Chapter 6

Six

Rhoswyn

I fall down on the sand the moment Lore leaves me, giving Cyreus one last distrustful glance. Residual nausea lingers in my throat from the iron, but I breathe through it as I search for Danu.

Banishing the voice that says Yvaine is too far gone, I find my connection to the Goddess as her fragile corpse appears in a blur of red beside me. The sea air thankfully dilutes the smell of her wound. The flesh is past gangrenous, and the pale dawn light doesn’t hide anything.

“Titania,” I whisper. “How are we doing this?”

My grandmother circles the banshee, tutting as she peers at the injury.

“A lot of this flesh is dead,” she mumbles. “The iron poisoning has allowed bacteria to infect the site. You’re going to have to cut it away so we can heal the main wound.”

My gut revolts at the idea, but I don’t have time to vomit.

“I need a knife,” I tell Lore, as he appears with Dare.

The redcap doesn’t hesitate, handing over a blade from his boot that fits nicely into my palm. The metal is cool, grounding me.

“What?” Dare asks, indecision flashing across his face.

Wordlessly, I take Titania’s left hand and place it on my shoulder, and my brother gasps as she comes into view.

“Tell me what to do,” I murmur. “Or… could you?”

She shakes her head. “I cannot perceive your world in the way I once did. It is better if you do it, or I might press too hard and hurt her.”

Taking a deep breath, I shuffle forward on my knees, using the knife tip to peel back the layers of fabric stuck to her.

“Carefully,” Titania coaches. “Dare, you will want to hold her down.”

“Will she live, Grandmother?” he asks, grimly pressing down on his mate’s shoulder and hip.

Titania bites her lip. “If the Goddess wills it.”

That’s not a yes, but I’ll take it.

I grimace as I make the first cut. The flesh is squishy, falling apart, and I cringe as I wait to feel some real resistance to the blade and find none.

Goddess, if the last few hours have taught me anything, it’s that a healer’s work is more gruesome than a warrior’s.

“You need to get it all,” Titania coaches. “We need living tissue to heal and regenerate.”

Nodding, I push through, trying hard to focus on the task, and not the person beneath the blade. If I do that, I’ll chicken out.

At the point when I finally start meeting resistance, the banshee jerks, and Dare has to hold her down while I finish. The second I’m done, all black flesh removed, I toss the dagger aside. Black-tinged blood is flowing freely from the site, coating both of my arms.

Don’t think about it. Breathe through your mouth and don’t think about it.

“Press your hand to the wound,” Titania instructs. “This will be difficult.”

“Just like Florian,” I remember, grimacing as Yvaine’s life fluid gushes over my hands. She’s getting impossibly paler, her breaths even shallower. Dare is there, staring at her with reddened eyes, like he can will her to live.

Perhaps he can. I have no idea what the mating bond is capable of.

Steeling my spine, I grasp my bond to Danu and let her power flood me, giving Titania everything she needs to work.

The banshee jerks again, thrashing as the magic forces its way into her polluted body. Scouring her veins until my limbs are shaking with the effort. This is so much worse than Florian. He, at least, had been treated by fae healers while I was in Fellgotha. Yvaine has been left in a cage to die.

It gets worse when she’s well enough to feel her side being woven back together. She gains enough strength to scream, to beg.

And she doesn’t beg me to save her.

“Let me die,” she wails, her voice piercing my eardrums until something gives way and wetness trickles down the side of my face.

“No,” Dare yells right back. “Don’t you give up, sweetheart. You wanted to see the waterfalls in Winter’s Fork, remember?”

“I can’t?—”

“If you die, I’m following you,” he vows. “You want to be the cause of me dying, Vainey?”

I tune out his frantic arguing and her begging and focus on her heart, which was already painfully weak. Now, under the onslaught of magic working on the iron poisoning, it’s beating too fast. I don’t know how I know that, but I do.

“We can fix it,” Titania promises, though she sounds as strained as I feel.

My bones have turned to lead, but I don’t let go until the skin has regrown. My body is exhausted, but Danu’s power has swollen beneath my skin, and it won’t rest until I either use it or send it to my mates. I release the banshee, curling in on myself as I struggle to get it under control.

“You can do this, dear heart,” Titania promises, releasing me and leaving that telltale tingle of magic where she touched. “Release, then ground, like I taught you.” Her head snatches up. “Don’t touch her. Let her figure it out.”

I can’t tell who she’s talking to. I don’t have the energy to care as I release my connection to Danu’s vast power and hunt for the bonds which have been hidden by the sheer magnitude of the magic I’ve drawn. If I can just get it to my Guard, I can ground the power and the rush will help heal them too.

“When you have your mating bonds, it will get easier,” she coaches, her voice cutting through the harsh sound of my panting breaths. “But you can still manage.”

