Chapter 16 #2
He draws a breath, though I can’t tell whether that’s physical pain or the weight of all that’s happened. “We—I—have one chance to get back to Tirnaeve and get help to fight Vheara, but for that to happen, I need to reach Muilean by Beltane Eve.”
I flinch at the name of the Sacred Isle—and the sacred date. It’s only a week from now. Or it would have been if Fionn hadn’t killed the last Cailleach Queen and seen to it that no more queens could be crowned. There hasn’t been a Cailleachan since.
“Why Muilean?” I ask suspiciously.
Chyr closes his eyes with a sigh, then answers: “Vheara changed the seals that lock the permanent doorways between our worlds to respond only to her magic. The only exception was a doorway on Muilean that we came through last year. Either Vheara couldn’t corrupt it, or she forgot about it.
It only opens once a year on the cusp of spring and summer. ”
“For the Cailleachan—the Hunt. I know.” My tone is bitter. “But why would it open when there hasn’t been a hunt in 400 years?”
Chyr pushes his hair back and rubs his temple as if his head aches. “Legal documents and magic are equally tricky, and the Compact is both. It says the Master can call the doorway to open for the Anvar’thaine on Beltane Eve, and we came hunting Vheara. It should open again for us to return.”
Now it’s my turn to sigh as I pick up the cup of henbane again to offer it to him.
The more I consider what Chyr’s said, though, the more fury creates a hard knot in my chest. “You begged me to give you time because it would save us, all of us.” The words come out in a rush.
“But even if you could reach Muilean in seven days, wouldn’t it be another year before you can come back and bring an army with you?
Vheara would have ground the rebellion to dust by then—and every clan in the Highlands with it. ”
“It’s a risk, but a small one, I think. Vheara had been working on her escape from the Gloaming a long time before she arrived in Alba Scoria, but no one knew that.
There was no chance to prepare an army to come through, not before Beltane.
But Chulainn’s had an entire year to be ready now.
He’d already ordered his mages to find a way to send the reinforcements we need before we left. ”
“Yet no one has come,” I say.
“No one has come,” Chyr says.
He’s good at schooling his expressions, but his jaw gets harder the more he pretends he isn’t bothered, and the pain is there, buried in the deep layers of his eyes.
I see the months of hope and heartbreak that he and the Riders have lived through.
There’s also the toll that’s taken in human lives, and I know Chyr feels that keenly.
“If we can reach the doorway in time,” he says, “with any luck, there should be an army waiting for us.”
“And if Vheara manages to seal that doorway, too?”
“We can only hope she hasn’t. Pray that she’s forgotten it exists and no one else remembers and reminds her.”
My knuckles go white on the cup, and something of my rage must show.
Chyr struggles to sit up. “Flora, I didn’t mean—”
“Four minutes or four centuries, it doesn’t matter how long it’s been. You can pray all you like, but no one in Alba Scoria will forget a stolen throne or the fact that Fionn used the last Hunt to kill the queen and crown himself.”
Of all our ancient stories, those about the ritual of choosing a new Cailleach Queen are the most revered. The Hunting of the Maiden was a chance for the Riders of the Anvar’thaine to prove they were worthy of the Maiden and for the Maiden to prove she was worthy to become the queen.
Neither the Sun King nor the Raven Queen were chosen. They simply took the crown as if it were theirs by right. The rebel king is trying to do the same.
Chyr watches me for another moment, then shakes his head. I know he’s going to say, “I’m sorry,” again, but his apologies mean nothing.
I take advantage of his confusion to press the cup of henbane to his lips. “Drink.”
This time, he doesn’t argue. He drains it all, and I guide his shoulders back to the bench, settle myself, and begin to clean the wound that he’s torn open.
The heat of his body releases the earthy scent of the layer of bog moss I placed over the wound earlier to bring down the inflammation. There’s also a hint of the spent lightning smell that comes from the celestial iron.
I peel the moss and bandages aside and cut away the remnants of the stitching where the wound has opened. There’s more blackening than before, but it’s a slow spread, not an infestation.
Lower down, whole sections of the flesh I stitched together have begun to knit themselves closed, and the pink seam at the bottom of the cut has healed well enough to fade to silver.
Chyr’s better, but not well enough to reach Muilean.
As if he’s heard my thought, his eyes find mine and hold them. “There’s only a week left if I leave tonight. I need to give myself as much time as I can.”
I pull my eyes away and concentrate on picking out the broken threads where my stitching broke. “And where is the king? The other Riders?”
Chyr pauses so long that I look up to study him. He’s struggling with the pain again, and the faint scar near his mouth stands out stark silver against the rest of his skin.
I run my fingertip across it, and my breath catches traitorously when he shudders in response.
“Was this made by celestial steel?” I ask.
“It was. The wounds leave scars even though they start to heal as soon as the metal is removed.”
I pluck out another broken thread from his wound, but he catches my hand suddenly and brings it to his lips. Then he holds it while I stare at him in shock.
