“Cécile?” Sabine’s voice was weak, snapping me out of my thoughts. Rushing to her side, I used the bloody knife in my hand to cut away her dress.

“The bullet’s still inside,” I muttered. “Can you get it out?”

“Yes.” Tristan’s face tightened in concentration, but as Sabine screamed and fainted, the shards of metal pulled free of her wound.

“Keep pressure on it,” I said, pressing his hand against her shoulder.

Then I ran to the chest where my mother had the ingredients for her magic. My hands shaking, I dug through them, searching for what I needed for a healing spell. Tiny bottles clutched in my arms, I dropped them onto the carpet next to Tristan, and then, relying on my memory of the time I’d helped Tips, I started mixing them in the basin.

“Fire,” I ordered, holding out a scrap of paper, waiting for the flames to turn from silver to yellow before touching it to the potion. As the fire flared up, I said, “Heal the flesh.”

Magic came from all directions, intensified by the moon and the solstice, and I pressed my hand to the injury, feeling the power flood into her and the wound knit beneath my hand.

Then it was over. Sabine remained unconscious, but her breathing was steady and her pulse even. Wiping my hands on my ruined costume, I slumped against Tristan, fingers gripping his shoulders as my emotions threatened to overwhelm me.

“Why did you do it?” Tristan’s heart beat rapidly where my ear pressed against his chest, and one of his hands slipped up into my hair, gently cupping the back of my head.

“She was going to kill me in the hopes you’d die too.”

“That wasn’t my question.” He caught my face in his hands and tipped it up. “I could have stopped her without killing her. I would have.”

“I know.” And I might still come to regret the choice. “Anushka was telling the truth when she said she didn’t break the mountain,” I said, seeing my memory of her memories though my eyes were wide open. “It was the mines, and the trolls knew it.”

“Then…”

“Alexis treated her better than he did his own wife.” I turned my head so I could see Anushka. She was a murderer, but then, so was I. “She had his child within days of the mountain’s collapse; and I think until that point, she believed none of the laws, customs, or beliefs of the trolls applied to her. That she was queen in his eyes, so their daughter would be a princess, or at least treated like one.”

My eyes burned as I remembered the way he had looked at the baby. The life of a bastard half-blood destined for servitude means nothing… “That was not how it came to pass.”

“She plotted and planned to flee with the child once there was a way out of Trollus, but Queen Lamia had other plans for her. She hated Anushka. When they were hours away from freedom, Lamia killed the baby right in front of her.”

Tristan’s breath caught in his chest, but he said nothing.

“Alexis refused to do anything to punish Lamia. Not because he didn’t think she deserved it, but because doing so would harm himself. She killed him for his weakness, but she cursed the trolls as revenge against Lamia. What the Queen wanted more than anything was to see her children rule the world, and all Anushka wanted was to take that dream from her.” Some punishments are worse than death…

“You think she was wrong to kill them?” There was incredulity in Tristan’s voice.

I shook my head. “She deserved that revenge, but…” I struggled to find the words to explain what I’d seen and how I felt. “She is not a god to condemn an entire race for an injustice she alone had suffered. And I could not live with myself for leaving our friends to die because I was too weak to do what was needed.”

My words were strong, but my skin already crawled at what I had done. A decision made in an instant that would change life as we knew it. If the world burns, its blood will be on your hands…

A slow, measured thud filled my ears like a vast drum beat by giant hands. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Tristan’s whole body stiffened, his arm tightening around me and making it hard to breathe. “No. Not yet.”

“What is it?” I demanded, his fear ratcheting up my own.

A scream like nothing I had ever heard rent the stillness of the night, piercing my ears and making my heart beat in the rapid, primal way of the hunted.

Clambering to his feet, Tristan pulled me along with him to the window and we both stared out into the night. A strange shadow flew across the sky, pausing in front of the glowing moon on wings as vast as a ship’s sails. Something so vast it defied reason. A creature that could not possibly exist outside of fairy tale and legend.

Just like the trolls…

Horror flooded my veins as I watched the dragon furl its wings and dive toward Trianon, and seconds later, all too real human screams cut through the night.

What had I done?

Fifty-Eight

Cécile

Swearing under his breath, Tristan went back to the other room and scooped up Sabine, depositing her on the bed. “She’ll be as safe here as anywhere,” he said. “The castle walls are rimmed with steel – the dragon won’t be able to breach the perimeter.”

“What do we do?” I said, pulling one of the blankets off the bed and draping it over Anushka’s corpse, more to spare Sabine the sight than out of any sentiment. The woman was nothing to me. “How do we stop it?”

Tristan picked up the knife and pistol from the blood-soaked carpet and handed them to me. “We don’t. I do. Keep a steel weapon on you at all times – those who come will have even less tolerance for the metal than a troll. Stab one while it is corporeal, and you’ll likely kill it.”