Chapter 44 Death and Return
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
DEATH AND RETURN
ADELINE
The centaurs aren’t stupid. They must know they’re at a disadvantage crossing the gorge. Then again, they probably didn’t realize that capturing an annoying, talking raven for themselves would earn them this much grief.
Their scout, who is currently yelling “We’re under attack!” but is probably thinking, Oh well, a fae, a human, and a lioness? How much damage could they do to a centaur herd?
Of course, they’ve never seen Roane and Ardruna fighting. Or they haven’t made the connection between the library’s guardian and this tall man dressed in black leathers, watching them from the rocks.
And maybe the scout is a little stupid, because he goes on to yell, “False alarm!”
Excuse me? I think as we leap on him, but then my thoughts scatter as with the impact, I fly off Ardruna’s back.
Shit! I hit the rocky ground with a cry. Ow. I roll to a stop and flinch when hooves gallop past me. I glance up, dazed, and find Ardruna hanging onto the centaur’s back, teeth and claws sunk into thick hide.
Quickly taking stock, I find I’m not broken into pieces and get up with a groan. I pat the book nestled against my breasts, relieved to find it’s still there.
The centaurs are now in disarray, struggling to turn around in the narrow passage, their stomping hooves echoing. The sound bounces from rock wall to rock wall in a deafening din.
Where is Roane?
A scream, a shout, two centaurs rearing up, and I know I’ve located my warrior librarian. A smile tugs on my lips, and when I realize that, I do my best to wipe it off my face. Nothing sexy about a powerful fae male killing monsters.
A powerful fae male who keeps pushing me away.
”Her. Let’s take her!” I find a centaur leaping over the body that Ardruna is still worrying at and pointing at me. “She’ll fetch a good price.”
I stumble backward, but I hit the gorge wall. With a trembling hand, I pull out the knife Roane gave me, and almost laugh at the image I present—a slight human girl, holding up a knife as a massive centaur canters toward me.
“Ellin! No!” someone roars, and I know it’s Roane. I see him from the corner of my eye. He’s somehow extracted himself from the bind he was in and is racing toward me, jumping over boulders and ducking under centaur bellies. The scimitars flash like stars in his hands.
The centaur standing before me bends his muscular humanoid torso, a long rope in his hands, preparing to catch me. His bearded face is split in a grin.
So I brace myself and throw the knife, and… I somehow manage to land the throw. It thuds into his chest and he glances down at himself, slowing.
Oops. Beginner’s luck?
“You hit me!” With a roar, the centaur rears up, his hooves flashing before my eyes. Pulling the knife free, he throws it back at me. “Die.”
It clatters beside me, making me scream. It misses me, thank the Gods, and I waste precious moments to grab it in case I need it again, before racing along the gorge wall toward Roane.
Before we meet, though, another centaur turns toward me, hefting a spear.
“You’re done here, human,” he growls.
But a serpent springs from… from me. No, not from me. It’s coming from Olm’s book, hidden inside my shirt. A familiar giant snake, rearing up and hissing. It rises in front of me and falls on the centaurs as I backtrack, horror taking my breath away.
The monster snake grabs a centaur in its jaws and throws him against the opposite gorge wall. The wet thump is followed by the body sliding down, leaving behind a smear of dark blood.
Gods… I realize I’m staring, slack-jawed. I never thought I’d ever see a centaur in my life, and now I’m looking at the corpse of one. I feel sick.
I’m still holding the bloodied knife, my grip white-knuckled.
“Aline!” Roane finally reaches me, his eyes wide, face pale and streaked with blood and filth. He drops the scimitars and grabs my shoulders. “Are you all right? I saw the centaurs coming at you—”
“I’m fine,” I whisper. “It’s already dead.”
His gaze moves over me, searching for any injury. “I saw that serpent. Was it you?”
“I have the book with me. Olm is protecting me.”
“Well, good,” Roane growls, “it’s the least that bastard can do after manipulating you like that.”
“Excuse me?” I’m not even angry, just shaken. “Nobody has manipulated me, I’m perfectly capable of—”
“Get back.” He slips an arm around my middle and yanks me to the side. “Fuck!”