There, at the back. So faint I can barely feel them. In my relief, I fumble them the first time before I manage to latch on.

I pour the Goddess’s magic down between all five of them without finesse as my vision blurs and I slump to one side.

It’s gone. Done. Only emptiness and exhaustion remains. Dimly, I’m aware of arms coming around me, immense black wings sheltering me from the wind as I struggle for breath.

“It’s okay, dragonfly,” Bree whispers, uncaring of the blood and gore covering me. “Take your time.”

Someone has found him some clothes, I realise dazedly as I curl my fingers into the soft black wool of his jacket.

“Is she okay?” I mumble against him, rotating my shoulders as I struggle to return some feeling to my limbs.

“She’s alive.”

Alive doesn’t necessarily mean well, but I hesitate to look over because there’s the distinct sound of weeping, and I don’t want to intrude on what must be an emotional moment for Dare and his mate.

“Nicnevin, I…”

My head snaps up and I see Cyreus waiting hesitantly on the beach. His eyes are wide, his green hair slick from the waters of the crystal-clear ocean behind him, and he offers me a respectful bow. “You truly do wield the power of necromancy.”

I nod, softly. “I thought word had gotten around about that already?”

“I thought it was exaggerated,” he confesses. “My lady, did you by any chance see…”

“Eero knows,” I tell him, sadly. “Ciara’s under lock and key in her rooms, and the guards have orders to kill you on sight.”

His mouth tightens, expression morphing into one of distress.

“I asked my mates to try to free her,” I promise.

“Máel is dead,” Bree croaks, as if he still can’t believe the truth. “Eero won’t risk harm to his only living heir.”

Cyreus pales, and I don’t blame him. News of Máel’s death may seem like a good thing, but now that I’ve met Eero, I can only imagine it will enrage him further. I would never have let her leave that room alive, but I know this will come back to haunt us later.

“Nicnevin,” Dare whispers, and I turn my head, meeting his teary blue stare with hesitant warmth.

He could be Florian’s lankier, less scarred twin. Except where Florian seems to carry the weight of the world instinctively, the stress of the last few weeks fits Dare like an ill-made mantle.

There’s no hint of the practical jokester I was told about now. The ghosts of laugh lines are written into the corners of his mouth, but his expression is set into a serious frown. His mate is limp in his arms, and for a second I worry that she’s died despite my efforts, but then her chest rises, and I let out a relieved sigh.

“Please,” I mumble. “You’re my brother. My name is Rose.”

“I owe you a great debt,” he says, still bowing in the sand, holding the unconscious banshee in his arms like she might break at any second. “Yvaine is my everything. I almost lost her, and all because I failed to warn you about what Eero was planning in the first place.”

I struggle out of Bree’s hold and shuffle over to him on my knees. “There is no debt.”

Dare looks away, stroking the mating mark along Yvaine’s arm as his shoulders heave erratically.

“She’s really bad at this,” Lore comments. “Shall we tell her that most royal fae hoard debts like goblins hoard gems?”

“Hush,” Bree mutters. “Let her be her own kind of queen.”

Turning, I behold my full Guard standing on the sand a few feet away, surrounded by packs and provisions I thought we’d left behind. A second later, Lore blinks Prae into the mix too.

They’re all injured, bedraggled, and weary, but they’re alive.

“We need to leave,” Drystan announces, with his customary brusqueness. “They’ll realise what we’ve done soon enough. The redcap killed too many soldiers to go unnoticed.”

“It wasn’t my fault!” Lore cartwheels over to me and presses a kiss to my cheek. “Honestly, Rose, my hat was practically pastel . It was necessary, right?”

I can practically hear Drystan draw in a breath through gritted teeth, ready to berate the under fae, but he catches himself at the last second, no doubt remembering how pointless arguing with Lore is.

“We need to go,” he repeats, instead. “Merrow, have you?—?”

“My people have left the horses in the cove up ahead,” Cyreus promises. “I must remain close to my mate. Nicnevin, it’s been an honour.”

With a bow, he strides back towards the sea, and my gut sinks as I realise that although the rest of my males have returned, they haven’t brought Ciara or Kitarni with them.

“Be careful,” I call after Cyreus, but I’m not sure he hears me over the crashing of the waves.

I’m allied with him and Ciara now, for better or worse. I can only hope that they prove to be better rulers than Eero if we all come out of this alive.

“I’ll get the horses,” Jaro says, stomping off ahead without another word.

His callousness is a blow to the heart, a dismissal I wasn’t braced for. One of the things that was getting me through this was the hope that maybe, at the end of all this, Jaro might hold me and let me fall apart. But his actions make it clear nothing has changed.

“There’s still the issue of the prince,” Drystan grouches. “And the Fomorians.”

“They’re coming with us,” I say immediately. “All of them.” I can feel his eyes burning into me, but Titania’s ghostly hand slips onto my shoulder reassuringly, giving me the strength to add, “Why isn’t Kitarni with you?”

