Silver in the Bone, page 40
The ghost of the woman in the snowy field flashed through my mind. The icy fire of her touch as she’d tried to drag me into death with her. The mark over my heart burned with the memory.
Neve touched my shoulder, guessing my thoughts. By the look on Emrys’s face, he’d figured it out, too.
I breathed in deeply, nodding. “That’s probably it.”
Olwen tied off the bandage. “Does that feel all right?”
I nodded. “Thanks. But here comes the hard part—are you both really willing to do what it takes to destroy the revenant, knowing she has some small piece of your High Priestess in her?”
“There is no other choice but to uproot her dark magic,” Caitriona said simply. “We must get the athame to perform the purification ritual.”
Olwen nodded. “If the ritual can restore the land and return the Children to their original selves, some good may yet come of this pain.”
“Well, it should be easy enough to destroy the magic the revenant is feeding on, right?” I said.
Caitriona and Olwen exchanged a long, horrified look.
“Right?” I repeated.
“Is it possible to merely…trap and relocate the revenant before killing her?” Caitriona asked, a pleading note in her tone.
“Is that your way of telling us you can’t remove the high magic attached to her new source?” I asked.
“Both Cait and I have the ability to do so,” Olwen said. “Only a priestess of Avalon may cross the wards protecting it.”
“Again, what’s the problem?” Emrys asked.
“The location in question,” Olwen said faintly, “is the living tomb of King Arthur.”
The words seemed to inhale all the air in the cottage.
Caitriona began to pace again, hugging her injured right arm to her chest to stabilize her shoulder. Her face was tight with thought as she tried desperately to untie the knot Olwen had just presented us with.
“It is an obligation of the Nine to protect the sleeping king,” Caitriona said, more to herself than to us. “Inherited from our sisters of ages past. If we remove the protective magic around the tomb, Arthur will die once and for all.”
Emrys swore beneath his breath.
I was the only one willing to ask the obvious question. “Does it matter?”
“What do you mean?” Olwen asked.
“Does it matter if he finally dies?” I asked. “The whole reason he was kept alive was to come to the aid of the mortal world in their time of greatest need, and the guy couldn’t even be bothered to wake up and help Avalon. Maybe we don’t want his help.”
Caitriona’s back was to us, her body rigid with the war no doubt raging inside. “You do not understand. You cannot.”
Olwen looked at us, her eyes pleading. “It’s one of the few duties we’ve been able to fulfill since the isle fell to darkness. We took a vow.”
Caitriona was only partly right. I might not have understood the point in keeping Arthur alive in the face of all we were up against, but I did recognize he meant something to them, just as he had meant something else to Nash, and to all those who longed for the legends to be true. The role the Nine played in protecting him was one of the few pure things that hadn’t been corrupted by the decay spreading through this wasteland.
“Fine,” I said, glancing at Emrys and Neve to make sure the three of us were in agreement. “Then we’ll try to lead the revenant away from the tomb. If we can’t, we’ll have to remove the magic she’s feeding on, even if it means letting Arthur go. Can you at least agree to that?”
“Cait?” Olwen looked to her, waiting.
When Caitriona faced us again, she was as pale as the snow outside.
“We’re losing the light,” I reminded her.
“Then…,” Caitriona said. “We had best hurry north and see the plan through.”
“You’re certain?” Olwen asked.
“The past cannot hold more worth than the future,” Caitriona said, her voice thick. “Nor can one man be prized above the whole of the isle.”
Olwen visibly relaxed as she pushed up off the floor. “I’ll gather our things.”
Caitriona nodded, retrieving her sword from where it lay across the table. She said nothing more, but I knew how much it would cost her to destroy a piece of something she had sworn to protect and serve.
And if she could escape the grip of all that she’d ever believed, perhaps there was hope for me, too.
* * *
The trudge north was an uphill battle through bone-chilling icy snow for the better part of an hour. The dead trees we’d used for cover dwindled in number the higher we went, until only craggy boulders were left to judge our slow progress.
My boots were soaked through, my toes, fingers, and face numb, when we reached what seemed to be the crest of the rise. Caitriona slowed, dropping onto her belly to crawl the rest of the way. We slithered up beside her, forming a line along the rocky edge.
The other side of the hill dipped a few feet before leveling out into flat earth. With a jolt, I realized we were at the northernmost point of the isle, and there was simply…nothing beyond it. Here, the edge of this Otherland ended abruptly, with a sheer drop down into the misty black void.
Between that darkness and us stood a handsome gray stone structure that looked to my eye like an open-air cathedral.
“Are you kidding me?” I whispered. “Every High Priestess gets buried in the same hunk of dirt and this guy gets a whole damn temple?”
Neve shushed me with a sharp jab of the elbow.
“Do you see anything?” Olwen asked, her voice scarcely above a whisper.
On cue, Emrys reached into his bag to pull out a pair of binoculars.
“The rocks,” Caitriona breathed.
I shifted my gaze west of the tomb, where spears of dark stones jutted up from bare soil and formed a natural barrier to the cliff. A humble cottage sat among them, its thatched roof buckling into its single room—it must have belonged to Bedivere before he took shelter in the tower.
