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Along the pathway forged by Calâr shortly before, a new presence sneaked into Basil’s mind. This one dark, much darker than the fae’s had been. It tasted familiar and yet strange, full of hot, age-old wrath.
Basil glanced toward the source of the new mind control, to that face which bore an uncanny resemblance to his own. His father’s eyes glowed amber in the dim of the room as he stared at Basil.
So much power, whispered his voice inside Basil’s mind. I’ve seen it in the fae’s thoughts. What you can do.
Basil grunted, struggled against the control.
I’ve seen what he planned. You could kill them all. They deserve it.
“No,” Basil ground out.
In his peripheral vision, he saw Hazel rise from her crouch, magic vibrating around her. “What’s going on?”
If you won’t do it, I will. A terrifying smile stole across the demon’s face. Sarômtanhâr.
Basil gasped, jerked as if hit with an electric charge. Shit. Somehow, his father had taken over Calâr’s mind mirror after he killed him, and now he knew Basil’s true name.
Basil struggled, pushed against the control to get to Isa.
Stop.
He froze as if paralyzed.
“Don’t do this,” Basil choked out. “Let me help her.”
His father tilted his head forward, his gaze never leaving Basil’s face. She’s dead. You can’t help her. He spit on the ground and added, She deserves her fate, after what she did to Roana. She deserves to die. His mental voice dropped to a tortured whisper. They all do.
“No!” Basil struggled against the invisible force holding him in place, against the insidious demand to use his powers to connect to, to find, to touch all living fae’s minds…
Witch magic rose in the air, its buzz like that of an enormous swarm of bees. “Basil? What is he doing?”
“He’s accessing my mind.” Basil panted. “He’s got a lock on me, on my powers. He’s trying to use them to slaughter every fae in Faerie.”
He’d barely finished his sentence when Hazel lashed out with her power, and slammed his father against the wall, holding him there in a magical vise grip. She advanced on the demon, stopped a few feet away from him. The air around her cracked and sparked with electricity, her face as harsh as Basil had never seen her before.
“Let. Go. Of. My. Son.” She bared her teeth at him. “If you want to have any kind of meaningful relationship with him—and I know you do—then release him. Do not use him this way. He will never forgive you.”
His father tensed, looking daggers at Hazel. Then, with a shuddering breath, he relaxed, closed his eyes.
Basil gasped as his father’s influence receded. With a start, he raced to Isa’s side and pulled her into his arms, cradling her lifeless body against his chest.
Maybe, just maybe, if there was a spark of life left for him to grasp, he could pull her back… On instinct, not really knowing what he was doing, and yet knowing, he closed his eyes, dove in, deep into his new powers, into the humming, swirling, iridescent darkness within him. It grew, stretched and rolled out, spread into a black field as far as his mind could reach.
Blips of light in the dark velvet surrounding him, blinking, sparking, moving… So many minds, so many thoughts and sensations, memories and images in a cacophony of light and darkness. And there…the fading ember of a flame that touched his soul. Isa.
He grasped at it with his mental fingers, and it almost, almost held—before her light slipped away, ran through his hands like softly glowing sand. He had to keep her. He knew he had to grab on to her to…what?
An idea brushed his mind, and on an impulse, he followed it.
Again, he reached for that elusive, fading light—and spoke into the darkness.
Isannarî.
Chapter 25
Slipping, slipping away.
Here to there, now to then, through velvet and darkness and time beyond time.
