Garrin shook his head slowly. “Impossible.” Or was it? Lex’s eyes and their glow. Her unusual power…
“Is it impossible?” Isle said rhetorically.
“Angels no longer come to our realm. They haven’t for thousands of years,” he said, attempting to place logic where there was none.
“Until your father committed a most heinous crime,” Isle spat.
“What crime?” Garrin shouted, his patience dissolved.
Isle moved beside Lex, who was staring at her mother in shock. “Your father hadn’t produced a child after hundreds of years of marriage to his first wife, Dark Prince, so he sent her away. In the middle of winter.”
Garrin looked down, trying to interpret her words. “He sent her to live with others. It isn’t compassionate, but there was no crime committed.”
Isle chuckled darkly. “Not to live with others. He sent her to live in the Land of Ice on her own.”
Garrin looked up and blinked. “To fend for herself?”
“Casone ordered it a crime to the crown should anyone assist her. Her body was found many months later,” Isle said, stone-faced. “No one can survive the Land of Ice in the middle of winter without support. His noble-born wife was no exception.”
Garrin couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You speak of the murder of an innocent woman, Isle Meinrad. Of the murder of a royal ordained to lead our land.”
“Indeed.” Isle gripped her daughter’s hand, and Garrin frowned. “And now you know why I must protect Lex from you and your father at any cost.”
Not from him. Never from him.
Garrin looked around the room. “Who else has heard this?”
Each face was more blank than the last. Until Garrin reached Amund’s hulking frame. “I have, Your Highness. Nothing for certain. And only amongst Newlanders. Nothing from our land.”
Camille carefully stepped forward. Garrin hadn’t noticed her partially hidden behind the others. “What Isle says is true.”
All eyes turned to Camille, even Isle’s, whose look of surprise could not be masked.
“I was acquainted with your father before I escaped Dark Kingdom,” Camille said. “The rumors of his ruthlessness in siring an heir are true. I never knew his first wife, but I knew y-your…mother.”
Camille’s whole body shook, whether from lingering weakness or the topic, Garrin didn’t know. “The angel Kushiel punished Casone, as Isle said, for what he did to his first wife by placing powerful magic over the land, preventing Dark Fae from leaving. I wasn’t alive at the time, but it is whispered to be true.”
History lessons and texts swam through Garrin’s mind. All of them missing evidence of what Isle and Camille said. “Why would an angel punish our people? If my father were to blame, why not harm or destroy him?”
Camille folded her delicate hands at her waist and looked down. “There is no greater punishment for Casone Branimir than failure. It is said that by making him responsible for his people’s misery, Kushiel served him his greatest sentence.”
Garrin felt the blood drain from his body. His father’s pride was a powerful thing.
If what they said was true, it would make his father a monster. One who callously murdered his first wife and silenced all those who knew about it. “My father couldn’t get away with such a past without lying.”
“Your father re-created the past in a farce that isn’t truth nor lie,” Isle said. “The truth lies in the details, which have been hidden. What is left is what Casone wants everyone to believe. And now, here we are.” She flung out her hand at their surroundings. “The Dark King wanted Lexandra, daughter of my husband who punished him, and you have spoon-fed her to him. Your father will have her destroyed.”
“I’m not afraid,” Lex said, and held Garrin’s gaze. “Okay, that’s not entirely true. The king scares the crap out of me. But I’ll fight with you. Someone has to stop your father.”
His nostrils flared, and he stared at Isle. “Why didn’t you mention any of this earlier?”
Her chest rose on an angry inhale. “If you recall, I told you not to take Lex to the castle. You didn’t listen. I do not trust you. Why would I tell you more than you needed to know?”
Lex watched Garrin run stiff fingers through his hair, his expression a mask of anger. “You told me not to take Lex to the castle,” he said to her mother, “but you failed to mention why. Lex had just survived a near-death experience in the Land of Ice. Without details of the king’s perfidy, the castle was the logical escape.”
Energy filled the room, and goosebumps rose on Lex’s arms. Garrin was pissed. And the room felt it too, because bodies shifted in what appeared to be preparation for a fight.
“There’s a lot of heat in here,” she said. “Why don’t we all just take a breath?”
Garrin’s death stare on Isle didn’t relax one bit.
Lex moved in front of him and ran her palm up his chest until she touched his jaw with her fingertips.
His eyes dropped to her face and lingered. After a moment he said, “Dangerous trick, Lexandra.”
“Trick?” The only thing dangerous in the cave was Garrin’s banked anger.
“Your touch,” he said, and gripped her fingers, tucking her close. “I cannot resist it.”
Amund re-sheathed his sword, which Lex hadn’t noticed him pull out, and walked toward Garrin. “There is much mystery surrounding your father’s reign. Many wars. Many noblemen killed in battle or gone missing. It isn’t only Lex’s memory that has missing pieces.”
Garrin eased Lex to his side, still holding her. “Nothing has changed. We will get Lex out of Dark Kingdom and deal with my father later.”
And then Amund asked the question Lex had feared. “And if we fail? Your father has managed to hide secrets from his people for centuries. If he finds us before we are able to leave…”
Zirel joined Amund’s side. “He’s right. We must plan for a worst-case scenario.”