But that wasn’t what Caitriona had spotted.
They were sprawled over the ground, clustered in the shadows of stones and trees. The coloring of the Children had made them nearly indistinguishable from the rocks and dead grass until they roused at the sound of a shrill, wordless call. I recognized it instantly.
The revenant.
The Children turned their faces toward the tomb in anticipation, barking and howling, foamy saliva dripping from their maws. They shivered and hissed as they crept out into what remained of the daylight.
It was all the proof I needed that the revenant was controlling them—instinct alone would have kept them in the shadows. Only their master could compel them to do the thing they most hated.
“Both plan A and plan B just got significantly harder,” Emrys whispered.
He passed me the binoculars. I counted a dozen or so Children, all speckled with mud and crusted with leaf litter. I followed their line of sight over the uneven ground, over the ring of green grass that surrounded the tomb, clearly marking the edge of the protective magic. One by one, they prowled forward to that living line, pacing along its length, until, finally, she came.
The revenant emerged not from the rocks but from the tomb, her body formed from dirt and dead leaves. Olwen’s sharp inhale faded beneath the eager howls of the Children as they saw what she was dragging forth by the ankle.
“Is that…?” Emrys whispered.
Neve pressed her hands to her mouth to smother her horror.
And there was nothing we could do but watch as she threw the sleeping body of Arthur Pendragon to the Children as if he were a mere slab of half-rotten meat.
Before any of us could move or speak through the strangling horror, the Children had devoured everything but the bones, scattering the final remains of Arthur Pendragon on the snow in bloodied ribbons of flesh.
Emrys gripped my wrist, trying to draw my attention to something, but I would never know what. Time wound itself as if on a spindle, tighter and tighter, until at last the thread snapped and it unraveled in a frantic spin.
“Guess we’re going with plan B,” I choked out. There was no point in trying to lure the revenant away now. The protective magic had to be removed.
Caitriona rose with a cry of pure rage, struggling to unsheathe her sword with her wounded shoulder. The harsh song that poured from her turned the eddies of mist below into streams of fire. She charged down the hill, her sword at the ready, leaving us, and the tatters of our plan, behind.
The rest of us had one heartbeat to decide what to do.
“Blessed Mother,” Olwen groaned, pushing up from the snow and darting right to make a wide circle around the tomb.
Neve turned to Emrys and me, her voice low and urgent. “Please be careful. I’m not sure I can call the light more than once…”
“We will,” Emrys swore. “Good luck.”
I nodded, an invisible fist closing around my throat as Neve rose, the image of grace and power, and followed Olwen. Her long wand was clutched in her fist—ready to protect the priestess in every way she could. But neither would make it if we didn’t draw the attention of the revenant and her Children away from them.
Emrys squeezed my wrist one last time and picked up the sword to follow Caitriona down the hill. My hand closed around the cold handle of Emrys’s small axe.
“Go,” I told myself, shoving off the ground. “Go!”
Terror made me feel strangely weightless as I ran forward, half sliding down the hill’s icy slant. The scene spread like a nightmarish painting by one of the old masters. The vividness of the fire, the blood, Caitriona’s silver hair, Emrys’s jacket as he raised his sword—every color was intensified against the blank canvas of the snow.
The revenant stood at the boundary of the protective magic, the emotionless shell of dirt and skin that was her face taking in the Children before her with glowing eyes. They formed a scattered line between her and us, knowing only one instinct—to protect their mother.
The creatures at the front threw themselves into Caitriona’s magic blazes, screeching as they were reduced to smoldering lumps of char.
The High Priestess growled like a thundercloud and the others were unleashed in all their bloodlust, using the burned bodies to vault themselves up over the flames. They hurtled toward where Caitriona stood alone. Her foot slid back in a defensive stance as she fought to raise her sword, her face screwing up in agony. Her armor glowed in the maelstrom of fire she’d unleashed.
Emrys moved to stand at her right, and I took my place beside him, adrenaline and terror pounding in my blood. The creatures galloped on hands and feet as they circled us, their spidery limbs tangling, their hooked fangs chattering with excitement.
“Stay close!” Emrys shouted, turning so his back was to mine. Whatever else he might have said disappeared in a chorus of barks and yelps as the Children leapt, launching themselves at us with teeth bared.
I gagged at their rancid breath but held my ground. I swung the axe wildly, hacking at anything that tried to slash or grab me. My chest burned and it was several moments before I recognized that I was screaming, the sound ripped from somewhere primal inside.
As she cut an expert path forward, her blade slicing through soft skulls, legs, claws, Caitriona called back to us, “With me!”
We tried to follow, but the Children flooded between us and swarmed her from behind. Claws pierced the back of her metal breastplate.
“Cait!” I screamed.
The girl took two staggering steps forward and then dove. As she rolled over the protective boundary of magic with a cry of raw pain, the Children clinging to her were thrown back with a tremendous pulse of light and magic. They yelped and stilled as they crumpled to the ground.
