by Amanda Fleet
“You lay one finger on me and I will kill you,” I growled. “Leave me be.”
From about ten feet away, Aegyir laughed. I raised my head, locking eyes with him. “Shut the fuck up!” I snarled, in English.
I looked back at Faran, desperate. I balled both fists and pounded them down on his chest. “Damn you! Wake up!”
I sat back on my heels, sobbing too hard to be able to breathe for him. Lord Sondan curled his arm around my shoulder, leaning me against him, tears in his eyes.
And then Faran coughed.
I leaned over, my heart in my mouth, my fingers fumbling at his neck. “Faran?”
“Mm.” His eyes slid to where Aegyir lay, then back to me. He brought an arm up, pulling me down against his chest. “I need you. Here.”
“You bastard! I thought you were dead!”
A soft huff emerged from him. “I think I was for a while.”
Behind us, Lord Eredan cleared his throat, and I extricated myself from Faran. Lord Sondan sported a black eye that he hadn’t had from Aegyir, but he smiled at me. I sat up fully.
“Lord Eredan, Lord Sondan. Forgive me.”
Faran cocked a brow at me, still lying flat. “What did you do?”
Lord Eredan held a hand out to help me up. “Lady Aeron, you are a fearsome adversary. Remind me never to oppose you in battle.”
Faran sat up, his movements slow and awkward. Lord Sondan helped him to his feet. In the fight between the Guardians and the slaves, most of the slaves had been disabled and those still on their feet were heavily outnumbered.
“What happened?” Faran said as he stood.
“Lady Aeron tried to slaughter him when you hit the ground,” said Lord Sondan. “I don’t know who it was Aegyir looked like, but Lady Aeron flew at him like a devil.”
Faran paused. “Light hair? Your height? Blue eyes?”
“Yes.”
Faran’s gaze locked on me. He obviously knew Aegyir had resembled Finn when I attacked him. He looked overwhelmed and gave me a half smile.
Behind us, the last one of Aegyir’s minions was defeated. A brief pulse of light surrounded Aegyir and he opened his remaining eye to stare at me.
“You still won’t win,” he said, his voice sing-song.
Lord Sondan marched over and kicked Aegyir in the head.
“Bring us chains and locks,” said Lord Eredan to the nearest Guardians.
I took stock. None of us had escaped major injury. Faran could barely stand, and I’d be amazed if he could see much through the blood on his face. Lord Sondan looked as if his collarbone was broken, and Lord Eredan’s hands were swelling badly. As for me, my right eye was swollen shut and I was fairly sure I’d got a couple of cracked ribs and a mild concussion.
With a clatter, two Guardians returned carrying a long length of chain. They dropped it on the floor next to us and retreated rapidly. Lord Eredan gathered it up and hog-tied Aegyir so tightly I thought he would break his back.
I leaned over so my mouth was close to Aegyir’s ear. “Time to die.”
29
Before we could do anything with Aegyir, we needed healers. I rummaged in a pocket to see if I had any salve to at least sort my face out, even if the rest of me would have to stay battered for the moment. The pot I found had only the barest scrape of cream in it. It would have to do. It wasn’t as if anyone else in the Great Hall was much better off. Behind us, a bevy of Guardians secured the remaining slaves, though there were more than a dozen injured Guardians slumped on the floor. The bodies of several slaves littered the hall. Abandoned food parcels skulked on long tables or hid in the corners they’d been kicked to. Above us, dusk thickened and around us, light-globes began to spring to life.
I sorted my eye out. Lord Eredan applied salve to his hands and stretched his fingers as if testing whether they still worked. Lord Sondan held his arm to take the weight off his collarbone, his eye still blacked from my punch. I offered to apply salve to his eye – after all, I was the one who’d given him the shiner – and he accepted with a smirk. Faran was standing, but barely. I wasn’t sure what salve could do for him.
Aegyir smiled at the four of us, and I scowled. “Did you want my boot in your face?”
Behind me, Faran snorted.
Little by little, the four of us pulled ourselves together. A healer came to help Lord Sondan. A second one checked over me and Faran, treating our injuries as well as he could and giving us each a new pot of salve. There were plenty in the room far closer to dying than us. Lord Eredan batted away the healer once his hands were checked.
