Sharon Ashwood - Unchained

“There used to be a dragon here,” he said, nodding toward the pool. “But they had to put it back downstairs, where it was warmer.”

“A dragon?” she asked. “My mom and Uncle Alessandro fought a dragon once. I wonder if it was the same one.”

“I think it was.”

She seemed to ponder a moment. “I thought dark fey were bad.” Eden made a face. “Sorry, but you seem nice. Not at all like what I’ve been told.”

Miru-kai blinked. That was the thing with children. They were blunt. “The dark fey are tricksters, but we’re part of nature’s cycle. Sometimes we’re the necessary chaos that breaks down old, dead patterns. Sometimes we give people what they deserve and they call it bad luck. That’s why they’re afraid of us. We’re not evil. We’re just uncomfortable.”

“And light fey?”

“They dress better, but they’re not that different. They don’t like to be around humans as much.”

“Why not?”

“It’s complicated. The last light fey I talked to still referred to humans as an upstart ruffian species that deserved to be exterminated like an unwanted invasion of ants.”

“Whatever.” She yawned. “Bring ’em on. Ants bite back.”

He tilted his head, amused. “I wonder how like your mother you are, and if Reynard knows what he’s getting himself into.”

Her mood, which he had so carefully eased, flattened. She began picking at her fingers, head bowed. “Why do you say my mom killed my grandparents?”

“It’s just something I heard,” he said lightly. “It’s probably not true.”

She gave him a withering look. “You said it had something to do with a spell?”

“So it was rumored.”

Eden pursed her lips, looking out over the dark pool of water. “I’ve asked and asked, but no one’s ever told me how they died. My grandparents weren’t sick or anything, were they?”

“No.”

“And no one suspected it was something magic?”

“Very few people had any idea there was anything out of the ordinary.”

“So it wasn’t like a mugging or something?”

“No.”

She fell silent.

“What are you thinking?” the prince asked uneasily.

“About something Mom said once. About how a selfish spell broke her powers.”

“What was the spell?” As soon as he asked the question, the prince felt a sudden need to change the topic. Talking about this was only going to make the child unhappier. “Have you noticed how sweet these blossoms smell?”

“It was to give Grandma and Grandpa car trouble so they wouldn’t come home and find out that Mom snuck out to a concert instead of babysitting Auntie Holly.”

“Ah,” said Miru- kai. “Would you like to visit the gargoyles? The hatchlings are really rather comical.”

“I don’t want gargoyles or flowers!” Eden snapped, then lowered her voice. “I just want to know the truth.”

Miru-kai considered long and hard. “A spell like what you describe is meant for two people. If your mother tried to perform it on her own, it would have been difficult to control.”

“Is that what did it? A car crash?”

Miru-kai looked down at his hands. “According to what I heard, your grandfather’s car went out of control.” He didn’t say the vehicle had fallen down a cliff, crashed to the beach, and burned mere feet from the ocean. In his experience, truth had to be adjusted to suit those who heard it.

Tears welled in Eden’s eyes. “I hate my mother.”

“Don’t be so hard on her,” Miru-kai said gently.

“She killed my grandparents. She cast a selfish spell that went wrong and they died.”

He winced. “And she’s had to live with that every day since. If she did not tell you before, it’s because she was afraid of losing your love.”

Eden looked at him from under dark lashes. “How do you know that?”

Miru-kai didn’t answer at once, but stared across the ruined amphitheater with its strange, fragrant vines. Images of the white blooms shivered in the dark pond, the water stirred by a breeze too faint to feel upon his skin.

“Because I’m very old, and I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Many were for selfish reasons. As I said, I was a pirate. A thief. Then I became a warlord. Those are occupations where mistakes are catastrophic. I don’t imagine being a young witch is any simpler, with powerful magic and the wildness of youth in one’s veins.”

“What she did was wrong.”

“Of course it was. But how does your anger fix anything at all? Does it make her a wiser person? Does it bring your grandparents back to life?”

“She should have told me.”

“She probably thought you were too young to understand. Perhaps she has not forgiven herself, and so finds it hard to ask forgiveness.”

“Why?”

“That’s something, sadly, you will learn in time. Think about it. If you were in your mother’s place, what would you think of yourself?”

Eden hugged herself, looking small and frail amidst the ruins of the hall. “No wonder she always seems so sad.”

“She’s a prisoner of those memories. Perhaps telling her you forgive her will set her free.”

Reynard drew his Smith & Wesson and fired all in one motion. A vampire head exploded. Two of the other vamps fired their weapons. Reynard dropped to the ground, tucking into a roll that took him backward. With four on one, room to move was essential.

He came out of the roll and into a crouch, bringing up his weapon again. Blam!

The corridor rang with the noise, hell on vampire ears. He missed, but they flinched. Blam! Another head exploded.

Three on one now. Reynard ducked into another roll and scrambled to take cover where this corridor crossed another. A bullet chinged on the stone near his ear, sending prickles of alarm in waves down his neck. Reynard jerked back from the corner, gripping his gun and pulling in a breath of stale air and cordite.

A small blue fey zigzagged down the corridor, wings humming. One of the vampires fired at it, sending sparks flying off the stone wall.

Silence, then a hum of magic. Reynard felt it crawl over his skin, vibrating in his back teeth. Carefully, he peered around the corner.

Just in time to see a portal close behind Belenos and his last two henchmen.

Damn and blast.

He had heard from Mac that Belenos had a key. Unlike the guardsmen, who could open a portal at will, a vampire would have to activate the key’s magic—chant a spell or do a dance or however the blazes the keys worked. Reynard had never needed to use one, so he didn’t know the specifics.

But that answered why the King of the East and his minions were in this deserted corridor. Belenos had probably been looking for a quiet place to make a door and get away—a bit of a challenge with the Castle guard in pursuit, but he’d just managed it. Damnation!

Reynard clicked the safety on his gun and slipped it back into the holster beneath his jacket, reciting a litany of curses compiled over several centuries.

The skirmish had been over in less than two minutes.

As he would after any of his daily battles in the Castle, Reynard checked for injuries—bruises, but nothing noteworthy—and carried on. He would report the fight to Mac as soon as Eden was safe.

Unfortunately, the skirmish had cost energy. As he pulled out Holly’s crystal and resumed his search, Reynard’s feet felt heavy, and an odd ache beneath his breastbone began pulsing with every heartbeat. He pushed himself, hurrying as fast as he could manage. He was running out of time.

The trail led him to a familiar room, one nearly destroyed by a cataclysmic battle last autumn. To one side, his silk garments an exotic splash against the stone, sat Miru-kai. Across from him, Eden perched on a lump of rock, looking hunched and tired. Reynard’s heart bounded at the sight of the girl.