“Tamsin—trade!” Emrys called, and I turned. In that split second, he had already tossed the sword to me, and I had no choice but to take it and throw the axe toward him. He caught it by the handle and swung it up, but the heavy sword hit the ground, and I had to rip one of the Children away from it with my bare hands.
It clawed back, slashing through my already wounded arm. Pain lanced through me as the creature bit into the back of my neck. I choked with the pain and terror, falling to my knees.
“Tamsin!” Emrys shouted.
I grabbed the sword hilt. Fire ignited along the blade with a furious whoosh. Twisting back with a scream, I rammed it through the head of the creature, and only then did it release me.
Hot blood spilled down my front as Emrys fought his way back toward me, but my eyes stared ahead, where Caitriona was facing the High Priestess.
The revenant darted forward, the athame aimed at Caitriona’s bare throat. Deflecting it with her sword, Caitriona spun around, slashing down across the creature’s chest. The movement tore open her healing wound, flooding the front of her armor with blood. Pieces of grass, wood, and mud fell away from the revenant, only to rise again as she re-formed.
“Cait!” I panted out as we finally fought our way to the edge of the protective magic. She had to get the revenant to cross the barrier, otherwise we wouldn’t be able to help her.
Caitriona’s dark eyes widened, sweat dripping from her face. She turned, looking past us, but her shouts were lost in the tumult of monstrous shrieks. I followed her gaze to where more of the Children had appeared at the top of the hill.
She threw out her left hand, the other limp at her side, struggling to hold on to her sword. Her lips formed the words of a song I couldn’t hear. Mist rose on the hill, thick and churning, but before it could ignite, the revenant struck again, gripping her by the neck and throwing her toward the ground.
Caitriona hooked her legs around the revenant and twisted, sending the creature flying toward the edge of the barrier, her head and arms falling across it. I lunged toward her with my blade, swinging it down, but the creature was too fast, and the flaming sword hissed as it severed only one of the revenant’s hands.
I brought my foot down hard on it to keep it pinned there. Frustration tore at me when I realized it was the hand with the ring, not the athame.
The revenant’s screech was like a knife in the brain. I screamed with her—all of us did—and even the Children shrank back from it. The revenant rose to her full, terrifying height and turned to me with burning eyes.
A voice like midnight slashed through my mind, drowning out the high-pitched keening.
I know you.
I gasped, dropping back onto my knees. The sword fell from my hand.
I saw you born in my dreams.
“St-stop—” I managed to choke out. My hands squeezed against my head, trying to drive the words out. “Stop it!”
He does not know what you are…
The air between us brightened, shimmering, then faded to nothing.
I heard Olwen’s voice as if it had traveled across worlds. “Now, Neve!”
“Wait—” I tried to say. “What does that mean?”
The wave of blistering light had already been unleashed.
Sensing that the magic was gone, the Children sprinted toward Caitriona as she fought to rise from the ground. Neve’s magic threw them back, incinerating them.
The revenant stood before us, her back to the throbbing power, letting it burn away her edges. A flicker of humanity appeared on her face.
“Caitriona.” The voice that emerged from it was as sweet as the first day of spring, and achingly tender. “My Cait.”
The revenant reached out to her with the athame, her body cracking and tearing as the light broke through it. The young priestess stumbled forward, tears streaming down her face as she reached out a hand.
“Why?” she begged. “Why did you do this?”
In her final moment, the revenant whispered, “The power…I could not stop…what had already begun…”
Her body disintegrated, crumbling back into bone and earth. As Neve’s light faded and the air cooled, the athame fell to the ground, glowing with heat and power.
Caitriona cried out into the sudden silence, her sob catching in her throat as she dropped to the ground.
My body felt hollow as I slowly knelt beside her. Hesitating, I wrapped my arm around her shoulder.
Instead of pulling away, Caitriona curled into me, sobbing against my shoulder. My throat was painfully raw, but I didn’t know what I would say if I could speak.
Neve and Olwen ran toward us and wrapped their arms around our small huddle, alive and whole and trembling. I clung to them, letting the insistent wind cool the sweat on my skin and the blood in my veins. But there was a warmth in me like the sun, rising and rising until I thought I might burst with it.
I pulled away from them, looking over my shoulder to seek out Emrys’s gaze.
But there was only ash and mist swirling in the air.
I unwound my arms from the others, fear slamming through my chest like a spike. “Emrys? Emrys!”
There was no answer.
I ran toward the hill, searching the remains of the Children that hadn’t burned to dust.
“Emrys!” If something had happened while I wasn’t looking—
I heard the others calling for him, their voices echoing through the silence, growing in pitch and fear.
Neve came to my side, shaking her head. “I don’t understand…The spell wouldn’t have harmed him. Could one of the Children have carried him away?”
The thought came like a blow to the stomach. I bent at the waist, trying not to vomit.
“Wait,” Neve said, grasping my arm and pulling me up again. “Look.”
Behind her, Olwen’s face drained of color. My heart rose into my throat as she and Caitriona came toward us.
