The Rise of Fortune and Fury (Chronicles of the Stone Veil 5)

Carrick caught the warm smile Finley had on her face, the blink of surprise from Zora, and then he had her in his arms.

She was stiff as a board and wouldn’t follow his lead, so they mainly stood on the fringe swaying slightly while Myles and Rainey danced.

“You and I haven’t had a chance to talk much since you came here,” Carrick said lightly. “Are you settling in okay?”

Zora nodded. “Finley’s done a great job of making me feel comfortable. And I thank you for letting me stay here.”

“You’re family,” Carrick replied nonchalantly.

“Finley told me about your history together and Rune’s curse,” Zora said, her head tipping to the side. “While you two aren’t married now, I suppose your past marriage makes it so we are indeed family.”

“Past marriages,” Carrick corrected, and Zora blinked in surprise. “Sometimes, we married before she died. Other times, we didn’t make it that far.”

“I’m sorry,” Zora replied, but her tone was flat. Carrick assumed not that she was bitter or uninterested, but that she perhaps just couldn’t understand that level of devotion and commitment. She’d been raised in the Underworld and had no examples by which to form opinions of such.

She’d learn though.

If they all survived the upcoming ritual.

“I hope you don’t mind me asking,” Carrick began as they started to move a little more loosely. “I’m curious what happened during the actual part of the changeling ritual when Kymaris left the Underworld.”

Zora shrugged. “It wasn’t all that spectacular to be honest. They brought me into the room at the castle where she was held in stasis.”

“What did her stasis look like?”

“Like she was a statue,” Zora described without any inflection. “Like her body had just locked tight. She went into stasis standing up, hands down by her side. And I remember finding it odd how serene her facial expression was.”

“I can almost imagine it,” Carrick murmured.

“At any rate,” Zora continued. “They shackled me in place behind Kymaris—”

“Shackled?” Carrick growled in surprise.

“The process of receiving magic was not pleasant,” Zora explained with some bitterness. “I had to be restrained.”

Carrick wanted to ask her more about that process, but it was personal and, he suspected, highly unpleasant. If Zora was going to talk to anyone about it, it would be Finley. So he refocused her just on Kymaris. “When they took the magic you were holding and put it into Kymaris, what happened?”

“At first nothing,” Zora replied with a slight shake of her head. “And I thought… they must have gotten something wrong, but the entire room started to hum, then it started to vibrate, and there was such pressure my ears started to hurt. As if something was compressing in on us. And then… boom… she just exploded.”

“Exploded?” Carrick murmured, fascinated by the description.

“Not like blood and guts exploded, but more like her body blew apart in a spray of black dust that was sort of shimmery. I remember it hanging in the air. I held my breath so I wouldn’t breathe any in, and then it just sort of disappeared. I assumed that meant she had gone through the veil into the changeling’s body.”

Carrick dipped his head, making sure he had Zora’s eyes. “I’m sorry that happened to you. We’ll help you avenge what was done to you.”

“You don’t have to—”

Carrick cut her off. “I do. Because what was done to you has torn Finley up, and when someone hurts Finley, I make sure to hand out retribution.”

Zora looked off to the side to where her sister was talking to Titus before giving her attention back to Carrick. “Finley is lucky to have you.”

“I’m lucky to have her,” he countered.

Zora actually smiled, but it was a bit on the apologetic side. “I don’t pretend to understand what you two have. I never saw love and commitment in the Underworld. Relationships weren’t like that. More like business partnerships. But… it’s nice, I’ll have to say.”

Carrick had a pang of pity for all she had not only lost, but also what she’d have to re-learn in this world. It would be difficult for her at best, perhaps an impossibility at worst.

“What about Amell?” Carrick asked. Finley had filled him in on the ways that Amell had looked out for her, and while she didn’t give him details, he assumed there might be something romantic between them.

“He’s a friend who took great care of me throughout the years,” Zora replied, a very benign statement that didn’t say anything about their true relationship.”

Once again, Zora looked over at her sister before bringing her eyes back to Carrick. “But he was also the one who worked in conjunction with the Light Fae to fill me with magic throughout the years. It was painful, and he was part of it.”

This was news to Carrick. Finley had told him that Zora only ever talked about Amell with fondness and respect. In this instance, she sounded bitter.