How do you cope with learning that your mother was murdered before you were born, your father is a fairy hitman, and you wield the power to raise an army of devoted love slaves... except you haven't the least idea how to control it?
Tom Corwen's di...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The lifeless body of a highland troll lay sprawled across a boulder, its bloody torso torn nearly in half and partially submerged in the stream. A Fae woman with alabaster skin and flowing, flaxen hair towered over its corpse, cradling her arm where the creature had broken it. Not so very long ago, the troop would have been less than an inconvenience, but her strength had been waning for decades.
The lure and the ambush that followed had been anticipated. Mab had been chasing her for months, following false trails and the hope of revenge. What the woman had not foreseen was the ferocity of the attack. If not for the troll's innate stupidity and lack of patience, all five soldiers could have been upon her before she summoned her strength. It would not have changed the outcome, but her injuries might have been much more severe, and that would not do.
The body of the kappa, most likely their leader, lay against the tree that snapped his spine. He was alive, though unconscious and missing an arm and part of his face. The pale woman folded her membranous wings like a cloak and approached him with disdain. All elementals were close to the Veil, but water most of all, and this witch had manipulated spells long forbidden in a desperate effort to bring her down. They had backfired catastrophically. Karma was indeed a bitch.
Kneeling, she took the kappa's chin in the long fingers of her good hand and turned what remained of his face toward her luminous, yellow eyes, focusing her attention on the bright sparks of his will.
"Speak," she hissed through sharp fangs, and the creature's eyes flickered open. "What was your purpose here?"
"Kill—" he coughed painfully as he tried to resist, but could not throw off the geas.
"Nonsense, I have slain legions greater than you. Why draw me to this forest when you knew you must fail?"
The kappa stretched the remains of his mouth into a smile, "Did—didn't fail." he cut off, choking on his own blood. "You bow to the queen's will. She commanded. You came."
The woman hissed through her teeth. She had always been clever enough to stay half a step ahead of the Queen of Ice, but only just. Mab was clever too. It was not a trap, it had been a test.
"To what end?" she demanded, digging her claws into the hag's bloody shoulder. "Speak!"
Charged by the woman's power, his neural networks fried themselves in their effort to comply, yet she denied him the silence of death or dreams. Instead, he spoke the words he most wanted to conceal.
"You have come too far to defend your charge. You wouldn't not leave him unprotected. There is another. One who has helped you in the past. One mighty enough to conceal and contain the abomination." He coughed again and she tightened her grip on his will. "Who can you trust? You have many enemies, fallen one, and few friends." He twisted his head as if the words were being torn from him. "We know Eiru walks among us."
