Chapter 52
Chapter fifty-two
Earthbreaker
Skyre’s eyes were fixed on the ancient tree.
Its haunting groans reminded him, with each passing moment, that he stood in the presence of something unfathomable.
Beneath its willowy branches, he was no king.
No being of might or majesty, but a feeble thing.
If he were stronger, maybe he could have stopped the druid from going.
He should have.
The tree pulsed; its womb filled with tangling vines. They grew upwards, concealing the druid’s pale form. Skyre’s gut twisted. It was the same feeling he’d had watching Niall careen across the grove—the moment before something inevitable.
And irreversible.
Every second the druid remained within deepened his dread. Minutes. Hours. Days. He might have lived a month within an instant—each one dragging, like a broken limb across a battlefield.
The druids seemed unmoved, and that only bothered him more.
“How much longer must we wait?” he asked.
“Have patience, Maister Vaich.”
But it was all wrong. His body braced against an unseen storm, as if his flesh knew what his mind had not yet accepted.
Until he heard it.
Soft. Distant. Torturous.
A small, but undeniable wail.
The knotted branches tightened like nooses and there came another cry all too achingly familiar.
He rushed forwards.
“You must leave it be,” said the Fíor.
“You expect me to do nothing?” Skyre hissed.
“That is the way.”
“It’s crushing him!”
“If he is to be consumed, it is the land’s right to take of him.”
“Fuck its rights,” Skyre growled, looking for an opening. With a snarl, he gripped the branches. The wood was rough and strong, but he yanked, refusing to let up. All his days of training, all the spars lost and won, every ounce of power that had been beaten into him since birth—he let it out.
The branches gave way with a crack and the tree moaned. Skyre reached for another and another as the Fíor’s screams lashed at him.
“Alas, you show your nature! A fox in a den of kits; bloody teeth barred! You defile this hallowed creature with your barbarity!”
The words gouged holes in his skin, but he did not stop his assault. He spat in anger and stared at the monstrosity. Sacred or not, it remained simply a tree, and so he drew his sword.
“Stop at once! You must not befoul her further!” The Fíor rushed up, crossing the king’s blade with his staff.
Skyre’s jaw clenched and he glared him down, finding a determined and familiar expression. He might have respected the man’s conviction, if it did not come at such a cost.
“Move or I will move you.” The threat bled out between his lips.
A flicker in that woody gaze. Not defeat, but realization. “Your greed will bring only ruin.”
“Get out of my way.”
With a reluctant recoil, the Fíor stepped back, and Skyre turned his attention to the tree.
With his body full of fury, he mounted the trunk, swinging his blade against it. Again and again he swung, chopping bits away until he saw the top of a flaxen head buried beneath the roots.
“Druid!” Skyre dropped his sword and grabbed at the vines again, tearing them between his hands. He gripped the wood on either side of the womb and, with a sharp breath, he pushed it wide, bowing the bark till it broke.
His nails cracked as he dug and clawed, his muscles groaning under the effort.
And when all was splintered, he reached between the fragmented pieces, pulling the druid’s body from within.
He knelt with him in the grass, holding him tight to his chest. The druid’s skin was ashen, as if he’d been entirely drained.
“Wake,” Skyre begged him. “Please, wake!”
“Death would be a mercy,” said the elder.
“He did not come here to die!”
“That is not for you to decide. That tree was older than man itself, and you destroyed it. There is only arrogance in your mind. You do not understand the powers around you. You do not understand sacrifice.”
“I decide what I am willing to give, and if you let him die you are no better.”
Skyre’s rage twisted out of him in one desperate scream. The druid was fading fast. He cupped his face, traced his lip in search of breath.
“Please,” he begged again. He turned stinging eyes upon the elders. “He is kin to you! A child of this forest!”
“No kin of ours would allow for such desecration. Begone from here, earthbreaker. Go and do not return. You are welcome in our faidh no longer.”
He watched them turn their backs as if it were some feverish vision. A fog gathered thick and cold and the druids disappeared like shadows in the dawn, leaving him panting on the forest floor, the younger druid cradled in his trembling arms.
Skyre’s teeth ground.
“You cannot die,” he whispered. “I forbid it… I forbid it!”
Once he had pled for the druid’s justice. Begged for his resent. But there existed no sentence more punishing than that which he suffered now.
There was no word the druid could speak… no blow that he could land that would cut deeper than the idea of going on from that place without him.
A strangled gasp erupted and the druid convulsed in his hold. Instinctively, Skyre’s fingers tightened. The druid’s eyes flew open, bloodshot and fearful.
“They are coming. They will—”
“Druid, can you hear me? What did you see?”
“ísth…mhach… the ísthmhach…”
Skyre shook his head. He couldn’t understand. “What is it?”
But the light was already fading in those silver eyes. The druid weakened against him. His final words escaped in a breath as he collapsed back into Skyre’s arms.
“It is… a door.”