No longer did her skin shine a pale luminescence; now there was a faint sheen of blue to it, like she’d been kissed by frost. Her lips were tinged in blue, her blonde hair had a faint pale blue tint to it. There was a harsh beauty to her now that’d not been there before.
The pillar looked up and blinked back at Nixie with lashes tipped in frost. Sadness tinged her features.
“Thank you, genie, for freeing me.” Luminesa’s words wrapped like an icy fist around her body and made her break out in a wash of goosebumps.
A jet of steam escaped Nixie’s lips as she whispered, “I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not.” Luminesa shook her head.
Cyrus’s lips thinned. “Stay strong, Nix, for I fear only the strength of your mind can sustain you now.”
It was like being buffeted by a raging tsunami. The power of Cyrus’s words unleashed a tempest of magic, dragging Nixie back kicking and screaming to her lamp, encasing her in a world of fiery pain.
She threw her arms out, trying to latch on to anything she could, but her form was immaterial. She fazed through trees, rocks, and dirt, slamming into her lamp and screaming as the cacophonous pitch of noise deafened her.
When it was over and there was nothing but silence, and all she could hear was the breath of her lungs and feel only the beating of her heart, she truly understood the torment she was now in for.
Her eyes saw nothing but a blanket of impenetrable blackness. She smelled no smells, heard no noise outside of her own…she was all alone. Danika could not visit her; her parents would never know what had happened to her.
This was solitary confinement. Kingdom style.
She couldn’t move into a more comfortable position. When she tried to whisper a command for her surroundings to shift, to become the Chicago skyline again, she had no vocal chords to work. All she had was her mind, and it screamed with its new reality.
And when she knew there was nothing more she could do, Nixie did the only thing left to her.
She cried.
Chapter 3
Eighty years later
“And you expect me to believe this twaddle?” Robin snorted derisively, staring at the withered gypsy woman.
They sat inside a tent perched on a wagon. The tent was lined with Turkish rugs and golden wares of all sorts.
The gypsy woman’s gnarled arthritic fingers bore rings of gold and silver, attesting to her great wealth, even if the garb of her clothing looked moth-riddled and threadbare.
“It is”—her voice sounded like dry bones rubbing against one another—“as I say it is, young Robin Hood. There is a dark genie.”
He chuckled, yanking his hand out of hers. He wasn’t sure how he’d been dragged into this ridiculous tent. His men had heard the gypsies traipsing through the woods, and on a lark John had dared him to go and seek his fortune. Fortunetellers had great and dark magic, oftentimes what they spoke, was truth. But they were also a greedy, selfish lot, and so it was difficult to suss out the fact from the fiction.
“Some doomed, cursed genie hidden in the wilds of Kingdom. That is a great story, ancient one, but it is a legend and not true. For I would know.”
“You’ve never known the truth of it because those who told her story didn’t know of its veracity, but I do.” She tapped the table between them. “For I’ve seen where she lies. Use your powers, search my heart.” Her rheumatic eyes thinned.
Shifting in his chair, Robin stared at the woman for a long, full minute before speaking. “How do you know about that…talent?”
Robin was born with the gift of truth. But it wasn’t something automatic to him—only if he concentrated and focused his thoughts could he see beyond the fa?ade. But it was rare for him to use his talents around outsiders.
When his eyes glowed, they were a dead giveaway to his true identity.
Her wizened laugh was almost painful to hear, making him cringe in response.
The red lights flickering inside the tent painted dark shadows upon her face, making the browns of her eyes seem suddenly malevolent. His hand slowly crept toward the dagger hidden in his boot.
Had Crispin sent a spy into their midst?
“I know things, young man. Such as the fact that you are even now reaching for a knife.” She held up a gnarled finger, when he wrapped his fingers fully around it, intending to shove it through the base of her neck. “But I do not work for the king.”
“Then whom do you work for?” he growled. “And tell truth, for I will know.”
Robin opened the floodgates of his power, allowing them to pulse electric through his eyes.
Her eyes widened at his display. “Impressive indeed. So now you can hear my words and know I speak truth. I do not work for the king. I work for myself. And there is a dark genie hidden in the wilds of Kingdom these past eighty years.”
His fingers relaxed just slightly at the ringing clarity of her words. When he heard truth it pierced through his heart like a sword. “Aye then.”
“I also know,” she continued, “that you’ve a wish to bring down said king.”