Darkest Mercy (Wicked Lovely 5)

fighting. Aislinn was nowhere to be seen. Let her be alive. Chela—now Gabriela—was a vision of horror as she fought with a fury that befit the Gabriel of the Hunt. Friends, faeries she’d known for most of her life, and those whom her friends had sworn to lead and protect were in the midst of violence.

As they pushed forward, they reached the faery who’d raised Keenan and served as his advisor Keenan’s entire life. Tavish wiped his sword on the shirt of a fallen Ly Erg. “Well, it’s about time you got here.”

“Ash? Seth?” Keenan asked him.

“My queen is over there.” Tavish pointed to a crush of bodies with his sword. “Seth is apparently in a cage on the other side of the wall of shadows the Dark King put in place to protect him.”

A roar from the Dark King rocked the room as several abyss-guardians took shape alongside Bananach.

That’s not a good sign.

“She’s winning,” Tavish said, rather unnecessarily. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to stop her.”

The abyss-guardians looked from Bananach to Niall, but did nothing more than hover in the space near the two. Their loyalty was to the regent of the Dark Court, but that loyalty was compromised by Bananach’s actions.

Which means she is a regent.

“Maybe we can at least contain her,” Keenan started. “It’s not ideal, but . . . it’s better than letting her loose on the world.”

“Good idea.” Donia squeezed Keenan’s hand and sent a spear of ice flinging toward War.

Bananach batted it out of the air without a moment’s hesitation. “You’re picking the wrong side, Snow.”

“Not really.” Donia set a sheet of ice to form under the raven-faery’s feet. “You can’t take another ruler’s throne.”

“But I did,” Bananach crowed. “He’s weak.”

The Dark King wasn’t wasting breath on words: he head-butted her.

Neither Keenan nor Tavish would be able to stand against Bananach: the abyss-guardians only appeared for Dark Court regents.

And only a regent can kill a regent.

That left Niall and Aislinn.

And me.

“I love you,” she told Keenan—and then she ran forward and sealed a wall of ice around herself and the small space where Bananach and Niall fought, looking the three of them in a frozen cage. The Winter Queen concentrated on making the wall thick enough that even if Bananach did defeat both of them, the raven-faery wouldn’t be getting out anytime soon.

Niall looked up and nodded curtly at her.

Through the ice, Donia could see Keenan clawing at the barricade. She turned her back on him.

“Tear it down.” Bananach pushed shadows at the wall. Nothing happened.

“Doesn’t work that way.” Niall slammed his fist into Bananach’s face. With his other hand, he raised an obsidian blade that he’d pulled from somewhere on his body and slashed toward her throat.

War dodged, and the blade glanced off her collarbone. A red gouge there showed that he’d at least made contact.

While Niall continued to fight Bananach, Donia crept closer.

She sent ice to wrap around the raven-faery. It started at the floor and covered her up to her hips, encasing her lower body in a miniature glacier, but between the wall around them and the ice used for fighting, the glacier wasn’t as strong as it would’ve been if Donia had not expended so much energy already.

Niall continued striking Bananach even as she was unable to move. The Dark King was not in full possession of his court’s powers, and War was in possession of her full strength as well as the rest of the Dark Court’s strength. He needed every advantage he could get.

And I’m not going to be useful too much longer.

“Your death is inevitable if you continue to irritate me.” Bananach pushed through the snow and ice as if she was wading through deep waters. “Perhaps that throne should be mine too.”