33
____________________
Hundreds of pixies from Saoghal were dead.
Hundreds of Rachainn pixies were dead.
I got a clear look at that, at the spread of bodies and the flooding of blood across the meadow from where I free-fell.
That arrow that Raegan had sacrificed himself to deter from my flesh had managed to hit me. Not where it had been aimed, I assumed, but straight through my left shoulder. The momentum of such a powerful hit had loosened my seat from Urram, where I now fell down towards the ground.
White-hot pain ripped through my body as I fell and fell.
Droplets that were freeing themselves from my wound hovered around me, careening down at my side where we were sure to soon hit the earth.
But I couldn’t focus on that, on my pain, on my approaching death, when all I could see and hear was Raegan.
The shout that had torn from his mouth as he had been impaled.
The roar that he had bellowed when he had seen the archer.
The widening of his eyes as he looked down at the sword through his body.
It was possible Urram hadn’t felt me fall. That, or he was so distracted by the sudden shifting of Gliocas on the ground below, on the red maw that was wide open with the call of the dragon released that echoed through the haunting world.
I closed my eyes.
I zoned out the shouting, the screaming, the sound of bloodlust. I muted the cries, the wails, the last sounds of a dying breath. I ignored the whipping winds around me and the ice-like rain that pelted at my skin.
I was left with only Saoghal. The quiet whisper of the meadows that I had strolled through. The chitter of creatures, the padding of their feet against the ground, the hot air blown from their noses as they tucked their bodies against ours and accepted caraid.
The melody of the trees deep within Choilltean as a breeze tickled at the leaves. The lapping waves of Uisge against the riverbed. And Cluaineach – always Cluaineach – the sun that had never felt as warm as it did in Saoghal. The orange and pink of a rising world.
And briefly, for only a quick second, I saw green eyes against my eyelids and felt the warmth of a prince born beneath a sun against my flesh.
I could think of no better place, no better way, to die.
But the world had other plans for me. Maybe it was Cernunnos, the god that they all prayed to and gathered for. Maybe it was the spite of Charlotte, wherever she ended up. Or maybe, just maybe, there was something left for me to do in this world.
Because all of a sudden, blades of grass were reaching up towards me.
Stretching and winding themselves through the unforgiving wind, until they were wrapped around me, over and over, cradling my body until I was set against the earth.
There, I ripped open my eyes only to see Rory, panting where he had his body curled over his knees, before his hands dropped and the grass around me restored itself as nothing more than plant-life.
“You… You saved me,” I breathed, blinking absentmindedly at the pixie who simply nodded his head. His once lavender and elegant hair was cast in a thick concoction of blood and rain and mud, hardly recognizable if not for the gentleness to his eyes.
From where I had fallen, I couldn’t see Urram. Nor Gliocas. Certainly not Raegan.
I could, however, see the small gathering of Rachainn who had identified my free-fall and were sprinting towards Rory and I with violence spinning behind their eyes.
Horror, true and utter horror, moved through me when I saw Rory charge towards them, his body soon lost amongst theirs.
Half of them carried on. Blades high in the sky, their eyes filled with nothing but savagery, I was left simply staring at the third threat to me in the last ten minutes.
Then dark brown hair, a frown where I hadn’t seen one before, and a bow pulled taut against her face. Niamh had arrived at my side, guarding my collapsed body like I was nothing more than an infant.
“Go, Niamh!” I roared, finally finding the strength to push myself up to my feet and pull the arrow from my side. She released her string, the arrow flying true and fast towards the first of the Rachainn.
She spared a glance over her shoulder. “I’m not leaving you!”
“Raegan needs you,” I begged as I lifted myself to my toes, trying to peer over the blades of grass in an attempt to see the Prince. “He’s over there. Uamhas got him!”
Niamh’s face twisted as she released a second arrow, finally tossing the bow over her shoulder and flicking her eyes between me and where I had pointed to Raegan. I took that same shaking hand and pressed it to my wound. That made Niamh shake her head at me.
“I won’t leave you here alone, Olivia.”
Just as she pulled her sword from her side in preparation for the fight to come, the Rachainn reached us. Faster than either of us had thought, because the one leading the group already had his blade out in front of him, where he quickly plunged it into Niamh’s side.
