The Vanishing Throne (38 page)

My skin goes cold.

The Cailleach's shadow cloak creeps along the ground, curling like snakes around my feet. “My sister was the Unseelie monarch before Kadamach,” she says. “I slaughtered her to unite the kingdoms. This is the way it's been through the ages: one Cailleach to replace another.

“My daughter will have to make the same choice I did. After she kills her brother, I'll pass my remaining powers to her and I'll die. She'll take the throne.”

I refuse to believe we can't decide our own fates. That Kiaran is destined to be death and I am destined to be chaos and Aithinne is destined to be queen. We're not pawns. This isn't a game. At what point can we choose?

“She loves him,” I snap. “Doesn't that mean a damn thing to you? You killed your sister and now you want your daughter to—”

“It doesn't matter,” the Cailleach says. “She can't let Kadamach live. If she doesn't kill him . . .”

“What?”

“She'll watch the world she loves die with me.” Her power around me is suffocating, down my throat like black ink. “The cost of their choices has already destroyed everyone you love. Soon, it will tear the realms apart. Yours
and
mine.”

Now I know why the stories always had the Seelie and Unseelie kingdoms at war, why it always began with a Wild Hunt.

War was supposed to bring thousands of years of peace to the fae. But Aithinne's choice to create the Falconers was
the first step to counter her fate, and set her against a story that had been repeated for generations before her.

It affected Kiaran's life; he was never supposed to fall in love with a Falconer. And it began a ripple effect across the centuries that eventually led to the destruction of our world.

I think of what Gavin told me in my imagined Edinburgh.

Some things can't be prevented
.

“Now you understand why Aithinne must do this,” the Cailleach whispers. “Which do you think she'll choose?” Frost creeps over the grass beneath the Cailleach's staff. “To let the realms wither to dust, or to let live the brother who would have slaughtered her?”

“I won't let that happen,” I say. There has to be a different solution. There
has
to be.

“There's nothing you can do,” she says coldly. “One of them has to die.” Her lip curls. “It should be Kadamach.”

Desperation gives me the power to break whatever hold she has on me, snapping the strings of power that keep me trapped here. She staggers at the sudden onslaught, her young face slipping back into its crone form.

I run. I hear her shouting as I leap through the dark trees. I keep going until I can't see anymore, until I am entirely surrounded by blackness. The voices of the dead call my name again. Their hands grab at me, but I fight, I claw.
Kiaran Kiaran Kiaran Kiaran
. I repeat his name like a prayer, a desperate benediction.
One of them has to die. It should be Kadamach
.

Then I'm in the clearing again. The fire is still burning. The Cailleach stands in front of me, calm and old and
surrounded by her shadow cloak. “You can't run from me,
mo nighean
. Not here.”

I don't care. I try again. I break through the trees. Branches slice through the skin at my shoulders, my neck. They rip my clothing as I shove them out of the way. I'm bleeding all over, but I don't stop. I keep running. I have to get to Kiaran.

I'm back to the fire again, to the damn Cailleach. My knees hit the ground in front of her shadow cloak and I heave in air, the first feelings of hopelessness beginning to overwhelm me. She'll keep me here like this forever, just as she said she would—unless I make the choice to die.

Her fingers lift my chin. I gaze into her old, wrinkled face with a shuddering breath. “It would be such an easy thing for you to let it all go,
mo nighean
,” she says. “No more death, no one to be responsible for. You could dance in lavish balls for eternity, if you wanted.”

No.
No
. I don't want balls, or parties, or dresses again. No elevenhours or fourhours or being forced into marriage. Those things all kept me caged, made me a girl too sheltered to understand any real danger until it met her on the street with sharp teeth and claws and ripped her life away.

But the Cailleach is a force drawing me in. She makes me want to shed all my responsibilities and never go back into that living world that made everything so hard, that made each day a struggle.

She leans forward and I'm drawn into that cavernous gaze. “You could see your mother again,” she whispers.

Kiaran's words are like mothwings across my mind.
Don't forget why you're there. What's on the other side won't want you to return
.

