Rise of the Fey Read Free

be tried and hung before that happens.”
    “I wouldn’t bet on it,” Nibs says.
    “Why not?” I ask, perking up.
    “Because of your Fey blood. Have you noticed a propensity to heal, by any chance?”
    I frown to myself, remembering my wounds closing up after drinking from the Sangraal. “I suppose…” I say tentatively.
    “So you’re likely to suffer a much more gruesome, painful death instead,” Nibs says with relish. “One that won’t give you a chance to heal back up.”
    “That was because of the Sangraal,” I say. “They can’t blame me for that, can they?”
    “The Sangraal helps augment one’s powers not temporarily give you one,” Nibs says.
    I think back to that dreadful night facing Carman, and how I was able to heal Arthur afterward. “Could it boost your healing too then?” I ask. “Could it restore your ogham?”
    Nibs chuckles dryly. “No, but I’d settle for a face lift at this point. Not that it matters in our present circumstances.”
    “If I get my hands back on it,” I tell him, “I’ll help restore you to health.”
    Before Nibs can answer me with another one of his jabs, the metal of the door vibrates against my back. Someone’s coming down the stairs. I straighten up as the tremors intensify—more than one person is coming, which means this isn’t mealtime….
    Someone unlocks the door and pushes it open, projecting a dazzling wedge of light inside the cell. Before I can scurry away to the other end, however, a guard grabs me by the arm and hauls me to my feet.
    “Time to get yourself burned at the stake, demon,” the man says before dragging me out into the narrow hallway and closing the door again.
    Despite the guard’s painful hold on my arm, the faint heat of the flickering torch releases some of the tension that’s been accumulating between my shoulder blades while in jail. As my vision adjusts to the light, I find myself standing before a familiar figure dressed all in black. The woman’s heavily-lined eyes are watching me with a flat expression, judging as they always have.
    “Hello, Irene,” I say, smiling until my lips crack. “Always a pleasure.”
    Her nose wrinkles in distaste.
    “
Laguz
,” she intones, flicking her hand towards me.
    The guard barely has the time to let go of my arm before a massive jet of water hits me in the chest, cold and unforgiving. When I think I’m about to drown, the deluge stops, leaving me soaking wet and shaking.
    “That’ll have to do,” Irene says with a slight smirk.
    The guard proceeds to handcuff me before slipping on a heavy iron collar around my neck, a long, heavy chain hanging from it.
    “A fitting leash for the little bitch,” he whispers, before dragging me after him.

    We emerge next to the church, the sky-lake bright with the light of noonday. The wind picks up, plastering my sodden clothes to my body, and bringing with it the ever-present scent of apple blossoms that can’t quite mask the acrid smell of fires. A chillruns down my arms as I remember the pile of dead Fomori serving as a pyre on my way back from facing Carman. Surely they can’t still be burning the dead?
    “Get going, you demon spawn,” the guard says, yanking hard on my chain.
    I stumble after him as Irene leads us past the church towards the training grounds. I hear the sounds of commotion long before we reach the arena, and I guess I’m to have a public trial, one the whole school seems most eager to attend.
    The crowd’s excited chatter grows to a roar of disapproval the moment I step inside the stadium. Something hits me in the face, splattering all over my hair and my guard’s uniform. I barely taste the juice of a well-ripe tomato before another flurry of vegetables and rotten fruit hits me.
    “Death to the traitor!” someone shouts as a solid apple hits the back of my head with a loud
thunk
before bouncing off to the ground and rolling away in the dirt.
    My guard cusses under his breath and forces me to go faster