Aegyir still smiled beatifically, and a horrible feeling made itself comfy in my guts.
“Let’s get this bastard to the technicians’ quarters and destroy him,” I muttered.
Faran and his father hefted Aegyir up to their shoulders to carry him. He was too tightly trussed to wriggle, but he still looked amused.
“You can wipe that bloody smile off your face!” I snapped. “You lost!”
“Have I? You haven’t destroyed me yet. Four stones… Just four.”
Lord Sondan and I exchanged glances. It took just one, didn’t it?
When we got to the room with the other demons, Lord Eredan and Faran dumped Aegyir on the floor. The three men removed their talismans and gave them to Nessa to grind. I kept mine on. Aegyir scanned the room.
“Four of us. And you still think you’ve won. Oh, dear. When are you giving up your talisman, Aeron?”
I ignored him and turned to check the other demons. They were weaker, but not about to fade back to being wraiths. Not for a while.
Lord Sondan fetched four vessels and an array of daggers. “Just in case.” He propped them in the corner.
Nessa returned with three shakers, and Aegyir chuckled.
“Why are you laughing?” I said. “Realised the futility of your existence?”
His face hardened to a snarl in a trice. “Oh. We will see whose existence is in jeopardy soon enough, Aeron.”
The three men formed up, ready to destroy Aegyir. A sickening realisation almost felled me.
“Stop!”
They turned to me, brows raised.
“If the dust doesn’t work, it will take the three most senior Guardians to defeat him and put him in a vessel,” I said, shaking. “Despite everything, he’s still too strong for it to be anyone other than the top three.” I looked at Lord Sondan. He’d never beaten me in training and he knew it, and by birth, I far outranked him.
“Ah. Aeron has finally worked it out,” said Aegyir, his voice taunting. “If your precious dust does not do what you want, you need the top three true Guardians. But Aeron is only a true Guardian while she wears the stone. As soon as she takes it off, she is mine again. Sondan is almost her match but not quite, and while Aeron lives, she outranks him. If the dust doesn’t work, you will need your top three to be Faran, Eredan and Sondan. You should ask yourselves if Sondan’s strength compensates for his lack of birth.”
“Unless Aeron is still wearing the talisman,” said Faran. “We have three ground already.”
“Then try your best with three,” said Aegyir. “What do I know about it all? I mean, it’s only my destruction we are discussing.”
I couldn’t believe what I was about to say, but I had to.
“Cuff me. Take my talisman off and grind it. If the three stones you’ve already ground are enough, great. Use mine on one of the other demons. If not… you’ll need mine and you’ll need to be ready to kill me.”
“No!” Faran shook his head, his eyes wide. “All of the other demons only needed one stone.”
“But they were weaker,” I urged. “None of you are protected any more. I don’t know what happens if you only partially destroy him.”
“Oh, I know. I can tell you,” piped up Aegyir, sounding like a child trying to impress a teacher. “I get to slaughter all of you. And then everyone else too.”
Was he telling the truth? Had we got this far and were still only goin
g to be able to trap him in a vessel again? I drew Faran to one side, trying not to cry.
“You have to take this off me and get it ground up.” My voice snared in my throat. “And one of you has to be ready to kill me, in case all four stones aren’t enough.”
“What? No! Three will be enough.”
“And if they’re not? Are you going to have Aegyir partially destroyed and lying there while we wait to grind the stone? What if he managed to kill one of you? Then we would never destroy him. Take the damned stone and get it ground up! Cuff me. Knock me out if you have to. But one of you has to be prepared to kill me if the dust doesn’t work.” Tears stung my eyes. I wanted to destroy Aegyir so badly I ached. Would he finally be defeated, but still have beaten me? If four stones weren’t enough, I would die and he’d still only be back in a vessel.
Faran opened his mouth to argue, but his father cut across him. “She’s right. Cuff her. Get the stone ground.”
“But if Aegyir isn’t destroyed, she’ll still be under his power with no more stones to protect her and no possibility of getting more!” said Faran, his shoulders tight.
