Fae didn’t sleep. She couldn’t call it something so restful and constant. Perhaps some would, but the regular pain, though dulled from familiarity, kept her conscious. That, and…
Whats… happening to… me…?
She could barely form the question in her mind, but she managed it because that was the question that gripped her heart. She was being drugged, or at least, that’s what it seemed like. Her fuzzy, cloudy mind. Her heavy, steadily numbing body. The way that, even with her glasses on, even when she opened her eyes as wide as she could, her vision was so blurry.
But it wasn’t drugs. This transference fluid… being injected directly into her through multiple points on both arms…
I can’t…
I can’t… become the Vessel…
Please…
Someone…
——
Madeline stared in shock, mingled with relief, as she stepped into the room.
Found one.
There was Olivia, dangling from a strange, horrific prison, her arms held out to her sides by metal constraints, held in place by a metal band around her waist while her legs hung free. She was unconscious, and blood was smeared in a thin line down the right side of her face.
“She’s breathing,” young Neptune said, gazing up at Olivia. “And she’s not as hurt as I’d feared. We must be making good time.”
“We have to get her out of this,” Madeline said, examining the despicable restraints that bound Olivia.
“Code,” the masked boy said, heading towards the grimy wall behind Madeline. There was a panel there with several keys with symbols and numbers on them. The boy couldn’t reach the panel, but Madeline could, and Neptune had told her about the codes for bypassing the system’s security measures.
“If we’ve already found one, then the Core is close,” Neptune said while Madeline entered the code. “It’ll be more difficult to move now, though.”
“Let me deal with that,” Madeline said. Her successes so far had bolstered her confidence in her Illusion Magic, especially when enhanced by her parasol Talisman.
I can hide everyone. Because I have to.
We’re all getting out of here together.
She finished entering the code and then jumped at the sudden sounds of the metal restraints being released — and then Olivia crashing to the floor.
“I’m so sorry!” Madeline said, racing to Olivia’s side. The fall had roused Olivia from her unconsciousness, but even now she was groggy, slow to get her bearings. “Come on, I’ll help you.” Madeline slung her arm over her shoulder, boosting Olivia until she could sit on the floor. It was a disgusting place to sit, but every surface in this entire underbelly of the Silver Star Sanctuary was covered in grime and filth, so Madeline had given up on staying clean in her rescue mission. Neptune and the masked boy stayed close, and Madeline sheltered them with Olivia in her Illusion aura.
“Where…?” Olivia started, blinking heavy eyes. Not for the first time, Madeline found it strange seeing Fae’s face — though without glasses — and hearing Fae’s voice from someone else. But this time, it also sent a pang of worry through her heart, knowing that Fae was still a captive somewhere, likely in the deepest, most protected cell of them all.
“What do you remember?” Madeline asked.
“I…” Olivia started. She shook her head slowly, and then winced, pressing the heel of her hand to her forehead. “Long fall. After we…” Her eyes suddenly went wide, and she stared at Madeline for a long, panicked moment, before calming. “You found me. Thank you. But where is everyone else?”
“We’re working on that,” Madeline said. “You’re the first we’ve found. I know you must be hurt, but if you can walk, the sooner the better. I’m sorry about that, but… we really do need to hurry as much as we can.”
“I can walk,” Olivia said. She reached out her hand, her alabaster scythe materializing. She gripped it tight, and strength seemed to flow into her. A moment later, she stood under her own power, leaning slightly on the scythe. She looked down, then, as if for the first time seeing the masked boy and… “Why do you… look like Neptune?”
“You can see me?” Neptune asked, tilting her head to the side. “Can you hear me, too?”
“Yes,” Olivia said.
“Hmm,” Neptune said, stroking her chin. She looked at Madeline, then back to Olivia. “It must be because of Madeline. Though I’m not sure how… anyway, the details don’t matter right now. I’m Neptune, but please don’t be troubled by that. The Neptune you know is still alive, and just as important as you think. If all goes according to plan, she’ll be the only Neptune soon enough.”
The masked boy took a step towards Neptune, reaching out for a moment, mouth slightly agape, but then dropped his hand, whatever he was about to say dying in his throat. “It’s all right,” Neptune said, smiling at the masked boy. “We’re going to get your memories back, too.”
“Looks like there’s only one way forward,” Madeline said, nodding to the second of two doorways in the cell. “Ready?” Nods went around, and Madeline led the way, with Neptune close beside, navigating.
