Forty-Seven
F ORTY - S EVEN
CALDRIS
Estrella was quiet as we made our way toward the river Lethe, but her thoughts moved so quickly in a torrent of violence that I couldn’t even hope to follow. It came as a comfort, seeing so deeply into the chaos of her mind in those moments when she was quiet. When she retreated into herself, I no longer had to struggle with the distance that it created between the two of us. I no longer had to wonder if she was angry with me or what might be going through her mind. Because even if I couldn’t understand the deluge of thoughts that flitted from one subject to another more quickly than I thought humanly possible, I could feel the intentions in them and the emotions that motivated them.
My star was not angry or upset with me, and she squeezed my hand back as I slid my palm against hers and intertwined our fingers together. The emotion that surged through her was one of warmth to contradict the confusion of her thoughts. The jumbled mess that she’d become as she tried to reconcile the person she thought herself to be with the person she had shown at that lake hours before.
Her violence should have shocked her. It should have reminded her that she too was capable of terrible things, but instead all it did was remind her that eventually, those who deserved it finally received their justice.
Even if it meant that one day, such a fate may await all of us. Power was fleeting, drifting through the air like snow on the wind. Who was to say there would not one day come a time when she was not in control of Byron’s suffering in Tartarus? Perhaps there would come a day when Mab ruled this place, too, and found a way to torture us even after our deaths.
I refused to believe it, refused to believe that the Primordials who hid here would allow her to infiltrate the home they’d chosen after they’d retreated and abandoned their own children.
But there was no telling what the Primordials, who were willing to abandon their own children, were capable of. It depended entirely on what suited them in the moment, and Mab would undoubtedly attempt to convince them that she was the strongest ally.
“ Caldris ,” Holt’s low, cautious voice hissed, the sound penetrating my thoughts so suddenly that I stumbled over my own feet.
Estrella spun to look at me, hearing it through the bond that pulsed with golden light between us. Her thoughts stilled immediately, the silence in their absence jarring as she studied my face. I stared down at her, my hand tightening around hers in an attempt to reassure her.
“You have to come back. You’ve been in Tartarus too long to be safe, and Mab is on a warpath now that she knows you’re gone.”
His voice faded off with the muffled sound of footsteps in the silence. Estrella’s eyes turned glassy as she spun away from me, hiding the emotion that came with the thought of being away from me. To be separated so soon after we completed our bond would be the greatest of tortures, and I could not bear the thought of leaving her behind at all, let alone so soon.
“It doesn’t matter,” I argued, even as my jaw clenched with the knowledge that I would be forced to leave people at Mab’s mercy.
“Of course it matters! There are people we love there. What of Holt and Imelda? What of Fallon?” she asked, shaking her head.
I sighed, cupping her cheek in my hand and turning her attention back to me. In the distance, a raven flew above our heads, swooping toward the ground and finally bursting into the three women of the Morrigan. Badb tapped her fingers against her thigh impatiently, eager to reach the next river in our journey.
“We do not have the time to dally,” Macha echoed.
“Of course they matter. You know that is not what I meant,” I said, sighing and forcing myself to ignore the intrusion of the Morrigan chiming their thoughts about the pause they could not understand. The conversation that had happened entirely within my head did not extend to those around us. “But what am I to accomplish by returning now? If I return without you, I will only put myself at risk. We’re stronger when we are together, and we will need everything we have to fight Mab in any meaningful way. If I die, you die, and all hope is lost, min asteren. Having me there may be a temporary bandage for a gaping wound that will not heal on its own. Having us there together may at least give us the ability to cauterize it.”
“But now you have the power of the Winter Court, and you’re no longer under Mab’s thrall. Maybe you could buy them some time until I can return,” she argued, hating the thought that people were dying because of our actions. That my coming to Tartarus to help her had been disastrous for so many.
“What do you think she’ll do when she realizes that she can no longer kill me at a moment’s notice, min asteren? She will do whatever it takes to eliminate any threat I might pose. I hate it, too, trust that, but the lives lost now will be a fraction of those that are lost if she kills me before we have a real chance together,” I said, hating the way she deflated. It was the reality, and we both knew our best chances of winning this war were by playing the long game and not allowing Mab’s tantrum to influence our decisions.
“Okay, min oscura.” She sighed, nodding and leaning her head forward until it touched my chest. She knew as well as I did that sometimes there would be sacrifices to be made in war. We wouldn’t be able to save everyone from the wrath of the Queen of Air and Darkness, but Estrella had never been forced to live through the reality of war before. She’d never had to be the one making choices, all the while knowing that it was other people who would likely pay the consequences for them.
There was a reason those who had power, and respected that power for what it was, didn’t want to keep it forever. There was a reason Kings and Queens who lived forever would one day pass on their rule to their heirs—a reason the Primordials had retreated from our world and given it to their children.
Nobody should bear the weight of that responsibility forever.
Estrella collected herself slowly, turning to continue on the path to the river. She walked at my side with her mother just behind us, the three wolves of the Cwn Annwn surrounding us and keeping us safe from any creature who might think us an easy snack in this treacherous place.
Together, we were formidable. Together, we would be enough.