She put her hands up. “I’m a mess. I see the way you look at me. I can imagine the things you want. A future. What if I—what if I’m not ready for any of that?”
His gaze did not falter. “I have waited hundreds of years for you,” he said. “You have no idea how patient I can be.”
Tears burned her eyes as she looked at him. “I don’t deserve your love.”
“Is that what you believe?”
She nodded. She really did. “You don’t know,” she said. “I—I’m awful inside. My mind is a mess. I’m a mess.” She shook her head. “One day I’m going to do something, and you’re going to see. You’re going to see me. The real me. The worst me.”
“I see everything, and I love you. Is that what scares you?”
“Why?” she demanded. “Why do you love me?”
He looked at her. “For hundreds of years before I met you, I don’t think I smiled or joked or laughed more than a handful of times. Nothing excited me. Nothing made me feel anything anymore.” He took her hand. “Meeting you was like remembering what I was like before the curses,” he said. “Loving you is remembering what I once loved about me.”
He leaned in closer.
“You feel so strongly. You care. I went centuries without feeling a single thing. Until you. Don’t you see? You brought me to life.”
Isla pressed her hand against his chest, over his heart. She heard it beat under her palm. The love between them was a bridge. It went in both directions. She could feel where their forces met as much as she could feel his heartbeat.
She dipped inside the bridge. She felt Oro there. His power. Sunling. Starling. Moonling. Skyling.
She gripped a bit and opened her palm. Fire curled out of her fingers. It was tinged in blue, just like his flames.
She had never felt closer to him. Sharing power was intimate, she knew that.
Darkness had clawed its way into her heart, but for this moment, all she could see was light.
All she could see was him.
She went on her toes and kissed him. He startled for just a moment before kissing her back. She clung to his neck, nails digging into his skin the same way they had the first time he took her flying.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he whispered against her lips. “My heart is yours for as long as you want it.”
“I’m not going anywhere either,” she promised.
Isla told Oro she needed to train alone for a while, in preparation for the battle. She asked him to supervise the Starling barrier being built. Earlier that day, Cinder had started the shield, summoning enough energy to make an entire shining wall herself. The rest of the Starlings were now going to build a second one, on the other side, securing their position.
When he was gone, and she couldn’t feel the connection between them at all, she sighed.
Remembering hadn’t worked.
She walked to the Wild Isle bridge. Crossed it. Made her way to the Place of Mirrors. She stopped in front of the vault and produced a blade.
“Forgive me,” she said to Oro. Then, she broke her promise to him. She sliced a long line across her palm. The skin parted, blood flowed, pain bellowed—
She turned it into strength.
All the Wildling power within her—the seed—melted down, dripped through her bones like liquid gold.
Isla stuck her crown into the lock, turned it—
And forced the door completely open.
No surge stopped her.
She took a step into the vault.
UNLOCKED
The vault was starless black.
And it was empty.
No. That was impossible. She could feel the power everywhere, metal in her mouth, enough to nearly bring her to her knees.
Where was it coming from?
Blood from her hand dripped onto the smooth stone floor. Her bare feet slid across it as she desperately searched every corner.
Nothing.
Roaring filled her ears; the world seemed to tip to the side.
There were footsteps behind her.
Isla whipped around and nearly dropped to the floor.
Terra said, “Hello, little bird.”
Her guardian stepped forward. “Do you feel proud, little bird?” she said. She smirked at Isla’s hand, still bleeding profusely. Isla didn’t even feel the sting of pain any longer. Power was still gathered in her bones; it still honeyed everything it touched. “Do you feel proud, when you should feel ashamed?”
Grim must have portaled her here. It was the only way. He must be watching her.
Did Terra steal whatever was inside?
No. She couldn’t have. Isla’s crown was the only key.
So why was she here?
Isla laughed without humor, the shock slowly wearing off. Ashamed? “You, who lied to me my entire life. You, who trained a girl to fight but planned for her to seduce a king.” She took a step. “You—” Her voice began to shake uncontrollably. “Who killed my parents in cold blood.” Another step, until she was out of the vault and standing in front of her old guardian. Her old teacher. Her old friend. “You, who warned me my entire life about Nightshades and have now joined them.”
Terra stood and listened, chin raised, almost in challenge. “I did what I needed to in order to protect our realm. To protect you. And I will continue to.” She outstretched her hand. “Come with me, little bird,” she said. “Before you make more of a mess of things.”
A mess?
She spat at Terra’s feet. “You are a traitor,” she said. “Don’t speak to me about making a mess.”
The vine came out of nowhere.
Isla was slapped across the floor. She slid for a few feet, then stopped. Her shoulders curved. She panted. Then she smiled.
“I’m not the powerless fool you raised anymore,” she said. Then she brought the entire force of the forest through the ceiling of the Place of Mirrors.
Trees blew through the remaining windows, and branches snapped, twisting into mangled shapes.
Vines lunged at Terra in every direction, enough to drown her in their grip, but the fighting master sliced her arms through the air in practiced movements, and they were all cut down.
Isla’s power was everywhere; it flooded her every thought, every sense, the pain in her hand feeding its frenzy. She bellowed, and the stone floor shattered as spiked trees erupted from below, right where her guardian stood.
Terra leaped from side to side, just barely missing every one right before it impaled her on its thorns. She tsked. “Little bird, your form is dreadful.” She shook her head, moving effortlessly to the side as a boulder broke through the ceiling, cracking into a thousand shards. “And far too predictable.”
Predict this, Isla thought before sharpening the trunk of a massive tree into a blade. She flung it at her old teacher, the drumming in her ears, her power, eager to see her cut down. She wanted to see her dead, bleeding out on the floor.
Power tastes like blood.
Before her sword could skewer Terra against the wall, her teacher made her own blade, cut from the side of a cliff. It raced through the broken windows of the Place of Mirrors. Both of their weapons now floated between them, two massive swords ready to duel.
Isla grinned. “Just like old times,” she said through her teeth. She tasted metal. She tasted blood.
She attacked.
Their blades crashed together, making a sound that rumbled across Wild Isle. Isla wielded hers with her mind, faster, faster, using all the techniques her teacher had taught her. But now, she was stronger.
She was a ruler. She ruled over everyone, not the other way around. Not anymore.
And Isla didn’t care about playing fair.
She created another sword, this one crafted out of a thousand gems. She made them from thin air, her power hardening into crystal and ruby and diamond. It took so much effort, enough that she felt her power scraped to the very bottom, getting every last shred. It was her anger, hardened into a blade, glimmering, remembering, about to make her guardian pay.
It sliced through the air behind Terra, ready to plunge through her back, to destroy everything she ever was.
But before it could, Terra turned her hand into a fist, and it all shattered.
Isla was sent backward, flying. She hit the ground with a crack. She slid until she hit the wall.