Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 109477 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 438(@250wpm)___ 365(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109477 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 438(@250wpm)___ 365(@300wpm)
Instead she latched on to the one thing she did grasp. “Sacrifice two beings?”
His eyes hardened. The burnished gold around his pupils flared gold before dying back down. “Yes. You…and myself.”
She put her hand on his chest. Despite the situation and all he’d said, her heart ached. “You?”
He was quiet for a long beat. “The history leading to this moment is long and complex. It comes down to this:
“With my birth, I stirred the gods. An experiment gone badly, we’ll say. Through no fault of my own—just by being born—I created a fissure within the High Kingdom. I created the rift within the royal family. And when there is rift and instability, the gods sense a game. They seek greater entertainment. To that end, they meddle. Oh, how they meddle. They create favorites and pit them against the favorites of other gods. We are pets, really. Pawns. My existence created the desire for treachery within the royal house…and the gods exploited it. That treachery—a betrayal—saw me to my grave. But on my deathbed, as I was watching the beautiful colors of dusk wash me away, Equilas came to me—”
“Equilas?” She remembered him using that name but had never asked more about it.
“Equilas, Goddess of Balance. One of three sisters in the Trinity, the most powerful of the gods in Faerie. She sits on the High Seat in the Divine Collective. She pulled me from the abyss and reset my path. But first, while I was delirious and desperate for one more breath, we made a deal.”
Shivers arrested Daisy. It seemed the fae had learned how to make deals with humans from the gods themselves. And by his tone, it sounded like the gods were no less cunning and ruthless, not even with their children.
He nodded. “I am bound to this destiny. I was tasked with finding the crystal chalice and restoring the balance of Faerie, regardless of the obstacles. Regardless of the degradation and horrors I was thrust into. I am a pet of the Obsidian royals…and a pawn of Equilas. A puppet, some think, beholden to the gods while being crushed under the boot of the Obsidian Court. Exiled from my home and lands, and my friends with me, until I can reset what my birth imbalanced. I’m being blamed for the sins of my parents, but still, I must atone. That is my life, Daisy. That is my destiny—what I’m up against. Why I need you. For if I can escape my imprisonment in this filthy kingdom and use you to reinstall balance, I will ultimately have to sacrifice myself for the good of the realm. I am entertainment for gods right now, but eventually, I am hope for the realm. We both are. We must be the dawn to end the starless night.”
Cold washed through her at the resignation in his eyes. She wished she could read his mind to find out more. His birth had disrupted the royal family? A birth out of wedlock, maybe? That would be a human reason in the olden days, at any rate. But that was hardly an experiment. Maybe something like the son rising up and overthrowing the father, like what used to happen a lot with Demigods…
“That was the fear, yes,” he said softly. “It wasn’t a desire in my heart, but I had the power to do it, and so it was assumed that I eventually would.”
The cold froze her solid, and her whole body stilled. His gaze was deep and imploring.
“But that would mean…” She let the words trail away as she went over everything in her mind again. All he’d said, what it had to mean. “You’re not…”
“In the Obsidian Court, I was given this title as a mockery of my rightful station. I was trapped into that court with the five obsidian seals. They tempered my magic so that I couldn’t rebel, forced the rules—the curse—onto me, erased my name and existence from the memories of everyone but the Obsidian Kingdom royals, and bled their magic into mine to strip it of its luster.”
“Bled their magic into yours?” She remembered the spectral brilliance that was his glamor, with the warm orange, amber, lavender, cerulean, and golden hues. Then his magic as it had danced and played around her, sparkling and gorgeous, like the sky at dawn. It was only when he used larger degrees of his power that she saw the black cut through or take over. Even then, sometimes it still shimmered with gold.
Another memory flashed through her mind, this time of wings. Delicate dragonfly wings big enough to lift a man. A fae, actually. The colors were the same, dawn-like…or dusk-like, one and the same. Like his glamor. Like his playful magic.
No, not a fae. A beautiful Celestial.
“Your mind moves so quickly,” he whispered, stepping toward her. His tone was warm, oh so gentle. Grateful. “I am always so impressed.”