The Fairy Letters: A FROST Series(TM) Novel by Kailin Gow Read Free Book Online Page B

of
phoenixes.
    “No,”
whispered my mother, “no.”
    “Get
him out of there!” I shouted. “We need to get him off the bridge!” A childish
wail broke through in my voice. “Daddy!” I had not used that name for him since
I was a child.
    “I
must tell him...” my mother closed her eyes, and in the fluttering of her
eyelids I could recognize the familiar marks of telepathy. She may have been
wary of emotion, but at that moment I knew the truth – my father was her true
love, for only through him was my mother able to communicate in that way. I
could see her lips moving, quivering, as she whispered to him – what must have
been words of warning, words for him to leave.
    Her
eyes shot open, and as she turned to me I saw that they were glazed over with
tears. “He says…” her voice shook. “Your father says that he's very proud of
you.”
    “Mother,
no!” I shouted.
    “And
that he loves you very much – and that he knows this is the only way...”
    “No!”
    “He
says goodbye,” my mother whispered, choking back her tears. And with that she
closed her eyes, and I felt a sudden burst of magic – a blue tidal wave of
force – course through me – a single freezing shock that seemed to radiate out
from my mother, who was shaking and glowing – a blue lantern in the midst of
all that silver. The force of the magic shook the earth, tore the trees from
their roots and tossed them up into the air, churned up the waterfalls until
they became a single, silver tornado.
    And
then the magic hit the rock bridge, and in a single, terrible instant the rocks
came apart, powdered into dust, and all those standing on the bridge were
plunged into the waterfall below. A few, able to respond quickly to the shock,
let their wingspan loose, but it was too late – those less able fairies,
panicking, had clung to them – and in the chaos that followed – the rearing-up
of unicorns, the implosions of phoenixes unable to withstand the desperate
attempts of falling fey to cling tight to their backs. Not one fairy escape,
but all plunged into the churning, hungry deep of the waterfall, consumed whole
by its furious maw.
    Tears
were streaming down my mother's face as she saw the bodies tumble downwards,
settling at last, after the awful screams had died down, in the pool at the
waterfall's edge – a pool turned silver by the blood of Summer and Winter
fairies alike. “It was the only way,” she whispered. And then the tears froze
on her face, and the grief in her was emitted in a single, agonized wail – and
then I never saw her grieve or cry again. That was the last time I have ever
seen my mother display emotion – the last time I saw her display anything other
than an implacable military strength, a desire to win the war at all costs.
    One
hundred thousand Summer soldiers were killed – and my father was killed – and
of the two I still cannot fathom which tragedy was greater. I know only that we
fished my father's body out of the pool to give it a proper burial – and
alongside it I saw the bodies of Plumseed and Allison, their eyes staring at me
– as if pleading for me to end the suffering that had tinged the bridge and the
pool with that noxious color. I know only that from that moment, I had no time
to love, no time to mourn. The war was irreversible now – too many had died;
too much had happened. My mother's pain had turned to inflexible will – and
mine did likewise. There was no time to think about love any longer – nor was
there time, my darling Breena, to think of you. Rather, it was necessary for me
to leave behind those childish dreams – dreams of love, of passion, of
happiness – in favor of the work that was to be done.
    The
day of my father's death and the breaking of my mother's heart was the hardest
day of my life. From that day forth, I knew, there was no time to think of you
– except in my dreams, when you crept forth, your eyes daring and bold, your
lips soft and sweet. The paintings I