He was going to kill Klea.

Or Klea was going to kill him.

In that moment, it didn’t matter which.

Laurel’s body ached and she hugged her arms to her chest. She’d barely gotten Mara out before collapsing on the floor in a fit of coughing. Then Chelsea was there, bending over her with concern on her face.

“It’s OK,” Chelsea was saying softly. “You’re all right.”

Several more faeries gathered round her as Laurel drew in a deep breath that filled her chest. “I’m good now,” she said after a couple more coughs. “I’m good.” But she didn’t get up. For a few seconds she needed to just lie there, focusing on breathing in and out. Just for a second.

She heard screaming and shouts from the wall of the Academy, but she clenched her eyes shut and blocked it out. She didn’t want to see them put the cut section of wall back in, or know how many they’d left to die. It was too much to even consider, so she lay with her eyes closed, trying to force her tears back until the commotion died down. Taking one more breath, she braced herself and opened her eyes, letting reality come crashing back.

“Where are David and Tamani?” Laurel said, pushing her sore body up and sweeping her hair out of her face.

“David’s over by the wall,” Chelsea said, pointing. “And I don’t see Tamani right now, but he made it out a couple seconds before you did, I promise,” Chelsea added. She must have seen the panic start to shine in Laurel’s eyes.

“OK,” Laurel said carefully. He’s here – I’ll find him.

At the wall between the dining hall and the greenhouse, they were stuffing thick mud from the planter boxes into the cracks around the cut-out square to seal in the poisonous mist. A couple of faeries had taken off their shirts and were using them to fan the stone, not only to dry the mud, but to dissipate any tendrils of the toxic smoke that might make their way out.

Laurel looked around the garden at the surviving faeries, more than half of them wounded or unconscious and all coated in soot. She should have felt pride that there were probably about a hundred survivors but all she could think about were the hundreds inside. The hundreds dead. Sprouts, professors, classmates, friends. All gone.

Friends.

“Chelsea, where’s Katya?” Laurel’s eyes darted around the garden, looking for the blonde hair and pink shirt that matched hers. “Where is she?” Laurel climbed to her feet, sure if she could just get a better look, she would find her friend.

“I – I haven’t seen her,” Chelsea said.

“Katya!” Laurel yelled, spinning about. “Katya!”

“Laurel.” Hands were on her arms and Yeardley’s voice was in her ear. “She didn’t make it. I’m sorry.”

Katya. Dead. Laurel vaguely heard David arrive at her side and felt his hand gentle on her arm. “No.” She whispered the word. Saying it too loud would make it true.

“I’m sorry,” Yeardley said again. “I tried . . . I tried to get to her to save herself. But you know Katya; she wouldn’t.”

Laurel had managed to hold back until now, but with Katya’s face still so fresh in her mind – her smile, her determination on the balcony – it was too much. She collapsed against Yeardley and let the tears come raining down on his shoulder as he held her.

“She will be sorely missed,” Yeardley murmured in her ear.

Laurel raised her face from Yeardley’s shirt. “I’m going to kill her,” she said, the bitterness in the voice that escaped her mouth not even sounding like her own. A spark of rage ignited within her and Laurel let it smoulder, growing hotter. First Shar, now Katya . . . for the first time in her life, Laurel realised she genuinely wanted someone to die; wanted it so badly that she would strangle Klea with her bare hands, if necessary—

“Laurel.”

Yeardley’s soft, penetrating voice brought Laurel back to herself. She looked over at the fundamentals instructor.

“Laurel, you are not a warrior.”

That was true. But did it matter? The Academy grounds were practically littered with guns just now – all she had to do was pick one up and shoot Klea in the back. It would be as easy as chasing her down.

“I have seen your work. You’re no destroyer. You’re stronger than that.”

What’s stronger than destruction? Laurel had seen strength. Tamani was practically built of it. Yuki was so strong she had almost killed them all. Klea was even stronger – she’d beaten Shar, who Laurel had imagined undefeatable. Even Chelsea and David had helped repel an invasion of thousands of trolls in one afternoon. So far today, Laurel had done nothing but run away.

“You’re a healer, Laurel, you always have been. And even though you’re angry right now, you don’t have it in you.”

“I could,” Laurel insisted. “I could do it!”

“No, you couldn’t,” Yeardley said calmly. “Not like this. And that’s not a weakness, Laurel. It is its own kind of power – the same power that makes you such a great Mixer, the kind of Mixer Callista could never quite be. Anyone can pluck a flower, Laurel. True strength is knowing how to give it life.”

He pressed something into her hand. Laurel looked down at the bright red flower – castilleja. Her mom called it Indian paintbrush; common both here and in the human world. But, when cured correctly, it was one of the most powerful healing flowers in Avalon.