“Rough?” I asked. “How rough, exactly?”
Lachlan frowned, as though trying to think how to explain it.
“Like cracking open a really tough shell to find the soft kernel inside,” he said. “Or maybe more like peeling back layers of dead, callused skin to get to the soft, supple epidermis—the true form underneath.”
“Peeling back my skin?” I said nervously. “Is that going to hurt?”
“Some,” Lachlan said, shrugging. He raised an eyebrow at me. “But would you rather have a little pain, or stay in your present form?”
Well, he had a point there. Though I had no idea what my true form looked like either—it might be worse than this. I might be a monster straight out of a fairytale. Maybe I was the Big Bad wolf under there. Or the evil witch in Hansel and Gretel who liked to eat children.
No, don’t think like that, I told myself. Brave, Emma—you have to be brave!
Lifting my chin, I nodded at Lachlan.
“Okay—do it.”
“As you wish.” He closed his eyes, raised his hands, and began to chant in a foreign language I couldn’t help feeling like I ought to know. (Was it ancient Celtic, like the skink had spoken? I thought maybe it was.)
Lachlan’s black cloak (I told you his clothes were kind of old-fashioned) spread wide around him, making him look a little like a very sexy and intense Count Dracula, only of course he was a Fae, not a Nocturne. But my mind was more on what was happening to me than on what he looked like.
I felt the magic the minute he started the spell or counter-spell or whatever it was he was chanting. A wind began swirling around me, just as it had in the forest—only this wind was stronger. It circled me like my own personal whirlwind, seemed to tear at me with long, prying fingers.
At first it was just a weird sensation—like someone scratching you lightly with their fingernails. But soon the feeling changed and it seemed like hundreds of sharp fingers were pinching me. That hurt but it wasn’t unbearable. I gritted my teeth and made up my mind to stand it.
Not much longer, I told myself, though I wasn’t really sure how long this whole process was going to take. Not much longer…not much longer…
But then the pinching turned to tearing and I swear to God, it really did feel like someone was peeling layers of my skin off one at a time in the most painful way possible.
I don’t know if you’ve ever been skinned alive but let me tell you, it is not fun. The feeling of my skin being torn off was horrible—a searing, burning, tearing agony that was happening all over my body at the same time. Also, it felt like someone had grabbed my hair and was trying to tear it out at the roots. Even my eyeballs burned, as though an invisible hand was sticking hot coals in them.
I tried to keep quiet—I really did. But you try not screaming when someone is tearing off your skin, ripping out your hair, and shoving red-hot coals in your eyes all at the same time! The shrieks that came out of me felt like they were ripping my throat out but I was in so much pain everywhere else, I hardly noticed.
Bran was standing there, his hands balled into fists, his blue eyes anxious and agonized.
“Stop!” he shouted at Lachlan. “Stop, you’re hurting her—it’s too much—she can’t bear it!”
Lachlan only shook his head and kept chanting. There was a look of deep concentration on his sharp features—an expression almost of pain, though I was in so much pain myself, I don’t know how I noticed. He fell to his knees, arms raised high, still chanting hoarsely as the invisible fingers of the magic wind tormented me and I shrieked and shrieked and shrieked…
The door to Bran’s room banged open and his parents and sister came tumbling in.
“What’s going on here?” Bran’s father roared. “Bran, what in the name of Our Lady of the Summer Court are you doing?”
“Oh no—it’s Wilde Magic,” Bran’s mother gasped. “Can’t you feel it, Connell?” she said to his dad. “This power is not of the Seelie Court!”
“Why does Bran get to do magic?” his sister asked plaintively. “I thought you said all magic was forbidden while we were in exile? It’s not fair!”
I have to be honest and tell you I only heard about half of what they said and understood even less than that. I was too busy being in horrible agony to pay much attention.
The invisible fingers were nearly done with me at that point, but I didn’t know that. It seemed that I had always been in pain and that I would always be in pain. And it hurt so much I could barely stand it, yet I couldn’t get away from it because the magic wind had me trapped. I imagine what I was feeling was what being burned alive would be like—it was honestly that bad.