Three centaurs have gathered around us, crammed inside the narrow gorge. They’re crowding us in. A wind is blowing, bringing the stench of death with it.
One of the centaurs, I realize, is a female, her bare breasts high and tanned, her muscular arms decorated with fine bands of gold. Her long dark hair is coiled up on top of her head, streaked with silver, and a golden diadem is set on her brow.
“Who are you?” she demands. “Why are you attacking us?”
“I’m the librarian of Areon,” Roane says, sounding winded. “And she’s my guest.”
The female centaur lifts a dark brow. “Guest. Really?”
Roane glares. “Got a problem with that? Introduce yourself, as it is proper.”
“As you wish. I am Bellera, and these are the untamed Pheres, my warriors.”
“And you let them abduct other women?” he grinds out.
“I don’t let them. I lead them into battle.” Her smile isn’t pleasant. “Those nymphs will fetch good coin for my people, and what we do is none of your business. Go home.”
Roane’s brow creases. “The raven isn’t your enemy. Free him.”
“That’s why you’re here? For a bird?” Queen Bellera scoffs. “He got in our way. Just like you are doing now.”
“You haven’t won this fight yet,” Roane seethes.
“Haven’t we?” She clucks her tongue and lifts her hand, gesturing. “Bring the lioness!”
“Ardruna?” I whisper. “Where is she?”
A centaur nudges his way between the queen and the gorge wall, carrying Ardruna in his arms. He drops her to the ground.
I jerk at the thump the lioness’ body makes as it hits the rocks, but my eyes take a long moment to comprehend what I’m seeing.
“No! Ardruna!” I cry out. “No…”
She’s dead. Cut through the middle, entrails hanging out in the dirt, her tongue half-bitten, her eyes filmed over. My stomach twists. Bile rises in my throat, thick and sour.
And all the while, Roane stands there, stock-still, his face devoid of all expression.
“You killed three of my centaurs,” Queen Bellera says, a satisfied smirk on her face. “I think this is only fair.”
“Fair? You abducted Talton, you…” With a wail of anguish, I turn on the centaurs, pointing my knife at them. “You! I curse you.”
“No,” Roane makes a grab for me, “Aline, get back!”
I dodge him and advance on them. “Bellera and her Pheres. I’m being duped. As much as this pains me, I have to do it.”
Roane catches my arm. “Aline! What are you talking about?”
“I know that name, Queen Bellera. You were never a centaur, were you?” I jerk away from him and, my hands shaking, I pass the knife through the belt of my leather vest, not to lose it.
“You led your riders against the Lemian citadel in the battle of Teresh, seeking to secure slaves for your kingdom.” I point my finger at her, and in my mind I’m really cursing them.
Cursing them with their true nature. “You are not centaurs! You belong in the Book of the Nymph Ilara. You’re just human, like me. Human and weak.”
The queen lets out a long wail. Her centaurs stomp and jerk this way and that, faces twisting, their forms snapping and reshaping until…
Until they are simply people on horseback. Not monsters. Not powerful. Just people.
And here is where the tide turns.
“Knock them off their horses!” I scream. “End them for killing Ardruna! Grind them to dust.”
With a curse, Roane lets his knives fly.
One man cries out and drops off his horse, then another.
Roane runs to grab the reins of the nearest mount and vaults onto its back.
The queen and her men turn and race down the gorge.
Roane gallops after them while I stand there, panting, hardly able to believe what I’ve done.
After a while, he returns, guiding his horse toward me, his expression dark. By then, I’ve gone to Ardruna’s side and dropped to my knees.
What does victory matter now?
“How?” Roane demands, dismounting.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific,” I croak, my hands in the dirt, my stomach heaving.
“How did you change the centaurs into riders?”
I swallow, my throat dry. “The name of the queen. I know that story. I knew she wasn’t a centaur and neither were her men.”
“That doesn’t explain it.”
A scream tears from my throat. “Ardruna is dead, Roane!”
He’s silent. Then he says, “Is she?”