I'm not the girl who lost her mother anymore and who can be enticed with promises to see her again. I'm not the girl so blinded by vengeance that my sole purpose is to
hunt kill maim
.

I'm not that girl. I'm
not
.

I'm someone else forged in a mirrored room, like steel melted down and made stronger. I don't need vengeance. I only need myself.

Familiar power rushes through me, hot and brutal. I've felt it before when killing fae, but this time it's stronger, near overwhelming. It's electricity through my veins, beneath my skin until I'm about to burst.

I jerk away from the Cailleach. “
No
.”

Then I reach out, palm up, and power explodes out of me. It slams into her. She's lifted off the ground, her body smashing into a tree.

I'm on my feet and walking toward her slowly, deliberately. Power grows inside me, hotter as I approach. When the Cailleach looks at me, I see the first flicker of fear in her gaze.

“Tell me how to get out of here,” I say, my voice low.

Her eyes spark. “Never.”

She raises her staff to ward me off, but I'm too fast. I grab hold of the staff and tear it away. With a sharp cry, she lunges for it, but I'm quicker than her frail old body. I dodge out of her reach.

Without her staff the Cailleach looks even older. Her body is skin stretched over bones, her eyes dull.

I release my power again. The burst hits her so hard that it snaps the tree in half.

Then I hear it: the pounding of boots through the forest to my left. I turn just as Aithinne bursts through the trees, panting hard. She's shaking with exhaustion.

“There you are!”

Her arms are around me and I suddenly forget all about the Cailleach and my powers.
Take me back
, I almost tell her.
Take me with you
.

“Good god, you are a difficult woman to find,” she says. “The
brìgh
wasn't—”

Her words cut off and her entire body goes rigid. I realize the Cailleach is on her feet. She's staring at Aithinne with her young face, the skin smoothed to perfection. Her expression is unreadable.

“
Màthair
,” Aithinne whispers.

“It's been a long time,” the Cailleach says.

Aithinne rakes her with a look and sways on her feet.
What's wrong with her?
“Not nearly long enough,” she says. “I would have preferred another thousand years before seeing your face again. Perhaps two.”

“Daughter—” The Cailleach reaches for her, but Aithinne jerks back, shaking her head. “So I'm back to
daughter
now, am I? After you wanted Kadamach to kill me.” She laughs bitterly. “What was it you called me after I made
the Falconers?
Masladh bith-bhuan
,
mo màthair
. Your eternal shame.”

I look at the Cailleach sharply. Before, I only wanted to force her to tell me how to get out of here. Now I'm tempted to smack her with the staff. On principle.

“Aithinne,” I say deliberately, before I do something I might regret. “Let's go.”

As we turn to leave, the Cailleach calls Aithinne's name. “If you let the Falconer die, you'll have your powers back. The throne will be
yours
.”

Aithinne sighs and I notice then that she's trembling. “Oh,
Màthair
,” she says sadly. “You've never understood, have you? I don't want it. I don't think I ever did.”

Then she gently takes the staff from me. In an instant she has a blade in her hand, slicing down her palm. Her hand is shaking so badly that the cut is jagged. She holds on to my arm and presses her bloodied palm to the intricate carvings of the staff.

“Goodbye,
Màthair
.”

“Aithinne!”

Aithinne lifts the staff and slams it to the ground. The Cailleach cries out while the ice from her staff freezes the ground at our feet. The fire is snuffed out to smoke. Above us, clouds build from nowhere, dark and thick. I hear a distant boom of thunder.

Lightning strikes the staff and Aithinne and I are enveloped in light.

I
GASP AND
choke. Beach rocks dig into my arms as I twist to cast up the water from my belly. I vomit and cough, my lungs and chest aching. I rest my forehead against the frigid stones as I heave in air, shivering uncontrollably. My shift is soaked and clings to me like ice pressed to my skin.

I sense a presence next to me, but I'm too dizzy. I shake my head once.

