122. Rorax
“Gods, I want to get home. I desperately want to get this filth off me. It’s disgusting,” Milla complained, looking herself over and shuddering.
It had taken less time to clear the battlefield than Ayres predicted, but it wasn’t a moment too soon for Rorax. They combed through the soldiers, beheading and hacking through the bodies of their ancient heroes, and only when they confirmed that every draugr was once again dead did they finally start making their way back to their horses. Rorax had to drag herself.
She had overdone it. She had gotten all the practice she wanted, true, but she had also come dangerously close to completely tapping out towards the end. Not only were her magick reserves running on fumes, but her physical reserves were almost gone as well. All her limbs and muscles were smarting, warning her they were close to failure, and her whole body ached with exhaustion. Rorax somehow got to her horse, groaning as she pulled herself up.
Only when she was firmly seated did she allow her pride to inflate inside of her chest. She had single handedly held off an entire draugr army. An admittedly small army, with less than two hundred half-wit soldiers, but she had done it.
“Are you okay?” Ayres pulled his giant chestnut warhorse next to her gray Garron and looked over her with knowing eyes. Despite the warmth of pride in her chest, her body was starting to feel cold and feverish. Even holding the reins of her horse felt like a huge task. If they had to ride hard for any reason, she was going to fall off her horse.
Ayres must have been able to see her exhaustion because he didn’t wait for Rorax to answer as he reached over, wrapped one arm around Rorax’s middle, and plucked her up and out of her saddle. He dragged her over to him like she weighed nothing, and settled her in front of him, her back pressed against his chest.
Ayres looked over at Piers. “Guide her horse back; she’s dead on her feet.”
Piers nodded.
“Thank you,” she murmured to them, resting her head back against Ayres’s shoulder as he wrapped his dark cloak around her tightly.
“How do you feel?” Ayres asked. He ran the meat of his palm down the length of her left leg, pressing down hard and massaging the aching muscles in her quad. She moaned in pleasure as he did it again, kneading over the ache.
“Like shit,” she breathed. “That feels so good.”
Ayres huffed a laugh in her ear and did it again, rubbing the muscle.
“You were impressive out there,” Ayres muttered. “I’ve never seen anyone hold off an army single handedly like that.”
Rorax moaned again as he transferred his reins to his left hand to rub his right palm down her opposite leg. His fingers rubbed deliciously hard into the flesh there again. “It felt good to . . . release. To see what I could do.”
Ayres hummed in understanding.
“I’m sorry about leaving without you. I know one of your cardinal rules is to never leave without backup.”
Ayres’s fingers stopped kneading, and she felt his jaw flex against her earlobe.
“I was furious with you. Furious that you didn’t wait for me; furious that you went in alone with only one soldier at your back. My instincts were screaming at me to lock you in a room, to keep you safe and out of harm’s way, but . . .” He sighed as if the words were heavy, like every syllable said cost him something. Rorax felt her insides tighten as his breath hit the sensitive hairs on her ears and neck. “There are very few people in the Realms more powerful, or more qualified to fight this than you, Rorax.” He pulled his arm tighter around her. “And if I want to keep you, I must let you. If I try to keep you safe, but leashed, I’ll lose you anyway and it would cost hundreds of people’s lives in the process.”
Ayres sighed. “I know it won’t be easy, and I know I’ll have to come to terms and accept the fact that the woman who is mine is also one of the most powerful beings in the Realms—in the world— but I will trust you to know your worth to the Realms, to decide which risks and which missions are worth it, and to trust that you won’t make any brash and unruly decisions with your life.”
Something hot and bright and happy burned through Rorax’s chest.
“That being said,” Ayres reached down and gently pushed his thumb in the soft flesh under Rorax’s chin, forcing Rorax to tilt her head up to look at him. “Your fledgling magick abilities were untested going into battle today. I’m grateful to have both books back, but taking on a draugr army by yourself falls under the classification of ‘questionable decisions’, Little Crow.”
Rorax scowled. Ayres grinned down at her and lowered his voice so no one could hear him. “However. I’ve never been so hard going into a fight. For the next hundred years, when I tend to myself, I will use today as my material.”
Rorax grinned up at him, and he smiled back.
“It won’t be like that in a month or two, though once I release my magick to Enna,” said Rorax.
The smile on Ayres’s face fell away, and his mouth pressed together in a tight line. He stopped his horse and his eyes flitted up passed her to his Guard.