“In which case, one of you would have to kill me. Trust me, you’d be doing me a favour. Having him in my head…? No, I’d rather be dead.” I tried to sound brave and defiant, even though I was terrified.
“Then we wait. Aegyir’s strength will fade. We keep him locked up and we wait,” urged Faran.
“You know how strong he is,” I whispered, catching his hand. “It’s too risky. Your talismans have been ground. If he got free again, The Realm would be lost.”
Faran propelled me to the far side of the room. “I am not losing you and my brother in the same day. No.”
I pressed my palm against his cheek. I had to keep it together but my whole world was falling away from me. “I know. And I’m really hoping I don’t have to die, you know! But your safety, the safety of The Realm, and the safety of Outside depend on being able to trap this thing if it can’t be destroyed. And I can’t do that. Cuff me. Kiss me first though?”
He smiled sadly and kissed me tenderly. “I love you. You’re my world.”
“I know. I love you too.”
“I can’t do this.”
“You have to.”
“I can’t kill you.” He snatched at his breath, his eyes shiny. “Even if you’re under Aegyir’s power. I can’t!”
“I know. Your father could though.” I gave him a lopsided smile and kissed him. “Come on. Cuff me.”
We walked back towards the others and I sat on the floor and put my hands behind me, shaking hard. Faran hung back. His father stared at him, but Faran bit his lips together, shaking his head. “I can’t, Father. Don’t make me.”
Lord Eredan held his gaze for a moment, then nodded. He cuffed my wrists and ankles securely, then turned to Faran.
“The talisman,” Lord Eredan said.
Faran blinked his tears away. “There must be another way,” he whispered.
Aegyir cackled. “There isn’t. You know, even when we’re in vessels, we can think. Plan. Enjoy the successes we had. I could bear another spell like that, knowing that Aeron had died to make it happen.”
I wished I could go and kick Aegyir’s head in. Lord Eredan strode over to Faran. He spoke to him in a low voice and I couldn’t hear what was being said. Faran turned his face away, distressed, before looking back at his father and nodding.
Faran came over to me and crouched next to me, visibly shaking.
“I don’t want to do this,” he said, his voice barely more than a breath. “I love you so much.”
“I know.” A fat tear rolled down my cheek. “But let’s get this done before I die of fear.”
He reached around to the back of my neck, his hands trembling.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “If it doesn’t work, I’m sorry. I do love you. I would have made it work. Here. With you.”
“Thank you,” he whispered back, his eyes filling. He unfastened the leather thong carrying the stone.
My head instantly filled with Aegyir’s thoughts and emotions – glee; hatred of the Guardians; arrogance. Was there a hint of fear in there?
“No, Aeron, I am not afraid,” said Aegyir. My thoughts were obviously in his head, too. “The worst thing that can happen to me is that you put me back in a vessel, but I have already escaped that fate, twice. And you would be dead for it to happen.”
“Surely the worst thing that can happen is that we destroy you,” said Lord Sondan, rattling the shaker in his hand.
Aegyir smiled. “That isn’t going to happen.”
Nessa took my talisman, hurrying out of the room as fast as she could and returning swiftly with the stone ground up. She handed the shaker to Lord Eredan. The three men exchanged looks and Lord Sondan picked up three daggers. “Ready?”
As the first dagger went in, I screamed. Aegyir laughed. “Oh. I forgot to tell you. Aeron and I share more than our minds at the moment. She will feel everything that I do.”
Faran blanched, staggering backwards and fumbling behind him for the wall. “We can’t do this to her!”
Lord Eredan raised his head. “We have no choice now the stone is ground. Step outside if you have to. If we need you, I’ll call you back.”
Faran clung to the far side of the room and shook his head.
The second dagger pierced Aegyir’s abdomen and I writhed in agony. It was as if someone had plunged a knife into me. Lord Sondan hesitated.
“Oh. You wait until the dust hits my skin,” gasped Aegyir. “Or maybe you won’t be able to do it, after all.”
With shaking hands, Lord Sondan drove the final dagger into Aegyir, and I shrieked, feeling as if I was being ripped apart – my bones cracking and my flesh exploding.
