Thirty
Only the fear of falling back into the city took Lara to the path’s end. It angled too steeply upward, and at any other time the incline would have defeated her. Her legs alternated between stabbing pain and rubberiness as they reached the far side of the chasm that protected the Unseelie city, where she and the others simply dropped to the ground, gasping sickly for air. A new sense of determination rolled from the staff and Lara let go a frustrated yell, casting it away so it couldn’t take advantage of her weakness. Contact with the land wasn’t enough: it needed a cognizant wielder in order to parlay its power, and she was determined not to become that conduit when physically and mentally exhausted.
She became aware, slowly, that there were others around them. The city, quiet as it had been, had not been abandoned: dozens of Unseelie lay scattered around them, men and women who had taken the paths that appeared through the dying city and who had run to safety along a road of magic. Like her little group, they were too sickened by the escape to react for a long while, but an explosion within the city jolted everyone out of their collapse to stare slack-jawed as the granite shell began to fall.
Voices slowly lifted in bewilderment, fear, and growing despair as flame engulfed their home. Their gratitude for surviving was so far beyond them that it was as yet unimaginable. It would come in time, along with guilt if anyone had been left behind, and with anger for what had been visited upon them. Lara, numb beyond comprehension, spared a prayer of thanks that they had survived, but like them, she had nothing in her but blank shock at what was unfolding.
Dafydd, dully, said, “Worldbreaker,” to Lara. The word held no accusation; it was just an exhausted and apt descriptor.
Aerin, beneath that, said, “Lara’s home, now Ioan’s. All that is left, Dafydd, is our own. ‘Worlds come changed at end of day.’ What will you leave us with, Truthseeker?”
“I don’t know.” Lara stared bleakly at the fire. She had in her life never visited destruction on anything more than a pillow, and now she had overseen the ruin of two cities in barely as many hours.
No wonder Hafgan had hunted down and eradicated the truthseekers.
“The city’s fall was my decision, not your failure. I could have drowned him, and chose not to. The survivors will know who destroyed their home. Perhaps it’s a way to mend the schism between Seelie and Unseelie. Especially, perhaps, if Emyr is indeed dead, and the crowns must fall to a different generation.” Ioan put a hand on Lara’s shoulder, then let it fall, as if afraid physical contact would make the uncertainty in his voice easier for her to read.
“What about Hafgan? Is he dead?” Looking at the blaze, it seemed impossible the Unseelie king could live, but Ioan shook his head.
“He’ll be in a fit of ecstasy, bathed in his element that way. It will fade, and he’ll come to the Seelie citadel in search of either Merrick’s capitulation or his own retaliation, but we have a little time. Time enough, perhaps, to learn if Emyr of the Seelie lives.”
“Time enough to depose a pretender and make a united stand against the Unseelie,” Dafydd growled.
Lara put her hand on his thigh, the gesture weary. “Don’t. Don’t you start hating the Unseelie as a whole, Dafydd. You defended Merrick when the rest of your people dismissed him because of his heritage. Don’t follow them down that path. I couldn’t bear it.”
“I defended an unworthy man.”
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean the rest of them deserve to be painted with that brush.” Lara’s shoulders dropped, weariness rolling over her again as she thought of how much Kelly would like hearing her use the vernacular phrase.
Dafydd crouched to put his arms around her shoulders and pull her close, murmuring a promise into her hair. “You’re right. I shouldn’t. I’m just tired of this game, Lara. I’ve never particularly liked politics, and now it seems they’re costing me the lives and love of people around me.”
“At least you were born to it. A month ago I was just a tailor.”
“Tailors,” Dafydd said solemnly, “are meant for great things. Someday I’ll have to tell you all the fairy tales that say so.”
Lara groaned, glad for a jolt of humor even as she said, sincerely, “Don’t. If I’d known that I might never have become a tailor.” The blatant untruth made her laugh, and she rocked in Dafydd’s arms, face buried against his chest. He smelled of fire and water, though none of them were as wet as she thought they should be after the deluge. Ioan’s doing, probably; there was no reason for anyone to stand around dripping when a master of the element was on hand. She finally exhaled heavily and sat back, though remaining coiled in Dafydd’s arms for hours was by far the most pleasant prospect she could think of. “Okay. Whether we’re finding Emyr or deposing Merrick, that means we have to get to the Seelie citadel. We don’t have any horses. How far is it to walk?”
Dafydd looked at the tennies she’d traded her soft Unseelie boots out for, then crooked a wry smile at her. “Far enough that you’ll be glad of those.”
“Can we get there before Hafgan does?”
“I may be able to help.” Aerin lifted her head. “The magic the horses use is a gift to them from the Barrow- lands, but it’s not far removed from my earth magics. With time—which we’ll have a-plenty, walking from here to there—I should be able to convince the land that we take seven steps for our every one.”
“Aerin, that will leave you exhausted. You’ve already used more magics today than anyone normally would in years. Decades,” Dafydd amended.
Aerin’s expression turned so sour it bordered on funny. The look she gave Dafydd said far more than words could, and he ducked his head in apology. “Forgive me. I didn’t mean to state the obvious, but I fear for you. You could find yourself—”
“I know. What choice do we have?”
“Find herself what?” Lara straightened, concern washing through her. “Not mortal?”
“Just useless for a very long time,” Aerin growled. “Useless, most particularly, in battle. My prowess is learned, but the strength that lets me fight inexhaustibly is the land’s. Without it, I’m no more than any other Seelie warrior, and if things go badly, we will need far more than ordinary fighters.”
“I do not believe,” Lara said with unusual clarity, “that anything could make you less than extraordinary on the battlefield. I’ve watched a lot of you fight now, Aerin. Ioan’s better than you are. I haven’t seen anyone else who even holds a candle to you.”
Surprise, then chagrined pleasure slid over Aerin’s face and she looked away. Lara wrinkled her eyebrows in confusion at Dafydd, and was only further confused at his quick smile. He leaned forward to kiss her and murmured, “You couldn’t have said anything better,” against her mouth, then lifted his voice to say, “Then we’ll rely on you, Aerin. Thank you.”
Aerin grunted, and in a little while they gathered themselves, preparing to begin their journey. Lara took up the staff again, about to slid it crosswise over her back when a thought struck her. It responded to emotion and need, and emitted emotions and desires of its own. She said, “Thank you,” aloud, if quietly, and after a few long seconds felt a sullen sort of pleasure from the weapon. Grinning, she tucked it away and fell in with the others as they struck out toward the distant Seelie citadel.
The Unseelie joined them, not so much willingly as with the air of people who had no other option. Ioan walked among them as they set out, offering what reassurances he could. They were scant, but Lara admired that he tried. Hafgan’s return had reminded them, sharply, that the man they’d called king for centuries was no more than heir to the throne. There seemed little resentment among them for the deception: as Ioan had suggested, they appeared more content with continuity than strict truth. Their distress now was for the betrayal laid upon them by the king who had returned; for the man who commanded fire, and who had burned their home to molten rock. A few came forward to walk with Lara, to verify she was a truthseeker, and that it was through her magic and Ioan’s that anyone had survived immolation in the fire. When those few fell back, satisfied, Lara thought Ioan had earned himself a small personal guard, men and women whose loyalty was to Ioan himself, not to the Unseelie crown. It could mean nothing or everything in the reshaping of Annwn that they intended, but either way, she was glad of it.
It had been midday when they abandoned the citadel, but night came on more quickly than Lara expected.