Garrin looked at Camille. She was on her feet, but she still looked awful. “Has your magic returned?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I will need a couple of nights’ rest at least. I fear what would happen if I tried to portal us now and we became stuck.”
“Amund?” Garrin asked.
“I could get us there,” Amund said slowly, “but it would take months, like it did the first time. And if all of us grow depleted during the extended trip…”
Garrin sighed. “We have more people and only slightly more food. We’ll wait and leave as soon as Camille is able.”
“What about my power?” Lex said. “I doubt I could portal anyone, but I might be able to help Camille regain her ability.”
Garrin looked down, considering. “Your mother helped us tap into your power at the ravine. It is worth a try.”
Lex had no idea what her mother had done to give Garrin and the others back some of their powers, but if Lex could bring back even a fraction of Camille’s portaling ability, it would be worth it.
“Do not underestimate my daughter, Dark Prince,” Isle said. “She is more powerful than all of us combined.”
Lex’s face heated, and she looked at Garrin. “Ignore her. She’s delusional.”
He smiled softly. “I do not doubt you will someday become more powerful than all of us.”
“So you’re not too much of a man to let a woman best you in magic?” Which was hilarious, because Lex could hardly use her abilities for more than a few seconds.
His lips twitched. “It will not hurt my ego.”
“That’s because your ego is enormous.”
He laughed. “Perhaps.”
Camille stepped forward. “Though it hasn’t manifested fully, Lex’s power is bottomless.” She looked at Amund, and he slowly nodded. “It is—” Camille opened and closed her fists, seemingly trying to come up with words.
“Vast like the oceanic tide of Tirnan—never-ending and surging with energy,” Amund said.
Em looked at Amund in surprise, and Lex had to admit, his description was uncharacteristically eloquent. Only…what the hell?
Like her memory, Lex’s power was spotty at best. “I can’t control it.”
Camille waved her hand slowly in front of Lex. “Even so, it is there, waiting for you to command. Kushiel bestowed upon you a great gift.”
It would be easier for Lex to believe she’d been fathered by an angel if she’d actually met the man.
Garrin stiffened beside her, and she looked up.
“Powerful magic can be misused or used against oneself,” he said. “You’ve not had decades of practice like the rest of us.”
“Speak for yourself,” the Halven named Derek said. “Maybe some of us don’t need decades to master our abilities. Elena and I”—he looked at the woman beside Keen—“and even Reese over there have only had our magic for a year or two. Yet Elena stopped a disease from destroying your world. Never underestimate a powerful will.”
Garrin’s jaw shifted. “I listen to you only because you came to help Lex and we need all the soldiers we can get, but don’t cross the line, Halven.”
“This again?” Derek shook his head, his shaggy brown hair falling in tousled layers around his handsome face. “You people really need to get over your prejudice toward the half-breeds of the realm. We’re here to stay.”
Lex caught Garrin’s eye. “He’s right. You once believed I was Halven. Did you think less of me then?”
“You were always different,” he replied. “But I won’t see you harmed.”
“And I won’t be. You have a plan. We’ll stick with your plan, and in the meantime, I’ll try to help Camille.”
He hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Lexandra will practice her skills. The rest of us will coordinate travel across the Land of Ice. It will be grueling, but less deadly with Camille’s assistance.”
Lex mentally flinched at the idea of another trip across the Fae equivalent of the Arctic. But even that didn’t surpass the fear of a narcissistic king after her. She’d take the Arctic with Camille and Amund’s portaling abilities any day.
She glanced at Garrin, and her mouth twitched. It was cute how he thought he decided whether she practiced her powers or not, but she let him believe he did because it doused that stubborn temper of his.
Garrin stepped away and pulled Camille aside, murmuring something that had the portal creator growing paler than she already was. But she nodded in response. Then Amund and Zirel, along with Keen and Jas and a few others, crowded around Garrin.
Isle approached along with Camille. “I will show Camille how to draw from your power.”
Lex nodded and practiced reading the portal creator’s magic. If she had to describe it, she’d say it was light, like smoke. She focused and pushed it at Camille the way she’d done with Em and Zirel’s magic.
It worked. Sort of.
Camille’s head sank, dark crescents shadowing her eyes. “I sense Lex’s power, but I cannot absorb it the way I should.”
Isle touched her friend’s shoulder. “Are you certain you cannot draw more?”
Camille shook her head. “I could portal all of us off this mountain, but not very far. If I slept…”
“Sleep, friend,” Isle said, and escorted Camille to a quiet corner inside the cavern.
Lex gave them space, and Elena, who’d remained quiet all this time, approached her along with Keen’s girlfriend, Reese. “You will want to know our abilities as well. The more powers you are familiar with, the better prepared you’ll be.”
“In some ways, your and my powers are similar,” Reese said. “We both use others to inflict the most harm.”
“Or help,” Elena said. “Not everything is about harming.”
Reese grinned. “Most of the time it is.”
Elena sighed in exasperation. “Thanks, Reese.” She shook her head. “Everything will be fine, Lex. But it can’t hurt to know more magic.”
Lex nodded. “I’d like that. I want to understand what I’m doing, just in case.”
Elena sent her a soft smile. “Just in case.”
