Ivy Touched and Bronze Blade

Contents Title Page Copyright 1. Chapter 1 2. Chapter 2 3. Chapter 3 4. Chapter 4 5. Chapter 5 6. Chapter 6 7. Chapter 7 8. Chapter 8 9. Chapter 9 10. Chapter 10 11. Chapter 11 12. Chapter 12 13. Chapter 13 14. Chapter 14 15. Chapter 15 16. Chapter 16 17. Chapter 17 18. Chapter 18 19. Chapter 19 20. Chapter 20 21. Chapter 21 22. Chapter 22 23. Chapter 23 24. Chapter 24 Copyright Copyright © 2023 by Shannon Mayer All rights reserved. Published by Hijinks Ink Publishing www.shannonmayer.com All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserve above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, store in or introduced into a database and retrieval system or transmitted in any for or any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the owner of the copyright and the above publishers. Please do not participate in or encourage the piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions. Chapter 1 Survive, daughter. Underhill’s last words to me echoed in the air long after she’d disappeared, and long after the sun had set, and stars bloomed above. The stars were as brilliant as lightning birds flashing through the sky, yet a shiver rippled across my skin, making me suck in a sharp breath. I was cold. Not cold. Terrified. Unafraid. Calm while feeling the windstorm ripping through my insides. How could both be true at the same time? I didn’t know, and yet it was the truth. Working with Cormac and Aaden, I’d stopped the darkness and saved the missing children. I’d returned the future queen of all fae to her mother’s arms. And I should have known the cost would be steep. I still couldn’t fathom what had happened. How it happened. The very weapon that destroyed the child thief had then turned on Cormac. The seedpod erupted into a tree that sought out and fed off darkness, but when the tree wasn’t satiated by the child thief, it became hungry for any power source to eat. With me drained of magic, the tree had feasted on the next closest person. Cormac. I could still feel the clammy cold of his skin. His eyes, empty of light…all I had left of him now was his sword. Tears trickled down my cheeks, cooling in the wind that caressed my skin and put tangles in my silver hair. Orry would want to re-braid it, that is if she were with me. But according to Mother, I wasn’t to take anyone with me on the next step of my journey, not even my little bat friend. Alone. Now. Except those words had stopped me from taking a step in any direction. Had I ever defied my mother? No. You didn’t defy Underhill and expect to live long. Even Kik, my former bestie, had never defied her will—at least not outright. As I crouched alone, immobile with indecision, I considered doing just that. Defying the force of balance across the realms. If I listened to her and went alone, then I’d go West to find the Oracle so I could uphold my oath to free Sigella, the woman trapped in a magical prison inside my head. Then I’d continue onward to kill the master of darkness—whoever that fucker was. If I listened to myself, where would I go? The answer came faster than expected. I’d head south, that was what pulled at me. My feet twitched, but I couldn’t pick them up. Panic wasn’t something I was used to. Fear? Yes, of course. But the full-blown, breath-stealing panic that rolled through my body was new, and I didn’t know what to do with the frantic, cooped-up energy. I couldn’t do anything with it. The longer I stood there, the higher the panic rose, choking and freezing me. I wasn’t indecisive. That wasn’t me in the least. But if I went south, I didn’t know what repercussions I’d face, and whether they’d be immediate or in the distant future. Such things had to be weighed when it came to my mother. Because she was balance. My mother was in possession of all the possibilities, and I was only in possession of those in my head. Could I handle the punishment for my disobedience and the toll she’d exact for any unbalance caused by it? “Dragon shit,” I whispered. The flutter of leathery wings turned my eyes to Orry as she swept around me. Her wings were usually bright gold, but they seemed dim—like the sun’s first weak rays painted on a gray dawn sky. She landed lightly on the top of my head, and I felt the soft scratch of her tiny claws. “Are you okay? I’ve been flying way up high for like an hour and you haven’t moved. I finally figured I’d better come see what in the world of Lugh’s balls was going on. What are you thinking about? What’s happening?” Her claws pulled at my hair, already untangling the knots that the wind had put into it. My friend couldn’t help herself when it came to my hair. “I have to go,” I murmured through stiff lips. “Yeah, I know! That’s what I’ve been saying for the last hour, you’ve got to get moving or you’re going to miss out on a hot supper. That and Aaden is acting super-duper weird. Like, way strange, even for a man.” “What?” Her words cut through my panic and indecision. I reached up, pulling her down so I could look her in the eyes. “Is he hurt?” Please, not both of them. The tree had pierced Aaden’s flesh too, after it had taken Cormac. Who knew what it had done to him? Orry wrapped her wings around my wrists, and her big eyes blinked several times. “No more hurt than when you saw him last. More like he’s not himself. Acting weird.” Earlier, I’d noticed something unusual about one of