Page 52 of The Ruthless Fae King
I couldn’t believe I was even thinking about killing people. It had started with Marcelle, and now five other lives were about to be at my mercy.
Could I take the lives of these guards?I wondered as Marcelle led us out of the room and down the hallway.
I peered down at the cuffs on my wrists. The empty feeling inside of me was an ample reminder that I had no access to my magic, and I wasn’t sure it was a feeling I could live with.
Yes, I told myself. If threatened with going back in these chains, I would kill to be free.
As we reached the door to the outside, Marcelle turned to Birdie. “You’re no longer needed. Goodnight,” he told her, dismissing her.
She looked at me but betrayed nothing. She just dipped her chin once and then walked back down the hall to her room.
The winter king is here.
The words written on the inside of my cloak brought me trepidation and relief. Knowing that man’s temper, I knew that if Lucien thought I left with Marcelle willingly or plotted against him, I might also meet my death tonight.
The frigid air greeted us as the doors were opened. Marcelle growled in annoyance.
The Sun Guard fanned out behind me as I stepped out onto the front steps overlooking the town square. Every rooftop was coated in white and my breath was a puff of air before me. Snow fell from the sky in chunks and my skin stung as the pain of the freeze covered my body. It reminded me of that night all those years ago when I lost my grandmother. It was a bone-chilling cold that stung your very lungs as you inhaled. And yet this time my thoughts were not anger at the winter king, but compassion for him. To be afraid of your power, that it might unintentionally harm people, was something I’d never experienced.
I stopped in the open courtyard of the palace and held up my wrists as Marcelle looked me dead in the eyes. “I have an archer on the roof. If you harm me, he’ll put an arrow through your neck.” Then he leaned forward and planted an unwanted kiss on my lips.
I stiffened, my eyes going wide as they flicked to the rooftop to see an archer crouching with a bow aimed right at me.
Pure unbridled rage consumed me in that moment. Marcelle reached out, pressing his magic into the cuffs. Because he was the one who had closed them over my arms, only he could open them. There was a click and then he stepped away from me as they fell to the floor. The five Sun Guards fanned around me and I inhaled, pulling the wind into me.
Tears blurred my vision as I felt the well of my power open. I didn’t realize until that very moment how much accessing my power completed me, how much it defined who I was.
One of the male Sun Guards stood right in front of me, hands held high as if ready to ignite my head into flames at any wrong turn.
“Move, unless you want to be blown into Spring Court,” I growled, and he looked to Marcelle, who was at my back.
The guard must have gotten the permission he needed from the king, because he moved.
My mind was racing with all the possibilities. How could I take out Marcelle and avoid the archer until it was done? I knew I had to make it look like I was clearing the town of the freeze first so that they would relax.
With a simple exhale, I pushed at the air around me. It was everywhere, in my hair, under the eaves of the patio, inside my lungs. The fog that had rolled in and settled onto the ground moved as a giant gust of wind picked up and rolled through town at my bidding. The snow flurries moved with it, and the clouds, making way for warmer air. My hair lifted and was tossed around as a brilliant idea came to me.
“Marcelle!” I called over the wind.
He stepped forward, at my side.
“Have your guards channel their power into fire. I will push warm air through the town to melt the frost.”
I didn’t see his face, I was too focused on the task at hand, but he must have liked it because he barked for them to do it.
Now if only I could get them to deplete their power before I took out Marcelle. I might actually be able to make it out of this situation alive.
I could blow the archer off the roof to the ground below, but not without Marcelle seeing. My mind raced as the guards lit up their power one by one, calling fire into their palms.
I sent my wind weaving in and out of their hands lightly, collecting the heat and distributing it through the town. The windows and rooftops began to melt of their frost, and the temperature raised dramatically. The snow covering the ground turned to puddles, and a stream began to trickle in the draining ditches on the side of the road. It stopped snowing.
“It’s working!” Marcelle sounded excited.
I felt no resistance to what I was doing, which told me that if the winter king was here, he was not fighting me. The freezing air and frosty mist were fleeing town easily.
A little too easily.
He’s helping me.
