Chapter 31 #2
“I did take it out on you. I didn’t care whether that girl lived or died, but you obviously did, and yet you helped me kill her.
You kept for me and held the thread open until it snapped and she died.
So if you want to blame anyone for her death, blame yourself.
” He smirked down at her. “Now run along back to the holds with the wagon before you get into more trouble, there’s a good girl.
And every time you feel guilty about your dead Fodder friend, do remember me. ”
Senan had wheeled his horse about when éadha spoke once more, loud enough for her voice to carry clearly on the rising wind.
“Her name was Seoda, and she was beautiful and strong, so much stronger than you or I will ever be.” He stared back at her as she continued, standing erect as her hair was whipped about her by a sea breeze come to blow the fog off the headland.
“She survived down in the holds, where they peel away every shred of human dignity and joy, and she endured. Here on this island of lords and Masters, she was one of the only people I met with strength enough to show kindness. This girl, who was starved and drained, denied her humanity in every way possible, was kind to me, gave me hope. So yes, I did care that she died. You broke my heart yesterday when I couldn’t save her. ”
Senan climbed down from his horse, the familiar flush of irritation suffusing his face.
He stopped directly in front of her and jabbed his finger in her face.
“How dare you speak to me like that, you stupid bitch? Maybe yesterday wasn’t enough of a lesson for you.
Maybe you need a lesson a little closer to home right now.
Have you ever been really drained by a Channeller?
Would you like to know what it’s like to be our Fodder, drained of every shred of your strength over and over again?
Would you like to find out, you stupid, worthless thing? ”
And he seized her hair, in the same moment reaching out along the thread between them, the now-familiar pull but more savage now, ready to scour her insides out with his clawing power.
éadha stood unmoving and stared straight back at him.
Inside with a flick she threw up a translucent, shimmering wall so his power rebounded straight back up the channel and into him, hitting him squarely in the midriff.
She followed it with a single blast of her own that sent him flying backward onto the sand.
All the rage, all the grief, all the pain, and all the guilt over Seoda, Gry, her aunt and uncle, Ionáin, and the nameless, numberless others she’d failed roared up within her until she must disintegrate if she couldn’t get it out of her.
With barely a flicker of power she rose in the air and flew to where he lay on the sand, shaking his head to try to clear it.
Looking down at his sprawled body, she said, “You ask me how I dare? This is how I dare.”
She hit him again and again as he tried to rise so that he sprawled helplessly on his back, arms and legs outstretched. He tried to reach out to the Fodder in the wagon, to draw power from them to retaliate, but she blocked his threads with ease.
“Uh-uh, fair’s fair. I’m not drawing power, so neither can you. Let’s see how that goes, shall we?”
He’d cut his lip as he fell, arms flailing, and as he wiped away the blood, she came and stood over him. She could feel him trying now to draw directly from her, but for the first time there was a look of real fear in his eyes as it began to dawn on him that he couldn’t.
“Look at you. You fool yourself that you’re powerful.
You’re an empty shell. A husk of vanity and ego needing to be filled with other people’s lives, their energy, their passion, to have any substance at all.
See how I block you? See how easy it is to make you powerless?
See how empty you feel, all of a sudden, without all your little people to drain and make you feel like a big man? ”
Senan scrabbled backward until he fetched up against a large rock jutting out from the sand, a mix of incomprehension and terror on his face. She followed him, her hand still outstretched.
“Look around, my lord. Here, now, you are alone. For the first time in your misbegotten, warped life, Senan, lord of the Family De Lane, you stand alone and you are empty. You’ve spent your whole life filling yourself, puffing yourself up with other people’s life force, living off other people’s lives and, foolish boy, you never once looked inside yourself to see there’s nothing there.
You and your precious Masters. They take you and spoiled children like you and hollow you out so there is no heart, no soul, nothing left but an empty vessel good only for filling with power, endlessly using other people’s lives to feel even half alive yourself.
And look where it’s gotten you, here on this beach with me, empty and useless. ”
“You fucking bitch, you’re insane! What the fuck do you think you’re doing?
” he screamed then, struggling still as she flattened him once more with ease as he still tried in vain to draw power from somewhere, anywhere, but there was no one he could reach, only seagulls that circled above them and the Fodder shielded in the wagon.
éadha stared at him expressionlessly as he put a shaking hand on the rock behind and tried to lever himself up.
“It’s as you said, my lord. As this is our last session together, we should reinforce what we’ve learned from each other.
The lesson you can take from me is that everything you think you know is a lie.
You thought you had power over me only because I let you think it.
Because not in this world or any other world would I ever care what scum like you thought of me.
“I walked straight into your citadel, into the heart of your power, and none of you even knew me for what I am. With your stupid incantations and ceremonies, your pathetic need to feel important and in control, and all the time we exist separate from you, uncontrolled by you, laughing at you.”
And though she knew she was signing her own death warrant, she didn’t hesitate. She raised her hand, palm outstretched. With one final blast of power, she knocked him back to the ground, instantly unconscious.