Contents ( 41)
- CAST OF CHARACTERS
- ACT ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- ACT TWO
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- ACT THREE
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- EPILOGUE
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- ALSO BY NAFIZA AZAD
“No,” Croi says, then blinks. “Do I sound different?”
The dryad peers at Croi, too close once again. She looks into Croi’s eyes, her own narrowed as if in thought. She hums a little before retreating.
“Yes. Your voice changed. The good thing is that you are no longer a little maybe. Your Glamour broke a little more. The forest will still not be able to, but I can recognize you as kin now.”
Croi gives the dryad a sharp look. “What kind of kin?”
“I can’t tell you that. I’m sorry,” the dryad says, looking anything but.
“All right. Fine. Let me go now.” Croi gives up trying to get answers from her. It seems that she is really not compatible with tree creatures.
“Croi…,” the dryad says again, entirely without warning, her voice catching onto the end of the syllable, the sound lingering in the air. A chill sweeps over Croi’s suddenly fevered skin, and her body jerks. A command is laced through the sound her name makes on the dryad’s lips. She is trying to claim Croi’s name as her own. Croi lifts her head and looks at the tree creature. The light keeping the dryad ablaze surges in response to Croi’s attention.
“Croi.” And again.
Broken not-brownie, Glamoured, fractured, hurting not-brownie, abandoned not-brownie. Her legs point in a direction she doesn’t want to go, and her body is coming apart, trying to assume a shape Croi isn’t sure it can. And now, yet another being with power tries to steal her from herself.
Croi has never felt this fire before, never before tasted this rage. She isn’t sure how she does it, but suddenly she opens her mouth, and she wills the dryad’s light to herself. Though she is deaf to the light’s song, Croi knows somehow that it will listen to hers. She is singing to the light with words that she forgets as soon as she speaks them, and the light responds sluggishly. It spills through the dryad’s ashy skin and bleeds through her eyes. The dryad’s light tries to make Croi shine.
The dryad screams, the sound of trees falling in storms, and scrambles backward, away from Croi.
When she can’t hold it any longer, Croi lets go of the dryad’s light, and it slithers back to her. Dimmer. Muted. Croi watches as fear settles on the tree creature’s face. It is her turn to smile. If power is the only language the dryad can comprehend, Croi will learn to speak it.
EIGHT
OBSERVE:
One very surprised dryad, lying on the ground with limbs awkwardly splayed; two halves of one Croi, still held prisoner by the tree; and the silent forest, judging them both.
Croi doesn’t take her eyes off the dryad, whose glowing orbs do not move from her face. They are at an impasse. Croi’s not sure how she called the dryad’s light to her or if she can do it again. She has to hope that the idea of losing her light frightens the dryad enough that she won’t try to claim Croi’s name anymore.