“There now. You're back and good as new,” says a shaky voice. It's Aithinne. She looks weak and tired and her nose is bleeding. She smiles her familiar smile, then says, “Easy.”

Before I can say anything, a high-pitched squeal pierces the air. Derrick barrels into me, all wings and arms and legs tangled in my hair. “You're alive, you bloody idiot, you're alive!”

Gavin comes to sit next to me, his blond hair plastered to his forehead. He unbuttons his heavy wool coat and wraps it
around my shoulders. I accept it gratefully, my fingers so numb I can barely keep it closed.

“Welcome back to the land of the living,” Gavin says. He gestures upward with a familiar half-smile. “I'm guessing it worked.”

I realize then that there are drops of water suspended in the air all around us. They glisten like millions upon millions of shining diamonds stretching across the beach.

In wonder, I touch one. It undulates as my finger passes through it, then breaks into a dozen smaller droplets. “Am I doing this?” I ask Aithinne.

She gives me a weak smile. “Controlling it takes some work. If you breathe out calmly and picture them slowly lowering—”

I blink and the drops fall to the ground with a heavy splat.

“Or do that instead.” Then she says reassuringly, “You tried.”

“Sorry.”

Gavin takes a moment to recover, swiping at his wet hair. He holds up a dangling strand of
seilgflùr
. “This might not be as impressive as suspending water, but I guess you won't be needing it anymore.”

Won't be needing it
? I touch the base of my throat, expecting the thistle to be where I left it, but it's gone. With a startled gasp, I reach for Derrick, closing my fingers around his body.

“Igh!'” Derrick cries, grabbing for strands of my hair. “Not so tight. I'm a pixie, not a damn flower.”

With a huff, he releases my plait and sits on my palm—and for the first time, I see him without the aid of
seilgflùr
. It's so different, like having a veil lifted from my eyes. His face is the same, his elfin features unchanged, but there's a lovely effervescent glow to him that he never had before—like the way Kiaran looked when we were in the
Sìth-bhrùth
for the first time. Derrick's wings glisten like morning dewdrops. The wee veins inside them look like strands of gold.

Derrick shifts uncomfortably. “Are you just going to stare at me?” He motions to my clothes. “Aithinne had a hell of a time bringing you back.”

That's when I look down and see that I'm covered in blood, my shift entirely drenched with it. I hiss in a sharp breath. “
Bloody hell
,” I murmur. “What happened?”

Derrick flies off and lands on Gavin's shoulder. The silence is an unbearable thing. It's Aithinne who answers. “After the
brìgh
lost your energy, it took me hours to find you.” Her voice trembles with cold.

Hours
? After the Cailleach wilted the flower, she must have been shifting us between memories to make Aithinne's search even more difficult. No wonder she decided on
truth
over any other “gifts” she could have bestowed.

Aithinne looks so fragile, like she'll break. The blood from her cuts streams down her arms. Her nose is bleeding; so are her hands, her wrists, her arms. Some are thin cuts, some dug to bone.

Blood for blood
, Kiaran had said. Was this the sacrifice she had to make to bring me back? Aithinne's dark hair is loose
from its chignon, sticking to the ice flaked to her forehead. Even her skin is blue.

“Here,” I say, slipping Gavin's coat from my shoulders to wrap around her. I glance at Gavin, but he's not looking at me. He's watching Aithinne, as if he wants to help but isn't certain how.

Her wounds aren't even closing up, certainly not as quickly as they usually do. Her blood is dripping onto the beach rocks. “You're not healing.”

Aithinne sways a bit, her skin growing even paler. “Part of the sacrifice,” she whispers. “Can't use powers to heal, and I had to use more blood than I expected.” Her eyes are unfocused. “You know, I don't think I feel well. I think . . .”

“Shit,” Gavin murmurs, reaching her before she pitches forward. He scoops her up in his arms. “Aithinne?” She doesn't respond; her eyes are closed, cheek pressed against his chest. “I need to get her inside,” he says. The front of his shirt is already soaked through with her blood. “One of the fae can stitch her up.”