Estelle lay with her cheek pressed against the cool tile of her bathroom. Her throat hurt. Her knees hurt. Her head hurt. But no matter how much they ached, that frustrating stab of the twisting knife in her heart refused to be outdone.
She felt like she'd been scooped out hollow. She sort of had. She didn't know what had onset it, but she'd been flying out of her bed every few hours to vomit her guts up since yesterday. She felt feverish, even here on the cold floor. She couldn't stop shaking. She didn't quite understand it, considering she hadn't gotten really sick like this since she was a child.
Odette would probably say it was set off by her own inner turmoil or something else sappy and romantic. Estelle didn't know about that, but she did know that she felt like absolute shit and wished she could make it all stop.
She'd locked her door. So far, Reave, Danica, Lysandra, Lorcan, and both her parents had come by trying to make her let them in. She'd ignored them all. Lorcan had almost broken the door down, if the aggravated growling and loud bang had told her anything. But in the end, he'd left her alone. They all had. And it was what she'd wanted, but now, laying here on the floor with fever burning in her skin, she wished she'd let them in.
Reave had known... all this time. That there was some other way. According to him, he'd thought of it mere days after the Gates closed. So why had he kept it from her for so long?
And why had he told their mother about... everything? Estelle was fine. She didn't need her mother's help. She needed--
She didn't know what she needed. But she knew exactly what she wanted.
Groaning, Estelle flipped onto her stomach and raised herself on shaking arms, grasping the side of her bathtub and hauling her legs into a bent position. Ignoring her violent trembling, she swiped the back of her hand across her mouth, her eyes trained on the door.
Everything had gone wrong the day those portals spat that stupid Illyrian into Erilea. No, that wasn't it. The fact remained that Estelle had never felt more right than when she'd been with him. Like some missing half of her soul had found its way to her through all odds. But everything wrong about her had begun the moment he'd gone.
She shouldn't. She couldn't. She really, really shouldn't.
But Estelle closed her eyes and winnowed, vanishing into the darkness, only one destination in mind. Take me to Prythian.
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Winnowing when riddled with fever was generally a very bad idea. Trying to winnow to another world while ill, when one wasn't even sure if that was possible, was an even worse idea.
When Estelle opened her eyes, her heart skipped a beat. She definitely wasn't in Prythian. Prythian, the parts she'd seen anyway, had looked much like Terrasen. Like a place humans and Fae could thrive.
Wherever she was, she could see nothing in sight that told her 'home.' She was suspended in midair, floating in a sea of darkness that stretched out for miles and miles in any direction. Twisting slightly, she craned her head to look all around her, searching for anything that might give her some information.
Her mother had often told her that winnowing was a different sort of transportation than flying or running. Ever since it'd been discovered that Estelle had the ability, she'd done her best to teach Estelle all she knew. Fenrys had helped, but even he had admitted that Estelle's ability was somewhat different than his own. Estelle had always wondered if it was otherworldly, this power she held. If it was something the Mother had given her, or maybe the Cauldron. Something of Prythian.
YOU ARE READING
Heir of Dreams and Princess of Light
Fiksi Penggemar[SPINOFF/SEQUEL TO CURSEBREAKER AND FIREHEART/ SON OF NIGHT AND DAUGHTER OF STARS] Estelle Whitethorn Galathynius is many things, but first and foremost, she is a daughter of Terrasen. She never wanted to be anything different. Until Nyx fell into...
