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Blooming Lotus it rendered me
a walking, breathing poison. Whoever touched me and exchanged
saliva or bodily fluid with me would die in great pain instantly.
But death didn’t spare me. Only slower. Don’t ask me why. It was
the Night Blooming Lotus’ magic property. One flower gave me three
days to live. Two flowers gave me two days. Three flowers one day.
I ate about ten or fifteen. I just wanted to make sure Valerian was
dead. I couldn’t take a chance.
    Valerian
couldn’t speak as he stumbled to the floor. He went into a violent
seizure. His eyes rolled to the back of his head. I laughed with
delight in watching him die. Maybe I had turned looney. Whatever.
This man, after all, had commissioned the death of my
father.
    My laugh
cut short with a coughing fit. When I wiped the spit, I realized it
was blood. My body was hot. My intestines felt as if they had been
replaced with coals.
    I slunk
back in the bed. I was sure Valerian was dead by now.
    It was my
turn.
    Bitch. It
fucking hurt. Seriously.
    The door
burst open. Sarene and Bres came to me.
    “ Don’t touch me,” I warned my governess.
    She broke
into tears. “Your Highness…”
    Bres took
out his frustration by kicking Valerian’s lifeless body
repeatedly.
    “ Bres!”
    He
stopped.
    “ Don’t forget about Jaime. You’ll release him and return him
home?”
    Bres hung
his head. “I will, Your Highness.”
    “ Good.”
    Everything darkened rapidly. My tongue swelled, turning
rubbery. I wanted to order Bres to tell Jaime that I loved him. My
voice had left me.
    Eternal
blackness claimed me.
    * *
*
    Faerykin
don’t believe in the afterlife. When a faery died, that was it. We
don’t have gods. Or hell and heaven. No reincarnation.
    So
imagine my shock when I opened my eyes and found myself in a
hospital bed with all kinds of medical gadgets hooked to me. IV.
Heart rate monitor. I writhed. Catheter. Ewww. Gross. Gross. Gross.
How could I get these things off me?
    My
attempts to remove the needles and other things attracted a nurse’s
attention. She scurried into my room and closed the
door.
    “ Don’t do that, Miss Walker,” she chastised.
    I
stopped. Miss Walker? I used Jaime’s last name when I lived with
him.
    “ You’ve suffered a skull fracture, three broken ribs, and
you’ve lost a lot of blood after the accident.”
    Accident?
Right. We hit the invisible barrier. Valerian and his
hunters.
    I still
didn’t get all of this.
    I died. I
had poisoned Valerian. How could I still be alive?
    The nurse
leaned down. She was a middle-aged woman with black curly hair and
a round face. The hospital scrub covered her generous boobs and
hips. Her eyes glittered. Face glowed.
    I tensed.
Somehow she looked familiar.
    “ Your Highness?” she whispered. Her voice changed.
    Heaven
and stars, she sounded like my mother.
    “ Lady Brigid?”
    She
sighed. My mother had taken over the body of a human nurse. “Your
body is weak, my dear one. Do not strain yourself. You are a mortal
now.”
    Mortal?
“H-how?”
    “ I learned about your plan from Sarene, but it was too late. We
cannot let you die. The elders and I made a pact with a
weaver…”
    “ Are you nuts?” Making a deal with a weaver was the same as
making a deal with the devil. Nothing good would come out of it. At
least, that was what I learned from books. Or I had watched
Supernatural too much.
    “ We had no choice. You must live. Midnight Court needs an
heir.”
    “ But you say I’m a mortal now. I can’t rule the throne as
one.”
    “ Your body might be a mortal, but your lineage won’t
be.”
    “ What do you mean?”
    “ Your firstborn will rule the Court of Midnight.”
    “ What? You gonna take away my kid? Assuming I have
one.”
    “ You will. And more. But the elders and I will take your first
one back to Midnight Court. It was part of the pact we made with
the weaver.”
    “ I don’t agree to this.”
    “ You do not have a choice. You were dying.”
    Oh
great.
    My mother
took my