Kingdom of Ash
Page 95

Manon jerked her chin toward the wyvern waiting behind the witch. “Tell your daughter all debts between us are paid. And she may decide what to do with you. Take that other wyvern out of here.”
Manon’s grandmother bristled, iron teeth flashing as if she’d bark a counter-command to the Blueblood Matron, but the witch was already running for her wyvern.
Spared by the Crochan Queen on behalf of the daughter who had given Manon the gift of speaking to the Ironteeth.
Within seconds, the Blueblood Matron was in the skies, the Yellowlegs witch’s wyvern soaring beside her.
Leaving Manon’s grandmother alone. Leaving Manon with swords raised and a crown of stars glowing upon her brow.
Manon was glowing, as if the stars atop her head pulsed through her body. A wondrous and mighty beauty, like no other in the world. Like no one had ever been, or would be again.
And slowly, as if savoring each step, Manon stalked toward her grandmother.
Manon’s lips curved into a small smile while she advanced on her grandmother.
Warm, dancing light flowed through her, as unfaltering as what had poured into her heart these past few bloody minutes.
She did not balk. Did not fear.
The crown’s weight was slight, like it had been crafted of moonlight. Yet its joyous strength was a song, undimming before the sole High Witch left standing.
So Manon kept walking.
She left Bronwen’s sword a few feet away. Left Wind-Cleaver several feet past that.
Iron nails out, teeth ready, Manon paused barely five steps from her grandmother.
A hateful, wasted scrap of existence. That’s what her grandmother was.
She had never realized how much shorter the Matron stood. How narrow her shoulders were, or how the years of rage and hate had withered her.
Manon’s smile grew. And she could have sworn she felt two people standing at her shoulder.
She knew no one would be there if she looked. Knew no one else could see them, sense them, standing with her. Standing with their daughter against the witch who had destroyed them.
Her grandmother spat on the ground, baring her rusted teeth.
This death, though …
It was not her death to claim.
It did not belong to the parents whose spirits lingered at her side, who might have been there all along, leading her toward this. Who had not left her, even with death separating them.
No, it did not belong to them, either.
She looked behind her. Toward the Second waiting beside Dorian.
Tears slid down Asterin’s face. Of pride—pride and relief.
Manon beckoned to Asterin with an iron-tipped hand.
Snow crunched, and Manon whirled, angling to take the brunt of the attack.
But her grandmother had not charged. Not at her.
No, the Blackbeak Matron sprinted for her wyvern. Fleeing.
The Crochans tensed, fear giving way to wrath as her grandmother hauled herself into the saddle.
Manon raised a hand. “Let her go.”
A snap of the reins, and her grandmother was airborne, the great wyvern’s wings blasting them with foul wind.
Manon watched as the wyvern rose higher and higher.
Her grandmother did not look back before she vanished into the skies.
When there was no trace of the Matrons left but blue blood and a headless corpse staining the snow, Manon turned toward the Crochans.
Their eyes were wide, but they made no move.
The Thirteen remained where they were, Dorian with them.
Manon scooped up both swords, sheathing Wind-Cleaver across her back, and stalked toward where Glennis and Bronwen stood, monitoring her every breath.
Wordlessly, Manon handed Bronwen her sword, nodding in thanks.
Then she removed the crown of stars and extended it toward Glennis. “This belongs to you,” she said, her voice low.
The Crochans murmured, shifting.
Glennis took the crown, and the stars dimmed. A small smile graced the crone’s face. “No,” she said, “it does not.”
Manon didn’t move as Glennis lifted the crown and set it again on Manon’s head.
Then the ancient witch knelt in the snow. “What was stolen has been restored; what was lost has come home again. I hail thee, Manon Crochan, Queen of Witches.”
Manon stood fast against the tremor that threatened to buckle her legs.
Stood fast as the other Crochans, Bronwen with them, dropped to a knee. Dorian, standing amongst them, smiled, brighter and freer than she’d ever seen.
And then the Thirteen knelt, two fingers going to their brows as they bowed their heads, fierce pride lighting their faces.
“Queen of Witches,” Crochan and Blackbeak declared as one voice.
As one people.
CHAPTER 57
An hour before dawn, the keep and two armies beyond it were stirring.
Rowan had barely slept, and instead lain awake beside Aelin, listening to her breathing. That the rest of them slumbered soundly was testament to their exhaustion, though Lorcan had not found them again. Rowan was willing to bet it was by choice.
It was not fear or anticipation of battle that had kept Rowan up—no, he’d slept well enough during other wars. But rather the fact that his mind would not stop looping him from thought to thought to thought.
He’d seen the numbers camped outside. Valg, human men loyal to Erawan, some fell beasts, yet nothing like the ilken or the Wyrdhounds, or even the witches.
Aelin could wipe them away before the sun had fully risen. A few blasts of her power, and that army would be gone.
Yet she had not presented it as an option in their planning last night.
He’d seen the hope shining in the eyes of the people in the keep, the awe of the children as she’d passed. The Fire-Bringer, they’d whispered. Aelin of the Wildfire.
How soon would that awe and hope crumble today when not a spark of that fire was unleashed? How soon would the men’s fear turn rank when the Queen of Terrasen did not wipe away Morath’s legions?
He hadn’t been able to ask her. Had told himself to, had roared at himself to ask these past few weeks, when even their training hadn’t summoned an ember.
But he couldn’t bring himself to demand why she wouldn’t or couldn’t use her power, why they had seen or felt nothing of it after those initial few days of freedom. Couldn’t ask what Maeve and Cairn had done to possibly make her fear or hate her magic enough that she didn’t touch it.
Worry and dread gnawing at him, Rowan slipped from the room, the din of preparations greeting him the moment he entered the hall. A heartbeat later, the door opened behind him, and steps fell into sync with his own, along with a familiar, wicked scent.
“They burned her.”
Rowan glanced sidelong at Fenrys. “What?”
But Fenrys nodded to a passing healer. “Cairn—and Maeve, through her orders.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Fenrys, blood oath or no, what he’d done for Aelin or no, was not privy to these matters. No, it was between him and his mate, and no one else.
Fenrys threw him a grin that didn’t meet his eyes. “You were staring at her half the night. I could see it on your face. You’re all thinking it—why doesn’t she just burn the enemy to hell?”
Rowan aimed for the washing station down the hall. A few soldiers and healers stood along the metal trough, scrubbing their faces to shake the sleep or nerves.
Fenrys said, “He put her in those metal gauntlets. And one time, he heated them over an open brazier. There …” He stumbled for words, and Rowan could barely breathe. “It took the healers two weeks to fix what he did to her hands and wrists. And when she woke up, there was nothing but healed skin. She couldn’t tell what had been done and what was a nightmare.”
Rowan reached for one of the ewers that some of the children refilled every few moments and dumped it over his head. Icy water bit into his skin, drowning out the roaring in his ears.
“Cairn did many things like that.” Fenrys took up a ewer himself, and splashed some into his hands before rubbing them over his face. Rowan’s hands shook as he watched the water funnel toward the basin set beneath the trough. “Your claiming marks, though.” Fenrys wiped his face again. “No matter what they did to her, they remained. Longer than any other scar, they stayed.”
Yet her neck had been smooth when he’d found her.