A few turns, and a few nerve-wracking brushes with biomechanical beasts, and they descended another flight of stairs to reach a new cell, undetected by Wasuryu’s defenses.
“Mercury,” Neptune said, staring, worry creasing her brow. Unlike Olivia, Mercury wasn’t held dangling from the floor, but was instead strapped to a bed tilted up at a forty-five degree angle. There were metal restraints on her wrists, ankles, waist, and neck, and her head was tilted to the side, her eyes closed. A bruise marked the corner of her mouth, and a cut had scabbed over above her right eye.
“She’ll be free soon,” Madeline said, finding the panel for this cell and entering the code. The restraints were loosed and Mercury rolled out of the metal slab of a bed, but Olivia and Neptune caught her so that she didn’t come crashing to the floor. Slowly they roused her, and Mercury’s blue eyes fluttered open. She looked around a bit, her gaze settling on Olivia.
“Fae…? No, wait,” she said, shaking her head. “Olivia. And… Madeline. Some kid. And…” Her eyes widened as she saw the young Neptune. “Oh. I’m dreaming. Weird dream, though. Hurts a lot more than a dream, too.”
“It’s not a dream,” young Neptune said. “Mercury, don’t worry. It’ll all make sense soon. But we don’t have much time to explain. We need to move quickly and quietly to find the others and reach the Core.”
“When we reach the Core, we’ll be able to disable this entire nightmare,” Madeline said. “Can you walk? We’ll help you if you need it.”
Mercury took a deep breath, then stood up straight. “Yeah, I can walk. Just, uh… go easy on me, okay?” She took another look around at the group. “Got a lot more to find and save.”
“Yeah,” Madeline said with a nod. She started forward, and the rest followed.
Their luck faded as they reached an intersection of five separate halls, all leading straight before turning out of sight, so there was no clue of which would lead down. And they couldn’t leave a single path unexplored, lest they miss one of their captive friends.
And yet, thanks to Madeline’s Illusion Magic, they were able to explore every path undetected. The only trouble was time. They couldn’t move fast, not with Mercury struggling along, smiling off her weakness but clearly having a rough time of it. And they couldn’t split up, because Madeline was the only one who could hide them, and Illusion Magic was the only reason they’d made it so far undetected.
As they found the next set of stairs, a vicious, wrathful roar made them all freeze in their tracks, looking around fearfully. It was such a powerful cry that it shook the halls.
“Above,” the masked boy said in the following silence. He pointed at the ceiling.
“You can tell that it came from above us?” Olivia asked.
“Yeah, me too,” Mercury said with a nod. “Not sure how high above us, but it definitely came from up, not down or around.”
“He must have found Olivia’s empty cell,” Madeline said. “Come on, we’ve got to move faster if we can.”
Fae, hang in there, please!
Please… don’t let us be too late…
——
Footsteps roused Fae, as much as she could be roused at this point. She’d been hearing their sound for a long time now, but only now realized what kind of sound it was.
Close, then…
Who’s… there…?
She couldn’t form words, so all she could do was feebly ask the question in the silence of her mind. She raised her head, as much as she could, which wasn’t much, but it was enough. Suspended as high as she was, she could see whoever entered without raising her head completely.
Please… not… Wasuryu…
The sound was foggy and muddled to her ears. It was hard to make sense of it, aside from the steady rhythm and slowly increasing volume. But…
No… click-clack…
She couldn’t hear anything like Wasuryu’s claws, or the Matron’s heels. But she couldn’t tell who it might be. All she could do…
Was wait.
Slowly, a form appeared in the dimly lit room. It was a rounded sort of shape, short and stocky, with the kind of roundness and hunched posture that made it clear even to Fae’s distorted vision this wasn’t a human.
“Oh, my poor dear.”
That… voice…
She recognized it. But it took several moments for her memory to catch up.
Toryu…
The Father Dragon came closer, enough that Fae could see more clearly the shape of his tortoise-like shell, the silhouette of his mustache. He reached up, and Fae felt a small prick against her arm. She glanced aside, as well as she could, and saw that her arm was bleeding, just a slight trickle.
But…
It wasn’t blood. There was a greenish glow to it.
She was cut, and she bled transference fluid.
What is… happening to… me…?
