I wanted to ask what I had ever done to him for such hatred to grow, but I had to concentrate on bleeding him to death before he could put that sword through me and my unborn children.
I wasn't even frightened anymore. All the emotion that was in me was concentrated in my left hand. Concentrated into one thought: die. I could pretend that all I wanted was his blood, but that wasn't enough. I needed death. I needed Onilwyn's death.
He was close enough that I could see the sheen of sweat on his face, even by moonlight. I kept my hand pointed at him, and I cried out, "Die! Die for me!"
Onilwyn rose to his knees, swaying like a thin tree caught in a strong wind, but he rose above Mistral's quiet body. The sword also rose.
I kept my hand pointed at him, but crawled backward from that shining metal. His hand fell, the sword striking the ground where I had been. He didn't seem to realize at first that he'd missed me. He drove the sword home viciously, as if he were cutting flesh.
I got to my feet, still bleeding him, still killing him.
Onilwyn frowned at the ground, where he was cutting nothing. He leaned on Mistral's body, one hand holding on to the other man. The other hand, with its sword, was thrust into the ground, but it was almost as if he'd forgotten it was there.
He frowned up at me, as if he couldn't quite focus. "Cel said you were weak."
"Die for me, Onilwyn. Die for me, and keep your oath."
His sword fell from his fingers. "If you can bleed me, you can save me."
"You would kill me and my unborn children. Why should I save you?"
"For pity," he said, his eyes beginning to look slightly to the side of where I stood.
I smelled roses, and the words that came from my mouth were not my words. "I am the dark goddess. I am the destroyer of worlds. I am the face of the moon when all light is gone. I could have come to you, Onilwyn, in the shape of light and spring and life, but you have called the winter down upon yourself, and there is no pity in the snow. There is only death."
"You are with child," he said, as he began to slump toward the cold ground. "You are full of life."
I touched my stomach with my right hand; the left never stopped pointing at him. "The Goddess is all things at all times. There is never life without death, never light without darkness, never pain without hope. I am the Goddess, I am creation and destruction. I am the cradle of life, and the end of the world. You would destroy me, Ash Lord, but you cannot."
He stared up at me with unfocused eyes. He reached out toward me, not with magic, but as if he would touch me, or was trying to touch something. I wasn't certain he was reaching for me, but he saw something in that moment. He saw something that made him reach for it.
"Forgive me," he whispered.
"I am the face of the goddess that you called into being this night, Ash Lord. Is there forgiveness in the face you see?"
"No," he whispered. He slumped until the side of his face touched the ground, and the rest of him was draped across Mistral's body. He shuddered, and gave a last, long breath. Onilwyn, Lord of the Ash Grove, died as he had lived, surrounded by enemies.
Chapter Eleven
I saw the white glow of the hunt behind me like a second moon in the sky before I heard the wind of its coming. But I kept my eyes on the fallen sidhe lord. Onilwyn looked unconscious, maybe even dead, but until it was certain, I would not turn and give him a second chance to kill me.
I heard the horses and other things land on the frozen ground. I heard running feet, and Sholto was beside me. He put himself between me and the slumped forms. The bone spear was pointed up, the bone dagger naked in his hand.
I leaned against his back, feeling the strength of him through the remnants of his t-shirt. He, like me, hadn't dressed for the cold. Magic can make you forget practicalities, until the magic recedes and you realize that you are mortal once more. Oh, I guess that was just me. Some of the sidhe never felt the cold.
"Are you hurt?" he asked.
"No, just feeling the cold." Saying it out loud seemed to give me permission to shiver. I pressed myself more tightly against the warmth of his back, and reached around to encircle his waist. I found more in the front of his body than just waist. The tentacles petted and caressed my hands and arms. He was touching me, holding me, just as he would have with his hands if they weren't full of weapons. But Sholto had enough "hands" to hold mean d fight. There had been a time when the extra bits had disturbed me to the point that I wasn't sure I could get past them, but such petty concerns seemed ages ago. The tentacles were warm, as if they had blood close to the surface. They reached around his body to hold more of me, stretching as only things with no bones can. Tonight it wasn't disturbing, it was warm.
Yolland moved past us in his court finery, his iron sword bare in his hand. I couldn't see what he did, but he said, "The green-haired guard has only the faintest pulse."
"What about Mistral?" Sholto asked.
"The same."
"We have to get Mistral to a healer," I said, still wrapped in the warmth of Sholto's back, and other things.
"What of Onilwyn?" Sholto asked. I was pressed so close to his back that his words vibrated against my cheek.
I thought of the look on Onilwyn's face, the hatred. He meant my death, and sparing his life wouldn't change that determination in his eyes. He would see it as weakness. "He must die."
I felt Sholto startle; even the tentacles reacted like a hand that almost draws back from yours. "We should ask the queen first, Meredith."
"Are there healers at the sluagh?" I asked.
"Yes," he said.
"Then take Mistral and me there. I must get out of the cold, and he needs the killing metal out of his body."
"Let us take you to the Seelie Court," Yolland said.
I laughed, and it wasn't a pleasant sound. "Without the power of the wild hunt, I would not enter there like this."
"Then the Unseelie Court," Sholto said.
"The men you killed were lords of that court, weren't they?"
"Yes," he said.
"Then it is not safe. Take me to your kingdom, Sholto."
"The sidhe are more fragile than the people of the sluagh. I am not certain our healers are the best for the Storm Lord."
"He needs the metal out of him, and warmth; beyond that, we will see. But time is not his friend, or ours. Kill Onilwyn. When we have survived this night, we will seek an audience with the queen."
"You cannot mean to end the life of one of the sidhe," Turloch said. "My enemies are many, my friends are few. I must prove to the first that to come against me is death, and to the second that I am strong enough to rule here.