I might have complained about her blind faith before, but I could really use some of it now. What happened in Siabetha might’ve taught me that I can’t allow my Guard to just steamroll over my instincts as I have been, but it’s going to take my confidence a little bit of time to catch up.

“The high priestess insisted on staying behind,” Drystan grates, wisely deciding not to test me on the subject of Caed. “Her plan is to fight the Temple’s schism from the inside. She believes that she can win back the support of the Grand Clerics.”

“She did what?”

“She’s not in danger,” he reassures me. “That asshole, Mervyn, has taken off to spread the word of your ‘corruption’ across the courts. He thinks it’s his holy mission or some other bullshit. The other clerics are old and peaceful. They won’t harm her.”

Great, just what we need. A fanatic spreading vile propaganda across the courts.

“With your permission, Nicnevin, I’ll hunt him down myself.” Dare stands, still cradling his mate. “It’s the least I can do.”

Send my brother to kill a priest for speaking slander?

“Send the Fomorians,” Drystan suggests. “Or the redcap. It’s his skill set, after all.”

“I’m not sure that would solve the issue,” I hedge. “Surely his death at our hands would give more credence to his lies.” Sighing, I wonder if I’m being too soft about it, then shake my head. “The best way to deal with him is to disgrace him. We can’t follow the original pilgrimage route, because Eero will have spies waiting for us, but there are other shrines. If Danu continues bestowing miracles when I bless them, the fae will know he’s spewing nonsense.”

“For the record,” Caed mutters. “I’m with the sticky prince and the dour knight. Enemies rarely cause you problems from six feet under.”

“No one asked you, Fomorian” Drystan snaps.

I eye the dullahan, considering whether I need to repeat my charm to stop them arguing, but he glares at me with amber eyes that dare me to try it.

“Caed is one of you,” I murmur.

He shakes his head. “He is far from one of us.”

Brushing him off, because I know that nothing I say will make a difference, I turn to Dare. “Go to Pavellen. Speak to Aiyana and let her know what’s going on. Tell her to shore up the border with the Summer Court in case Eero and his Fomorian allies decide to attack there.”

They need a chance to recover after what they’ve been through, and Madoc will keep them safe.

The Spring Court is well defended, and Aiyana wouldn’t dare cross me again. I refuse to lose another brother on this stupid pilgrimage.

He bows. “As you wish.”

He’s still too formal, and my heart aches. Stepping towards him, I place my hand on his shoulder, unable to hug him with his sleeping mate in his arms.

“When this war is over, I want to hear firsthand how our mother reacted to you sticking our fathers to the dinner table when they were trying to scold you,” I say quietly, bringing a ghost of a smile to his lips.

“Aye, there are a lot of stories you should hear. Bram and I?—”

Something in my expression stops him.

“What?” Dare asks, looking over our group. “I thought Bram was travelling with you. Florian sent word?—”

I look over my shoulder at Jaro, who’s walking down the beach, still pretending that I don’t exist. I need him. He’s the one who holds me together when things feel like they’re falling apart. My dependable, loyal wolf. His absence is cutting.

“Prince Bram is dead.” Drystan doesn’t deliver the words harshly; in fact, I’m pretty sure we’re back to him pretending I’m a horse that might spook at any second.

Still, they bring a lump to my throat. Bree senses it, stepping in and taking my hand.

“Eero was going to kill her. Bram shifted to escape the fae holding him, then shifted again to take the blow. In the process, Rose fell from the throne room window,” Drystan explains.

Dare’s anguish returns, harsher than before, and I flinch, my heart squeezing painfully.

“I’m sorry.” The apology slips out, raw and bleeding. “All my coming to Siabetha has done is brought you pain.” First his imprisonment, and now the loss of a brother he’d only just regained.

“You are not responsible.” Dare shifts Yvaine in his grip until she’s supported entirely with one arm, freeing up his hand to ruffle my hair with easy affection. “Goddess, you’re just like him. Taking on the world’s problems.”

In that sentence, I glean a ghost of some old argument, a fragment of who the brothers were before war, separation, and our mother’s death broke apart our family.

But he’s wrong. He’s so, so wrong. Bram’s death is a hundred percent my doing. Sure, he made the choice to jump between me and the blade, but I made choices, too. Choices that led us to that room.

Jaro has stopped with the horses a little way off from our group, and Dare leads the way over to him with his mate in his arms.

“We’ll ride to Pavellen with haste and send news when we have it,” he promises. “Watch for my hawk.”

Drystan nods on my behalf, and I watch as Jaro silently helps Dare manoeuvre his mate into the saddle. Then my brother takes off, riding into the morning sun.

Which leaves me alone with my Guard and Prae. A wave of exhausted grief crests and threatens to tear me apart at the seams.