“So it’s already advanced this far,” Toryu said, his voice gentle, but tinged with worry. “I was too late. I’m so sorry, Fae. And I… cannot free you. But don’t worry. If all has gone well, someone will soon come along who can. And you shouldn’t see Wasuryu again. I’ve led him on quite the merry chase, and once I’m out of here, I’ll continue to keep him busy. It’s… the least I can do.” He bowed his head, muttering so Fae couldn’t hear for a bit. He let out a heavy sigh, then looked back up at Fae, and she saw something glisten in his hands. “This was very nearly stolen from you. I managed to recover it, and… Fae, my dear. The journey of recovery will be a long and arduous one. And… you will never be entirely the same. But, well… to keep you from losing yourself to him, from becoming his Vessel, this is the only way I can see to save you from that fate. If you trust no one else, you can trust her, Fae. She can save you. And when you see her, at the end of your journey… she’ll explain everything. I truly believe that is why she entrusted this to you.” Toryu reached up, over Fae’s head, and then lowered his hands gently. Something cool, metallic, touched the back of Fae’s neck — a chain. And hanging down from it against her chest, some sort of pendant. But Fae couldn’t muster an idea of what it was, what it could be.
“We will see each other again soon, Fae,” Toryu said, turning away. “Please… do not abandon hope. No matter what soon happens…”
As he padded away, his footsteps receding down the hall, Fae’s head slumped forward, her eyes fluttering closed. Strength failed her, and she drifted between sleep and wakefulness, unaware of all else that was happening. Thoughts couldn’t come, and she was only dimly aware of tears rolling down her cheeks…
——
“You’re… me…?”
Neptune’s voice came out taut with disbelief as she stared down at the younger Neptune. Madeline entered in the code, and Neptune’s restraints were released, as Mercury and Jupiter supported her.
“Just one left,” Madeline said, breathing a sigh of relief as she joined the group, minding her Illusion Magic. There had been several more roars from Wasuryu along the way, but each one was more distant than the last. He was angry about something, and the younger Neptune thought he was chasing someone.
As long as he’s getting farther away, that’s all I need to know.
There was Olivia and Mercury, but Jupiter and Sonya had been found as well, while Neptune was their latest release. Now the older Neptune knelt before the younger, staring at her in shock.
“I am,” the younger Neptune said. “It will make sense when we reach the Core. I suspect we’ll find that before we find Fae.”
“Why’s that?” Madeline asked, worry piercing her heart. “We need to set Fae free!”
“And she’s Wasuryu’s most valuable captive,” the young Neptune said. “He’ll keep her more deep, distant, and hidden than anyone else. Most likely we’ll need the Core’s help to locate her.”
“Okay, but like…” Jupiter said, scratching the back of her neck. “You can’t tell us anything about the whole ‘two Neptunes’ thing?”
“As I said,” the young Neptune said.
“It’ll make sense when we reach the Core, huh?” Neptune asked. Her younger self nodded, and she stood. “Well… all right, then.”
“Really, you’re cool with that?” Jupiter asked.
Neptune managed a wry smile. “Who can I trust if I can’t trust myself, right?” she asked.
“Lead on,” Sonya said, nodding to Madeline. “We can’t slow down now.”
Madeline started ahead, and the others followed. They passed through several corridors, snuck carefully past quite a few biomechanical beasts, and then found a set of stairs leading down, which stopped at a metallic door with a keypad beside it.
“Code,” the masked boy said.
“Right,” Madeline said, punching in the code that the boy and the younger Neptune had told her of in advance. The door hissed open, and the group stepped into a spacious domed room with a huge sort of computer on the far side. Madeline assumed it was a computer, judging both from how the younger Neptune and the masked boy had described the Core, but also from the numerous flickering monitors, the keyboard at the base, and the various wires and cables plugging into a large box humming softly.
But it wasn’t like a normal computer that Madeline had ever seen. She was familiar with dual-screen and even triple-screen setups, and she knew a few oddballs who went for four monitors to a single system, but there were twelve monitors feeding into one box with this thing. And the monitors were all different sizes and shapes, from circles and ovals to squares and rectangles. They were situated both horizontally and vertically in a sort of hodgepodge fashion, roughly three monitors wide and four monitors high, but with their vastly varying sizes and shapes that just gave a rough shape of it. All were mounted directly into the wall, suspended on metal posts, angled slightly downward so that whoever sat at the computer in the chair provided could see the screens more easily by just tilting their head up slightly.