Lord Eredan stepped forwards and started to scatter the stone dust over Aegyir. I thought my body would shatter. My skin burned; my muscles cramped agonisingly. Lord Eredan emptied his shaker over Aegyir, but Aegyir’s flesh barely changed. My head still sensed nothing except Aegyir’s confidence, despite the excruciating pain.
With tears in his eyes, Lord Sondan scattered the contents of his shaker over Aegyir.
“Stop! Please! This is killing me!” I cried and his hand paused.
Faran swiped at his face, mouthing to me, “I’m sorry… I’m sorry. Forgive me.”
“It’s Aegyir speaking,” said Lord Eredan, taking the shaker and continuing to cover Aegyir with the dust. “Not Lady Aeron.”
“It’s both of us!” I sobbed.
Lord Eredan ignored me.
“Two stones down,” gasped Aegyir, his eyes burning red, his skin hissing. “And you have not killed me yet. Aeron? I don’t think she will last two more stones. You’ll kill her but not me.”
Lord Eredan smashed the heel of his boot into Aegyir’s mouth and held his hand out for the next shaker.
I slumped forwards, howling, my flesh searing, my eyes stinging from the acrid smoke coming from Aegyir. In the corner of my eye, I saw Faran scrape his hand over his face, distraught.
“Maybe if you scream a little more, he will stop his father from using the final stone,” boomed Aegyir’s thoughts in my head. I strove to have control of my mind and body, but Aegyir was still too strong. All the words that came from me were Aegyir’s.
“Please. Please! This is killing me,” I moaned. “It’s not going to kill him, but it’s killing me.”
Faran’s eyes shone with tears. Perhaps just a little more and he will break?
“Faran, please! You said you loved me.”
“Father…” His voice cracked.
“It’s Aegyir speaking.” Lord Eredan finished emptying the third shaker. “And he’s finally turning.”
Lord Sondan passed him the final canister.
“Please don’t do this. It will kill me.” I wept, my body contorting in agony.
To no avail.
Steadily, Lord Eredan coated every last millimetre of Aegyir’s body before moving to wh
ere I lay. He drew a short dagger from his belt and sat behind me, the blade of the dagger cold against my throat, his hand holding my chin tightly. Faran gazed at me, his breathing ragged.
“Keep your eyes on Aegyir,” said his father, gruffly. “If he doesn’t change, we need to make the triad.”
Faran stepped towards his father, his fists bunching.
“Have you finally cracked? Will you stop your father?”
“Sondan,” murmured Lord Eredan.
Lord Sondan caught Faran’s arm, propelling him back to the far side of the room. Faran struggled with him, finally shaking him off. “You can’t kill her!” he sobbed. “Please! There must be another way.”
“Faran,” said Lord Sondan. “I know how hard this is, believe me. But stay here. Don’t make me hurt you.”
Tears ran openly over Faran’s cheeks as he looked from Aegyir to me and back. Slowly, his back slid down the wall, until he sat, his arms around his knees. Lord Sondan watched him for a moment, then peered at Aegyir.
“It hasn’t worked,” Faran said, his voice thick, his shoulders heaving.
“Give it time.” Lord Eredan shifted behind me but the blade didn’t leave my neck. A feeling of being burned alive shredded me, but through it, I could feel Aegyir’s triumphalism.
“Where are the remains of the stones that were destroyed?” asked Lord Sondan. “Should we use those?”
He pulled the bottle of gritty sludge out of a glass-fronted cupboard at the side and looked across to Lord Eredan. The triumph I’d just sensed, vanished, replaced by cold fear.
“Sweep up any dust on the floor.” Lord Eredan tightened his grip on me, holding me firmly against him. “Then pour that jar over Aegyir and scatter the dust.”
Lord Sondan found a small brush and pan and brushed up the dust from around Aegyir, shaking visibly. He put the pan to one side and picked up the jar. He swirled the liquid, mixing the acid and the sludge, and dribbled it over Aegyir’s skin.
The combination of the acid and the stone dust was torture. Aegyir’s skin blistered and an acrid smell rose from his flesh. I screamed. Lord Sondan shook the dust from the pan over Aegyir, and it stuck to the acid, burning his weathered skin. A long, continuous wail emanated from me.