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Calâr lost his grip on Isa, and she crumpled to the ground. Her back bowed, and with a strangled gurgle that broke everything good inside Basil, she exhaled and then collapsed. Her chest ceased moving. Her head tilted to the side, her eyes open yet motionless, her face a mask of stillness. The rumbling of the stones stopped. Silence filled the temple.
His soul fractured. No. No, no, no. She couldn’t be—there had to be more time.
Basil’s thoughts were a mess, his mind unwilling to comprehend, to process what just happened, when a violent gust of wind slammed him down, hurled him up the dais. He hauled in a breath, grabbed a hold of one the edges of the slabs, pain piercing his cut palms.
“Well,” Calâr sneered from the foot of the dais, “now your pretty fae is dead, it seems I’ve lost my leverage over you. Which means we’ll have to do things a different way. It will be a bit harder, but I’m sure you’ll be just as willing to cooperate with enough incentive.” His voice dropped low, barely audible amid the whooshing of the wind. “It’s all a matter of how much pain you can tolerate.”
A tornado-strength torrent of air lifted Basil off the dais, broke his grasp on the slab, and catapulted him against the wall. Pain exploded in every nerve, the breath knocked out of him. He was still gasping for air when another violent gust hurled him across the room again, slammed him against the opposite wall. More fierce agony pierced his battered mind and body.
He sank down to the ground, caught sight of Isa’s still form as he struggled to breathe.
She’s not dead. The thought surfaced in his mind, buoyed by an impossible hope. Maybe, maybe she wasn’t gone yet, and he just had to get to her. If he unlocked his powers, he might be able to help her—after killing Calâr, of course. He couldn’t risk triggering the true name revelation with that bastard still alive, but once he was gone…
“Are you going to be a good sport and cooperate?” Calâr strolled toward him.
“Yes,” Basil croaked. “I just need…a hand. Not sure I can make it up the dais.”
If only he could get close enough to the fucker—the weight of the dagger he’d kept hidden in a sheath strapped to his calf felt damn good right about now. One well-timed strike, and he could incapacitate the asshole, then kill him.
“Sure, I can help you with that.” Calâr’s smirk said he wasn’t fooled by Basil’s request for assistance.
With a flick of his hand, he called the wind again, hauled Basil up to his feet, and pushed him toward the slate slabs. Dammit. Against the force of the whipping wind, he managed to grab the dagger from his ankle sheath, twisted around and threw it at Calâr.
Its flight path changed by the wind, the blade rammed into the fae’s shoulder instead of his chest. Still, Calâr grunted from the impact, and his grip on the air slackened. Enough for Basil to charge down the dais and launch himself at him.
With a roar, he tackled the bastard, punched him in the jaw so hard, the fae’s head snapped back. Calâr retaliated with a strike to the side of Basil’s face, making stars burst in front of his eyes, and sharp pain shoot down his neck and spine. The next second, a line of fire slashed across his chest, followed by the cold kiss of a blade against his throat.
Calâr loomed over him, the dagger in his hand nicking the skin below Basil’s chin. Breath heavy, the fae snarled at him. “You leave me no choice, half-breed.”
A nasty, brutal force slammed into Basil’s mind. He wheezed from the impact, his weak mental shields assailed by Calâr’s powerful magic.
“I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do this,” Calâr whispered, his face contorted as if struggling with lifting a heavy weight. Sweat beaded on his forehead, his eyelids twitched. “Cooperate with me, and I will refrain from causing you more pain.”
Whatever mind control Calâr was trying to achieve, it had to take one hell of a toll on him. Good.
Basil gritted his teeth. “Fuck…you.”
Trembling, he fought against the foreign force invading his mind. His vision flickered in and out, darkness closing in from the edges of his sight. He tried to pull up mental shields the way Lily and Hazel taught him, but each barrier he attempted to build shattered under the onslaught of Calâr’s growing power. The fae smashed through Basil’s fragile shields as if they were made of porcelain. Pain radiated through his limbs, flowed and ebbed in his blood. Calâr’s mental control was as cold as ice, penetrating Basil’s bones. He couldn’t shake him.
Crawl to the platform.
Calâr’s command echoed in the corners of Basil’s mind, hammering at him with an imperative that was so powerful, so overwhelming, his body moved without his conscious control. Screaming inside his head, he crawled up the dais toward the statue.
No. He struggled, gathered all of his force of will just to lock his muscles and remain still, disregarding Calâr’s booming command reverberating in his head.
Crawl to the top. Lay your hands at the statue’s feet.
Basil’s muscles trembled from the force it took to stay motionless, to disobey Calâr’s order. How much longer could he keep it up? The tenuous hold he had on his own body snapped when Calâr boomed another command in his head. With a gasp, Basil crawl-stumbled forward until he reached the top of the dais.
Sweat broke out all over his skin, and his jaw was clenched so hard the pain of it zinged throughout his entire body. Have…to…resist.
Lay your hands at the statue’s feet.
Shaking as hard as Isa used to do when caught in one of her seizures, Basil laid his hands on the platform at the feet of the statue.
Close your eyes.
His face hurt from the struggle to resist Calâr’s command to close his eyes. To no avail. His lids fluttered closed.