While Madeline stared in confusion, Jupiter and Sonya both gasped and started forward, gazing at the machine with wide, excited eyes.
“No freaking way,” Jupiter breathed, gazing at the box that all of the various pieces were connected to. “This is… this is some totally wild magitech.”
“This is completely new,” Sonya said, running her hand softly over one of the circular monitors. “The entire system… it looks so old. It is old. But… there’s nothing this advanced, this detailed, anywhere else. No one’s figured this out. And yet… here it is.”
“You know magitech that well?” Jupiter asked, looking at Sonya with newfound admiration. “I thought you said you were a writer.”
“I’m from Renault,” Sonya said. “I’m a writer, yes, but also a magitech engineer.”
“Oh, I so have to come visit you when all this is over,” Jupiter said.
“Anyway, let’s hurry and find Fae,” Madeline said. She crossed to the computer and entered in the series of passcodes that the younger Neptune had told her, and breathed a sigh of relief when no alarms went off and the monitors began to display a variety of information and images.
“We have a few things we need to do here, actually,” the younger Neptune said.
“Memories,” the masked boy said.
Young Neptune nodded. “Yes. The first, and most important thing to do, is to find and restore the memories of the Star sisters and my friend.”
“More important than rescuing Fae?” Madeline asked.
“Let me check something,” young Neptune said, climbing up into the chair and typing on the keyboard. A moment later, she nodded. “As I thought. We can’t save her like the others. The only way her bonds will fully release is by shutting down the entire system.”
“Wait, hold up,” Mercury said. “You’re saying our memories are on this computer? They’ve been stored as data? But… how? And…”
“And if we need to shut down the system to free Fae, will we be able to access our memories after shutting it down?” Neptune asked.
The younger Neptune frowned. “Unfortunately… shutting down the system is permanent. It’s fortunate, of course, because we’ll free the entire Sanctuary from this wickedness, but… if we’re to get your memories back, and properly restore the memories of my friend, then we can’t free Fae immediately. We need to download our memories from the system, first.” She turned to look at her older self. “I’ll also have to upload myself, to integrate with the memories directly, so that your memories are complete. That will take less time than downloading —”
“You’re just… data?” Madeline asked.
Young Neptune smiled. “I’m me,” she said. Then she pointed at her older self. “But so is she. We cannot both continue separate from each other. What I am are memories that held on, memories that refused to be stolen. I exist for this exact purpose. Please don’t worry for my sake.”
Madeline stared at the girl, stunned by what she was hearing, and surprised as well by how much her heart hurt to think of the younger Neptune ceasing to exist. She’d grown so attached to her so quickly, without even realizing it.
“But what’s the downloading process like?” Jupiter asked. “Or, okay, hold up, backtrack a little. I mean, I am wondering if we have to hook our bodies up to a computer, because that’s way too weird, but before that, what’s the deal with memories? Why does Wasuryu have them? How do they exist as data on a freaking computer?”
“ ‘Data’ is perhaps not the perfect word,” young Neptune said.
“It’s like…” Sonya said, continuing to examine the system, “it can… store energy. As in, Energy Magic.”
“Soul energy,” the masked boy said.
Young Neptune nodded. “Our souls, our core essence, are made up of many things,” she said. “One key component of our core essence is memory — our experiences and how they’ve shaped us defines who we are. Wasuryu exists in a purely metaphysical state. He cannot manifest himself physically, not without a Vessel. That, or… by harnessing the soul energy of others.”
“He stole our memories to give himself physical form?” Mercury asked.
“Not just the three of you,” young Neptune said. She nodded to the masked boy. “His memories were stolen far more completely than yours. And if you delve deep enough, you’ll see that hundreds of people have had their complete essences fully downloaded, all to feed the Dragon’s hunger for physical form.”
“Hundreds…?” Mercury asked, eyes widening.
“That’s… why the Sanctuary is so empty. Isn’t it?” Neptune asked. Her younger self nodded.
“All stolen,” the masked boy said.
“He and I are the only ones who managed to escape complete erasure,” young Neptune said. “Please, let me say a few things. Once I’m uploaded, I can’t speak to you anymore, so the download will be up to you.” She held out her hand, palm upwards, and the masked boy came over to her. He held his hand over hers, palm down, and a pulse of light leapt from his hand to hers. When the masked boy stepped back, young Neptune was holding four silver spheres, each the size of a ping-pong ball.