“You three go ahead. Rorax and I need a moment,” Ayres commanded Kaiya, Milla, and Piers. Kaiya gave Ayres an almost grieving look that Rorax didn’t understand, but none of them said a word as they kicked their horses farther down the path and out of earshot.
All the cheekiness that had lived in Ayres’s face was gone, replaced by somber seriousness that made Rorax uneasy.
“We need to talk,” Ayres murmured, looking down at her with charcoal eyes so dark they were almost black.
“About what?” Rorax asked hesitantly as she snuggled deeper into his chest.
“About your conversation you had with Jia the other day.”
Rorax’s insides went cold. “About . . . the Choosing?”
“Yes.” Ayres sighed, reaching up and rubbing the back of his head.
“What about it?”
He studied her for a long, heavy moment, contemplating his words. “When we find the way to release Contestars from the Choosing . . . we need to use it to release Enna,” Ayres said in that voice that was commanding, unmovable, unshakable, and never-endingly steady. “Rorax, you know as well as I do that Enna would never have been able to do what you did today. She would never be able to fight in the same capacity as you did. You are the Guardian the Realms need, Rorax. You. Not Enna. Not Isgra. You.”
His eyes were so hot, so sure on her face, that Rorax had to drop her stare onto the hands in her lap.
“You handle the magick better than anyone, you wield it more comfortably than any Guardian before you. Even when your magick fails your body is trained enough to carry on the fight with Glimr and the rest of your weapons.”
Rorax shook her head, “It doesn’t matter, Enna—”
“Do you really think Enna could have done that?” Ayres released her hips to gesture with his arm to the direction of the old volcano where she had fought the draugr. “We both know that even on her most bloody, ruthless day, Enna would never have the reckless abandon and skill to be able to do that, Rorax. And as the Guardian facing a Pit War you are going to face so much worse than that.”
Rorax swallowed hard, thinking of the look of grief, and understanding Kaiya had given Ayres. “Have you told Kaiya?”
“Kaiya doesn’t need to be told. She already knows. I know. Jia knows. Kiniera knows. Hell, Rorax, I think we all know. Including you.” Ayres’s voice remained unmovable and as steady as his eyes.
“This is still your choice, Rorax, but if you chose to abandon the Realms . . . well it’s the wrong choice. A choice that could leave millions dead.”
Rorax finally found the gumption to look back up at Ayres, and they were silent for a long time, silently communicating.
“You were born to be the Guardian, Rorax.”
“After everything I have done, how can you still think that I’m destined to become this?” Her voice was small and pitiful, telling exactly how she felt inside. Small. Stained. Unworthy.
Ayres cupped his hand around her face, bringing it up to his. “The Guardian role aside, Rorax Greywood, how can you still think you are not enough? Have you not bled enough? Fought enough?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t know if it will ever be enough.”
“Then let me tell you. As the first-born Prince of Death, the right-hand of Marras, Heir to the Harbinger of Death, and a son of Sumavari; you have done enough, Rorax. Forgive yourself because I have forgiven you already. We have forgiven you already.”
“Conrad will never forgive me.”
“No, and there will be others who have lost too much to forgive . . . but the majority of my people, the Queen, Cannon, me . . .and even Marras herself has forgiven you.” Ayres brushed the hair out of her face tenderly. “Rorax, you’ve been fighting your whole life. If you decide to keep fighting for us or not, you have absolved yourself of your sins, and you can rest in peace that you have earned.”
Tears, thick, hot drops slipped down her face. “Do you mean that?”
Ayres cupped the sides of her face with his hand, wiping the tears away from her skin. “I do.”
Rorax pressed her fingers to Ayres’s chest plate, over the tattoo of Marras marked in the center of his pectorals. “When we stopped in Povelinn I asked her . . . I asked her to help me keep you and your people safe.”
Ayres wrapped his hand around hers, squeezing it tightly. “You make me feel safe, Rorax. Not just physically, but . . .” Ayres’s throat worked. “I trust you. Completely and in all things. When Jia, a Heilstorm, and a daughter of an Ice General rode by with one of Sumavari’s books I was going to pry it from her hands, but . . .”
Ayres released her hand to dig in his pocket, pulling out her ribbon. It was blood speckled and dirty, but nothing had ever made her heart glow in her chest more than this gesture. She reached out and rubbed her fingers over the silk. “Thank you, Ayres.”