Page 79 of The Sunbound Princess
Nikolas swallowed, eyeing the bench. “Is this…?”
“Yes,” I said, joy swelling my chest. “This is the Grove where I played as a child.”
“You moved us across the Covenant,” Nikolas said slowly. He looked at me. “How did you do that?”
Laughter bubbled alongside my joy. “I honestly don’t know.”
Masculine shouts penetrated the curtain of sunlight. Instinct tugged me to my feet, and I moved toward the soaring, shimmering rays. Reaching out experimentally, I touched one.
The ray responded, parting as if I’d drawn back a curtain. Heart pounding, I touched another ray. Again, it drew to the side.
“Hello, beautiful,” I murmured, stroking my hand down the elegant cylinder of light. It glowed brighter, as if the sun itself purred. Smiling, I curled my hand around it. The ray shrank abruptly, forming a beam of light about the length of a broadsword.
Dain appeared at my shoulder. “You’ve tamed the sun.”
I hefted the sunblade, testing its weight. “I wonder what else I can do?” And justhowhad I managed to move all three of us from Solbarren to Lum Laras? Where had all this power come from?
“Bel,” Nikolas said, stepping to my other side. Anger clouded his features as he pointed past the gap in the curtain. “Look.”
I brushed the rays aside, revealing Corvus and Viraxes huddled at the edge of the Grove. Corvus’s normally smooth hair was a brown tangle around his shoulders. My father’s crown sat askew on his head. The arrogance had drained from him, leaving only fear. Viraxes stared with flat, unreadable eyes.
For a breath, I drank in the sight. They looked small now. Stripped of their stolen power, they were diminished. My heart should have soared with triumph.
But something tugged at me, its pull deep and ancient. Impossible to ignore.
I stepped past the veil of light.
And there it was.
Suspended in the air above the center of the Grove, the sunstone shimmered in a shaft of golden light. It didn’t hide in some long-lost vault or dusty treasure trove. It had been waiting here all along, radiant and patient. Like it had known I would come.
I hadn’t found the sunstone. It found me.
And then it led me home.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
NIKOLAS
Iheld my breath as Ezabell approached the sunstone.
She wasradiant, light rippling from her in waves. The sigils burning on her throat and arms were as bright as the stone, which pulsed like the heart of some great, terrible beast.
Magic whispered through the Grove, the words too quick to catch. Power lifted the hair on my nape. In some dim corner of my mind, I was aware of Corvus and Viraxes cringing away from the light. But I couldn’t be bothered with them. They were insignificant now, any threat they’d posed vanquished by Ezabell’s transformation.
Because she was utterly transformed, her gorgeous body dipped in gold. Embers danced in her wake. Her cloud of black hair floated behind her as if tossed by an otherworldly breeze.
The whispers raced faster. Ribbons of light spooled from the stone, rising and falling like gentle sighs. Ezabell paused before the stone, a golden goddess in the center of the Grove. Then she reached up with a steady hand and took it.
Light blinded me. I jerked away, throwing an arm over my eyes as I waited to be incinerated. But the brilliance dimmed as swiftly as it came, and when I lowered my arm, Ezabell stoodbarefoot on the grass with the sunstone cradled in her hands and a look of wonder on her face.
Strong fingers tangled with mine. I looked at Dain and saw my own emotions reflected on his face. Awe. Happiness. Pride.
Ezabell turned toward Corvus, who still crouched with Viraxes at the edge of the Grove. A wild look appeared in his eyes. Babble spilled from his lips as Ezabell advanced on him.
“Everything I did, I did for the kingdom!”