“These are what your memories get downloaded to,” young Neptune said. “You don’t have to hook yourselves directly into anything technological. Once downloaded, you can access the memories — and have them automatically absorb into you, syncing naturally with their proper owner — simply by giving the sphere a light pulse of Energy Magic, while mentally focusing on that singular query, your desire for your memories. It’s very simple. Downloading your memories is more complicated. Sonya, you’re a magitech engineer?” Sonya nodded. “I’ll entrust you with the controls. Let me explain…” She started going over the technical process, and Jupiter listened as well, promising to be backup if Sonya needed it. “Do not try to download any other memories. There are only four spheres, and you cannot combine memories of multiple people in a single sphere, or it will corrupt, and all memories downloaded will be lost forever. You can see here —” she indicated things on the monitors as she walked through the process, “that there are plenty of memories and essences of others. These cannot be restored, and must not be tampered with. When the system shuts down, they’ll be freed.”
“What’s that mean?” Jupiter asked. “Do they have bodies to return to?”
Young Neptune shook her head. “But when a person is gone, they cannot fully pass on if their soul is captive elsewhere. This… allows them to finally pass to the next life. And for our immediate purposes, it wrenches that stolen power away from Wasuryu, dissolving his physical form.”
“How long does the download take?” Madeline asked.
Young Neptune hesitated. “It… can take quite a long time. We’re dealing with memories, complex webs of information and experience that can’t be compared to any actual digital data. This system is incredibly powerful, but even so… it could take hours for a full download.”
“But… Fae…” Madeline started, feeling her heart sink.
Young Neptune nodded. “In truth… we likely can’t wait that long. Even if we can keep Wasuryu away from her somehow, what’s already been started is a process that should be halted as soon as we can.”
And yet…
Madeline understood. The memories the Star sisters had so longed for all this time, that they’d journeyed so far just to find… and the memories of this small masked boy, a boy so broken and devoid of so much of his soul that he was more like a ghost, who spoke with incomplete sentences because that was the best he could do.
We have to save Fae. We have to, and quick!
But if we save her too soon… then their memories… everything they’ve lost…
“I’m going to upload myself,” young Neptune said. “I trust all of you to handle the rest.” She particularly looked at her older self, who nodded back at her. Madeline, caught in the vicious moral quandary she’d fallen into, only at the last second realized what was happening, and raced to the young Neptune.
“I…!” she started, and then cut off as the little girl took her hand.
“I’m not leaving,” young Neptune said with a smile. “But… I understand. Goodbye… Madeline Crowley. And thank you, so very much.”
Madeline stared, lost for words, as young Neptune placed her hands on a portion of the console. Her body gleamed with blue light, for two seconds…
And then she was gone.
Sonya slipped right into the chair and began typing immediately. Jupiter placed the four spheres into slots on the console.
“The upload was almost instantaneous,” Sonya said. “All right… I’ve started the download for the boy. Now Mercury… Jupiter… hang on a bit… there, Neptune, you’re started, too.” She looked at Madeline, who slowly got hold of herself, looking back at her. “I’ve found Fae. I’m monitoring her, but… someone should be there when she wakes up. And someone should be there to handle things, to properly watch out and let us know if something happens that we can’t see from here.”
“But she’s hiding us,” Jupiter said. “Isn’t that —”
“Core,” the masked boy said, shaking his head.
“That’s right,” Madeline said, remembering. “The Core is one of the few places that’s hidden from Wasuryu’s senses. It takes too much of his attention to focus on it, and he’s protected it in such a way that no one should be able to get inside anyway. So you guys are safe here, while I… can go to Fae. But…”
“But nothing,” Jupiter said. “Go. Be there with her. And if something happens… hey, can she let us know somehow?”
“Here,” Mercury said, handing over a guitar pick. “It’s a twin. Just give it a little pulse of magic, doesn’t matter what kind, and its twin will glow.” She held up an exact twin of the pick she’d given Madeline. “So if there’s trouble, let us know, and we’ll shut it all down.”
“But your memories!” Madeline said.
“We’ll get as much as we can,” Jupiter said. “But we’re not letting Fae become that monster’s Vessel. And we’re not letting her suffer any more than we have to.”
“Seriously,” Mercury said. “Go to her. Alert us the second there’s the slightest bit of danger there. Don’t take any chances.”
