us in the back the first chance they get.”
The streets are relatively empty, faint screams carried on the breeze. There are several miles between here and the castle, and I’ve no doubt they’re swarming it already. The changelings will be naturally drawn to the concentration of energy, and if she’s amassed enough that she thinks she can Frankenstein Cody back to life, there’s no way to hide it from them.
And as much as I hate Elorie, I love Cody more. If there’s actually a chance that she can bring my brother back, I’m going to make sure that I do everything within my power to give her the opportunity.
“And if she’s just crazy?” Atlas doesn’t have any snark behind his question, just voicing what the others were too polite to ask, worried about taking that hope away from me.
“I know it’s unlikely,” I reply with a sigh. “Impossible not to get my hopes up a little, though.” Turning to walk backwards in the middle of the street so that I can face him, I meet his eye so that he can see the conviction in mine. “Then we try to kill her before she kills us. Because if this fails, she will have absolutely no reason to keep me alive anymore and will blame me as much as her consorts have all of these years. She’ll be heartbroken, furious, and can teleport. Really small window of opportunity to take her out before she realizes that everything she’s worked towards for decades was pointless. And I doubt that even Azazel is fast enough to escape her wrath if that happens.”
“How many more consorts does she have?” Lucien’s eyes scan our surroundings warily, waiting for a feral changeling to jump out of the shadows or a pissed off fae to lash out.
