Julie Kagawa - The Iron Warrior

The Iron Prince—my nephew—betrayed us all.

He killed me.

Then, I woke up.

Waking after a month on the brink of death, Ethan Chase is stunned to learn that the Veil that conceals the fey from human sight was temporarily torn away. Although humankind’s glimpse of the world of Faery lasted just a brief moment, the human world was cast into chaos, and the emotion and glamour produced by fear and wonder has renewed the tremendous power of the Forgotten Queen. Now she is at the forefront of an uprising against the courts of Faery—a reckoning that will have cataclysmic effects on the Nevernever.

Leading the Lady’s Forgotten Army is Keirran himself: Ethan’s nephew, and the traitor son of the Iron Queen, Meghan Chase.To stop Keirran, Ethan must disobey his sister once again as he and his girlfriend, Kenzie, search for answers long forgotten. In the face of unprecedented evil and unfathomable power, Ethan’s enemies must become his allies, and the fey and human worlds will be changed forevermore.

Praise for internationally bestselling author

Julie Kagawa

‘Katniss Everdeen better watch out.’

— Huffington Post on The Immortal Rules

‘Julie Kagawa is one killer storyteller’

— MTV

‘A book that will keep its readers glued to the pages until the very end.’

— New York Journal of Books

‘Kagawa pulls her readers into a unique world of make-believe with her fantastic storytelling, and ultimately leaves them wanting more by the end of each book.’

— Times Record News

‘Kagawa has done the seemingly impossible and written a vampire book … that feels fresh in an otherwise crowded genre.’

— Kirkus Reviews on The Immortal Rules

‘An intense and thought-provoking series.’

— School Library Journal on The Eternity Cure

‘Surpasses the greater majority of dark fantasies’

— teenreads.com

JULIE KAGAWAis the internationally bestselling author of the Iron Fey, Blood of Eden and The Talon Saga series. Born in Sacramento, she has been a bookseller and an animal trainer and enjoys reading, painting, playing in her garden and training in martial arts. She lives near Louisville, Kentucky, with her husband and a plethora of pets. Visit her at www.juliekagawa.com.

Julie Kagawa

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Praise

About the Author

Title Page

PART I

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

PART II

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

PART III

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

EPILOGUE

ACNOWLEDGMENTS

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

FLOATING

My name is Ethan Chase.

And I can’t be certain, but I think I might have died.

CHAPTER TWO

WAKING UP

The dream always ends the same.

I’m in my room again. Or, maybe it’s my sister’s room or a stranger’s. I can’t tell. There are photos on the wall I don’t recognize, pictures of a family that isn’t mine. But the desk is mine, I think. The bed and the chair and the computer are mine. There’s a figure sleeping on the bed, long chestnut hair spilling over the pillow. I’m trying to move about silently, so that I don’t wake her, though I can’t remember why she’s here, in my room. If this is my room.

Whoever’s room this is, it’s dark. I can hear rain pattering on the tin roof overhead, and the distant squeals of the pigs in the shed outside. Dad wanted me to feed them today; it’s going to suck tromping out there in the rain and mud. I told him I would feed them when the rain lets up. Truthfully, I don’t want to go outside in the dark. I know it is out there, lurking in the shadows, waiting for me. I’ve seen it in the mirror, reflected in the glass: a tall, thin silhouette at my bedroom window, peering in. Sometimes, from the corner of my eye, I think I see long black fingers reaching out from under the bed. But when I turn and look, there’s nothing there.

My phone buzzes on the desk. I let it ring, feeling my stomach knot and twist as the phone vibrates on the surface.

“Why don’t you answer?” the brown-haired girl asks, now sitting up on my bed. Her green eyes seem to glow in the darkness.

“Because she’ll be angry with me,” I reply. “I left her. I promised to come back, but I left her alone. She won’t let me get away with that.”

The phone falls silent. Voices echo from downstairs—my parents, telling me it’s time for dinner. I look at the chestnut-haired girl again, only it’s not her any longer, but Meghan, sitting on her bed, her long hair pale and silvery in the shadows of the room. She’s smiling down at me, and I’m four years old, hugging my stuffed rabbit to my chest.

“Go get dinner, squirt,” Meghan says gently. She’s still smiling, though I can see the tears on her face, creeping down her cheeks. “Tell Mom and Luke I don’t feel well right now. But come back when you’re done, and I’ll read to you, okay?”

“’Kay,” I answer, and pad to the door while clutching Floppy tightly in one arm. I wonder why she’s crying, and if there’s anything I can do to make her happy again; I hate it when my sister is sad.

“She’s lost someone,” Floppy whispers to me, as he does sometimes when we’re alone. “Someone has gone away, that’s why she’s sad.”

Outside my room, the hallway is dark, and the rest of the house is cloaked in shadow. A single light flickers from our tiny kitchen, and I make my way down the stairs toward it, trying to ignore the dark things that move and writhe around me, just out of sight. A boy, shaggy-haired and ragged, waits for me at the foot of the stairs. “Can you help me?” Todd Wyndham asks, eyes pleading. The shadows curl around him, clinging to his thin frame, drawing him back into the darkness. I shiver and hurry past, squeezing Floppy to my face, trying not to see. “Ethan, wait,” Todd whispers as the shadows suck him in. “Don’t go. Please, come back. I think I’ve lost something.”

Darkness swallows him, and he’s vanished from sight.

“There you are,” Mom announces when I finally step into the kitchen. “Where’s your sister? Dinner is ready. Isn’t she coming down?”

I blink, no longer four years old, and bitterness settles on me like a second skin. “She doesn’t live here anymore, Mom,” I say, sullen and angry. “Not for a long time, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right.” Mom takes a stack of plates from the cupboard and hands it to me. “Well, if you do see her again, will you tell her I’m keeping a plate warm for her?”