My head was starting to hurt, and my arm felt dead. Pinpricks coated it, and I began to shake. The cracks grew, sending spiderwebs of instability through the surface of the rings. Panicked, I froze. There wasn't enough energy in there yet to rekindle the charm, but any more, and it would break. "Pierce?" I warbled, and his fingers around mine grew warm.
"I can't do anything," he said. "Rachel, you have to finish it!"
"It's going to break!" I said. "I can't hold it!"
"It's that damned elven magic," he said, and I caught my breath when his hands left mine. "Your energy is not mixing with the original maker's. Can you . . . think elf thoughts?"
Think elf thoughts, I mocked in my head, but the cracks weren't going away. I couldn't stop, and I couldn't move forward. I knew it would blow them to hell if I just let it go. "Elf thoughts," I muttered, frowning as I thought of Trent, tricky, proud, arrogant.
The skin of the rings seemed to shimmer, and I took a quick breath. The cracks were still there, but it felt right. My teeth clenched, and the memory of Trent's music as he sung my soul to sleep slipped into me, hazy from my subconscious. It was his plea to his goddess that he didn't believe in to listen, the source of his wild magic. It circled around and around in my head until I felt a somnolent nothing seem to take notice, hesitating in its glorious song, turning one of a thousand eyes to me. Hear me, I thought, begging. See what I'm doing. Lend me your skill.
Wild magic smiled at me, and the skin of the rings warbled. My last shining of aura reached for the rings, and with a ping of sound that echoed in my soul, the magic vibrated through me and became one. That simple, the rings reinvoked themselves and sealed.
I gasped, staring at the rings glowing in my palm like glory itself.
"Well, I'll be!" Pierce beamed as his protective circle flickered and went out. "You did it! First time out of the box!"
Elated, I clutched the rings. I had a chance now. I had a chance to fix the line, to free Lucy and Ceri. I looked at the clock on the stove before I remembered where I was. I had to get back to Trent. We had to move on this, and now!
"Thank you, Pierce, thank you!" I said, pulling him into an expansive hug, my clenched hand with the rings tight to his back. "I couldn't have done it without you. I can do something now. Thank you!"
He was smiling when I dropped back, his curls at his forehead damp with the heat, and my expression froze when he touched my hair. "You did it, not me," he said. "All of it. I only told you how. You never needed me. Even when you were but a young woman."
I let go of him, the memory of what lay in his eyes rushing back. "I did," I said, needing to be honest. "I did need you. I was strong with you. You helped me find that." Eyes down, I shoved the rings away. "I'm sorry," I said, knowing it was over, but not remembering why.
Pierce took a step back to put more space between us. "I demanded too much," he said, his sadness at himself, not me. "I see in your heart you found someone who makes you strong who does not hold too tight, who has learned that the pain of losing you to fate is more than the pain of you dying in a cage. Who is he?"
I looked at the clock again. "No one."
"Ivy?" he guessed, immediately shaking his head. "No. Someone new? No, someone old," he said firmly, his eyes going to my pocket. "An elf?" he guessed, then became ashen. "Kalamack?" he blurted, taking my shoulders. "Rachel, no," he pleaded. "I know I have no right, but he lies. He deceives. It is their nature. This is his plan, isn't it? That you come here, risking yourself instead of him?"
"It was my plan," I said, pulling back in anger. Oh yes, now I remembered why it hadn't worked. "It was all I could do to make him stay and not follow me here. He would've been recognized. I have a right to be here." I glanced at Newt's kitchen. "Well, not here, here, but the ever-after. Besides, would you've taught him how to invoke the rings?"
Damn it, he'd made me mad at him again, and I didn't want to be.
"He made you think it was your idea." Pierce pleaded, "Don't trust him. He's a Kalamack!"
"He . . ." I started, not knowing where I was going with my argument. Pierce had said I'd found someone new to love, and Trent wasn't it, but to say so sounded like I was protesting my way into a bag of truth. "There's no reason I can't work with him," I said belligerently, making a fist to hide Trent's pinkie ring. "Ku'Sox stole Ceri and his daughter. I can trust his hate."
There was a small circle on the floor where I'd popped in, and I stood in it, waiting for his help to get out of here. Nothing like needing an ex-boyfriend to slam your door for you as you make your dramatic exit.
"But he will spoil you, Rachel," Pierce said, and I stared until I realized he meant ruin, not overindulge. "He'll turn your heart hard and you will become as him. A shallow, self-indulgent shell of what you are now. Don't trust him. Let me help you. I have an arsenal. We can destroy Ku'Sox together. Right now. This very hour. Your strength and my charms. Our magics blend so well. With those rings, we can make a fist of it for sure!"
I looked him up and down, not surprised. "The rings are not for attack, they're a safety net for fixing the line. You keep telling me that Trent is going to change me, but you're the one who keeps trying to get me to kill everyone!"
"But it needs to be done," he insisted, and I crossed my arms over my chest.
"Send me to the mall, please," I said tightly. "I appreciate your help more than you will ever know."
"Rachel."
It was stifling, and I brought my attention down from the ceiling. Pierce stood before me, looking capable and strong, with his curls about him and his eyes promising me success. I remembered how thick his circle had become and imagined the skills he'd been honing since becoming Newt's familiar. Had she been training him for this? "Can you leave Newt's rooms without being detected?" I asked, already knowing the answer.
His head dropped. "No."
My posture eased and my anger vanished. "I'm sorry, Pierce," I said, touching his arm. "You'll jingle like bells in the forest, and I have to move with stealth. You've given me a tool that I didn't have before. I can do this. Thank you."
Jaw tight, he looked up, hearing the truth in it.
"Do you need anything?" I asked, not wanting to leave like this.
"Only that which you can't give. And I will not ask for it."