“Niamh!” I bellowed as a heavy set of wings began to beat above me, a new and darker shadow taking its place over top of us. Urram dropped to the earth only a second later, before his jaw hinged open and the Rachainn were left as nothing but ash that floated away in the harsh winds.
I dropped to her side where she had fallen, restlessly pulling at her clothes where she tried to assess her wound.
Pushing her hands away, I took over and tried my best to identify where she had been hit.
She wasn’t a dog or a cat, but the anatomy and the stitching together of bodies wasn’t so different from humans. Well, pixies.
It didn’t look too bad. Blood wasn’t immediately pulsing from the space, leaving just a cavernous hole in her side that looked like nothing more than a source of agony that the young pixie groaned against.
Urram finished frying everyone around us before he swivelled a slitted eye in my direction. “You were hit.”
“I’m fine,” I grunted. In all honesty, I couldn’t feel anything.
It was probably the adrenaline that was pumping through my body, but I didn’t dare question it.
Instead, I reached a hand up and pushed as much of my damp hair away from my face as I could, before I looked back down at Niamh.
She was curled over on her side, both hands pressed to that wound, her eyes pinched.
“Urram, where did they set up the healers? We need to get her there, now.”
The beast nodded his head before dropping as low as he possibly could against the dirt.
Somehow — again, adrenaline, possibly — I lifted Niamh and winced as she let out a weak cry.
But then we were climbing up Urram’s back, using his scales as some sort of rock-climbing-wall, until I was seated over his spine with Niamh wrapped tightly in my arms.
~
I didn’t want to leave Niamh there, alone, with the healers, but the fight waged on. Urram and I took back to the skies, where we peered down at the chaos below with faces braced against the cold.
That was where I saw Killian arrive in front of Raegan, who was slouched down on his knees before Uamhas who was calling his armies to watch. His sword, lifted high in the air, was on a sweeping arc towards Raegan’s neck when Killian intercepted it with his own.
Raegan groaned as he slumped forward, blood pulsing from his stomach. But the Prince was nothing if not stubborn, and pushed himself to his feet just in time to see Killian meet another swing from Uamhas.
Killian had lived his whole life for this moment. None other, but this. And as his sword raised a third time, the shine in his eyes was renewed, a thirst in the crease of his brows as he swung his mighty blade.
He had been right, his name would be forever remembered by the pixies.
Because that sword cut clean into Uamhas’ neck, freeing the head of the King of the Rachainn clear from his shoulders.
It flew through the air, where it bounced against the meadow and found itself in a small crevice in the earth, eyes still wide open.
Honour and valor burst from Killian as he pumped his sword into the air several times, letting the words echo from his mouth across the entire battle. “Uamhas of Nothing is dead!”
Everyone stilled.
Cheers and cries of victory tumbled through the crowds, but mixed in were the screeches of defeat. Then the swords that dropped, the bows that relaxed once more. The clouds parted, the rain stopped.
It was instinct that forced the two armies to regroup once more. Those of Saoghal met across the fields, reforming tight lines of weapons and scowls. Then the Rachainn, crawling their way across the carnage until they circled around the dead King.
The battle had started off well matched. Thousands of them to thousands of Saoghal. But now…
Over half of the Rachainn had been slaughtered. They seemed to realize that, too, as they rose from the death of their leader. They all turned to face those of Saoghal, submission etched into their faces as they came to understand that they had lost.
They all dropped to their knees. Hung their heads. Released their weapons.
Raegan was on Rìoghail once more, the beast thundering across the meadow where Raegan fought against his wound, his sword in the air, victory in his eyes. Gliocas perched on his shoulder, blood dripping from his beak, feathers seared from his flesh.
They did it. Saoghal did it. They defeated the Rachainn.
My heart lifted, my hopes along with it, until I saw Raegan regrouping with his fellow monarchs. They all gathered in front of the remnants of their army, their brows furrowed as they discussed.
“What are they doing?” I whispered to Urram, who continued to glide overhead and allow me the pleasure of watching from above. But Urram didn’t need to answer, because Raegan’s declaration shook the earth below.
“Consider this hour the hour of the death of the Rachainn!”