The Fae Princess (The Pacific Princesses Book 2) Ektaa Bali (free ebook reader txt) 📖

all things, it fades. And when those embers extinguish, the light moves on to the next Fae.”

—The Book of the Fae, Queen Mab the First, 3333 B.C.

Vidya sat in her parents’ bedroom, rocking baby Mahiya in her arms. She felt numb. Pancake’s tiny body being swept up by the Bunyips was more than she could bear. She had cried more tears that she had thought was possible. They had returned the previous night; the others carrying her in their arms together. Lobey had not asked when she met them at the door. She had seen Vidya’s face and looked at each of them in turn—then her eyes had gone to Vidya’s empty shirt pocket, and she had known. Silently, they’d carried Vidya up to bed, and the four of them had slept together as she cried herself to sleep. Vidya refused to believe anything bad had happened to Pancake. Something in her knew he was still alive. The light in her mind that was Pancake had not gone out. She would know it if he was gone forever. That much she was sure about.

And that night, she had a clear vision from the flower of Awakening.

“Did it work?” she asked the flower as it sat in front of her.

“I… feel something,” was all the flower would say.

The vision faded, and Vidya was swept up in hours of dreamless sleep. When she got up, she went straight to her parents’ room to hold Mahiya for a little while.

“Fingers crossed, Mahi,” she said softly. “Mother and father will wake up soon, and father will tell us what to do about the Bunyips, and we can just go back to the way things were.” She kissed Mahiya on the forehead. “Doesn’t that sound good?”

Mahiya blinked up at her with wide green eyes and gurgled. Vidya grinned at her baby sister.

By her parents’ bedside, she waited and waited and waited. But still her parents did not wake. As they slept on, the sinking feeling in her chest grew and grew into a dark gaping hole. As it reached midday, Vidya had to admit to herself the harsh truth. The spell given to them by the Wollemi Tree King had not worked. She saw the face of the little mushroom Lily had tripped on, the one that had told her she was no Queen and the Leaf Master’s raspy voice played in her mind.

“I’m foolish and I’m selfish.

I till the soil and dig the land

And will fulfil your every wish

All the earth I do command

Come at me with your best

And I’ll chop you up

Good and fresh”

The Bunyip King would pay for this, Vidya decided. In whatever way she could manage, he would pay.

A commotion outside made her stand up abruptly, clutching Mahiya to her chest.

Lobey burst into the room, red faced and panting.

“We have a problem,” she said. “The twelve-year olds, Lotus and a few others. They’re asleep. They won’t wake up.”

Vidya’s heart sank even deeper into the bowels of her belly. The Flower was weakening even more, and now even the children were being affected. It would weaken until the youngest children fell asleep. Vidya was ten. She would be next.

Vidya cast another look at her parents and put down baby Mahiya in her cot with a sigh. “Show me the damage.”

Lotus was fast asleep on Vidya’s bed. He hadn’t even woken up that morning. Luna had run around the palace and the city to do a tally and found that twenty Fae twelve and some eleven-year-olds were asleep.

“We’ll have to move them all this afternoon,” said Vidya. “Right to the back of the city. It’s time to move my parents and Mahiya as well. Our plan didn’t work.”

“You tried, Vidya,” said Lobey gently. “Now we have to fight.”

“I know, how are the bows and arrows coming?”

“We have plenty of bows,” Lobey replied, “And the kids are still whittling the arrows and dipping them in the venom. I told them not to stop. We need as many as we can get.”

“We do,” agreed Vidya.

“What about the nets?”

“Done, and in position.”

Vidya nodded.

“Lobey, I—”

“Don’t, Vidya,” said Lobey, her eyes red and shining. “We’re all frightened. We need our Queen to be strong. Would you speak to the little kids? I think they’d like that.”

Vidya agreed, everything as they knew it was changing, and whatever tonight brought was not going to be good. If her mother were here leading the Fae city, she would make sure everyone was calm and that no one was panicking. But your mother would have never failed, said a dark voice in the back of her mind. Your mother always did what she set out to do. Vidya shook herself, pushing the thought away. Mother always did her best, and that’s all I can do as well. That’s what she would want me to do.

An hour later, Vidya, Lobey, Willow, Luna, and Toad, plus two Devil’s Finger plants, carried the King and Queen and baby Mahiya out of the Palace. All morning, Lobey had directed the strong trees to carry the sleeping Fae to their hiding spot, and the royal family were the last. Vidya had been holding onto hope that they would wake, but it was finally time to admit they were still asleep and hide them away to keep them safe.

As they strode past the tree houses of the Fae city, Vidya remembered how, just before all the adults had fallen asleep, Nani had told her to help her father find a solution to the mystery of what was going on. Nani had no idea how things had come about. The Devil’s Fingers trees holding Nani in her hammock would not let them move her. Deciding that the fearsome trees would guard Nani better than anyone else, they decided to let it be.

But walking past the greenhouses had reminded Vidya of something else.

“Father said that each Fae king or queen is granted another power,” she said out loud.

Lobey raised her eyebrows. “I was wondering when