“What the hells do you mean? She’s been cut in two, she…” A sob escapes me. I place a hand on her matted, bloodied fur. “Ardruna. She was kind to me.”
He slides to his knees beside me. “For what it’s worth, about what you told Bellera… I don’t think you’re weak because you’re human.”
I shake my head, not sure I want to hear this now.
“I don’t think you’re weak at all.” He puts his hands on Ardruna’s leg. “Come back to us, Druna.”
“Stop acting as if you’re a god,” I scoff, anger threading through my sorrow. “You can’t bring creatures back to life.”
“Druna,” he says, ignoring me. “Answer my call. Follow my voice. Come back, now!”
Ardruna’s body jerks, and the air leaves my lungs in a hiss.
Her pieces are coming back together, the guts slithering back into her torn belly, the edges of her flesh knitting themselves together.
The cut in her tongue closes. Her eyes start regaining color, the film covering them fading, the blue returning.
“What’s happening?” I’m shaking so hard I almost fall over. I realize tears are sliding down my cheeks. “What is this? How are you doing this?”
He shoots me a sideways glance. His face is haggard, but his gray eyes gleam. “The same way you’re changing rivers and creatures into something else, by my guess.”
“It’s not the same! Once I knew what the centaurs really were and what their story was, I only had to say it. Call out the story name. Call out their true nature.”
“I didn’t know you could do that.” He keeps his hand on the lioness’ leg. “Is this the magic Ardruna mentioned?”
“Yeah. It’s a recent development.” I wipe impatiently at my cheeks because I don’t know what I’m weeping for anymore. “Is she alive?”
“She is.”
“Tell me how you did it.”
He shrugs his broad shoulders and slowly gets up, a wince crossing his features. “Nothing to tell. I’m this world’s guardian. I have certain powers.”
“Your powers are failing you. And this shouldn’t be one of them. Just tell me the truth.”
“The truth,” he says, his voice growing cold, “is that you think I’ve failed this world, that I’m not up to the task of protecting it. And you’re probably right, as I’ve said before. So rest assured; you’re right about my failures and shortcomings. I’m lazy and incompetent, like you surmised.”
“I never said you’re lazy,” I start, “I just…”
He’s right. At some point, I made up my mind that his failure to use his magic properly is his fault. That he isn’t working hard enough at it, that he didn’t care enough to study the books, that he broke this world.
Why am I so set against him, when all I want is for him to want me back?
“He has been an asshole,” Olm mutters. “That’s why.”
“True. On occasion.”
“You’re talking to your fucking book again,” Roane grumbles. “Should I give you some privacy? We were only discussing matters of life and death here.”
“I was talking to Olm,” I correct him.
“Right. The one who saved you when it should have been me. When I failed you yet again. I’ll leave you to talk to him, then.”
“Wait…” I blink. “Are you jealous? Of Olm?”
Roane shakes his head and walks over to the horse who is nibbling at the few grasses growing in the rocks. Dismissing me. I watch him pat the horse’s neck. He’s standing with his head bowed, his mane a tangled mess on his back, those dark lines of a mark gracing his long neck.
Is he really jealous, or feeling guilty for not being there when I was in danger? That’s sweet.
“Nothing sweet about it,” Olm grouses. “He’s right, I was there for you and he wasn’t.”
“And that was sweet of you, too,” I say, though all I can think of is Roane, roaring my name, racing to reach me when the centaurs attacked me. He rushed to protect me, like every other time.
“He said you were a liability,” Olm reminds me.
“Which is true. I know nothing about this world or about fighting monsters, and he’s had to save my life time and again.” I stroke Ardruna’s neck, the golden fur, feeling her warmth returning. She had said that, too.
“You shouldn’t be seen as a burden.”
“He never said I was a burden,” I whisper.
“You are past love-struck,” Olm groans. “Alas! This is beyond belief.”
I sigh. “You’re full of melodrama, aren’t you? Just…”
But Ardruna blinks slowly, letting out a low growl, and I shout with joy.
“Ardruna!” I lay my head on her side. “Welcome back to the world of the living.”