The thought of him leaving makes me want to memorise his features, every curve and hard angle of them, and the layered depths of his eyes that hold as much danger of drowning as a selkie’s invitation.
“I know that you don’t want to hear it,” he says, “but I am sorry, Flora. For all of this. Your family. Your home. I know how it feels to lose the things that matter most. The choices I made in not telling you…We couldn’t risk anyone knowing where we are going, not even General Mora, so we split up to lay false trails until we can all meet again at the doorway.
If the army isn’t there, I swear we’ll make the—”
He cuts off with a muffled curse, and his chest arches up, the muscles in his back clenching so hard that it bows his spine. Several of the black runes on his arm light up in gold, and the bands slowly spin along the thick-veined muscles.
“What is it, Chyr? Tell me what I can do to help?”
He collapses back to the bench, sweat beading on his temples and his breath coming too fast. When he finally relaxes, he looks at me, and there’s no expression on his face at all.
“Would you be willing to use your magic to heal me again?” he asks. “To pull out more of the celestial iron.”
“You were dying then. You had nothing to lose—”
“I’m still dying, and it will have been for nothing unless I can reach Muilean in time. Vheara will win, and you won’t be safe—no one in Alba Scoria will be. Stopping her is worth any risk.”
“All I did yesterday was draw your fever. If you’re asking me to draw the celestial iron, you might as well ask me to give you the moon.”
“Are you certain that’s all you did?”
His eyes find mine, and my heart gives a thud at the expression welling in them. I’m not sure if it’s pain or fear, but whatever it is, I hate to see it.
“I wouldn’t know how to begin to draw poison out of your body,” I say. “Where would it even have gone?”
“Your skin was smoking.”
“You think I burned some of it away?”
“At least some of your magic must come from the Cailleach Queens, from the land and the Great Mother herself. I can’t fathom how that works, but if it’s anything like Siorai magic, it’s not something anyone can teach you.
Magic is as individual as we are, and there’s no right or wrong to how we feel our way through learning. ”
“If I wanted to experiment, I’d begin with a broken bird’s wing, not—”
“Not what?” He reaches up as I bend over him and cups the curve of my cheek with his palm. The heat of his touch pools beneath my skin, trying to draw out an answer I’m unwilling to give myself, much less to this man who sees and understands too much.
I don’t want to believe in the rebel king. I don’t want to support him, but after what I saw today, after what the Greys did, I don’t have a choice because the Raven Queen must die.
As much as I want to stay to protect Dunhaelic and my own people myself, I can’t stand back when there’s much more at stake.
The women and children in the hills will be no safer if I am here, and Faolan can see to the building of an escape out of the keep in case Vheara’s army comes in force.
We would lose Dunhaelic, but as long as Vheara is defeated, we can rebuild.
If she remains in power, then all is lost.
I’ll heal Chyr. I’ll trade my pain to give Chyr strength. My pain to save him and let him get to Muilean so he can save what he can of my world. But I can’t let him go alone, because he won’t make it there without me.
The room feels like it’s shrinking around us, and I pull away.
“I’ll cut out as much of the blackness as possible again,” I tell him. “Then I’ll try to draw the rest out with magic. But I have a condition.”
“Anything,” he says in that voice that curls through me like peat smoke. “I’ll give you whatever is in my power to give you. Believe me, I’m aware that I’m asking far more from you than I should.”
“Swear it. Promise you’ll give me what I ask.”
“If it’s in my power to grant it, I swear on my oaths and the Father of Light to give it to you. What do I have to do?” His eyes search mine.
My jaw set, I refuse to look away. “Take me with you to Muilean. Whatever the outcome when I try to heal you, you’ll need me to make sure you get there.”
“No.” His tone brooks no argument.
“You swore, and you need me. I know the Highlands and the clans. Mainly, I’ll be there to help if something goes wrong with your wound. If it isn’t healing.”
“Apart from the other dangers, we could all be walking into a trap if Vheara knows about the doorway.”
“Today proved that staying here won’t change anything. I can’t save my people on my own. Vheara will send more Greys and more soldiers, and you won’t be here to stop them.”
Chyr’s jaw tightens. “I’m sorry, Flora.”
“Sorry doesn’t change anything. No one I love will be safe until Vheara is dead, so I want to help. I can’t fight her, but I can make sure you get to Muilean.”
“No—”
“Yes. I’ve made the trip through Ehrugael many times with my father. I know the routes and the people know me. If you hope to make it in a week, you can’t afford to turn away my help.”
Chyr’s eyes burn into mine, and he brushes his knuckles lightly against my jaw. That sends a spark of heat along my nerves, feather-soft and devastating, a warning that a journey with Chyr will be dangerous in many ways.
“I hate that you use my own arguments against me. There should be a rule against that,” Chyr says with a twitch of his lips as though he’s trying not to smile. “But if you insist, then yes, I will accept your terms. We leave tonight.”