“But… whatever’s not downloaded is lost forever,” Madeline said. “And…” She stopped as the masked boy tugged on her sleeve. Looking up at her, he shook his head.
“Go with you,” he said. “Save Fae. It’s okay.”
Madeline fought tears at the simple kindness of this boy who had lost so much. She looked at him, then around at the others, who all stared at her with determined expressions, and…
Smiles.
Madeline took the masked boy’s hand and rose, steeling herself. She looked at the guitar pick, and at the twin in Mercury’s hand.
After looking over the map that Sonya brought up, Madeline headed out, terrified of what state she’d find Fae in.
And holding out hope that she could wait long enough for everyone to get their memories back.
——
Fae blinked heavy eyes, though she wasn’t sure why she even let her eyes be open at all.
She couldn’t sleep. She was so tired, so heavy, so aching with dull pain and pressure.
And yet she couldn’t sleep. She could sink into an in-between state, a twilight realm, but she couldn’t stay there forever.
But being awake was useless. There was nothing left for her to do. She’d prayed for help until her mind could no longer take hold of those simple, desperate pleas…
And that was all she could do. There was nothing else for her but waiting.
She’d long ago lost hope. Toryu had come, had hung something around her neck and said strange things, then left.
He’d showed up, spoken kindly, but he hadn’t rescued her. He’d abandoned her.
What could she hope for if that was what amounted to kindness for her? Rescue wasn’t happening. All she could hope was that she’d properly fall into the sweet escape of sleep, of unconsciousness, when the time came to be turned into a Vessel. Then at least the horror wouldn’t be real, she’d escape that sensation, and would simply cease to exist.
At least the pain would end.
So it was strange to her, when she noticed a blurry form standing in front of her. She blinked, struggling to widen her eyes a bit more, to focus her vision. Such a simple action was so difficult to her now…
But her eyes soon focused on the shape of a parasol. It had a distinct outline, a distinct style…
I…
I know that…
Swallowing what little faint drops of moisture remained in her mouth, Fae parted her lips and fought to say one word. “Made…line…?”
“Hey, Fae,” came a voice that shone a blazing ray of sunlight on Fae’s heart. A voice that broke with emotion, and yet it was the happiest sound Fae had ever heard.
Both girls were silent for a long time after that brief exchange, but Fae felt buoyed so much by just two words, and the presence, the constant presence, of her dearest friend. Madeline wasn’t going anywhere. She wasn’t leaving.
She seemed to be waiting for something.
“You’re…” Madeline said after a time, “gonna be okay. I promise. We’re gonna get you out of here. Soon. Not… not just yet. But I’m not going anywhere. Not until I leave here with you. Okay?”
Fae nodded the best she could, with the faintest movement of her head. But Madeline seemed to get it.
Silence stretched between them once more. Fae had no clear sense of time anymore, so whether seconds or hours filled the space between talking, she had no idea.
But…
Madeline’s here. She came for me. And she’s going to save me.
I just… need to hold on. Just a little while longer.
After a time, a sudden gasp from Madeline caught Fae’s attention. She fought to pay closer attention, and after several moments…
Click. Clack. Click. Clack. Click. Clack.
Fae’s eyes widened, and she strained against her bonds despite her exhaustion, despite her hazy sense of being, despite the fresh pain that lanced through her, setting her body ablaze.
Wasuryu!
The sounds of his claws and padded feet echoed, coming closer and closer. Madeline turned, facing away from Fae, as if to stand as a shield between her and the coming Dragon.
And then…
“We… can’t take chances,” she said softly. “Can we?”
A small voice responded to her with a simple, “I trust you.”
Madeline hesitated for a moment, and when next she spoke, her voice was taut, strained with emotion. “I’m… I’m so sorry, everyone.”
There was a faint pulse of white light. A moment later…
Fae gasped. The IVs pulled themselves free from her arms, and her restraints released. She fell, but only for a second, before landing in Madeline’s arms. Cradled softly in the arms of her best friend, she found relief flooding through her. Madeline spoke gently. “I’ve got you, Fae. I’ve got you. I’m going to take care of you. Don’t worry about a thing.”
And while those words brought hope to Fae’s heart…
Fresh tears fell from Madeline onto Fae’s face.
Fae opened her mouth to ask what was wrong, but she couldn’t form the words. A new sensation was enfolding her, one she’d longed for so long.
A moment later, the deepest, most dreamless sleep took her.